DID IT SUCK? | Doctor Who Flux FINALE [THE VANQUISHERS REVIEW] 

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This series will forever be known to me as No Flux Given.

I think it's wild that we have had three seasons now of the 13th Doctor but she hasn't had one moment alone for her own adventures, she always has companions with her at all times from the very beginning to now. There's no room for any Big Finish stories with the 13th Doctor on her own. They've even established how she is very much not used to travelling alone from that one episode last season. And the wildest thing is that Yaz, Dan, and Jericho spent three years alone doing their own travels, rife for Big Finish stories. We literally have more potential for Jericho stories than 13th Doctor stories.

Please never stop making these videos, I honestly find them 1000x more entertaining than the actual show itself... and the only real reason I'm still watching DW is to watch you slaughter each episode

This is the first series of the show where I haven't even bothered to give it a fair shot, I've just watched your videos instead because I, generally, trust your judgement (I still haven't forgotten the Heaven Sent review Harry). I legitimately tried to love series 11 and I seriously attempted to like series 12, but if you can't accomplish in two series what Russel T Davies did for me in one episode, then you're clearly not worthy of showrunning this masterpiece of a TV show.

Remember that time when the doctor committed genocide and it took 3 incarnations and 2 show runners for them to come to terms with their actions. Really shows Chibnalls ingenuity to do all that in under 10 minutes

I’m surprised no one in any review I have watched has mentioned this: Why do the Daleks need the Sontaran protection? The Daleks we have seen them build and own and operate a void ship before. So why don’t they just go to the void again and move to the next universe? The Daleks who created a reality bomb to destroy all universes and they would somehow survive in their ship the crucible. So why do the Daleks need Sontaran help??

Chibnall's era has so many missed opportunities. He had some good ideas, but he was absolutely terrible at executing them. I feel like flux might have suffered from having too many main characters and cuttable storylines. More time should have been spent developing the antagonists and those few characters that mattered (Dan, Kate Stewart, Jericho, etc). A big part of doctor who in the past has been the moral debate the doctor has when it comes to defeating the antagonists. Putting the doctor in charge of the flux should have been a serious dilemma. She could wipe out three of her worst enemies, but... should she? Is that too much power? I seem to remember twelve being mortified when Missy handed him an army of cybermen(correct me if I'm wrong). Not to mention the way the daleks and cybermen were handled. At the very least, both races would have had plans in place to make sure the sontarans would hold up their end of the bargain, as well as to ensure their own continued existence. In summary, Chibnall had some ideas, but he's a terrible writer with no idea how any of this actually works.

23:07 as someone from Liverpool, I can confirm that spiral has been there for years. I don’t have enough respect for Chibs as a writer to think he could use an environment to this effect

To be honest let's be glad that RTD is coming back for season 14 so be glad that Chibnaill is leaving, it is a shame that Jodie is leaving as well, because it would have been nice to see how Russell could have written a story for Jodie, though he might have a chance because he is writing the anniversary, and the anniversary might be Jodie's final episode

- The Chocolate Scene was insulting. - For some reason, I really warmed to Vinder in this one. God knows why. - What a waste of Kate. - Did Jericho need to die? It just felt like "WE NEED A SAD BIT!" - Using the Passenger to absorb the Flux was quite clever, I liked it, and didn't think of it myself. Just remember, a lot of this might be going the way of the "Half-Human" stuff and just be ignored. Not explicitly removed, just not mentioned.

For most of these six episodes, it felt like Chibnall had a big grab bag of characters, plot devices and locations and just shook the bag and whatever fell out, that was the story of the week.

I feel so bad for the Grand Serpent, his character could’ve been so interesting. Also the fact that he always has snake patterns on his clothes is adorable

I was watching this episode live with my uni’s Doctor Who society and every single fucking person was audibly groaning at the trailer for the New Year’s special. It was fucking hilarious.

10:58 Also 'Out the airlock' doesn't sound like a very Sontaran way to deal with things, they're bred for war, they love to fight. If they were just going to space them, why did they board the ship and fight Carbanista in the other shot.

I’m confused! Didn’t the flux go through our universe and the only reason earth was saved was because of the shield? Doesn’t that mean the sun and moon and all the other planets are toast? How is everything fine in the last episode? Shouldn’t the Earth be cold and dark, floating through the debris left after the flux?

My expectations were low…. BUT HOLY CRAP. Timeless Child felt like a kick in the perineum, but at least it made some sort of sense.

So happy chibs is leaving, he's ruined the show

My problem with the plan of using the monster armies to cancel out the flux is the flux is a disaster designed to wipe out the entire universe. How on earth are a load of ships gonna be enough to cancel out the flux when it has consumed multiple galaxies?

Things I dislike about this season: - Yaz has suddenly been given a huge intelligence stat increase where she's gone from just stating the obvious in previous seasons to now being able to fly the TARDIS and say timey-wimey things. - That one-armed lady didn't really need to be there. So many characters could have been removed; she's the one I'd pick. - So many cool big villains - Sontarans/Cybermen/Daleks/Snake man/the two Tweenies - but none of them really got any depth or worth of respect here. - Every fight scene involved half a minute of missed laser shots while the heroes escape. - The 'Flux' really just didn't seem as serious as it was supposed to be. The Lupari dog people were cool though.

I couldn't care less about the Flux plotline being a load of nothing, but I am mad about Swarm and to a lesser extent Azure being wasted like that.

If there trying to go all sciency with antimatter and matter canceling out, wouldn't the resulting explosion of even a single planet being wiped out be the largest explosion ever? Not to mention the other plannets, solar systems, stars, galaxys, and the dalek and cuberman ships

Chibnall proving (again) he is incapable of being a writer or showrunner. Best episode in this series was not written by him. Can we also talk about the Dan character? Was it not an "all Liverpudlians are cheeky chappies, but completely stupid" stereotype? Had he worn a shellsuit, curly wig and shouted "calm-down/calm-down" every two minutes he could not have been any worse. Apparently, we have to put up with more Chibnall 'specials', but please, please, please, please, please, RTD, assign this tripe to the cosmic bin.

Almost every scene of every episode either poses a question that never gets answered, does a thing that never gets explained, or disposes of something without any reason. I honestly don't understand how a script so full of Whu? moments ever gets to the screen without someone saying "Whoa whoah whoah, Chibs, me old mate! This is just a series of events slamming into the back of each other like a ten-mile pile-up on the M62! You can't put that on telly!"

For me, a fundamental problem throughout was that I was not clear about the nature of the Flux. Did the Flux vaporise planets or did it mess up time? It seemed to be "whatever's convenient".

When they said all the lupars are dead I felt nothing

Just to going to mention one of the things that annoyed me the most is how inconsistent the flux was. Like it wipes out some planets but not others? It can't get through a ship shield which would certainly mean Daleks and Cybermen would have the tech to survive it pretty easily. I think the flux would have been far better off being a far slower moving wave across the universe that wipes out everything and mean everything. This way you have a far better time limit for the doctor and co to save as many races as possible and would give a far better reason for Daleks and Cybermen and other species to run from it. Also all of the villains went out in the lamest way. What was the point? The whole point of villains is for the hero to overcome them somehow. Edit never mind about the passenger thing I think but it still doesn't quite make sense. I legit have memory wiped out this season as it was so badly written I watched to laugh at it.

I just watched the episode Hide, and it massively knocked down my impression of Village of the Angels. Much like most of Chibnall's work, Village ended up being a worse copy of Hide, and the amount of parallels (everything from the island in space to the psychic characters) were laid bare after watching the series 7 episode.

How many genocides has 13 acquiesced in? How often does she arbitrate morally-dubious "justice"? How incapable is she when it comes to making tough but necessary decisions? Even as the scripts fall apart at the foundations, 13's character stays the same: a callous, uncaring, pompous, sociopathic, intolerant, genocidal control-freak whose inconsistent morality is part of her personality ("My rules change all the time", anyone?). It's a clear personality. The trouble is, we usually call this type of character a "villain". How is this the only consistently-written element of the entire era, practically the only personality any character has/retains, and why does no one with access to the levers of power seem to realise that it's a problem?

So guys, it's been 3 years. We have almost 30 episodes worth of Chibnall writing. Can we FINALLY agree he's a shitty writer? Or what? Do you really think the 3 specials next year are gonna change anything?

There is a literary style where each chapter finishes on a cliffhanger. It has a specific name (other than cliffhanger), but can't remember it. First heard it on a program about The Da Vince Code book since Dan Brown uses it a lot there. It can be done well and it can be done badly - very badly. If the last page of a chapter is the cliffhanger setup and the first page of the next chapter is the cliffhanger resolution then everything before and after is unrelated to this cliffhanger then it is just an obvious hook when a writer isn't confident the actual story will keep people reading without it. The same is true here. Each episode finishes with something that is resolved in seconds in the next episode to try and keep the audience coming back week after week. Most blatant for me was Ep4/Ep5 - Doctor becomes a weeping angel and then doesn't; companions are stuck in a time-displaced village floating in the void and then they aren't. (All the Episodes did it, but this one was the most jarring for me.)

the grand serpent actor is fucking great in line of duty which is a serious role and the script isn't doodoo

Happy New Year! Thank's for the laughs, glad to be a patron

My favourite part of this episode is that it confirms the doctor just had to wait 3 years after angels take manhattan and saved Amy and Rory

Chibnall: *Fails... Again* RTD: Fine, I'll do it myself...

Revisiting the Capaldi era? Best announcement for the next year

oh and one last thing, your other videos (non-DW related) are amazing too... even if they don't get many views you should keep making them because one day one of them will be shared on a twitter/insta account with loads of followers and they'll suddenly BOOM

Thanks for the summary. By this episode/chapter, I was so tuning out the program, it was basically just on while I'm browsing. I 'saw' it from beginning to end, and still much of this is new to me.

Yeah... WHAT THE ACTUAL F*** was Vindor's purpose? Correct me if I'm wrong (and I could be because I know I was zoned out a lot during about 4 out of the 6 episodes)... What the hell was his purpose? Also, Claire? ALL OF THEM xD

I said this after the Hallow-e'en Apocalypse, but this whole series needs a fan edit

( 9:29 ) I think it’s because it shows contemporary Britain and therefore bypasses the BBC’s rules, it’s only an issue if they focus on one product I think. 👍🏻

The best thing about the chibbnal era are your reviews. If only you could do series boxsets so they could sit proudly on my shelf next to capalids boxes

Ummm product placement is the company paying the creators to feature their logo or product on screen, the BBC didn’t “get away” with it

I’m surprised you gave the last episode a 1/10 like god damn that’s generous

God thank you for making this season watchable, I think without your reviews, I would not have been able to get through all this garbage XD Watching you absolutely decimate this show is so hilarious and reminds me of the power of doctor who fans even when the show runners don’t give a rip about what the fans actually want. Thanks so much for your honest reviews, we all love to complain about this show with you! Hope to see these videos again when RTD returns!

Anyone noticed the tension between Yaz and the Doctor at the end of this episode? Perhaps I was imagining things, but there was something happening there.

Ravagers and Time was probably Chibnall trying to do his version of Thanos and Lady Death in the Marvel comics.

Cya in 2021 Harry, Merry Christmas 😊😊👍👍

17:48 No wonder he's not big on Physics if simply hearing that antimatter annihilates regular matter makes him "want to fall asleep." :)

At least they didn't introduce Omega or Romana. I mean, they COULD have but thank god they didn't!

I just catched up on Who (well still one special left) This episode was so weird because nothing mattered… things were said, but nothing felt like it mattered. Emotionally, or story wise. After 6 episodes, nothing mattered.

Hey so I've noticed you say it in a few videos and I don't think you know what product placement is I'm not sure if it's meant to be a joke but Product Placement is when they're being paid to put a product on TV not just when a brand is in a shot. The BBC is allowed to have brands in shot as long as they or the people who made the piece of entertainment weren't paid.

They're basically audioplays already, with the characters constantly explaining what they and the audience are already seeing you could easily follow episodes with your eyes closed; apparently Chinball misunderstood 'show, don't tell' as 'show and tell.' :)

Yeeeeeeesssss!!!!!! It’s a shame Swarm and Azure where wasted. I think they had a lot of potential. Some of the best original villains since 2005 in my opinion. I loved whenever they disintegrated someone. It was so satisfying.

Chris Chibnall as the next doctor

Goal 1: Defeat the bad guys/whoever the bad guys are working for Goal 2: Restore all the damage caused by the Flux Did the show think we'd forget the Doctor failed *BOTH* their goals?

Chibnall had 6 hours to do whatever he wanted and he still messed it up with a really confusing and disappointing ending, did the doctor commit genocide 3 times? Is earth the only planet left in the entire universe now that the flux has destroyed everything else? Will Russell save doctor who?

glad to be a patreon

So I just got around to finishing the series today and the last episode was pretty bad. Even with all the other confusing episodes, I will still able to follow along, but this one was just waaaaay too confusing for me. I also recently finished binge watching Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul. It makes me wonder how well Vince Gilligan would be able to write and direct episodes of Dr. Who considering how amazing the other two series are. I think there are a few things that can be done to make Dr. Who much better. The first of which would be to introduce morally ambiguous characters and situations (intentionally) and to treat them as such. Immediately, that would make the show more interesting as it will add suspense as to whether a character will make the right choice or whether the choices the make will end up being the right ones. Perhaps this could come in the form of time going awry and the Doctor being forced to choose between the timeline inhabited by the main companions and the existence of a timeline an episode's character is from. I also do like the idea of a series long story made up of mini-stories. It was handled poorly this time, but it can work really well if the choices that characters make have consequences later on (like a butterfly effect). I have an idea of what I'd like to see in a series of Doctor Who which is inspired by what made Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul such good shows. 1. Open the series with a teaser of the finale. This teaser would have to show something shocking and devastating such as a character becoming evil, the destruction of some place, reign of terror of a villain, etc. 2. Time goes awry (possibly as a result of the flux series) such that competing timelines converge on and diverge from each other making the now established multiverse unstable. During episodes, we would meet characters from these timeline fragments whose existences would be in danger due to the instability of the multiverse (broken fixed points determine which characters can exist and who will be wiped out of existence in the past, present, and future). 3. One of the characters met from the timeline fragments could be a situational villain fighting to defend their timeline and everyone in it from the threat of never existing in the first place. They could be a good person at heart, but their prioritization of their own timeline of others makes them desperate and an obstacle to the Doctor. Sympathy and tension regarding the character can be drawn by using visual effects to demonstrate their instability within the multiverse as they are always on the verge of being wiped from existence (like Rory was for a short period). 4. Along the way, we meet alternate versions or "variants" of well known characters. Perhaps they meet a version of the Master who has finally turned good (perhaps due to the death of the Doctor in their universe), a version of the Doctor who uses villainous means to achieve charitable ends, a version of Davros contemplating what the final nature of the Daleks should be, or the Doctor and Rose from the parallel universe (perhaps their existence would be at stake in the series to drive in some serious tension). 5. At some point, there should be a terrifying and highly threatening villain in the series. This villain can either be one that steals the show every time they appear or a much more stealthy villain that pulls off difficult operations almost effortlessly. Either way, every minute this villain is on screen, there should be extreme tension and suspense about what they'll do next. 6. The series should have some good character development for all the main characters. This means that they have to have good characterization from the start and they need to undergo some sort of change or process of change. How extreme this needs to go can vary, but it must be present to make the series worth watching.

I think Kate appearing with the Tardis can probably be explained away with "It was under lock and key....until I turned up with more soldiers then the section on duty and bigger guns, at which point they gave me the key.."

I think that’s all Chibnall’s era is - just a random load of great scenes like the reveals of the Master, some fun scenes with the Angels and so on but it’s surrounded by shite.

Thanks for explaining this ep...I still have no idea what I just witnessed. Maybe alcohol helped

I would argue in the case of product placement, they would probably just use the same permissions they get for shows like EastEnders which is supposed to reflect on real life if a character enters a shop for example; it would be weird if everything in the shop wasn't our own branding. Most companies pay places like the BBC to show their products. Perhaps in this case it was done for free since, yknow, they needed a corner shop scene anyway? 😅

If the Grand Serpent has always worked for the Sontarans in UNIT, why didn't do anything in POISIONED SKY with the first new era story with the Potato heads ?

Pity that this version of the doctor never got a chance to shine. With Russell T davids coming back would of loved to see what he would have done. He also has alot of work cut out to try retcon these retcons though as it is.

Not sure what could have made The Flux better but maybe it may have worked if the Sontaron plan reveal would have been kept secret without the episode of Sontarons on horse . Also now i think Chocholate bars consumation either increased by 25% or decreased by 75% after The Flux

The whole Matter, Time and Anti-matter thing really does just make me think about Gen 4 pokemon.

Theres 1 very simple way chibnall could have made them get funded for the trip round the world. Make Dan or Yaz the inventor of the paperclip! It was invented in 1902 and is so simple that either of them could pull it off, patent it and use the royalties to fund EVERYTHING!! That wasn't hard now, was it Chris?

I still don’t know what the hell happened this entire series. Was there a point to any of Flux that I missed?

To be honest your were quite generous with your scores

I hope Russell reboots the show and confines her to like the female ghostbusters,it never happened.

I'll be honest, I had the point and laugh for fun mentality simply because at the back of my mind I know RTD is coming back. If he wasn't or if it was still uncertain of what's happening next I would be extremely depressed right now. I compare it to Batman and Robin. Knowing Nolan came after it we can point and laugh with and at it... but in 1997/1998... Not so much.

There is one thing that came out of Flux, and that was the Evil Dan memes.

I swear Chris didn't actually know what he was writing and the reason why is because he used an AI generator.

also if the ships realigned closer to the earth then the surface area would have decreased. So what happened to the spare ships

Out of curiosity, what rating would you give Flux as a whole? Perhaps a 2/5, like the finale, or a 3.5/10, which is the average for the entire season based on your individual episode scores.

I’m gonna have fun watching this one

I’m probably the only person who noticed it was in the background, but vitamin C is a great song

9:23 lockdown mood

What caught me off-guard was the fact that the passenger uses a fucking airsoft mask for its outfit.

I just watched a hbo now heads the flux series. I want to know why is the music so loud compared to the actors taking. I wanted to reduce the volume but couldn't as i could not hear them taking of i did

Chibnall and Whittaker have killed this show. Be a miracle if RTD can salvage it with series 14.

1/10 for the finale? A bit generous. I'd have given it a zero, straight up. By far, the worst finale in New Who 🙄

Overall this is Whittaker’s best season but it still pales in comparison to the eras of Tennant, Smith & Eccleston

Drink whenever you see a yellow time/place label!

My own take on Flux was that it seemed a bit overwhelming. I think I prefer clever, varied and original little stories that fit tightly into a sub-60 minute segment than effects-laden explosions of ideas that go on for several hours (albeit serialised in Dr Who). As someone said recently about modern superhero movies - they are getting more like theme park rides than actual film stories.

Glad i skipped this season. I watched the last one and thought it was awful. I think my biggest issue was that Yaz’s character was about as poorly written as Rey from the new Star Wars trilogy.

Is it really that bad? Or do you just have a Chib on your shoulder? No, actually it is that bad.

Did they ever even explain why the female Vanquisher was free when both were captured together?

RTD can fix this very easy, The show starts with a black screen, camera slowly pulls back to show a closed eyelid, Suddenly the eye opens, camera pulls back more to a sweaty, startled familiar face laying flat down on the floor of the Tardis, It the 12th Doctor (Peter Capaldi) ! he jumps up and says "That was a HORRIBLE NIGHTMARE !!!" ,(effectively erasing all of Chibnall's crap) and goes on to figure out what Evil Beings hacked his brain and made him think he was a women to keep him busy while they threaten the fabric of time or something, then he regenerates into a new male Doctor. Fixed that easy , because it was all a bad DREAM...

This livestream chat was destroyed by scamp 😂

Those Sontarans aren't at any sort of war with the daleks. Dalek Sec alone could end that whole thing.

BENNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNIEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! tOO GenerouS

I’m midway through 2023 watching this, you were gonna revisit Capaldi’s era in 2022 were you?

I can honestly say, this was easily the best Jodie Whittaker season. I'm glad we got to see a real actor play the Doctor albeit briefly (Ruth, the Fugitive Doctor).

simpson hit and run halloween music?

How am I not surprised that it was a disaster, honestly!

why have you ignored the thasmine at the end

I spent most of this episode on my phone. I should not spend the majority of a doctor who finale on my phone. But i did

We all told Chibnall he should write more like RTD and he listened. He managed to also write a massively overstuffed finale that relies on technobabble, deus ex machina and multiple doctors.