Doctor Who, season 12 episode 4 – Nikola Tesla’s night of terror

How would be the world if Nikola Tesla and Thomas Edison would have get along good enough to work together instead being rivals (an almost legendary and not pleasant at all rivalry)? Or if Tesla would have been also a business man, not only a genius inventor? Nobody knows, but it would have been a very different world than the one we see around us.

One of the original purposes of Doctor Who series, the one who started more than a half of century ago, was to present to the public historical informations, events as well as people that changed the human history: now Tesla (the name, not the object – in Romanian language tesla is a cutting tool used by carpenters) is well known because the electrical cars and the company owned by Elon Musk, but it belonged to a real person. He lived between 10 July 1856 and 7 January 1943 and, even after he invented a lot of things, he died broke.

The first moments of episode 4, season 12, show Nikola Tesla searching for sponsors for some of his inventions. The search fails and there are several reasons: the info about the electrical signals from Mars (perhaps there were not from Mars but Tesla did indeed got some signals from the extraterrestrial space) and the appearance of a strange device break the talks. The Doctor and her friends are appearing also, searching the device because they noticed its energy, and things become complicated: some scorpions camouflaged as people want Tesla to fix their alien ship and weapons.

The episode is almost funny (at least in some moments) and its style is almost the Doctor’s. The planet is saved, again, even if the spider queen could be more credible, and the rivalry between Tesla and Edison continues even after they have fought together against a common enemy.

Directed by Nida Manzoor and written by Nina Metivier.

Cast: Jodie Whittaker (The Doctor), Bradley Walsh (Graham O’Brien), Tosin Cole (Ryan Sinclair), Mandip Gill (Yasmin Khan), Haley McGee (Dorothy Skeritt), Robin Guiver (Bill Tallow), Russell Bentley (Mr. Brady), Brian Caspe (Mr. Martin), Shaun Mason (Foreman), Robert Glenister (Thomas Edison), Anjli Mohindra (Queen Skithra), Goran Visnjic (Nikola Tesla).

Next episode, Fugitive of the Judoon, will be aired 26 January 2020: stomping their way into present-day Gloucester, the Judoon are on the hunt for someone on the run. Who is this fugitive? And why are these alien mercenaries after he / she?