Doctor Who series 10 episode 3: Thin ice

In the previous episode Bill wanted to get into the future, now she and the Doctor get into the past, in 1814 London. And the episode 3 starts from the moment the previous one finishes, with an elephant and an entire fair on the frozen surface of Thames.

Historically speaking, Thames has frozen 23 times starting the XIVth century (and the ice was thick enough for the people to walk over it). The year 1814 was the last one when this has happened, something that was a reason good enough to be used as background for several episode during the last decade of new Doctor Who.

But a huge creature hunts under the ice, and every time someone gets under it (with or without the fishes with lights) he / she becomes food for something else. More: the one that Doctor calls Tiny or the Monster of Loch-Less or Not-so-tiny mermaid has been kept captive for decades, feeding with people from London for the benefits of others.

One of the children that have stolen the Doctor’s sonic screwdriver becomes food for fishes, a motif good enough for Bill to ask the Doctor about his 2,000 years story and the deads that hunts him after so many wars and adventures. The 10th episode of series 10 is a good motiv for the Doctor’s memorables speeches, even if it’s a shorter than the on from episode 10, series 9, The Zygon Inverson.

The Doctor and Bill borrows some diving suites in order to get on the bottom of Thames, under the thin ice, to discover more about the creature and how it got there. But you have to find out the details alone, watching the episode.

Directed by Bill Anderson, written by Sarah Dollard. Cast: Peter Capaldi (The Doctor), Pearl Mackie (Bill), Matt Lucas (Nardole), Nicholas Burns (Sutcliffe), Asiatu Koroma (Kitty), Peter Singh (Pie-man), Simon Ludders (Overseer), Tomi May (Dowell), Austin Taylor (Spider), Ellie Shenker (Dot), Kishaina Thiruselvan (Harriet), Badger Skelton (Perry).

In the next episode, Knock knock, Bill is moving in with some friends and they’ve found the perfect house – so what if it’s strangely cheap to rent, and the landlord is a little creepy? The wind blows, the floorboards creak, and the Doctor thinks something is very wrong. What lurks in the strange tower at the heart of the building – and why can’t they find any way to enter it?