Fascinating and Terrifying "73 Yards" Doctor Who S1E4 (S14E4) Reaction
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- čas přidán 21. 07. 2024
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0:00 Intro
1:26 Reflections/Disclaimers
7:45 Second intro
8:30 Reaction
32:56 Discussion
39:17 Outro
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What makes it especially terrifying is the way her mother and Kate both look at her with such contempt, like they’re accusing her of something. Fits with Davies’ insistence that this whole episode is Ruby’s punishment for violating the fairy circle by reading its letters.
Some sort of purgatory and redemption: facing her most horrible fears and, eventually, finding meaning (real or not, doesn't matter) and peace.
The first time round, the old woman appeared AFTER the circle was broken.
The cliff where the Thirteenth Doctor regenerated is supposed to be in Dorset, but is, in fact, not a location shoot at all - it's actually an effects shot. The location in 73 Yards looks like it'sa ctually filmed in Wales.
It was filmed in the studio, but the outside view was a very specific place in Dorset; Durdle Door. Close to where Chris Chibnall grew up, and close to where Broadchurch was filmed.
I thought it was close to Broadchurch. Really looked familiar in POTD
I dont think the spirit was Ruby until she reached out for the spirit to take her back. As someone said before the circle was broke the spirit had not been invoked.
LOVE YOUR EYESHADOW!!!
I have a huge fear of abandonment so this episode hurt me and i cried a lot.
Thank you so much!! And ugh 🙏🏻 That makes sense, it was such a heavy theme throughout
I loved this episode, not just because of the great story about isolation and how stagnated you can feel when you have this thing that is omnipresent in your life, but I also love the idea of the fairy circle tormenting Ruby by making her live out her entire life before she could actually solve the problem, that's something I don't need explained (and I really hope this isn't just foreshadowing Ruby having some supernatural lineage)
This is the episode everyone will still talk about, years down the line. That's cause it's so open to interpretation (something I think is awesome, rather than frustrating!).
Btw I think it's sad you've had to address some people's negative reactions to your...reactions 😮. Your opinions are so valid, as are everyone's. The rudeness from some people ('gatekeeping' Doctor Who fans are awful IMO) is so unnecessary! You are brilliant! The way you did your eyes here = the wow factor also. 🤩 Enjoy the rest of the season!! 🌌👏👍
Thank you!! That’s very kind, and yes as time passes and I hear so many different interpretations I’m more and more happy with the ambiguous ending
At the end Old Ruby said "Don't Step" which urged Young Ruby to stop the Doctor from standing on the fairy circle. She wasn't there to stop the Doctor at the beginning of the episode so the circle was broken and Ruby read the messages. This released Mad Jack (Roger ap Gwilliams). He says they used to call him Mad Jack. When was that? About the time the Doctor and Ruby broke the spell:? Anyhow Ruby has to go through all of her life on her own and has old Ruby to guide her in a way though it is heart breaking in how it affects her. Only when Mad Jack stands for parliament does she see the point of what she has to do, and she doesn't see how she's going to do it till they're on the football pitch. After that, she has no way of getting back until she dies. At the end of the episode, Old Ruby appears to Young Ruby as they come out of the Tardis, and the whispering "Don't Step" gets Ruby to stop the Doctor from breaking the circle, so even if Roger is elected as Prime Minister when Young Ruby is in the second time loop, he'll never be quite as dangerous as he was while Ruby was 40 in that first time loop. Who knows what Old Ruby says to everyone, and I think it's important that we don't know. Knowing could only lessen the impact on us. Bits of trivia. The distance Old Ruby and Young Ruby had to be between each other had to fit in a football (soccer) pitch, and RTD experimented on Swansea Pier and found that at 73 Yards, you could make out a figure fairly clearly but couldn't make out their facial features so you didn't know who they were.
It is heavily implied that Ruby appologizes to that woman because she was assaulted by Mad Jack and Ruby did nothing to prevent this from happeneing.
Yeah I caught that after my initial confusion, I think I was just hyper focused on trying to figure things out and missing some obvious things
Few thoughts on your reaction:
Yes thats Susan Twist, again. Who is she? We don't know....yet.
Well, the fandom do have a theory on Ruby and the Trickster: the song Ruby sang while being controlled by the Maestro resembles the Trickster's theme...
I don't think its the Great Intelligence, he disappeared since he invaded the Doctor's timestream and got kicked out by Clara in Name of the Doctor. Could be a new enemy, since DW never really focused on gods and celestials since Classic Who and the comics.
This episode is set in present day.
Welsh actor Aneurin Barnard plays Roger ap Gwilliam. He was in Goldfinch, 1899, and Peaky Blinders. And he's not Captain Jack im afraid. It is implied he is possessed by the actual evil deity Mad Jack (Jack of all trades phrase) and went mad with power and almost caused the nuclear war as the Doctor said.
He's not as deadly as Harold Saxon/the Master, but he represents extremist world leaders of our world, which is just as scary.
Its implied that Roger assaulted Marti, but Ruby, even though she knows he is a monster, did not help Marti, that is why she was apologizing.
This episode is similar to Turn Left.
I think its a bit of a cycle and different timelines (since Kate Stewart mentioned it) Ruby may have gone through this a few times and finally on this try, she got the message of do not step on the fairy circle through to her younger self and the timeline was restored, meaning Mad Jack never got released and the world never went nuclear.
I think this episode is designed for us to interpret it in our own ways.
While there are some loose ends which aren’t unambiguously explained, here’s my take on the meaning of the episode, of which, there seem to be multiple meanings. I feel, there is a deceptively deep, almost philosophical meaning to this episode. I felt as perplexed as everyone else after my viewing of it, but a comment by someone in another thread provided the key to the meaning of the mysterious woman for me. Which I expand on below.
That mysterious woman is Ruby’s future ghost, haunting her living self within this alternate time-line created by the Doctor's clumsy disturbance of the Fairy Circle. The woman also represents something much more terrifying than that. She is death, personified. At least, she personifies Ruby’s death. So, she unintentionally (I believe) scares away everyone who tries to speak to her. Although, I don’t have an explanation for why Ruby’s mom, and Kate look at Ruby as though she has committed some unforgivable transgression. Her purpose in the episode is primarily as a metaphor for the eventual death which awaits us all. Stalks us our entire lives, just as it stalks Ruby in the form of the woman. While our own death is rarely at the forefront of daily awareness, neither is it ever far away. You might say, that death is always 73 yards away. Close enough to be visible, but not so close as to be clearly so. The best that we can do is to ignore our self-knowledge that it is always there. Always waiting, and that we will one day, die.
Soon, living Ruby simply accepts the woman as an inevitable part of her daily existence. Realizing, that there’s nothing she can do about her anyway, Ruby decides to do something meaningful with her life. Utilizing the mystery woman for an extremely constructive purpose in that endeavor. Until, finally, Ruby is at the end of her life, and the mystery woman manifests closely in her room. Ruby’s death is closely approaching her. In the last moment of life, when the medical monitor in her room that had been reassuringly making a regular beeping sound suddenly starts making that dreadful flatline tone, the woman turns to face Ruby. As she does, Ruby loses all anxiety, and embraces her death with outstretched arms, and a smile of relief. Ruby passes, and then becomes the ghost which had been haunting her. Chills. Throughout life, Ruby has felt abandoned, and isolated. Which is sad enough, but she also ends up dying alone, as well. A feeling, and an ending, for too many of us. Davies appears to touch on that.
The episode’s main fault is that it’s too ambitious for one-hour. Further complicating matters is the ‘Mad-Jack’ sub-episode. 73 Yards could have, and probably should have been made into a two-part episode. As for the time-paradoxes, such as how Ruby’s future ghost could haunt her living self, those have been explained by Tenant in the famous ‘Blink’ episode, Wibbly-Wobbly, timey-wimey stuff. In other words, don’t let paradoxes interfere with the message of the story.
Mad-Jack, seems to be a destructive spirit/entity which corruptly influences a young Gwilliam, once it is unbound from the Fairy Circle when the Doctor disturbs it. A disturbance which then launches the alternate time-line centered on Ruby, and which Kate, of U.N.I.T., cryptically asserts has happened. That alternate time-line is erased when Ruby’s ghost, whispering “don’t step”, warns young Ruby in time to prevent the Doctor from disturbing the Fairy Circle in the first place. BTW, apparently, ghost Ruby is repeatedly signing; “bless you, thank you”.
So amazing hearing all the theories everyone has. So many possible interpretations, as with any sort of art.
Also love hearing that’s what she was signing the whole time. It did feel somewhat loving how she was gesturing in a weird way. That’s beautiful
I don't think the old woman was old Ruby, for one thing they were both in the hospital bedroom at the end of Ruby's life. Maybe her consciousness went back to that earlier point? Old Ruby had short hair for one thing, plus the weird powers... As much as I'd like this weirdness explained in a later episode, I'd be equally happy if it isn't explained.
I assume the spirit of Mad Jack wiped the Doctor from the timeline as his main threat, it's implied that the Doctor is the one that stops Mad Jack from going nuclear in the future so once the Jack is unbound with no Doctor only Ruby can save the world and restore the timeline.
A lot of people loved this episode and a lot of people really disliked it. The end is intentionally confusing and is not meant to make sense imo. Kate's line, where she says we put rules to things we can never understand, is the key to the episode. It's more about Ruby's fear of rejection imo than anything concrete. You have to kind of switch off your sci-fi brain and watch it as a high-fantasy ghost story that someone might tell around the campfire. I love it so much and I'm glad you enjoyed most of it!
Also I recommend Joe Brennan's review!
Ruby is cursed. You can't explain a curse in Sci-fi terms, that's why the curse confuses Whovians. Banishing a trespasser to be plagued with a terrifying Demon is one of the cheapest curses at the "Spells R Us" store.😎
Loved this episode, writing was on point 👌🏼gives haunting of hill house vibes..
An excellent episode in britain we like our story writing not to explain everything we like mystery.
I enjoy it so much more now really, even if it is unexplained. It’s a great episode, on par with Boom for me. Hard to decide which one I like best.
Curious why it's marked as Season 1 when it's actually Season 14 of the reboot. Seems like that will be confusing to a lot of folks, especially if the reactions move into other seasons.
I marked it as season 1 because that’s how they’re branding it. Though I have considered having series 14 as a separate numbering system so it can be found by more people. There’s like 3 different systems it’s pretty ridiculous. On Disney+ the Christmas special is episode 1, but on iPlayer Space Babies is episode 1 (as it should be), and for some it’s series 14 🤷🏼♀️ It’s complicated. But I may end up trying to add multiple numbering systems to these reactions.
I dont know about the woman's hand gestures and why exactly 73 yards, but i do have other theories.
Where did the doctor go: he was the one who broke the fairy circle, so his disappearance from existance was a type of punishment. And why didnt Ruby disappear? She was the one who took the scroll about Mad Jack and read it, so taking down the PM had become her mission alone, although she didnt know it yet.
Why did the woman make everyone hate Ruby: I feel like it was a defence mechanism, coz nothing should hamper Ruby's mission of dethroning the PM. If Unit, for example, successfully intervened and captured the woman, Ruby would have never been able to deal with the PM. So, its like: you try to approach her or talk to her, then you are repelled by her and driven away from Ruby, so that Ruby's mission can be completed without impediments or distractions. Nobody tried to approach the woman after Ruby dealt with the PM, so we don't know if this theory holds.
Unfortunately the PM took advantage of Marti, and Ruby feels guilty coz she introduced them. This adds to his villany and why we are motivated to see him dethroned. So Marti is esctatic when the PM runs away and resigns.
There is no loop or paradox. The episode occured in an alternate timeline, like Kate told Ruby. And in that timeline, Ruby stopped the PM from leading the "the world to the brink of nuclear war", to quote the Doctor. So there is no actual nuclear war. When the timeline is reset in the final scene, Ruby does not live a life where she will stop the PM, so it isnt a paradox. Her original timeline is restored when she dies in her deathbed and united with the old woman. In the final scene, the doctor again tells Ruby about the dangerous PM. It is a fixed event in time that cannot be changed. Going by the exact words of the Doctor, the PM will indeed come to power in 2046, but clearly doesn't do any catastrophic damage. He simply acquires the weapons for symbolism and leads the world to the "brink" of nuclear war.
This entire episode was in an alternate timeline and trying to be all meta coz in this alternate timeline, Doctor Who does not have a title sequence.
I *really* like this explanation for what’s gone on in this episode:
czcams.com/video/B-EiDZfL6d0/video.htmlsi=Uv6kR1QLi3skwQbl
Why is it a problem to show names? Everyone who worked on it is publicly listed on imdb.
Nothing is wrong with the names, I just didn’t want to be spoiled if there was a cameo in it I didn’t know about. Like how they had Billie Piper’s name in the intro of Day of the Doctor.