Doctor Who: Space Babies

Doctor Who is back on screens, beginning its first season with a double bill, Space Babies and The Devil’s Chord. Space Babies has the Doctor and companion Ruby travelling the cosmos before discovering a baby farm trapped in orbit, haunted by the Bogeyman.

The first episode of a new series is a tough sell. Returning audiences expect more of the same, but most importantly, it’s a jumping-on point for new audiences. Space Babies, written by Russell T Davies and directed by Julie Anne Robinson, is definitely trying to service the latter, with global distribution now a major sell thanks to the partnership with The Walt Disney Company finding a new home for the show on Disney+. Inherently, this shouldn’t be a bad thing. If anything, the global reach and investment from two large studios, Disney and Sony – the owners of Bad Wolf Studios – means that financial aid can pump life into a show which loyal fans claim it needs.

However, whilst those working alongside the BBC for the show’s future have a financial success in mind, it ultimately comes down to the actor playing The Doctor to sell the show to audiences. In this instance, our cheekily suave Ncuti Gatwa. Introduced in the 60th-anniversary episode The Giggle (2023), Gatwa is proving himself already as a tour de force in the role, especially highlighted in how he, and companion Ruby Sunday (Millie Gibson) share the screen. Having only met her an episode earlier in The Church on Ruby Road (2023), the chemistry between the pair sizzle with energy boding well for the series’ future.

But here and now its Space Babies. The first episode amongst the stars, and the first chance to learn more about the man who whisked away Ruby Sunday to a baby farm run by babies. Sure there are threats, and thematic odes to adoption and abandoning, but there’s an acute knowledge that this is the show’s chance to tell us more about the Doctor for those unfamiliar.

The best example of this is in comparing it to Russell T Davies’ previous attempt at introducing the Doctor to new audiences: The End of the World (2005). Newcomers are shown the Doctor, then played by Christopher Eccleston, and companion Rose Tyler (Billie Piper). Similarities are instantly drawn between this and Space Babies, as for our companions’ first intergalactic trip they land at orbiting space station, that when they explore, a viewing gallery frames our companion (Rose/Ruby) staring at a planet and the vastness of space before immediately worrying about their families’ wellbeing. With Davies’ experience as a writer, it would be hard to argue that this wasn’t deliberate call back.

Of course the similarities are to offer returning audiences a moment of recollection of when they had the same experience, sharing it now with their children or younger family members, but from a story perspective, what this does is highlights how the first trip away from home serves a secondary purpose. Its here that we are able to learn about the Doctor, moreso than the companion. That could possibly explain why it feels that Gatwa was the runaway success of the episode, however, there’s more to it than that. What makes that first space trip so interesting is that it becomes the first instance where the Doctor is the focus. Whilst we learn about the companion and their way of seeing the world in episode one, as we whisk away into space, this is their world, and now, finally, we’re given an opportunity to understand this mysterious madman with a blue box.

Rose (2005) and The Church on Ruby Road (Season 1 Episode 1; 2023) introduced us to our companion. Now is the time to learn about the Doctor, his personality and his history.

Thankfully, Space Babies leans into the premise established in its earlier episode with Ruby and the Doctor bonding over the fact that they were adopted by having their first adventure amongst other abandoned babies. Coincidence? I think not.

Whilst Gatwa nails the introduction to the fantastical space-time travelling show, and his charismatic Doctor fizzles with glee, the episode itself falls short in proving Russell T Davies’ writing ability. Haunted by the Bogeyman on the lower decks, a crew of babies – space babies, as the episode naggingly reminds us – are left to orbit a planet, unable to seek asylum until they arrive, but without any engines, they’re trapped, as the Bogeyman stalks the corridors below.

There are concepts within this work, notably the political message about asylum-seeking, and refugees, a message Davies explored in earlier work Years and Years (2019); however, the juvenile development of the script reduces its core message into toilet humour: the babies farting to safety.

Striking the right tone for the first episode is a tricky balancing act: a tone to appease both new and old audiences and a tone that says to families that this show is welcoming and fun. However, the episode feels uncomfortable with babies zooming around the station and their mouths moving with crass CGI.

Not only does it feel as if only a juvenile audience is the priority, but the mismatching of exposition and story feels wrongly weighted in favour of exposition.

With science fiction, the world is your oyster. In fact, with science fiction, a world could be a literal oyster; whose to say? But, the whole genre lives within a set of rules. Rules that, for the most part, audiences are on board with. Of course, Doctor Who is known to ignore its rules in the past, but in episode one, they’re defining those rules.

Most importantly, though, even if the writers change a few bits here and there, you’re not affecting the core DNA of the show. And yet, Space Babies feels sacrilegious. The principles of the story are out the window, and everything is amuck. The show asked audiences to suspend too much disbelief too early, and as a result, the whole thing unravelled into a disappointing affair.

Russell T Davies’s writing is powerful, primarily when he writes for an ensemble cast of conflicting personalities and dynamics. However, despite the numerous babies, they all behaved the same, making Space Babies feel very flat and two-dimensional. This episode was meant to excite and propel us into the show ahead, including the musical episode The Devil’s Chord, but ultimately ended on a bum note.

Doctor Who: Space Babies is available on BBC iPlayer, with new episodes released weekly on Saturday at midnight on the streaming platform, or broadcast later in the day on BBC One. Outside the UK the show can be watched exclusively on Disney+.