TV Recap: A Surprise “Doctor Who” Sequel Takes The Doctor Back to a Terrifying Planet He Survived Once Before in “The Well”

This week’s Doctor Who sees the Doctor and Belinda land on a devastated mining colony with only one survivor. To discover the truth, the Doctor and Belinda must face absolute terror, in what ends up being a surprise sequel to a beloved story. Suffice to say, there are spoilers aplenty in my spoiler-filled recap.

The episode begins with the Doctor (Ncuti Gatwa) and Belinda (Varada Sethu) in the TARDIS immediately following their last adventure in “Lux." Belinda is concerned about the TARDIS not being able to land in 2025 and becomes worried about her parents, to which the Doctor reassures her that he will get her home. He brings out the vortex indicator (or vindicator) again to continue to try and get the TARDIS to be able to land on May 24th.

After changing outfits into an appropriate space suit, as they’ve landed 500,000 years in the future. They find themselves aboard a ship alongside a bunch of troopers who are about to jump, whether the Doctor and Belinda like it or not, down to the planet’s surface – which brings us to the title sequence. Following on from the titles, our heroes land on a crater with a truly beautiful view of the planet beyond (yet more examples of Disney’s extra money massively helping the show's visual effects).

Upon landing, the soldiers train their guns to the Doctor and Belinda, but the Doctor is able to assert authority through the use of his psychic paper. We get to see some great acting from Sethu as the two characters try to figure out some information about where they’ve landed. They find out from Troop Leader Shaya (Caoilfhionn Dunne) that the squad traveled to this mining operation, where 15 days prior, all contact with those on board the station was lost – with 35 colonists lost, and possibly deceased.

The soldiers and our team make their way onto the base, where they begin to see some trouble from the squadron’s #2 in command, Cassio (Christopher Chung) – who is very much not liking the Doctor’s casual, un-military-like way of speaking. During their search for life, they find a number of dead crew members, with half shot in the back and half mauled to death. A life sign is detected, and the squadron finds the lone survivor, Aliss Fenly (Rose Ayling-Ellis). Suspicion immediately falls on Allis for all the deaths, but her personality and obvious lack of physical strength makes that seem a far-fetch. Why the squadron is superstitious, the Doctor is immediately more friendly. Allis is deaf, and while Belinda and the squadron use a clever device to translate to her, the Doctor is able to sign.

While Belinda tends to Allis’ bruised arm, the Doctor tries to find out more information on just what has happened in the mine. He finds out Allis had survived for 15 days, and that everyone else “went crazy." As the Doctor and Shaya go off to find the titular Well, which runs five miles deep, Belinda begins to start seeing something appearing behind Allis’ back – although it only appears for a brief second. Eventually, everyone begins to get a brief sight of something behind her back, but no one can pinpoint it – leading to everyone getting increasingly stressed and paranoid.

We continue to get a tease as to one of the season’s running mysteries, as the Doctor and Belinda both mention Earth and human beings, something which these people have never heard of – although the Doctor says they should have, as Earth is part of the Foundation right now. Cassio, Shaya and the Doctor are able to recover the videotapes that have been wiped, and they see some of the mine’s former inhabitants “going crazy," while Cassio questions the Doctor’s authority.

The Doctor learns more details about the planet’s ancient history from Shaya, where a sun burned out 400,000 years ago and the planet’s surface was stripped of its most precious commodity – diamonds. The old name of the planet, now known as 6767, was Midnight. That’s a name Doctor Who fans will immediately recognize, as a fan-favorite story from the Tenth Doctor era took place on that planet. It featured a creature that no one could see, that took over its host’s body in a mysterious, and mostly unexplained way.

With this new information, the Doctor rushes back to the room with Allis and Belinda, where members of the squadron are suddenly getting attacked and flung across the room. The squadron seem to think it was Allis that threw the woman across the room, but Belinda isn’t so sure. After Shaya refuses to let Cassio ignore the Doctor’s orders, he stages a coup amongst the ranks. This is after we find out that, through Belinda’s deducing, those that end up behind Allis end up getting killed. Cassio and another soldier test this theory, which leads to a number of more deaths.

In order to get Cassio to stop, Shaya (known for her excellent shot) kills him and takes command back. Shaya decides that the mission has failed and they must retreat and leave the infected Allis, but the Doctor still has some hope. After giving Allis a hug, he realizes that the creature is saying something to whoever it leaches onto, but because Allis is deaf, she can’t hear it and that could be how she survived. Whatever the thing behind her back is can’t see itself back, and so using Shaya’s excellent shooting abilities, causing the mercury used in the mine to fall and reflect the creature – which causes it to detach from Allis.

Our heroes make it out of the room, and Allis along with two of the troopers make it to the escape pod. However, the creature (which we still can’t see) catches up with the Doctor, Belinda, Shaya and Mo (Bethany Antonia) and manges to attach onto Belinda. Using her excellent shooting skills, Shaya decides to shoot Belinda close enough to death so that the creature will leach onto Shaya instead. Whenthis happens, Shaya runs back into the base and throws herself into the well, seemingly killing the unknown creature as well.

Belinda recovers aboard the TARDIS after that harrowing incident, which is even more stressful after she tells the Doctor that the people they met hadn’t heard of the Earth or humans. As the Doctor and Belinda ponder the implications of this, we cut back to Mo talking to her commanding officer, who is revealed to be the mysterious Mrs. Flood (Anita Dobson). She mentions the vindicator and asks if the Doctor was carrying it, to which she seems to be pleased. After, Mo walks in the hallway and talks to a fellow trooper, who seems to be spotting something behind her. Could the creature have survived? We have no way of knowing, as this is how the episode ends.

“Midnight" is one of my personal favorite Doctor Who stories, which was written by Russell T Davies himself. The man returns to pen the sequel here, alongside Sharma Angel-Walfall. Setting out to write a sequel to such a popular story must have been no easy task, so I’m delighted to say that “The Well" really holds up. In just 48 minutes, it makes you care for (one way or the other) each of the supporting cast, gives the unseen creature a real menace without letting you see it and some real, great tension. “The Well" feels like a perfect extension of what was introduced in “Midnight" without repeating too many of the same story beats.

Next week, we (somehow) head back to Earth and revisit an old friend, Ruby Sunday (Millie Gibson). But as she faces life back on earth without the Doctor, can Ruby and UNIT save her new boyfriend, Conrad, from a dangerous new threat?