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Doctor Who: Our "The Well" Thoughts (Including One Big Easter Egg)

Our deep dive into Doctor Who S02E03: "The Well" includes the biggest easter egg of all, dominating the entire episode from start to finish.

Now that you've watched this week's episode of Doctor Who, let's do the usual rambling deep dive into "The Well". It's the most tonally consistent episode of this season so far and a welcome return to old-school Science Fiction horror. Now, we don't dive into every single easter egg or meta reference, only the most fun and interesting ones. The episode kicks off immediately after last week, which gives the season a more serialised and bingeable feel. As a straight-up adventure story, it feels like classic Doctor Who that everyone expects and likes, including the use of psychic paper.

Yay! Quarries are Back! It Really Feels like Old School Doctor Who!

One thing that fans miss in a slightly perverse way is the presence of quarries in Doctor Who. They're usually filmed somewhere in rural England, Wales, or even Spain at one point. So that epic shot where the Doctor and Belinda arrive on the planet is a real location, a quarry in Wales, and at night, no less (any actor and crew will tell you how exhausting a night shoot is). The scene is lit with enough spook,y gothic darkness to set up the mood of the episode. Last season's "Boom!" could have been set and shot in a quarry, but they used the Volume screen to shoot the whole episode in a soundstage instead. The quarry here has been used before, the last time in Jodie Whittaker's final story, "The Power of the Doctor". Amazing how different lighting and camera angles can make a place look completely new and different, isn't it?

The Return of the Jerk Military Officer

Christopher Chung plays a common type in many Doctor Who stories, especially the classic era, which is the officious, brutish asshole military officer who just wants to kill everything including The Doctor. The last time this archetype appeared was in "War of the Sontarans" early in Jodie Whittaker's final season. Cassio here is uptight, officious, and hints that his tension with his commanding officer, Shaya (Caoilfhionn Dunne), is due to his belief that he should have her job. Chung's performance suggests Cassio is also power-hungry and a megalomaniac, which leads Shaya to reluctantly but calmly sacrifice him by manipulating him to his death-by-alien. Chung seems to be forging a career out of playing assholes in interesting ways. For example, he's best known for playing Roddy Ho in Slow Horses, the hilariously obnoxious incel hacker spy exiled to Slough House because everyone hated him.

On Representation and Discrimination

The best performance in "The Well" is from Rose Aisling-Ellis as Aliss, the hapless Final Girl at the base. Davies changed the script to suit her and present a commentary on discrimination where the hearing-impaired are often seen with suspicion, here amplified by the soldiers' fear that she might be the monster that killed everyone at the mine or is possessed. Her fear that people turn their backs on her, so she doesn't know what they're saying, is a detail of the everyday discrimination she faces. Aliss is the ordinary person character that Russell T, Davies always reserves sympathy for. And the Doctor is Daddy – of course, he would know sign language to put her and the audience at ease. That people in the future have screens to let them understand her and that

Nobody's Heard of Earth

The Doctor and Belinda are shocked that none of the soldiers have heard of Earth or the human race. Granted, they're 500,000 years in the future, but these are humans who don't seem to be called humans. This suggests that Earth's destruction on May 24th, 2025, has completely messed up history and is part of the season-long arc.

Yup, It's a Sequel to a Classic NuWho Episode

Is it really a spoiler if virtually every fan had already sussed out that "The Well" is a sequel to "Midnight", the 2008 episode that many fans consider a classic of the modern era? Davies already hinted that an episode this season was an "unexpected sequel" to one of his episodes. You could say "The Well" is the type of sequel to "Midnight" that Aliens is to Alien, bigger and slightly different. This episode didn't necessarily need to be a sequel to "Midnight" since the entity behaves differently in the story. Davies does a bit of futzing around with the monster's rules so they're different this time. The entity doesn't mimic, then possess its victims this time, but stays behind its host to kill anyone who comes directly behind her. The entity would hurt itself if it saw itself, hence the broken mirrors in the base, which is a new rule.  Aliss turns around at the start to show that nothing is behind her, which should have killed everyone there, but somehow, she didn't. That seems a bit of a plot hole there. And "nuke the site from orbit" is a direct reference to Aliens. The other difference is that The Doctor is less helpless this time, having a better handle on keeping control of the situation. Then there's the horror movie twist at the end where the entity isn't dead but has possessed someone to get off the planet.

The Biggest Easter Egg of This Episode

It's staring at us all along. It has nothing to do with Doctor Who lore or continuity. It's that "The Well" is virtually a remake of the 1965 Italian-US-Spanish space horror movie Planet of the Vampires, directed by Mario Bava. The entire plot of "The Well" is lifted from that movie, about a bunch of astronauts who arrive at a mysterious planet and get picked off by an alien entity. The Doctor and company showing up at the base to find it full of dead bodies totally echoes that movie.

Filmmakers consider Bava a brilliant filmmaker and craftsman who never really got his proper due. He was instrumental in establishing the Gialo genre in the 1960s, a precursor to the slasher film, and mentored horror director Dario Argento.  Planet of the Vampires also follows the slasher film plot structure. It's also been said to be an inspiration for Ridley Scott's Alien. Scott claims he had never seen the movie, but it's likely that screenwriter Dan O'Bannon did, since it was shown in grindhouse cinemas across America. The biggest visual homage and clue that the makers of "The Well" have seen Planet of the Vampires is the dark blue skintight astronaut suits they wore in the episode.

Shaya's Heroic Sacrifice

It's Shaya who saves Belinda by taking the entity to her, then sacrifices herself to kill it and save everyone despite the Doctor's offer or attempt to sacrifice himself. A supporting character's heroic sacrifice is a common trope on Doctor Who, but this one is better written and presented than most, with Murray Gold's music and the flashback to Shaya's past to define her sense of duty. This might also reveal something new about the series and the Doctor – he can never die, so everyone who takes the bullet for him and sacrifices themselves for him is a tragedy because they don't know that. Now the Doctor weeping every week makes a lot more sense.

Mrs. Flood Watch

Mrs. Flood shows up as the commanding officer of the troops safely sequestered back at headquarters. This is a direct echo of how Susan Twist popped up all over Space and Time last season. She's just fishing for confirmation that the Doctor and Belinda still had the Vindicator he used to return to May 24th, 2025. Now we know for sure she's stalking The Doctor across Space and Time with a villainous sneer. This suggests she also knows what's happened to Earth in 2025. Did she cause it, or was she involved in some way?

Doctor Who is streaming outside the UK on Disney+.

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