I’ve added the full transcript of this episode, and also uploaded loads of quotes with screen grabs!
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Found out yesterday that my friend’s youngest two children (8 and 12) are now scared of pianos because of watching The Devil’s Chord! Superb! Doctor Who can still put kids behind the sofa.
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It’s interesting looking at this thread in hindsight with the whole season over and done with. Say what you will about the actual resolutions to the season’s arcs, but there is a bit of genius from RTD. I only saw a few mentions of the “ruined future” scene. Said scene is basically a sly harbinger of Sutekh’s return, but no one here appears to have considered it. Instead that scene was just briefly mentioned in a handful of posts as an homage/reference to the past. Instead, all the speculation was about whether the Trickster would return.
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To be fair I did see a lot of talk about Sutekh over on Twitter
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Ah. And I’m not on Twitter.
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I would tend to agree, except music is just an apex level of order and Maestro is a catalyst of entropy. The whole sequence with the projector screen and the dialogue about aeolian tones across the whole of creation;
“That lament will be my symphony supreme, with all of life extinguished.”
It’s bold and powerful. That whole middle third of the episode is dark, funereal almost. I see it as a ‘Logopolis’ for the 2020s.
Love that middle third!
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I wasn’t a big fan of this one. I feel like it was too much too soon and the maestro just seemed too camp and silly.
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I adore this episode. It takes the “Beatles” episode and does something entirely new and different with it. The scene with Ruby playing her theme and all of London hearing it and remembering music is an all time great imo.
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It’s good to read this. I also love this episode, which surprised me so much as it was probably the one I was least looking forward to. Whilst I’d never claim that it’s perfect, I actually hugely admire it for daring to be what it is and for avoiding a more structured, conventional plot. For the most part, The Devil’s Chord just… is! It’s very much its own thing. I’ve waxed lyrical about the middle third, starting with the rooftop scene you describe. It’s so beautifully done, going from soaring highs to a true sense of desolation. This was the moment that I knew Ben Chessell had made his way onto my list of top tier DW directors.
I absolutely get that it is a divisive episode and not everybody’s cup of tea but I also see it as something a little bit special. It’s exactly the kind of thing that I love DW to do from time to time.
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I know you posted this an age ago (or so it seems) but you are not the only one. No, it’s not great but it’s an outpouring of joy as music rushes back into the world.
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Outside of Doctor Who, I also nestle softly in the theme park fandom space. There’s a specific genre of ride that pops up that is very affectionately known as a “cocktail party” ride. It’s usually a slow moving ride past a series of vignettes covering a specific theme (a la walking through a cocktail party and overhearing parts of longer conversations) rather than a hard three act structure plot. Think your Pirates of the Caribbeans or Haunted Mansions. This episode is kind of the Doctor Who equivalent of that. It’s very much a “vibes” episode that one can turn on and just enjoy without being bogged down by heaviness and plot. You can just enjoy it for what it is and what it brings to the table.
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I didn’t even know there was a theme park fandom. Every day’s a learning day (as they say).
Anyway, yes I see that. Nicely explained. Thank you! 
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I read that first line as “liked the snog.”
What did I miss? 
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I’ve never heard that term before for rides like Pirates or Mansion, but it’s such a good one. I don’t really do theme park fandom but I LOVE theme parks!
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