On an alien planet, Donna meets a fortune teller, who launches her into a world based on one question: “What would happen if Donna never met the Tenth Doctor?” Without the Doctor, the whole world is in ruin, and a mysterious blonde tries to warn Donna of the oncoming darkness… Now a simple refugee, Donna is the only one who can undo the damage. But how?
Rate and review below:
This scene alone makes this a 10/10. The rest of the episode is also really really good. But this scene is the most heartbreaking in all of Doctor Who.
I enjoy this story, but I’ve never quite understood the hype it gets, it was one of those that just sort of blended into the background of series 4 when I did a big rewatch a few years ago, but I’ll acknowledge it does have some absolutely heartbreaking moments, 8/10
What can I even say about Turn Left? It’s possibly RTD’s best ever script. It’s dark, it’s tragic, and it’s a perfect 10/10
A fantastic episode, & yes that scene. So powerful, sadly increasingly relevant.
“Those Who Do Not Learn From History Are Doomed To Repeat It.”
Okay, so. I’ve not yet participated in any of the TV Club, nor even watched this one for this purpose[1] - but Turn Left is, for me, the all-time pinnacle of Doctor Who stories[2] and a piece of exceptional television in its own right. So I couldn’t resist the chance to do a bit of an appreciation post.
I adore Turn Left. David Tennant isn’t my favourite Doctor[3]. Donna isn’t my favourite companion[4]. RTD isn’t my favourite writer[5]. And yet, this is the best episode of Doctor Who, bar none. The performances are nothing short of outstanding, particularly from Bernard Cribbins and Jacqueline King. As stated above, the labour camps moment is flawless. There is only one story I’ve watched more times than this[6], and yet that moment still gives me physical chills every time. And the other scene that needs equal praises sung is the utterly harrowing shot of Sylvia as Donna speaks to her in the background. She says nothing and yet her face gives more of a performance in that single shot than swathes of supporting actors manage in entire episodes. Simply unreal.
Then there’s Catherine Tate. We discovered very quickly when she returned for series 4 that BOY can she ACT. But this episode took her to a whole new level[7]. Yet in this episode, she covers more ground in terms of emotional spectrum and journey than many companions get in their entire arc. Tennant is great but you don’t miss him one bit here, and that’s thanks to her.
Even Billie Piper isn’t as irritating as I find her elsewhere. The mystery around who she’s become is tantalising - to be fair, I am always a sucker for a parallel world story so I was always likely to enjoy it, but the dynamic she brings to this are really effective (and rewarding after what felt like such a long wait!)
Then you have things like Rocco (is there anything more powerful than a character you believe to be just brilliant comic relief suddenly becoming something incredibly profound?); Wilf being caught out in the Queen sing-along; the hotel scene; the brilliantly satisfying callbacks to the events of the previous seasons and references to the characters we’ve loved losing their lives in this alternate reality; the use of UNIT (RTD’s version of UNIT really works in this parallel world[8]); that cliffhanger at the end!![9] and Ten’s reaction to it.
Sure okay, some of the adoration may come from the context of the build-up, internally and externally to the show, and the nostalgia of all that, maybe even the hints of what was to come immediately following this[10], but for me, it’s never been beaten and it will be very, very hard to do so. My favourite stories in any medium or franchise are those that have some genuinely strong humour and then follow it up with a gut punch or two of raw, meaningful emotion, especially if rooted[11] in real-world issues. I’m not sure Doctor Who has ever blended those two elements better than in series 4 as a whole, but this episode especially. It’s divine. I adore it. See you all for The Eleventh Hour.
I have this weird thing where I feel unable to jump into something at an illogical point, even when it’s something I know back to front like series 4. I’m relatively new to the site and missed the Partners in Crime week so am waiting until we start Smith to join in properly. I’m just a bit odd. ↩︎
Second only to Children of Earth, if you count that. ↩︎
He’s good, but he’s no Smith. ↩︎
She’s brilliant but she’s no Clara. ↩︎
He has his moments but he’s hardly Moffat. ↩︎
The Christmas Invasion. I have no good reason for this. It’s good but it’s hardly THIS good. ↩︎
I genuinely wouldn’t have thought it possible after The Fires of Pompeii. ↩︎
Now I think about it, how effective would it have been if that version was saved only for this episode? ↩︎
I know it annoyed some people and seemed goofy but for me, again, CHILLS, every time ↩︎
Whether that paid off or not is a different discussion of course… ↩︎
at some level ↩︎
This episode was brilliant. Everything about it. The build up, Donna and Rose’s interactions, tense moments.
Catherine Tate’s acting was absolutely fire
I also like how different Rose was in the story. Her never telling Donna her name, being all mysterious, acting like the Doctor
I’ve always respected this episode more than enjoyed it. I do like it, I’ve just never loved it like a lot of other people. It doesn’t help that it’s such a dour episode. That’s not a criticism, I enjoy plenty of sombre stories, I like other sad DW episodes. But the thing about this franchise is that even when the story doesn’t entirely work for me, I will at least usually have fun watching it anyway. The story here has never entirely worked for me and there’s nothing fun for me to latch onto either.
There’s a couple of things that don’t work for me, the main one being that this episode is supposed to be how special Donna is (the dialogue explicitly states that this is what the episode is about numerous times) and I don’t think this episode does a very good job of conveying that fact. In fact I think it actually shows us how special the Doctor is, and how screwed the world would be without him.
Series 4 has done an excellent job throughout it’s run of highlighting what makes Donna so special. Her boundless empathy and her Super-Temp skills allow her to use her natural humanity & everyday skills to solve problems throughout the series that the Doctor could never have done without her. It’s kind of the main theme of S4, how utterly remarkable every seemingly unremarkable human can be. My point being that I think many other episodes in S4 do a better job of making Donna feel special, than the episode specifically about how special Donna is.
To be fair to this episode it does make Donna special at the end, but it’s this grand, heroic act of martyrdom that she does to save the world, not any particular skill or characteristic of Donna really. She’s just willing to die to save the world which whilst remarkable, doesn’t feel inherently Donna, lots of other characters in this universe have done this. Besides that what makes her special is apparently that if she wasn’t there to tell the Doctor to leave the Racnoss’s den as it was filling with water, he would’ve just stood there until he drowns apparently. I dunno, it doesn’t feel enough to really sell me on the point of the episode really.
Besides the ending, Donna is mostly just a passive observer to the events of the episode. Which brings me to my second issue with the episode. It’s quite repetitive. An alien catastrophe from earlier in the RTD era happens but the consquences are more dire because the Doctor is dead. Donna witnesses it in horror and then Rose mysteriously explains to her what happened a little later. It’s fun to see these events recontextualised from an outsider perspective, but it happens a bunch and for me with diminishing returns.
It’s the stuff in between the disasters that really works for me though. The true horror of the human race abandoning it’s humanity in the face of multiple catastrophe’s, and the incredibly mundane dystopia that reveals itself piece by piece. Catherine Tate, Bernard Cribbins & Jacqueline King are all incredible during these sections. The aforementioned Labour Camp scene is so powerful and sadly more pertinent today then it was when the episode was released. All of this stuff is excellent, so I do understand why a lot of people love this episode. It’s just all the Doctor Whoey, sci-fi, plotty stuff around it always felt more functional than exceptional to me.
In any other season, this would be my favourite episode. Not only is Donna put through the wringer, taking it in way which places her among my favourite companions, the alternate timeline on offer goes from saddening and plausible, to chilling, to downright horrifying.[1] The framing device, if it could be called that, works better at the end than it does at the beginning; the dramatic reveal makes it easier to tolerate the uncomfortable depiction of someone Asian.
Unfortunately, this premiered a week after “Midnight”, which also sees a main character goes through hell without their friend. Second place ain’t half bad. Or, should I say, Bad Wolf?
That’s what they called them last time! ↩︎
All excellent points, and probably why I rated this a 4.5/5.
I was 10 when Turn Left came out, and I watched it so so many times because it’s chilling. It’s ‘what if I made a decision and everyrhing was different’ taken to extremes. And I love it.
Catherine Tate is truly remarkable when she does ‘real’ Acting. She is just astonishingly good in this. Donna’s true belief that she is just nothing important is resonant and heartbreaking. Absolute favourite of mine
I swear it’s Sylvia’s fault
And her dad’s, in my headcanon. I like to think that when she was growing up, he was a submariner in the Navy,[1] meaning that there was never someone to temper her mum.
a little out there, yeah ↩︎
I mean, there’s not many points I can add after the previous comments. It’s a fascinating episode because Donna sees what would have happened had she made a different choice one day, and we see what the Earth would be like without the Doctor still around to protect it. The story and the characters were amazing in this episode and it was really well done. I just don’t watch it often because I hate to see Donna in pan.
I love turn left but it’s something I’d only watch in specific circumstances, because the contents of the episode itself was very distressing for me.
But it’s 10/10 peak from me. The way this whole episode is structured, Roses involvement, Wilf. All that is so sad and it feels so real and it hurts. One of the highest highs of season 4
I should clarify, 4.5 instead of 5. There are more than a few flaws.
Gwen and Ianto killing themselves to ignite the atmospheric converter thing will never not break my heart. Very sacrificial.
It’s an excellent 4.5 from me. Its both a great what-if episode, and the end of a great run of episodes.
My only gripe is the ending with Bad Wolf written everywhere.
I never liked the bad wolf thing Atleast after series 1
