The Chris Chibnall era was divisive amongst the fan base, no question. Some people would rather extract their own teeth before rewatching The Timeless Children, Arachnids in the UK, The Ghost Monument, The Tsu— okay, well, there’s a list. 

But an interesting thing has happened. Some people now refer to Chibnall being better than what Russell T Davies gave us with Season 1/14/40/flapdoodle, whatever you want to call it. I personally disagree, but since the complaints seem to elevate the Chibnall era, I thought it only fair to root around and see what hidden gems — if any — can be found during Jodie Whittaker’s time in the TARDIS. 

Now, I’ve already done a piece here on the wonderful Jo Martin era (Fugitive of the Judoon), which is smack dab in the middle of the Whittaker era, co-written by Vinay Patel, who also wrote Demons of the Punjab. I’ve also commented many times on how The Woman Who Fell to Earth was not really a bad start and The Power of the Doctor was not a bad ending. 

Part of the problem back then was that, having to sit through most of Series 11, by the time you got to a couple halfway decent episodes (not written by Chibnall), one tended to be a bit soured on the era. Getting into the negative mindset and starting to expect the worst tends to slant the view on upcoming episodes. Episodes that perhaps suffered from being in the shadow of what came before. 

So today, we’re going to look back at It Takes You Away from the latter part of Series 11, directed by Jamie Childs and written by Ed Hime.

This episode is one of the very few from the era I’ve rewatched a couple times, as I do feel it’s several cuts above most of the rest of the unfortunate Series 11. Here are some of the things I really liked about it.

The companions. Many people complain endlessly about three companions being too many; there’s not enough to do; oh, it just can’t work. Nonsense. All three companions get plenty to do here, and amazingly, they each get a little character development as well. 

Yaz shows off some of her police training while touring the seemingly abandoned house, and has a good rapport with the girl, Hanne. She holds her own here and is an actual person, not stuffed into a corner to be forgotten as in previous eps.

Pete McTighe is another writer who’d given Yaz more of a spotlight in Kerblam!, again exhibiting some police training when she gets the bad guy in a judo hold. The only one who seemed to have immense difficulty giving Yaz any proper attention or character development and care was Chibnall. No, Yaz is a welcome, capable presence in this ep. She actually comes across as a competent police officer a few times.

Ryan is shown to be a jerk, saying Hanne’s dad probably abandoned her (like his dad did with him) then proceeds to make amends later on, demonstrating some personal growth, and in a touching moment near the end, finally calls Graham “granddad”, which was very touching. Instead of just showing Ryan as a sullen teenager and an idiot, he’s more well rounded here.

Bradley Walsh shines in this ep, from the amusing bringing-a-sandwich-on-adventures-just-in-case, to having good interactions with Ryan, to going back and forth with Ribbons in physical encounters, to the heartbreak of discovering a Grace who’s not really Grace. He’s tortured that he’s found her, only to have to let her go again. All wonderful scenes. 

And then there’s the Doctor. Jodie came under fire quite a bit for her Doc Brown impersonation, always silly and wacky and unimpressive. Never really giving us the necessary gravitas. But in It Takes You Away, the script demands she tone it down and she does, far more than usual. She’s more impressive in the few times when she’s actually serious. She doesn’t even exhibit the usual impatience and annoyance with the “fam”. In fact, when Ryan screws up, it’s Yaz who gets on his case. Hime has a better understanding of the regulars, a better understanding of how this group should work. 

The Doctor even has the sensitive discussion with Graham about it not really being Grace and why they have to leave. It’s a serious talk that shows she can relate to her companions on an honest, forthright level. A shame the writers of Can You Hear Me? (Charlene James and Chibnall) weren’t able to step up in that area.

The concept was bold and the set up was simple yet epic. The Solitract was an interesting character/universe. Yes, the frog at the end wasn’t perfect but the reason for it was sound (Grace loved frogs) and I’m certainly not going to take away points for the CGI of its minor mouth movements: it’s Doctor Who. The SFX comes second to the story. This ain’t Star Wars after all. 

And finally, Ribbons. What a wonderfully slimy alien creep. I wonder if Kevin Eldon took a page from John Simm’s book when he portrayed Razor in World Enough and Time.

All in all, a very peculiar and very Doctor Who story. The atmosphere, direction and visuals were all stunning as well, courtesy of Jamie Childs. I even liked the worrying jokes about the sheep rebellion. 

I think Ed Hime is an underrated writer, all told. I thought he delivered brilliantly here. Now, of course, his follow-up was Orphan 55, which was a disaster. But to put that in context, Neil Gaiman wrote The Doctor’s Wife, and then went on to write Nightmare in Silver. I strongly suspect that behind-the-scenes issues, schedules and problems affected the latter, and that Chibnall muddied things up a bit too much in Orphan 55, adding in some ham-fisted messaging. The direction on Orphan 55 was a real mess as well, showing monsters in broad daylight instead of night, etc. Just very sloppy. It was an overall, unintentionally hilarious Mystery Science Theater 3000 episode by the end.

I also strongly suspect that the only part of that ep that was pure Hime was the opening section where they’re mopping up the TARDIS and clearing out giant tentacles. That part was very entertaining. 

After Orphan 55, Hime did not return during the Chibnall era, as the showrunner ended up writing most of the rest of the Whittaker era himself.

I would like to see Hime come in and pitch more story ideas, much like Jamie Mathieson from the Steven Moffat era.

In conclusion, if one can push aside most of the rest of the season, I recommend It Takes You Away as a worthy gem from Series 11 to revisit. The nice bit is that one can choose to go back, ignore the really bad stuff, and cherry-pick here and there when the mood hits. It Takes You Away is a decent choice.