Doctor Who “World War Three”

So, the Slitheen, giant, doughy-looking things with baby faces and a flatulence problem when they wear human skins, don’t look all that threatening.

Then again, do most Doctor Who aliens?

The Doctor was being electrocuted by the Slitheen after all, but since he’s not human, he’s able to get the charge off and jam it into the Slitheen’s translator collar for the one right in front of him.  That electrocutes the Slitheen, and the Doctor, and only the Doctor, gets away, and by the time he comes back with armed soldiers, he sees the baddies back in their human suits , and since one is acting Prime Minister, they can order the men to capture and then kill the Doctor.

By then, Mickey has retrieved Jackie and Rose and Harriet Jones, MP, have gotten away safely, but that means a chase between Slitheen aliens and various human and human-looking folks through 10 Downing Street, ending with the Doctor, Rose, and Harriet Jones, MP, holed up inside the cabinet room with the steel shutters down.  And here’s where we get some interesting tidbits.  Rose’s phone was fiddled with, so Mickey can call her and the Doctor can guide the young man (Jackie screaming at them both the whole time) through UNIT’s website since the Doctor knows the password.  They learn, from the Slitheen, that “Slitheen” is a family name and not a species, that the creatures have a great sense of smell, and the farts smell more like bad breath than anything else, so when the cop alien finds Mickey and Jackie, the Doctor tells them to throw vinegar on it.

That actually makes the alien explode.

Too much calcium or something in its make-up.

So, why go to all this trouble?  The Slitheen don’t want to rule the Earth.  They don’t even like it.  They want the UK’s nuclear codes, and that means getting the codes from the UN and that means faking an invasion with their own escape craft conveniently parked on the bottom of the Thames.  They need hefty human skins to disguise themselves and the devices needed to shrink themselves a little bit to fit cause all the gas.  Basically, these guys are gross, and the Doctor keeps thinking Harriet Jones, MP, seems familiar to him somehow.

Moot point.  The Slitheen are looking to sell radioactive material as a fuel source by using the UK’s nuclear codes to start World War III, and the only way to stop it is for the Doctor to guide Mickey through launching a short-range missile to hit 10 Downing Street.  The Slitheen have all gathered in their true form in the ready room, the cabinet room’s closet is sturdy enough to take a blast, the humans in the building evacuate when the warning comes through with one cop seeing the Slitheen in their true form and slowly backing out of the room, and the whole thing is set up in such a way to take out the baddies and maybe lead to Harriet Jones, MP’s future role as a three term Prime Minister.

So, since the Doctor cannot guarantee safety for Jackie, will Rose go with him?  Um, yes.  Interestingly, he offers Mickey a chance to come along, something Mickey declines because he’s not that brave, and the Doctor respects the decision, also respecting Mickey’s wishes enough to cover form him when Rose asks if Mickey can come too.   So, that was nice.

What may not be so nice is what the Doctor and Rose find in the next episode, something that looks a lot more dangerous than those baby-faced fart machines.