Original subtitles

- And... - In this episode...

- ..action! - I need to increase the weight on the mine at the exact

moment I decrease it.

- ..we've got a hopping mad Doctor... - He had to stand on one foot!

- I've got one massive glute.

And the other is normal size.

- ..the return of a Doctor Who legend...

- Come on through...

..into...

- Ah! - ..the TARDIS. - You've redecorated.

- I'm Anglican.

- A revealing scoop interview with the latest companion

to join the Whoniverse, Varada Sethu.

Sort of day one of the rest of your life at this point now.

Isn't it?

- Is it?

- And spoiler alert, we've got a world exclusive clip from the next

Doctor Who episode.

Welcome to Doctor Who: Unleashed.

Well, well and well.

Have we got an explosive episode for you!

Unleashed goes boom with not one, but two bombshells.

Later on, we've got the inside intel

on the return of Doctor Who legend Steven Moffat.

- And then one day, I had this one,

"What if he stood on a land mine for the entire episode

"and couldn't move?"

- But first, let's diffuse the mystery of Mundy Flynn.

- Splice, are you OK down there? - I'm here, Mundy.

I'm trying to find Daddy.

- Or should I say Varada Sethu?

- My name is Mundy Flynn.

I'm an ordained Anglican Marine.

What are you doing down here?

- Or should I actually say Varada Sethu, the recently unveiled

and latest companion to join the Whoniverse family?

Well, if we're going to unpack that one,

we're going to have to go back in time.

Where were you on the afternoon of Friday 10th of March 2023?

Me, I was on stage six at Wolf Studios watching filming of Boom.

- And action!

- On set was Varada, fresh from playing Cinta Kaz

in the Star Wars series Andor.

- It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter.

Look at the readings.

If that mine blows, it blows everything.

- This was her Doctor Who debut.

Of course, you've got a bit of a thing for being in big sci-fi

brands, haven't you? - Maybe.

- STEFFAN LAUGHS You know, Doctor Who, Star Wars.

They're two pretty cool franchises to be a part of.

- Yeah. I don't know how I've got here, mate.

I have no... I don't know, but I'm enjoying the ride.

- Everyone's faking it, right? I'm the same. - I'm the same.

Fake it till you make it. No, it's actually incredible.

I love, um, action and, like,

adventure, sci-fi, fantasy as a genre.

And it's what I've wanted to be in. Like, my favourite films

when I was growing up were things like, um, Indiana Jones

and Star Wars, you know?

So it's amazing being here and it is absolutely

a dream come true.

Where's your dad?

- You're joking, but he's not.

Everybody knows he likes you.

- Splice, your dad. Where is he?

- Varada spent three weeks filming on Doctor Who and then left with love

and best wishes.

Except she didn't quite.

Nine months later, Varada was back behind these walls,

largely unnoticed until today, 12th of April, 2024,

when she was officially announced as a new companion for Season Two.

Let's see if I can get my timey-wimey Doctor Who brain

around this. Because we are filming this,

this is April 12th, 2024.

You have just been announced as the new companion officially,

which is very exciting. Congratulations.

- Yeah. It's exciting.

- Yes. But we filmed before, together, over a year ago

for episode three, Boom. - Mm-hm.

- Now, when we did that interview, you wouldn't have known

that this would happen.

- Oh, no. I was just in it for the ride.

I had a great time for those three weeks, and it was just like, um,

you know, I was devastated to be leaving

because I had so much fun.

But, um, yeah, I didn't know anything about it. That call

came much later. Months and months. Months later.

- Yeah. - So, yeah. - What's it like, then, finally being able

to sort of breathe out and say to the world,

"Yes, I am the new..." - "It's me! I got it!"

- "For God's sake, it's out there."

- I don't know, because I think when I first started the job,

it was like, "Oh, my God, I'm gagging to tell everyone that I've

"got it. I've got it, I've got it, I've got it."

But then I started to really value being able to, um, being able

to film, just put my head down and work and, like, get through it.

- Without the noise. - Without all the noise.

But, um, I am excited to see, er, what being announced brings,

being able to be a lot more open about, you know, what the experience

has been like, um... - Yeah.

- ..and also just, I think being able to engage with the Doctor Who fans

that are already sneakily reaching out.

I don't know how you guys found out, but, um, yeah, like, being able

to say, "Yes, it's me. It is me."

- Because without being sort of hyperbolic about it,

but it's like sort of day one of the rest of your life

at this point now, isn't it?

- Is it?

- Because you'll always be from now on...

- Yeah. - ..one of the Doctor's companions.

- Yeah, it is, it is.

And it... I find it, um...

Yeah, I can't wait. I can't wait for what

that brings, the chapter. Like, it's... Yeah.

- Because you still have secrets that you must keep.

- I have. Yeah. I can't say anything right now. - Yeah.

So, forget about those ones and just focus on the one thing

you can say, which is you are the Doctor's new companion.

- I'm the Doctor's new companion, and I am so excited and pleased

and over the moon to be here.

- Well, shall we cheers here with a cup of lukewarm tea?

- Yes. Thank you. - Well done, you. - Best tea ever.

- Yes.

Not really.

So what has Russell got planned for Varada's new companion?

- She's coming in, into Season Two.

But quite how that happens, what happens, why it happens,

it's very much knitted into the story of the Doctor and the story

of Ruby Sunday, so come back and find out.

- Welcome to the planet Kastarion 3, a war-torn world

overrun by the villainous Villengard algorithm.

Kastarion 3 is full of armed vicars and vergers, vacuum drones

and watch-where-you're-stepping...

..vaporising mines.

And all of it dreamt up by the luminous mind

of writer Steven Moffat.

- Are you my mummy?

- For all you Whovians out there, you'll know Steven is responsible

for some of the greatest moments in Who history.

He has written over 40 episodes and was the Doctor Who executive

producer and showrunner from 2010 to 2017.

- Wibbly-wobbly, timey-wimey...stuff.

- On top of that, he was the co-creator behind the global hit

Sherlock and wrote recent series Inside Man, starring the tenth

and 14th Doctor, David Tennant.

And now he's back on the TARDIS, quite literally, actually.

And what we all want to know is, how come?

- Well, the night before Russell announced his grand return,

he emailed me

and said what he was doing, and I was astonished.

And I'd been out for a celebration meal with my wife and so,

we were both quite merry.

And I found this email on my phone from Russell saying,

"Well, I'm going back! I'm going back to Doctor Who!"

And I thought... That's exactly how he talks.

And I remember looking at it and thinking, "I...I don't know

"if that email is really there."

It was there the next day, and I phoned him up

and we laughed away together and talked

about the old days and talked about the new days and talked

about his plans, which I thought sounded great.

And inevitably, because it's us, we started talking about ideas.

Then one day I had this one -

"What if he stood on a land mine for the entire episode

"and couldn't move?"

And within 30 seconds, and I'm not kidding,

within 30 seconds, as I was getting up from my computer just having

pressed send, he came back and said, "Oh, my God, yes!" - And action.

- When I came back on board with Doctor Who, I think phone call

number three was Steven Moffat.

Phone call number one was Bad Wolf.

Phone call number two was Murray Gold.

Phone call number three was Steven.

And it might not have been in that order, to be honest.

And, um, begging him to come and do it. And it's brilliant.

He just says... He literally just sent me an email saying,

"What if the Doctor stands on a land mine and can't move?"

Yes. I literally went,

"Yes, that's it, that's it. Brilliant."

- Ruby, if this doesn't work out...

..you are brave.

You are wonderful.

- When you get scripts through and it says at the top "Steven Moffat",

did you sort of read it differently or did you...could you feel

it was written by someone different compared to the rest?

- You could, yeah. - You could. - Yeah, you could.

You could tell that it wasn't Russell, because I feel like every

writer has such a unique way of writing.

It's like a puzzle, really, in that episode.

- Yes. That's a script that has been written by a Scorpio.

Like, it's very...

It's, like, it's very dark, but dealing with, like, huge themes.

Like, thematically, what's happening in that episode

is...is like...is almost quite Grecian.

Like, it's very grand themes

that he's, like, executed so subtly and so cleverly.

- And obviously, thank you, Steven,

for giving you some of the longest sentences.

- And really some of the best as well.

He gave me some beautiful lines.

I'm a much bigger bang than you bargained for.

I'm a lot more explosive than I look

and, honey...

..I know how I look.

Oh!

Thank you, Steven, for that one!

- Millie has just described Steven Moffat's script as a puzzle.

Well, it was also a series of challenges for the cast

and the crew.

Challenge number one - where to film it?

Going all the way back to the classic era,

if you wanted to create an alien planet, you went

to the nearest quarry.

Whether you were trying to recreate Mars, Utopia

or the Planet of the Ood, a limestone, sandstone,

clay or slate hole in the ground was a ready-made solution.

In fact, down the years, over 30 different quarries

have guest-starred on Doctor Who.

Some of them more than once.

But when it came to creating Kastarion 3, in March, in Wales,

nobody was keen to go down that hole, so they built it instead.

- I wasn't remotely surprised to hear that the crater would be built

on set and not on location,

because I've been in this kind of situation.

You want a controllable weather environment.

Oh, God, you do.

Several days of rainfall could destroy your show.

And above all, the job of a Doctor Who creative is to spend as much

time avoiding going to a muddy field as possible.

I managed that for years when I ran Doctor Who.

For years. I just said that I'm not going to the muddy fields.

I don't care what happens. I'm not going. "But you wrote it."

"I know. I'm not going, because I'm the boss and I'm not

"going to the muddy field. Deal with it.

"Going to go watch Strictly, right?

"You go to the muddy field."

- While Steven kicks back to watch Strictly,

I'm going to take you on a tour of the muddy field, AKA

the indoor crater.

It's going to get a bit tight in here, OK, so, um, bear with me.

So everybody's very busy, as you can see.

Come on up the big ramp.

Have you seen the sides, by the way? You can't really see

it yet, but they've painted all this giant mural all on the side.

Must have taken ages to do that.

So these rocks, you know, they look really realistic,

but they're actually fake. So there we are.

- I love this set. - It's such a cool set.

It reminds me of a war film.

- I mean, it's all... We're not actually on a crater.

So, some of it is foam, some of it is rock.

You've got to be careful where you stand.

- This is what's really catching me out with all these sets

we've seen - the attention to detail.

Like, real gravel on the floor. Makes you feel like you're here.

You know, it doesn't feel synthetic. It feels real.

So, down there, they're just working on where the camera's positioned.

And... Is that a thing a director does?

I don't know. They're working on stuff.

They're sorting stuff out down there.

But this is the top of the set.

Now, eagle-eyed fans out there, I know lots of you are

eagle-eyed fans, might recognise this,

I don't know, broken spaceship,

we might say, this here. It's been blasted apart in the war.

That is actually the Meep's spaceship from special episode one,

but repurposed by the brilliant effects team here to look

like it's been blasted apart in this war.

There's all sorts going on here. So they've got these lights

on the ceiling that are like inflatable tents.

Is that a fair description?

Someone's going to give me a row for describing them like that.

But they just look... I mean, they just create that atmosphere

because you just look up and you think,

"Oh, I'm just on a different planet."

Actually, I'm in Cardiff city centre.

- The technology is going to be sick for this episode.

It's incredible.

Like, obviously we've got this whole screen and then we've got

the set, but then...

- We've seen the demo for the planets that Ruby sees and it's incredible.

- Incredible.

So, thinking about what is going to be put behind us...

- Yeah, it's like... - ..is so cool.

It's not here now, obviously, but like... - It's not real.

- And later in the episode, we'll reveal exactly how the not-real

planets become very real, right in front of our eyes.

Still to come on Doctor Who: Unleashed...

What's that made out of, then? - A real gun.

- That's a real gun? - I think it was a harpoon gun.

- Yeah, right. Yeah.

..I take a tour of the encampment set,

try not to go up in flames on my latest work experience...

..and spoilers -

we've got an exclusive clip from next week's Doctor Who.

But first, this...

- Come on through...

..into... - Ah! - ..the TARDIS.

- You've redecorated it.

- On 4th of January 2023, Unleashed invited

two of Britain's most acclaimed TV dramatists onto the TARDIS.

- You like it? - No.

Ah, it's... It's absolutely incredible.

It is absolutely beautiful.

- It's beautiful, isn't it?

- Between them, since 2005, Steven Moffat and Russell T Davies

have written 80 episodes of Doctor Who.

- Where do you want to go? How about...2003

to stop ourselves... - Yes. Yes. We had careers then!

- We had youth. We had faces.

- THEY LAUGH

- Everything. And now... - Yeah.

- So we asked them to answer the following simple question.

- What are the ingredients of a good Doctor Who story?

- There's an awful lot, that's the trouble. And that's why...

That's why it's hard to get people to write it.

You need an idea so big, it could be a movie.

Even a bad Doctor Who story has got a big idea in it. - Yes.

- The Doctor himself is such a massive idea,

such a massive character. - It is an event.

- I am a higher dimension Time Lord.

I am a complex space-time event.

- He's got to walk into a situation that's as interesting as he is

or he'll bleach it out. He can't go and solve a whodunnit...

- That's true. - ..because that's not enough for him.

- And even it's hard now to say,

"He enters a factory which has been overtaken by monsters."

That's not enough now. - No. - There's got to be... What else is there?

What else is there? What else? - Well, you sort of think he would

do that with his left hand, you know what I mean? He wouldn't bother.

But it's exhausting, isn't it, when you've got to write him

and you think he's got to walk into a room and do something

or think something, you think,

"What does the cleverest, fastest person in the universe do now?"

- Yes, yes. - "And how does he think about things?"

It's different. It's disconnected. - I do find I think you have to

shut him up sometimes. - Oh, God, yes.

- Because he just will stand there and explain everything. And other people

have got to have a voice. - Yeah. - And it's like, "Shut up."

- Shut up, Doctor. - Shut up!

- Shutity-up-up-up.

- I'm trying to get him on his back foot,

which is a great place to put him.

- You literally do in your story! - Yes, yes.

He's on one back foot for quite a lot of it.

- But that's...that's... You have to get inventive around him.

- Yeah, yeah. - That's the show at its best. - Yes. No, it really is.

It really is. - Getting my Zen on.

My land mine Zen.

- How do you stop him winning?

- It's delaying. It's tough. Every episode is tap dance.

- Yeah. - It's tap dancing. It's putting on a show to stop him

finding that button and pressing it and saying, "Everyone stop."

- One wrong move and boom!

I go all food mixer.

- And you start to realise, I mean, the solution in the old show,

quite often by episode three, was to knock him unconscious. - Yes.

- Doctor Who spends quite a lot of time in episode threes

of the old show... And I understand why, I get it.

- Yes. Have to lock him up in a cell. - Yeah, and just...

just get him out of the way.

- You are in my sights! I can drop you where you stand.

- No, no, no, no, no, no, no.

- Doctor Who doesn't do, for the most part, straightforward suspense,

straightforward tension. You know, like a big Hitchcock thing.

"You're standing on a wire," or something.

So you need a big idea that doesn't get bleached out by the TARDIS

and the Doctor. - Yeah. - It needs to be an adventure.

That's the big word, isn't it? Adventure. Rather than sci-fi.

- Absolutely, absolutely. - But...sci-fi is a freedom it has rather...

- Well, sci-fi, it's interesting, that's the one modulation

I think I've kind of brought to it, is when I started writing

the Toymaker that the supernatural kind of crept in... - I'm loving...

- Suddenly I thought, I can write goblins, you can write

the God of Music. That's been a real... To an extent,

it's like, let's stop pretending there's any hard science fiction

in this show. Look at this magical box. It's just nonsense.

It's like, we will do... I mean, ironically, yours

about standing on a land mine is very, very hard sci-fi. - Yeah.

- So you can do those, but you can also do stories

that are just wild and mad. - Yes. - That's nice territory to be in.

I've enjoyed that. - Yes. Yeah.

- Um, cos I think actually, one of my ingredients is death.

That there should be absolute danger of death in it.

And I think in Doctor Who, if there isn't,

it's so lacking something, that fear of death...

It doesn't quite stalk Star Trek, it doesn't quite stalk Star Wars

in the way that it does Doctor Who. - No, it's absolutely true.

The proper visceral jeopardy. But that's partly because,

you know, the characters in Star Trek are sensible.

They arrive with guns and equipment and a giant spaceship and a team.

That's how I'd like to arrive on an alien planet.

The Doctor puts his coat on and, you know, forgets his screwdriver

because he didn't... he wasn't using it recently.

So it's full of that.

You're following a genius idiot into an incredibly dangerous landscape

that he has tremendous faith ISN'T going to be that dangerous

or bad THIS TIME because presumably he doesn't watch the show.

- As well as the crater,

there was one other set constructed for this episode -

the military encampment.

Built on the backlot at Wolf Studios,

it's only seen on screen for 81 seconds,

but the detail and the care taken by the art department

in bringing the set to life is gobsmacking.

The department's Rhys Ifan has agreed to take us for a spin.

Oh, this is so detailed. It just looks like I'm just here,

I'm in the middle of the encampment.

How long did it take you to make this?

- Four weeks from start to finish. - Four weeks? - Yeah, yeah.

- What are these made...? Are they...? - So they're shipping containers.

- Are they actual shipping containers?

- Yeah, they're actual shipping containers that we've cut up

and sprayed. - The thing about this one is the scope of it, you know,

it's like above you as well, and it feels really real.

Even, like, the stones on the floor, you've got different colour.

- So the idea was to keep as much of it in camera as we could. - Yeah.

- Didn't rely on VFX and greenscreen. - Yeah, yeah, yeah.

So how do you make a tank like this?

- So these were tanks that we purchased.

- So you bought an old tank? - Er, they were Snow-Tracs.

- What's that made out of, then? - So that's a real...real gun.

- That's a real gun! - I think it was a harpoon gun. - Yeah, right, yeah.

Well, I mean, I've just spotted this bit here.

It looks like it's...sort of like a command centre or something

over there. Do you mind if I go another nose? Can I have a nose?

Oh, this is cool. Don't know if you can see that.

Probably not going to show up on screen, is it?

But, like, all the little details,

like all the Villengard stickers and stuff.

- That's our graphic design... - Graphic design? - Yeah, there's an awful lot

of detail that goes into it. And even if it doesn't show up

on camera, it helps. - Oh, you can feel it. Yeah, absolutely.

You seem very calm. Cos obviously this is your job.

Whereas I walk on here, I'm like a kid in a candy shop.

It's like laser quest, but ten million times better.

So this is the kitchen, then? - Yeah.

- We don't actually see much of this space in the episode, do we?

Or the one opposite. This is much bigger than what we see on screen.

Why do you... Not "why bother" but sort of why bother?

- Um, well, we've got 30 supporting actors on the set.

Um, so it kind of... They'll all be moving around from one place

to the other, so they've got to have somewhere to... - Move to.

- Have a reason... Part of it is that we get a bit carried away. Um...

- You're there drawing. You're like, "What if we add this in as well?"

Rhys, thank you very much for your time. Just wondering,

where do you buy a harpoon gun from? Big ones as well.

Earlier in the episode,

Ncuti and Millie spoke about the incredible scenic backgrounds

that would be added to the crater footage.

Towards the end of the shoot,

an LED wall was erected on set.

Apparently, it's here to do magic.

- The LED screen technology is a technology

that I've been fascinated by for a while.

The amazing thing about it is, they worked with Phil Sims

to build an extension of the set.

There was an LED wall, which is effectively like a window

into the 360 world that they built,

and the actors could stand in front of it and could walk around

on that set, and behind the actors would move

as if it was the real landscape.

- And three, two, one. Action.

- So how does this technology work?

- In order for us to maintain the right perspective

when it's on camera, we have this tracker.

And what this does is talking to all of our motion tracking cameras

along the edge of our screen.

It tells the camera where it is in 3D space and where it's moving

and turning, and that makes sure that this always looks right.

If that doesn't happen, it's just going to look

like a painted backdrop.

- So what you're seeing is we have about 33 cameras set up right now.

We just try to maximise the amount of space that they'll capture.

So, you know, if we do a camera move from back here,

if they want to use a crane, we have that fully captured.

Those lines that you're seeing are the actual rays

that are hitting the tracker that Billy probably already talked about.

And that gets processed

and what you end up seeing on the wall is the projected perspective

of the camera's position.

- It's live. So it's not, you know,

six months down the road in visual effects.

It's right now and everybody's present that has a say in that

can actually, you know, have opinions about it,

get it changed on the day and it's done.

- And when you look at it through a monitor,

it looks like magic with the practical foreground

and then the background. So, yeah, it really is magic.

- In every episode of Unleashed, I get to try out a bit of work experience.

Now, I have to say, I'm really looking forward to this one,

because I've been eyeing the work of this guy up enviously all shoot.

His name is Tom Vincent and he gets to do stuff like this.

And although I'm not going to be allowed to do this or this,

I am going to be playing with fire.

So we know there's that big set with the crater just over there, Tom.

What can I blow up today or what-what... What can I help with?

Can I set something on fire? What are we doing today?

- Definitely a bit of fire today. - Yeah. - Um, we've got these, er,

metal things called fish tails with flame coming out.

We'll have you operating one of them on the gas bottle. Nice and safe.

Nowhere near the flame. - Sounds exciting. Fish tails. Fire. I'm in.

THEY LAUGH

Today, like every day on the crater set,

Tom and his team are setting fire to stuff.

- We're doing flame effects, um, which can be dangerous.

We're on a set which is made of foam,

so we're going to be super careful.

If you look over there, we've got protection all up the set.

So that is, er, Durablanket.

Uh, it's basically...it's...

Can't conduct heat and it can't burn, so...

- Oh, so that stops...

Anything goes wrong, yeah. - Protection. It's a bit,

to be honest, a bit overkill. But we're doing everything properly

because it's a film set. - Yeah, absolutely. We're in a war zone,

right? - Exactly. - So there's... There's fire kicking off. - Exactly,

yeah. We're basically on the outskirts of this,

bit of flame reflection sometimes in the back of shot. - Yeah.

- Um, and the way we achieve that is with gas,

this item here, which is called a fish tail. - Yeah.

- Commonly used in the SFX world.

Um, super safe, super easy.

- Fish tail? I think that's my cue.

But before I burn the house down, how do you get to work in SFX?

- Well, I actually started off as a trainee rigger, um,

which is a scaffolder, for people who don't know,

and I absolutely hated it. - Did you? - Yeah. - Why didn't you...

Why didn't you want to be a rigger? - I didn't get on with the boss.

- THEY LAUGH

Hello, old boss. - Yeah.

Um, but I saw the guys doing special effects on Doctor Who

cos I had a contract with Doctor Who. - Yeah.

- And I just basically begged him. I was like, "Come on..." And, er,

luckily, they gave me a chance, and that was 12 years ago.

- Yeah. - Yeah, haven't looked back. - And...action!

- So you've got your fires and also you're in charge of smoke wafting,

which is... - Smoke as well, yeah. Bit of smoke.

So, yeah, with the smoke, we fill up the stage.

Um, it helps blend this transom in with the set.

- Do you mind if I have a little go putting this fire on?

Not that I'm a pyromaniac or anything. - No problem at all.

What we'll do, we'll put you on the bottle. - Yeah.

- Not the flame end. So I'll show you...

- I wouldn't trust me with the flame end either.

Tom's talking a good game, but when it comes down to it,

don't go near the flames. - Yeah. - That's fine.

- We'll do the flame end, you do the bottle end. No problem.

- Right. - Make your way down here. - OK, here we go. This is it.

Right, so these big bottles here, is that... - That's it.

We've already preset the level here.

So it'll be a simple case of, we instruct you to turn this valve.

- Yeah. - Turn it straight, that's gas on.

When we say "gas off" you bring it back.

Super safe. - Great. - Yeah?

- So...a very small chance of me messing this up. - Yes, very small.

- This is perfect work experience, isn't it? Yeah, great.

- They could revive her...

- Just don't try this at home.

- Bring the gas on. - OK, here we go. Watch this.

Oh, did you see that?

- There you go.

- Hey, war zone, look at that.

In one fell swoop.

What do you think? - Love it.

And then gas off when you're ready. - Gas off and ready.

- Cut there, thank you.

- There's people watching this, think, "I want to be making smoke

"and snow and all the cool stuff that you've done."

What advice would you give them? - Well, things are a lot easier now,

I think, with Skillset Cymru, um, and Bad Wolf in general

are really good with apprenticeships. But, yeah,

get in touch, keep writing, don't give up, send in CVs, phone calls.

- Next time on Doctor Who...

- Mad Jack is unbound.

- BANGING ON DOOR

- Oh, don't.

- He'd kill me. He would kill me. I'm the one he'd kill first.

And you know why, don't you?!

- What the hell have you done?

- No, that's just someone at the door.

BANGING CONTINUES

DR WHO THEME