Doctor: Jodie Whittaker
Companions:
Mandip Gill – Yasmin Khan
John Bishop – Dan Lewis
Others
Jonathan Watson – Skaak/Sontaran, Commander Riskaw
Sara Powell – Mary Seacole
Jacob Anderson – Vinder
Sue Jenkins – Eileen
Paul Broughton – Neville
Steve Oram – Joseph Williamson
Gerald Kyd – General Logan
Dan Starkey – Svild
Sam Spruell – Swarm
Rochenda Sandall – Azure
Craige Els – Karvanista
Jonny Mathers – Passenger
Nigel Richard Lambert – Priest Triangle
Directed by Jamie Magnus Stone
Written by Chris Chibnall
Script editors: Caroline Buckley, Rebecca Roughan
Produced by Nikki Wilson
Executive producer(s): Chris Chibnall, Matt Strevens, Nikki Wilson
Incidental music composer: Segun Akinola
Series 13
Running time: 2nd of 6-part story, 59 minutes
First broadcast 7 November 2021
Following the events of the previous episode, the Doctor, Dan, and Yaz are transported to Sevastopol during the Crimean War, where they all briefly meet Mary Seacole before Yaz and Dan are transported away through time and the Doctor is unable to enter her TARDIS to track and find them. Remaining in Sevastopol with Mary, the Doctor realizes the influence of the Flux has shifted human history, and the British opponents during the Crimean War are now the Sontarans, with all traces of China and the Russian Empire now replaced with Sontar. Tricking a Sontaran scout into granting parley with his general, the Doctor comes to find that seconds prior to the Lupari shielding Earth from the Flux in the previous episode, the Sontarans took advantage of the chaos of the Flux and rewrote human history to feed their species’ hunger for battle.
Meanwhile, Yaz is transported to a religious temple on the planet Time, where she briefly encounters Joseph Williamson before befriending Vinder when they are both recruited as repairers of the temple’s mainframe. At the same time, Swarm and Azure arrive to take control of the temple and use its power for themselves.
Dan is transported back to Liverpool, where he finds a world now taken over by the Sontarans. Saved from a Sontaran unit by his parents, he learns that a three-minute blackout caused by the Lupari shield allowed the Sontaran fleet to land first at the Liverpool docks, where they established a base of operations. Dan sneaks onto one of the Sontaran ships and is able to contact the Doctor who tasks him with ending the Sontaran offensive in the 21st century.
Dan is discovered by the Sontarans but is saved by Karvanista, and the pair destroy the primary fleet by ramming their captured vessel into the shipyard and evacuating at the last moment. Poisoning the supply system of the Sontarans in Crimea, the Doctor is able to cripple their offensive, forcing them to retreat, although the British commander General Logan destroys their vessels with explosives as revenge for massacring his troops. The Doctor regains access to the TARDIS to rendezvous with Dan and find Yaz.
In a state of disrepair due to the Flux, the TARDIS malfunctions and forces The Doctor and Dan to the planet Time. The Doctor is welcomed by Swarm to the Temple of Atropos, through which all temporal energy must pass. The death of the Mouri gatekeepers and ruin of the temple has resulted in the Flux phenomena, and now seeking to control time for himself, Swarm has imprisoned Yaz and Vinder as replacement bodies for the Mouri. Knowing the power unleashed will kill Yaz, the Doctor begs Swarm not to activate the temple, but he ignores her and takes control.
Flux - Chapter 2: War of the Sontarans