Wednesday afternoon, and Karli and I are approaching the entrance to the UNified Intelligence Taskforce (UNIT) headquarters on Davies Mews in London for the
Doctor Who: Time Fracture event: it's show time.
I'm a bit apprehensive - no pun intended, but it's been
a long time coming, and expectations are high.
Two and a quarter hours later (plus some time for the gift shop) and we're done - we've saved the universe, and we have the gratitude of the Doctors, all of them.
Overall, Time Fracture is good, but sadly, it's not great - which is a shame, because the framework for greatness is certainly there.
It's surprisingly like being in an episode of the series: time travel, aliens, inexplicable technologies, historical figures, Cybermen, Weeping Angels, saving the world, and, of course, Daleks - what would a Doctor Who event even be without a Dalek or two?
The immersive aspect of the event gives every attendee a unique experience, and it's VERY immersive - how often do you attend a theatrical event where you're so much a part of the performance that you have lines and talk to the performers? The Time Fracture performers themselves deliver uniformly impressive performances that give the show its energy and focus. However, there are some serious problems with the show's pacing, and it could stand some upgrades to its practical effects.
Here's how events unfold:
In 1942, an unknown device detonates in the center of London, creating a rift in time - the time fracture of the title. The experience starts with the attendees entering a large black ops laboratory that UNIT has set up to monitor the fracture, where we are informed by UNIT scientists that recent spikes in energy readings indicate that a catastrophic event is approaching. The Doctor has given our names to UNIT, and Chief Scientist Kate Lethbridge Stewart makes a video appearance, inviting us to volunteer to help solve the mystery behind the fracture and save all of time and space from disaster. However, as the UNIT science team is preparing to send two of us through the fracture, Daleks attack the lab. The Doctor is able to intervene and temporarily protect us, but all the volunteers are forced to flee through the time fracture instead of just two.
On the other side of the fracture, we find ourselves in a nexus of disjointed locations in time and space, where we are split into small groups under the leadership of guides, each of whom has a particular goal to accomplish with our help. Our group finds itself paired with Zoria, an intense young woman with a piercingly direct stare, dressed all in red and armed with a futuristic blast pistol, who asks us to become her Agents as we seek out the components of the Time Disruptor that caused* the fracture.
Her mission takes us to a variety of historical periods in different side rooms, travelling through liminal spaces that act as conduits to the different periods: corridors, foyers, galleries, and so on.
Our first stop was Broll's Salvage and Import Export Emporium, where I was tasked with asking Brolls, the pig-headed (literally) dealer in obscure and hard to find items, what he would do if the item we needed was illegal. I took my cue, asked my question, and that set the tone for the middle sections of the experience, as we run from Broll's future to Da Vinci's Italy, and from Elizabethan England to a 1920s Torchwood outpost that had somehow been merged with one of its future incarnations.
I had an extended argument with Captain Stephen Davies in the Torchwood section - Zoria told us to enter his headquarters and to immediately find out who was in charge and to demand the Key, which was actually part of the Disruptor. (At one point Davies dryly observed that I was from "across the pond", which I thought a good improv moment.) I don't know if people were relieved or frustrated that I took the lead on our conversation with Davies, but it was fun - and we were on the clock, someone had to do it.
As we collect the pieces of the Disruptor, it becomes evident that some of the group leaders, including Zoria, are Time Lords (for all we know, the same Time Lord, it's not impossible).
Apparently there are 14 separate plot streams during this section of the experience, and under different circumstances I'd very likely attend the show again, perhaps more than once, just to fill in some of the plot gaps. For example, only through online research did I discover that Brian, the Ood who is one of the group leaders, has been hired to kill Zoria - it's a tie-in with the Time Lord Victorious series, where Brian accompanies the 10th Doctor through most of his battle against the Kotturuh in the Dark Times. There's apparently also an extended subplot involving Davros, founder of the Daleks; Queen Elizabeth marries one of the volunteers; and River Song, played by Alex Kingston, makes an appearance at Torchwood via video.
I enjoyed this section quite a bit - for me, it was the most interesting
part of the event, and I wish there had been more of it. The actors do
a brilliant job, both in their performances and their timing. I can
only imagine the challenges of juggling three or four different
conversations and storylines as volunteers run in and out of rooms, and I
was quite impressed that Zoria got us back to Brolls exactly in time for
the auction of the last remaining piece of the Time Disruptor, just
before marauding Cybermen chased us out of the nexus.
And then they lost all the momentum and excitement that they'd built up by dumping us into a room where we sat for 35 minutes and listened to a blue lounge singer.
I don't know what was happening behind the scenes during that 35 minutes. Were they resetting the staging? Reloading the smoke machines in the Gallifrey High Council room? Changing costumes? Disinfecting the seats?
Whatever the reason or reasoning was, it was a mistake. Thirty-five minutes is far too long an interval: if you've only got 135 minutes in total, there's no desire to spend almost a quarter of your time cooling your heels in a space bar.
Admittedly, there were some bits of extraneous business in an attempt to liven things up - Zoria exchanges shots across the room with someone, and one of the group leaders convinces the captain of the ship to detour to Gallifrey, the home of the Time Lords, but really, it was 35 minutes of sitting and wondering what we were supposed to be doing.
We could see some of the volunteers exiting through the rear of the room, and finally the last of us were ushered out through a gauntlet of Weeping Angels to the chambers of the High Council of Gallifrey, already locked in debate as we enter the room.
With our support, the Council votes to resurrect Rassilon, the founder of the Time Lords. (Interestingly, research reveals that Rassilon resurrects as either male or female, depending on what day it is.) Reborn, Rassilon decides to detonate the Time Disruptor, ensuring Gallifrey's ascendance over all of time and space.
The Doctor shields the council chambers in an attempt to protect the rest of the universe from the temporal detonation, but the volunteers are able to use the residual artron energy that they've accumulated during the experience to defuse the Disruptor and save the universe. The volunteers return to UNIT to celebrate, and the experience comes to an end.
So, what would I have done to improve Time Fracture?
I would have told it as more of a unified story, gradually pulling all the threads together to bring everyone together on Gallifrey and giving the plotline more structure and closure so that everyone knows what's happening.
I would have skipped the lounge entirely, and brought each of the groups into the Council Chambers as a logical extension of the storyline - Zoria takes her Agents there after finding all the components of the Disruptor, the other Time Lords find out and pursue her, one of the other groups obtains the Crescent of Rassilon that Queen Elizabeth I is wearing as a crown and delivers it to to the High Council for the resurrection, Brian the Ood and his group pursue Zoria to Gallifrey for a climactic showdown - I'm even willing to have one group get there via the starship, albeit a lot faster than in the current arrangement.
I would have had Zoria be part of the Council - it's well and good that she runs away shouting that the Council will be sorry after they reject her, but it would have made so much more sense to involve her in the finale, rather than a bunch of Time Lords that we haven't seen. In fact, all the Time Lord group leaders should be part of the council, it would have tied things together more logically.
I can also think of half a dozen different ways to enhance things on the practical effects level. Many years ago, there was a 3D ride at the CN Tower in Toronto. At one point during the preparation for boarding the ship, a blast of air innoculated travellers for the trip - a simple idea but very effective, and that sort of effect would have greatly improved things at Time Fracture.
In the UNIT lab, we were told to brace ourselves several times, but nothing happened. Okay - if you can't afford a motion platform for the room (or don't want one for safety reasons), at least get some IMAX-level woofers with the kind of bass that make things vibrate.
Let's make the various time portals more, well, portally. Flashing lights are all very well and good, but let's put some fans in there, or jets of compressed air, rumbling bass sounds, something to make me feel like I'm going through a rift in time and space, rather than down a flight of stairs. Similarly, the portals between areas in the second part of the experience are heavy plastic slats and plastic tubes, something less prosaic would have enhanced the experience.**
A couple of small Van De Graff generators concealed close to the Time Disruptor would have made saving the universe more dramatic - good grief, a good disco ball would have made it more dramatic, or even some focused high powered lighting effects. As it was, it was hard to tell whether anything was actually happening or not during the climactic event of the experience, which is unfortunate. In fact, if I had to sum up that aspect of the show, it completely lacked any "wow" moments - wouldn't it have been better to have something happen that makes the audience gasp at the end?
I walked away with two t-shirts to commemorate Time Fracture - I do like a t-shirt - and some mild regret at the unrealized potential in the show. That being said, ultimately, I'm glad that I went. It was a unique experience, in spite of its shortcomings - and hey, we saved the universe!
- Sid
* Or will cause - wibbly wobbly, timey wimey.
** It's surprising that the doorways are so basic, considering how incredible the rest of the set is in terms of detail and quality. I suppose they wanted the doorways to be more durable than decorative, but they might have gone a bit too far in dumbing them down.
