We finally find out who "Missy" is. For those of you that knew it was the Master, congratulations you win. For those of us who were praying it was not the Master, we loose. Talk about taking an easy way out. Steven Moffat had so many interesting characters to chose from to reveal as Missy and he picked the most obvious one. The Rani, Romana, Susan and even the Tardis herself would all have been better choices then the Master. It was such a let down. Why did he chose the Master? I really think that Moffat wants to have a female Doctor. This is his way of testing the waters, or should i say testing the Dark Waters. There have been lots of hints of a female Doctor, that I think it's inevitable. Which makes me wanna weep with sadness. I'm in the camp of not wanting a female Doctor. It doesn't make sense that a Time Lord can change gender. It would ruin all family life on Gallifrey. Lets say you are female Time Lord married to a male Time Lord and you have 2 Time Lord kids. Then all of a sudden your husband regenerates into a woman. Talk about throwing a monkey wrench into that family dynamics. How would you explain that to the kids? Would you still love your husband? I just can't see the Doctor as a female, unless he's really been struggling with his gender indentiy. In that case, change away.
The Cybermen are back, thanks to the Master, and along with the Master are planning to change every person on Earth, dead or alive, into a Cyberman. All of this to make the Doctor have his own army and then he would realize that he and the Master are not so different. We kind of already know that they are very similar. The Doctor and Master have teamed up on multiple occasions to stop a common enemy. It's just the Master at the end, wants to be in charge and the Doctor likes to go on his merry way. These Cybermen are really kind of boring. They mostly just walk around aimlessly and not even attacking people. I guess that's what happens when you don't have a Cybercontroller. The real Cuybermen were probably embarrassed the way these fake Cybermen behaved. They kind of reminded me of Zombies, except they had no appetite.
There were a couple consequences of the dead becoming Cybermen. First, the Brigadier comes back from the dead as a Cyberman and shoots the Master. Even though it didn't feel like the Brigadier, it still brought a tear or two to my eye. Oh, how much do I miss the way the Doctor and the Brigadier would banter back and forth. It got me thinking about who else is now alive as a Cyberman. Sarah Jane would be the first one to come to my mind. The Cyber Brigadier and Cyber Sarah Jane flying around and solving mysteries. Sounds like fun. The other event that happened was that Clara's boyfriend, Danny Pink, is turned into a Cybermen and is in control of the other Cybermen. Seeing Danny trying to convince Clara to turn off his emotions, was kind of heart warming. I was never a fan of Danny, but that was by far his best moment in Dr Who.
We also finally learn what the after-life or the promise land really is. Danny is guided through their after-life by the best character in this whole serial, "Seb". Seb was hilarious. I actually hope that Seb is real, when I die. I would love to get a guided tour of Heaven by him. He really was the bright star in both episodes. Speaking of after-life, I really liked the whole idea that the dead can feel what their bodies are going through. This made more sense to me then the whole cyberpollen idea. I wished they would have explored this more. Even though the Master created this matrix to house the dead souls, they didn't shoot down the idea of the dead feeling what their bodies feel once they are dead. This idea did upset some people who complained to the BBC. I thought the idea was fresh and followed the theme that Moffat created all season of challenging our accepted views and beliefs.
So, what did I think of the episode? It was just ok. Nothing too special and not even the best episode of the season. It kind of reminded me of Matt Smith's first season finally, "The Big Bang", which was kind of disappointing. Hopefully Capaldi's Doctor will keep getting better, just like Matt Smith's did. So for that being said, I give "Dark Water" & "Death in Heaven" a 2.5 Tardis's out of 5.See you on Christmas.