It helps to start there, with the writer herself. Nina Metivier. She was actually around behind the scenes as a script editor for Series 11, tweaking both The Woman Who Fell To Earth and It Takes You Away. Both good episodes (ITYA being slightly better and on great tier), so whatever she did to make them consistent paid off. It's the former job I want to bring up in parallel to this, because I feel that it's key to understanding the main driving theme of Metivier's first Doctor Who script. The Woman Who Fell To Earth had many elements to it, key of which was defining the 13th Doctor. The episode itself settled on this sort of steampunk inventor archetype, and you got Jodie Whittaker wearing goggles and gloves while using Stenza tech and Sheffield steel to hash out her new sonic screwdriver. The idea of Whittaker as this clever handywoman has popped up here and there as her era has gone on, but it's that specific trait of hers that Metivier has locked on to as the theme of her episode. Every idea starts as a stray thought, a simple little seed that a good writer can water with creativity and trim with editing. I can almost see the idea seeds that Metivier's episodes would grow into. Simple thoughts while brainstorming like "Ooh, in her first episode, she was sort of a clever inventor, I should make a story about that" or "She should meet another famous inventor from history, that would be a neat parallel". Ideas like that, and consistency like Woman Who Fell To Earth or It Takes You Away, get you an episode like Nikola Tesla's Night Of Terror. It's brilliant, it has a point, and let's talk about that point.Inventing, and paralleling. Oh hell. Let's just go all out and call it what it is. Mirroring. You've got not one, but two famous inventors from the turn of the 20th century interacting with the 13th Doctor, a steampunk inventor type in her own right. I don't know if Metivier was a Tesla expert before writing this, but it appears she's done her homework on the history of the man. I can't speak to this, but my Who podcast co-host Kat is a huge Tesla fangirl, and gushed at great length about what Metivier got right. Key among her observations, and one I want to borrow, is that the actual Nikola Tesla acted a lot like the character of the Doctor. Clever, charismatic in a room full of people, but with a sense of sadness to him. Yeah. That's the Doctor! Hell, you've got Tesla's secretary in the episode, Dorothy Skerrit. Loyal to Tesla, gets caught up in alien adventures, helps the man as he does clever science shit to save the day... if Tesla is a mirror to the Doctor, then Dorothy Skerrit is his companion. The point at which all this started to come together for me is the scene where Tesla and the Doctor talk in his lab about inventing, and Tesla finally has someone who seems to understand the world the way he does. Tesla as a visionary of the future, and the Doctor literally from that future. It's beautiful, and it's a strong theme which resonates through the rest of the episode, thanks to Metivier's artistry of consistency.
That becomes clearer when you get to the antagonists; one far less hostile and murderous than the other. Thomas Edison, like Tesla and the Doctor, is an inventor. Unlike them, his motivation lies more on the capitalist side. He's got a whole team of guys and he's getting patents left and right, and it's all a business enterprise to him. Crucially, though, he's still not nearly as bad as the villains of the episode. There's a difference between Edison's antagonism with Tesla, and the villainy of the alien Skithra. Nevertheless, they do mirror each other in some ways. As framed in the episode (I can't say anything about the real Edison), both Edison and the Skithra are in it for themselves rather than changing the world. The Skithra are presented as bigger villains, and not just because of all the murder. They do not invent. They scavenge and steal technology for their own purposes, and don't understand how it works to such a degree that they want to kidnap Tesla to fix all their broken-down shit for them. The Doctor, an inventor herself, is absolutely appalled at this mentality, the idea of scavenging and stealing shit you didn't make. (A quick awkward aside that doesn't ruin the episode, but does make you go "oof": just how did the Doctor come into possession of that TARDIS again?) It's consistent theming that works with the episode, and the Skithra are pretty fun for a one-and-done.
Yeah. That's about all I have for this one. It's very good! On our podcast I called it top three Whittaker era material, and I'll stand by that. (It Takes You Away and Demons Of The Punjab being the other two.) Not only is it a fun action romp with lots of running around and shit exploding and giant alien scorpions crashing into shit, but it has a powerful theme that was well-considered and given enough time to permeate every facet of the episode. It really works! It's one hell of a first Doctor Who script for Metivier, and I really hope she comes back to give us some more stuff. If not that, then at least script edit some stuff and help trim the fat to give an episode consistency. Either way, I loved it and can call it the best episode of Series 12 so far. Oh, and neither Tesla nor Edison got their minds wipe in a "MUST PWESERVE HISTOWY UWU" bullshit manner, SUCK ON THAT SPYFALL PART 2 NINA METIVIER KNOWS HOW TO FUCKING WRITE
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