SUMMARY
- Doctor Who’s “73 Yards” raises big questions with disappearing Doctor and older Ruby’s time travel mysteries.
- Unexplained Doctor’s disappearance and older Ruby’s appearance create plot holes in the episode’s timeline.
- Ambiguity remains about the impact of Ruby’s alternate lifetime and the fate of the enigmatic figure Susan Twist.
The latest Doctor Who episode, “73 Yards,” was brilliant and inventive but leaves behind several big unanswered questions. The episode focuses on Millie Gibson’s Ruby Sunday more than anyone in the Doctor Who season 14 cast, with Ncuti Gatwa’s Fifteenth Doctor disappearing for almost all of the adventure. However, “73 Yards” also includes the anticipated return of Jemma Redgrave’s Kate Stewart, the leader of Doctor Who’s UNIT.
Throughout the Doctor Who season 14 episode, Ruby faces a lifetime by herself because of an enigmatic woman following her everywhere she goes. This is a result of one misstep on a cliff in Wales, and the one small movement changes Ruby’s life completely. While the ending of Doctor Who’s “73 Yards” sees Ruby save the world from the most threatening Prime Minister in British history and the timeline of the episode essentially reversed, there is still some confusion about the events of Ruby’s bizarre life.
8 Why Did The Doctor Disappear?
The Time Lord Vanished With No Explanation
Within moments of stepping out of the TARDIS, the Doctor disappears and doesn’t return on-screen until the final minutes of the episode. After Ruby steps on the fairy circle, the two briefly speak, but the Doctor strangely vanishes with no explanation for his absence. No line of dialogue or action explains why the Doctor goes missing, either at the beginning or the end of the episode. There is also no good reason as to why the Time Lord isn’t at Ruby’s side.
Unless this detail is revealed at a later date, there is no known connection between the Doctor and the fairy circle. There’s no doubt that Ruby’s timeline changes at this moment, but it doesn’t impact the Doctor’s either. The Doctor isn’t taken, attacked, or even acknowledged properly in his split-second disappearance, and Ruby is left talking to herself mid-sentence. It’s not even clear whether the Doctor is elsewhere throughout the episode or if he just stops existing altogether. Although Doctor Who explains why Ncuti Gatwa isn’t in “73 Yards, the show fails to outline why the Doctor isn’t.
7 How Did Ruby Sunday Travel Back In Time As An Old Woman?
Ruby Is On Her Death Bed Then Mysteriously Appears In Her Own Past
In the climax of “73 Yards,” Ruby Sunday meets her end and embraces her final moments on her death bed. However, rather than slipping away naturally, she finds herself back on the cliff at the start of the episode, watching herself and the Doctor from a distance. But this scene isn’t really the same events as the beginning of “73 Yards,” as she distracts her younger self from stepping on the fairy circle and, once again, changes history.
Although this is a creative way for Doctor Who to reverse the alternative timeline, it does create a plot hole. How older Ruby appears on the cliff doesn’t make any sense. There is no supernatural or scientific explanation for her sudden appearance, like a teleport or time loop situation. Ruby simply pops from one place to another, which even confuses her. While the woman being an older Ruby is a solid idea, there are too many other questions that spawn from her existence.
6 Why Was Ruby Seeing Her Future Self Throughout Doctor Who’s “73 Yards?”
Ruby’s Older Self Followed Her Throughout Her Timeline
Ruby Sunday being stalked by her older self is an unusual concept, but the logistics behind how it’s executed is rather complicated. Older Ruby is always standing a certain distance away and cannot be seen any other way. However, the fact that older Ruby is following her past self raises several other questions: If she has already stepped on the fairy circle, what is future Ruby trying to achieve? Why follow herself and not “Mad Jack”? Older Ruby is supposedly at death’s door, so how does she survive for decades?
Clearly, older Ruby is trying to warn young Ruby about her future. But as she initially fails to do this, there seems to be little purpose as to why she’s persisting in her mission. Ruby continues to see the mysterious woman after she sends Roger ap Gwilliam packing. It seems unlikely that older Ruby is directing her past self to stop Doctor Who season 14’s evil Prime Minister, so her actual plan appears to be still under wraps.
5 What Was Old Ruby Saying To Scare Everyone Away?
The Words “Don’t Step” Shouldn’t Make Everyone Scream
Another issue with older Ruby is how she scares everyone who speaks to her, making them sprint away screaming and shouting. At the end of the episode, older Ruby desperately utters the words “Don’t step” again and again. However, this statement can’t be the same as what caused so many people to turn against Ruby. When she causes Carla to abandon Ruby, her daughter struggles to hear what the old woman is saying over the phone. Doctor Who doesn’t do something like this without reason, which makes older Ruby’s haunting words even more interesting.
Whatever she says is clearly awful. Her words make Carla put out an injunction on her own daughter and say some horrific things to Ruby. Although Ruby’s mysteries in Doctor Who are intriguing and likely to pay off later on, it’s still baffling that she ruins her own past. There are also her weird hand movements. Older Ruby is always moving in the same way, as if she’s repeating the same thing and stuck in a loop. It’s unknown as to what Ruby is saying throughout the episode, but there’s no logical explanation as to why “Don’t step” petrifies everyone.
4 What Happens To Older Ruby At The End Of 73 Yards?
The Elderly Version Of The Character’s Fate Is Unknown
After Ruby avoids stepping on the fairy circle at the end of “73 Yards,” she and the Doctor walk away unscathed and ready for their next adventure. However, there is no conclusion about the fate of the woman who spends the whole episode lurking around Ruby. Older Ruby changes history but then is nowhere to be seen. It makes sense that she vanishes to a certain degree, as her timeline never happens. However, because the events of the episode cancel out, there isn’t anyone to stop Ruby from stepping on the fairy circle in the first place.
Ruby and the Doctor avoiding ruining the mythological structure may be a simple coincidence, but there isn’t really such a thing in Doctor Who. The show doesn’t set this up without a purpose, so it seems unlikely that the future Ruby isn’t still around in some form or another.Ruby’s story in “73 Yards” relies on two versions of her for the events to play out, and according to the rules of sci-fi, removing her future self should be either impossible or cause the episode’s storyline to repeat itself endlessly.
3 Was The Fairy Circle’s “Mad Jack” Connected To Roger Ap Gwilliam?
The Villain Of “73 Yards” Receives Very Little Backstory
Although Doctor Who implies that Mad Jack is Roger ap Gwilliam, the show never actually confirms it. It’s wildly coincidental that the Doctor brings the politician up and mentions his nuclear launch code controversy, only for Ruby to find the perfect opportunity to change the course of history. However, when older Ruby’s secretive words cause Gwilliam to resign and fade from the public eye, nothing happens. Ruby’s timeline remains the same, and she lives to an elderly age. But at the end of “73 Yards,” the Doctor once again mentions Gwilliam, suggesting that certain events of the episode still happen.
Considering the emphasis on the Pantheon in Doctor Who, both Mad Jack and Gwilliam may be connected to the villainous group, regardless of whether they’re somehow the same person. Because Mad Jack’s fairy circle survives Ruby’s blunder, yet Gwilliam is still a part of history, something doesn’t quite add up. The Pantheon operates outside of the laws of the universe, so there’s a chance that Mad Jack is Gwilliam but escapes from a timeline that never happens in some way.
2 Was “73 Yards” Undone & Does Ruby Remember It?
The Outcome Of Ruby’s Alternative Lifetime Is Unclear
Whether Ruby’s life throughout the episode is still real or not is ambiguous. Although she and the Doctor happily wander away from Mad Jack’s fairy circle with no clue as to what happened, it’s clear that remnants of Ruby’s memories are still present. When they exit the TARDIS, Ruby tells the Doctor she’s visited Wales three times, whereas previously, it’s only twice. The Doctor questions the third occasion, and Ruby looks puzzled but states that “it must’ve been now,” believing she misspoke. However, Ruby’s facial expression shows that her alternate timeline is still lingering in some parts of her mind.
If the Doctor still knows about Roger ap Gwilliam, then that means the Welsh Prime Minister still exists. The Doctor brings him up in the exact same way the second time, notably that Gwilliam is known as “terrifying.” In theory, the two Gwilliams that the Doctor mentions at the beginning and end of “73 Yards” are guilty of the same injustice and so are the same person. Ruby also hears the echo of the Doctor’s first statement about Gwilliam during the second, so she must remember in some way. While complicated, the two timelines are more similar than they seem.
1 Why Does Susan Twist Have Such A Notable Appearance?
Doctor Who Season 14’s Enigmatic Figure Finally Interacts With Ruby In “73 Yards”
Doctor Who’s Susan Twist appears in every episode so far, but always in a different context. Including her debut as Mrs. Merridrew in “Wild Blue Yonder,” Susan Twist also pops up several times in Doctor Who season 14: in the audience of Ruby’s concert, as part of a recording in “Space Babies,” as a tea lady in the 1960s, and also as the face of the Villengard’s ambulance AI. However, Doctor Who teases Susan Twist’s real character in “73 Yards,” although there are still very few details about who she is.
There is a connection between Twist and the Doctor and Ruby that is yet to be uncovered. As she appears in different points of time and space in Doctor Who, much like Clara Oswald’s “Impossible Girl” storyline, it’s odd that Twist isn’t immune to older Ruby. Twist’s role and purpose in each episode so far are harmless, but her suddenly having more screen time and dialogue in “73 Yards” implies there is a reason for this. Twist appears more than once in the present day for Ruby, so perhaps the character also originates from the same time period.
