It turns out the mystery of Mrs. Flood was only the start as last night’s exposition-heavy penultimate episode of this season of “Doctor Who” teased the return of another iconic villain from the classic era of the series – pulling off an even bigger ‘return’ than last year’s Sutekh.
A post-credits scene for the sixth episode saw Mrs. Flood (Anita Dobson) revealed as the Time Lady, The Rani, who regenerated with the new The Rani (Archie Panjabi). Together, the pair and their ‘companion’ Conrad (Jonah-Hauer King) served as the foils for much of the episode.
An overly elaborate scheme involving the baby God of Wishes and the creation a false world which they subsequently and deliberately collapse was all in aid of only one thing – to break reality enough to access the ‘underverse’ and bring back ‘The One Who Is Lost’ who is revealed to be none other than Omega.
In “Doctor Who” lore, Omega was one of the founding members of Time Lord society alongside Rassilon. A stellar engineer, he was the one who detonated a star with the resulting singularity serving as the power source allowing Gallifrey’s indigenous population to time travel.
In doing so, he fell through a black hole into an anti-matter universe. Countless millennia later, what was left was a being sustained by pure will and a desire for revenge against the Time Lords who thought him dead.
Omega appeared in several classic “Doctor Who” episodes, most notably he was the antagonist of the first ever multiple Doctor crossover special “The Three Doctors”. He then re-appeared with a very different look in a Peter Davidson-era story where he was banished back to his alternate universe.
Now he returns, four decades later, but in what capacity? A trailer for next week’s episode indicates The Rani, ever the scientist, has plans to use his body to reconstruct the Gallifrey that The Master wiped out.
How will all this resolve? Will we see more with The Doctor’s granddaughter Susan and Jonathan Groff’s bounty hunter Rogue? The season finale airs May 31st on The BBC and the Disney+ service.
