TV Review Doctor Who Rosa

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Spoiler alerts A very daring TV episode in which the travellers witness the Civil rights Movement in 1955 and in particular the refusal by Rosa Parks, to vacate a bus seat in favour of white passengers in Montgomery, Alabama. The Doctor and companions prevent a rogue and racist time traveler from preventing the event, and face no choice but to sit back not interfering as Rosa makes her brave challenge and gets arrested, knowing this will help destroy the hateful Apartheid of the period. Vinette Robinson is perfectly cast as Rosa. Martin Luther King is only given the briefest of scenes. The Doctor having a young, proud black assistant and a Pakistani girl on her team too, makes the episode more poignant and powerful. The youngsters get a poweful scene together iscussing the kin of racism they have both endured in their own Our own time, now) A lovely episode in every respect. I was wondering how they might do it without just doing a history episode. Keeping the time travel disruption guy quite low key enabled them to show the actual events with all due gravitas and respect, with Team TARDIS clearly uncomfortable about just letting the event unfold as they had to, without giving in to any instinct for intervention. The companions were well used here, and each played a strong role in keeping events on track. I would have liked to have known more about the time-crook guy and I wouldn't be surprised if he returns from wherever he ended up at some point. This was very much Rosa's story and it deserved to be. Though it had alien elements it felt like a very authentic slice of history. As I thought before even seeing this it was very brave story telling as getting this wrong might have been a critical problem but the episode works perfectly. Arthur Chappell