GALLERY

CAST

Regular Cast

Russell Tovey (Barclay Pierre-Dupont), Gugu Mbatha-Raw (Salt), Jemma Redgrave (Kate Lethbridge-Stewart), Colin McFarlane (General Austin Pierce), Rodo Gener (Agustin), Cat Gannon (Kirby Pierre-Dupont), Francesca Corney (Sergeant Hana Chakri), Ann Akinjirin (Barbara Pierre-Dupont), Hannah Donaldson (Captain Louise Mackie), Henry Nott (Corporal Pip Morgan), Waleed Hammad (Colonel Tariq Hashim), Mei Mac (Min Tso), Fia Hadeed (Private Bushra Abdallah), Catherine Garton (Corporal Jane Hart), George Robinson (Steve Chesney), Jennifer Jones (BBC Newsreader), Edward Wu (Chinese Newsreader), Lachele Carl (Trinity Wells), Stewart Alexander (General Oscar Gunsberg), Barbara Probst (General Dominique Dussolier), Ruth Madeley (Shirley Bingham), Vincent Franklin (Prime Minister Harry Shaw), Alexander Devrient (Colonel Christofer Ibrahim), Adrian Lukis (Sir Jonathan Hynes), Delroy Brown (Jackson St Lewis), Leo Anthony (Roger Trevithick), Gethin Alderman (Homo Aqua), Charles Sandford (Homo Aqua), Russell T Davies (Idea Originator)

CREW

SYPNOSIS

Barclay’s ordinary life becomes a world of terror when an ancient species rises from the sea. As UNIT fights for control, the summit on the Thames reveals terrifying secrets.

PLOT

Off the Spanish coast, a fisherman throws a plastic bottle overboard before helping his crew bring aboard their latest haul of fish. The crew hears a screeching from a creature within the netted haul, and he readies a rifle in a panic. As the creature – a Homospondyl Erectus – breaks free from the net, he fires at it.

Sometime later, in London, Barclay Pierre-Dupont is awoken in the middle of the night by his UNIT-issued mobile phone. Waking up his child, Kirby Pierre-Dupont, he rushes them to get dressed under the pretence that he has been summoned to Scotland to deal with an oil spill, and tells them that he has to drop them off with their mother.

Outside, at Barclay’s insistence, they both get into a car with Sergeant Hana Chakri and quickly head to Barbara Pierre-Dupont’s house in Fulham where he drops off Kirby, to Barbara’s slight annoyance. As Barclay and Hana continue on their way, Hana explains to Barclay that he has been assigned to the mission “to replace someone called Roger Trevithick” because he is on another mission at present.

Arriving at an aircraft hangar, the pair are greeted by General Austin Pierce and taken aboard a plane, where the general explains that the plane will proceed to Cabrera from where they will be picked up and moved to the location of their assignment: a village called Cala Escondida on the island of Dragonera.

Everyone assigned begins examining their mission briefing on the journey, apart from Barclay, who finds himself unable to access it. He confides in Pip Morgan that he has been put on the mission due to a long-standing issue in UNIT’s Human Resources department where he is constantly marked as Roger Trevithick’s replacement due to a one-off incident where Barclay covered Trevithick’s phone calls when he rushed away to see his wife during a premature birth.

Though Barclay tries to get himself out of the situation by explaining that he works in transport and only has a very low security clearance, Pip panics and refuses to speak to him any further, fearful that he has already said and shown too much to Barclay about the mission.

Arriving on the island, the team are then taken to Cala Escondida by helicopter, where UNIT soldiers have set up an encampment across the coastline. After arriving at a building at the edge of the village, and going through a decontamination process, the team meet with Colonel Tariq Hashim who shows them the body of the dead Homospondyl Erectus shot by the Spanish fishermen. Colonel Hashim explains that the fishermen brought it back to the village and strung it up on the wall in hopes of making money out of it as an attraction of sorts.

As General Pierce expects, UNIT scientist Min Tso has already discovered a pearl on the corpse at the base of the neck, though her examinations have given no clear indication of its purpose despite it being a feature of all Homospondyls that UNIT has previously encountered. Min returns the pearl to the corpse, and General Pierce sends everyone off on various tasks. Before Barclay leaves to follow the general, he takes a moment to stop in front of the Homospondyls’ body and crosses himself as a mark of respect for the dead creature.

Out on the clifftops, Barclay helps set up a signalling translation pulse to call in other Homospondyls whilst General Pierce and Colonel Hashim discuss the possibility that an underwater avalanche few years prior is a sign of the gradual reawakening of these creatures (whom General Pierce instead insists on referring to as “Homo Aqua”).

Whilst most of the team goes to sleep for the night, Pip is put on night-guard around the body of the dead Homospondyl alongside Private Bushra Abdallah. During this night-guard, other Homospondyls arrive, liquifying the ground below the pair to retrieve their fallen comrade and enact revenge, first submerging Bushra and then dragging down Pip whilst he tries to help Bushra and radio for help.

A flicker of Pip’s radio transmission makes it through to the rest of the camp and everyone is put on alarm, and rushed into action. General Pierce and company, including Barclay, rush back to the room where the body was being kept to discover the room empty with a solid floor. Upon continued attempts to radio the two soldiers, General Pierce realises that Pip’s radio is in the floor below them. Scrabbling at the ground, he breaks away enough of the floor to discover the head of a now-dead Pip, effectively buried alive by the re-solidification.

Out on the coastline, the general tries to reassure Barclay about the recent deaths whilst Barclay once again explains that he shouldn’t be on the mission. This is met with the response that UNIT protocol dictates that “at times of historical, political or cultural impact, a member of the civilian staff must stand alongside the military as witness” – effectively onboarding Barclay to the mission in a new role, before leaving Barclay and Hana alone.

Hana confesses her frustration that Barclay has so easily made it onto the team, which Barclay understands, before he notes that despite his lack of qualifications, he has previously met the Doctor briefly, and it remains a key part of his everyday thoughts. Hana then explains to Barclay about Aquakind’s existence, their previous ownership of the planet, and UNIT’s role in keeping knowledge about them under wraps.

Their conversation is interrupted by the emergence of another Homospondyl along the coast, with whom General Pierce – via the assistance of translation technology devised by UNIT scientist Steve Chesney – negotiates for talks of peaceful settlement. The Homospondyl, backed up by a swarm of others, agrees this but insists that “We all talk to all humans.”

The entire base suddenly receives alerts from their phone, insisting that they return to base, as all over the world, Homospondyls emerge from the sea, revealing themselves to everyone. The President calls for an H2O Diplomacy initiative, and work is put into place to build a Waterway leading into Imperial House, where the peace discussions will be held.

At Barbara’s home, Barclay fills her in on days he will be unable to see Kirby, and tries to pass this off as the result of a simple promotion at work before sending three thousand pounds to her bank account.

Barclay then arrives with the many other peace delegates at the Empress Hall, whilst Kate Lethbridge-Stewart co-ordinates from a separate room in Empress House; having been selected as a government-neutral organisation capable of leading the peace talks without such biases. Kate also confirms with Prime Minister Harry Shaw that Downing Street has a link-up camera view of the hall.

Roger Trevithick bursts into the hall, shouting furiously at Barclay, declaring that it is all his fault that he is not being authorised to be present for the talks, before being apprehended and forced out of the room whilst a bemused Barclay watches. After a brief malfunction with one of the seals that Jackson St Lewis resolves, The Waterway is then opened to allow Aquakind delegates into Empress House.

To UNIT’s surprise, as well as four Homospondyls, other creatures arrive. Two of which Min Tso dubs as “Piscimorpha Grandis”, and the last of which – leader of the delegation, Salt – is dubbed as “Homomorpha Sapiens, or to simplify, Homo Amphibian”.

The assigned ambassador, Sir Jonathan Hynes begins to speak, but is stopped by Salt who explains in English that translation will not be required, and then in Russian that they have learnt all of humanity’s languages. Sir Hynes then offers a gift to the delegates – a plant called Rhodenron Nivale.

Salt responds with her own “gift” – the dead eggs of her unhatched children – and explains that they did not survive because of humanity’s pollution. Salt then follows this by refusing Sir Hynes as an ambassador, and insists that she will speak with only one person: Barclay.

Whilst Kate, Shirley and Ibrahim panic about this decision and scramble for intel reports on Barclay, Salt explains that they are aware of his gesture of respect towards the dead Homospondyl when he was at Cala Escondida. Salt asks Barclay if he will stand as humanity’s ambassador, and a bemused but brave Barclay responds: “Okay.”

NOTES

In The Witch of the Waterfall, an obituary is dated 22 October. The preceding episodes take place over a matter of days.
Liam was, at the least, the performer who portrayed the Homo Aqua who emerged from under the water in this episode. Lisa Gledhill in DWM 625 notes this being due to him being a trained stunt performer.
This was the first DWU television story since The Power of the Doctor not to feature the Whoniverse ident in the UK.

Worldbuilding
Individuals

Clive, Kalisha and Stanley are at Barbara’s party when Barclay drops Kirby off.

Locations

Dragonera Island is located on the Mediterranean. Cala Escondida is a village on the island.

Science

The pearl embedded in the Homospondyl is made of calcium carbonate; 60% aragonite and 40% calcite.

Culture

The fishermen listen to “Dale Don Dale”.
Barclay jokes that “Homo Aqua” means “gay water”.

Filming locations

Mallorca, Spain – Dragonera Island

TRAILER