Turn Left

TURN LEFT

EPISODE: 201
AIR DATE: June 21, 2008
VILLIANS: Fortune Teller
ALIENS/MONSTERS: Tricksters Brigade
OTHER CHARACTERS: Rose Tyler, Wilf, Sylvia, Capt. Magambo, UNIT
LOCATION: Shan Shen; London 2009
PLOT:

Donna’s entire world collapses, but there’s no sign of the Doctor. Instead, she finds help from a mysterious blonde woman – a traveller from a parallel universe. But, as Donna and Rose Tyler combine forces, are they too late to save the whole of creation from the approaching darkness?

The Doctor and Donna are on the Chino-planet of Shan Shen, and are mixing with the locals. Donna wanders away from the Doctor to explore. A mysterious Chinese figure (Chipo Chung) tempts Donna with a reading that is 'free for people with red hair'. The fortune teller searches Donna's past for a single event. This event is where Donna and her mother are in a car at a T-junction arguing about her future. Sylvia is trying to persuade Donna to turn right and go to an interview; Donna turns left in defiance. As the fortune teller attempts to persuade Donna to turn right, something crawls onto Donna's back. Finally, under the fortune teller's persuasion, Donna turns right and alters the course of her life as well as the future of all existence.

Donna is removed from meeting the Doctor. It is Christmas Eve 2006. Suddenly, one of Donna's friends starts looking at her back. The Racnoss Webstar appears. When the army destroys it, Donna finds a hospital van, and a group of UNIT trucks. She overhears a UNIT officer telling someone that they found a body. A hand drops out of a bodybag and drops a Sonic Screwdriver. The UNIT officer says "The Doctor's dead. Must've happened too fast for him to Regenerate." The Doctor's body is bundled into the van. As Donna walks away, a blond figure suddenly appears: the Doctor's former companion Rose Tyler. Donna tells her they found the Doctor's body. Rose keeps looking at Donna's back, then disappears.

Weeks on, the Royal Hope Hospital is mysteriously pulled out of the ground. When it returns, it is revealed that everyone inside died, and only one person survived. It is revealed that the hospital was invaded by talking rhinos (Judoon) and that they were running out of air. It is revealed that Martha Jones died after giving the medic the last oxygen tank. The MRI machine was about to explode. It is revealed that Sarah Jane Smith managed to stop it, but in the process she, her teenage son Luke, and her teenage friends Maria Jackson and Clyde Langer died.

On Christmas Day 2007, a replica of the Titanic is reported to be heading straight for Buckingham Palace. It crashes, and causes a nuclear explosion that obliterates London. Donna, Wilf and Sylvia are forced to move to Leeds. A soldier again notices something on Donna's back and holds her at gunpoint, but is released when nothing is apparently there. The United States pledges to help Britain with monetary relief but then goes into their own crisis when the Adipose wipe out much of their population. Donna wakes up to find soldiers gunning at cars when the Sontarans activate the ATMOS devices, covering the earth with a poison fog. That night, Donna meets Rose again. Suddenly, the sky is cleared by an atmospheric converter. Rose reveals that Torchwood team members have given their lives to achieve this: Gwen Cooper and Ianto Jones, while Captain Jack Harkness has been transported to the Sontaran homeworld. Rose then tells Donna that the darkness is coming, but will not tell Donna her name. Donna tries to walk away, but Rose then tells Donna that she will have to go with her when she is ready and that she has three weeks to decide. Rose warns Donna that when she comes with her, Donna will die. Then she vanishes.

When Donna and Wilf look through Wilf's telescope, they are shocked to see the stars going out. Donna then tells Rose she is ready. Rose takes Donna to UNIT via jeep. Rose switches on a light which reveals what is on Donna's back: a 'Time Beetle'. Donna is horrified and the light is turned off. Rose then shows Donna the TARDIS, which is dying after the Doctor's death. Rose tells Donna she must go back in time to make Donna in the car turn left not right. Donna lands- half a mile away. She tries to run to herself, but running out of time she steps out in front of a lorry and sacrifices herself to jam the path to the right. Rose appears beside Donna, and whispers two words in her ear. Traffic builds up and Donna in the car decides to turn left. At once, everything that has happened since Donna turned right is undone. The beetle falls off Donna's back and the fortune teller runs away. Donna is reunited with the Doctor.

The Doctor tells Donna that the beetle is part of the Trickster's Brigade. The Doctor tells Donna that she seems to be surrounded by unique coincidences and that they seem to be somehow bound together. Donna tells the Doctor she is nothing special. The Doctor tells her she is "brilliant" and Donna realizes that Rose said exactly the same thing. She tells the Doctor about Rose, and that she didn't say her name. Donna tells the Doctor she whispered two words in her ear: Bad Wolf. The Doctor is horror-struck, and runs out to find Bad Wolf written everywhere - even on the TARDIS. Inside the TARDIS itself, the control room is glowing red and the Cloister Bell is ringing ominously. Donna asks The Doctor what Bad Wolf means and he tells her that Bad Wolf means "the end of the universe".