Editor's Note: The below recap contains spoilers for Doctor Who Season 1, Episode 1, "Space Babies."

The Big Picture

• Ncuti Gatwa infuses even the most ridiculous scenarios with sincerity, grounding the wild adventures.
• Millie Gibson shines as Ruby Sunday, proving to be a strong and worthy companion to the Doctor.
• Russell T Davies excels in turning ordinary people like Golda Rosheuvel's hero into extraordinary figures worth cheering for.

Whether you call it Series 14 or Season 1, Doctor Who has returned with a new Doctor and companion duo fit for a new era. With showrunner Russell T Davies back in the driver's seat, the first episode, titled "Space Babies," serves as an entry point for new viewers — and the first season available to stream worldwide on Disney+. In addition to introducing Ruby Sunday, and by extension the audience, to the Doctor and the TARDIS, "Space Babies" sets up what will likely be a season-long mystery and delivers a front-row seat to a wildly fun adventure.

Following their impromptu run-in with a horde of goblins back at Christmastime, this episode serves as Ruby (Millie Gibson) and the Doctor's (Ncuti Gatwa) first off-world adventure with each other. In classic Doctor Who fashion, "Space Babies" is as silly as it is serious, and despite its outlandish concept, the episode delivers moments of horror, tense action sequences, and even a hilarious happy ending.

'Doctor Who' Formally Introduces One of the Franchise's Best Duos in Years

The episode picks up just moments after the end of the Christmas special, "The Church on Ruby Road," as Ruby joins the Doctor in the TARDIS. Gatwa's Doctor, with an unparalleled amount of rizz, delivers the quick and dirty breakdown of his standard backstory — he's the last of the Time Lords from the destroyed planet Gallifrey, and he travels the universe in his bigger-on-the-inside blue box. To prove that they can go anywhere (and any when), the Doctor takes Ruby to the middle of Wyoming at the height of the Jurassic era to show her the dinosaurs — and really flex the show's new and improved budget. Doctor Who gets delightfully meta in this sequence as Ruby accidentally alters the course of history by stepping on a butterfly, immediately after verbally worrying about doing so. And as much as I love Rubathon Blue of the 57th Hemisphere Hatchling, the Doctor thankfully breathes life back into the little insect and time goes back to normal.

Gatwa and Gibson's chemistry is immediately off to the races once they pile back into the TARDIS and Ruby picks a year in the distant future to fly off to. While continuing to learn about how time travel works, Ruby uses Star Trek to contextualize being transported to a different place. Doctor Who has mentioned its fellow long-running sci-fi franchise many times in the past, but this is the first time that the Doctor refers to the series as if it really happened — the historical documents, if you will (thanks, Galaxy Quest). Set to more of Murray Gold's gorgeous score, Ruby and the Doctor stumble head-first into an encounter with a terrifying fanged creature in the depths of the space station they've landed on. The scene is tempered with humor as the Doctor and Ruby squeeze into an escape tube and find safety — and babies galore — above.

Mistaken for "mommy and daddy," Ruby and the Doctor are greeted by a whole crew of babies, running a baby farm and seemingly abandoned by their parents. While the talking toddlers are certainly a little bit silly, Gatwa makes it work beautifully. The Doctor is both endlessly kind and deeply haunted, and he takes all of that experience to make these children feel seen and cared for exactly as they are. Davies also ties in some "Timeless Child" lore by further establishing the Doctor's unique and unknown origins. And his history — or lack thereof — continues to link him to Ruby as time somehow slips the two of them back to the night of her birth with snow falling around them in space and the Doctor's memory of the night's events changing. The episode doesn't dwell on the moment too long, but this new piece of the puzzle points to the possibility that something is still in flux about Ruby's birth.

We're promptly treated to another clue, as the mystery woman from "Wild Blue Yonder" and "The Church on Ruby Road" appears in a video of the ship's crew members dissenting about their mandated evacuation of the ship. No longer Mrs. Merridew or a drunk in a bar, she's now a comms officer called Gina Scalzi. While we see her, the Doctor has already moved on to the next problem, keeping her just adjacent to him but never in his line of sight. While it's still hardly clear who or what she is, it's clear that her appearance wherever the Doctor goes is no longer a coincidence.

'Doctor Who' Turns Reality Into a Fairytale

While the babies are magically capable of running the ship on their own, it becomes apparent that they haven't been totally abandoned. One of the best things about Davies' writing is how he turns ordinary people into heroes, because ordinary people become heroes every day. Enter Jocelyn Sancerre aka Nan-E, played by the incomparable Golda Rosheuvel (Bridgerton). With a dig at pro-lifers, the tragedy of the birthing station becomes apparent as the government both abandoned the children but refused to turn the baby machine off, and Jocelyn has been their only hope for the past six years.

While they're within shouting distance of a refugee planet, they seemingly don't have a way to get there, and Davies throws in another biting critique of the government, having Jocelyn point out the irony of refugees having to rescue themselves. That swiftly becomes a problem for later, though, when one of the babies decides to take on the Boogeyman on his own, inspired by Ruby's bravery. Gibson really gets a chance to shine here as Ruby doesn't even hesitate or wait for the Doctor before she jumps into action to go save the kid. From the moment she darts into the depths of the ship and starts chaotically drawing the Boogeyman away from the baby, it's almost impossible not to love Ruby. With the babies sent safely back to the upper levels, Ruby continues to prove she's more than worth her salt. When the Doctor tries to send her away so he can go all self-sacrificial, Ruby does her predecessors proud and practically laughs in his face (with love!) and jauntily leads the way into the creature's lair.

In the belly of the beast, Ruby gets Nickelodeon slimed with what later turns out to be literal boogers. She and the Doctor bounce ideas back and forth as they put the whole story together and discover that the machine created both the babies and the monster in a twisted sort of space fairytale. It's worth noting that part of the reason the creature is so frightening is that it's literally designed to be scary, with its roar calibrated to the exact pitch to strike fear into anyone who hears it. The episode's climax runs the full gamut of human emotion as Ruby and the Doctor now have to fight Jocelyn to also rescue the Boogeyman. In the hands of a lesser actor, it could become ridiculous to watch the Doctor risk his life to save a monster made of actual boogers, but Gatwa's sincerity makes it believable. Gibson also gets another really lovely moment as she helps Jocelyn realize she doesn't have to kill the creature to save the babies. The mission is capped off with one last joke as the Doctor sends the space station flying toward the refugee planet with a giant fart.

'Doctor Who's New Season-Long Mystery: Who Is Ruby Sunday?

With the day effectively saved, the Doctor is already ready to make Ruby his long-term companion by giving her her own TARDIS key. It's a right of passage that Davies always included for each companion, and one that Ruby has absolutely earned already. However, traveling with the Doctor naturally comes with a few terms and conditions. Knowing that Ruby's biggest desire is to find her birth mother, the Doctor has to break her heart almost immediately by confirming they can never ever go back to the night she was born to find her mom. It's also a subtle callback to the time the Doctor took Rose back to the day her father died and nearly got caught in a paradox. Despite the wind dropping from her sails a bit, Ruby rolls with the punches and chooses a trip home as their next destination. In a move Donna Noble would be proud of — and right out of "Partners in Crime" — Ruby goes to see her loved ones before galavanting off into the stars with the Doctor.

Continuously looping in Ruby's family, Carla and Cherry Sunday, Davies fills out her world beyond her connection to the Doctor, making Ruby all the more complex for it. Meanwhile, before formally introducing himself to her mother as an alien, the Doctor lingers for a moment having the TARDIS analyze Ruby's DNA — much like he did with Amy in Season 6. The episode ends before she reaches any conclusions, but the snow returns to add another layer of intrigue to the mystery that is Ruby Sunday. "Space Babies" doesn't reinvent the wheel, but it's a solid starter episode with a lot of charm and rewatchability. With Gatwa and Gibson's joyful banter leading the way, it looks like we're in for one hell of a season.

New episodes of Doctor Who will air on Disney+ on Fridays at 7 PM ET.

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