Can You Hear Me? (Doctor Who)

Plot

The Doctor drops her companions in Sheffield for some time with family and friends, while she answers a distress call from Aleppo, Syria, in 1380. There, at the bimaristan Arghun mental hospital, she rescues Tahira, the sole surviving patient, from a threatening creature. Back on Earth, the Doctor’s friends are plagued by dark visions. Graham sees a trapped woman crying for help.

Yaz is haunted by nightmares of a man dressed in dark clothes. Ryan witnesses the same man remove his own fingers and place them in the ears of Ryan’s friend Tibo, after which both the man and Tibo disappear. All three contact the Doctor at the same time.

Using the TARDIS’s telepathic controls, the Doctor traces Graham’s vision to a spacecraft wedged between two planets, holding them apart to prevent a collision. Inside the ship is a small prison, its power source secured by a quantum fluctuation lock. The Doctor and her companions discover that signals are being sent from Earth to the prison through the detached fingers. While the Doctor works on the lock, the others explore the craft but are captured by the dark-clothed man.

Just as the Doctor opens the lock, the man reveals himself as Zellin, an immortal god, and thanks her for freeing his ally, Rakaya, another immortal god who had been imprisoned there. These two gods thrive on causing chaos; they had turned the civilizations of the two planets against each other until the inhabitants learned how to trap Rakaya. To keep her sane during her imprisonment, Zellin fed her nightmares taken from humans on Earth.

Broadcast and reception

Can You Hear Me? aired on 9 February 2020. It was watched by 3.81 million viewers overnight, making it the seventh most watched programme for the day in the United Kingdom. The episode had an Audience Appreciation Index score of 78. The official total across all UK channels was 4.90 million viewers, and it was the 36th most watched programme of the week.

On the review aggregate site Rotten Tomatoes, the episode received a 67% approval and an average rating of 6.64/10 based on 15 reviews from critics. The consensus on the website reads: 'Can You Hear Me? has plenty of ideas and some decent spooks, but good intentions can't carry an episode to a satisfying conclusion.' The scene where Graham expresses concern to the Doctor that his cancer could return but she is too 'socially awkward' to appropriately respond was criticised by fans for being insensitive or jarring to the episode's message.

In response to complaint emails sent to the BBC, viewers were told the scene 'was never meant to be dismissive' and that 'the intention of the scene was to acknowledge how hard it can be to deal with conversations on this subject matter.'

Did You Know?

• Ian Gelder portrays Zellin in this episode, having previously appeared in the Whoniverse as Dekker in Torchwood: Children of Earth (2009) and voiced the Remnants in 'The Ghost Monument' (2018).
• Sharon D. Clarke reprises her role as Graham's late wife, Grace.