Doctor Who: Flux Brought Back A Familiar Face, But What Does Their Epic Return Mean?

Number 13 sneering on Doctor Who
(Image credit: BBC America)

Warning! The following contains spoilers for the Doctor Who: Flux episode “Once, Upon Time.” Read at your own risk!

Doctor Who: Flux dove a bit deeper into its season-wide story, though I think it’s debatable whether or not fans of the sci-fi series learned all that much more about Swarm, Azure, or whatever the hell is happening to the galaxy at large. One positive outcome  amid all the confusion is that a familiar face reappeared via the return of Jo Martin’s “Fugitive Doctor," but that of course only meant there would be more questions on the way.

Jodie Whittaker's Doctor reacquainted with the other version while in the midst of being sucked through various moments in time in quick succession. The two Doctors came together after spotting one another in the reflection of a mirror, despite the fact they were presumably two different individuals working independently of each other. In any case, while our resident protagonist immediately recognized her counterpart, the Fugitive Doctor didn’t have the slightest clue who she was looking at.

Jo Martin as Fugitive Doctor in Doctor Who

(Image credit: BBC America)

That detail feels like an interesting and possibly key factor for Doctor Who: Flux, and it's something fans have encountered before with River Song. If the Fugitive Doctor does not recognize her counterpart, she might be moving through the timeline in a way in which her battle with Swarm and Azure occurred before they crossed paths in Doctor Who Season 12, while still happening in our Doctor's past. Yet somehow, the two appeared to be simultaneously locked in the same battle, even handling the crisis in the same way, though without necessarily knowing of the other's existence. 

Doctor Who: Flux is seemingly all about time and disruption, and if we can believe The Doctor, it specifically involves her as well. The latest episode really had me wondering if there’s any validity to the theories that Jo Martin’s Doctor is the Doctor of a parallel universe, and if that's the case, then it's worth pondering whether or not that universe was a result of The Flux. 

Truthfully, it feels reckless to speculate anything about Doctor Who: Flux's chaos at this point, just because of how little we still know about the season a few episodes in. If nothing else, one thing I feel comfortable speculating is that if Season 13 brought Fugitive Doctor into the mix, then there’s a solid chance The Flux will tie into some of the weirdness and big storylines we learned about in Season 12. That’s a relief to me because so far, there didn’t seem to be any indication of such explanations happening, so hooray for another familiar character who can hopefully shed some light on what is transpiring in this wild season. 

Doctor Who: Flux airs over on BBC America Sundays at 8:00 p.m. ET. Hopefully, some of the wild things we’ve seen so far start to come together and make this season’s mystery a little clearer, or we get another character beloved by fans to make the wild ride a little less bumpy-wumpy.

Mick Joest
Content Producer

Mick Joest is a Content Producer for CinemaBlend with his hand in an eclectic mix of television goodness. Star Trek is his main jam, but he also regularly reports on happenings in the world of Star Trek, WWE, Doctor Who, 90 Day Fiancé, Quantum Leap, and Big Brother. He graduated from the University of Southern Indiana with a degree in Journalism and a minor in Radio and Television. He's great at hosting panels and appearing on podcasts if given the chance as well.