Earth is stolen, the Daleks are back, and everyone who’s ever been on the Doctor’s Christmas card list shows up to yell “Doctor, where are you?!”
Short Synopsis
The Daleks yoink Earth out of orbit and drag it into a cosmic scavenger hunt with 26 other planets. The Doctor and Donna scramble to find it, while Torchwood, UNIT, Martha, Sarah Jane, and Rose all frantically wave their arms. Then Davros pops up like the world’s creepiest jack-in-the-box.
Extended Storyline
The Doctor and Donna pop out of the TARDIS, expecting a quiet day. Instead — no Earth. Gone. Vanished. Not even a “BRB, gone to the shops” note left behind. Turns out Earth (plus 26 other planets) has been stolen and parked in the middle of nowhere like some cosmic junkyard.
Meanwhile, on Earth, everyone’s understandably freaking out. Entire continents are under Dalek occupation. TV networks are somehow still broadcasting (because even in the apocalypse, the BBC never dies). Torchwood sets up a last stand in Cardiff, Sarah Jane flips her “Protect Luke” switch, and UNIT runs around waving clipboards. And Rose — oh, Rose — she’s been building up to this moment for two seasons of “I can cross universes now, nyah nyah.” She spends the episode wandering war zones with a comically oversized gun, trying and failing to bump into the Doctor.
The Daleks, meanwhile, aren’t just doing their usual “exterminate everything with a pulse.” They’ve got a bigger plan. And who’s behind it? None other than Davros, resurrected from his fiery swan dive in Revelation of the Daleks. He’s now looking even more corpse-like, as if Skeletor had a baby with Emperor Palpatine. He introduces himself like a B-list celebrity who just walked onto the Strictly Come Dancing set: “Yes, it’s me, Davros! Thought I was dead, didn’t you?” Cue evil laughter.
The Doctor, of course, spends most of the episode not with his friends. Instead, he’s chasing “the missing planets mystery,” which is basically Moffat-level Sudoku. Eventually, he figures it out: all 27 stolen planets form a “reality bomb.” (Not to be confused with a regular bomb, which just explodes. This one explodes existence. Much more impressive.)
By this point, all the Doctor’s friends have done their bit: Torchwood’s hacking, Martha’s threatening to use the “Osterhagen Key” (translation: nuke the Earth out of spite), Sarah Jane’s prepping her doomsday closet, and Rose is still waving that gun. They finally manage to call the Doctor, and we get that glorious split-screen moment where everybody is talking to him at once. It’s chaos. It’s brilliant. It’s basically Comic-Con via Skype.
Just when the gang’s about to reunite, bam! The Doctor gets shot by a Dalek. Full-on laser to the chest, staggering toward the TARDIS in slow motion while Rose screams his name. He collapses inside, regenerating glow already starting. Donna and Rose look on in horror as we fade to black. Cliffhanger of doom achieved.