Doctor Who Recap: Robot of Sherwood

Season: 8 / Episode: 3 We’re in the third episode of season eight, and now the Doctor has gone medieval with the Prince of Thieves. In the beginning of the episode, we see the Doctor writing a bunch of equations on a chalkboard, presumably the same equations we’ve seen him brooding over in the last two episodes in what will surely be revealed as part of a larger storyline (surprise!). The Doctor asks where Clara wants to go in time and space, and in a legitimate fangirl moment, she says she wants to meet Robin Hood. The Doctor scoffs—in case you are suffering from short-term memory loss and forgot that he’s an asshole—and says Robin Hood doesn’t exist. Of course, they immediately find Robin and once again, in what seems to be the norm for this season, Clara is proven right and the Doctor is proven to be a narrow-sighted old man. Robin—winking, whooping and bantering with a campy, dramatic bravado reminiscent of that of his furry incarnation in the 1973 animated Disney film and Cary Elwes in the 1993 Mel Brooks classic—tries to steal the Tardis, naturally. In a scene that foreshadows just how ridiculous and corny the episode will be, Robin and the Doctor have a sword fight—Robin with his sword and the Doctor with a spoon. Just imagine what he could do with a spork.   Clara and the Doctor get to meet Robin’s Merry Men, but the whole time the Doctor continues to question whether they are real. He examines them, pokes them, takes samples and generally makes everyone uncomfor…