OK, so, this episode doesn’t really have too many surprises for people familiar with Doctor Who now, but I am sure that was very different for people from 1969.
Yes, unsurprisingly, both the Doctor and the War Chief are as the security chief suspected, members of the same race: the Time Lords.
And both of them are criminals.
How is the Doctor a criminal? Well, he hasn’t said. He did something, and he doesn’t want to go back to the Time Lords. He also doesn’t want to help the War Chief, but he may not have any choice. The War Chief lets it be known if he doesn’t help out the War Lord and his people, well, they’ll just execute the Doctor.
What is the War Lord’s plan? To take the most aggressive and violent race of people that he could find–humans–and turn them into a super-army by putting soldiers from different time zones in perpetual combat in order to find the bravest, strongest, and most adept soldiers possible in order to conquer the universe.
OK, setting aside that there must be hardier aliens in the universe of Doctor Who that might actually be better at this whole “kill things” concept, that’s not a terrible plan. Oh, it’s evil, but it’s not terrible.
Will the Doctor join the War Lord? The War Chief says the Doctor will before the Doctor has a chance to answer. So, yeah, the Doctor is in a really tough spot.
But meanwhile, back in the 1917 chateau, Zoe, Jamie, Carstairs, and the other rebels are organizing. Because Zoe knows who all the rebel leaders are and how to find them, it’s easy enough for her to track down the leader and soon everyone is onboard with a plan.
First, they go to the various places the time machines drop off soldiers, jump the aliens running the place, take out the computers, and then make a run for it when guards show up to find them. Leaving only the one in the American Civil War zone, the rebels bring all their forces there, assuming (correctly) that Central Control won’t have many guards left by then so they can storm the place when the last computer is taken out and take out the War Lord.
That’s also not a terrible plan. Too bad it doesn’t work.
See, the Doctor calls them just before they break the last computer and says he has a portal in. He needs to talk to Zoe, Jamie, and the various rebel leaders, including the one where an English actor is doing a bad Mexican accent for once instead of a bad American one, and that sounds fine.
Except it’s an ambush and Zoe, Jamie, and the rebel leaders are surrounded by guards when they get to Central Control. Did the Doctor betray them?
Of course not. Just wait and see what happens next.