Line #3 Recap/DoctorWhoS37E7Kerblam


1	[[WMG:[[center:[-''[[Series/DoctorWho Doctor Who]]'' [[Recap/DoctorWho recap index]]\
2	'''Thirteenth Doctor Era'''\
3	'''Series 11:''' [[Recap/DoctorWhoS37E1TheWomanWhoFellToEarth 1]] \| [[Recap/DoctorWhoS37E2TheGhostMonument 2]] \| [[Recap/DoctorWhoS37E3Rosa 3]] \| [[Recap/DoctorWhoS37E4ArachnidsInTheUK 4]] \| [[Recap/DoctorWhoS37E5TheTsurangaConundrum 5]] \| [[Recap/DoctorWhoS37E6DemonsOfThePunjab 6]] \| '''7''' \| [[Recap/DoctorWhoS37E8TheWitchfinders 8]] \| [[Recap/DoctorWhoS37E9ItTakesYouAway 9]] \| [[Recap/DoctorWhoS37E10TheBattleOfRanskoorAvKolos 10]] \| [[Recap/DoctorWho2019NYSResolution NYS]]\
4	'''[[Recap/DoctorWho2016CSTheReturnOfDoctorMysterio <<< Series 10]]''' \| '''[[Recap/DoctorWhoS38E1E2Spyfall Series 12 >>>]]''']]-]]]
5	!Kerblam!
6	[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/screenshot_20181118_194851_video_player.jpg]]
7	[[caption-width-right:350:''[[Recap/DoctorWhoS25E3SilverNemesis What do you think]], [[Recap/DoctorWhoS31E13TheBigBang still me]]?'']]
8	->Written by Pete [=McTighe=]\
9	Directed by Jennifer Perrott\
10	'''Air date:''' 18 November 2018
11
12	->''"Space postman. I've seen it all now."''
13	-->-- '''Graham'''
14
15	JustForFun/TheOneWith killer bubble wrap. ([[Recap/DoctorWhoS12E2TheArkInSpace For real this time]])
16	----
17
18	The TARDIS, in the Time Vortex, is being chased by something, which the Doctor assumes to be hostile until she realizes it's just a teleport pulse. It's a Kerb!am Man delivery robot, from the largest retailer in the galaxy, with a delivery for the Doctor, a ''very'' overdue one: a [[Characters/DoctorWhoEleventhDoctor fez]]. And, on the back of the packing slip, a message: "HELP ME". So the Doctor and her friends head off to Kerb!am's headquarters, the warehouse moon of the planet Kandoka, to investigate. A little help from the psychic paper and sonic screwdriver gets them in as new hires allegedly related to the First Lady, and they're given work assignments and a tour by "head of people" Judy Maddox, which is only slightly marred by a brief power outage. Judy is happy to explain that Kerb!am, with a 10% organic workforce, is a people-powered company (and the Doctor is upset to find out that they are ''not'' allowed to ride on the conveyor belts.)
19
20	The Doctor switches work assignments with Graham after discovering that employees in the purple section are the closest to where the packing slips originate from, sending her and Ryan off to pack ordered products in boxes with the friendly Kira, who's relieved to have a job since so many people are unemployed. Yaz heads off to the warehouse to collect ordered goods from the stock boxes with Dan. And Graham is assigned to maintenance (read: janitorial duties), which he's not too thrilled about, working with somewhat socially-awkward Charlie. Talking with Kira, the Doctor and Ryan discover that there have been multiple Kerb!am employee disappearances recently. Yaz, after hearing about Dan's daughter, finds him gone after he insists on switching tablets with her so she doesn't enter a dangerous area of the warehouse on her first day, and is forced to flee several out-of-place Kerb!am Men. After swapping stories at break time, and noticing Charlie's crush on Kira, the Doctor tells Graham to find a map of the facility while she, Ryan and Yaz file a complaint. The executives, Judy and Slade, promise to look into the disappearances, but the Doctor is sceptical, and while Graham persuades Charlie to help him get the original company plans from their glass case in the lobby, the Doctor, Ryan and Yaz sneak into Slade's office when he's out.
21
22	In a filing cabinet full of paperwork out-of-place in a computer-run factory, the Doctor and her friends discover Slade has been keeping records on the missing employees. Judy walks in on them, having tracked them down by their company-issue ankle bracelets, and is shocked when they show her Slade's records. Just then, there's a system-wide blackout, and Graham and Charlie arrive with the blueprints, having discovered something, only to be followed by the one active Kerb!am Man left. After the Kerb!am Man attacks Charlie when he tries to deactivate it, it seems the system is at fault, and the Doctor and company head off to fetch the original Kerb!am delivery robot, Twirly, from its case. Meanwhile, Kira, at work, is led off by two robots who tell her that, having been appointed "Employee of the Day", she will receive a gift, and is left in a room in the basement. Judy's tablet alerts her to this, which, since none of the other missing employees were marked as such on the device, leads her to suggest the system is sending a message. After charging up Twirly, the Doctor discovers that seems to be the case, as she realizes that the ''system itself'' sent her the message for help. Meanwhile, Ryan, Yaz and Charlie have taken to the conveyors to head to the foundation area to find Kira, and are just in time to witness, through a one-way window, her death by exploding bubble wrap, to Charlie's horror, with Ryan realising he knew Kira was about to die before it happened and he must know something.
23
24	Slade, having seen the retrieval of Twirly on the security cameras, confronts the Doctor, Graham and Judy in the lobby just as the Doctor uses a robot to teleport everyone down to the foundation area. After being disarmed, he's revealed to be innocent, having kept paper files to keep his investigation confidential and not told anyone because he was unsure of who he could trust. They find a vat full of the liquefied remains of the missing staff, and wonder who is responsible. In the Delivery section, full of Kerb!am Men carrying overdue packages and a power source so they can all teleport away instantaneously, everyone comes together and the truth is revealed: Charlie is responsible. Seeing himself as an activist against the hordes of robots stealing jobs from people, he plans to kill thousands of innocent customers with the explosive bubble wrap to destroy their trust in automated workforces. The system killed Kira to try and dissuade him from his plot, but it just drove him over the edge, and he sets the Kerb!am Men to teleport away with their deadly cargo before smashing the remote. Yaz grabs him in a lock as the Doctor works to try and stop the delivery, eventually succeeding in reprogramming the Kerb!am Men, with an assist from Twirly, into delivering the packages to themselves and then popping the deadly bubble wrap. The Doctor offers Charlie, who ran into the crowd of robots after getting away from Yaz, a chance to escape, but he's frozen in fear and dies in the blast as everyone else is teleported to safety.
25
26	Afterwards, in the employee break area, Judy and Slade tell the Doctor and her friends that Kerb!am is suspending operations for a month, with all employees given a two-week paid break. Judy also plans to increase the company's percentage of human employees, since Charlie ''did'' have a point there. She offers the Doctor and her friends jobs, but the Doctor declines, explaining they're freelancers. Back on the TARDIS, Yaz asks the Doctor for help delivering a necklace Dan wanted to give to his daughter, and Ryan persuades Graham to leave the bubble wrap from the Doctor's package alone.
27
28	----
29	!!Tropes:
30
31	* AccidentalMurder: Charlie never meant for Kira to die by his bubble wrap bombs, but the Kerb!am system gave her one to kill her as a warning to stop Charlie from going through with his plan.
32	* AgitatedItemStomping: Charlie destroys the remote he was using to hack the Kerb!am systems this way, but the Doctor is able to stop the delivery anyway.
33	* AIIsACrapshoot: It initially appears this way, but it's subverted with the reveal that Charlie has hijacked the Kerb!am system for his own ends and the system is trying to fight back.
34	* AlmightyJanitor: The Doctor suggests that Graham use his position in maintenance to get anywhere and find things out. On the flip side, Charlie takes advantage of this to carry out his dirty work.
35	* AstonishinglyAppropriateInterruption: Charlie's Kerb!am Men blow up just when they get to the word "Kerblam!"
36	* BenevolentBoss: Judy is one of the nicest characters in the episode, and is an important member of Kerb!am as the one looking out for all of its human ("organic") workers. It's even mentioned that she once gave Kira some chocolate as a birthday gift, which was the only gift she had ever received.
37	* BigBrotherIsWatching: Kerb!am uses pedometer-like devices to keep track of their employees' movement and productivity, and the [=TeamMate=] robots carry out random spot checks on employee conversations.
38	* BitchInSheepsClothing: Charlie is initially presented as an awkward but friendly young man, but it turns out he's the mastermind behind the things going wrong at Kerb!am, and plans to kill thousands of innocent customers to get the company into trouble after already killing ten employees to test his bombs.
39	* BlueAndOrangeMorality: The system killed Kira to either show Charlie the weight of what he's going to do with his bombs or show him how awful it will feel to lose a loved one this way. However, only Charlie is punished for his terrorism, while the System is forgiven because it's a robot with no sense of right and wrong.
40	* BombThrowingAnarchist: Charlie is an anti-corporate activist who is prepared to commit mass murder to make other people see his point of view. The Doctor points out that planning to kill thousands means he's not really an activist.
41	* BookEnds: In the first scene, Ryan snags the bubble wrap from the Doctor's delivery gleefully and pops a few bubbles. In the last scene, Graham retrieves the bubble wrap, and Ryan, now wary of it, suggests he not pop it, so Graham puts it back in the box.
42	* BoringButPractical
43	** While the Doctor is trying to sonic the Kerb!am Man that attacks Charlie, Judy just twists the robot's head off.
44	** After her companions nearly get killed getting down to the basement via the conveyor belt, the Doctor just uses a delivery bot to teleport down.
45	* BrickJoke:
46	** In "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS31E13TheBigBang The Big Bang]]", Eleven, after surviving flying the Pandorica into the exploding TARDIS, decided he could buy a fez after he found himself without the one he'd picked up. Six series later, one finally arrives.
47	** In "[[Recap/DoctorWho50thASTheDayOfTheDoctor The Day of the Doctor]]", Clara comments that someday, the Doctor's just going to walk past a fez after he steals yet another one. Eleven responds that it's never going to happen. True enough, Thirteen still loves them.
48	* TheButlerDidIt: Custodial staff having unlimited access and yet going unnoticed is exactly how Charlie was able to enact his plan.
49	* CallBack:
50	** The item that the Doctor receives from Kerb!am is a [[Creator/MattSmith fez]], with the implication that Eleven ordered it at least a few ''centuries'' ago and it took until now to show up.
51	** Much like in "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS30E3PlanetOfTheOod Planet of the Ood]]", the Doctor and her companions infiltrate an industrial facility via the psychic paper, only for a female executive to later discover they're not meant to be there. There's also an employee who turns out to be a spy, although, unlike Ood Operations, Kerb!am isn't up to anything malevolent, and the infiltrating employee is, in fact, the bad guy.
52	** When the Doctor, Yaz, and Ryan go to hide while waiting for Slade to leave his office the Doctor begins to relate Yaz's comments about wasps to [[Recap/DoctorWhoS30E7TheUnicornAndTheWasp Agatha Christie]].
53	** The Doctor's comment that some of her best friends are robots is probably a reference to K9, who was sometimes called "the Doctor's best friend" (being a robot dog).
54	* CastingGag:
55	** Julie Hesmondhalgh joins the actors the show shares with ''Series/{{Broadchurch}}''. It makes for an especially odd experience here as on that show, Creator/JodieWhittaker was a counsellor for Hesmondhalgh after a rape.
56	** The voice of the Kerb!am Men was provided by Matthew Gravelle, who was Joe Miller on ''Series/{{Broadchurch}}''.
57	* ClipboardOfAuthority:
58	** The Doctor takes note of Slade's clipboard when she first meets him. It turns out to be a plot point--he's not holding it for effect, but because he's keeping information on paper because he doesn't trust the System.
59	** Judy Maddox also counts, as she holds her tablet like a clipboard and is one of the people in charge of Kerb!am.
60	* CluelessAesop:
61	** By the end of the episode, the people in charge at Kerb!am decide to scrap most of the robots and re-introduce a human-majority workforce. The decision to continue menial wage labour in a society that is clearly quite capable of transitioning into a fully-automated, post-scarcity society (think ''Literature/TheCulture'') isn't condemned, and the assumption that people can't be provided with the necessities for life through a system other than wage labour is not challenged. [[note]] It is implied that a lot of those jobs are going to be management level stuff, in addition to menial, since Judy offers such to Team TARDIS, which is confirmed in the novelisation. Also justified by the fact that at the end of the day, the Doctor is just a time-travelling observer; she can't get that involved.[[/note]]
62	** Charlie enacts his murderous plot to ensure the unemployed are given jobs. The plot is foiled, but because of the plot, the Kerb!am managers say they will make a human-majority workforce company policy. The moral of the story is "Terrorism works", kids. [[note]] However one should note that there was already a political movement to this same end, "real people need real jobs", and Judy was employing as many as she could. Charlie just advanced the schedule. [[/note]]
63	* ContinuityNod:
64	** The Doctor says that "Some of [her] best friends are robots", referring to the likes of K-9, Kamelion and Handles.
65	** While hiding in a panelled alcove with Yaz and Ryan, the Doctor asks if she ever told them about [[Recap/DoctorWhoS30E7TheUnicornAndTheWasp her and Agatha Christie]].
66	** For the [[Recap/DoctorWhoS37E2TheGhostMonument second time]] this series, the Doctor uses Venusian Aikido to temporarily subdue a man with a gun.
67	* ConveyorBeltODoom: After riding the conveyor belts into the Foundation level of the Kerb!am warehouse, Ryan, Yaz, and Charlie are subjected to an unpleasant decontamination spray and bursts of disintegrating laser fire as the system attempts to purge itself of organic elements.
68	* CranialProcessingUnit: The [=TeamMate=] robots can be disabled by having their heads removed.
69	* CuteMachines: Twirly, the MK 1 delivery bot, is smaller and cuter, not creepy like the later models. Yaz remarks on it.
70	* DoesThisRemindYouOfAnything:
71	** The TrackingDevice used to record worker position and efficiency is an ankle monitor.
72	** The main villain is a highly intelligent MadBomber who dispatches his bombs by using the postal services to convince people to agree to their ideas. He creates and uses homemade bombs and has a grudge against the technical revolution. Looks like Charlie's taken lessons from the Unabomber.
73	* DeadStarWalking: Comedian Lee Mack plays sympathetic single-father Dan, who bonded very well with Yaz. Of course, he doesn't end the episode alive.
74	* DisposableWoman: Kira is killed off later in the episode to show Charlie how his terrorism will affect others but it only makes him double down his plans.
75	* DoubleMeaningTitle: The episode's title refers both to the delivery company and the explosive plot of Charlie.
76	* EurekaMoment: The Doctor hits on the idea of infiltrating the factory by posing as new workers when Ryan, who works in a warehouse in Sheffield, says that the warehouse moon of Kandoka reminds him of his job.
77	* EveryoneCanSeeIt: The Doctor and her companions immediately recognize the mutual crush between Kira and Charlie. So does the system, for that matter, which is why it targets her.
78	* EvilLuddite: Charlie is so afraid of the JobStealingRobot trope that he's prepared to commit mass murder against Kerb!am's customers, and his fellow employees, to shake people's faith in automated labour.
79	* EvilVsEvil: Both Charlie and the Kerb!am system were willing to sacrifice innocents to stop the other. Charlie murdered ten employees and wanted to send out explosives that would shake customer faith in Kerb!am, while the system sacrificed Kira to prove a point to Charlie in an effort to push him away from his goals.
80	* ExcitedEpisodeTitle: {{Justified\|Trope}}, since that's how the store spells its name.
81	* FatalFamilyPhoto: Dan tells Yaz about his daughter and shows her the pendant she made him before he's abducted and killed.
82	* FictionalCounterpart: Kerb!am is basically Space Amazon, with the "HELP ME" message [[https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/5057792/amazon-christmas-package-note-found-girl-bosses-evil/ ripping straight from the headline]].
83	* ForcedToWatch: The system seals Kira in a room with one-way glass and gives Judy a heads-up to her location, likely anticipating that Charlie would be among those to find her and witness her death.
84	* {{Foreshadowing}}:
85	** When the Doctor gets her package at the beginning of the episode, it's implied that she ordered it so long ago that she'd completely forgotten about it (six seasons ago, in real time). When, much later on in the episode, they discover Charlie has been keeping some of the delivery robots at the factory to fit them all with his deadly packages, Judy mentions that they had been getting complaints about delayed deliveries.
86	** Ryan removes the bubble wrap from the Doctor's package and pops a couple of bubbles. It turns out Charlie intends to use bubble wrap to kill thousands of Kerb!am customers.
87	** The Doctor, trying to find out where the message for help came from, sonics her and Graham's ankle bracelets to switch work assignments, sending Graham to maintenance work with the other janitor, Charlie. Since Charlie is the villain and the computer itself sent the message, it's clear the system was trying to direct the Doctor to the bad guy as quickly as possible.
88	** Employees are warned never to get onto the conveyors. It's no surprise that's exactly what happens.
89	** It's stated that human employees aren't allowed in the lower levels, where products are dispatched from, and have no access to the printing process for the packing slips, hinting that it was, in fact, the computer itself that sent the message for help.
90	** Dan's comment that his pendant is made of arcadium and [[TemptingFate will be around long after he's gone]]. He's later abducted and killed, and the pendant becomes a TragicKeepsake.
91	** The Doctor tells Graham that, as a janitor, he has access everywhere, and Charlie later mentions that he has all the access codes when he and Graham are taking the historical blueprints. This is exactly how Charlie was able to carry out his plot.
92	** When there's a total system blackout while the Doctor, Ryan, Yaz, and Judy are in Slade's office, the Kerb!am Man left active immediately attacks Charlie when he approaches it. The system was trying to kill him so his plan wouldn't succeed.
93	* FlyingPostman: In this case a teleporting courier.
94	* GoneHorriblyRight: Charlie produced the bubble wrap explosives so unsuspecting victims would trigger them. He definitely wishes they weren't so effective when his crush, Kira, is killed by them.
95	* GoodIsNotNice: Slade initially appears to be a MeanBoss, but he isn't the true villain; In fact, he's taking on a solo investigation to find out why his employees are disappearing.
96	* GotMeDoingIt: Judy keeps calling humans "organics" (the system's term for them) and correcting herself.
97	* HandshakeRefusal: Graham attempts a handshake on meeting Charlie, but settles for a wave when Charlie tells him he's just finished cleaning in the toilets.
98	* HappyFunBall: Charlie disguises his bombs as bubble wrap, knowing it's the one thing no customer will see as dangerous and at least a majority of customers will pop out of habit.
99	* HelpHelpTrappedInTitleFactory: Yaz discovers "HELP ME" printed on the back of the packing slip in the Doctor's package, setting off the plot.
100	* HelplessWindowDeath: Charlie is forced to watch as his crush Kira is killed by one of the bombs he has been producing, seeing her open the package behind a window but being unable to break through to save her.
101	* HoistByTheirOwnPetard: Charlie is killed by his own bombs despite being given a chance to escape.
102	* IWantYouToMeetAnOldFriendOfMine: Creator/JodieWhittaker and Julie Hesmondhalgh were both in ''Series/{{Broadchurch}}'', also by Creator/ChrisChibnall.
103	* TheInfiltration: The Doctor, Ryan, Graham, and Yaz infiltrate the Kerb!am warehouse to find the source of the message by posing as new hires, with some help from the psychic paper and the sonic screwdriver.
104	* InLoveWithTheMark: Charlie only worked for Kerblam! to get revenge on the company. He didn't plan on developing a crush on Kira and accidentally causing her death. Once he does, Charlie has a VillainousBreakdown.
105	* IrrevocableOrder: Charlie triggers the mass bomb delivery and then destroys his remote so it can't be stopped. Lacking enough time to override his commands, the Doctor instead wires Twirly into the system and changes the delivery address to the robots themselves, then has them open and trigger the bombs.
106	* JerkassHasAPoint: Slade insults Kira when telling her to get back to work and then threatens the Doctor with a disciplinary when she talks back to him about his manners. In spite of his crude approach, Slade is the manager and everyone is at work, so they shouldn't be stopping to socialise, and the Doctor is a new employee showing clear signs of insubordination, so he is right to to put her in her place.
107	* JerkWithAHeartOfGold: Slade comes across as a MeanBoss during his first scene, rudely chastising Kira to get her to return to work and threatening the Doctor with disciplinary action when she stands up for her co-worker. However, he's just as concerned by the employee disappearances as the Doctor is.
108	* JobStealingRobot: Even with a 10% Organic Employment policy being enforced on Kerb!am (and, presumably, all similar corporations), robotic workers causing mass unemployment is a major problem throughout the galaxy. Dan remarks that ''half'' the galaxy is unemployed. During his MotiveRant, Charlie states that trying to change this fact is what drove him to do what he did.
109	* KarmaHoudini: The Kerb!am system is ''never'' punished for causing Kira's death. The Doctor brushes it off and explains it as the machine trying to stop Charlie from committing terrorism. If anything, both the Kerb!am system and Charlie are as bad as each other because they are both willing to sacrifice innocents to stop the other. The closest punishment comes from the company deciding to remove the robot workforce to provide jobs to humans.
110	* KarmicDeath: An insane, murderous terrorist tries to kill thousands of innocent people (after offing several of his own co-workers) to try to prove some kind of point to himself, not caring about the massive loss of life as collateral damage. The Doctor screws up his plan, and in the end, the only one who gets blown up by Charlie's plot is Charlie himself — incinerated by thousands of his own bombs. Textbook karma.
111	* KilledOffscreen: Dan is abducted by the Kerb!am Men, and all that remains of him when he's rediscovered is a vat of liquefied human remains.
112	* LoveRedeems: Averted; Charlie did develop genuine feelings for Kira while working at Kerb!am, but the system killed her as a warning to him, but this only caused Charlie to become heartbroken and even more determined to carry out his plan, with the added motivation of spiting the system in revenge.
113	* MegaCorp: Kerb!am, which seems to be your standard Amazon-style mail-order shopping service on a ''galactic'' scale, with the episode set on their moon-sized shipping warehouse. The entire complex is considered its own jurisdiction as far as law enforcement goes.
114	* AMillionIsAStatistic: The Kerb!am system's reason for killing Kira is a personal demonstration for Charlie by the System. As the Doctor explains, the grief and anguish he feels is what he is about to inflict on millions of people. It backfires by instead hardening Charlie's resolve.
115	* MotiveRant: Charlie has one after being exposed as the villain, complaining that the 10% organic staff policy doesn't go far enough and he wants to discredit Kerb!am's [[JobStealingRobot Job-Stealing Robots]] for the good of all the unemployed people in the galaxy.
116	* MythologyGag:
117	** One of the most notorious pieces of [[invoked]]SpecialEffectFailure of the classic series was the monster from "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS12E2TheArkInSpace The Ark in Space]]" simply being a guy covered in bubble wrap. Here, it's literally bubble wrap that's killing people.
118	** The Doctor tells off his companions for being robophobic. There actually is a condition called robophobia as shown in [[Recap/DoctorWhoS14E5TheRobotsOfDeath "The Robots of Death"]], which has a plot that's the opposite of this one (humans are living indolent lives because robots are doing all the work, so a disgruntled human decides to liberate the robots).
119	* NoodleIncident: Ryan once ended up riding the conveyor belt at his warehouse job, but doesn't say how or why he did.
120	* NoPaperFuture: Yaz and Ryan wonder why, in a corporation where everything is stored electronically, Slade needs a clipboard and a filing cabinet. He later justifies it by saying he thought the system was responsible for all the employee disappearances and was keeping a log of them somewhere no-one else could access.
121	* OlderHeroVsYoungerVillain: Granted, the Doctor is older than most people living anywhere, but she still has an adult body, while Charlie isn't even an adult yet.
122	* OneWordTitle: "Kerblam!"
123	* PoorCommunicationKills: A lot of trouble would have been averted if the System could have explained everything on the note it sent the Doctor or through one of the [=TeamMates=], such as the one that attacked Charlie.
124	* PosthumousVillainVictory: Although Charlie is killed before he can enact mass-murder, Judy and Slade decide the VillainHasAPoint with regard to {{Job Stealing Robot}}s and solving mass-unemployment, and decide to enact a policy of hiring more human workers.
125	* RedHerring:
126	** Slade is a {{jerkass}}, and the discovery of records of the missing workers in his office seems to paint him as the villain. When he confronts the Doctor, her friends, and Judy, it turns out he's innocent and thought ''they'' were responsible for the disappearances. The reason he kept a paper trail of all the employee deaths was to make sure no one else could access it, including Judy, whom he didn't fully trust.
127	** The audience is then made to think that Kerb!am's automated system is responsible for the disappearances and projecting itself through the robots, a fairly typical sci-fi plot. However, the system is actually fighting back against the true saboteur, Charlie, who has been hacking its systems and draining its electricity. It itself sent the Doctor the "HELP ME" message.
128	* SavedByThePlatformBelow: Ryan tries to high-give Charlie on the conveyer belt, only to accidentally knock him off. Fortunately, he just ends up on the one beneath them, which Ryan and Yaz have to jump onto to follow him.
129	* SaveTheVillain: Charlie flees into the warehouse of Kerb!am Men before the Doctor orders them to blow themselves up. They try to talk Charlie into coming back, but he won't do it, even when it becomes apparent what she's done.
130	* SchmuckBait: Charlie's plan hinges on the almost inevitable occurrence of people innocently popping the bubble wrap that their deliveries come wrapped in, as Ryan did at the start of the episode. At the end of the episode, Graham is shown fingering the bubble wrap, apparently wanting to pop one despite what they've just seen. Ryan calls him away... and then everyone stares at the bubble wrap apparently fighting the same urge.
131	* SeenItAll: After the Kerb!am Man leaves, Graham quips, "Space postman. I've seen it all now."
132	* SelfParody: The menace is literally [[Recap/DoctorWhoS12E2TheArkInSpace killer bubble wrap]].
133	* ShootTheDog: Kira is killed by the Kerb!am system as a warning to Charlie, who had a crush on her, to stop him from sending deliveries that would kill their recipients. Charlie is heartbroken, but he doesn't back down.
134	* ShoutOut: The Doctor mentions to Ryan that she's met a "bloke" named [[VideoGame/SpaceQuest Roger Wilco]].
135	* SomeOfMyBestFriendsAreX: The Doctor literally says "Some of my best friends are robots" while telling off her companions for being "robophobic".
136	* TargetedToHurtTheHero: The system kills Kira deliberately to cause Charlie pain. The Doctor says it was attempting a lesson in empathy.
137	* {{Teleportation}}: The Kerb!am delivery robots beam away to their destination. The first one seen is able to teleport into the TARDIS, although only after the Doctor slows down when she realizes it's not hostile.
138	* TooGoodForThisSinfulEarth: Kira loved her job and was motivated by the joy of others. Sadly, this motivation is what killed her, as she was given a gift wrapped in explosive bubble wrap.
139	* TragicKeepsake: Dan has a pendant inscribed with the word "Dad", given as a gift from his daughter. Yaz asks the Doctor to help her deliver it to the daughter after Dan's death.
140	* TrialRunCrime: Turns out the disappeared workers were [[TestedOnHumans test subjects]] that Charlie was abducting and murdering to perfect the ability of the bubble wrap bombs to kill in such small concentrations.
141	* UncannyValley: Noted InUniverse. Kerb!am Men are human-like with glowing eyes, rigid and perma-grinning mouths, and hands with too few fingers, making them look like creepy ventriloquist dummies. In contrast, Twirly is a cute and toyetic little squid-robot who spouts sales offers.
142	* UnnecessarilyCreepyRobot: Graham, Ryan, and Yaz find the Kerb!am Men, which look a bit like ventriloquism dummies, unsettling. The Doctor tells them off for being robophobic.
143	* VillainHasAPoint: Charlie wasn't wrong in his anger with Kerb!am; the robots outpaced humanity and cheated thousands, if not millions, of desperate humans out of a job, and a 10% minimum human employee policy is a pathetic minimum. Judy and Slade even agree with his reasons, but not his methods, in the end and make a policy to hire more humans and stop using the robots as the primary workforce.
144	* VomitDiscretionShot: Judy appears to be fighting the urge to throw up after the Doctor discovers the vat containing the liquid human remains of the disappeared employees, but never does so on-screen.
145	* WeWillUseManualLaborInTheFuture: Kerb!am is required by law to maintain a minimum 10% organic staff policy, but mass unemployment caused by [[JobStealingRobot Job-Stealing Robots]] is still a major issue. Judy mentions wanting to review company policy to allow for more human workers at the end of the episode.
146	* WhamLine:
147	** When the Kerb!am system, speaking through Twirly, starts chanting, "Help me. Help me.", alerting the Doctor to the fact that, rather than being responsible for all of the murders, it's a victim of the chaos and was the one who sent the Doctor the message asking for help.
148	** Charlie yells to Kira not to pop the bubble wrap, with Ryan quickly picking up that this means he knew it would kill her.
149	* YouGotMurder: Charlie plans to kill Kerb!am's customers by putting explosives in their delivery boxes.

Context Recap / DoctorWhoS37E7Kerblam