Oh no, he has a purpose. He's a red herring designed to make whatever solution does work seem even better. Like 10.2's gun, the warp star, and the Osterhagen Key in Doctor Who [all the same episode]. They're all things introduced in the story that could end it, but they're idly pushed aside once it's time for Donna to solve all the problems. This makes us go 'woah this is awesome' and not really realize how quickly the giant menace was dealt with until later.
It could work if we were all ten/don't watch Doctor Who.