Doctor Who Series Six: Afterthoughts
So we’re done with another season, Moffat’s second as showrunner, and it looks like I got a fair bit right in my assessment last week.
The point of this year’s story was to cut the Doctor down to size. He’s now invisible to the Silence and his principal enemies, who now think him dead. His future incarnation knew who the Impossible Astronaut was, and so did River’s. And the ‘Doctor’ who ‘died’ was indeed not him, but it wasn’t a Ganger – instead it was a robot body provided by the Teselecta (although as I’ll get back to this creates more problems than it solves).
I have to say I loved the series but I’m no wiser to what’s going on now than I was at its outset. Series 6 pretty much answered its own self-contained questions, but the outstanding questions from series 5 were bafflingly left hanging. Why was the Tardis blown up and the universe rebooted? I’m no clearer to what the point of series 5 actually was – was it jus another assassination attempt or was there a deeper purpose? Worse, was it another ‘Bad Wolf’ moment – a great idea by the show runner, who never gets about to explaining it?
I’m enjoying the sophistication, but I’m getting worn down by subplots taking too long to resolve. Moffat may have budget problems with the BBc, but why do we still have multiple, poorer quality filler episodes, which could be used to tell his story? RTD’s series finales tended to be poorly written but at least he gave us a start, middle and end for each series!
High point for series six though were plentiful: Neil Gaiman’s episode, River Song every time she turned up (but especially in her origin episode), and the unexpected gems like ‘The Girl Who Waited’. Matt Smith sure raised his game, now fully comfortable in the role, but who though Karen Gillan would do the same? I’m now hoping she returns in 2012, which I couldn’t say this time last year. There were down sides too of course: Mark Gatiss’ episode (again), that godawful pirate story, and the whole ‘big reveal’ about Melody/River was handled kackhandedly, but these were mostly unimportant, and anyway RTD had more than his fair share of clunkers on his watch.
I would sway though that Moffat needs to have a think about how he approaches series 7 in the coming months – if the only thing he has to say about Who is the River Song/Silence saga maybe he needs to leave the stage soon. He’s written the best stories I’ve seen in the current era, but has largely side stepped the needs of RTD-era fans for straightforward resolutions to grand plots. I wish I knew what the current plot is ultimately all about. The answer to the question ‘Doctor Who?’ surely doesn’t need three years to resolve. And for that matter can someone please tell me how th Teselecta robot managed to mimic a Time Lord’s regeneration?!
Will The Doctor Die? (Spoilers)
Personally I’m going to go with ‘no’, but it’ll be interesting to see how we’re going to get there. My theories (in addition to what we know) are:
- The object of Moffat’s run so far has been to cut the godlike RTD figure down – his ‘death’ will be sleight of hand;
- The Doctor knew in episode 1 that the Impossible Astronaut was River Song, and so did her ‘present’ incarnation;
- The Doctor and River Song both lie – just because we’re still being led to think that it’s the Doctor who’s shot by River Song, it doesn’t mean it’s not a Ganger.
My questions however remain:
- What was the point of rebooting the universe? Was that actually River blowing up the Tardis?
- ‘Silence Will Fall’, eh? So the whole thing has been about killing The Doctor? A simple yet dastardly plot? Is the assassination in America just a second attempt by the Silence movement?
- Who the hell is Madame Kovarian?
Comments and theories welcome!
Dr Who Midseason Prequel
It’s looking increasingly like it’s back on the 27th of this month. Are you excited? Particularly after the word of mouth about ‘Let’s Kill Hitler’ (s6 ep 08) I certainly am!
Dr Who s6: pt 2 Theories (Spoilers)
I have a very strong suspicion this one is completely correct. But first…
Doctor Who s6 ep04: Review (Mini-Spoilers)
The Doctor’s Wife
I’m sorry it’s taken me such a long time to report back on Neil (‘Sandman’) Gaiman’s debut writing effort on Who, but what can you say about this episode other than that it was just beautiful. A love letter to the past, present and future, hitting old, familiar beats and creating new ones, this epitomised the potential of Steven Moffat’s run – sophisticated narratives, strong character development and filling in gaps (albeit off-screen) in canon, making you long for more.
The Doctor receives a message in a box, which could only have come from a Time Lord. Racing into the pocket universe from which it was sent, he, Rory and Amy find themselves on a sentient junkyard world, but all is not as it seems. The Tardis matrix is ripped from the console room, as House unveils its trap, leaving the time travellers in genuine danger and the Doctor with no idea of how to escape, while his companions run for their lives through a suddenly possessed Tardis. But they are far from helpless – the matrix has been deposited in the body of patchwork human Idris (Suranne Jones), who gets to talk one-on-one with her Doctor for the very first time.
The relationship between Time Lord and his ‘old girl’ is investigated with warmth, sensitivity and huge intelligence. It has to – he lives his life out of order and she exists throughout all time and space simultaneously – how on earth can they possibly understand one another? The acting picks up on this and is just sublime – Suranne Jones in particular as Idris is spellbinding – channelling Helena Bonham-Carter style madness yet refining it into incredible sophistication, acting as the perfect foil for a 900 year old man who’s still a boy at heart. ‘What makes you think I would ever give you back’ made me laugh out loud. It would be churlish not to remark on just how good Matt Smith is in this episode too – it’s hard to imagine David Tennant delivering the Doctor’s joy and bewilderment in such an honest yet alien way. His Eleventh Doctor is a brilliant creation, and his ability to vary his performance (under the right director) from boyish glee to ancient stature really is exactly what Steven Moffat’s run needed.
The production values this time around are also superb – Victorian costumes, possessed Ood and half eaten Tardises sit alongside butchered Time Lords, patchwork people and even a (welcome) return to the coral console room used by the Doctor’s last two incarnations. The revelation that the companions are standing in a graveyard of hundreds of Tardises and Time Lords is particularly fascinating and horrific (and impressively delivered), and Gaiman doesn’t scrimp on the horror. The architect of many of the last of the Time Lords’ people’s demises (voiced brilliantly by Michael Sheen) puts captives Amy and Rory through extraordinary levels of hell, and it’s unsettling viewing. Yet it’s delightfully filled with humour too: from Idris’ remarks about the Doctor’s misuse of her front doors to the freshly revealed irony of their very first encounter and the true nature of their relationship (‘I always got you where you needed to go’), the master author is always sure to vary the sensitivity of his touch.
It’s an episode with enormous heart, as the Tardis of course can’t remain in a human host, leaving the Doctor to continue with the way things used to be between them, and I must confess I was pretty moved by their parting comments. Yet now they understand each other for the first time, and Amy rightly voiced the truth that these two travellers will stay together long after his human friends leave him. ’The Doctor’s Wife’ didn’t expand on the series’ mysteries, other than a cryptic comment about (presumably) River Song, but it didn’t matter. Directed by Richard Clark, this standalone did what others in Steven Moffat’s run haven’t always managed – it delivered humour and horror alongside dramatic character development (which I hope Moffat draws on), whilst evolving the mythos in a way to appeal to viewers old, new, classic and rebooted. I really hope this isn’t the last we see of Gaiman. It may be the best episode of the series ever written.
10/10
Dr Who Series 6: Ten Questions
OK so there are plenty of people (particularly a certain niece of mine) who won’t want to (or shouldn’t) read this post. It’s incredibly spoiler heavy and full of speculation about what the the underlying plot of series 6. So here’s your chance to click somewhere else and here’s a little
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Why did the Doctor kill himself?
It was clearly planned – you can tell by the Doctor’s body language. Delaware knew, the Silence knew and River seems to have known something. The secrets are spoken too far away from the companions to know, so what could cause the Doctor voluntarily to walk into his death? It certainly seems connected to something involving Amy and/or River, but what? His and Amy’s true relationship is apparently going to be revealed – what don’t we already know? Remember him lying about the crack in space following her around him series 5…?
What’s the secret of the space suit?
Why is it used to kidnap the little girl and to kill Eleven?
And who was in it when it killed the Doctor (whom he clearly knew in advance would be there)? River Song in ep 1 says ‘of course not’ when she fails to kill whoever was in the suit. Does she know what’s going on because that was her in the suit? It’s highly unlikely Eleven remains dead at the end of the series, so short of rebooting the universe again, how do they do it?
What’s with the quantum pregnancy?
Why do the Silence need the Doctor to know about it? Amy’s nauseous one minute, then not the next. So is River. Rumours are abounding online about two children.
Who is the little girl?
If she’s Amy’s child how can she regenerate? And who’s the father? If she’s River Song, why does she seem to have no Time Lord-related talents at all?
Who is Eye Patch Lady?
Amy has serious lost time from ep 2 when she was kidnapped by the Silence. Did they impregnate her? What is a humanoid doing voluntarily working for/with the Silence? Apparently named Madame Kovarian, is Amy dreaming of her or remembering her? And why?
Can time really be rewritten?
His previous incarnations insisted not, but Eleven was gung ho about it in series 5. What are the implications for rewriting time and who would really benefit from it?
What’s with the Silence’s Tardis?
It’s the same one cloaked above James Corden’s flat in series 5, which needed a Time Lord to be activated. So why is it constantly hidden, whose is it really, and why not just try to kidnap the Doctor to power it?
Who is River Song?
In her first appearance in the Library she knew his name. The kiss in ep 2 suggests just the relationship that Ten theorises. If they’re destined to be together in her past, and if a past River killed Eleven, how can their relationship happen at all? There has been talk of parallel timelines happening at the same time, and it wouldn’t surprise. Since the start right until last night’s episode Moffat has based his run on the theme of things happening in front of your face which you can’t see.
After the universe was rebooted it took Amy remembering the Doctor to return him to existence. River had never forgotten. She could well be the Time Lord who seems to be revealed in ep 2, but why not regenerate in the Library when she saves Ten?
What are the Silence really up to?
On the planet for centuries, manipulating humanity to what? The moon? Purely to justify the space suit which kills the Doctor in the future and kidnaps (and houses) the little girl? They’re at the Doctor’s death despite him tricking them into suggesting humanity kills them all, and constantly focus on Amy. Have they been doing that off camera in series 5 too? ‘You are Amelia Pond: you will bring the silence.’ Is that so?!
What is this all leading to?
Pond’s pregnancy, River Song’s secret, ‘silence’ falling, and whoever manipulated the Tardis to destruction, causing the cracks in space. All connected? I wonder.
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I’ve seen an excellent theory suggesting…
the young girl is River – an assassin created to kill the Doctor (remember even the Daleks fear her adult self), which she seems to do. But all is not as it seems – by inviting the adult River to the deaths she’s already caused, he can successfully cover up the fact he isn’t really dead – he’s sustained by something to do with the second shot (which she remembers and makes sure Amy doesn’t interfere with), and of course she is hardly going to kill her younger self. That younger self goes on to meet the future Doctor whom she presumably marries, and who knows to share his name with her (if only so she can gain his younger self’s trust in the Library). The slap in the diner was for making her watch her ‘kill’ him again.
But even though the Silence created her (Amy is clearly her mother, but which father?), are they really working for Eye Patch Lady (Madame Kovarian apparently) or someone else? And has River concealed Time Lord abilities as long as we’ve known her? Did the pregnancy (as Rory’s rebirth as an auton) happen in the timeline aborted by the Tardis’ explosion, but not in this one (causing the fractured memories/problematic pregnancy)? Does the Doctor die in the aborted timeline? Is that where the orphanage is hidden? Another great theory is here.
In this theory characters are bouncing between the two timelines, possibly without any of them realising it. The Doctor might be dead in one reality but not the other. What he and everyone else (except perhaps River Song) doesn’t yet know is why. What’s the Silence’s Tardis? And what the hell was that regeneration?
Further speculation suggests that the Doctor who died may well have been a clone, but how do the Cybermen fit in all this?
SPECULATE AWAY!
Doctor Who s6 ep03: Review (Mini-Spoilers)
“The Curse of the Black Spot“
Stephen Thompson’s first shot at the Doctor is much lighter in tone than Moffat’s opening two-parter – a great big pirate romp on a pirate ship, without very much mention of the Silence, rewriting time, mystery pregnancies, unexpected future deaths or River Song. For me personally it made it a lesser outing – showrunner Steven Moffat has raised the stakes so high now that any delay in dealing with his increasingly intricate plot strands is just annoying and it’s a little bit of a shame. Having said that the episode had its merits – the Tardis trio opt for an adventure on a pirate ship being terrorised by a Siren, who apparently kills crew members at the slightest drop of blood. But is she all she seems? And why is Amy still seeing visions (memories?) of the Eye Patch Lady from episode 2?
The humour is clumsy, Smith seems completely out of his element, but the script does have some warm moments, particularly when the Doctor bonds with pirate captain Hugh Bonneville, playing off one another as fellow ship’s captains. And director Jeremy Webb does a fair enough job, particularly in the more intense moments late on in the episode between Amy and Rory, but will the kids care? It’s a difficult one – I have a suspicion that the core audience for series 6 is a fair bit older than under Russell T Davies, and although the mystery around Amy’s pregnancy is touched upon, I don’t think enough was presented for the more sophisticated audience Moffat seems to be aiming his run at.
The story had a happy enough ending and it’s cute (if unremarkable) how they get there, but this felt distinctly like filler material. Writer Thompson has very little to say even about the Doctor himself, unlike Simon Nye in ‘Amy’s Choice’, and it leaves the episode feeling bland, despite some highly emotive exchanges.
The questions about the ongoing subplots remain though: who is Eye Patch Lady? Casting Frances Barber is serious stuff so she’s clearly someone significant. Why is Amy pregnant one second and not the next? Is it because rebooting the universe created a parallel timeline? How would this benefit the Silence? And what the hell was that regeneration at the end of the last episode? And who the hell is River Song really? Memories are being played with still, very little is as it seems (and since Amy’s introduction never has been) and I’m getting impatient for the payoffs to start. Episodes under Moffat’s management come off best with high stakes and a certain amount of darkness. I hope we get some of it next week with Neil Gaiman.
6.5/10
Doctor Who: A Christmas Carol
We’re so lucky to have The Moff.
The first Steven Moffat written Doctor Who Christmas Special is showrunner Steven Moffat’s take on Dickens’ A Christmas Carol, and what a breathtaking morality play it is, wrapped up in sly humour, unbelievably strong performances and a script which made all of the RTD specials instantly redundant. Rory and Amy begin on a honeymoon cruiser that’s about to crash on a planet covered in a mysterious fog. Local baron Michael Gambon has the power to control the fog, and save the Doctor’s assistants’ lives, as well as the other 4000 passengers, but he doesn’t want to; there’s nothing in it for him. To save the ship the Doctor has to teach an alien Scrooge morality and discover why he has Katherine Jenkins flash frozen in his basement. Can he do it in just one hour?
Of course he can, and Moffat indulges his propensity to play crazy backward and forward games with time, managing to take a wholly new perspective on a very old story. Ghost of Christmas Past Eleven fits a lifetime into one hour, trying to get into the heart of a bitter old man through making friends with his younger self. It’s a wonderful, rich drama with towering performances – ‘Dumbledore’ Gambon always careful though not to overshadow the leads, as the comfortably quirky yet demonstrably noble Doctor played by Matt Smith holds the show together. It’s not like anything we were given during the Tennant era – this isn’t superheroics by any means. It’s a nuanced look at love and loss under the cover of sci fi, whilst giving us a wonderful, leisurely look at what makes Eleven tick too. Marilyn Monroe? OMG!
Gone is the regular Christmas campery of Russell T Davies, in is seasonal fantasy and steampunk chic – the production crew pulls off a Dickensian yet futuristic cityscape brilliantly. The shark too was a suitably weird touch, and wonderfully deployed – lost your sense of wonder at Christmas stories? Get it back right now (I should add Moffat adeptly bleeds any hint of religious undertones out in the very first act). And rather than taking a Kylie-esque role, Katherine Jenkins doesn’t just act brilliantly (who knew?), but is an essential element the Doctor needs to understand – singing and all – in order to make Gambon’s character care about other people. There was more than one occasion where the acting and writing came together to make me more than a little bit tearful, which couldn’t have made me happier. But as I said earlier, Moffat’s story is nuanced – for every dramatic turning point there are chillier scenes, like the holograms of the condemned 4000 passengers, and Gambon’s determination to ignore them.
It’s all blissfully continuity-free, which may have helped Karen Gillan seem to feel comfortable as Amy Pond for a change and act with authority. I should add it was pretty cute to have hers & Rory’s sexual roleplay clearly signposted, despite the seasonal tone of the story. Continuity though, as the trailer for series 6 shows, is about to take centre stage; this special is the calm before the storm. The Doctor was manipulated into rebooting the universe, we don’t know who was responsible for the cracks in space, and are no nearer to finding out whose voice it was who said ‘silence will fall’. With River Song’s imminent reappearance in what looks to be a deeply dark first half of the series, we may be about to get answers. I for one can’t wait.
Doctor Who V: 4 & 5: The Time of Angels/Flesh and Stone (Spoilers)
This series is good. Scratch that this series is damned good. Oh fine episode 3 with Mark Gatiss’ multicoloured Daleks didn’t quite hit the mark (and may have been written for David Tennant’s Doctor anyway), but new series runner and lead writer Steven Moffat is creating the stir with series 5 which has only previously been matched by RTD’s ‘Bad Wolf’ conspiracy in series 1. And Matt Smith isn’t just good as the Eleventh Doctor he’s quite outstanding – youthful passion mixed with an older professorial nature; together they’re making the post-RTD/Tennant era electric. Episodes 4 and 5 should have been good – the two-part sequel to Moffat’s award-winning ‘Blink’, but as I’m going to show you, they’re absolute gems.
Quite possibly the scariest episode of Who I’ve ever seen, balanced out beautifully with darkly funny moments (and intrigue) with the returned River Song (Alex Kingston). The Angels return, at the crash scene of The Byzantium, foreseen by River Song in series 4, and the Doctor is drawn in by a younger version of the woman his earlier incarnation believed was his future wife. But what is her agenda? As the team investigates the danger increases as the Angels demonstrate abilities above and beyond what we already know, and Amy is left mysteriously subverted. The stakes get higher when it’s revealed that River Song isn’t remotely what she appears to be, just at the moment when the Angels spring their trap. How will the Doctor rescue them this time?
It’s a spellbinding episode, energetically directed by Adam Smith, effortlessly balancing wittily scripted banter by Moffat with scenes of sheer terror which outrival ‘Alien’. The scene where the Angel projects itself out of the CCTV tape is quite remarkable for its restrained horror, and is brilliantly acted by Karen Gillan, proving her chops for the first time this series. And the episode really does stand out for the quality of its acting – Alex Kingston chews up every scene she’s in, and has perhaps even more chemistry with Matt Smith than she did with Tennant. He in turn proves ever more each week just how outstanding a choice he was as the Eleventh Doctor, commanding the screen with passion and power in equal measure; in many ways his Doctor is even more interesting and likable than Eccleston or Tennant’s.
Funny, terrifying and sophisticated in equal measure, this is as good as Doctor Who has ever been.
The intrigue deepens. What is the crack in space from Amy’s bedroom, and why is it following her? As the Weeping Angels close in on the Doctor, Amy, River Song and the Clerics, why does the crack reopen, why does it begin on her wedding day, the day she chose to leave with the Doctor? For that matter how can the Doctor hope to defeat the Angels, keep a now crippled Amy alive, and find out more about River Song’s transgressions? It’s an episode with far more going on than it seems, as the Clerics fall one by one, and Amy, blinded, must navigate through a forest in the Byzantium in an attempt to stay one step ahead of the beings now eager to feed on the time energy of the crack in space. But why does Amy have to remember her first meeting with the Doctor? And can River Song be trusted when the Clerics’ Bishop reveals the man she apparently is in their custody for killing was a future incarnation of the Doctor himself?
The brilliance continues as the mystery hots up. If the the crack in space is formed by something to do with Amy, is it somehow because she becomes River Song? Does the future incarnation of the Doctor appeal to Amy to remember because of what happens in the final episode – presumably on her wedding day? What is it about these two that he’s drawn to? As in part one the direction by Adam Smith is top notch, marrying high emotion with real terror as it seems there’s no way out from the trap set by the army of Weeping Angels. Matt Smith acquits himself even better than the previous episode too, as his compassion for all the humans in his care erupts violently. It’s been said his performance might outdo Tennant’s at his best – I’m inclined to agree. I’ve never seen Doctor Who better than this. We even have a conspiracy as profound as Bad Wolf in series one, but with much greater care taken over the running of the series. Each week another level is revealed, as more questions get set. I can’t wait to find out the answers.
Doctor Who 5:1 (Spoilers)
It can’t be this good. It can’t be. They couldn’t have got the tone that right, they couldn’t have reimagined the Tardis, the costume, the feel of the show that perfectly, could they? Our expectations of Steven Moffat couldn’t possibly be met or even exceeded, could they? The answer is yes to everything.
A newly regenerated Eleventh Doctor (Matt Smith) crash lands his burning Tardis in rural England and gets the attention of young Amelia Pond. Neither he nor the Tardis have finished rebuilding themselves and after a garbled first meeting, he rushes back to his ship to send it five minutes into the future to stop the engines from exploding. But misses by 12 years. When he returns he collides with a now adult Amy Pond (Karen Gillan) as the new menace he’d seen emanating from her room when she was a child begins its assault. Will the Earth survive when Prisoner Zero’s alien jailers threaten to destroy the earth to kill it?
Steven Moffat begins his run as head writer and showrunner with a tale of a child’s imaginary friend and what happens when he returns to her as an adult. With threats happening out of the corner of your eye, with menace lurking where you least expect it and a wry, often dark humour replacing RTD’s slapstick, Moffat explodes series 5 into our consciousness with a script just as sharp as expected. The real revelations are Matt Smith as the Eleventh Doctor and Karen Gillan, whose chemistry easily rivals Tennant’s and Piper’s, the former in only one episode bringing a truly fresh approach to The Doctor. It’s easy to see how he defeated his rivals for the role, owning every scene he’s in – bonkers and young one minute, an old man out of his time the next; very human one minute, quite alien the next. It feels entirely fresh, entirely true to what’s gone before, and Moffat even has him walking through holograms of his preceding personalities, establishing himself quite authoritatively as someone quite new by the end of the episode. The tone is spot on, the production values give it valuable extra weight, and Moffat was telling the truth when he said every episode wouldn’t turn out as dark as Blink; the crackpot whimsy he uses to launch his run is a delight. We do however have the Weeping Angels to look forward to in three weeks…
The new Tardis is insane, far bigger than ever before, with no right angles, and cobbled together with retro chic. It’s a wonderful evolution, whilst again remaining true to what’s gone before. What stories Moffat wants to tell in that space is anyone’s guess, and don’t miss the oscilloscope on the new console. Amy thinks Eleven has latched onto her by accident, but he and the Tardis already knew about the crack in space in her wall. What’s his real motive, and for that matter is Amy all she appears to be? A conspiracy is set up to run through the next three months:
“The cracks in the skin of the universe – don’t you know where they came from? You don’t, do you? The Doctor and the TARDIS doesn’t know. The universe is cracked. The Pandorica will open. Silence will fall.”
With the impending return of River (‘Alex Kingston’) Song, we can only guess. I’ll admit I hate the new title sequence, but everything apart from that has been a true delight. Welcome to the new Who era!
Doctor Who Series 5 Trailer (Spoilers)
David Tennant and the Tenth Doctor are no more, and Russell T Davies is no longer in charge of Doctor Who. Was Davies the saviour of the franchise? Without a doubt, and all of us who love the show owe him a debt of gratitude which can’t be repaid, but in more recent years his writing quality has shown a marked decline in quality. The show’s never lost its entertainment value, particularly because Tennant is such a good actor (and is unquestionably the Doctor of this generation), but Davies’ writing has often been quite painful. No doubt there have been good reasons (Torchwood: Children of Earth showed just how good he can still be), but part 1 of The End of Time was a recent example of just how bad things had got.
I’m going to see the Tennant run out by warmly welcoming new show boss Steven Moffat and Eleventh Doctor Matt Smith to control of the franchise, and offer you the trailer for series 5 which went online this evening. I don’t believe for a moment that we have anything to worry about with these two at the helm; far from it. I am convinced the show’s glory days are ahead of it. We’re going to be lucky enough for Moffat to pen a sequel to his much lauded Blink? April can’t come quickly enough…
