Tag: river song

Doctor Who 6×7 – A Good Man Goes To War

As River would say: Spoilers!

Demon’s run… when a good man goes to war.

The Doctor is a legend that is known throughout time and space. All who know of him, know what he is capable of. Now one of his best friends is in trouble, and he is determined to do everything in his power to save her and her newborn child, Melody.

We find out a lot of things in the midseason finale of Doctor Who. First, we learn that the baby shows traces of Time Lord DNA, even though the father is Rory. This is explained as being due to the fact that she was exposed to energy from the time vortex while on the TARDIS.

The other big reveal comes at the end when we finally learn that River Song is really Amy’s daughter. I had heard this theory before, but I never gave it much credence. I guess this just goes to show that no theory is too crazy when dealing with Doctor Who and their madly brilliant writing team.

When I did my review of the first two episodes I had a bit of a mad theory myself. I believed that River was the one who killed the Doctor. When we saw that it was the girl in the spacesuit, however, it seemed to end that as a plausible idea. I am now resurrecting it based on the new evidence we have collected tonight. Assuming that the girl in the spacesuit is Amy’s daughter (which we seem to be), and knowing that River is the adult version of the child, I now feel I can confidently say that River does indeed kill the Doctor on that lakeshore. She said once that she killed “a very good man,” and I would argue that it doesn’t get much better than the Doctor.

That’s it for all the major reveals. The only thing you really need to know about the episode itself is that the Doctor and Rory gather an army to rescue Amy and her child, which partially succeeds. At the end of the episode, Amy is safe but the baby has been taken. We know everything will be alright because of River’s existence. We just don’t know how it all plays out. The next new episode is scheduled for September, so we’re going to have to keep busy this summer by watching the new season of Torchwood, which begins July 8th on Starz.

Doctor Who – The Pandorica Opens

Welcome to part 1 of the two part fifth series finale of Doctor Who. It seemed like we had to wait ages for the premiere, and yet we are already wrapping up another great season with The Doctor and his companion. *Here begins Spoil Time, kids*

We certainly started this one off with a bang, seeing the return of both Vincent and River. We also got a lovely painting of the TARDIS exploding and hints of the Pandorica opening (which is apparently supposed to be a myth, according to our friend The Doctor). Yep, not five minutes in and we already can tell this is going to be a good one.

Remember last week when I said all our adventures seem to happen in dark, creepy places? Yeah, cue the dark creepy cave where we find the Pandorica. So much for it being a myth! I guess even The Doctor can be wrong on occasion. The bad news here is this thing holds some big bad that is now making its great escape. Oh, and it gets better – because there is a signal being broadcast telling everyone in the area about this event. Every alien that ever wanted The Doctor dead is now coming straight for him! Daleks, Cybermen, and much, much more. You name it, they are probably on their way. How are our heroes supposed to fight with odds like that?

With no weapons and absolutely no plan, I still love The Doctor’s chances here. He will win because, like he said, he’s got nothing to lose – except the Universe itself. Oh, and the TARDIS which is looking like the source of all the cracks in time. We know the cracks were caused by a really big explosion, and The Doctor pulled out a piece of the TARDIS from one of those cracks. It would appear that the TARDIS exploding causes several rifts in time, the first one we notice being the one in Amy’s bedroom. Which is probably why River ends up back at Amy’s house – because it all goes back to her somehow.

Sidebar before I do my final wrap-up: I was completely (and pleasantly) surprised to see the return of Amy’s fiance, Rory. (Even better was seeing him as a Roman soldier. I loved how long it took The Doctor to process that one). It was great seeing him again and even better seeing Amy slowly remember who he was.

Back to the story – It turns out that the Romans aren’t real and the whole thing is an elaborate trap to get The Doctor’s attention. Other bad things that all happen within the last five minutes include – The Pandorica opening, the TARDIS exploding, an alliance of basically every creature in the universe capturing The Doctor inside the Pandorica, Rory shooting Amy (with her looking quite lifeless as he holds her in his arms), and the pending doom that is the potential end of the Universe as we know it. If you’re wondering how we make all of this better, then you’re gonna have to wait till next week. This is proving, so far, to be one of the best finales Doctor Who has had. It’s definitely right up there with my personal favorite up until this point, Season 3. The Master’s complete dominance over The Doctor for a majority of the 3-part story had me on the edge of my seat. I don’t think my jaw has ever dropped as low as it did tonight though. As a voice echoed, “Silence will fall,” I noted how that could apply to the events happening on the show, as well as the silence in our own homes as we watched in astonishment at how epically bad things had gotten for our heroes.

Thus concludes this week’s recap. What did you think of tonight’s episode? And how do you think The Doctor is going to get out of the biggest trap he’s had to face yet? As always, sound off in the comments section below. And don’t forget to tune in next week for the thrilling conclusion. Here’s a preview of what to expect:

Doctor Who – Flesh and Stone

*As always, Spoilers ahead*

When last we left The Doctor and Co, they were trapped by an army of Weeping Angels. That is exactly where we pick things up this week, with the aftermath of The Doctor firing the gun he borrowed from Father Octavian up into the air. They have jumped up onto the ship that had crashed and away from the Angels – but not for long.

The Angels follow them onboard the ship, and with that the chase is on. At this point it is important to note that Amy seems to be counting down from 10. The audience notices this (or should) as does The Doctor. Also worth noting is the crack in time has made a surprise early appearance. That is because it is going to become the focus of the rest of the episode. The Doctor says it is pure time energy and the end of the universe. That doesn’t sound very good to me…

Back to the thing with the counting though… turns out there is an Angel inside Amy’s mind (from back when she had a staring contest with the one) and it is kinda just chilling in the vision center of her brain. The Doctor has her close her eyes to “starve” the Angel. Problem: she can’t open her eyes or the process will start up again and she will die. I loved how this sort of switched things up from what we were used to when dealing with the Angels – instead of “don’t blink” and have to keep staring we now aren’t allowed to open our eyes.

At this point the story with the crack starts to take precedence. The Doctor explains something about there’s going to be a very big bang and things will collide and *poof* a crack in time will emerge and bring about the end of the universe. This particular crack seems to originate from Amy’s time. The Doctor ponders, “what would happen if time could run out?” and I start clinging to the edge of my seat. I knew this was going to be our story arc from early on, but it was still cool watching it play out. This is the reason that Amy couldn’t remember the Daleks. And these memory lapses aren’t going to be the last thing the crack in time changes. People are forgetting things, as if time is being altered. And it seems to affect the Angels as well – they all run in fear from the light (which is shaped like the crack in the wall).

I’ve noticed this pattern that The Doctor and Amy seem to split up a lot. Is it just me, or did that not happen nearly this often in past seasons? I’m not sure how I feel about him always leaving her behind or letting her fend for herself. It’s as if he just thinks she will get in the way. And then he wonders why she doesn’t trust him…

While Amy is dealing with cracks in time making her guards disappear one by one, The Doctor is with Father Octovian, who gets caught by one of the Angels. Before he dies he tells The Doctor that River was in prison for killing a man and that she can’t be trusted. My reaction – River killed someone?! WTF?!

Finally we see a merging of the two stories going on (Amy, the Angels, the crack, all of it). Now that Amy is all alone The Doctor has realized just how dangerous that crack can be. “If the time energy catches up to you, you will never have been born,” he warns her. Amy has to literally walk blind and try to get to The Doctor while staying ahead of the time energy. The crack is hungry and needs to be fed. I loved The Doctor’s comment at this point, “The Angels came to feed on the time energy, and now it’s going to feed on them.” I loved the irony in this, but not as much as what happened next.

The Doctor feeds the Angels to the crack to get it to close! The crack is not gone forever though. The explosion that created it in the first place is still happening somewhere in the universe. This means we have not seen the last of this story arc. As for River and the “good man” she killed – could it possibly be The Doctor? If she cared about him as much as she seems to have, then why kill him though? And when The Doctor says, “Time can be rewritten,” is he referring to the person River killed? I tried figuring out River’s timeline with The Doctor in my head but it just made my head hurt.

Going back to the story though… The Doctor returns Amy home, they snog a little bit, and The Doctor has a light bulb moment where it all suddenly makes sense. Except it doesn’t entirely make sense to this blogger. I get that it has something to do with Amy but that is all. And it seems that we are dropping this until the season finale, especially since the date they mentioned in the show was 26-06-2010 – June 26, 2010 for those Americans who might not be used to this way of writing the date. Looks like we’re going to just have to take what we have so far and enjoy the ride as it happens. No spoilers!

Doctor Who – The Time Of Angels

As River Song would say… Spoilers!

OK, two really big milestones in this episode: the return of the Weeping Angels and River Song. Two of Steven Moffat’s greatest creations in one fantastic adventure.

Right off the bat we see River being her awesome self. It’s cool watching her do her thing as The Doctor discovers her message. Also cool: watching her school The Doctor in how to drive his TARDIS. Why does she seem to know more about this than he does? Unless she was just around when he made all these discoveries for himself the first time. Regardless, watching these two match wits is priceless. At the same time, it’s weird how their timelines keep crossing over in the wrong order and watching them navigate this problem. But more about the mysterious Dr. Song later.

The Weeping Angels are possibly the creepiest monsters The Doctor has ever faced. They were bad enough when there were just a few of them trying to survive. Now we learn all new things about them that make them even worse. At first we just get a four second clip of one on a loop. Then Amy discovers that the Angel in the recording moves. This just as The Doctor and River make their own discovery – “That which holds the image of an Angel becomes itself an Angel”. The recording comes to life with Amy locked inside with it. She manages to freeze the recording in just the right spot to stop it, but this is only the beginning.

The other thing we find out about the Angels is that you are not supposed to look the Angels in the eye. This comes into play later in the episode. At this point I realized – this might be an old monster but we are putting a fresh spin on it here.

Our V-8 moment for the evening comes in the last 15 minutes or so. If the statues in the cave were made by a species with two heads, then why don’t the statues have two heads? Answer: because they are all Weeping Angels. They have been slowly dying in the caves for years. The ship crashing down on the planet was a rescue mission to save an army of them. But why are they killing people off instead of displacing them in time like they normally do? Oh, and remember Amy looking into the eye of the one Angel? Now would be the time for this to come into play. The gang is all ready to run, but Amy says her hand has turned to stone and she can’t move. The Doctor tells her it is all in her mind and she is really not turning into stone. She doesn’t believe him so he bites her hand to prove it. “Ow, you bit me!” she exclaims. “And you’re alive. Did I mention…?” he replies. Even in the darkest of moments, he is still able to bring some light to the situation.

We leave things with everyone seemingly very much trapped by the army of Angels. “No way back, no way up no way out.” Ah, but this is The Doctor we are talking about here, River. “There’s always a way out.” Cue inspirational speech by The Doctor that gets everyone to trust him and follow whatever crazy plan he comes up with next.

The Doctor: Big, big mistake. Really huge. Didn’t anyone ever tell you? There’s one thing you never put in a trap. If you’re smart, if you value your continued existence, if you have any plans about seeing tomorrow, there is one thing you never, ever put in a trap.
Bob: And what would that be, sir?
The Doctor: Me

Our final scene is him shooting a gun up into the air after this moment of pure awesome.

Questions that still need answering:
Why are the Weeping Angels killing people?
What was up with the convo between River and Father Octavian where he asks her “He doesn’t know yet? who and what you are?” And she says something about having “no intention of going back to prison”…say what?! Prison?! We knew there was a huge mystery surrounding this character but this takes it to a whole new level. She also said something to Amy about things not being as simple as they seem and wouldn’t confirm that she and The Doctor were married even though he seems to think this is the case… or will be eventually. He also doesn’t seem too sure how he feels about this. Notice how he was ready to just leave her on the planet to fend for herself?

I think that is quite enough questioning for this episode. Next week we get the conclusion, and based on previews it looks like we may be connecting this to the cracks in time that keep appearing everywhere. You’re not gonna want to miss a single second of the adventure that awaits. (No fair downloading it online though. River would not be pleased with the Spoilers.)