The Rule: Boxed spoilers until the episode finishes airing on the west coast of the USA (i.e., Pacific Time [sorry, Alaska/Hawaii]). In other words, boxed spoilers until 2:00 am UTC.
I’m looking forward to this! I thought the last episode was absolutely fantastic. This season couldn’t be more different than the last one - Moffat’s redeeming himself.
So, in the above-linked trailer, the Doctor mentions that he and River had a serious argument. Now we can have fun speculating whether the Doctor meant that took place when he was 10, 11 or 12. After all, 10 had the “gap year” after he mind-fucked Donna. (Hey, RTD, I’m still furious you had 10 do that to her!) And, just like Amy and Rory, Clara takes time off. So, 10, 11 and 12 have all had plenty of time in which to meet up for fun, games and mayhem with River.
That looks like one of those highly “redacted” documents the CIA sends out in response to a FOIA request. Bwah ha ha!
Anyway, FWIW, I was reading a TARDIS-load of threads on a Doctor Who-specific board and the long-timers snarked that every time some mysterious female villain shows up, fans start crying out, “It’s the Rani! It’s the Rani!” I’m sure Moffat is well aware of this so, I don’t know if Missy is not going to be the Rani because it never is the Rani or, Missy is the Rani because Moffat likes perpetrating “gotchas!” in his scripts/story arcs.
A warm and funny episode, with great interactions between the Doctor, Clara, and Danny. I do like episodes where the Doctor is a fish out of water though, so YMMV. I particularly enjoyed the Eleventh Doctor mix-up.
The Doctor: …and there’s a sinister puddle. Band name!
LOVED this episode! There are so many good lines in this episode, if I posted them before the time limit, this post would be a huge blank spot on the page, filled with nothing but spoiler box after spoiler box.
Well, I loved almost everything about this episode. I could have done without Courtney “Disruptive Influence” Woods. I really hope we won’t be seeing much of her in the future. Although, thinking about it, I suspect she’ll end up being a companion in the Donna Noble/Tegan Jovanka style. And I liked Donna and Tegan.
I particularly like that both Clara and Danny are shaping up to be strong characters who are capable of butting heads with this Doctor.
Any sense of how to make sense of the big arc bit?
I also like how they are mixing up the forms. This one is focused on character development and relationships without being afraid to make this Doctor strange/alien and not charmingly eccentric, with a MOW that was a cardboard cut out for the characters to interact about. Every week of that and the thing is a soap opera; we need good monsters and villians too; to be scared and excited sometimes and solving puzzles with answers that make sense sometimes too. Not sure what the perfect balance is but nice that they are trying to find it.
I suspect she’ll be a companion in the *Susan *style. It’s pretty clear they’re recreating the original crew of the Tardis from 1963: The Doctor + two teachers and a student from Coal Hill School. Of course this time they have English and math instead of history (Barbara) and science (Ian).
It’s a good dynamic if they’ve got Courtney right. She needs to be curious one that wanders off and gets into trouble. And she needs to do it without coming across as annoyingly foolish. Carole Ann Ford did it brilliantly. It should be interesting to see how this plays out.
I liked the implication that the Doctor took to Courtney and related to her because she was a “disruptive influence”. Anyone else get the feeling that he was thinking back to a Gallifreyan boy who grew to challenge the system more and more?
I loved this episode. Another eyebrow joke, a reference to River, a look at how disruptive the Doctor is to a normal life. I did not like Danny’s ultimatum about the Doctor pushing Clara too far. What is he going to do about it? She is a big girl.
I liked how Clara jumped to the conclusion that the Doctor knew Jane Austen and he just looked at her and said he read the bio at the end of the book. And then called her out on “Boggins”.
From the very moment I saw him, I figured “Mr. Pink” was a plant. A person out of time and place who was put there to get close to Clara, and thus, the Doctor.
The way he kept talking about helping Clara last night only reinforced that feeling.
So I’m Wizard Hatting it right now: He works for that woman in “Heaven”.
Completely off the wall, stupid and guaranteed wrong guess at the arc:
Matt Smith’s doctor really did die, and this is all being done in the afterlife. He’s seeing his life ‘flash’ in front of him, which is why there are so many call backs to the past.
Yeah. I don’t believe it either. But it would be…creative?
Slight tweak to it, the Doctor cheated death AKA Missy and death is pissed about it and trying to claim his soul. Afterall he lived so long and experienced so much, he must be like the greatest game to death or something. There was some BBC thing that said her character was “The Gatekeeper Of The Nethersphere” and that sounds to like either death or satan or something. This is also why we see Missy interviewing dead characters, and all the promised land arc stuff.
