# Doctor Who Series Five: UK pace thread \[edited title\] **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [April 3, 2010, 9:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/doctor-who-series-five-uk-pace-thread-edited-title/534851 "2010-04-03T21:23:14Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 45
**Author:** ![Nobody](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/94ad74/32.png) [@Nobody](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nobody)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2010, 5:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/doctor-who-series-five-uk-pace-thread-edited-title/534851/881 "2010-06-28T17:04:38Z")
> [@Merijeek](#): > > Yeah, how often does one see a multi-season story arc? > > So, for those of us who haven’t really watched any of the Old Who since we were ten or so…some specifics on Omega and the Black Guardian, please? > > -Joe Short: Omega - Worked on a star near Gallifrey to give his people time travel ability. The star exploded and Omega was thought dead, but in reality he survived in an anti-matter universe. Black Guardian - Wikipedia says it best > [@](#): > > an anthropomorphic personification of the forces of entropy and chaos, the counterpart of the White Guardian, a personification of order. The two Guardians balance out the forces in the universe, although the Black Guardian seems to desire to upset the balance in favour of chaos and evil while the White Guardian prefers to maintain the status quo. Long: [Omega](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Omega_%28Doctor_Who%29) [Black Guardian](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Guardian) ---
**Author:** ![yojimbo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yojimbo/32/232_2.png) [@yojimbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yojimbo)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2010, 5:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/doctor-who-series-five-uk-pace-thread-edited-title/534851/882 "2010-06-28T17:14:30Z")
> [@TWDuke](#): > > .Although apparently with all the memories of Auton Rory. (It’s easy to miss, but as Amy walks to the Tardis in the reception hall, he says “I was plastic” to the person sitting next to him.) I’m nearly sure he also says “and she/Amy was a stripper” which she was albeit on the entry level i.e. a kissogram. ---
**Author:** ![TWDuke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e495f1/32.png) [@TWDuke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TWDuke)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2010, 5:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/doctor-who-series-five-uk-pace-thread-edited-title/534851/883 "2010-06-28T17:29:23Z")
I didn’t hear that part, but looking around the Web it seems others heard him say “He was the stripper…”, referring to when the Doctor popped out of a cake. So, generally I’m not too fond of Bill & Ted solutions. They work great in “Bill and Ted” movies, which are all about ridiculous jokes and general silliness. Granted there’s a lot of that in “Doctor Who,” but it also asks you to take the characters’ plights seriously, which is harder to do when they can always go back and fix things. That’s why writers of “serious” time travel fiction impose limits on what can and can’t be done, like traveling back into your own time stream and rewriting your own past. But who cares. It was a thrilling ride. Matt Smith was once again brilliant and ably supported. I’ve really come to like Arthur Darvill and would like to see him doing more outside of “Doctor Who.” (Inside Doctor Who, it’s too dark to see.) It was so nice to see the Doctor didn’t really leave little Amelia in the yard all night (at least not in every reality). His speech to here was quite lovely and worked literally and metaphorically, so when it also turned out to contain a secret coded message designed to trigger her memory, it was a crowning moment of awesome. One trivial thing that nevertheless made me admire Moffat’s writing. Even before the beginning of this series, it looked like “Geronimo” was going to be an annoying catchphrase tossed around freely to show what a devil-may-care scalawag this Doctor was, along the lines of “Allons-y!” or “Dyn-o-mite!” Then it all but disappeared. Making it the Doctor’s “final” word (and written, not spoken) gave it a lot of poignancy, at least for me. ---
**Author:** ![Hallucinex](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/ba9def/32.png) [@Hallucinex](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hallucinex)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2010, 5:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/doctor-who-series-five-uk-pace-thread-edited-title/534851/884 "2010-06-28T17:29:54Z")
> [@yojimbo](#): > > I’m nearly sure he also says “and she/Amy was a stripper” which she was albeit on the entry level i.e. a kissogram. I’d thought he said something about the Doctor being the stripper - i.e. from when he popped out of the cake. EDIT: Forgot to mention: Loved it. ---
**Author:** ![Merijeek](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f05b48/32.png) [@Merijeek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Merijeek)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2010, 5:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/doctor-who-series-five-uk-pace-thread-edited-title/534851/885 "2010-06-28T17:34:32Z")
Did everyone else get a huge laugh out of “It’s a fez. Fezes are cool.” -Joe ---
**Author:** ![Lissla\_Lissar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8491ac/32.png) [@Lissla\_Lissar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lissla_Lissar)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2010, 6:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/doctor-who-series-five-uk-pace-thread-edited-title/534851/886 "2010-06-28T18:32:55Z")
Yes. I did. I really liked this episode. I especially liked that not all the loose ends were tied up. Next Saturday there will be no new _Doctor Who_. ☹ ---
**Author:** ![Smeghead](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f1d935/32.png) [@Smeghead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smeghead)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2010, 6:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/doctor-who-series-five-uk-pace-thread-edited-title/534851/887 "2010-06-28T18:41:18Z")
Sigh. I think that we can at least all agree that bow ties are cool. My apologies if this has been mentioned before (I just recently caught up on the series, so I’ve been avoiding this thread until now), but I really enjoyed all the references they threw in. I had to keep pausing it so I could laugh and explain them to my wife. Like when he ran into the holographic automated bad guy in the half-built TARDIS and said “Please explain the nature of your emergency”. Or the nod to Douglas Adams with the words written in mile-high letters on the cliff. There were several others I’ve forgotten, but they did it really well - obscure, but not too obscure, and quick enough that I didn’t feel like I was being beaten over the head with them. ---
**Author:** ![pepperlandgirl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/f17d59/32.png) [@pepperlandgirl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pepperlandgirl)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2010, 7:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/doctor-who-series-five-uk-pace-thread-edited-title/534851/888 "2010-06-28T19:43:45Z")
> [@TWDuke](#): > > I didn’t hear that part, but looking around the Web it seems others heard him say “He was the stripper…”, referring to when the Doctor popped out of a cake. > > So, generally I’m not too fond of Bill & Ted solutions. They work great in “Bill and Ted” movies, which are all about ridiculous jokes and general silliness. Granted there’s a lot of that in “Doctor Who,” but it also asks you to take the characters’ plights seriously, which is harder to do when they can always go back and fix things. That’s why writers of “serious” time travel fiction impose limits on what can and can’t be done, like traveling back into your own time stream and rewriting your own past. > > But who cares. It was a thrilling ride.. It was a thrilling ride, but I think you’re looking at the events of the episode from the wrong perspective. Usually, Doctor Who _does_ have firm rules about traveling back to your own time stream and rewriting your own past. There have been episodes (like Father’s Day) on why this is a Very Bad Thing To Do. The Doctor has made it clear again and again that he can’t fuck around with the “fixed points” in time, and we never see him using his TARDIS to give himself a do over. The reason that they could do all the timey-wimey stuff in this episode is that _time didn’t exist_. Space and Time had already been destroyed by the time the Doctor jumped back to give Rory the screwdriver. There were no paradoxes or problems with Amy touching Amelia because there was no Time. Things just appeared to be the same on Earth because, as the Doctor said, they were at the eye of the storm. ---
**Author:** ![dangermom](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e274bd/32.png) [@dangermom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dangermom)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2010, 8:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/doctor-who-series-five-uk-pace-thread-edited-title/534851/889 "2010-06-28T20:06:49Z")
I liked the ending a lot, and, Rory! I love Rory. ---
**Author:** ![Electric\_Warrior](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/ee7513/32.png) [@Electric\_Warrior](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Electric_Warrior)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2010, 8:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/doctor-who-series-five-uk-pace-thread-edited-title/534851/890 "2010-06-28T20:13:00Z")
> [@Hallucinex](#): > > I’d thought he said something about the Doctor being the stripper - i.e. from when he popped out of the cake. > > EDIT: Forgot to mention: Loved it. Yep, I just checked again and it’s “I was plastic and he was the stripper at my stag.” **Smeghead** , I also liked the _Princess Bride_ reference: Amy being “only mostly” dead. ---
**Author:** ![yojimbo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yojimbo/32/232_2.png) [@yojimbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yojimbo)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2010, 9:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/doctor-who-series-five-uk-pace-thread-edited-title/534851/891 "2010-06-28T21:36:08Z")
> [@Electric\_Warrior](#): > > Yep, I just checked again and it’s “I was plastic and he was the stripper at my stag.” Ah. Knew I heard stripper and filled in the rest. Cheers. ---
**Author:** ![Pushkin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ee59a6/32.png) [@Pushkin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pushkin)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2010, 11:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/doctor-who-series-five-uk-pace-thread-edited-title/534851/892 "2010-06-28T23:05:14Z")
> [@Merijeek](#): > > Yeah, how often does one see a multi-season story arc? It’s a pretty big change for Doctor Who, the last story that came close was [The Trial of a Time Lord](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Trial_of_a_Time_Lord), which was still only about as long as a season of NuWho, but was spread over four (almost) stand alone stories, each lasting several episodes each. ---
**Author:** ![bonzer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/45deac/32.png) [@bonzer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bonzer)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2010, 11:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/doctor-who-series-five-uk-pace-thread-edited-title/534851/893 "2010-06-28T23:22:36Z")
Am I the only one who, while I enjoyed the episode, thought it rather sad - simply in general, never mind the two thousand year wait - that Rory wound up with pretty much the most shitty wedding imaginable. It really wasn’t quite his day, was it? ---
**Author:** ![Peter\_Morris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/peter_morris/32/359_2.png) [@Peter\_Morris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peter_Morris)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2010, 2:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/doctor-who-series-five-uk-pace-thread-edited-title/534851/894 "2010-06-29T02:09:52Z")
> [@MacTech](#): > > Plus, River said something to the effect of “A Nestene duplicate, I dated a Nestene duplicate once, swappable head…kept things fresh” > > And considering, Rory _IS_ a Nestene duplicate/Auton… I think that it was a reference to [Worzel Gummidge](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Worzel_Gummidge_%28TV_series%29), who had swappable heads, and was played on TV by Jon Pertwee. ---
**Author:** ![Achren](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/898d66/32.png) [@Achren](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Achren)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2010, 2:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/doctor-who-series-five-uk-pace-thread-edited-title/534851/895 "2010-06-29T02:43:59Z")
> [@bonzer](#): > > Am I the only one who, while I enjoyed the episode, thought it rather sad - simply in general, never mind the two thousand year wait - that Rory wound up with pretty much the most shitty wedding imaginable. It really wasn’t quite his day, was it? Well, at the end of the day, the girl he loves loves him and has married him and they’ve both run off with the Doctor for adventures on the Orient Express. IN SPACE! It might not have been his day, but it sounds like good times to me. ---
**Author:** ![Jennyrosity](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/2bfe46/32.png) [@Jennyrosity](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jennyrosity)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2010, 8:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/doctor-who-series-five-uk-pace-thread-edited-title/534851/896 "2010-06-29T08:31:50Z")
I now officially adore Rory. Any man (or robot, or whatever) who would stand guard over the woman he loved for 2000 years is ok in my book. I also loved how when the Doctor was talking to the sleeping Amelia, he refers to himself as an “old man”, and manages to actually seem like one - a tired, scared old man. I hadn’t been completely sold on Matt Smith’s doctor till then, but I am now. ---
**Author:** ![Quartz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/quartz/32/267_2.png) [@Quartz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quartz)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2010, 9:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/doctor-who-series-five-uk-pace-thread-edited-title/534851/897 "2010-06-29T09:09:27Z")
> [@bonzer](#): > > Am I the only one who, while I enjoyed the episode, thought it rather sad - simply in general, never mind the two thousand year wait - that Rory wound up with pretty much the most shitty wedding imaginable. It really wasn’t quite his day, was it? The wedding day is always the bride’s day. ---
**Author:** ![Angua](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/8baadc/32.png) [@Angua](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Angua)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2010, 12:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/doctor-who-series-five-uk-pace-thread-edited-title/534851/898 "2010-06-29T12:28:59Z")
> [@Jennyrosity](#): > > I now officially adore Rory. Any man (or robot, or whatever) who would stand guard over the woman he loved for 2000 years is ok in my book. Exactly. If that’s not true love, I don’t know what is! I really enjoyed this series. I wasn’t too keen on Smith as the Doctor when he was first announced (The Doctor. Younger than I am?? Nuh-uh!), but he’s really grown on me. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Quartz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/quartz/32/267_2.png) [@Quartz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quartz)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2010, 12:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/doctor-who-series-five-uk-pace-thread-edited-title/534851/899 "2010-06-29T12:54:40Z")
> [@Jennyrosity](#): > > I now officially adore Rory. Any man (or robot, or whatever) who would stand guard over the woman he loved for 2000 years is ok in my book. That’s a wonderful scene, even better because it ends with the Dalek saying, “Exterminate!” ---
**Author:** ![Smeghead](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f1d935/32.png) [@Smeghead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smeghead)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2010, 1:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/doctor-who-series-five-uk-pace-thread-edited-title/534851/900 "2010-06-29T13:58:47Z")
Rory’s story was really well done. He started off as another Mickey - kind of a doofey guy that somehow landed this really hot girl who was way out of his league, and who wasn’t really sure that he was the guy for her. It would have been easy to do the Rose/Mickey story again, having her gradually drift away from him, and they certainly telegraphed that direction, but I loved the way they turned it around and made it work for them without making it feel cheesy or forced. There’s still the sense that he’s a little in awe of her, but it also feels much more like a real relationship that works. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/doctor-who-series-five-uk-pace-thread-edited-title/534851.md?page=44) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/doctor-who-series-five-uk-pace-thread-edited-title/534851.md?page=46)