Kinda sucked for the mom though. Here’s this grand adventure where the father learns the truth about his son that makes them closer than ever before. You can’t really tell that story afterwards, the mom would never believe it. Sucks to be her.
“Night Terrors” was originally supposed to air in the first half of series 6, and they filmed it before deciding to change the order (obviously tacking on the “the Doctor’s gonna die, by the way” ending later). So I assume that line was originally meant as foreshadowing of Amy’s condition.
You know, despite my love of “We’re dead, again” and Amy carrying around the giants fake lantern and pan, I think this would’ve made a great Doctor-lite episode, ala Blink or Vincent and the Lodger. Play it all out the same way, but just focus on the dad and the son. Just see Amy and Rory in the background, and only see the Doctor when he shows up. Just imagine what it would be like at the end when the Dad gets sucked into the dollhouse and you see Rory fending off wooden doll Amy with absolutely no context as to what’s going on.
Exactly. There have been all kinds of references to The Doctor not being a good man. In ‘‘A Good Man Goes To War’’ I thought it was pretty obvious the ‘‘good man’’ was Rory. IIRC, the episode opened with HIM, as if to say ‘‘Bam! There’s your good man.’’ According to River, her crime was killing a good man. By the show’s own logic it can’t be The Doctor. I think Rory’s going to die (again.)
As for the critiques of Season 6, I think it’s hands down the best. I love involved story arcs. Yes, it’s a little confusing. The kind of show that will stand up to countless rewatchings, revealing itself more and more each time you watch. I never watched Lost, but it’s clear that Doctor Who writers do eventually tie up the loose ends. But isn’t it all about the journey anyway?
All of which have been made by the Doctor himself. (Or a psychic projection of his inner thoughts, but that’s still him.)
Even Madam Kovarian, the one who brainwashed Melody into killing him, refers to him as ‘a good man’. ‘The anger of a good man is not a problem. Good men have too many rules.’ It was the Doctor who replied to that, saying he’s not a good man. ‘Good men don’t need rules. Today’s not the day to find out why I have so many.’
She feared him enough to create a Tyke-bomb to take him out, and she STILL called him a Good Man.
The Doctor’s self-loathing has had a few major showings since his regeneration - Amy’s Choice (‘nobody in the universe hates me as much as [myself]’) and Let’s Kill Hitler (‘Guilt! More guilt! STILL GUILT! There must be ONE person in the universe I haven’t screwed up!’) being the biggest, but The Time of Angels/Flesh and Stone, The Impossible Astronaut, The Doctor’s Wife, and A Good Man Goes to War all have slightly lesser moments of it.
But, how he sees himself isn’t the same as how others see him - not all of his enemies think of him as a good man, of course (see The Stolen Earth, or The Pandorica Opens), but it’s telling that the alliance from A Good Man Goes to War, at least in part, do. And his friends, even those who’ve left him, couldn’t be shaken from their belief that he’s a good man, even if they had to stay on the TARDIS and hear him whine about it for the next century. (They may realize he’s dangerous to be around, but that’s not the same as not being good.)
I thought that was a pretty decent child-scarer. As folk have said it was a bit “Monster of the Week”, but nothing wrong with that to my mind.
A cross between the Olympic themed one (Fear Her?) and Madame de Pompadour’s dolls from The Girl In the Fireplace. Disappointingly dull 
Worth it for the dead-pan exchange between Amy and Rory when they finally got out of the lift: “Was I a…?” “Yeah.” Perfectly executed 
That explains why Amy and Rory got over the whole Melody/Mels/River thing so completely so quickly.
I liked the nursery rhyme at the close:
Tick tock goes the clock
He cradled and he rocked her
Tick tock goes the clock
Even for the Doctor
…I would have so loved to have seen that episode!!! 
Am I the only one who just kept noticing the references to previous episodes? I mean we have:
[ul]
[li]A man and a dog (Prisoner Zero)[/li][li]Rory with a mop (The Big Bang)[/li][li]Getting trapped in a lift (Beast Below)[/li][li]Rory and Amy “dying” (Every damn episode!)[/li][li]Woman getting swallowed by rubbish (Mickey’s first episode)[/li][li]Amy turned into a doll (Amy turned into a ganger)[/li][li]Child calling for help (Beast Below)[/li][li]The boys and his parents (parallels with Rivers relationships with the Ponds)[/li][li]The eyeball. (The Ganger episodes, the 11th hour)[/li][/ul]
Was it just me?
And for the record, I loved this episode too. Only wish it had played earlier in the season as planned and not now: would have fit better.
Yes, I think it was a massive improvement. I’m one of the ones very much against the Lostification of Doctor Who and being back to a simple story with a beginning and end was a huge relief. Best episode of the series so far and, yes, I am including Gaimen’s in that.
My wife says that the music sounded like it had a few Vertigo riffs to it as well.
I must have been watching something else 
- boring…
Been watching Dr Who as far back as I can remember (46 don’t you know) from Pertwee to now - even got a load of the early ones on tape - but this was in par with Paradise Towers with the 7th Doctor - Scary - :dubious: never :dubious: - nothing like the Daleks when (according to my mother) I used to hide behind the couch every time they were on screen - and not those new :smack: Duplo :smack: Daleks the original ones…
That’d be pretty weak. I think it’s more that Amy is no longer a wooden doll.
For those who were fans of “Ashes to Ashes”, it was interesting seeing Keats as a loving father rather than…you know.
Also, I’ve gotta say it it shows how much of an effect that Moffat has had that I watched a standalone episode and thought that it felt kind of weird that it was a standalone.
And thanks for the nursery rhyme, standingwave. I could hear that it ended with “the doctor” but couldn’t catch the rest of it.
-Joe
I thought it was a very uneven episode - some interesting ideas and some comic moments but not scary (oddly the one genuinely unsettling moment for me - the eye in the drawer - turned out to be unimportant). There wasn’t enough menace built up around the dolls and the ending felt rushed; by the time the Doctor went into the cupboard there wasn’t enough time for much more than a frantic chase.
I also thought the father was put in an unpleasant position of knowing the truth about George but never being able to tell his wife without her seriously freaking out and possibly harming or rejecting George.
The Doctor sees himself as the man who wiped the Time Lords out of existance in order to stop the Daleks. Sort of makes him orders of magnitute worse than Hitler. His friends think of him as a good man because they seem him as the zany Time Lord taking them around the universe on madcap adventures saving civilizations and never leaving his friends behind.
It would be interesting to see how they would react to the Doctor if he were put into another unwinnable position where he had to sacrifice someone for the greater good.
Yeah, it took me a little while to accept Danny Mays as a good guy. Didn’t help that both this and the Ashes to Ashes finale involved a Scary Lift.
Yes, I got the same ‘rushed’ feeling. Plus, the whole conflict seemed to be resolved by the Doctor just prompting the kid to ‘face his fear’, which then he just did, and all came out alright. There seemed to be no growth in the kid in order to enable him to confront what previously he could only deal with by psychically locking it into a cupboard. (True, there was growth in the relationship between the father and his ‘son’ – what exactly did the Doctor say he was again? – but this seemed largely a separate issue to me.)
Here are all the lyrics from throughout the episode thanks to Doctor Who Quotes:
[spoiler]Tick tock goes the clock
And what now shall we play?
Tick tock goes the clock
Now summer’s gone away?
Tick tock goes the clock
And what then shall we see?
Tick tock until the day
That thou shalt marry me
Tick tock goes the clock
And all the years they fly
Tick tock and all too soon
You and I must die
Tick tock goes the clock
He cradled her and he rocked her
Tick tock goes the clock
Even for the Doctor.[/spoiler]
Doctor Who’s real name. Thanks to youtube.
Start at about 1 minute in.
