Doctor 7.5 Review- A Night of Terror and Tears.

A Smiling Angel
(who knew they could get creepier?)

A night of terror and tears, otherwise known as The Angels Take Manhattan.

This episode was intense.  It began intensely suspenseful, had intensely awesome and hilarious moments, and of course intense sadness.  Spoilers abound, just so you know.

The story begins in Manhattan, naturally, with... you guessed it, yet another voice over.  And this voice over is yet again by an inconsequential character.  The scene itself was important for setting up the Angels' hotel, but the voice over could have been dropped.  If it seemed vital, they could have lost earlier voice overs so I wasn't rolling my eyes. Couldn't they have just had someone encounter the creepy collector guy and get sent to the hotel? Or incorporate the guys that capture Rory later?  



All of the Angels are seriously creepy in this episode.  They must have gone out searching for creepy looking statues. The laughing babies were horrifying (except for the fact that they sounded just like the Boos from Mario Bros - J).  The Statue of Liberty as a Weeping Angel is likely a direct result of online commentary. With it used only lightly, it is mostly okay. I do think it highly unlikely that everyone in NYC was not looking at the Statue of Liberty so that it could move... that doesn't quite add up! It is nice that the Angels have taken over, not that they've always been there. 

Rory with creepy Baby Angels

After the credits we jump to modern New York and see the scene that's had pics splattered online for months.  As soon as Rory leaves the group for coffee you know he's going to go missing, and the laughing babies just confirm it.  It was very creepy, and leads into the real start of the story. 

Beautiful moment of
The Doctor & River

My favorite thing in this episode is River. We're supposed to love her- lots of sad things are happening in this hour and the interaction of River and the Doctor is supposed to be our reward for making it through the episode.  From the first moment we see River and realize that the Doctor has been reading about her (yowzah!), it puts a smile on your face. River is my favorite thing in Doctor Who right now, so I was just THRILLED to see her, and she lived up to all of my expectations.  I can't wait to rewatch every scene she's in. When she flat out says, "Just wait till my husband gets home," I love it. And the Doctor primping! Ahhh!! I could fill a blog with quotes by her and the Doctor, but I am going to stay on task and move on.  It is important to note that she isn't in jail anymore- she was pardoned since the man that she killed doesn't seem to have existed. It made me want to review River's history again - was she pardoned during Silence in the Library? 

The Doctor is devastated by reading the final chapter titles of River's book, and his reaction is so honest.  You see how connected he really is to Amy; we've always known that Amy is important and precious to him, but here we see - he almost doesn't know how to control that emotion. He refuses to accept the reality of the situation and moves on.  He refuses to break River's wrist just because the book says so. Which bugs me a little - didn't he break a couple things while landing the TARDIS - that counts as breaking, right? Have we heard before about reading it making it fact?  Is that new?  I mean, we hear all the time that time can be rewritten.  So you can see it, but you can't read it?  It just seems like there's something wrong with this rule. I feel like if I reflect on this, or even the paradox created by Rory & Amy's jump, I'll become frustrated by the wibbly-wobblyness of it all.  For now, I choose to move on.


When the family reunites in the the Angels' hotel, it's to see a moving death of Rory Williams.  Amy is touching here as well.  Their love is so powerful and so obvious in every second of this episode. At times it has been hard to see the depth of their love for each other; they get so into the Doctor's issues, but recently you've seen how much they are in love with one another. Real life gave them that - they had these shared experiences that no one else could relate to and they realized that they needed each other.  It's impossible to imagine them without one another.  I spent the episode trying to decide if they were going to kill one of them, and they were showing them so in love just to rip out our hearts.  When they make it to the roof and Rory is ready to jump, I am just amazed at the talent of these actors.  They make the characters so real to me, and I am so appreciative of how much of themselves they must put into their parts.  Both Rory and Amy are beautiful in these moments on the roof, before jumping off.  Of course, a highlight moment is when Amy asked Rory if he thought after jumping he would just come back to life. His answer, "When do I not?" was brilliant.

The Doctor on his own

The whole group survives (I held my breath until River appeared on the other side of the Tardis) the jump and the death of the Angels.  As a viewer, we know there are only moments left and something bad is going to happen. We're right.  Rory's last moment is both sudden and heart breaking.  Amy's simple choice is of course her only option.  She says good-bye to River and the Doctor, and it's just inevitable.  She turns away and is gone.  


River and The Doctor return to the Tardis, and River seems eerily calm.  The Doctor acknowledges she's just said good-bye to her parents, and she seems somewhat unconcerned. What's up with that?  She then walks off to write her book, that Amy is going to publish. Does Amy publish her book in the past then? Does River go back and see them? Has she already gone back and seen them? Does she already know that they were back in time at the beginning of the episode? Being so calm, has she always known? So many River related questions!! I'm shocked. 

Amelia Pond, the Girl Who Waited

I loved the ending. Amy sends the Doctor back to the night she waited, and it was great.  It was comforting to remember that somewhere in time Amy is just beginning her adventures with the Doctor. I think every companion should have gotten such an awesome tribute - it was pretty freakin' awesome. It made me totally respect and love Amy more than I have over the past two and half seasons. 

Happy moments with The Doctor, Amy, & Rory

As far as the future (in the viewer's timeline), it's been stressed throughout the season that the Doctor doesn't need to be travelling alone. I'm looking forward to seeing Oswin at Christmas, hopefully joining the Doctor for a while.  I can't wait to see what happens with that.  If he saves Oswin, does he start to exist again?  It should be interesting.  As far as River, I imagine it will be ages, if ever, before we see such fun interaction again. I doubt there will be many times that we see them when they are both aware of the fact that they're married and should be flirting.   I'm pretty sure that we only got those happy moments to make up for the extreme sadness we endured.  It may take a while, but hopefully we'll eventually get all our questions answered!

DFTBA and Stay Shiny!
Jana and Kristin

An Anticlimactic Invasion- Doctor 7.4 Review

I know my Pacey picture is dreamy and should just replace all other pictures in the blog (or at least stay at the top longer than 24 hours)... but we've got to get a new Doctor review up and running!

So... The Power of Three. Can I just start with that? I thought that Power of Three crap was incredibly annoying - didn't like it. The beginning and the end, with Amy narrating, ugh. It's also the third (so 3 out of 4) episodes beginning with narration.  On the upside, at least it was Amy.  The other two have been from characters irrelevant to the story line. It seems like it's supposed to make you feel like something epic is happening, but I'm not sure that it followed through.   

The setup of this episode was interesting. The year of the slow invasion; when the doctor came to stay.  I liked that it went through the whole year (year and a half?), but was left wondering - when did this happen in reference to what we've seen this season? Are these events occuring in the order we've viewed them?  Is it possible that this is before a Pond Life? It seems like it's after Dinosaurs on a Spaceship because Mr. Weasley (sorry, but that's who he is) knew the Doctor. I read an interesting theory stating that the Doctor is working backwards through his time with Amy and Rory... the Henry the 8th comment from "The Town Called Mercy" and then seeing the Henry the 8th situation in "The Power of Three" made me think we were definitely on wibbly wobbly time now.

A rather confusing villian

I hated the stupid cubes; ick. I'd rather have a freakin' Dalek or Cyberman. Even an adipose was better than those stupid things. And that villain? Who was that? I hope that there is some history there that I'm unaware of, or that they're coming back.  We had tons of time spent on setting up this world-wide problem, and then it just ended.  Why did the humans need to be wiped out?  Who set that in motion? And whatever started it,  surely we did not actually solve this damn cube crisis with the pressing of like three buttons. Come ON!!  Waving a sonic screwdriver at something may help find a solution, but it is not an "Easy Button" that simply solved the entire crisis.  It brought people back to life, defeated the villain, and saved the Earth?  Seriously?  It was anticlimactic and confusing.

Kate & the Doctor

I adored the references to the past though - the fact that UNIT was back, that the head of UNIT was Brigadier's daughter - LOVE! Making me applaud our efforts in learning about Doctors 1-8 even more. (We will so have to go into that when we're done analyzing next week!) The comment about the companions - obviously not just about Rose and Martha and Donna (which haven't been mentioned in 2 seasons anyway), made me want to cry and cheer at the same time. Finally, some history of the Doctor being brought in! About time Steve Moffatt!! Thank you!!

I know we're in for a set up next week.  Obviously the Ponds are not going to choose to go gently in to that good night, so it's going to be special and I'm certain, even as ready as I am, that tears will be involved. I didn't realize how sad I would be until I read that the last scene the trio actually filmed was from this episode.  The final moment from the hour, the three waving good-bye as they stepped into the Tardis, was the final shot filmed with Amy, Rory, & the Doctor together.  It made me sad to think of that, and I know next week is coming on strong.

Rory, The Doctor, & Amy in their final shot

I actually peeked at next week (some people on this blog work hard not to watch "next time on..."); not going to say a thing, but I think we're in for a monumental episode. I think this is on Silence in the Library, Blink proportions people. Everything's been building to this episode and I think some of the confusion (because Lord knows it can't ever all be sorted out) will be put to rest.

DFTBA & Stay Shiny!
Jana & Kristin

K's Doctor 7.3 Review

Some of this may be repetitive if you check out Jana's earlier post, but I wanted to share a specific review of last night's Doctor Who episode, "A Town Called Mercy."  Heavy on the SPOILERS!

The opening was interesting, but I'm a little tired of voiceovers by random people.  Don't get me wrong, I don't miss the Amy intro, but I'd rather just jump into the action.  Also, it was obviously space meets cowboys, so it made me miss Firefly.    I found the setting distracting to the story. So much emphasis was made on it being a "western" that it had to fight itself before it could become serious.  Matt Smith was adorable dancing through the Western cliches, but accents were distractingly bad, and I found that it was just trying too hard.  Maybe this is just the result of having a British television show portray the American West.  The sheriff was all right, but most of the other characters seemed more like caricatures than real people.



The Doctor or The Sheriff?

 I've repeatedly complained about missing River, but when Amy acknowledged she was a mom, that was actually enough for me.  This was not an episode that seemed like it should include River; it wasn't about collecting a group like last week, and River wasn't any business of this guy's.  Amy didn't need to provide him with details.   This simple acknowledgement that River existed (the VERY first this season) was satisfying and seemed appropriate.  I still miss her, but I didn't feel a gaping hole where she should have been, like I did last week.



Solomon (David Bradley) from 7.2

 This episode did manage to overcome it's cheesiness after a bit.  When the Doctor grabbed the gun and was ready to let the cyborg man kill "the alien doctor," I was horrified and thrilled.  Matt Smith is really coming into his own in my opinion.  It created a complex situation that brought back the feel of some darker Tennant episodes.    It also proved that his merciless action last week (letting the bad guy just die) was not careless, out of character writing, but establishing a pattern. 




Amy

 
This was a story that made you ask questions and I loved it. It is true that sometimes the questions were pushed in our face just a little more than neccesary.  I want to come to questions of right and wrong on my own, and it was very spelled out this time, but it still was a great episode.  It was my favorite this season so far. 

Other things of note- The Doctor is 1200 now, so he's aged a bit and hasn't spent all that time with Rory and Amy.  This is obviously something that Moffat made some effort to point out, and it's the reason the Doctor has gone through some changes.  Amy and Rory specifically said that they need to spend some time at home because they're aging faster than their friends.  This is yet another mention this season (in addition to families and jobs) of life outside of the Doctor.  You can feel Moffat setting something up.

I can't wait to see what other people thing about Season 7 so far!

I have a Christmas list, too! (Doctor Who 7.1&2)

I know we’re growing in distance from our first Dragon Con experience, but I’m still overwhelmed and I just can’t narrow it to a readable amount.  So here's my thoughts so far about Doctor Who- Season 7.  (Other than one TINY thing, the first part of this review is actually spoiler free.)

What I was thinking when I heard this quote...

Right after watching the second episode of the season, I realized I MISSED RIVER!!! (That's the tiny thing.) I then turned right around and watched The Time of Angels (S5.4), just to see River, but it made me notice a few other things.  Matt Smith has a come a long way as the Doctor.  You don’t notice the change from mere quippyness right away.  He still carries himself in a similar manner and says the same clever lines, but he somehow seems less superficial.  It’s almost like at the beginning he was saying lines and acting like the Doctor, but now he really IS the Doctor. 

I know most Whovians who adored Tennant will never be satisfied with Smith, and I get it.  Tennant was able to convey deep emotion with an eyebrow while Smith fills episodes with jokes and quips.  It's easy to fall for someone when he wears his hearts on his sleeve. The thing is, Smith has created a Doctor who is believable. You can’t let everything rip your heart out for 900 years without building some walls, and you can believe that Smith’s Doctor is laughing to keep from crying.  He’s living with some barriers.  I came to adore River, and she adores the Doctor.  I thought that I just fell for him with her, but in retrospect I realize now that I also came to believe in him through the later episodes.

As for particulars about the new episodes, I’ll keep it short. 

SPOILERS!!

I loved meeting Oswin. She’s fantastic.  I miss River, but I understand she’s not always around.  What’s weird is them not mentioning her at all. Is something up with that; are we supposed to be questioning why no one even talks about her?  I mean, the “gang” was gathered up for episode 2, and the Doctor’s gang has no River?  Is it possible this is to distance her storyline from the Ponds?   I also felt like meeting the extra characters in the second episode was kind of random.  They seemed like such full characters, but it also doesn’t look like we’ll see them again.  I hope we do, because it just felt strange and disconnected.   I loved the Doctor and his Christmas list, and I appreciated meeting Rory’s dad.  He was fun, and he made me feel like I knew Rory a little better. 

So Jana, do you want to share some thoughts on Doctor Who, or do you want to dive into Dragon Con?  Take your pick!

Stay Shiny!

Kristin