[TV] Doctor Who

[Mathew_Freeman]

It was simply a fun and entertaining episode with lots of funny scenes.

You see, I disagree. I think it's potentially quite an important episode. Lots of questions.

Who built the time ship and how did it end up on top of that building? I'm under the impression that apart from the Daleks "temporal jump" escape mechanism that no other race apart from the Time Lords even HAVE time travel? Plus, it looked an awful lot like a TARDIS on the inside.

Who exactly is this "Mark", who oh-so-conveniently disappeared just before this all kicks off, allowing the Doctor time and space to arrive, solve the problem etc?

What's the significance of the numbers on the display on the TARDIS? they started at 9, went down to 5, and then into the minuses, and the Doctor (whilst not saying anything to Amy) did look pretty worried by that.

Also - those cracks in the wall aren't following Amy. They're following the Doctor, surely.

Spoilers for next week for those that haven't seen the trailer:

Spoiler

River Song! Yay! Plus the "most feared creature ever to have existed". Mouseferatu, on his LJ was speculating that this could actually be...the Doctor himself? Very interesting thought.

 

[Pseudonym]

Plus, it looked an awful lot like a TARDIS on the inside.

I thought I heard the Doctor say "someone is trying to build a TARDIS" or something to that effect when they went in. When they had a figure shooting lightning off-screen for a second I thought we would see yet another return of The Master.

Spoiler

River Song! Yay! Plus the "most feared creature ever to have existed". Mouseferatu, on his LJ was speculating that this could actually be...the Doctor himself? Very interesting thought.

I had that same thought.

 

[Volaran]

Who built the time ship and how did it end up on top of that building? I'm under the impression that apart from the Daleks "temporal jump" escape mechanism that no other race apart from the Time Lords even HAVE time travel? Plus, it looked an awful lot like a TARDIS on the inside.

Captain Jack had time travel capabilities back in series 1, and had previously worked for a 51st century-based Time Agency of some sort.

 

[Mouseferatu]

Plus, in addition to the Time Agency, the Daleks have time travel capabilities far in excess of the Emergency Temporal Shift. At least back during the old series, they had time machines that were basically very TARDIS-like: bigger on the inside, capable of traveling anywhere at any time. I'm currently watching a (mind-numbingly awful) six-part story of the first Doctor, in which the Daleks are chasing the TARDIS through time.

(I think the official cannon is that they stole some of that tech from the Time Lords, but I think that had more to do with the "bigger on the inside" bits than the actual time travel. But even if it was the time travel, they've had it for ages.)

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

Who exactly is this "Mark", who oh-so-conveniently disappeared just before this all kicks off, allowing the Doctor time and space to arrive, solve the problem etc?

I figure the Doctor "created" this uncle (remember - psychic paper) so that someone in the building would go away and he could do his thing.

Spoiler

River Song! Yay! Plus the "most feared creature ever to have existed". Mouseferatu, on his LJ was speculating that this could actually be...the Doctor himself? Very interesting thought.

Some speculation (which is also based on the trailer for next episode, therefore spoiler tags)

[sblock]
If the terrible creature is indeed the Doctor, we might have seen "him" already in "Amy's Choice". The dark part of his personality surfaces.
Names dropped in the trailer seem to include the living plastic monster in the first episode of the new Doctor Who series in 2005 (?).
Over the course of the last few seasons, there have been several mentions of races that were displaced, lost their homeworlds and similar experiences. Maybe this is all the "dark doctor" doings? I mean, the Doctor was certainly... displeased with all these aliens trying to destroy/conquer earth, so his dark self acts on this anger, thereby creating the problem in the first place...
[/sblock]

 

[Herschel]

I liked teh episode, but am really Hype for next week. River rocks and the trailer was almost as awesome as the long one for Season 4. That might be my favorite TV trailer ever. It was probably the only one that ever game me goosebumps of anticipation (even though I'd already seen most of the episodes!). This one was fairly close.

As for the Doctor's anger, they touched on it at the end of the Family of Blood two-parter and maybe they'll go back to that premise for the season round out..

 

[Raven Crowking]

Going back a bit (because less of the season has aired here than there): Am I the only one saddened by seeing that the Daleks now buy their casing from IKEA? Like the old Dr. Who RPG: The IKEAan Menace?

Some theories:

Spoiler

Rory will be back. Amy will have another choice, either to undo the timequake, and thus her time with the Doctor, but also preventing Rory from being killed....or some other way for the Doctor to survive the TARDIS's apparent destruction.

Without seeing the episode, is it possible that a future Doctor, past the TARDIS's destruction, is trying to recreate it in The Lodger?

Wouldn't the dark side of the Doctor be the Valeyard?

 

[Mallus]

OK... so this week's episode was a proper rom-com, with real comedy and no ashy core of sadness --well, until the very end, and only briefly-- like last weeks. Matt Smith is a very talented comedic actor. I wouldn't have enjoyed a story like this half as much if Tennant were playing the Doctor.

 

[Felon]

I LOVED THIS EPISODE. It was less a Doctor Who story and more of a tribute to a man unappreciated in his lifetime, only for him to realize (through the miracle of time travel ) how great his legacy would be. My eyes welled up at the scene in the museum.

Great episode. I liked the way the curator summed up Van Gogh. Throughout the history of creative media, there persists the popular conception that it's fresh and innovative to depict ugliness in as raw a state as possible. Fans gobble it up. But real genius isn't deconstructive. Also, it is touching to see Van Gogh's reaction, because the real Van Gogh probably went his whole life without feeling that anyone ever quite got him.

The one thing that made me cringe was the trite music swelling up like I was watching the end of a Grey's Anatomy episode (actually, the end of every Grey's Anatomy episode, come to think of it).

 

[horacethegrey]

The one thing that made me cringe was the trite music swelling up like I was watching the end of a Grey's Anatomy episode (actually, the end of every Grey's Anatomy episode, come to think of it).

It was written by Richard Curtis, so what did you expect? Most of his films (Four Weddings and a Funeral, Notting Hill) end on a musical montage. Sure it's manipulative, but damn if it isn't effective.