Doctor Who 7.05 The Angels Take Manhattan
Sep. 30th, 2012 08:12 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
selenakIn which we get the last ep before the Christmas special, and you know, I've enjoyed this half-of-a-season much, much more than the first half of season 6. Probably also more than the first half of s5 which was fine but did have one big clunker (this season didn't) plus I was still trying to get a grip on Amy's character then. Thus I declare s7, first half, as my favourite first half of a Moff era season.
First of all: what you won't find in my review: comparisons between this and other New Who companion exits. Once, just once I wish people would get out of the habit of praising Moffat by dissing RTD (or vice versa), and evaluate either man's work on their own merits.
With this cranky observation out of the way, except for one nitpick, I really appreciated this episode. As far as the Angels were concerned, it felt like a far, far better comeback for them than the neckbreaking killers from s4 were, and the idea of them farming people by sending them back in time over and over again in the same house and getting charged by the energy not only fits by what was established in their first appearance (as opposed to the killing from s5), but managed to up the creepiness of what being sent back in time could mean.
It was guessable from the trailer that the Angels would be how Amy and Rory made their final exit from the TARDIS, and given Blink, where the people sent back in time did manage to have a happy life (even though it was different from the one they had originally planned on), and specifically a married happy life, I never believed Moffat would separate the Ponds, or kill them. (He did lonely Amy for decades The Girl Who Waited and lonely Rory for a millenium in The Big Bang, and both "died" a few times - well, Rory did, Amy just the once - but neither was meant as a final fate.) So that wasn't unexpected. It was the execution which mattered, though, and the execution was lovely and made me blink a few times in a non-Angel-threatened manner due to my misty eyes. The one thing about the goodbye I was about to complain for was immediately addressed when the Doctor said "they were you parents" and recalled River had her own Ponds grief and wasn't just there to help him through his.
I do have a River complaint, though, and just one - everything else River in this episode was good and reminded me again why I enjoyed the character so much in s5 and much, though alas not all and most definitely not the finale, of s6: "never let him see the pain" and "never let him see you age", seriously? Look, any number of Companions in both Old Who and New had no hesitation whatsoever showing the Doctor their misery when they were in pain, and this is how it should be. (Arguably the only one subscribing to the stoic hiding of pain, specifically Doctor inflicted pain, I can think of was Martha and this was not a good thing for either of them, whereas Martha finally having it out with him and walking away was.) But this aside, as I said, I did love River's appearance, from her showing up as a noir detective (of course she did), to her understated but tender goodbye to Amy (kissing her hand, and Amy calling her Melody for the first and last time). Despite my growling about River's hide-the-pain attitude, I did love the Doctor making up for the fact her broken wrist was his fault by using some of his life force on her, which Ten previously did for the TARDIS in the zeppelin two parter and which also recalls newely regenerated Melody/River reviving him with her energy in Let's Kill Hitler. And of course I loved the newest twist at the way these two are sending each other messages, this time via Chinese vase, oh and the Doctor by now being so into River that he wants to look good for her. (While I have my issues about River's Doctor emotions mixd up in conditioning and her limited choice about them, I like we see the Doctor slowly but surely going from worried fascination to attraction and distrust to falling in love over the course of several seasons.) When she said she was Professor Song now, the look Eleven gave her to me seemed to carry awareness this means from River's pov, the time of her death/Library existence is drawing nearer. (Also it occurs to me that while the Doctor may run into pre-Angels Take Manhattan River a couple of times more as well as into post-Angels Take Manhattan River, he now will have to be the one guarding knowledge of the future from the former.)
The opening teaser with noir!male gum shoe and noir!boss of crime was fun, but I also welcomed the implication of Amy's afterword remark that she thinks the Doctor won't return to "here" i.e. 20th/21st century Earth for a while. We've done contemporary London, we've done a lot of the U.S. by now. Let's have some more time and space and alien planets interjected with the occasional historical.
Two teaser images making up the Christmas trailer: looks like the historical part will come first, and I'm more curious than ever whether New Companion is identical with the actress' character from the season opener or simply related to same (ala Martha and her cousin as an explanation for Freema Aygeman's pre-Martha appearance on DW).
First of all: what you won't find in my review: comparisons between this and other New Who companion exits. Once, just once I wish people would get out of the habit of praising Moffat by dissing RTD (or vice versa), and evaluate either man's work on their own merits.
With this cranky observation out of the way, except for one nitpick, I really appreciated this episode. As far as the Angels were concerned, it felt like a far, far better comeback for them than the neckbreaking killers from s4 were, and the idea of them farming people by sending them back in time over and over again in the same house and getting charged by the energy not only fits by what was established in their first appearance (as opposed to the killing from s5), but managed to up the creepiness of what being sent back in time could mean.
It was guessable from the trailer that the Angels would be how Amy and Rory made their final exit from the TARDIS, and given Blink, where the people sent back in time did manage to have a happy life (even though it was different from the one they had originally planned on), and specifically a married happy life, I never believed Moffat would separate the Ponds, or kill them. (He did lonely Amy for decades The Girl Who Waited and lonely Rory for a millenium in The Big Bang, and both "died" a few times - well, Rory did, Amy just the once - but neither was meant as a final fate.) So that wasn't unexpected. It was the execution which mattered, though, and the execution was lovely and made me blink a few times in a non-Angel-threatened manner due to my misty eyes. The one thing about the goodbye I was about to complain for was immediately addressed when the Doctor said "they were you parents" and recalled River had her own Ponds grief and wasn't just there to help him through his.
I do have a River complaint, though, and just one - everything else River in this episode was good and reminded me again why I enjoyed the character so much in s5 and much, though alas not all and most definitely not the finale, of s6: "never let him see the pain" and "never let him see you age", seriously? Look, any number of Companions in both Old Who and New had no hesitation whatsoever showing the Doctor their misery when they were in pain, and this is how it should be. (Arguably the only one subscribing to the stoic hiding of pain, specifically Doctor inflicted pain, I can think of was Martha and this was not a good thing for either of them, whereas Martha finally having it out with him and walking away was.) But this aside, as I said, I did love River's appearance, from her showing up as a noir detective (of course she did), to her understated but tender goodbye to Amy (kissing her hand, and Amy calling her Melody for the first and last time). Despite my growling about River's hide-the-pain attitude, I did love the Doctor making up for the fact her broken wrist was his fault by using some of his life force on her, which Ten previously did for the TARDIS in the zeppelin two parter and which also recalls newely regenerated Melody/River reviving him with her energy in Let's Kill Hitler. And of course I loved the newest twist at the way these two are sending each other messages, this time via Chinese vase, oh and the Doctor by now being so into River that he wants to look good for her. (While I have my issues about River's Doctor emotions mixd up in conditioning and her limited choice about them, I like we see the Doctor slowly but surely going from worried fascination to attraction and distrust to falling in love over the course of several seasons.) When she said she was Professor Song now, the look Eleven gave her to me seemed to carry awareness this means from River's pov, the time of her death/Library existence is drawing nearer. (Also it occurs to me that while the Doctor may run into pre-Angels Take Manhattan River a couple of times more as well as into post-Angels Take Manhattan River, he now will have to be the one guarding knowledge of the future from the former.)
The opening teaser with noir!male gum shoe and noir!boss of crime was fun, but I also welcomed the implication of Amy's afterword remark that she thinks the Doctor won't return to "here" i.e. 20th/21st century Earth for a while. We've done contemporary London, we've done a lot of the U.S. by now. Let's have some more time and space and alien planets interjected with the occasional historical.
Two teaser images making up the Christmas trailer: looks like the historical part will come first, and I'm more curious than ever whether New Companion is identical with the actress' character from the season opener or simply related to same (ala Martha and her cousin as an explanation for Freema Aygeman's pre-Martha appearance on DW).
no subject
Date: 2012-09-30 11:14 am (UTC)I thought there was also an echo of Father Octavian - sometimes there isn't a magic solution - though the outcome wasn't fatal this time. (Though, given that we see damaged Angels, I've never been quite clear why one can't take a chisel to them. Brian would have brought one...)
One thing I particularly liked about the episode was that it was full of echoes like that. I thought it blended the two accounts of the Angels well - the original conception of Blink, where all they do is send you back in time so that they can feed off the time energy or whatever it is, and the much more malevolent and violent Angels we met on the Byzantium. (I'd be tempted to say that this should end the Angels arc, as well as that of the Ponds, but they're probably too popular, and even on Earth the Doctor seems to have left one free.) There was the echo of Kathy Nightingale, of course (and I've always thought of her brother as proto-Rory). Amy's determination to go with Rory, both on the roof and in the graveyard, recalled Amy's Choice, when she took action knowing she might end up dead but taking the risk because there was no other way to get Rory back. And of course the idea of spoilers, so often linked to River, developed into a real danger - not just that you shouldn't know what happens next, but that knowledge will rule out all other possibilities.
And I thought it was a great episode for all three Ponds, especially in the final graveyard scene where River sees what's right for her mother when the Doctor can't, and urges her to do it - perhaps another echo, of Mels making sure her parents get together in the first place.
Things didn't turn out as I expected; I'd believed for a long time that River would kill Rory, and that that was the real reason why she stayed in the Stormcage when she demonstrated time and again that she could get out. But Moffat managed to steer a course between a happy ending, which would have been a cop-out, and an unhappy ending, and found the right ending. So I am content.
no subject
Date: 2012-10-01 06:14 am (UTC)All the echoes were lovely, and I am content with the ending for Amy and Rory as well.
no subject
Date: 2012-09-30 12:59 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-10-01 06:10 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-10-01 11:33 am (UTC)I must rewatch and check his face when she says "Professor".
no subject
Date: 2012-10-01 04:30 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-10-01 06:12 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-10-01 04:10 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-10-02 12:46 pm (UTC)Well, despite my reservations against a certain Dalek episode I must say that I couldn't agree more if I tried to.
One of the things I enjoyed most is how the writing managed to highlight each character both as an individual and as a member of of TeamTardis. Lots of small but convincing character moments, leading up to and seemingly complemeting each other, especially with regard to the Ponds.
Amy's "take charge" attitude from Dinosaurs on a Spaceship felt als natural and palpable as the quiet and accepting pragmatism we saw from Rory when he concluded that the only possible solution lay in jumping off that roof.
no subject
Date: 2012-10-03 03:33 pm (UTC)Yes, me too. There was an evenness there, a balance, between all our characters. Which made for a really enjoyable final (half a) season for Amy and Rory; I think the Ponds proved that you can do a Team TARDIS for several seasons with more than one companion in New Who. (And Old Who hadn't done it since Five's time, either.)