Doctor Who

[LyonJacques]

Did Amy and Rory even know which town/city that house was in?

[BigShimmeryWall]

Earth Capital

[Sarlaccfood]

Did Amy and Rory even know which town/city that house was in?

The line about the favorite car was nice though and true to both characters. You can really imagine the exchange between them on a quiet day in the Tardis.

[The Sarge]

So, anyone else like to take a guess as to what was behind the Doctor's door?

I mean, it was obviously himself, wasn't it.

Not as funny as the gif Harsin posted, but it managed to get a chuckle...

[Captain Novaforce]

Not as funny as the gif Harsin posted, but it managed to get a chuckle...

Surely you should replace the second last frame with:

[SeanR]

I liked that one.

[SeanR]

I tell you what's changed - Doctor Who has become scary again. When I think back to being a kid I remember being scared a lot of the time watching the Tom Baker episodes, and my daughters (4 and 7) are both massive Who fans and happily watched all of the Ecclestone and Tennant episodes, but I've noticed with the last few that it's given them the heebeejeebees - especially the Dolls, and the episode that just aired. That's how Doctor Who should be, not farting aliens and face fucking paving slabs.

the difference is the budget's caught up with the ideas

[zxcvbnm]

I was watching an Ecclestone episode yesterday and the difference in quality is staggering - the sets, the quality of the film stock used, the scripts, acting - everything has just taken a huge leap forward.

[Reidles]

Really good article on if this season is too complicated here.

Totally echoes something wider in TV. Whithouse's comment about going up against Red Or Black is totally on the mark. Prime time television for adult audiences, etc is woefully dire. We get served up New Tricks, Casualty and the like and it's patronising on their auidence. Kids/Family TV, films, books, etc. have been on the rise because the quality of the storytelling of Who/Pixar/Dreamworks/JK Ruddy Rowling in comparison to their 'adult' contemporaries.

The real jewels like, The Wire, Mad Men, Breaking Bad, Curb, etc get put on ridiculous times in comparison to the prime time stuff we get and the viewing public, in general, are unaware of them.

Anyway, rant over, I'm off to watch Thundercats.

[Uncle Mike]

While I don't disagree with the general point that a lot of mainstream telly is made at a simple level for lowest common denominator audiences, I don't believe it's complexity that's annoying people with this current run of Who. I think it's muddled-ness.

[NecroMorrius]

Whilst I agree I'm not sure the general public does. I think I'm right in saying that the last three episodes have had the worst audience figures since the show returned, about two million less than what an average RTD era episode was receiving. Although whether you can put it solely down to the darker direction is debatable as I wouldn't be surprised if the complexity of the overarching story has probably put more families off. It will be interesting to see if these lower numbers continue and whether or not it forces the BBC to simplify and lighten the tone.

I'd put money on it being down to the fact that it's much better now, and the general public have absolutely terrible taste in TV progamming.

[JohnC]

Christmas Special stuff announced.

Not really spoilery, but some people might like to not know even this much I suppose.

Guest cast

Bill Bailey, Arabella Weir, and Alexander Armstrong as well as the previously announced Claire Skinner

Story synopsis

The story will see Madge Arwell (Skinner) and her two children, Lily and Cyril, evacuated to Dorset, where they meet a "mysterious young man in a bow tie, and a big blue parcel is waiting for them under the tree. They are about to enter a magical new world and learn that a Time Lord never forgets his debts..."

[El Pibe]

Personally, I don't mind having an arc but my problem with the arc in this series is that it's not half as interesting as those running the show seem to think.

The main problem being River Song. I am completely and utterly bored of her now and would happily never see her in another episode.

[lordcookie]

The balance between standalone and arc stories has been off this season too. Before the break nearly every episode had a strong arc element to the episode even if it wasn't directly about Amy being pregnant or River. Yet since the return we've had four in a row (if you include this weeks that at least appears to be standalone) that don't really reference this wider story.

[JBD]

Personally, I don't mind having an arc but my problem with the arc in this series is that it's not half as interesting as those running the show seem to think.

The main problem being River Song. I am completely and utterly bored of her now and would happily never see her in another episode.

Agreed, the problem for me isn't that the season has a complex arc, it's just that this one is a bit of a duffer; It's muddled and tiresome and, crucially, I just don't care if they find their kid or not (difficult when they don't seem to). I've enjoyed most of the more standalone stuff this year, it's the arc that's dragging.

[SeanR]

just to confirm, we didn't mind Corden in that previous episode, did we? So the next one could be ok, right?

[Headache]

Yeah, I thought he was fairly decent playing his usual character opposite the Doctor. I'm hopeful he'll be ok this time too.

[mayor_mike_haggar]

Acting is basically the perfect career for Corden, since any time he spends pretending not to be himself is a huge bonus.

[Reidles]

Agreed, the problem for me isn't that the season has a complex arc, it's just that this one is a bit of a duffer; It's muddled and tiresome and, crucially, I just don't care if they find their kid or not (difficult when they don't seem to). I've enjoyed most of the more standalone stuff this year, it's the arc that's dragging.

While this season has had it's problems with the overall arc, we must remember that the real arc is the Doctor's death. I saw Let's Kill Hitler as a 'part two' to A Good Man Goes To War.

While the Amy pregnancy thing had been going on for a while, I think it's pretty much tied up now. We found out that Amy was Flesh-Amy and she really was pregnant at the end of one ep, and they went and rescued her in the next and the found the baby again in the next ep after that. While the conclusion to that did have some problems (too much crammed into one episode, etc.), I still think it was pretty much was concluded. The only link that's missing is we now know that the little girl in the spacesuit was River, but who was the person in the suit who shot The Doctor?

Maybe the PR machine made too much hype about the 'Who's the Baby' thang in the summer and it's obvious to see why that should appear more important than The Doctor's death - which we all know isn't going to happen...

The real arc - and this has been going on since The Eleventh Hour - is 'Silence Will Fall' and, this season, the death of the doctor, which seem to be linked. I may be wrong here, but wasn't a point made a while back to The Silence not being the Silence in the 'Silence Will Fall'? I think they need to wrap this up by the end of this season, else there does run a massive risk of the show getting too convoluted for it's own good.

[Harsin]

The problem is that Amy and Rory not being all that worried about the Melody situation because they know she eventually turns into Alex Kingston only works on a cold logical level. It feels emotionally dishonest (to me at least) to have them giggling in the Tardis while the Doctor plans to take them to holiday planets.

[RikC]

The balance between standalone and arc stories has been off this season too. Before the break nearly every episode had a strong arc element to the episode even if it wasn't directly about Amy being pregnant or River. Yet since the return we've had four in a row (if you include this weeks that at least appears to be standalone) that don't really reference this wider story.

There may still be incidental stuff going on that'll tie back into the final episode that we just haven't noticed yet. Apples and Rubix Cubes! Two different timelines running concurrently perhaps? Or, you may be right and Moffat has front-loaded the arc.

[Nick R]

I might be jumping the gun to suggest this, given that we don't know how the finale is going to resolve things. But maybe this series would have been better without the summer gap. Then, without the need for a big mid-season revelation/cliffhanger, the episodes could have been reordered so that the AmyGanger/birth/MelodyRiver revelations happened slightly later. That would help alleviate the issue of Amy and Rory happily joining the Doctor on all these stand-alone adventures instead of yelling "We've been deprived of our chance to raise our daughter!"

[kensei]

Dont mind the arc. Like Riber. Bit the arc standalone split has been a touch off this series. Like jumping from Day of the moon to the pirate ep. Ugh.

Still, some great eps and absolutely fascinated about how this is pieced back together. Doctor dead, ponds seemingly wrapped up, loose ends with River. Where does this go.

[RikC]

Click at your own risk! Massive fecking spoilers!

Large poster from the finale! More spoilery pics from the finale!

[hereticboy]

(that was just to mess with people. I haven't looked at the links)

[Professor Puzzles]

I looked at the links and is a pretty reasonable reaction, though I still don't have any idea what exactly is meant to be happening there.

[Hexx]

So Korvavian's eyepatch.

Anyone else think it's got a little picture of Silence on the inside, so she always remembers them?

[JohnC]

That poster is a bit of a photoshop nightmare, especially Rory.

[mayor_mike_haggar]

Why is rory cosplaying as rolento?

[NecroMorrius]

Click at your own risk! Massive fecking spoilers!

Large poster from the finale! More spoilery pics from the finale!

What's actually going on here? All I can see is the Doctor's hair looking a bit dishevelled and Rory dressed like

Jill Valentine