"Closing Time"

So today I am doing a Doctor Who double feature to get caught up and hopefully be able to stay live to wind up the season.  The flickering lights are never a good sign, and the Doctor showing up at Craig's house and finds that Craig is now a stressed out father.  Meanwhile, a shop girl discovers a Cyberman in the dressing room ... I wasn't aware that they were known for their keen fashion sense.

The Doctor starts working in a shop to investigate the strange power fluctuations, and he and Craig end up in the Cyber-ship via a teleport hidden in a shop elevator.  The Doctor and Craig get mistaken for "partners."  The Doctor is doing well investigating, but Craig ... not so good at it.  I like the alien "shhh power."  They are looking for a "silver rat," in actuality, a cybernate (another nod to the old series).  In the shop, the Doctor sees Amy and Rory shopping and sees a little girl ask Amy for her autograph.  He turns around and discovers that Amy has become a model.

The Doctor captures a Cybermat, and whoa, I have never seen a Cybermat with teeth before.  While the Doctor is talking to the baby, the Cybermat reactivates and starts stalking the Doctor.  Craig gets attacked, and the Doctor manages to deactivate it again.  The Doctor is feeling alone and melancholy.  He feels like his life is coming to a close and he is questioning wether or not having companions is a wise choice.  He goes off on his own to face the Cybermen, and Craig hurries off to help him, because the Doctor NEEDS his companions (Think back to "Turn Left" in series four).

The Doctor discovers that the Cybermen were on a ship that crashes centuries ago, and they were trying to rebuild.  They are defeated by the power of a father's love and instinct to protect his crying baby.  The Doctor swans off tidys up the house for Craig before Sophie returns and he takes some TARDIS blue envelopes from Craig's house, and as a partaking gift, Craig gives him a stetson hat.  This leads me to wonder how much time has passed in-between "The God Complex" and "Closing Time" because remember that the Doctor who died in "The Impossible Astronaut" was 200 years older than the current Doctor.

The Episode ends with the eye-patch lady and the Silence coming for River Song and encase her in the astronaut suit to set up the events of "The Impossible Astronaut."  The Season Finale is next week, and I can't wait!  Of course, then we have to wait until autumn 2012 before the next season begins.

"The God Complex"

I am still a little behind.  I am finally watching last week's episode, "The God Complex."  The opening  promises that this will be an amazing episode, scary and creepy.  After all, who hasn't had nightmares about a haunted hotel?  Each room has something someone fears, and everyone goes form room to room until they find their worst fears.  All of the pictures feature people and what their worst fear was.  The Sontaran's greatest fear was defeat, and the young lady cop was that horrible gorilla from the pre-credits sequence.

Apparently , the blogger's greatest fear is a room full of attractive females.  Heck, that is my wildest dream!  I loved his theory about the CIA and underground cities in Norway.  Rory get's a great line here, saying that he came up with an explanation more bizarre than what was actually happening.  Of course, Joe gets taken, and all of the repetitions of "praise him" are slightly disconcerting.

Personally, I think that Rita would make a great companion.  She has a confidence that would make the Doctor's travels slightly more interesting.  The Doctor works out that the hotel is the hunting grounds of an alien monster that feeds on fear.  Of course thinking of a basket of kittens banishes all of my fears too!

The Doctor faces the monster and tries to reason with it, but the geeky blogger (I'm terrible with names) gets in the way and the creature is on the rampage again.  I like that Rita isn't automatically impressed by the Doctor and it will be sad if she buys it!  The Doctor found his room, and while we don't see his greatest fear, we hear the TARDIS cloister bell ringing.  The Doctor finally works it out, that it isn't fear that the monster feeds not on fear, but on faith, and in order to save Amy, he has to break her faith in him. While it works and the monster backs off and eventually dies, we get our first possible glimpse of Amy and Rory leaving the Doctor.

The monster turns out to be another look back at the old series as the Doctor tells us that the creature was related to Nimon from the Fourth Doctor Story "The Horns of Nimon."  I think one of the great things that Moffat has done is he has incorporated references to the old series several times now.  It really makes old-school fans like myself feel like we are appreciated for sticking with it.  I haven't seen "The Horns of Nimon" in several years, so maybe I will have to watch it.  I wonder if it is on my DVD library?

The episode ends with the Doctor dropping Amy and Rory back off at their house and heading out on his own.  At least Rory gets a car out of the deal.  It is kind of a sad ending with the Doctor alone in the TARDIS.

The Girl Who Waited

Wow, it has been a while!  Somehow I managed to miss two weeks worth of Doctor Who and am finally watching "The Girl Who Waited" from my DVR.  Thinking of Amy as a companion, this episode is obviously intended to shine a light on her and develop her character some more.  The companion-centered episode is a peculiar development of the new series, starting with "Turn Left."  In the old series, there really wasn't much need to develop the characters of the companions (or the Doctor for that matter).

In the early years of the series, when there were 42 episodes per year, different episodes would be written in order to allow the principal actors to take a week off here and there.  Now they write an episode with minimal involvement of the primary characters, or rather different primary characters at different times.

Amy being trapped in a separate time stream as a method of quarantine is almost genius.  Moffat is, if nothing else, able to create a great story, even if he tends to write a very confusing season.  Karen Gilliam really shone in this episode, showing her versatility in showing us an older, harder, less innocent Amy Pond.  An Amy who was abandoned and used the things she learned from the Doctor in order to survive.

Rory forces Amy to face herself, and we see the image of Amy the way that Steven Moffat sees her.  She starts out as an innocent scottish girl, left behind and waiting for the raggedy doctor, to being the fulcrum which pivots the Doctor's life and travels, to being the mother of the person who murders the Doctor (according to the little dudes in the person-ship during "Let's Kill Hitler," but  I still have my doubts).  Of course, seeing older Amy swinging away with a sword and stick ... hmmm ... makes me wanna be more manly.

Rory being forced to make a choice was a great moment, especially when he told the Doctor "you're turning me into you."  After all, that is what the Doctor does ... he makes decisions.  It was fun to watch him force someone else to make the decision for once.  But what was with him sticking his tongue out at Amy?

Night Terrors

Time to watch Night Terrors and get caught up!  Of course I won't be home this coming Saturday night, so that will be blogged off of my DVR again too.

Gotta love a little kid who can psychically call the Doctor across time and Space.  Amy Intro .... BOOO!

A child's bedroom is the scariest place in the universe?  Wow.  Whoda thunk?  I kinda feel for the kid, laying there with his flashlight.  I don't think I have EVER been as scared as this kid looks.  Of course, Rory and Amy's elevator ride to hell looks scary too.  Plus a little old lady getting eaten by a pile of trash bags ... hrm.

OK, the dollhouse, kinda saw the coming, and it reminds me just a little bit of another First Doctor story, Planet of the Giants.  Of course, in that case the TARDIS screwed up and shrunk everyone down, and in this case we are talking about an alien kid who sticks people in a dollhouse in the cupboard, but hey, go with it, eh?

Of course as this episode draws to a close, all's well that ends well ... of course with Stephen Moffat, one never knows ... especially with The Doctor obsessing over his own death.

Let's Kill Hitler! Ooooh, please, please, can we?

NO!

"You cannot change history, not one line! ... What you are trying to do is utterly impossible! Believe me, I know, I know!"  Those were the words that the First Doctor said to Barbara when she told him that she intended to convince the Aztecs to end the ritual of human sacrifice so that Cortez would not destroy their civilization when he arrived.  So when I saw the title, "Let's Kill Hitler," well, it kind of made me wonder if this was going to be another one of Moffat's misdirections.  But then again, in "The Fires of Pompeii," the Tenth Doctor explains to Donna that some events are fixed and others are in flux ... the fixed ones tend to be the ones where the event shapes the whole of history after it, and lets face it, Hitler is one of those fixed points, so we are kind of stuck with him.

This turns out to be one of those wonderful "wibbley, wobbley" episodes.  you know, the ones where you need to use your TV TARDIS (aka, your DVR) to go back and satisfy your "did he really just say/do that?" curiosity.

The episode revolves around the addition of Amy's friend Mel, a juvenile delinquent all growed up, and the title comes from what I think is one of the most brilliant lines in the episode: "You've got a time machine, I've got a gun, what the hell, lets kill Hitler."

I am going to try to go with a lot less detail from now on, but I think that the progression of Amy's life with Mel and Rory growing up was ... fun.  Especially the fact that Amy thought Rory was gay for so long.

Temporal Grace ... does it exist or not?  Well, it did once upon a time.  It definitely worked back in the Fourth Doctor's era, but then by the time the Fifth Doctor came along, it didn't seem to work.  In the books after the original series ended, the Seventh Doctor said that the temporal grace circuit needed looking at.  Apparently he never got around to it, and he started using Temporal Grace as a "clever lie" to convince people not to fire their weapons in the TARDIS.

The Antibodies are cool, they would make awesome hall monitors in a school.  No pass?  Zap 'em!  Oooh, and Hitler delivers a wicked right cross on Hitler.  Rory really comes into his own in this episode.  I am starting to like him now.  The fake man with the little men inside ... Brilliant!  Mel is shot and regenerates in to the River Song we know and love, except, she is not quite so lovable in this episode.  Call it the redemption of River Song ... or the redemption of Melody Pond into River Song ... or ... ok, you get the idea.

The rest of the episode focuses on River going through her post-regeneration trauma (oh, and she poisons the Doctor along the way).  And what is the cruelest form of warfare?  Warfare of the heart.  When River is being evil, she is totally badass!  By the way, love the sonic cane.

In the end, Amy and Rory are rescued, River gives up her remaining regenerations to save the Doctor, and she is set on the path she must travel to become the River we know.  Hang on tight, the rest of the season is looking like it will be quite a ride!

That TARDIS DVD Cabinet ...

A Series of pictures showing the adding of the doors to the TARDIS video cabinet:

So here we go ... raw lumber ...

Doors made!

Doors hung!

Doors painted!

DVD Collection in its new home!

I still need to add the plexiglass and the sign top and door hardware. I also need to pull out my plane and fix a little sticking on one of the doors. Then, on to corner posts if I am feeling adventurous. And that is ONLY an if ...

Back to the Beginning: "An Unearthly Child"

So I was on a trip to Washington DC last week. on one of the evenings, instead of going out and exploring, I sought the refuge of my air-conditioned room and some very old friends. It is hard to believe that Doctor Who first appeared on TV screens in 1963. This is especially true since I was born in 1968. They say that our experiences make up our reality, and the reality is that when I was born, Doctor Who was into its fifth season, second lead character, and thirteenth companion. The current serial airing when I materialized on this planet was "The Invasion" (hmmm, I have that in my DVD archive, maybe I will have to review that one next).

"An Unearthly Child" was a four-part serial, airing from November 23 to December 14, 1963. It was the first Doctor Who story, and at that point, nothing was known about the Doctor. Just that he was a cranky old man in a box with his granddaughter, and a couple of people he picked up along the way. The Doctor's backstory evolved as the show went on, and so did the story telling. That being said, if you have never seen this serial or read the Target Books novelization, here, for your reading pleasure, is a summary of the first Doctor Who story to grace our screens:

It all began in a junkyard as they say. The first part of the serial opens on a foggy London night, and a patrolman checks the gate at I.M. Foreman Scrap Merchants, 76 Totter’s Lane. He walks away, and the gate opens and the camera enters the yard and settles on a police box as we hear a distinct humming noise. Fade to Coal Hill School, where two teachers, Barbara Wright and Ian Chesterton are talking about a student named Susan Foreman. They are bothered by the fact that she seems absolutely brilliant, but astoundingly dull in other ways. Barbara had tried to visit her grandfather, a “doctor,” but found that the address on file with the school office was the junkyard at 76 Totter’s Lane. They decide to follow her home and try to solve the mystery that is Susan Foreman. The teachers leave Susan and she picks up the book and immediately upon starting to read exclaims “that’s not right!”

The teachers watch her entering the junk yard and follow her in. They discover the police box, and soon encounter an old man. They hear Susan‘s voice inside the police box and argue with the old man about it, thinking he knows something about it. Susan opens the door and Barbara and Ian force their way in, discovering that they are not inside a police box, but a very large, complex machine with Susan inside.

The old man instructs Susan to close the door, and Ian argues with the old man about wanting an explanation how a police box can contain a vast room such as the one they are in. Susan calls the ship they are in the TARDIS, which stands for Time And Relative Dimensions In Space. The old man tells them that he and Susan are exiles, cut off from their own planet without friends or protection. He talks of them being wanderers in the fourth dimension of time. Ian tries to leave and gets shocked by the console. The old man and Susan argue about letting them go, and Susan tells him that if he tries to leave, she will leave him and the TARDIS. He activates the controls and the TARDIS takes off and lands in a rocky wilderness area. The first part of the story ends with a shadow looming menacingly near the TARDIS.

The second part opens with the same exterior scene of the TARDIS and the menacing shadow. The shadow is cast by a cave man who looks at the TARDIS in disbelief. The scene switches to a tribe of cave men where one of them, Za, is trying to make fire while being ridiculed by an old woman. Za and a woman talks about who will be leader of the tribe and whom her father will give her to. The scene switches to inside the TARDIS, where Barbara and Ian regain consciousness after having been knocked unconscious by the TARDIS’s trip.

Ian argues with the old man, calling him “Doctor Foreman,” to which the old man replies “doctor who?” They talk about the ship having gone back in time, but Ian is skeptical. They all exit the TARDIS, and Ian is dumbfounded, and the old man is wondering why the TARDIS still looks like a police box. Everyone starts exploring, Ian, Barbara and Susan exploring separating from the old man. Barbara refers to him as Doctor Foreman and Ian says “That’s not his name, who is he? Doctor Who?” The Doctor lights his pipe, and is attacked by a caveman named Kal who thinks that the Doctor can show him the secret of fire allowing Kal to take over the tribe. Susan, Barbara and Ian go to his aid and find that he has been taken. They take off in search of him as the scene shifts to the cave.

Za is having a hard time keeping his position as leader in the face of a challenge from Kal, and as Kal returns to the cave carrying the Doctor. Kal convinces the tribe that if he can bring them the secret of fire, that he should be leader. The Doctor awakens and tells the tribe that he would make fire for them, but he can’t make fire without matches. This adds to the conflict between Kal and Za. Kal threatens to kill the Doctor, but is interrupted by Susan, Ian and Barbara. They are overpowered by the tribe and imprisoned in the cave of skulls. Za and the woman’s father discuss her being mated with Za. As the second part ends, the four travelers discover that the cave gets its name from being littered with skeletons and skulls and that the skulls have all been split open.

In the main cave, an old woman of the tribe departs while the others are sleeping. In the cave of skulls, the travelers use a sharp edged stone to try to cut their bonds, and the Doctor tells them to use a sharp piece of bone. The old woman leaves the main cave and is seen by the woman, Hur, who wakes Za and they follow the old woman. The old woman comes into the cave of skulls, and tells the travelers they will not make fire. Hur tells Za that the old woman went to kill the travelers, and they go to follow her, overhearing her telling them that she will she them free if they do not make fire. The old woman frees them, and they escape through a back entrance to the cave of skulls.

The travelers escape into the forest at night and are pursued by Za. The travelers stop to catch their breath and Barbara is startled when she trips over a fresh corpse of an animal. They are being stalked by a wild animal, but they are saved by Za, who kills the animal, but is gravely wounded in the fight. Barbara goes to help the wounded Za, followed by Susan. Hur resists their help, and Ian tells them he is their friend and wants to treat his wounds. They argue over helping Za, and they make a stretcher to carry Za. Kal goes to the cave of skulls and questions the old woman, and Kal kills her.

While building the stretcher, the Doctor picks up a rock, and is stopped from killing Za by Ian. They begin to carry Za back to the TARDIS. Kal wakes the rest of the tribe and leads them out to stop the travelers, blocking hem from reaching the TARDIS as the third installment ends.

The final installment of this first serial starts with the travelers being taken prisoner once again. In the cave, an argument breaks out over who killed the old woman, Kal accusing Za. The Doctor tricks Kal into showing the tribe his bloody knife, forcing him to confess. The Doctor and Ian provoke the tribe to drive Kal out, and they are once again imprisoned in the cave of skulls for their trouble. They make fire for the tribe believing this to be their ticket to freedom, and give the fire to Za. Za is attacked by Kal, and in the fight, Za kills him. They ask to be set free now that they have given Za fire, but Za keeps them prisoner, forcing them to remain and join the tribe.

As the tribe celebrates the return of fire, the travelers use the fire to trick the tribe into believing that they are dead and escape. The tribe follows when they discover the deception and give chase, but the travelers reach the TARDIS and escape as spears are thrown at the vanishing TARDIS.