Sunday, May 1, 2011

Doctor Who: Love a Tomb [Spoilers]

The more I think about this episode, the more I think it's pretending to answer a lot of question but not really.

For example, how on bloody earth did they get from the Warehouse situation to Canton pretending to hunt them down? Or from the Doctor telling Canton to look behind him at the Silence (what a rubbishy name) to having the Doctor all chained up?



With a rubbishy beard and a self satisfied little smirk, completely cool and collected and charismatic in the face of anything.

And where exactly did they get the materials to build the knock-off Pandorica? And when exactly did the Doctor and Canton have time to cook up this plan? And how did they get the TARDIS into Area 51? And where is Future!Eleven's TARDIS?

Shit has happened in that warehouse and now we're going to have to wait to figure out what, exactly, happened.

Bollucks.

Just amp up the anticipation and the suspense why don't you.

Though, I have to admit, when "three months later" scrolled down at the bottom and it showed Amy running



the first thing that popped into my head THANK THE TARDIS THERE IS NO BABY BUMP.

And I was very happy. And then Amy was like oh I was mistaken and I was even happier.

Even though I think the Silence is a bollucksy name for them, I do admit that they work fantastically as television monsters. I mean, I don't think their effect would be quite the same in like a novel.

As long as there's been something in the corner of your eye or creaking in your house or breathing under your bed or voices through a wall.


Oooo. Shivers.

But this scene here, with Amy, in the orphanage? Chills when I watched it. Chills.



First, everything is fine. Creepy, but fine.



Hands! Oh my god! And then the very next frame:



!!!!!

WHAT HAPPENED TO YOUR FACE

And of course, the weather doesn't help a bit: it was a dark and stormy night. Oooooo.

Though, this entire orphanage scene also raises more questions than it actually answers.

A). Where did Amy actually get the pen? In the beginning, the episode always showed a pen dangling from their necks. But there is no pen anywhere on Amy's person that I noticed -- just a flashlight. So, who marked her up -- or was it just a continuity error?

B). If the pen-less-ness was just a continuity error, then why would Amy mark up her face? That just seems like it would be awkward and unnatural because it would be even harder to see the tally marks (no peripheral). But then Rory was all marked up on his face too, so maybe I'm just overanalyzing it. The marked up faces are more compelling than arms and hands -- but I'd still like a reason. /pout.

C). And what happened in the lost time? Something significant or Amy just counting how many of the creepy Silence are haunting the "orphanage" (if it's even still a real orphanage, herrrumph)?

And who is this woman?



Who's dreaming and what's the dream -- though, to be honest, I'm hoping it's not something similar to what happened in the Library episodes.

Still. I'm going to guess there's a perception filter at work here. I bet that bedroom wasn't even real.

I hope not because there's this:



It's like -- ah, can't get away from the pregnancy! But, the closing scenes, the one where it showed the bio scan oscillating from negative to positive gives me hope that a) there won't be a pregnancy period or b) even if there is a pregnancy, there'll be a rousing good story behind it which will hopefully be ultra light on the soap opera aspects so many of these arcs tend to take. (And apparently, the tumblr-verse is calling it Schrodinger's Uterus, which kinda made me smile, I admit it.)



I adore the framing of this scene, just fyi.

I love Rory. What a beautiful man.

Rory: She can always hear me, Doctor. Always. Wherever she is, and she always knows that I am coming for her, do you understand me. Always.

Amy: Doctor, are you there, can you hear me? Doctor -- oh god. Please, please just get me out of this.

Rory: He's coming, I'll bring him I swear.


I love how the show still highlights Rory's insecurities, but how it never dwindles into some machismo bullshit. How, even when he's not sure whom Amy loves in that one scene, it seems like his love for her transcends the territorial, melodramatic relationship patterns that is so stereotypical of so many shows these days.

And that's so, so beautiful. (Though, now that it's established that Amy loves Rory, I hope the show won't keep on pointing it out to the viewers, no matter how sweet it is.)

And I love this weird, little, simple, beautiful relationship that is beginning to form between the Doctor and Rory.

Especially when they talked about Rory as a roman in more than an off-the-cuff sort of joke:

Rory: Rome fell.
Doctor: I know, I was there.
Rory: So was I.
Doctor: Do you ever remember it? 2000 years, waiting for Amy - the last centurion?
Rory: No.
Doctor: You're lying.
Rory: Of course I am.
Doctor: Of course you are. Not the sort of thing one forgets.
Rory: But I don't remember it all the time.


And in this moment, Rory becomes more than the boy who waited for Amy all those years, but he becomes someone more -- it's acknowledged (understatedly, which are the best kind of statements), that Rory is, technically, older than the Doctor. That he is, in some ways, equal to the Doctor -- and yet, in many ways, not because he doesn't remember it all the time, unlike the Doctor. But, I thought this would be an interesting aspect to have in the companions (because Amy isn't typical either, what with the whole of time pouring through her head growing up) and I wasn't sure if it'd be ignored or what -- but, here it is. And it's so lovely.

And it's part of what makes this relationship between Eleven and Rory so endearing that I can't even describe it -- it just, made my heart melt whenever I saw him interact with Rory, how he sort of looked at them out of the corner of his eye when they were kissing their I-love-yous. It was just.

That's true love, there. In all its forms.



River: My old fella didn't see that did he? He gets ever so cross.
Rory: So, what kind of doctor are you?
River: Archeology. Love a tomb.


Oh, River Song. You are cooler than the sum of Indiana Jones and Lara Croft put together.

Also? Why don't Americans use the word "cross" more often? What a lovable word.

And the Doctor's description of her:

This is my friend River. Nice hair. Clever. Has her own gun. And unlike me she doesn't mind shooting people. I shouldn't like that, kinda do a bit.


Aw. Excuse me, I'm going to go melt into a puddle of goo at their little relationship/flirty/type-thing they've got going on.

I suppose it'd be a rubbishy sort of review/musing/squee-fest if I didn't talk about the girl, the nameless girl, the Time-Lord-Girl:



Couple thoughts:

1). The girl is the "honour" that the Silence spoke of to Amy, maybe? ("We do you honour. You will bring the Silence. But your part will soon be over.") Except a pregnancy isn't exactly "soon," unless they were planning to go all Fringe-y on her.

2). The girl is out of time -- because of the photo Amy found. So, how did she get into the time she is now? With the knock-off TARDIS? But why would the Silence need a space suit if they had the technology to make a knock-off TARDIS?

3). Speaking of the life-supported Space Suit, perhaps the girl needs it to live -- which is why she is dying six months later. But why would it take her six months to die if she needed the suit to live? And if she needed the suit to live, why would she just regenerate? Unless the process would fix why she was dying or why she needed the suit in the first place? If something happened in the six months, then what and why weren't the readers privy to it. *grumble (but only the good kind of grumble)* I also noticed that with the three months later notation at the beginning of the episode + the six months later at the end = nine months, which is always a significant number because of the whole birthing metaphor-imagery-thing at work. Balls.

Doctor: Incredibly strong and running away -- I like her.


(aside, I do like that the show isn't always gung-ho about its heroes having to be strong and bold and facing whatever's coming with squared shoulders and what-not; it doesn't mind celebrating the Trickster nature of the hero, and that I love.)

Misc. Thoughts

I love how the show establishes how Nixon became so paranoid (record everything!) which basically is a fan-fictiony explanation for Watergate:

Doctor: Oh, Dickie. Tricky Dickie. They’re never going to forget you.


Oh, excuse me while I giggle.

Also, I wasn't really expecting this:

President: This person you want to marry. Black?
Canton: Yes.
President: I know what people think of me, but perhaps I'm a little more liberal --
Canton: He is.


And, despite the Doctor's wishes, it still hasn't happened yet! Hello, Social Commentary. And they science fiction isn't relevant. ;)

Also: Eleven and River kissing. I love how he doesn't know what to do. It's so adorkable. I just melted inside.

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