Well, well, well. Bet you weren’t expecting THAT to occur in the mid-season finale to Doctor Who. Now is the time to talk it up – was it all that? Were the returning characters a good justification, or something whipped up to make the episode feel more epic? And, did you see the ending coming seven episodes ago, or were you taken at the last minute? Time for you to talk Doctor Who – A Good Man Goes to War!
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16 Comments
Sometimes the simplest stories are the best. I’m really thankful for a straight-forward River origin as opposed to something convoluted and metaphysical (even if I called it). Really can’t wait to see what’s in store for the Doctor and the Ponds.
Honestly? I was surprised. Very surprised. It does lead to some very interesting ideas knowing that River was the little Time Lord in the astronaut suit, and that a person in the astronaut suit shot the Doctor, and River is in prison for killing a good man, and the Doctor is a good man, and BWWWAAAAHHHH…. My brain hurts.
But for seriouslyness. I loved the episode and I can’t wait for the next half of the season.
I loved the characters they brought back. And the entire episode was a great one, even if the River reveal was anti-climactic because we saw it coming from episode one. The end was particularly powerful when the Doctor had to reassess who he had become. It was a great mid-season finale too because it introduced enough elements to make me excited for the second half while still wrapping up a lot of the loose ends from the other episodes.
I also love the misdirects they keep putting in where they make you think Amy is describing the Doctor, but is really describing Rory.
You’ve known since Rose that the daughter of the Eleventh Doctor’s companions would would be a woman the Tenth would see “die” before seeing her born? Are you the Doctor?
I believe s/he means “episode one” of the season…
I really liked how they made Rory more than just a bumbling idiot. I feel like television and movies have a really bad habit of creating those types of characters. But Rory is a believable husband and father. The way he’s committed to Amy is really amazing.
Other than that, I thought the episode was fine. The ending was done well. Even if the payoff was telegraphed it was revealed in a pretty fun way. My only qualm with it is this: Exactly how many times are we going to go back to the “let’s round up the troops” well? It was almost guaranteed in the Tennant years that they were going to bust out old companions or enemies for the finale I was hoping we could get away from that.
It’s interesting that when the Doctor called in his debts, we mostly saw people who we never saw before. Considering what a riot the Sontaran nurse was, I kind of wish we’d seen how he came to be in the Doctor’s debt.
This whole episode was just six kinds of awesome. The only thing that kind of nags at me is who the heck are the people who took Melody? They would appear to be connected to the Silents and they were able to maintain a link between Amy and FleshAmy across time, space, and even from outside the universe.
This show is timey-whimey-wibbly-wobbly . . . who says we WON’T find out how he came to be in the Doctor’s debt? :)
I liked it. The Doctor collecting his debts was swell. I particularly enjoyed the return of the pirates.
I was just sad he didn’t go get Capt. Jack Harkness. With the relaunch of Torchwood coming soon and all, it would have been nice to see his reaction to another new doctor.
Rory is one of the most real, deep, and multi faceted characters on television. I’m always afraid they’ll “Mickey” him, but he always comes through in the clutch.
As for the River reveal: Brilliant. I love that they play this show to the smart people. When River said she was in prison for killing a good man, we all sort of knew she meant the Doctor. But in this episode, the reveal isn’t actually at the end: It’s at the beginning. When she says: “This is the day he finds out who I am.” My wife and I shared a simultaneous jaw drop. That was the reveal. With that in mind, the pacing of the end, where they show it off to Rory and Amy, is brilliant. It gies you time to piece together all the other things you know about River and The Doctor, how she must have been initially drawn to him out of a sense of guilt for killing him, which grew to love, and coupled with the knowledge that every time they’re together, every time they have a first experience, it’s her last experience (the Doctor’s first kiss was her last.) Makes a truly compelling and heartbreaking story.
While MOffat’s episode-to-episode isn’t QUITE as strong as Davies (the Rebel Flesh almost lost me, as did the iDaleks) he does a much better job at exploring the interesting aspects time travel can bring to story telling, his season long meta-plots are better, and he throws out bat-shit-weird moments like no one else (crack in the wall/the silence will fall/ weird lady peeking through walls in space-time/marks appearing on your arm showing alien encounters BRRRRRRR)
I’m babbling. Because that’s how great it was.
Nothing in the reveal said River was in that suit the Doctor’s killer wore.
As soon as the camera focused in on the baby basin saying “Melody Pond”, it wasn’t much of a stretch to figure it out for me… in addition we have seen River pilot the TARDIS before, and just recently they stated only a Time Lord could pilot the TARDIS.
What I like most about the reveal is that it raises more questions than it answers. Does that mean the little girl in the spacesuit is also River? Or is there something else at work here?
How much Time Lord power does adult River have? If she still had a lot, they’re going to have to do some serious backflippy justification of everything that’s happened up til now.
I’m not a huge River Song fan. I think they play her too much like a female Jack, but with that being said I still feel a little pang of heartache every time I see her, since we know how it ends for her.
I think the River Song reveal was telegraphed because the real mystery they’ve been pushing since last season is The Silence.
I missed the original airing though, and the repeat sped up the Demons Run poem scene.
I wonder why they’re breaking up the season.
Also, Doctor Who will return in “Let’s Kill Hitler?”, what!?
What was the biggest moment for me in the whole episode? When Rory asks River there can’t be 2 Doctors can they? Now flash back to “The Almost People” episode where it’s stated that the Flesh-Doctor’s mind could in theory survive the body’s destruction add the fact we never “see” who was in the suit that killed the Doctor and that he can stabilize the Flesh into a “real” body, add the fact this ends with the Doctor saying “I’ll bring your daughter back even if it kills me” and we have a nice possible scenario where the Doctor kills “himself” to put in motion the events of this season.
Also, the ones who had River in custody where “clerics” in the episode “the time of angels”, my guess is that they are what the army fighting the Doctor becomes after he defeats them.
P.S. Rory’s intro was better then anything I’ve seen on TV in a long time.