Well... Kind of. if nothing else it'll give us an extra period of wild speculation, rumor, and inevitably a couple of spoilers. So... thanks for that?
But enough rambling about the unknown future. What of the episode itself?
Well, it does have a reasonably climactic vibe going for it, but more than that it has a curiously old school nu-who vibe. It has all the hallmarks of an RTD story. We have grand spectacle, gay couples, a clunky and poorly realised prophecy, terrible innuendo and bestiality. Not necessarily in that order. Not that I'm saying any of that is per se a bad thing. We'll, the bestiality is a BIT dodgy, but at least we don't come out of it calling anyone pigfucker.
Seriously though, we have on offer here some of the most enjoyable characters ever to be introduced and then summarily executed. Commander Strax the Sontaran nurse is a fantastic character, instantly giving an extra layer of depth to the whole Sontaran race and will be sorely missed. And then there's Madam Vastra. What on earth could possibly be cooler than a Victorian Detective Samurai Silurian? Only a LESBIAN Victorian Detective Samurai Silurian! Despite that brief moment of somewhat crude innuendo the whole girl on lizard relationship is subtly played and, actually really works quite well. There's a sense of depth there, and these are a pair of characters I'd love to see return. I mean, Lesbian Victorian Detective Samurai Silurian AND Warrior Maid (dressed as a Butler)? This is Christmas. Also it's frankly fantastic to get to see the Silurians being good guys for once. They've long been a favorite monster of mine, and it's been a bit sad to see things go wrong for them in every single story. They're not bad guys after all. And then of course we have Mr Dorium Maldovar, quickly establishing himself in the lovable rogue mould before getting the cold shoulder from the Headless Monks. It's quite sad to see these awesome characters introduced and killed so quickly, but if you want to establish the enemy as a threat you've gotta kill someone worthwhile.
The Monks themselves make a cool monster in a very budget conscious way. I mean, they're sinister and creepy and deadly, but at the end of the day they're a nicely affordable bunch of guys in robes. Indeed, there's a interesting money saving vibe at work across the board here. After all, we're reusing a lot of what we've got in stock to great effect. Does anyone really think we'd get something nearly as cool as the opening scenes of Rory storming the Cyberman command ship if there weren't a bunch of cyber suits on hand? Similarly we've got actors that have been in the makeup previously for our Sontaran and Silurian leads, thus saving on new molds. The space Spitfires turn up again, and there's even a couple of random Judoon thrown in for good measure. Earlier in the series we had the clever reuse of the old TARDIS set, and the pseudo TARDIS set as well. I don't think any of this is even remotely bad. Indeed, it makes a lot of sense to reuse the resources you have available. The big question is has there been some sort of budget cut in the BBCs flagship show (it's happened before after all), or more excitingly are they saving the money for something REALLY big?
Speaking of really big, let's talk about the much hyped giant cliffhanger to end all cliffhangers of ultimate destiny. Or, you know. Not. Now, I have to admit that I didn't really see it coming. Whilst it had been suggested to me I never really bought it. Goes to show what I know about anything really. My problem with this episode, and this cliffhanger, is that we haven't received ANY answers yet to any of the question posed in this series, or indeed the last one. Once again it just adds to the confusion, and there's little sense of things actually moving forward.
We don't actually have any clue who's behind whatever it is that's going on. We don't know how any of it connects with the Doctors death, or the Silence, or that whole trying to destroy the entire universe thing. We don't know who it is that's at war with the Doctor. We don't know WHY they're at war with the Doctor. The dialogue betwixt the fat one and thin one implies that the church has been employed somehow, so we can't even say it's the space pope. Hell, we don't know how it is they've got the resources to project a control signal into the TARDIS no matter where it is in time and space, let alone when it drops out of time and space completely to visit another universe. And now we've been told that River is in fact Amy and Rorys child. A child which has been kidnapped, taken to deep space in what appears to be the 51st century before being taken back to earth in the 20th century to be raised in a space suit by the Silence. A child who is being used explicitly as a weapon against the Doctor. Somehow. Who now turns out to have been his his mystery future fuck buddy all the time. And is kind of part time lord.
Damn you Moffat, what the hell?
The irksome thing is of course that rather than bring up any of nightmarishly complicated questions this raises the Doctor does a runner. I know that Rivers somewhat complicated timestream does make simple questions such as "why you didn't seem very surprised to have wandered into your own childhood earlier?" a bit tricky as it might not have happened yet, but still...
Clearly whatever it is that is going on this series is a very long game. I can only hope that things will actually start to make sense in the second half of the series. Whilst this was an enjoyable episode, to be left hanging like this, with all these questions, for several months....
Why, it's one of the best cliffhangers ever actually. I can't wait to see if the resolution stands up to the wait.
Oh, one final thing. I've often thought that an interesting idea for a Doctor Who story would be one in which someone went back in time to kill Hitler, and the Doctor was forced into trying to stop them in order to preserve the timeline. You could get all kinds of interesting stuff out of a story like that, with deeply complex moral issues, shades of grey and all that stuff. It would allow you to explore all kinds of interesting themes and issues. Not that I'd ever really be up to writing such a tale of course, you'd need someone GOOD to do it justice. But it was fun to think about. Who knows, maybe one day I'd even give it a shot.
DAMN YOU MOFFAT!!!
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