I'm pretty sure that I've previously mentioned Steven Moffats apparent and somewhat disturbing prediliction for having his main characters repeatedly killed off. This really doesn't look like a habit that's going to get broken any time soon.
Sorry, does that count as a spoiler? I would have thought you'd realise that "Someone Dies" is pretty much par for the course these days. I mean, it's the whole POINT of this series. And anyway, why would you have not watched it by now? It's a goddamn week later. The only reason it's taken me this long to start writing it up is that the Wii Fit is trying to kill me.
So, anyway. What did we think of The Girl Who Waited (to fucking die).
Goddamn, how good was that? After an okay start to this half of the series it's nice to see things getting up to steam once again. A deceptively simple premise leading to some wonderful character development for all of the principle cast. There's just so much to like here.
Where shall we start? How about with the monsters? Obviously they're not actually monsters, but that doesn't make them any less creepy. The brilliant thing here of course is that they're not malicious in anyway. The Handbots are genuinely trying to help. They just don't understand that their help is fatal. The idea of an entity that simply cannot understand the harm it's doing can be so much more effective than any legion of ranting tinpot robots if handled correctly. Indeed, it's a facet of the Cybermen that, sadly, has never really been properly explored. The simple fact that they think they're doing the right thing.
Plus of course these are nurse robots from space with hypodermic cannons in their heads. If that's not fucking cool I don't know what is.
The setting is effectively simplistic, with the clean white spaces somehow evoking Timelash, but broken up with a bit of location work to keep things getting to dull. Just goes to show what Doctor Who can pull of with some white panelling and a few days on the OB unit.
But it's the intersection of plot and character that really makes this interesting. Amy has always had such faith in the Doctor. Even when he's being a bit dodgy or failing to live up to his promises she's always trusted him. And so, at a basic level, this story sets out to ask the question "What does it take to break Amy Pond?".
The answer is not exactly clear cut, but I'd say it's somewhere in the region of "A hell of a lot". Thirty six years of isolation and torment doesn't QUITE break her, but it certainly bends her into an almost unrecognisable shape. From this we learn two important facts. Firstly that Karen Gillan is actually one hell of an actress. Secondly that Amy would be pretty handy to have around in a zombie apocalypse. She SURVIVES.
Rory of course is brilliant. Always a delight. And whilst he gets some brilliant moments with scary older Amy, it's in his confrontations with the Doctor that he really stands out. It's great to see him really standing up for himself, and for Amy too. Whilst the Doctor is far too keen to madly gallivant around and Amy is enthusiastically following it's up to poor old Rory to be the voice of reason. And, to be fair, he's got a point.
And then there's the Doctor. I don't mind saying that if there's one particular defining moment that really makes this episode for me, it's the moment when he closes the door. Rule one: The Doctor Lies. In action. It's nice to see both his grasp of the bigger picture and darker side conflicting with the difficult decisions he has to make. This is what makes the Doctor a hero. He's capable of doing what it takes to save the day, no matter what the cost, but he's also capable of hating himself for it. Really when you think about it the Doctor has many of the traits required to be the greatest villain in the universe, but he CHOOSES not be. He chooses to try and be a good man, and do what's right. And then he has to live with those choices and keep going. Matt Smith makes for such a FUN Doctor that it's sometimes easy to forget that he has that darker nature, and it's really nice to see it being explored more this series.
Doom is coming, and I for one can't wait to see what it's going to be like.
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