I'm the biggest fan of the Eleventh Doctor and of Moffat as Doctor Who showrunner. The change from RTD's constant contrived flamboyance has been welcomed, and the show looks amazing.
But if there's any way in which series six actually makes any internally consistent logical sense at all please let me know.
A few thoughts:
The Doctor's death averted
- The Doctor beside Lake Silencio was clearly not the Teselecta. The mannerisms, the fluid movements… And how do you make a Teselecta look like it's regenerating?
- If the Doctor was never going to die on that beach after all, then why would River not killing him violate a fixed point in time? Or why would the audience finding out that he was never going to die suddenly make that sit right with time?
- I suppose we found out that the fixed point was actually the Teselecta getting shot, not the Doctor. Hardly seems like something that Time would care all that much about, though.
- How did River overcome the suit's programming? She was destined to be forced to make that shot and the entire series's build up has relied on it. That she can just decide not to bother makes me wonder why I was ever supposed to care in the first place.
- River told Amy that she had to lie about recognising the space suit. That sort of implies that she remembers being inside it (contrary to the Doctor telling her that she won't remember it), and consequently possibly that the Doctor won't die after all. If nothing else, her entire shocked reaction in The Impossible Astronaut was supposed to be completely faked? Guh?
- If River is powerful enough to do this, that just begs the question: why would the Silence and whoever else deliberately create a powerful timelady to do the job? If the suit's supposed to do all the work, why not just stick any old arbitrary human inside it? They were asking for trouble, really.
- I still want to know why it had to be a United States spacesuit.
- The Doctor had his last picnic with only his closest friends. He honestly seemed to want them there so he didn't die alone. But then, actually, he was faking his death… so why wouldn't he instead invite some people who wouldn't blatantly find out about it? Maybe some intergalactic news agency? In fact, why would he bother inviting Amy, Rory and River at all? It's not as if he knew that they were there "the last time".
- Post-Time War, Time Lords used to be a myth, a historical echo of a civilisation erased from history. Jabe of The Tree People from the Forest of Cheem was stunned to see a living Time Lord. But, "now", the Doctor is so ubiquitous that there are entire species out to kill him (and to make a pretty big deal out of doing it). But how can there be a concept of "now" compared to "then" when everybody's zipping through time? How can the Doctor have a different standing in the Universe in Series Six than he did in Series One? Sure, it's a different Universe (The Big Bang), but it is supposed to be atomically identical…
- If the next Big Bad is an event known as "The Fall Of The Eleventh", and there are all these things that the Doctor is still known to have coming up for him, why isn't it obvious to everyone else that he can't be dead yet? "Doctor Who" indeed.
"That" alternate timeline
- Even if the Doctor was inside the Teselecta in the real timeline, how did he end up being inside it in the bubble timeline?
- Why was he captured by Churchill-Caesar?
- Where did he get a felt-tip pen from?
- How come Amy and friends mustered up an army against and captured the Silence, when nobody seemed able to do that in the real timeline?
- How do the Silence know that Rory keeps dying? That keeps happening in alternate realities, alternate universes, alternate timelines… only we're supposed to know about that.
- The Doctor managed to get from the Teselecta bridge to the eye in pretty sharpish time whilst he was "marrying" River. And it's a shame that there was utterly no emotional connection in that kiss, since River was snogging a shapeshifting robot.
Unanswered Questions
Some inconsistencies that I was hoping to see resolved this week… well, they weren't.
- At start of the series we see 1100-year old Doctor reunite with Amy and Rory. But why had they been at home? Why weren't they, at that time, running around with 900-year old Doctor? Had that, in their personal timelines, been after the events of The God Complex? No? Why not? Rory talked during that episode about his time in the TARDIS in the past tense; the Doctor noticed this, Rory couldn't explain why he said it, and I started wondering whether this might end up leading to explanation of the messy personal timelines. Guess not.
- And the Silence is the name of the race, again, now? Where did they come from? Why were they on Earth in the 60s? Why were they trying to get to the moon? What's the significance of the space suit? Why do they want the Doctor dead if the rest of the Universe suddenly loves him so much?
- Why would the Silence want to blow up the TARDIS? Don't they realise it'll blow up the Universe? Are they aware that they tried it before and ultimately (sort of) failed? Will they try it again? Are they still capable of taking complete control of the TARDIS? Nobody seems too fussed about that.
- What does Madame Kovarian have against the Doctor, anyway?
- When was Amy replaced by a Ganger? And, frankly, why?
- When did Amy spend time with infant Melody? There's a photo of Amy with infant Melody in infant Melody's Silence hotel in Day of the Moon.
- The Silence believe that the Doctor must never be allowed to answer "the question", because otherwise "silence will fall". But they named themselves "The Silence" and last series everybody seemed to be goading the Doctor about the silence, as if they wanted it to happen. The Silence seemed to be his death (cf. "Lake Silencio"). But, now, the phrase "the Silence" seems to refer to something else entirely…?
And now the Doctor's had two hundred years of adventures without us, for what turns out to be no reason at all.
It's evident that we're two parts through a three- or four-part story arc long game, so the above may work itself out over the ensuing series. But Moffat's series resolutions so far haven't given me much confidence in that so, for now…
Contrived, silly and utterly illogical. What a shame.
