Sea Devils And Die: GeroniMoffat's Doctor Who In The 2010s

Rory is utterly pointless. New assistant please.

What's especially annoying is that Darvill is at least three times as likeable in interviews, which makes me think the character is probably not a good fit for him.

Your spot on there. He seems an affable chap. What purpose does the Rory character have?

Eliminates the RTD-style Doctor/companion love interest thing.

Arthur Darvill's the RADA grad in the room and is doing Mephistopheles in Doctor Faustus later in the year. I don't think this sub-Lyndhurst dweeb we're currently seeing is where the character of Rory will end up (he did the whole 'going mental' thing v. v. well).

agh, what I'm trying to say is Moffffffffffffffeeettttttttttttttttttttttttt wants to indicate pretty strongly that his show will not create any sort of emo love affair b/n the Doctor and Amy and that Rory is the clearest manifestation of that xp

lol at "sub-Lyndhurst"

I for one do not approve of an emo love affair b/n the Doctor and anybody. It is a shame that Rory couldn't have had more depth.
I doubt he'll develop into a raging crazy all powerful Rory-Tron 3000. He'll probably just wimper in the corner like he normally does. Or die.

Rory's been ok in Moffat's own eps where he tends to get both funnier lines and more to do. Plus the constant dying is starting to get funny now.

And the bit where aged Rory is all "You always leave me!" was pretty sad and alarming

Just realised that Suranne Jones, who played the TARDIS Idris, was also the actress in 'Single Father' with Tennant last year, in which she was also rather excellent

I wonder if Moffatt ever saw the thing Lawrence Miles did in the books with the humanoid TARDISes

Now I'm wondering if Gaiman saw the thing Lawrence Miles did in the BBC books with the humanoid TARDISes

oh hai it's me, the one who said last year was worse than syphilis. I just watched the Vincent van Gogh episode and bawled for 10 mins straight.

:D

I think maybe Moffatt's a fan of the Doctor-Sarah Jane-Harry season but Rory's there to fill the walk-around-looking-bewildered role. For one thing, given that Amy knows the Doctor is going to die there needs to be a co-conspirator onboard to stop her just blurting it out. I get the feeling he's being lined up for something later in the series.

Constantly dying is starting to bring the lolz though.

The bloke who does the Guardian Who-blog suspects Rory is being lined up for something too. And even if he isn't, surely fathering the time-babby is enough? Being a kids show, you couldn't have Amy getting preggers from a one night stand with some random soldier/timelord/alien, lest the Daily Mail blow a gasket. I think the dynamic between the three is getting more interesting, what with the big secret, their own marriage (loved the bunk bed gag) and their Tardis corridor drama.

yes yes its Threadless but this is pretty cute

http://media.threadless.com//imgs/products/2899/636x460design_01.jpg

Finally the Ga'Hoole/Dr Who fan mashup I have been craving.

Dr. Whooot

Hopefully, like the Ga'Hoole movie, this season's climax involves Matt Smith flying in slow motion with a bucket of molten steel while Dead Can Dance plays.

http://isamypregnant.com/

ok I laughed way too hard at that

"To see what I saw click on the spot beyond the Doctor's home planet."

Just caught a bit of Satan Pit on Watch - a meh episode that doesn't hold up at all well. Waste of a (visually) good monster.

I dont think this has been posted: Doctor Who credits in the style of Buffy The Vampire Slayer :D

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OMiMCMWp4bw&feature=youtube_gdata_player

Thought that was terrific and genuinely creepy. I have soft spot for "idiot humans let down the Doctors moral universe" episodes. I suppose it raises the possibility of the Doctor we saw dying being the ganger though.

thought the whole 'clones running an industrial facility then getting upset about being clones' thing was a great idea, perhaps someone should make a film w/that premise

That was really good. More like old school Doctor with its 'trapped in a scary castle' setting. Relatively low budget too, so relies on some good old fashioned scares. Benefitted from the two part treatment too - not too frantic, with the bit part characters given a chance to develop. Good SF premise too. The Doctor fighting his doppleganger has the potential to be a bit naff, but hopefully they'll pull it off. Could the doppleganger be the Doctor who dies? Or maybe that's a bit too obvious, not to mention rather early a reveal.

Doctor Who credits in the style of Buffy The Vampire Slayer :D

amazed at how much I like this!

More like old school Doctor with its 'trapped in a scary castle' setting.

Yeah, I've been non-spoily teasing people this week saying how classic-70s Who it felt. A spooky castle! A small team in a base under siege! Horror elements! The threat is from within! And a cliffhanger!

I don't think the ganger is going to turn out to be the Doctor that dies - a simple plastic Doctor wouldn't regenerate - but they're definitely planting piles and piles of references, hints and red herrings about deaths, resurrections and alternate bodies through the year to make us wonder and have fun speculating on how it's going to go down. I really loved the downcast Rory, now used to karking it most every episode, saying "Welcome to my world" in response to the pretty girl's fear of dying.

OTM about this week being like an old school revival, it felt like a classic Tom Baker episode. Well written and I am pleased it is a two parter. Scariest moment was the stretchy neck bit in the bathroom, awesome stuff.

I was a bit harsh on Rory last week, but he was great in this, growing some nuts at last!

buffy who thing = crap concept, excellent execution

best thing about this ep for me was the slower pace a 2 parter enables, similar and not really any better than The Hungry Earth (which was ok)

big crush on jennifer (sarah smart)

my favourite of the series so far.

Yeah, The Hungry Earth was exactly what it reminded me of, with a bit of Warriors of the Deep thrown in. Enjoyed it, but the series arc thing is getting in the way of the storytelling for me.

Wow, that was that rarest of rare things for Who - real proper quality SF. Best bit for me was when they were all together and I was thinking 'hey what can't they all just get on', and then the ganger starts talking about 'his' son...

I don't believe the series arc can really be getting in the way THAT much seeing as episodes like this basically work on their own whatever, aside from the Doctor looking at Amy's pregnancy scan once an episode and Amy/Rory being all conspiratorial for 30 seconds.

Best bit for me was when they were all together and I was thinking 'hey what can't they all just get on', and then the ganger starts talking about 'his' son

Yeah that bit was amazing. Whole ep reminded me of Moon a bit, actually.

It's possible that the Doctor that lives could actually be a more stable ganger, and the 'real' Doctor dies, seeing as they're essentially the same person anyway. Timelord DNA in that vat could do anything. Get the feeling Moffat's trying to find a sensible way to write himself out of the 12-renegeration limit. Or alternatively, Amy and Rory, knowing what's coming, will need to preserve the ganger.

Two Doctors hanging out together is going to be fun though.

Also, <3 the Doctor's rubbish Northern accent.

Was The Hungry Earth the Silurian two-parter? Yeah they were kinda similar but this was way better on almost every level. Siluriun ep was kinda ruined by both the Silurians and the scientists being a bit shit.

'real proper quality SF' - urgh, get this stuff out of my kids telly. i think it was io9 that marked this story as the sort of stuff that was at home on ST:TNG.

I wasn't feeling this at all - but then i had a 3 yr old asking me 'where's the spaceship? where's the storm?' on 5 second repeat, so i missed much of the atmos and any nuance of the plot, and a lot of even who is a duplicate. having said that i guessed both that first lady was a duplicate, and (as they signposted it so surely everyone here did) that the doxor had been too.

base under siege feeling = dud tho. that combo'd with the massive continuity callbacks of last ep make me feel oddly JN-T about this series

Really liked Amy's hair this ep, looks great with her bangs pulled back.

She doesn't have bangs, does she? Great hair, anyway.

Started off like the Thing, then went a bit androids dream of electric sheep, but kept a Moon-ey sort of vibe throughout.

I'm still sure that the final kicker is that they are all gängers, and the real people shipped off very dangerous acid-land, years ago...

Liked the Doctor not knowing Scottish from Northern, seeing as he's traveling with a Scottish girl and used to be Northern. ("all planets have a north!" - eccleston, ep1)

Rory came correct tho'

I'm still sure that the final kicker is that they are all gängers, and the real people shipped off very dangerous acid-land, years ago...

This was also my hypothesis -- don't know how a goop-clone of the doctor figures into it all though!

I'm pretty sure that we've never met a fully human Jennifer, and that's why her ganger does the freakiest stuff.

This was kind of the like the Hungry Earth if the Hungry Earth had not been completely awful. I liked it a lot.

Full Party Animals reunion next week please, inc. Andrea Riseborough.

First time I've ever actually liked a Murray Gold score this week! Felt like a nice blend of pertwee era and hammer horror. Beyond the music, yeah, nice to see a bit of hard scifi but the cliffhanger was telegraphed what, 10 minutes in? And after that a bit too much of the episode felt like treading water until alt-doc showed up.

Anyone know where it was filmed? was it a real castle? Looked like one (those wooden walkways looked very touristy).

yeah I wanna go!

Was a bit annoyed when Amy was going "oh, you're a medieval history expert are you?" to Rory, because course he is, he lived through the middle ages and she knows he did. Felt weird when that just went unaddressed though.

rory was A+ in this ep. Also love whatever that substance is they used for the malformed faces...looks like pliable candlewax almost, so cool and melty-creepy looking

Rory would've been looking after Amy in a box for most of the Middle Ages so I suspect he'd have missed most of it.

Great episode - as stated above, properly sci-fi. it helped that it was a little less manic compared to all the recent ones and glad they allowed Rory the nurse to take over from Rory the doofy husband.

also I really like this season's glimpses on life in the tardis, like that bit in the beginning with Rory and Amy playing darts.