Doctor Who Flailing

[metaphasia]

Argh! I totally meant to be posting more frequently with this journal, but have been failing utterly. So, since the only way to change not posting is to actually post, I'm going to be putting stuff up whether or not I think it's perfect. AND WITH THAT I BRING YOU: Thoughts on Doctor Who!

So after the mid season finale I did some rewatching of Series 5 and have a few things I want to bring up.

First, The Almost People. I'm not sure everyone caught it, since it wasn't called back on later, and I think the only reason that I did catch it was that I caught that the Doctors had swapped shoes early on since they were doing their Very Careful Are You Sure Asking thing to Amy when she was talking about how she could tell the difference between the Doctors, but when she revealed that the Doctor had been killed, it was to the original Doctor, not his ganger. Which is probably going to come up again at some point. I'm guessing it will be before the season finale, probably in the next episode or two, since the last three were sort of continuous.

Rewatching the Time of Angels/Flesh and Stone two-parter, when they're in the forest, right when the Doctor splits off from the group, he and Amy have a quick conversation. The Doctor from that conversation is actually from The Big Bang, when he's reversing through his time stream. I didn't notice it the first time I watched it, but in rewatching, it's obvious, especially since he's wearing his coat, which the Doctor isn't at that point in the episode. Also, after having seen the latest episode, I am no longer sure that the Doctor is the person who River killed to get put into Stormcage. Watching ToA/F&S the first time, it seemed like the obvious set up, but now we know that the Church hates (or at least doesn't feel a whole lot of love towards) the Doctor, since they're trying to kill him in AGMGtW, so it's unlikely that he's the good man she killed. Also, since they seemed to have intended her to do that from her birth, it seems unlikely they'd throw her in jail for it (unless they're concerned about her growing too strong). Although, I am now convinced that this episode takes place much earlier in her confinement at Stormcage than the series 6 episodes, based on how flippant she is about the prison in the more recent episodes than in that appearance.

Also, I'm kinda disappointed in the reveal of who River is in A Good Man Goes to War. Mostly, I think my disappointment is because of the fact that they rolled up three mysteries into one: she's not just River Song, she's Amy and Rory's daughter, and she's the mysterious baby Time Lady from the season opener. It feels like they're trying to push too much into her character and the awesome things she does do are less awesome because of it. I was also hoping that the Time Lady being held captive in the season opener was going to turn out to be Jenny from The Doctor's Daughter from series 4.

Although, the revelation that River is at least part of the way to being a Time Lady makes the fact that she can read Gallifreyan make more sense to me, which I view as something the Time Lords, even the Doctor, would never teach a member of another species. Also I'm totally of the opinion that the reason she can fly the TARDIS better than the Doctor is that she actually uses the controls, whereas he doesn't even try, not because she's better at it; She (and other Time Lords) make the TARDISes go where they want to go, the Doctor lets it take him where it wants to go (like they said in The Doctor's Wife), so since he's not even trying to steer, he just hits the buttons in whatever order he likes most of the time.

tellitslant wrote over here that, prior to A Good Man Goes to War, some people thought that the Doctor and River were living their lives in exact reverse order. The events of the latest episode obviously disprove this, but I think it was fairly obvious even beforehand: they have spoilers diaries, which only makes sense if they aren't in perfect reverse order. Because if they were, then everything they did would be spoilers to each other, and they wouldn't need to figure out which events each other had done, because everything that they had done would be a spoiler.

Also, I love Amy Pond so much, but lately she's been losing her status of Awesomest Companion Ever (Or At Least Since Ace) because of how she isn't as active as she could be. When it comes down to the action portions of the adventures, it's the Doctor and River and Rory who do all the fighting, while she tends to turn kind of Damsel in Distressy. Despite all that, I still really like her, mostly because her origin story and childhood is the most tragically depressing and sad thing since Seymour from Futurama getting flash fried (before Bender's Big Score, at least), or Littlefoot's mom dying. She got left behind! Many times! I guess I'm hoping we'll get a chance to see her be more badass in future episodes in conflicts and not just social situations, because she is still really awesome at telling people off when they act like they know what's best for her.

Finally, was I the only one who read the title for the next episode in the Doctor's "my whole brain just went what the hell" voice from the Christmas episode? I totally see Rory making the Time Traveler's First Mistake and saying 'why can't we just go kill Hitler and make everything better through history?' and the Doctor instead of arguing and explaining why it doesn't work just says 'what the hell' and takes them back to show them why it's a terrible idea by doing it. If that's not how the episode goes I will be vastly disappointed.

And now there's no new Doctor Who until September! The wait will be devastating.