Monday, 19 October 2015

Doctor Who: The Girl Who Died



So we’ve all been waiting MONTHS for this episode, right?! I mean, MAISIE WILLIAMS is guest starring! I just hope we haven’t worked it up to be bigger than it is.

Well, let’s see!

Clara is floating in space (wearing Ten’s spacesuit, I might add!), with a space-spider crawling up her leg.

The Doctor is under attack on the TARDIS.

He figures out where Clara is and materializes around her, just in the nick of time…oops, but out of the frying pan and into the fire!

When he they land, they’re surrounded by Vikings who draw their swords and break the sonic sunglasses!

Queue the opening credits…which aren’t nearly as rocking as they were last week!

A Viking village; The hero Vikings return, with a chained Doctor and Clara in tow. But the Doctor has a plan, as he keeps telling Clara….Riiiiiight.

Maisie Williams greets the heroes as they return. She’d had a nightmare that they’d all died. But yay, they’re all okay. A Viking gives her half of the broken sonic sunglasses.

The Doctor stares at her. Does he know her? He says he doesn’t but….Hmm…

The Doctor breaks out of the chains and tries to scare the primitive Vikings with a deep voice and a yoyo. He says he’s Odin…Um, and then Odin appears in the sky, so….whoops.

Odin sends huge mechanical welder-type dudes down to take the strongest Vikings to Valhalla.

Clara gets to Ashildr (Maisie William’s character) and tells her how to open her chains with the sonic sunglasses. The welders see the technology being used and take both Clara and Ashildr.

Valhalla is apparently a metal room, and if you try to leave it, you get vaporized. So, yay?

They have no choice but to leave when the walls of the room start to get smaller and push them into the corridor where the vaporizer is.

The Vikings are all vaporized, but Clara and Ashildr get through the door on the other end. Odin arrives and asks about the sonic sunglasses.

Clara realizes that Odin hasn’t killed them because he’s worried about their advanced tech, and he may not win the fight against their people if he starts one.

Odin then drinks a yummy juice of testosterone from the warriors he just killed. Mmmm…testosterone…

Clara almost has him talked out of fighting, but Ashildr’s anger gets in the way as she challenges him to war for what he’s done to her people. D’oh!

They make a date to have a nice war the next day, and then he changes his face to…something we don’t get to see. Yet!

The Doctor is reading his diary as Odin sends Clara and Ashildr back to the village. Um what is that diary?!? Since when is that a thing?!

He’s read in his diary that the race is a deadly race called the Mire.

The Doctor tries to convince the rest of the village to flee, but they decide to stay and fight. Of course.

A baby starts to cry, and the Doctor translates. It’s absolutely heartbreaking. Wonderful writing by Matheson and Moffat so far.

The Doctor leaves. He won’t help them fight a war. The earth is safe, humanity isn’t in danger. It’s just one village….and this is sounding awfully familiar. Just one village. Just one person…Like Pompeii? Like Donna asking to save just one? Whoa…

The Doctor tries to explain to Clara that if he saves this one village, the Mire will return like ripples in a pond.

The baby starts crying again, and Clara makes him translate. He does, and again it’s heartbreaking. The baby says something about fire and water…Again, I’m reminded of Pompeii. Is this purposeful??

The Doctor has decided to stay. Clara knows before he says so because the baby stops crying. Babies can sense danger, and I suppose there’s less danger now that he’s staying to help.

The Doctor begins to train them in sword fighting—and he gives them new names!

He trains them with wooden swords, and then gives them real swords…which starts a domino effect when one of them faints and a horse starts a fire in the village. It’s a really hilariously written scene.

Clara and the Doctor have a long chat. He seems tired of always having to watch out for her. She’s tired of him never having a plan until he’s almost killed. So…they’re kind of at a stalemate, then.

The Doctor enters Ashildr’s tent, where she’s fighting a wooden puppet. They talk, and she tells him she knows they’re all going to die.

The Doctor tells her she should leave, and in a very touching scene, she explains that, although she knows she’s different…although everyone there knows she’s different from them, she’s loved. It’s her place in the world. For her, leaving would be death itself.

Her father enters and promises to keep her safe. Through the window, they all see Lofty taking his baby to the boat house.

Something about that gives the Doctor his epitome! Fire in the water! I have no idea what it means yet, but his excitement is always so contagious!

The Doctor calls Clara and explains his plan, which involves the electric eels that the village has in the boat house…Yeah, I don’t get it either. Let’s watch as they prepare the plan!

Okay, that was fun! But now, WAR!

Odin and his ten welders arrive on the planet, where a merry party has begun! Lofty is playing the ring toss, and he tosses a ring at one of the mechanical welders. After the welder grabs the ring, we see that it’s attached to a copper wire (where did they get copper wire?!), which is attached to the eel barrels. The welders are electrocuted, while others are broken apart by very strong magnets! 

WAUGH, THEY’RE NOT MECHANICAL AT ALL, THEY’RE UGLY CREEPY ALIENS FULL OF TEETH-FACES!

The Doctor has gotten his hands on one of the welder helmets, and it’s Ashildr’s time to shine!
She puts the helmet on, and a huge snake enters the party! It’s HUGE and ANGRY!

The welders all retreat and teleport away, leaving Odin by himself. The snake turns into one of Ashildr’s wooden puppets—I guess she was able to project what she wanted them to see into their minds with the helmet?

Clara has recorded everything on her phone, and the Doctor threatens to send it out into the universe, destroying the Mire’s reputation. I mean, no one would really be afraid of them if they’re shown running from wooden dragons and fishermen, right?

The Doctor teleports Odin back to his ship, which leaves with its tail between its legs. But not before promising that “we haven’t seen the last of him”, or some such.

Ashildr’s father goes to celebrate with the girl, but she doesn’t respond from beneath the helmet. They pull it off the girl, and find that she’s dead.

Her heart failed, and the Doctor realizes that it’s his fault. He plugged her into the helmet and “used her up like a battery”.

Clara tries to console him, but he’s sick of losing people. And then…something happens.

Flashbacks to the first time he saw his new face.  Reflections in the water. “Who frowned me this face?” What is happening? Why do I have goosebumps?! WHY AM I ALMOST CRYING?!

He knows why he chose his face! HE KNOWS!

OKAY, WAIT. WAIT. I CAN’T SEE. I CAN’T SEE THROUGH MY TEARS TO EVEN WRITE. I CAN’T BELIEVE THIS IS HAPPENING. I’M LITERALLY SOBBING. UGLY TEARS. YOU GUYS, HALP ME. I CAN’T.

POMPEII. DONNA. MY BELOVED DONNA. I KNEW IT. I SAW IT DIDN’T I?! DIDN’T I SAY IT UP THERE?! POMPEII!!!!! HIS FACE! TEN! AHHHHHHHHHH MY HEART!!!!!

I’M SORRY I’M SCREAMING. I CAN’T SEEM TO STOP. I STILL CAN’T SEE VERY WELL THROUGH THESE TEARS.

His face. He chose the face he did…the face of Caecilius to REMIND HIM that HE’S THE GOD DAMN DOCTOR, AND HE SAVES PEOPLE. Like Donna had to remind him so long ago! MY SWEET, SWEET DONNA.

YOU GUYS THIS EPISODE! AND IT’S NOT DONE YET!

The Doctor runs to where Ashildr is lying. He takes a medical kit from the Mire helmet and reprograms it. It dissolves into Ashildr’s forehead, and starts to repair her. She wakes! She’s alive!

But, ohhhhh….he’s made her immortal. Oh my god. He gives a second medical kit to her father to give to, “Whoever she wants”. Which means “to whomever she can stand being with for eternity”. 

Oh, this is going to come back to haunt him forever. And it’s wonderful! I can see her being an enemy way down the line, right? Like, ten thousand years from now, when she’s half-insane from losing everyone she loves over and over and over...Er, is that dark? Yeah, that’s dark. Funny, how my mind works…heh…Um…

As Clara and the Doctor get back to the TARDIS, he explains to Clara what he’s done to Ashildr.  He was angry, emotional. He wonders he he’s made a terrible mistake.

And, oh my god. There’s more. THERE’S MORE. He explains that now, in a way, because of the alien tech inside of her, Ashildr is now, A HYBRID.   A HYBRID, YOU GUYS! DO YOU UNDERSTAND WHAT THAT MEANS!?!?!?

Okay, okay! Let’s go back to Davros. Remember? What did he say? Something about a prophesy on Gallifrey? A prophesy about a HYBRID RACE?!?!?!?!?!!? YOU GUYS! WE THOUGHT THAT MEANT A DALEK/TIMELORD HYBRID!

Did the Doctor just make the prophesy come true?! A human/Mire hybrid instead?!

AND THAT ENDING!!! I TOLD YOU! I TOLD YOU SHE GOES EVIL!  Look at her poor face. Look at how it goes from happy, to curious, to sad, to EVIL, as the world revolves and eventually explodes around her. I LOVE THIS!

Guys, this season is so far blowing it out of the park! The last three episodes have been great!


Okay, I remembered this time. Here are my favourite lines:

  • The Doctor: “I’m not actually police, that’s just what it says on the box.”

  • The Doctor: “No, no, not Vikings! I’m not in the mood for Vikings!”

  • The Doctor: “People talk about premonition as if it’s something strange; it’s not. It’s just remembering in the wrong direction.”

  • The Doctor: “When I say jump, you say ‘How high?”. Unless it’s across a gap of some kind, which of course means you jump horizontally.”

  • The Doctor: “Why has Lofty stolen a baby?!”

  • Clara: “What’s happened?! Have you trapped your finger in something again?”

  • Donna: “Just someone. Not the whole town. Just save someone.”

  • The Doctor: “I’M THE DOCTOR, AND I SAVE PEOPLE. AND IF ANYONE HAPPENS TO BE LISTENING, ANYONE WITH ANY KIND OF A PROBLEM WITH THAT, TO HELL WITH YOU!”


Go watch the next time trailer, and I’ll see you next time!




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