(800) The Time of the Doctor

So today is the final story for Matt Smith as the Doctor (although not his final appearance). Another thing that is worth noticing is that this is the 800^th episode of Doctor Who. The 700^th episode was Aliens of London and its amazing to think how much the show has changed since then. This story is the final part of the Doctor trilogy and it was always going to be difficult to match what was seen in Day of the Doctor and what I think Steven Moffat has done is to not try but to forget about that story so that this story gets the chance to say goodbye to Matt Smith. Matt Smith up until this day had been Doctor for 1,454 days which is 14 days short of David Tennant and is now the fourth longest serving Doctor in terms of days served and seventh in terms of episodes.

The Doctor starts the episode with a Cyberman head called Handles and it has a different voice to a normal Cyberman. When handles dies later on in the episode its quite a sad moment. I cant quite believe that I find it sad that a head has died. There is a moment where Matt Smith reveals that his hair is in fact a wig and this was because he had to have a buzz cut (shrugs shoulders) for a film he was doing and I didn’t realise this at the time but he isn’t the only one wearing a wig because Karen Gillan wears a wig because she had to shave her head because of being in Guardians of the Galaxy.

The Silence make a returns as do the Weeping Angels and of course there is a final appearance of the crack in the wall. It’s like Matt Smith’s greatest hits which is probably what Smith deserves. The Silence aren’t the Silence that we have seen because now they appear to be religious members of the silence which I don’t understand personally but what the hell. The Weeping Angels get to have their moment to shine and it was short but sweet. There is a wooden Cyberman that appears. I like the look of it but sadly because its impractical it doesn’t last very long in the story but from a visual point of view, it was a success.

The Doctor arrives in a town called Christmas on Trenzalore. The Doctor remains on Trenzalore to defend it from the aliens that are orbiting it. He cant leave without sacrificing Gallifrey and he cant leave because they will destroy the planet and the Timelords chance to come back. The Doctor becomes really old and this is where the Doctor defeats the Daleks but it is also where he is forced to regenerate.

This story deals with the small issue of regenerations because due to the War Doctor and the Doctor using a regeneration back in Journeys end, this is the final Doctor. However Steven Moffat being the smart cookie that he is uses the crack in the wall as a way of basically breaking the rules that have been around since The Deadly Assassin. Even though it was a throwaway line by Robert Holmes, it has become an unbreakable rule until now and I love that it must have annoyed a lot of people. The Timelords using the crack to reset his regenerations and I like that one story after they returned they are interfering.

The final scene is really nice and isn’t overly sentimental like Tennant’s was. Smith’s final speech to Clara about change coming is a good one and it’s the latest in a long line of good speeches from Smith because Smith has a way that makes you forget everything that is going on around him and just focus on him. Its one of the things that I will miss about Matt Smith. Jenna Coleman is quite good in this episode but for large portions of this story she seems to be on her own or at least without the Doctor. On a separate note, Sheila Reid returns to Doctor Who after previously appearing in Vengeance on Varos back in 1985.

It was a surprise that Amy Pond came back for a cameo. For some reason Karen Gillan sounds different and when she says raggedy man she doesn’t sound Scottish. It could be argued that because its in his head, she wouldn’t sound the same but I just think it would have been nice if she had sounded more Scottish which isn’t a line I think has been written in a blog review before.

Some people were quite surprised that the actual regeneration was so short. There is no rule that it has to be long but it was still good that they went with something different because people would probably have complained that the regeneration effect was repetitive. Peter Capaldi’s brief moment in the episode is perhaps a little less bonkers than Matt Smith’s first few moments back in 2010. I think that there was a clearer indication of what Capaldi’s Doctor would be like which wasn’t the case when Matt Smith first appeared.

I don’t think that this story was one that was heavy on a plot and just seemed to try and tie up all the loose ends that Steven Moffat had started during the Matt Smith era. I think that Smith’s era has been a good one and whilst there have been a few bumps along the way (Curse of the Black Spot for example), this era of the show has been a consistently good one and one that is partly down to Matt Smith and partly (perhaps more) down to Steven Moffat. As I embark on the final part of this marathon, I do so knowing that there are some good stories coming up and also a good Doctor coming up.

(794) Hide

Hide is the shortest worded Doctor Who story ever. This is another of those stories that I have never really felt to warmly about in the past but having re-evaluated The Rings of Akhaten, it was perfectly plausible that my opinion would change for this story and to be honest I can say that things have changed in certain ways and largely its due to the performances which are all quite good.

This is the second story in a row that has a helpless feel to it and by that I mean that there is no way that help can save the day and its down to the Doctor to save the day but unlike Cold War, he does use the TARDIS quite a lot.

Dougary Scott guest stars in the episode as Alec Palmer. Perhaps his most famous role was in Mission Impossible 2. I think that his performance was the best of everyone and the strongest out of the supporting characters. Palmer is someone who has issues but Scott plays him as someone who feels that he can accomplish something in this massive house. Jessica Raine also appears in this episode, later in the year she would played Verity Lambert in the superb An Adventure in Space and Time. She does that wounded soul who can talk to others rather well but it’s a rather underwhelming character that only really shines when she has scenes with Scott. There is a nice bit where Emma Grayling is wearing something from Metablis III (although Smith does pronounce it wrong). I don’t think that it really adds anything to the story but it’s a nice bit of fun for the longtime fans.

When the Doctor goes into the pocket world then that is a great moment for Matt Smith who has been on fine form in this series. When he admits that he is frightened I found myself really impressed with his performance

I like how we don’t see much of the monster in the pocket world. When we get to see a good portion of it there still isn’t much seen which is sort of the best way. It’s not always necessary to see the monster but the thing that I liked most of all about the monster was that it turned out it was one of the good ones.

This was a good episode although on reflection I think that I enjoyed The Rings of Akhaten more. Just a little bit more but it was still an enjoyable episode that was quite cheap but still felt like a Doctor Who episode. There aren’t many more episode left in the Matt Smith era and its weird that just as he’s about to leave he really gets in his stride. The NEXT TIME trailer shows that things are going to get interesting cause its going to show the TARDIS in ways it hasn’t been seen since The Invasion of Time.