Ten Statements About....DOCTOR WHO SEASON SIX, EPISODE THIRTEEN: THE WEDDING OF RIVER SONG (2011)

He wears a stetson now because...well, because it suits his
new direction.

"Something has happened to time. That's what you say, what you never stop saying. All of history is happening at once...but what does that mean? What happened? Explain to me in terms that I can understand. What happened to time?"

"A Woman."

1) Two minutes in and I don't know what has floored me the most--the sight of balloon assisted cars floating over London as a steam train emerges from that Faberge'-Egg looking building whose name I can never remember; seeing Simon Callow, who was so wonderful in 'The Unquiet Dead,' reprising his role as Charles Dickens on a TV chat show...or discovering that Moffat somehow got Meredith Viera to do a guest spot! Russell T. Davies made up an American television anchor--Moffat got the real thing!

2) You know...the stetson really suits Matt Smith's face, as does this version of the Doctor, who is something of a lone gunslinger tracking down the 'man' who's sworn to kill him before he himself is killed. I think he needs to keep the hat into season seven.

3) Cannibal skulls...ewwwwww....pretty gross idea even if we don't see the actual gore of them eating that guy.

4) Once again, just as in 'The Big Bang,' we see how Moffat uses props and visual cues gleaned from previous episodes this season to move the story along much quicker than it deserves to be...and considering how he looked further away from the end this season than last, those short cuts are welcome.

5) The moment where the passing of Nicholas Courtney was acknowledged--subtlety and kindly--blindsided me. A wonderful moment that recognizes how big a part this man, and his character, had in this series.

It's Amy..in an eyepatch..shooting a gun...
I want to marry this girl...

6) I love how Smith plays off of Ian McNeice's Churchill, and it's fitting that he becomes the 'companion' for this episode, as we know that in the real timeline he's aware of The Doctor's nature, and is smart enough to piece together what's going wrong.

7) Oh. My. God. I'm in love with James Bond Amy...sorry, Amelia....

8) Would people be pissed at me if I said I would love to see the Doctor having adventures on this weird Mish-Mash World? It just seems so unbearably cool.

9) The brilliance of the solution to the quandry of this season? It was right there out in the open. We just never considered it until it's waved right in front of our nose. This is why I will always prefer Moffat to Davies--Moffat understands that the satisfaction comes not from the surprise itself, but in the way we see behind the curtain when the surprise is sprung.

Just to remind you...this is pure nightmare fuel...

10) I like the implied new status quo of the show--with this, Moffat has managed to smoothly pull The Doctor away from the 'superhero and messiah for our age' mode that Russell T. Davies put him into and placed him firmly into the mode he was in the classic series...an enigma wandering the universe from the shadows, quietly operating as a universal spanner in the works of evil....I almost wish we see him operating on his own, or with some short-term companions ala' Tennant during the 'Specials Season' two years ago.

In short....after a shaky season with some even shakier individual episodes, Moffat once again ties things up neatly and with flair, answering some questions while leaving some open and, it is implied, giving this Doctor a new direction. Bravo, Mr. Moffat. Bravo.

Ten Statements--No, Eleven--About....DOCTOR WHO SEASON SIX, EPISODE ONE: THE IMPOSSIBLE ASTRONAUT (2011)

"Time isn't a straight line. It's all bumpy-wumpy. There's loads of boring stuff like Mondays and Tuesdays and" Thursday Afternoons. But now and then there are Saturdays, big temporal tipping points where anything's possible."

1) Matt Smith dancing with Laurel and Hardy? Win. Naked Matt Smith hiding under a woman's skirts...not so much...

2) There's something really, really wicked cool about the whole 'Getting The Band Back Together' feel of the pre-title teaser....and there's something even cooler about how the music sort of builds when everyone gets their invites...

3) YES! Arthur Darvill gets his just rewards by being top billed along with Matt and Karen...

The Doctor and Company welcome aboard that guy
from THE MATRIX, as played by Michael Ironside

4) ...and as proof that Arthur deserves above-the-title credit, look at how masterfully he handles the big shock at the ten minute mark...His Rory is obviously breaking up inside, but he is able to pull it all together in a snap and makes sure what The Doctor wanted done gets done. This is a fine actor, and may be the show's secret weapon this season.

5) Once again, we are asked to share Steven Moffat's love of twisting and contorting time lines...and once again, it's very clear that all this fooling around has a purpose, that he has a story to tell with a very clear end point somewhere down the line.

6) This version of The Matt Smith Doctor is a lot less bombastic...but it's clear that the anger that drove him throughout Season Five is still there, just transformed into something subtler--and scarier. And speaking of subtle...



"NO....YOU SUCK!"



7) Is it just me, or has Karen Gillen stepped up her game? The character is still recognizably Amy, but also recognizably more mature....it's obvious that Gillen is using the knowledge of her character's new status to give us a more nuanced, sober version of Amy.

8) The Silent...creepy little mouthed energy sucking things that you can only remember when you look at it straight on? In suits, no less? I'm sold.



Shut up...she's cute...

9) I like the younger Canton. It's like they decided that the perfect partner for this iteration of The Doctor was Michael Ironside--and much props for letting us in on something about Canton with the kind of subtlety Russell T. Davies wishes he could have pulled off. On the other hand, every time I looked at this episode's Nixon, I thought 'when did we elect John Cusack president?'

10) This may very well be my favorite River Song appearance to date...she's a lot more nuanced, and the true bond that seems to have grown between her an Amy (prolly growing out of a similar bonding between Alex Kingston and Karen Gillen) is natural and warm. And on top of that, we get the scene between her and Rory which suddenly throws a lot of her behavior into a sharp, cold light...and it's at turns both sad and terrifying.

11) Is that the same control module as we saw in "The Lodger" last season?

In short...this isn't as great a season opener as last year's in terms of spectacle--but it's a better in terms of character. The strengths of last season look to not have been abandoned, and The Silent may prove to be another in a long line of great Moffat monsters.