Doctor Who: Twice Upon a Time
Dec. 26th, 2017 12:23 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
selenayWatching the Christmas special this year was a bit of an adventure. A massive storm hit us on Christmas Day (think, it would have been classified as a hurricane if it wasn't December) so I lost my power around 4.30pm and it didn't come back until early this morning. Woe! No live Doctor Who!
For anyone worried about Christmas dinner - I was lucky. I was at my aunt's place and her power stayed on. We got delicious turkey. The power had gone out by the time I got home and I had to do a detour to get here, because the main road in was blocked by downed utility poles. So the rest of the day was spent in a dark house, under a huge pile of blankets, hoping my Kindle battery lasted until I went to bed. It was such a relief to have the power back when I woke up. Power cuts in the winter are the worst. This definitely wasn't the best Christmas for me.
Thankfully iTunes had Doctor Who up by the time I finished breakfast so I have now seen it. Yay!
Spoilers abound from here.
First things first. I am so happy Jodie's first words were "Oh brilliant". That look of dawning joy and her enthusiasm made me gleeful. September seems like a very long way away. I want my Thirteenth Doctor!
It's possible she might even up my favourite modern Doctor :-D
As Twelve prepared to regenerate in the TARDIS, I did have a moment of "you idiot, stop doing that! Every time you regenerate in the TARDIS, you break it!". And low and behold, the TARDIS went tragically wrong as soon as the regeneration was over. Doctor, you need to start regenerating somewhere else. Your TARDIS might need a new interior to go with the new face, but this is not the way to achieve it.
That final speech from Twelve was beautiful, such a lovely summation of everything he's learned during his time. The emphasis on being kind might be the best thing about it, because that's the thing I think he's had to relearn over his time and he finally got there. No wonder he didn't want to leave. Hopefully that idea of kindness, never being cowardly, and love being wise is a thread that will be picked up for Thirteen.
As for the rest of the episode...okay, I suspect the logic of it will fall apart under close examination, but I don't bloody care. It hit so many emotional notes that I needed and had so many callbacks to the different eras of Doctor Who that I adored it.
The reference to the Weapon Factories of Villengard...I didn't think that would ever get followed up on (it was a throw-away line from season 1 after all), so I was delighted. And then having it tie into "Into the Dalek"...loved it.
I knew this was going to be a nostalgia fest when we started with footage from The Tenth Planet. I mean, it sort of had to go there, but I somehow didn't expect they'd actually use the footage. It was wonderful, and then seeing it blend into David Bradley's Doctor was lovely. (I loved the explanation for the slight change of face!) Completing that arc by fading into the regeneration footage was incredibly satisfying.
Moffat paid tribute to his own work and the work of everyone who came before througout the episode. It was a lovely way to end his reign.
And speaking of everything that came before...I figured out who the WWI captain was about fifteen seconds before he said his name. I didn't realise until then that we hadn't been told his name yet, and that was when I realised there had to be a reason. He couldn't be the Brigadier but the timing meant he could be the Brig's grandfather. I got a little teary at that moment. We've now met three generations of Lethbridge-Stewarts and they're all wonderful.
Mark Gatiss played a character I actually felt sympathy for. That's pretty rare, so well done him.
The idea that the important parts of us are our collections of memories is one I've often seen in sci-fi, but it's one I love. I don't know why. Maybe because it means we're more than simply a collection of cells? Whether you believe in souls or not, we're more than pure chemistry and biology.
This wasn't a perfect episode, it never could be, because it had to do so much. But it was brilliant and I'm sure I'll be remembering more things I loved as time goes by and I rewatch it a couple of dozen times. As a farewell to Twelve and to Moffat, and an introduction for Jodie as Thirteen, I thought it was just right.
Now, excuse me, I need to rewatch Thirteen's first couple of minutes a few million more times. September feels very far away right now.
For anyone worried about Christmas dinner - I was lucky. I was at my aunt's place and her power stayed on. We got delicious turkey. The power had gone out by the time I got home and I had to do a detour to get here, because the main road in was blocked by downed utility poles. So the rest of the day was spent in a dark house, under a huge pile of blankets, hoping my Kindle battery lasted until I went to bed. It was such a relief to have the power back when I woke up. Power cuts in the winter are the worst. This definitely wasn't the best Christmas for me.
Thankfully iTunes had Doctor Who up by the time I finished breakfast so I have now seen it. Yay!
Spoilers abound from here.
First things first. I am so happy Jodie's first words were "Oh brilliant". That look of dawning joy and her enthusiasm made me gleeful. September seems like a very long way away. I want my Thirteenth Doctor!
It's possible she might even up my favourite modern Doctor :-D
As Twelve prepared to regenerate in the TARDIS, I did have a moment of "you idiot, stop doing that! Every time you regenerate in the TARDIS, you break it!". And low and behold, the TARDIS went tragically wrong as soon as the regeneration was over. Doctor, you need to start regenerating somewhere else. Your TARDIS might need a new interior to go with the new face, but this is not the way to achieve it.
That final speech from Twelve was beautiful, such a lovely summation of everything he's learned during his time. The emphasis on being kind might be the best thing about it, because that's the thing I think he's had to relearn over his time and he finally got there. No wonder he didn't want to leave. Hopefully that idea of kindness, never being cowardly, and love being wise is a thread that will be picked up for Thirteen.
As for the rest of the episode...okay, I suspect the logic of it will fall apart under close examination, but I don't bloody care. It hit so many emotional notes that I needed and had so many callbacks to the different eras of Doctor Who that I adored it.
The reference to the Weapon Factories of Villengard...I didn't think that would ever get followed up on (it was a throw-away line from season 1 after all), so I was delighted. And then having it tie into "Into the Dalek"...loved it.
I knew this was going to be a nostalgia fest when we started with footage from The Tenth Planet. I mean, it sort of had to go there, but I somehow didn't expect they'd actually use the footage. It was wonderful, and then seeing it blend into David Bradley's Doctor was lovely. (I loved the explanation for the slight change of face!) Completing that arc by fading into the regeneration footage was incredibly satisfying.
Moffat paid tribute to his own work and the work of everyone who came before througout the episode. It was a lovely way to end his reign.
And speaking of everything that came before...I figured out who the WWI captain was about fifteen seconds before he said his name. I didn't realise until then that we hadn't been told his name yet, and that was when I realised there had to be a reason. He couldn't be the Brigadier but the timing meant he could be the Brig's grandfather. I got a little teary at that moment. We've now met three generations of Lethbridge-Stewarts and they're all wonderful.
Mark Gatiss played a character I actually felt sympathy for. That's pretty rare, so well done him.
The idea that the important parts of us are our collections of memories is one I've often seen in sci-fi, but it's one I love. I don't know why. Maybe because it means we're more than simply a collection of cells? Whether you believe in souls or not, we're more than pure chemistry and biology.
This wasn't a perfect episode, it never could be, because it had to do so much. But it was brilliant and I'm sure I'll be remembering more things I loved as time goes by and I rewatch it a couple of dozen times. As a farewell to Twelve and to Moffat, and an introduction for Jodie as Thirteen, I thought it was just right.
Now, excuse me, I need to rewatch Thirteen's first couple of minutes a few million more times. September feels very far away right now.
