Grade: A+
I'm honestly beginning to think that I'll have to change the name of this site before I start blogging anything. Originally the plan was to begin blogging Merlin immediately, but then I got sucked into Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and... well, seven American seasons, and this blog just sat here, and in the thrill of a watching new series I never got around to starting Merlin again, and... yeah. At the moment I'm fairly close to finishing Buffy, at which point I will buckle down and watch The Dragon's Call. I hope to cover the first season of Merlin before beginning any new shows; after that, I'll start interspersing my Merlin posts with observations on Angel, which is next in line on my TV-watching queue. Other programs, among them the new Doctor Who series and possibly the upcoming Torchwood miniseries, will make cameo appearances. So there you have my tentative game-plan for this site. On to the blog proper.
First of all, The Impossible Astronaut was a brilliant series opener. Moffat pulled out all the stops and hurled game-changing events and time-traveling conundrums into the mix with the same abandon usually only employed in series finales. The Impossible Astronaut is already a rival to The Pandorica Opens/The Big Bang in terms of grandeur and insane mind-games, and that's minus the second half of the planned two-parter. Which, keeping in mind that we are talking about a Moffat two-parter here, also means that nothing makes sense as yet. We don't know anything; whether the Doctor was really killed at the beginning of the episode, how the little girl and the astronaut relate to each other, who the astronaut is, whether Amy managed to kill/injure the girl/astronaut with her final shot, and, if so, whether it will prevent the future holding the Doctor's death.
The overarching plot of the episode is simultaneously intriguing and mind-boggling. The Doctor, two hundred years older than the one that Rory and Amy know (and yet, somehow, still Eleven... what's up with that?) invites his two young companions, River Song, and a mysterious old man named Canton to an abandoned lake in Utah. It appears to be an informal picnic gathering until something dressed as an astronaut, true identity concealed, walks out of the lake and exchanges a few unheard words with the Doctor, then kills him. Kills him in the middle of his regeneration cycle, removing any possibility of his return. The companions burn the Doctor's body with gasoline provided by Canton, and return to their earlier rendezvous point. They deduce that the Doctor must have invited one more person to their meeting, at which point the no-show enters. It's the Doctor, a younger version unknowingly recruited by his older self to carry out a cryptic mission. The companions, now privy to the terrible secret of the Doctor's future death, convince him to follow the vague clues provided by his future self, and are led to the White House during the term of President Nixon. The President has recently hired former FBI agent, a younger Canton, to investigate a series of panicked phone calls he's been receiving from a small girl. At the White House, Amy has several terrifying encounters with an alien species who are able to erase themselves from human minds as soon as they are no longer being observed, making themselves essentially impossible to remember. The Doctor identifies the location of the girl's calls, and brings Canton and the other three companions to an abandoned warehouse in Florida. A trapdoor into a previously undiscovered or forgotten tunnel system is found, in which River and Rory repeatedly encounter and forget the same race of aliens that Amy saw. Meanwhile, the astronaut menaces the Doctor and Amy in the warehouse; moments before the episode ends, it is revealed to be a little girl, and Amy shoots at it in the hope of averting the Doctor's future death.
Despite the complicated nature of the installment, quite a few questions were answered in this first part. River's role in the Doctor's life was clarified considerably, and many of her previously inexplicable actions and attitudes were made clearer. The fact that the Doctor and River are really traveling in completely opposite directions, rather than simply meeting each other at random intervals, adds a new dynamic to their relationship. It also gives River a sense of pathos and tragedy that she never had before; rather than simply being a mischievous, enigmatic figure who pops up in the Doctor's life at random intervals, she is a woman being forced to watch helplessly as her oldest friend and possibly the love of her life draws further and further away from her. Her face of quiet heartbreak when the Doctor refuses point-blank to trust her, and turns to Amy instead, is made especially poignant in the enormity of the realization that, from River's perspective, the Doctor is displaying a attitude towards her that will only get worse. The man she has known and loved her entire life will never trust her again; in fact, the next time they meet, he will trust her even less, until Silence in the Library happens, and does, indeed, kill her. We, the audience, are in on spoilers that would break her heart.
The revelation of Amy's pregnancy is also a large long-term game-changer. She and Rory appeared to have been happily settling down together after two months without a visit from the Doctor, and their role in the episode and dynamic with both the Doctor and each other is markedly different from that in the Series Five. Rory is more assertive and involved as a full-time companion, and the Doctor and Amy's individual rapport is somewhat diminished. With four and later five people playing active parts of the TARDIS team, the close Doctor/companion dynamic of previous seasons was noticeably absent from this episode, setting up an unique tone to the relationships and interactions of the upcoming season. Beginning the episode with the apparently companion-less Doctor's future death was also a sobering view of the big picture; somehow I suspect that this series isn't going to be particularly light-hearted.
I say bring it on. The Impossible Astronaut was a brilliant opener to what I hope and expect will be a great series.
Complaints:
- As I mentioned above: the two hundred-year-old Eleventh Doctor rather took me out of the story for a moment. So far, in the new series, individual regenerations have lasted for an average of two years each; considering the Doctor's action-packed life, any more would push the limits of disbelief. And now, in contrast, Eleven hangs around for two centuries in his own timeline? That just doesn't compute.
- Canton is already among my favorites when it comes to one-off companions. I hope that this two-parter isn't the last we see of him.
- The "Americans are gun-toting, trigger-happy lunatics" stereotype cracked me up.
- I really enjoyed all of the re-explored dynamics in this episode. River/Doctor/Amy/Rory, River/Amy/Rory, River/Rory, etc. After a full season of nothing but continuous Doctor/Amy with occasional appearances from River and Rory, we get to see how they all play off each other in a group setting. The addition of Canton to the mix changed things up even more. I like it.
- So far, the Silence are creepy, but don't come anywhere near rivaling the Weeping Angels in my book. I did enjoy their marked resemblance to the Gentlemen from Buffy, though.
- In this episode we really got to see a darker/harder edge to Matt Smith's Doctor. Despite its necessity, I really hope that he doesn't reach quite the angst levels that Ten had by the end; that said, an occasional deviation from the innocent, fluffy Doctor of Season Five can only be a good thing.
- Finally, The Lodger is given some context. As a somewhat stand-alone episode from last season that I didn't particularly enjoy, I've only seen it once; however, I do recall that the machine discovered on the top floor of the building was virtually the same as the one in the Silent's underground hub. Significance?
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