all caught up on Doctor Who

[dbskyler]

I finally got to see the last episode of the first half of S6, so I am all caught up on current Doctor Who. Which means I can go back to reading LiveJournal and Teaspoon again. Hello, fandom, what have you all been up to?

And now, some really quick, off-the-cuff reactions:



I did a good job of avoiding spoilers, but I was afraid that I hadn't. I was trying to be really careful on LJ, but nevertheless I came across a reference to a character named Jenny in this episode, and I assumed it was THE Jenny, aka the Doctor's daughter. Which led me to all sorts of thoughts, such as was Jenny the girl we saw regenerate, and was Jenny River. But it turned out that it was a different Jenny altogether, so I wasn't really spoiled after all. Whew!

I did not make the connection between Melody Pond and River Song. That came as a complete surprise. I am . . . not sure how I feel about it. I think if you had told me beforehand that River was going to turn out to be Amy and Rory's daughter, I would've hated the idea, but now that we've seen it, I'm more neutral about it. I'm definitely not in love with it, but I don't hate it either. I mostly want to see what happens next. Which I won't get to see for months now. Oh well, at least everyone else has to wait with me.

Oh, and my new favorite minor character? The Sontaran nurse. He was AWESOME. Especially when he was boasting about his lactation skills.

Comments

[persiflage-1.livejournal.com]

The Sontaran nurse was an hilarious twist. I love the idea of the Doctor punishing a Sontaran by making him into a healer. Very clever.

And Centurion!Rory - he makes me gleeful! (I def need an icon!)

[dbskyler.livejournal.com]

Centurion!Rory was indeed glee-making. I loved how badass he was with the Cybermen, and then when he finds Amy his "I was going to be cool."

*has no Rory icon at all . . . yet*

[persiflage-1.livejournal.com]

*nods* His "Shall I repeat the question" after everything outside went boom was especially fab!

I'm trying to find one - but too many people seem to go in for arty-farty fancy colouring, which I hate because half the time, you can barely make out the faces.

[thisbluespirit]

*not reading most of this post*

So that's where you were! I thought you had gone off to see Much Ado already! :-)

I made some Planet of the Spiders icons. There were probably other more interesting things othre people did, too...

[dbskyler.livejournal.com]

Don't read the rest of this post, and don't read what Pers and I talked about above!

I was away for a few days too, but mostly I cut way down on LJ because I wanted to avoid the spoilers. I tried only reading the posts that seemed to be safe, but then I accidentally came across a spoiler, so then I cut back even more. (Fortunately it turned out to be not much of a spoiler, but when you're avoiding spoilers, it's hard to know what's a big spoiler and what's a small one. Besides, the goal was to avoid all of them!)

Much Ado is several weeks away still. Getting excited for it, though!

[thisbluespirit]

I got more spoilers from the Radio Times, and from DWM (who were assuming their readers were up to date). I think if I can get through to the point where I'm well enough to watch and enjoy DW again, I shall be a v lucky person indeed to have avoided spoilers for everything. I think I've stopped worrying about it. And of course, I went looking for the obvious spoiler for The Doctor's Wife - didn't want to spend the rest of the year worrying that I wouldn't like the answer. :-)

But, yay, nice to see you back as ever.

[dbskyler.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I only had to get through two weeks, so it was easiest to just cut myself off from most fandom things. Not worrying about spoilers sounds like a good strategy, though. Also, now that I've seen everything, I think that the real fun of the episodes isn't the surprises, but their execution, so I think you'll enjoy them despite knowing a few things ahead of time.

[thisbluespirit]

*puts hands over eyes while typing to avoid seeing other comments*

It's true of quite a few things, so I'm not too worried - but I'm trying to get away with as little as I can. I don't plan on avoiding fandom for however much time that is. It helps keep me sane at the moment. :-) And I watched the whole of B7 knowing what happened in the final episode (it's hard not to know something about the final episode over here, especially if you ever read DWM and they interview people like Chris Boucher and Terry Nation and David Maloney... Or any of the other people who worked on both) and it turned out there were important things I didn't know about what happened, so yeah. ...And I'm waffling. Excuse me.

[tempestas-inu.livejournal.com]

I started off-handedly wondering if River would turn out to be related to Amy in some way last year, not long after I first started watching Doctor Who and about mid-way through Series 5. Obviously at the time I felt I was just thinking out of left field.... making connections like the fact they both had names that were bodies of water, noting that they both had chained the Doctor to stuff with handcuffs..... y'know, little things that probably meant nothing. Admittedly the closer the finale airing date got the more and more I was thinking this was going in the direction of River being Amy's child but it was still neat and weird to see something I'd been thinking about for nearly a year turn out to be correct.

I too thought I'd be very displeased if River turned out to be Amy and Rory's daughter, but for some reason I'm not. Maybe it was the way the reveal was executed, or maybe how the characters have changed/grown over this first half of the new series, but I was definitely still excited as heck once the credits rolled. I don't know what to think of the plot element story-wise, but I have to admit there are a number of Amy/Rory/River family-related fics out there now that made my heart melt.

The episode was chock full of interesting characters that I wish could've been covered more.... like Madame Vastra and Jenny, that soldier girl whose name escapes me, and of course the Sontaran Nurse. I never thought I would ever care so much for a Sontaran.

I think when the Sontaran died saying that he was a nurse was a shock to Rory, because that's what Rory is, except in that moment he wasn't, because he was centurion self. Which goes along with how I think Rory might be going through a bit of an identity crisis. Speaking of Rory he was amazing in the episode wasn't he?

[dbskyler.livejournal.com]

I started off-handedly wondering if River would turn out to be related to Amy in some way last year

Good for you! I didn't suspect it at all. I think I had even seen some people speculate on them being related, but I discounted the idea (partly, I'll admit, because I didn't like it).

I was definitely still excited as heck once the credits rolled

Me too, I think because the way the reveal was written and acted was done really well. Also, I think there are going to be some consequences to her being their daughter beyond just, "oh hey, I'm the daughter of your companion!"

The episode was chock full of interesting characters that I wish could've been covered more

It really was, wasn't it? There wasn't an uninteresting character in the bunch. I even cared about Colonel Runaway by the end.

I think when the Sontaran died saying that he was a nurse was a shock to Rory

I wonder if there's more significance to that moment than we've seen yet. I almost wonder if we got all those reminders that Rory is a nurse just so we'd get the connection when the Sontaran died.

[clocketpatch]

I loved the Sontaran nurse. He reminded me of the Sontaran in that Sarah-Jane episode who ended up sacrificing himself to save the world because it was the honourable thing to do, and everyone being sort of dumbstruck. They're terribly mis-guided those Sontarans, but get them on the right track and they aren't all bad...

And Rory. RORY!!!! RAAAAAAWWWWWWWRRRRYYYYYY!!!!!!!!!

In the Lone Centurion Uniform.

It makes me happy.

[dbskyler.livejournal.com]

Rory was total win in this. I just watched the episode for a second time, and I especially loved the beginning part where Amy is telling Melody about her father, and we're supposed to think she's talking about the Doctor because she's saying all those wonderful things, but all those things are true of Rory because Rory is awesome.

And I want fic about Commander Strax now. (In fact, I'm a little peeved at the who_like_giants mod for closing the prompt bank before this episode aired in North America. I'd be prompting like crazy otherwise.)

[cavgirl.livejournal.com]

I loved the Sontaran nurse. And his moment at the end with Rory, with that lovely warrior-cum-nurse-cum-warrior sharing was just...awww.

I wasn't surprised by Melody = River, but the idea had occurred to me even before I was spoiled, so not surprised. I didn't really like the idea before, but now, as you say, I'm more neutral. I do think, though, that while River's parentage may be important, it may end up being something of a red herring in the end. After all, knowing who River's parents are does not answer the question of what she is to the Doctor, or what she becomes (has become, and done) in her own right. Moffat is Very Sneaky.

[dbskyler.livejournal.com]

Her parentage is something of a red herring, I agree. It doesn't tell us whether she's married to the Doctor or not. (I'm still really hoping for "not.")

We're certainly starting to see the explanation for a couple of things, though, such as why the Doctor trusts her so much, and why she can fly the TARDIS. I'm also wondering if the rescue of baby Melody is going to involve her having to learn the Doctor's name.