Doctor Who for Dummies: Series 6

Doctor Who - Series 6 (2011)

Matt Smith begins his second year as the Doctor, coming off a killer first year. It was tight and the through line that connected the series was super strong. I was curious how they could top it, of if they would. Well, all they needed to do to top it was focus on my favorite Doctor Who character: River Song. By weaving a story that finally gives us the origin of the show's most enigmatic character and incorporating the series heart, the Ponds, series 6 is my favorite so far.

The series begins with the usual Christmas special, "A Christmas Carol." If that sounds like a certain Dickens novel, well, that is on purpose. The episode takes that basic structure and reflects it through a Whovian lens. While Rory and Amy are honeymooning on a space liner containing 4,000 passengers it gets caught in an electrified cloud. Amy calls out to her Raggedy Doctor and he finds out the electrified cloud is controlled by the miserly Kazran Sardick. The Doctor is initially unable to barter with Sardick until he goes back in time and meets him as a child. While together, they find a cryogenic chamber containing a beautiful woman named Abigail, and they spend Christmas together. This begins an annual tradition and as Sardick grows he falls in love with Abigail. Sardick wants to release Abigail forever but she tells him that the reason she was frozen was because she had an incurable disease. Unfreezing every year has caused the disease to progress to the point where she will die. Sardick becomes bitter. The Doctor isn't out of tricks. He shows the younger Sardick what he will become and that convinces the older one to release the ship from the cloud. Because of his change, Sardick can't control the cloud, so they release Abigail one last time. She sings to calm it down and they enjoy one final Christmas together.

This is a really sweet episode and I love the montage of the Doctor, Sardick and Abigail enjoying the Christmases together. They have great chemistry and Katherine Jenkins, the Welsh singer who makes her acting debut is really pleasant. The twist of having her sing to calm things is a little much and a tad contrived, but it works for a holiday episode. I'd probably be a little more critical of it if this wasn't a holiday themed episode.

Ride or Die

The proper series 6 premiere is the two-parter, "The Impossible Astronaut/Day of the Moon." The Ponds and River Song receive invitations from the Doctor. They meet him along with Canton Everett Delaware III, in Utah, outside Lake Silencio. He tells them he's 200 years older then when he last saw them all and before they can get more info, he is shot and killed by someone wearing an astronaut uniform. That's it, series over. JK. At a diner, our Doctor emerges, but of course no one can tell him what they saw. Turns out the Doctor had received the same invite. They time travel to 1969 where they meet the younger Canton who is working for President Nixon. They are trying to save a young girl who is being chased by someone in a space suit. These episodes also introduce us to creepy creatures called the Silence who people forget about as soon as their backs are turned. Oh and Amy's pregnant. Or is she?

These two episodes throw a lot at you, but they never feel over stuffed in a bad way. There's a lot of great stuff. Delaware is an awesome character played by Crowley himself, Mark Sheppard. It's cool to see the characters in the US. I believe that this is the first time that the show has filmed in America. The Silence are legitimately terrifying. They look like a cross between The Gentlemen from "Buffy" and aliens. It also creates a really compelling backbone for the series. The death of the Doctor is something you are immediately invested in and Amy's potential pregnancy along with her visions of the Eye Patch Lady are just icing on the cake. 

The Doctor and the Ponds meet pirates in "The Curse of the Black Spot." The trio ends up in the 17th century on a pirate ship. The captain, Henry Avery, advises our heroes that they are being terrorized by a siren-like creature that marks them with a black spot after they injured in some way. Then it kills them. After Rory and Avery's son are taken, The Doctor, Amy and Avery hurt themselves and are transported to a ship.  This episode is fine. It's fun. It's inconsequential. The siren being a med-bot basically taking tissue samples from the crew to create a disease is a nice twist. It's good to be reminded that Rory was a nurse and he kind of saves the day, which is awesome. Amy sees the Eye Patch Lady, so that keeps the connection of the larger series thread going. It's not a bad episode, but it can't help feel like a bit of a letdown after the awesomeness of the premiere.

In "The Doctor's Wife," the Doctor and the Ponds respond to a distress call on an asteroid junkyard. The asteroid is controlled by something called House that has lured other Time Lords there to drain their TARDISes of their energy. The Doctor's TARDIS takes possession of Idris, a woman on the asteroid when they landed. It's up to the Doctor and the TARDIS in human form to save Rory and Amy from House. This is a phenomenal episode. Susanne Jones is great as Idris aka the TARDIS in human form. She has this great manic energy and this is a weird thing to say, but I've never thought about what a human TARDIS would be like, but she is definitely it. She and Matt Smith have this awesome chemistry and I just want to watch them forever. Sorry, Amy and Rory. Also, props to Michael Sheen. It's hard to make a disembodied voice menacing and scary and he does it.

Fancy a smooch?

Next up is the series first two-parter, "The Rebel Flesh/The Almost People." After a solar storm, the TARDIS crash lands on a monastery in the 22nd century. A group of humans there use something called The Flesh to create doppelgängers of themselves to clear acid from the planet. O course, these doppelgängers, Gangers, for short, gain sentience and decide they shouldn't have to die and start hunting the crew along with the Doctor, Amy and Rory. The Doctor even gets his own Ganger which is creepy as fuck. It all culminates with the Doctor revealing that Amy has been replaced by a Ganger. Somewhere, the real Amy is somewhere in labor and the Eye Patch Lady is screaming at her to push. This two-parter is fine. It's entertaining. It's thrilling. There is this sense that you can't trust anyone. The Gangers are perfectly creepy, but much like last season's two-parter where Rory "dies," it's the final minutes of "The Almost People" that are the most exciting. It sort of erases anything that happened before, which is not great. The reveal that Amy is a Ganger is great and that the Eye Patch Lady she's been seeing is the real Amy trying to break through is legit shocking.

Worst baby shower ever.

"Doctor Who" has it's first mid-series finale in "A Good Man Goes to War." The Doctor, Rory and an army of their own making hit Demon's Run to save Amy and their daughter, Melody Pond, from the Eye Patch Lady aka Madame Kovarian. They rescue Amy, but it all seems for naught, when it's revealed that the baby they have is actually a Ganger. The Doctor vows to rescue Melody, but the big reveal is that River Song is Melody. Yep, River is Amy and Rory's daughter. This might be my favorite single episode of "Doctor Who" so far. It's jam packed and everything is awesome. Karen Gillan really knocks it out of the park especially. It's awesome to see Amy Pond as a mother and everything shifts and clicks right away. "Doctor Who" always deals with large stakes, but these are some of the biggest and most personal yet. The River Song reveal blew my mind. I had no idea and I think my jaw was dropped the whole time.

"Let's Kill Hitler" puts a pin in the whole Melody Pond/River Song situation for the time being. Amy and Rory meet up with their childhood friend, Mels, who immediately hijacks the TARDIS and they end up crash landing in 1938 Berlin. They interrupt a Tesselecta that is trying to kill Hitler. Mels then regenerates into... River Song. River attempts to kill the Doctor, eventually kissing her with poison lipstick giving him 32 minutes to live. Alls well that ends well, because River eventually saves the Doctor by sacrificing her remaining regenerations. This is another great episode. We finally get to see the beginning of River's life as River. I will say her being Mels was a teeny, tiny bit heavy handed, but I'll allow it. It was great to see the return of the Tesselecta. It's all very satisfying in a way that the resolution of some "Doctor Who" mysteries aren't.

In "Night Terrors," the Doctor and the Ponds make a house call. A boy named George is terrified of everything including his wardrobe. Maybe that most of all. Amy and Rory are transported into a life-size doll house full of creepy peg dolls. Turns out George is actually an empathic alien who took the form of Alex and Claire's, his "parents," desired child and has been locking his fears away in a wardrobe. George faces his fear, Alex accepts him, everyone escapes, all's well that ends well. This episode is kind of a let down after the awesomeness that we've been getting. It's kind of pedestrian. Not terrible, but not great. Very just OK.

Still waiting.

In "The Girl Who Waited," the planet Apapalucia is under quarantine. The two-hearted natives are susceptible to a plague. Victims of the plague are placed in a room that has an accelerated time stream. They are able to live out their lives and remain connected to their loved ones. Amy accidentally locks herself in one of those rooms. The Doctor has to leave because of the plague and he and Rory return, except for Amy it's been 36 years. Rory leaves the Doctor on the TARDIS and attempts to rescue the younger Amy. Old Amy is not a huge fan of this, but she eventually relents when the Doctor promises that both Amy's will be able to live on the TARDIS. Rule number one: the Doctor lies and Old Amy is left behind to prevent a paradox. Now this is more like it. A really great episode and a standout showcase for Karen Gillan who has grown so much in her time on the show. The old age make up is a little cheesy, but Gillan's performance more than makes up for it. This is a great play on the original conceit for Amy and the Doctor where again he leaves her waiting, but this time with disastrous consequences. It's also a nice reminder that the Doctor can still be cold if need be to do what needs to be done.

"The God Complex" finds the TARDIS landing in an alien structure disguise as a hotel from the 1980's. The layout is ever shifting and they eventually lose track of the TARDIS. They meet three humans and an alien that are also trapped and being systematically hunted and killed by a minotaur-like creature. The Doctor surmises the minotaur is using what they all have the most faith in to take them out. The Doctor convinces Amy to break her faith in him to stop the monster. He then drops the Ponds back on Earth to prevent them from being killed. This is another episode where on the outside it feels very ordinary. Very run-of-the-mill. Then, once you start getting into it and the layers peel back you realize that it's actually pretty extraordinary. The theme of faith is interesting and Amy finally stopping putting all her faith in her Raggedy Doctor is pretty compelling. It's heartbreaking when the Doctor drops off the Ponds and leaves to destinations unknown.

My two dads

"Closing Time" is a sequel to series 5's "The Lodger." It's been about 200 years and the Doctor returns to pay a visit to his old flatmate Craig (James Corden) before making his fateful trip to Lake Silencio. It turns out Craig and Sophie are new parents to little baby Alfie. Sophie is off on holiday, so the Doctor and Craig investigate some electrical disturbances in the area. The Doctor finds a Cyberman spaceship under a local department store. When he and Craig attempt to infiltrate it, Craig is captured and almost converted but hearing Alfie crying helps snap him out of it. At the end of the episode, we see Madam Kovarian strapping River into a spacesuit. "The Lodger" was a great episode and Matt Smith and James Corden had such great chemistry it's not a surprise that they would bring them back together. This is a really cute, funny episode. It's light, which is what we need, since we know the finale is probably going to be pretty heavy. I love all the insinuation that the Doctor and Craig are romantically linked and caring for Alfie. It's presented as no big deal and that warms my queer heart. The Cybermen, as per usual, are pretty underwhelming bad guys, but who cares when it's the Doctor and Craig show? The cliffhanger is predictably ominous.

Eyepatches. It's called fashion. Look it up.

In "The Wedding of River Song," the Doctor comes face to face with his demise. Everyone converges on Lake Silencio, but River refuses to kill the Doctor. This creates an alternate timeline where all of history is running at once. Amy has been getting glimpses of the past timeline due to the crack in her wall. She eventually gets back to the Doctor and they meet River. River knows that if they touch the original timeline will commence. When Rory shows up, Amy remembers everything and shoots Madame Kovarian for stealing her baby. The Doctor knows that everything will cease to exist if the timeline doesn't revert to normal. He whispers a secret in River's ear, marries her and they kiss, returning everything to normal. Once the dust settles, River visits Amy and Rory and reveals that the Doctor that was killed was actually a Tesselecta with the real Doctor inside. He's alive. Elsewhere, the Doctor confronts Dorian who reveals the question the Silence were trying to prevent being answered was "Doctor who?" This is a big finale. I mean, let's be real, all "Doctor Who" finales are big finales, but this is probably it's biggest and most successful. It ties together so many threads from the Silence to the cracks in the wall to River and it's all great. Karen Gillan gets to play a different Amy and the scene where she shoots Kovarian is legit chilling. Deserved, but chilling nonetheless. The reveal that the Doctor that died was a Tesselecta is a great bit of plotting that doesn't feel cheap. It just feels really clever and this maybe the first time the show ends on a legit cliffhanger, the question presumably being the set up for series 7.

This is such a great series of "Doctor Who." Definitely my favorite so far and another series will have to be pretty superlative to top it. There were a few not so great episodes but even those had something that made them if not compelling than extremely watchable.

It feels like Matt Smith's time as the Doctor just began but it's wrapping up as we begin part one of Series 7 and say good-bye to the Ponds.

Does anyone else love this series as much as I do? What is your favorite? Let me know in the comments.