After saying a "final" goodbye to Amy and Rory, the Doctor knows his time is running out so goes on one last farewell trip around the universe it seems. We catch up with him here as he decides to revisit Craig who he first met in The Lodger in the previous season.
Gareth Roberts again writes a fantastic script full of funny moments. I really think he captures the strangeness of Matt Smith's Doctor brilliantly. It's hard to say who comes up with some of the more physical aspects of the comedy. I particularly enjoy the moment when as the Doctor is chatting to Craig in his kitchen he casually picks up a piece of green chalk and goes to eat it before realising it's not something meant for eating. He just seems so much more alien again when compared to his tenth and ninth incarnations.
Craig now has a baby son and has been left alone for the first time to look after him. It's quite fortunate therefore (or unfortunate depending on your point of view) that the Doctor turns up to help. It was hinted in a previous episode that the Doctor could speak "baby". Whilst this doesn't make much sense it does create some humourous moments in the story, especially when the Doctor informs Craig that his son Alfie prefers to go by the name of Stormageddon Dark Lord Of All. Alfie refers to Craig as "not mum" and to everyone else as peasants "which is unfortunate".
The Cybermen are also back in this episode. In a ship buried beneath a department store, they are awakened by the laying down of new electrical cables. We also see Cybermats again for the first time since Revenge Of The Cybermen. You just know when they brought them back that they knew what a brilliant marketing device they would be for toy replicas! One character even mistakes them for a toy within the episode itself!
The Doctor investigates the department store by taking a job there in their toy department. I was eagerly checking the shelves to make sure there were no Doctor Who items on the shelves because that's the sort of geek I am. Fortunately I don't think I spotted any.
It's a really good episode but I must admit that the resolution whereby Craig defeats the Cybermen using the love he has for his son made me want to vomit. It's just such sentimental garbage. At least the Doctor tries to give a more scientifically accurate explanation as to how they were defeated before giving up and admitting it was effectively through love.
As the Doctor leaves to go on his final journey to Lake Silencio where he knows he will die there is brief moment where he speaks to three young children who happen to be playing near the TARDIS. As he does so the scene cuts to the future where River Song is reading testimonies from these three children about their meeting with the Doctor. Now one thing has always bothered me about this. Attached to each testimony is a picture of the child who gave it. And the picture is taken in the exact position where they just met the Doctor and they are wearing the exact clothes. Who took that picture?? Surely it would make more sense that someone spoke to them later in life about their experience of meeting the Doctor and took their picture for the files then! It's a small thing I know but it always annoyed me a little.
As Madame Kovarian appears to River and positively identifies her as Melody Pond, she is once again forced inside the space suit and position below the lake for her appointment with the Doctor.
"Tick tock goes the clock, he cradled and he rocked her. Tick tock goes the clock till River kills the Doctor"
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