Two things I forgot to mention: I love the idea of a person perceiving time at a vastly different rate. That idea reminded me of my favorite entry in Big Finish's Short Trips audios, "Rise and Fall," where The First Doctor and Ian observe the rise and fall of a civilization developing super fast while said beings see The Doctor and Ian as Unmoving Gods. Also, Clara's conversation with The Doctor about seeing his companions has ghosts reminded me of "The God Complex" and my theory that The Doctor saw his companions' mortality in his room. I hope this theme continues to be explored for the rest of the season and in the anniversary special.
I like this, because it used the idea of ghosts and hauntings as a jumping off point for some interesting thematic things. All too often ghost stories and scary movies only use ghosts as a monster or a villian, but I've always thought the ghost things lends itself to a sort of poetry. They couid have beefed up the part about the two lover creatures, but I suppose it's hard to relate to giant turtle monsters and their hormonal desires. My favorite part of the episode was when the professor revealed that if he could communicate with the people who died he'd tell them "Thank you", instead of the generic "I'm sorry" or "I love you."
WOW, got lots to say 1.) Boy, they are really getting wordy with classic Who references this season: Susan, HADS system, The Eye of Harmony in tonight's episode, and even the coat rack the Doctor use to have in the control room. I wonder if this means something. 2.) Next week's episode is the episode I've been waiting for since Doctor Who came back, an inside the TARDIS episode. We've had a few in the classic series, and it's time we had one here. I think people that only have come into Doctor Who since the new series aren't even aware of how big the TARDIS is on the inside, how many rooms it has, and all the various rooms it has. We've seen in the old series lots of it, but I think this is going to rock next week to see what the inside is like now. I even wonder if they will stumble into some of the old control rooms! Think about that. I wonder if we will see The Eye of Harmony in the big cathedral room like in the '96 movie, heh. At any rate, very very excited. Ok, now on to this ep, it started out kinda slow, I'll say that, but it did pick up half way in. I thought this episode made wodnerful use of the TARDIS, this is something that has been lacking in nuWho. In the classic series you always saw the Doctor running into the TARDIS, pulling out equipment, and setting up some technological gizmo for the episode at hand, and this is exactly what the Doctor did in this episode. It reminded me of the classic series. Also, it was excellent seeing the TARDIS fly around in real space, and also that little trip they took from the beginning of the world to the end in a few minutes time. It really makes you see the big picture of being a time traveler. The fact that Clara had to deal with seeing that, also handled greatly. The TARDIS really shown in this episode as being a powerful companion for the Doctor. Oh, and the hologram was brilliant. Even the premise of the episode was pretty unique, instead of a ghost, it ended up being one of Earth's early time travel experiments gone wrong, sending the poor girl to a pocket universe. Very clever, and the fact that time ran so slow literally minutes for her was billions of years real time, very very mind blowing stuff. I kinda of would have liked her to become another companion at this point, imagine a woman from a few hundred years in the future as a companion, who knows a bit about time travel, but hasn't actually got to experience it yet, till she meets the Doctor. That story has potential. Anyway, good episode, A+ Can't wait for next week
I enjoyed the episode too. Found the frightening bits well...frightening. But they didn't last long until the Doctor sussed out the cause of the ghost. One question though, I had a bit trouble hearing during the bit where Clara talks to the holographic avatar of the TARDIS. What did the TARDIS say to Clara? And after that why did the TARDIS say they couldn't get the Doctor cause she'd die and then they went and got him anyways?
I had trouble with that as well and had to turn on the captions. The TARDIS said the voice interface scans her mind and shows her the one she holds most esteemed and then said out of the billions of choices it chose her form, presumably as an insult. When Clara convinces it (her?) to go I think it was as a grab-and-go using the portal to get out. I think the small window is why it had to grab the Doctor on the run as there's no time to stop.
That makes sense, and now that you bring it up, I do recall the TARDIS insulting Clara that way. However I'm still unsure how Clara convinced the TARDIS to go get the Doctor.
I think Clara convinced the TARDIS (maybe telepathically as well) that it was now or never. It had the cloister bell going so it knew there was danger.
Thanks for clearing that one up too. I figured that was the cloister bell but I thought maybe there'd be a line of dialogue to point that out.
The first time I heard the dialogue, I thought the TARDIS said that it had "selected the image of someone you have seen. This one seemed to best fit the criterion." and I was confused as to why Clara would react so negatively. After listening again, you're right, the TARDIS says "esteem", not "have seen", i.e. "someone you esteem", implying that Clara is self-absorbed.
I can see your logic but I think he'd still be a bit too young considering the amount of responsibility he seemed to have during the war. Unless he was some kind of prodigy but I don't think that was ever mentioned.
I think this had a huge problem near the end. It wasn't bad at all. It was just that it fell apart at the end because it couldn't keep going on as a story. Time restraints hurt this story because the plot basically had to be told us in a 10 second exposition line. We didn't know what was really happening till then. It would have been great if it was able to be built up more as a story and finding out how this girl got stuck in a bubble dimension. Could have been an epic 2 parter.
I disagree entirely. The pacing was phenomenal compared to what we've been given of late. Her story is interesting, absolutely, but remember that one of the secrets of good storytelling is leaving people wanting more. We know enough of her story to resolve this particular plot and there was no need for more.
That's was simply awesome, what a brillaint atmosphere, some of the lighting when running about with the candles was really errie, and now we know the Tardis indeed has issues with her, very intresting to say the least. Roll on next week.
I'm so not feeling the love this season, but, I dunno, I suspect it's me. The setuo was pretty good, the first thing I thought of was 'The Stone Tape', something I haven't seen it was originally broadcast Down Here 40 years ago - yeah, it sticks in the mind. But it seemed all over the place in terms of pacing fastsloooowfstsloooooowfastfastfast. Again, might be me, but they spent waaaay too long in the pocket universe, time that could have been used elsewhere like the rushed ending (and yes, that ending would have been predictable, but still). As for The Clara Mystery, well, she's not a very good empath. Was it just me, or did anyone else notice that when Clara crossed the circle, that was when it started to steam? Hmm. Hmm, all of the above seems negative, but really, it was a fun 45 minutes and I have watched it twice. Oh, and good pickup on the "esteem" line! That makes much more sense now, and is pretty funny! Next week looks good.
We weren't given anything about the bubble universe till exposition by the Doctor about 2/3rds in and it came out of nowhere and for all we know was pulled out of the Doctors butt. How did he know anything about this person in the bubble world? And after building tension for the entire episode suddenly the Doctor knows all the exposition about it? It's like we missed a complete episode at that point. That's the problem I had. It wasn't really the fast pace it's that almost an entire episode is missing there. You could have had a 2 part episode building up the bubble universe and really had a great story going. Instead it kinda made me think wait a second how did you know this? Where did all this information come from? Who is this time traveler? Then the end about them being related also came out of nowhere and I found it hard to believe that the Doctor would just know that. Then the monster love story came out of nowhere. At the very least 20 more minutes would have really helped this episode. I do really love the Goth Horror elements of this story. Reminds me a lot of a 4th Doctor story.
Not really impressed with this episode. Pretty much by hte numbers Doctor Who fare. The Doctor meets up with ghost hunters, though there is of course a rational explanation explaining the ghost is not really a ghost, in this case the supposed ghost is really a time traveller trapped in a pocket universe threatened by a mysterious monster. The time traveller is saved, and it turns out the monster is simply lonely and looking for its lover. The episode is once again saved by the interaction between the Doctor and Clara, Smith and Coleman really do work well together. I like the episode continues to deal with some of the mysteries of the season, particularly why the TARDIS doesn't seem to like Clara. And there seemed to be some stuff in the conversations between the Doctor and the ghost hunter that seems to tie into the greater arc this year regarding who the Doctor really is. Or at least I thought so while watching the episode, but now I can't really remember specifically what it was that was said that made me think so. This episode is full of quotes that have been used out of context in the trailers ("You are the only mystery worth solving." "I am the Doctor and I am afraid."). And it's nice to see they're continuing to get their mileage out of Tennant's space suit from The Satan Pit. EDIT: The shots in episode of the TARDIS flying through the vortex really look crappy now.
watched it again. it really struck me how nothing annoyed me in it. which is good. also the creepy monster was actually creepy for once.
Weirdly Doug Ray Scott also stars in Hemlock Grove which started today. Odd timing. I just want to here the Doctor say the magic word... Pandorica.
You have a good memory. In fact, in an interview [1], Neil Cross explicitly cites The Stone Tape as an inspiration for this episode. [1] http://www.sfx.co.uk/2013/04/16/doctor-who-hide-writer-neil-cross-interviewed/ "One of my great inspirations was The Stone Tape, which was a great Christmas sci-fi/ horror teleplay from 1972 . . ."