7X05 The Angels Take Manhattan (Grading/Discussion) (SPOILERS!)

[Mr. Adventure]

It's what I said about needless arc and hype - if they'd just done the episode and moved on we'd all be thinking "cool, they live out their lives in the past" but by going on about the finality of how they can never see the Doctor again, it just makes us go "but they can if..." Moffat's a great scripter, but their grasp of publicity and guiding the audience is totally borked.

What bothers me is they've been building up three themes with Amy and Rory. One deals with the danger, the Doctor had left them once because he felt he might get them killed and we built up a whole new character in Brian to solemnly ask the Doctor to keep them safe. The second deals with Amy and Rory aging with their travels, lines showing, reading glasses, wanting to settle down. Finally, there's been all the stuff regarding wanting to raise a child and the obstacles there.

So how do we resolve these threads? They get stranded and isolated in old New York. The end.

I just feel it could have been more satisfying dramatically.

 

[Photoman15]

I say in Time of Angels that Amy could only hear the Doctor. There was a reason her eyes had to be closed. They also filmed it like scenes from The Sixth Sense. Amy has her hands in a position that the Doctor COULD be holding them or not. She sways slightly during the scene so that we don't know if she moved slightly when the Doctor kissed her forehead. We know from when he woke up on the Tardis and called out to Amy that she could hear him. How he was able to pick her up and bring her (little Amelia) into the house, I don't know. But he did sit there while she drifted into sleep and tell her the story of the old man and the blue box he stole.

 

[Worf2DS9]

I enjoyed the episode for the most part. Aside from the silliness of the Statue of Liberty gag (it's not even stone!), my main issue is why Amy blinking at the end would allow the angel to zap her back in time. Both the Doctor and River were both looking towards Amy and therefore the Angel. Even if they weren't looking directly at the Angel, focussing their attention on Amy, they'd still see the Angel in the corner of their eye, thus keeping it solid. Surely Amy's slim frame wasn't blocking it entirely from view.

Something else that bugged me (and this has nothing to do with the episode itself) was SPACE cutting to commercial after the opening titles! I don't recall them ever doing that before.

 

[Kai "the spy"]

That said, last night felt to me in many ways the most "RTD" that Moffat has ever been; the Statue of Liberty being able to go walkabout Ghostbusters II-style without anyone noticing in the city that never sleeps, for example. That kind of "spectacle over plot logic" was very Russell IMHO.

Davies would have at least used the "Angel of Liberty" in a pivotal way.

 

[Iamnotspock]

Davies would have at least used the "Angel of Liberty" in a pivotal way.

That I have to concede.

 

[Samurai8472]

Davies would have at least used the "Angel of Liberty" in a pivotal way.

Tenth Doctor- CyberKing c'mon out!





RTD- Who doesn't want to see a CyberKing and the Statue of Liberty duke it out in NYC

 

[Mr. Adventure]

I gotta admit this talk got me thinking about the Cyberking as well.

 

[Alidar Jarok]

How about not having had the previous series revolve around the idea that you can cheat your way past any sort of paradox or unchangable fixed point in time with the aid of a handy robot?

Well, technically, he showed that changing the events (not having River shoot the Doctor) causes everything to get fucked up. Just what it also shows is that we are sometimes mistaken about what that fixed point actually is. I realize technically, they only know for a fact that a gravestone has to appear, but that doesn't mean they can risk it.

 

[Starkers]

I enjoyed the episode for the most part. Aside from the silliness of the Statue of Liberty gag (it's not even stone!), my main issue is why Amy blinking at the end would allow the angel to zap her back in time. Both the Doctor and River were both looking towards Amy and therefore the Angel. Even if they weren't looking directly at the Angel, focussing their attention on Amy, they'd still see the Angel in the corner of their eye, thus keeping it solid. Surely Amy's slim frame wasn't blocking it entirely from view.

Something else that bugged me (and this has nothing to do with the episode itself) was SPACE cutting to commercial after the opening titles! I don't recall them ever doing that before.

I took it that Amy was between the Angel and the Doctor/River, so she was the only one technically looking at the Angel, hence when she turned she was zapped.

 

[Starkers]

Oh yeah, and another moment I loved, not sure if anyone's mentioned it, was the Doctor's face when River told him she was a Professor now!

 

[Kruezerman]

My problem are the open story lines:

1. Brian Williams
2. The Fields of Trenzalore
3. Amy and Rory's life back in 2012 (or 2020, whatever)
4. River
5. The inbetween bits with the Doctor (he aged three hundred some odd years and we weren't a part of it!)

But my biggest problem was that it felt like a half assed good bye, like the PTB were just dumping them off. I felt the emotion, but I kinda felt like it was forced. One thing I do miss is the familial part of the current Who, Rose and her mother, Martha and her parents, Donna and her family, with Amy we saw her family, maybe once for five minutes. That doesn't really work for me. Doctor Who in the Tennant era was a very human experience with family and emotion working alongside the fun, this is turning into your run of the mill sci-fi adventure. It's becoming generic and it's almost becoming forgettable to me.

 

[Mister Fandango]

The typical response of the Moffat Fan. "You're all too stupid to understand his Genius."

When it's true it's true, as it is in this case (see the last response below).

So how did the Statue Of Liberty wander around Manhattan without anyone noticing, or it being constantly stopped by people looking at it? Use only information contained in the episode itself while answering.

The same way no one noticed a giant Cyberking was being constructed in 1851. Or how dragging Earth through space didn't cause even a single tidal wave or earthquake (or any of the other countless disasters that should have coincided with it). Or having a massive planet closer to Earth than the Moon is didn't fuck either world over. Or how the Titanic successfully crashed into the TARDIS. Or any of the other countless bouts of random stupidity that came from RTD's tenure.

How does not being able to visit New York in 1938 stop the Doctor rescuing Amy and Rory in any one of a dozen other ways? Actually make it two dozen since River must be able to visit them whenever she wants in order to drop off her book manuscript. Use only information contained in the episode itself while answering.

This has been explained several times. Feel free to go back and re-read any of the posts in which it has been addressed. Including the one you replied to.

(Hint: It's not that they couldn't find a way to go back, it's that doing so would likely cause the world to go kaboomy. And, since they're all nice and happy back then and lived to a ripe old age, there was no real imperative to go back and risk destroying the entire planet to save them from their happy little life that they were already longing for.)

 

[Alidar Jarok]

For what it's worth, I would use "bouts of random stupidity" affectionately (except the CyberKing, that was just bad).

 

[Allyn Gibson]

3. Amy and Rory's life back in 2012 (or 2020, whatever)

Considering that Amy was reading a newspaper with a headline screaming that the Detroit Lions had won the Super Bowl (which would happen in February) while Central Park was in full flower (which would happen in April), the Doctor must have picked Amy and Rory up in February 2020-1 the day after the Lions won the Super Bowl and then taken them back to April 2012 for a picnic and Amy brought her newspaper along because she really wanted to read it.

 

[Starkers]

My problem are the open story lines:

1. Brian Williams
2. The Fields of Trenzalore
3. Amy and Rory's life back in 2012 (or 2020, whatever)
4. River
5. The inbetween bits with the Doctor (he aged three hundred some odd years and we weren't a part of it!)

But my biggest problem was that it felt like a half assed good bye, like the PTB were just dumping them off. I felt the emotion, but I kinda felt like it was forced. One thing I do miss is the familial part of the current Who, Rose and her mother, Martha and her parents, Donna and her family, with Amy we saw her family, maybe once for five minutes. That doesn't really work for me. Doctor Who in the Tennant era was a very human experience with family and emotion working alongside the fun, this is turning into your run of the mill sci-fi adventure. It's becoming generic and it's almost becoming forgettable to me.

I actually quite liked that we saw Rose's home life, I thought it was an interesting new take on a companion, unfortunately I didn't need to see it with every single companion, nor did I need it to be so similar (the harridan of a mother and the weak father). I hope we don't see any of clara's family, which doesn't mean I want us to never see a companion's real life again, I just don't think it needs overdoing, and doing all the time.

Of course this isn't a nu Who thing really. Nyssa saw her father often

 

[Alidar Jarok]

Amy and Rory's life in the present time period isn't really an open storyline. It's pretty clearly closed. They chose the Doctor over that life and then they got zapped back in time.

Brian isn't exactly an open storyline, but it's a shame that he won't see his son anymore (then again, neither would the parents of any companion who died).

River and the fields of Tranzalore are likely still yet to come. The gaps in the Doctor's life was for a specific story reason and because it allows flexibility if they later want to claim something happened in the 11th Doctor's life that we didn't see (and for books, audio dramas, and fan fiction).

ETA: For what it's worth, I liked not seeing Amy's family. The show is about their travels, not their family. I thought having Rose's family was a nice change of pace and I liked Donna's family so it was worthwhile (Martha's family were relatively pointless), but it isn't necessary each time.

 

[StCoop]

(Hint: It's not that they couldn't find a way to go back, it's that doing so would likely cause the world to go kaboomy.

Wrong. It's stated more than once that only New York would be in danger. Try again.

 

[StCoop]

(Hint: It's not that they couldn't find a way to go back, it's that doing so would likely cause the world to go kaboomy.

Wrong. It's stated more than once that only New York would be in danger. Try again.

The same way no one noticed a giant Cyberking was being constructed in 1851. Or how dragging Earth through space didn't cause even a single tidal wave or earthquake (or any of the other countless disasters that should have coincided with it). Or having a massive planet closer to Earth than the Moon is didn't fuck either world over. Or how the Titanic successfully crashed into the TARDIS. Or any of the other countless bouts of random stupidity that came from RTD's tenure.

Ah the old "the other guy did it" defense. I though Moffat was supposed to be far superior to Davies?

 

[VDCNI]

The typical response of the Moffat Fan. "You're all too stupid to understand his Genius."

When it's true it's true, as it is in this case (see the last response below).

So how did the Statue Of Liberty wander around Manhattan without anyone noticing, or it being constantly stopped by people looking at it? Use only information contained in the episode itself while answering.

The same way no one noticed a giant Cyberking was being constructed in 1851. Or how dragging Earth through space didn't cause even a single tidal wave or earthquake (or any of the other countless disasters that should have coincided with it). Or having a massive planet closer to Earth than the Moon is didn't fuck either world over. Or how the Titanic successfully crashed into the TARDIS. Or any of the other countless bouts of random stupidity that came from RTD's tenure.

How does not being able to visit New York in 1938 stop the Doctor rescuing Amy and Rory in any one of a dozen other ways? Actually make it two dozen since River must be able to visit them whenever she wants in order to drop off her book manuscript. Use only information contained in the episode itself while answering.

This has been explained several times. Feel free to go back and re-read any of the posts in which it has been addressed. Including the one you replied to.

(Hint: It's not that they couldn't find a way to go back, it's that doing so would likely cause the world to go kaboomy. And, since they're all nice and happy back then and lived to a ripe old age, there was no real imperative to go back and risk destroying the entire planet to save them from their happy little life that they were already longing for.)

So since RTD did stupid things that excuses Moffatt from doing the same!? Some of us watch the show on its own merits and don't turn everything into some imaginary battle between two different showrunners.

 

[Mister Fandango]

So since RTD did stupid things that excuses Moffatt from doing the same!? Some of us watch the show on its own merits and don't turn everything into some imaginary battle between two different showrunners.

When the argument is that it only crops up during Moffatt's tenure and that RTD was some kind of angelic saint who never included stupid crap in his shows, yes, it very much does. Do try to keep up with the conversation.