5x07 Amy's Choice (Grading/Discussion) SPOILERS!!

[Count Zero]

I nearly forgot about my solemn duty to make the episode thread. So I took my Tardis a few hours back in time to create this thread punctually. Phew.

Spoiler: synopsis

It's been five years since Amy Pond last travelled with the Doctor and when he lands in her garden again, on the eve of the birth of her first child, she finds herself facing a heartbreaking choice - one that will change her life for ever.

Well, I thought the trailer last week was really intriguing, so I'm looking forward to this episode.

 

[Samurai8472]

Here's a fair sized group of videos and things of note before today's episode:

-An "introduction" to Amy's Choice by Arthur Darvill (Rory)

-3 very short clips from Amy's Choice
-Matt Smith interviews Karen Gillan and vice versa.

-Blue Peter "Design a TARDIS Console" winners meet Matt Smith

www.youtube.com/watch?v=JsCFGUmRuow

 

[wamdue]

lets hope this episode has some good writing, as I think its going to a cheap one, CGI wise, dont even know if its going to have any proper aliens.

Also lets hope the Amy being pregnant thing, isnt too close to the various times Sci-Fi women (or even men) have gotten pregnant before.

 

[Count Zero]

Thanks for the links but I've decided to stop watching the preview clips for the episodes. I think they have diminished my enjoyment of an episode a few times.
As for Amy's future, I believe it's an illusion created by the Dream Lord.

 

[davejames]

Thanks for the links but I've decided to stop watching the preview clips for the episodes. I think they have diminished my enjoyment of an episode a few times.

Same here. The episodes are already short enough as it is, and I don't want to ruin what few surprises there are.

 

[DarkHorizon]

I thought that was brilliant.

Who else thought the Dream Lord was going to be the Celestial Toymaker?

And I still think it was him.

 

[Bob The Skutter]

I really enjoyed that episode. Nice idea for the villain of the piece.

 

[mappster]

I thought that was brilliant.

Who else thought the Dream Lord was going to be the Celestial Toymaker?

And I still think it was him.

The personification of the Doctor's darkness already has a name, and it isn't the Celestial Toymaker.

 

[Eyes]

Wow! That was amazing.

I'm really liking the Amy/Rory relationship, especially with the Doctor being like a mentor and friend rather than getting involved with his companions.

As for the Dream Lord, one of the most intriguing villains so far, nice to explore the Doctor's dark side.

One, the random postman just in case it wasn't clear enough what happened to the kids. "Morning, Aaarrggh," *turns into dust*. Really? At least give characters you're killing off more than a few seconds screentime.

That's really my only quirk with the episode though. I absolutely loved it.

 

[Pat]

Really enjoyed that; voted "good", but it did have a very derivitive "seen it before" feel for me.

 

[WillsBabe]

I really enjoyed it in so many ways. Very, quirky and clever and different. I'm getting really fond of all 3 characters.

 

[Hennessy Badger]

Really enjoyed that; voted "good", but it did have a very derivitive "seen it before" feel for me.

Agreed.

This was a good episode that had the potential to be a really great episode but didn't quite make it there. I don't think it packed the emotional punch that they were going for. This was more of an emotional poke.

I don't know. One of the main problems for me was that as a viewer, there was absolutely no doubt in my mind that the "future" scenario wasn't real.

 

[Lonemagpie]

Was a bit worried about this - on the one hand, Simon Nye writes great stuff and knows SF (cf the episode of Men Behaving Badly when they're watching Star Trek) and the "killer pensioners" thing mentioned in the Radio Times sounded fun. OTOH, the trailer last week made it look like the worst episode since season 24.

Thankfully, that was more a fault with the trailer than with the episode, which was a witty - if weird - budget-saver.

Arthur Darvill is still by far the weak link in the season, and Toby Jones came over as annoying - but made sense at the end of the episode. There was a reason for it, not just the actor not working out.

The situation was as predictable as expected, and the truth about which reality is real was easy to call even before the episode started - but the reason why things worked out the way they did was the surprising bit.

Overall, Darvill as Rory drags it down a bit, and I'm sure the kids will have been bored stiff by the lack of action and monsters, (it was very Big Finish-ish in that regard actually) but it was all well-written and well thought-out, so I'd give it an 8/10 or so.

 

[wamdue]

As for the Dream Lord, one of the most intriguing villains so far, nice to explore the Doctor's dark side.

I agree, but it was a shame the Dream Lord was not a real villain, they could have used "him" in SJA heck they would even have had to had used the same actor, as the impression I had before we saw the seeds was that the Dream Lord took his apperance to suit the people he visited.

Never got that whole thing about not knowing its if a dream or not, could just be me, but ive been aware im dreaming sometimes, and gone on to do some awful things, simply knowing that.

Moving on, more than clear this was the cheap episode, but it worked quite well, and would scare some kids who live in villages of old people, its not unrealistic, to say nothing of our ageing population.

 

[captcalhoun]

i loved it.

 

[Starkers]

Wow I might wel have to watch it again because my initial thoughs were that it was terrible, seriously I felt like Fear Her and finally been overtaken!

It had some nice ideas, but the script and direction...I dunno it just felt really, really flat.

Maybe I just wasn't in the right mood?

 

[Shazam!]

Nowhere near as good as it should have been. I was hoping for clever clues and hints in regards as to what was real and what wasn't rather than them pretty much hoping for the best and/or The Doctor just deciding.

 

[Shazam!]

Oh, and the TARDIS interior looked amazing white*. They should totally go back to that.



*I know it was iced over.

 

[Haggis and tatties]

Another brilliant bit of Dr Who entertainment.

 

[DimesDan]

i loved it.

As did I.

I didn't catch Confidential, but where they were filming the village scenes, did they say where it was in Wales?