Spoilers The Pyramid at the End of the World (Grade & Discussion Thread)
- Thread starter TommyR01D
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Subpar. I LOVED some of the ideas in the story. Being able to use the simulation to predict when we'd self-destruct is interesting. Also, I like the notion that we don't need alien help in destroying ourselves, we can do that just fine by ourselves, thank you!
I also liked how the Doctor figured it out and figured out where the problem was occurring. Lots of good ideas in the script.
But, the execution was bad. The idea of consent was bad. True, we don't even know what that was all about. But, WTF?! If they legitimately need consent for whatever they want humanity for, you have to get it from each person. No one can provide consent for someone else, unless there's a pre-existing agreement between those parties. Well, I suppose aliens can have a different notion of consent. Maybe they're a hive mind and it works that way?
The specifics of how the world was going to end didn't seem too believable. I won't rehash what others have said, but, seriously, an unstoppable venting to the outside for a facility that should be able to quarantine itself?!
I hated the music in the episode. It sounded cheap to me. It detracted from the story.
I though Bill had figured out the blindness when she was asking the Doctor if he needed to tell her something. She should have known.
So much of the episode just didn't click that it didn't really feel like it happened! The 3 military leaders were odd. The monks were meant to enigmatic, but they weren't. That didn't work.
I also liked how the Doctor figured it out and figured out where the problem was occurring. Lots of good ideas in the script.
But, the execution was bad. The idea of consent was bad. True, we don't even know what that was all about. But, WTF?! If they legitimately need consent for whatever they want humanity for, you have to get it from each person. No one can provide consent for someone else, unless there's a pre-existing agreement between those parties. Well, I suppose aliens can have a different notion of consent. Maybe they're a hive mind and it works that way?
The specifics of how the world was going to end didn't seem too believable. I won't rehash what others have said, but, seriously, an unstoppable venting to the outside for a facility that should be able to quarantine itself?!
I hated the music in the episode. It sounded cheap to me. It detracted from the story.
I though Bill had figured out the blindness when she was asking the Doctor if he needed to tell her something. She should have known.
So much of the episode just didn't click that it didn't really feel like it happened! The 3 military leaders were odd. The monks were meant to enigmatic, but they weren't. That didn't work.
Thinking about the episode more I also have my concerns with the solution of blowing up the lab. If the monks are basing their predictions on the simulation they've run (that we saw last week), and that simulation includes the Doctor, how do they fail to predict that the Doctor will work out the apocalyptic event in the space of about 10 minutes, and then act to stop it? This is a simulation which correctly predicted the breaking of a pair of glasses in a random accident, but failed to foresee the Doctor would work out the impending disaster?
That was my thought too. But then I realised that the monks never specified what the ultimate cause was; perhaps they included the Doctor and Bill in their calculations, and were using Bill as the trigger for consent. The problem with that scenario, however, is the future that they saw from the simulation; how would Bill denying the monks lead to that future? It can't just be a made-up presentation, or it renders the simulations meaningless, and makes the monks little more than con artists.
This is all assuming that there isn't someone else pulling the strings behind the monks, like the Sontarans with the Vardans in The Invasion of Time.
This is all assuming that there isn't someone else pulling the strings behind the monks, like the Sontarans with the Vardans in The Invasion of Time.
I wanna know how these monk(ees) were able to give The Doctor back his sight so magically?
The idea of the monks having an all-knowing simulation that turns out only to be all-knowing when it is necessary for the plot is all style over substance. The idea was cool in concept but just not executed well enough to stand up to scrutiny. And not even that much scrutiny..
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I'm wondering if this is just another simulation somehow. Wouldn't be my first choice of resolutions.. But the choices in the episode were already questionable in the first place.
Maybe the Simms' master is behind all of it? Using the Monks to gain control of Earth again?
Yeah, I wouldn't trust an explosive to save the day. Yes, fire is a useful tool for destroying contaminants if the system is designed to keep everything contained while everything hazardous is destroyed. An explosive, on the other hand, could destroy some of the material while acting to release the rest.
Dreadful. Boring. General insignia on a Colonel commanding a force that should be commanded by (at least) a Lt. General? A resolution that didn't resolve everything. The Doctor burned up all the bacteria, except for the ones that came through the airlock and the ones that infected Nardole.
Silly and dumb.
Silly and dumb.
My biggest problem with it was this: If the bacteria dissolve *all* life, why isn't the Doctor a pool sludge? Also, weren't some stuck to his clothes before the bomb went off, so why isn't the scientist girl a pool of sludge and the world still fucked?
We saw from Torchwood that Martha still had heightened resistance to infection some months after leaving the TARDIS, with the dialogue suggesting the TARDIS shields its occupants against most diseases. Coupled with the Doctor's own regenerative abilities and ability to manipulate his own biology somewhat (Time Lords can consciously stop one or both hearts, able to shift radiation around their bodies, etc) he may have been able to render all the bacteria on him inert.
Or he had a particularly hot curry for lunch and the bacteria wanted no part of that.
It was a strain of Listeria so it could handle it.
EDIT: I thought that was a decent pun...
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Or start regenerating - still doesn't save wotsername when there should have been loads of bacteria still on his clothes. Then don't even get me started on the idea that a biological facility's lockdown containment protocol requires the deadly stuff being locked down to keep it from escaping into the atmosphere be... vented into the fucking atmosphere every 30 minutes! I mean, what? What the actual fuck? This makes zero fucking sense whatsoever!
The whole thing is so stupid that it has to be another simulation...
Or the Land Of fiction (Why not, since it's followed by Victorians on Mars and then the Eagle of the Ninth...
There has been no clear verdict on the rating of this episode.
The poll mean was 3.25, which puts it at -0.55 compared to Series 9.
We're halfway through the series, so let's review:
Still, though there has been some disappointing drudgery we've yet to suffer anything outright horrible.
The poll mean was 3.25, which puts it at -0.55 compared to Series 9.
We're halfway through the series, so let's review:
- Pilot 4.19
- Oxygen 3.95
- Ice 3.89
- Smile 3.81
- Extremis 3.81
- Knock 3.49
- Pyramid 3.25
Still, though there has been some disappointing drudgery we've yet to suffer anything outright horrible.
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