Eleven! And the Ponds!
Man, I don’t even known which doctor is my favorite. Each has their strengths. But if I had to pick one (I haven’t seen 13-15 yet), it would probably have to be Eleven. He’s just such a mix of chaos, fun, and an absolute confidence in himself.
Say what you will, but he starts the season running an alien spaceship off of Earth with nothing but his reputation and ends it with literally the entire universe at stake.
And then the ponds. Oh, Amy is fun and a great companion for the Doctor. Add in Rory, who is a great counterpoint to both of them and you have a delight of a dynamic.
I do think that the season long arc here (the crack in the wall!) is a solid one. It’s spread over the season and actually integrates well with other stories–with real stakes as you go.
Episodewise, you have a two parter with Weeping Angels–weaker than Blink but still good; the finale (the PANDORICA!); and perhaps one of the best episodes of the series: Vincent and the Doctor.
A wonderful season. Onwards to more Eleven and the Ponds!
Reviews for individual episodes (spoilers!):
Doctor Who Season 5
1. Eleventh Hour
The (Eleventh) Doctor and Amy!
The Doctor: You know when grown-ups tell you everything’s going to be fine, and you think they’re probably lying to make you feel better?
Young Amy: Yes.
The Doctor: Everything’s going to be fine.
Eleven is just such chaos as he tries to find his new self.
The Girl Who
Oh, I do love that pairing, especially later as/when we get more Rory as well.
The Eleventh Doctor: Amy Pond, there’s something you better understand about me, cos it’s important, and one day your life may depend on it. [He smiles] The Eleventh Doctor: I am definitely a madman with a box.
2. The Beast Below
The UK… IN SPACE!
A sort of retro futuristic space, where everything starts ’not as it seems’ and only gets progressively weirder from there.
Mandy: Everyone chooses the “Forget” button. The Doctor: Did you?
Mandy: I’m not eligible to vote yet. I’m 12. Anytime after you’re 16 you’re allowed to see the film and make your choice, and then, once every five years.
The Doctor: And once every five years, everyone chooses to forget what they’ve learned. Democracy inaction.
And who could forget the political commentary?
Amy Pond: What are you going to do?
The Doctor: What I always do. Stay out of trouble.
…
The Doctor: Badly.
😄
Amy Pond: What if you were really old, and really kind and lonely, your whole race dead. What couldn’t you do then? If you were that old, and that kind, and the very last of your kind, you couldn’t just stand there and watch children cry.
What if Amy. What if.
3. Victory of the Daleks
Winston Churchhill: Well then. Time to roll out the secret weapon.
So it’s going to be that sort of episode, eh?
If Hitler invaded Hell, I would give a favorable reference to the Devil.
All righty then!
The Technicolor Daleks were kind of a hoot though.
Amy Pond: So, you’ve got enemies then.
Eleven: Everyone’s got enemies.
4. The Time of Angels
The Doctor: The writing - the graffiti - Old High Gallifreyan… the lost language of The Timelords. There were days, there were many days, these words could burn stars, and raise up empires, and topple gods. Amy Pond: What does this say? The Doctor: “Hello sweetie.”
The return of River Song! She has a fun dynamic with Eleven.
Eleven: Cos she’s my future.
Amy Pond: Can you run away from that?
Eleven: I can run away from anything I like. Time is not the boss of me.
She has a fun dynamic with Amy as well. Which given what we eventually learn… 😄 Spoilers!
The return of the Weeping Angles was about as chaotic and intense as it was in Blink. The ‘that which holds the image of an Angel becomes itself an Angel’ is a bit weird, but I suppose they have to add something each time to make them creepier.
5. Flesh and Stone
Amy Pond: Ten.
Oh this is an episode. I do like the two parters. And I’m glad I don’t have to wait…
Octavian: [about The Doctor] You trust this man?
River Song: I absolutely trust him.
Octavian: He’s not some kind of madman, then?
River Song: [pause] I absolutely trust him.
Well, she answered the question!
Octavian: Doctor, we can’t stay here, we’re too exposed.
The Doctor: We’re too exposed everywhere, and Amy can’t move, and anyway, that’s not the plan.
River Song: There’s a plan?
The Doctor: Don’t know yet, I haven’t finished talking.
I did really love Ten, but Eleven may just be my favorite. And it’s for moments like this.
6. The Vampires of Venice
Rory Williams: You know what it’s dangerous about you? It’s not that you make people take risks, it’s that you make them want to impress you. You make it so they don’t want to let you down. You have no idea how dangerous you make people to themselves when you’re around.
The Doctor, Amy, and Rory! Yay!
7. Amy’s Choice
The Doctor: Examine everything. Look for all the details that don’t ring true.
Rory Williams: OK we’re in a spaceship that’s bigger on the inside than the outside.
Amy Pond: With a bow tie-wearing alien.
Rory Williams: Maybe “what rings true” isn’t so simple.
The Doctor: Valid point.
Weird is kind of how the Doctor do.
The Doctor: You said everyone here lives to their 90’s, there’s something that doesn’t make sense. Let’s go poke it with a stick.
And poking with a stick. Definitely the Doctor.
8. The Hungry Earth
Eleven: Behold, Rio.
Amy: Nah.
Rory: Not really getting the sunshine carnival vibe.
Eleven: No? Ooo, feel that, though. What’s that?
(The Doctor jumps up and down.)
Doctor: Ground feels strange. Just me. Wait. That’s weird.
Rory: What’s weird?
Amy: Doctor, stop trying to distract us. We’re in the wrong place. Doctor, it’s freezing and I’ve dressed for Rio. We are not stopping here. Doctor. You listening to me? It’s a graveyard. You promised me a beach.
Doctor: Blue grass. Patches of it all around the graveyard. So, Earth, 2020-ish, ten years in your future, wrong continent for Rio, I’ll admit, but it’s not a massive overshoot.
He’s not wrong.
He’s rarely wrong.
9. Cold Blood
Elliot: But where are we?
Mo: Well, I’ve got to be honest with you, son. We’re in the centre of the Earth, and there are lizard men.
A good summary.
Eleven: I’m sorry, I didn’t know. You have to believe me. They’re better than this.
Ambrose: This is our planet!
Eleven: We had a chance here.
Ambrose: Leave us alone!
Eleven: In future, when you talk about this, you tell people that there was a chance but you were so much less than the best of humanity.
A touch hypocritical?
10. Vincent and the Doctor
That’s just a delightful episode. The Doctor meets someone famous, their life is weirder than expected, and (usually) things end up the better.
The Doctor: Between you and me, in a hundred words, where do you think Van Gogh rates in the history of art?
Curator: Well… um… big question, but, to me Van Gogh is the finest painter of them all. Certainly the most popular, great painter of all time. The most beloved, his command of colour most magnificent. He transformed the pain of his tormented life into ecstatic beauty. Pain is easy to portray, but to use your passion and pain to portray the ecstasy and joy and magnificence of our world, no one had ever done it before. Perhaps no one ever will again. To my mind, that strange, wild man who roamed the fields of Provence was not only the world’s greatest artist, but also one of the greatest men who ever lived.
11. The Lodger
Or, the one with James Corden.
It is kind of fun watching Eleven and Craig (Corden) banter.
The Doctor: I’m the Doctor. Well, they call me the Doctor; I don’t know why. I call me the Doctor, too. I still don’t know why.
They just never quite stop.
Craig Owens: Has anyone ever told you that you’re a bit weird? The Doctor: They never really stop.
Well…
12. The Pandorica Opens
Rory Williams : But I don’t understand. Why am I here?
The Doctor: Because you are. The universe is big. It’s vast and complicated and… ridiculous and sometimes, very rarely, impossible things just happen and we call them miracles, and… that’s a theory. Nine hundred years, never seen one yet, but this would do me.
A game of phone tag, from Vincent to World War II, to Doctor Song, Spaceship UK, and onwards.
All to tell the Doctor… that it’s the end of everything the season.
The Doctor: You graffitied the oldest cliff face in the universe!
River Song: You wouldn’t answer your phone!
Such a lovely chaotic delightfully busy mess of an episode.
The Doctor: There was a goblin, or a… trickster. Or a warrior. A nameless, terrible thing, soaked in the blood of a billion galaxies. The most feared being in all the cosmos. And nothing could stop it, or hold it, or… reason with it. One day it would just drop out of the sky and tear down your world.
Oh, that’s quite the trick.
13. The Big Bang
The Doctor: Amy. Where’s Amy?
Rory: I killed her.
The Doctor: Oh, Rory!
Rory: Doctor, what am I?
The Doctor: You’re a Nestene Duplicate. A lump of plastic with delusions of humanity.
Rory: But I’m Rory now. Whatever happened, it’s stopped. I’m Rory.
The Doctor: That’s software talking.
Rory: Can you help her? Is there anything you can do?
The Doctor: Yeah, probably, if I had the time.
Rory: The time?
The Doctor: All of creation has just been wiped from the sky. Do you know how many lives now never happened?
The Doctor: All the people who never lived. Your girlfriend isn’t more important than the whole universe
Rory: She is to me!
The Doctor: Ha ha! Welcome back Rory Williams!
The Doctor: Sorry, had to be sure! Hell of a gun arm you’re packing there. Right, we need to get her downstairs.
The Doctor: And take that look off your plastic face - you’re getting married in the morning!
Man this one got complicated. In all the best ways.
Rule one. The Doctor Lies.