It’s official: there’s a new Doctor in town. Matt Smith has handed the TARDIS keys to Peter Capaldi in the much-balyhooed Christmas special “The Time of the Doctor.” As a newcomer to the Whoniverse, this was the first time I’d actually seen a regeneration in ‘real time’ as opposed to watching it several years later on Netflix, and I thought the whole thing was something of a mixed bag.
Basically, a veritable “Who’s Who” of the Doctor’s enemies descended on Trenzalore so they could besiege him in a town called ‘Christmas’ that looks like it was built from Department 56 houses. Meanwhile, the Time Lords (who were revealed to be trapped in a pocket dimension in the 50th anniversary special), are trying to make a comeback by sending messages through the cracks in the universe that first appeared in series 5. The message is simply “Doctor Who?”; if the Doctor responds by telling them his real name, his fellow Time Lords will know they’ve found the right universe and burst in like the Kool-Aid Man.
The Doctor knows that, if he allows the Time Lords to return, it will simply reignite the Time War. At the same time, he’s determined to protect the people of Christmas and their cutesy, overpriced ceramic houses. He ends up spending 300 years defending Trenzalore, and he’s convinced that he’s finally going to bite the bullet since Time Lords are limited to thirteen incarnations1.
Obviously, the BBC is not going to let a technicality like that get in the way of such a lucrative franchise, so it was pretty much a given that they’d find some way around the regeneration limit. Unfortunately, their solution was somewhat hamfisted: the Doctor’s companion, Clara, talked to the Time Lords through the crack-in-the-universe and begged them to help him, saying that “the Doctor” was his name for all intents and purposes. This somehow convinces them to deliver a burst of extra regeneration energy through the crack, which the Doctor uses to slaughter the Daleks who are about to destroy Christmas. It all seemed too convenient, and if they could deliver the regeneration energy, I don’t know why they didn’t just break through then and there.
The pacing of “The Time of the Doctor” also felt rushed. The assembly of the Doctor’s enemies never really had a chance to feel menacing since it pretty much came out of the blue2and most of the enemies only got cameos. And while Steven Moffat did his best to wrap up existing plot threads, most of that material seemed better suited to a behind-the-scenes feature rather than an episode.
The episode did do a nice job of letting Matt Smith show off his acting chops. Although Eleven has never been my favorite Doctor (I’m a Ten man, myself), Smith is an excellent actor who arguably brought more nuance to the role than any of his predecessors (at least as far as the revived series is concerned–I haven’t seen any of the pre-2005 stuff). Smith was especially good at playing the aged Doctor after 300 years on Trenzalore. Done wrong, it could have degenerated into farce, but Smith managed to capture an old man’s physicality remarkably well.
I also loved Eleven’s final soliloquy. Capturing the essence of an entire character in a single piece of dialogue is no mean feat, yet Moffat managed to write a fitting tribute to Eleven. It had an understated poignance that stood in marked contrast to the overwrought melodrama of Ten’s sendoff.
Brief as it was, Karen Gillan’s cameo as Amy Pond also deserves a mention. The stories of Eleven and Amy were uniquely intertwined, so it was fitting that he should share his final moments with her, even if she was just a figment of his imagination.
Sadly, it will be a while before we get to see what Peter Capaldi’s Doctor is like. They haven’t even started filming series 8 yet, so we might have to wait until Fall of 2014 for new episodes. Damn you, British brevity!
