Doctor Who 6x04 Reveiw

[iaria]

The Doctor's Wife

I loved this episode but I don’t really know how well the title actually goes with it. I mean it does establish the TARDIS as the most important person to the Doctor, and I am all for that, but ‘wife’?

• This episode really hinged on Suranne Jones as the TARDIS and I thought she did a fabulous job even if there were a couple times where I couldn’t figure out what she was saying. This episode was all about the TARDIS – meeting her, learning about her, seeing parts of her we haven’t before or in a long time, talking about her in new ways and most of all her relationship with the Doctor. I loved it all.

• I want to start and just get it out of the way – I did find it a bit strange that there was no mention of Bad Wolf even obliquely. The TARDIS has been in a human body before. Once. Once she shared the body of a Companion who shared her love for the Doctor and together they saved him and destroyed his enemies. I think I would have been happy with even just a mention of that time while she was in the cage figuring out her body. If perhaps after she started blurting out random stuff she’s looked confused/irritated and said to herself ‘this didn’t happen the last time this happened’ or something. Just anything.

• My favourite bit of new canon: “The mark of the Cosair. Fantastic bloke. He had that snake tattooed on every regeneration. Didn’t feel like himself unless he had the tattoo. Or herself a couple of times. Oooo, she was a bad girl!” Awesome. I love that gender-switching regenerations, much talked about but often waved aside, are now canon. That just makes me so ridiculously happy. It means that the Time Lords could change gender. It means that the Doctor could regenerate female in canon. I doubt it will ever happen but it’s a possibility.

• My second favourite bit of new canon: the fact that the TARDS archives all the old control rooms. I’m choosing to believe that she also chooses to archives other important rooms she cares about like old Companion’s bedrooms.

• I loved that we got to see Nine and Ten’s control room again. That was a fabulous. At the same time though it being deleted made me all sad.

• The Doctor and the TARDIS were fabulous. I totally ship them. I mean I’ve always shipped them a bit but, you know, she’s a bunch of light trapped in a ship form and she’s never really had a solid personality so it’s hard to really get attached. But I certainly am now. I loved all their interactions. I think I read somewhere once that the show was the love story about a boy and his magic box who go on adventures and this episode pretty much made that canon. There are so many moments and lines between them and I kind of just want to quote everything. Here are some that stick out:

- I adore the fact that the TARDIS’s first response to seeing the Doctor is to immediately run to him and kiss him. And then when Uncle says she bites her response is to go “Do I? Excellent” and then bites the Doctor. :D And she’s just so gleeful about it. Oh, and then “I have just had a new idea about kissing come here” and chasing him around. Hee.

- “Thief. Where’s my thief? Thief!!!!” That’s adorable. I just find that so ridiculously adorable. I am seriously just sitting here going ‘awww’ over it.

- “Oh my beautiful idiot. You have what you’ve always had. You’ve got me.” ♥

- “700 years finally you ask. I think you call me sexy.” / “Only when I’m alone.” LOL. I loved that. I loved that the TARDIS introducing herself to Amy as ‘sexy’ and the Doctor’s “shut up” to Amy over it. Hee.

- “And you never read the instructions.” / “I always read the instructions!” Heee. That actually really reminds me of River and the River/Doctor relationship. Also it amuses me because I’m pretty sure last season the Doctor told Amy there was a manual for the TARDIS but he threw it out because it was wrong (or something).

- “The first time you touched my consol you said” / “... you were the most beautiful thing I’d ever known.” / “Then you stole me and I stole you.” / “I borrowed you.” / “Borrowing implies the intention of returning the thing that was taken. What makes you think that I would ever give you back?” ♥♥ She stole him too! I love that. I love that the TARDIS is just as possessive of her Doctor as he is of her.

- “You didn’t always take me where I wanted to go.” / “No I always took you where you needed to go.” So true and exactly how I thought it worked. So it’s basically canon then that the TARDIS often ends up controlling where and when they end up and thus the Doctor isn’t actually as bad a driver as he so often seems?

- “I wanted to see the universe so I stole a Time Lord and ran away. And you were the only one mad enough.” I love this version of events. I love the TARDIS wanting adventure in her old age and stealing herself a Time Lord in order to get it. That’s awesome.

• I loved the Doctor. I found him really endearing and I spent a lot of time wanting people to hug him. I really liked that he asked the Ood if he could look at it's voice box instead of just doing it. I liked his glee at getting mail and how he loves the idea of bunk beds. I just liked everything about him this episode.

• “I really don’t know what to do. (smiling) That’s a new feeling. (smacks himself)” Hee. That is like quintessentially the Doctor isn’t it? Sure he’s all panicked and freaked out and uncertain in a way he’s never been before but that’s kind of cool because he’s never been that before. Also him smacking himself proves that sometimes he can in fact reign himself in and doesn’t need a Companion to do it for him. Just usually.

• “The only water in the forest is the river.” Well, clearly ‘the river’ has to be talking about River Song but I have no idea about the rest of it. ‘the forest’ makes me think of the Library where River dies but I’m doubtful that that is what it’s referring to. Hmm.

• I loved getting to see more of the TARDIS. I love how Moffat era Doctor Who has so many mentions of the rest of the TARDIS - the swimming pool being brought up a number of times, mentions of bedrooms, the library, a scullery and squash court 7. It makes the TARDIS seem even bigger.

• There were three Doctor and Amy exchanges that I really loved:

“You want to be forgiven.” – Amy
“... Don’t we all?” – Doctor
“What do you need from me?” – Amy

Oh, Doctor. The way he just kind of hunches down. I just wanted her to hug him. I loved that she sussed out the truth and I loved her response to him.

“She’s a woman, and she’s the TARDIS.” – Doctor
“Did you wish really hard?” – Amy
“Shut up, not like that.” – Doctor

LOL. Oh, Doctor. It totally is, stop lying. It probably would have been more convincing if he hadn’t just been saying ‘she’s a woman and the TARDIS’ over and over in glee.

“What do you think dear? Where should we take the kids this time?” – Doctor to TARDIS
“Look at you pair. It’s always you and her, isn’t it? Long after the rest of us are gone.” – Amy

Two things I found interesting: the Doctor calling Amy and Rory ‘the kids’ and then Amy, the first time I think I’ve seen a Companion actually say it to the Doctor, talking about when she and Rory are gone. I continue to love him calling her ‘dear’.

• Amy was fabulous this episode. I loved her line to Rory: “It’s just what they’re called. It doesn’t mean that he knows what he’s doing” because that is so true and I like that she realises it. I loved her figuring out how to open the door and it impressed me because I didn’t put together.

• At this point Rory dying seems to be a running joke on the show. I am actually fine with that. As long as he doesn't really die.