Doctor Who - 5x04 - The Time of Angels
The episode opens on a bright and sunny day, where a man is standing in the middle of an open field with a confused look on his face. There's a sloppy lipstick mark just above his mouth.
A man in a tuxedo walks up, followed by two armed men. He pulls out a handkerchief and rubs the lipstick.
"Hallucinogenic lipstick. She's here."
Flash to the POV of the others. They're inside some type of corridor rather than an open field, though the clothing is the same.
Elsewhere, a woman in high (red) heels pulls out a small gun, shoots the lock on a door, and breaks inside. The gun is also a torch apparently, and she starts to open a box inside the room. Hello, River.
12,000 years later.
The Doctor and Amy are in some of museum, where the Doctor is basically going through talking about how wrong everything is (and why he loves museums because of that fact). The museum they're in is apparently the largest one ever.
Amy's not so impressed. Especially since, theoretically, he has a time machine that can take him anywhere or anywhen.
Doctor: Ooh, one of mine. Also one of mine.
Amy: Oh, I see. It's how you keep score.
Then the Doctor sees the box-like object that River the woman was fiddling with 12,000 years earlier. It immediately catches his attention.
Ah. Back in the past, she wasn't cutting it open. She was carving a message. In Gallifreyan.
Doctor: There were days, there were many days, these words could burn stars and raise up empires and topple gods.
Amy: What does this say?
Doctor: Hello, sweetie.
Back in the past, River walks out of the room and stares straight at the camera. Then she winks.
In the future, the Doctor and Amy steal the box. Alarms blare, guards go chasing after them... in other words, nothing new there.
The guards go chasing after River, while the Doctor uses the TARDIS to find out what happened on that ship 12,000 years earlier.
Amy: Why are we doing this?
Doctor: Because someone on a spaceship 12,000 years ago is trying to attract my attention.
River knows that the Doctor's listening into the video feed, and she gives him all the information he needs to help her escape. Then she opens the airlock... and flies directly into the now open doors of the TARDIS. Where the Doctor grabs her, sending them both sprawling to the ground.
"Follow that ship."
Cut to the opening credits, which are really growing on me.
River: They've gone into warp drive. We're losing them. Stay close!
Doctor: I'm trying!
River: Use the stabilizers!
Doctor: I don't have stabilizers!
River: The blue switches!
Doctor: Well, the blue ones don't do anything. They're just... blue.
River: Yes, they're blue. [hits switches] They're the blue stabilizers!
Amy wants to know who River is and why, you know, she can fly the TARDIS. The Doctor pouts and ignores them both.
River lands the TARDIS, but it doesn't make the usual (very familiar) wheezing noise. The Doctor demonstrates said sound.
"It's not supposed to make that noise. You leave the brakes on."
The Doctor gets ready to just walk out of the TARDIS, but River points out that it would probably be smart to check the environment outside first. He, you know, ignores that bit of advice. As usual.
Amy: How come you can fly the TARDIS?
River: Oh, I had lessons from the very best.
Doctor: [smug] Well, yeah.
River: It's a shame you were busy that day.
Oh, until we find out otherwise, it's totally my canon that she learned how to fly a TARDIS from Romana. For the record. :-P
River's trying to figure out why the other ship landed there, and the Doctor tells her they didn't. They crashed.
She goes outside to investigate, leaving the Doctor and Amy in the TARDIS.
Amy: Explain. Who is that and how did she do that museum thing?
Doctor: It's a long story, and I don't know most of it. Off we go.
Amy: What are you doing?
Doctor: Leaving. She's got where she wants to go, let's go where we want to go.
Amy: Are we basically running away?
Doctor: Yep.
Amy: Why?
Doctor: 'Cause she's the future. My future.
Amy: Can you run away from that?
Doctor: I can run away from anything I like. Time is not the boss of me.
Amy points out that the Doctor promised to take her to an alien planet, and he reluctantly agrees to let her go outside for five minutes.
"That woman is not dragging me into anything!"
It's still Dr. River Song right now. She's not a professor at this point in her timeline. The Doctor grimaces when he realizes that he inadvertently gave out spoilers.
River tells Amy that two things always turn up in museums: the black box from that particular line of ships and, eventually, the Doctor.
Doctor: I'm nobody's taxi service. I'm not going to be there to catch you every time you feel like jumping out of a spaceship.
River: And you are so wrong.
She tells the Doctor that there's one survivor, something in the ship that can never die.
"Now he's listening."
River pulls out the diary, which immediately catches Amy's attention.
"Her past, my future. Time travel, we keep meeting in the wrong order."
The people River's traveling with this time are soldiers. Well, sorta. They're priests, but by this point in the future that basically means soldiers.
Father Octavian: You promised me an army, Dr. Song.
River: No. I promised you the equivalent of an army.
"Doctor, what do you know of the Weeping Angels?"
The Doctor's head snaps in her direction.
Ooh, catacombs. The Doctor's thrilled to hear that they're going to be searching those.
"You're letting people call you 'sir.' You never do that. So whatever a Weeping Angel is, it's really bad, yeah?"
Doctor: You're still here. Which part of waiting in the TARDIS 'til I tell you it's safe was so confusing?
Amy: Are you all Mr. Grumpy Face today?
Doctor: A Weeping Angel, Amy, is the deadliest, most powerful, most malevolent lifeform evolution has ever produced, and right now one of them is trapped inside that wreckage and I'm supposed to climb in after it with a screwdriver and a torch, and - assuming I survive the radiation long enough and assuming the whole ship doesn't explode in my face - do something incredibly clever which I haven't actually thought of yet. That's my day. That's what I'm up to. Any questions?
Amy: Is River Song your wife?
Surprise, surprise. The Doctor neatly avoids answering that question.
"It's the 51st century. Church has moved on."
River calls the Doctor and Father Octavian in to see the footage that she captured of the Weeping Angel. Amy follows behind them, completely ignoring the Doctor's orders to go back to the TARDIS.
Father Octavian: You've encountered the Angels before?
Doctor: Once, on Earth a long time ago. But those were just scavengers, barely surviving.
Everyone else goes outside and begins preparing for... whatever they're going to do. There are six billion human colonists on the planet that need to be protected.
Amy doesn't have anything to do, so she goes back inside the room they were using as HQ. She walks up to the video feed that River captured, staring at the Weeping Angel. It's changed. The Angel's looking up now; it's face is somewhat visible.
River hands the Doctor a book about the Angels, the only one that exists. He examines it. There's something wrong.
Amy sticks her head out and asks River if she only had the four second clip of the Weeping Angel. When River says "yes," she goes back inside and stares at the video some more.
Now the Angel is staring straight at the camera. And moving closer.
Ah. River has pictures of all the Doctor's regenerations; that how she recognized the Tenth Doctor in the library.
The Doctor realizes that there aren't any pictures of the Weeping Angels in the book. It's nothing but text.
Inside, Amy tries to turn off the video. It won't disappear from the screen.
"You're just a recording. You can't move."
Amy looks away for a second, trying to unplug the monitor. When she glances back up, the Weeping Angel is even closer on the screen than it was before. And she's locked in.
Outside, the Doctor and River figure out that there aren't any pictures of the Weeping Angels in the book because, if something holds an image of an Angel, it becomes one.
The Doctor realizes what that means, and he runs to try and get Amy out of the room. He tells her not to look away; as long as she doesn't even blink, she's safe.
"I'm not blinking! Have you ever tried not blinking!?"
Amy: Doctor, what's it gonna do to me?
Doctor: Don't stop looking at it! Don't stop looking!
The Doctor tells Amy not to look into the Angel's eyes.
Amy remembers what the Doctor said about anything that holds the image of a Weeping Angel being one, and she uses that against it. There was a tiny error on the video, where the image disappeared for just a second, so - when it comes around - she turns it off then. And it works.
Doctor: River, hug Amy.
Amy: Why?
Doctor: Because I'm busy.
"It's no longer dormant."
Outside, something explodes. They've made their way inside the catacombs.
The Doctor and River go outside. Amy follows after a few seconds. There's something in her eye.
Inside the catacombs, the Doctor has given up on leaving Amy behind in the TARDIS. The Doctor uses a futuristic light so everyone can see what surrounds them - including a ton of stone statues.
River: A needle in a haystack.
Doctor: A needle that looks like hay. A haylike needle of death. A haylike needle of death in a haystack of statues. No, yours is fine.
Father Octavius asks the Doctor how they fight the Weeping Angel.
"We find it. And hope."
Father Octavius: He doesn't know yet, who and what you are.
River: It's too early in his timestream.
Father Octavius: Well, make sure he doesn't work it out. Or he's not gonna help us.
River: I won't let you know. Believe you me, I have no intention of going back to prison.
Two of the soldiers go into a separate chamber to investigate.
Elsewhere, Amy is staying close to the Doctor. She keeps rubbing at her eye, and dust seems to pour out onto her hand for a moment.
River comes up behind her and asks if she's alright. Amy quickly tells her that she's fine.
The Doctor's trying to eavesdrop on him, and River calls him on it. When he says that he's busy and not listening, she points out that he's holding the pad in his hand upside down.
Amy: You're so his wife.
River: Oh Amy, Amy, Amy. This is the Doctor we're talking about. Do you really think it could be anything that simple.
Amy: Yep.
River: You're good. I'm not saying you're right, but you are very good.
Cut to the two soldiers who separated from the others. Surprise, surprise, they find the Weeping Angel. And it sends them to who knows when.
After apparently adding impersonation to its list of talents.
One of the soldiers, Bob, starts firing at a regular statue.
"Anyone in this room who isn't scared is a moron."
Bob stays behind to guard the entrance to the maze, with the two other soldiers who were left behind. The others don't know they found the Angel already.
Amy asks if there's a chance everything will collapse on them, what with there being a crashed ship on top of them. River tells her that the people who designed the maze were talented builders.
Doctor: Had dinner with their chief architect once. Two heads are better than one.
Amy: What, you mean you helped him?
Doctor: No, I mean he had two heads.
The Doctor tells River to pull out the book on the Weeping Angels and read the last page.
"What if we had ideas that could think for themselves? What if, one day, our dreams no longer needed us? When these things occur and are held to be true, the time will be upon us. The time of Angels."
Huh. Apparently the Angel killed the two soldiers from earlier, rather than simply sending them back in time?
The Doctor comments that, when this is all over, he should take Amy to visit this planet before the people die out. He likes the species.
Amy: I thought they were all dead?
Doctor: So is Virginia Woolf, but I'm on her bowling team.
The Doctor and River realize that there's something wrong, but they can't put their finger on it. Personally? I'm wondering why a species with two heads made all these statues with just one head. It could just be me.
... or not.
Right then, the Doctor and River both realize what they were missing. River asks how they could have missed it, and the Doctor tells her that they probably had a low level perception filter set up.
The Doctor and River point out the whole two heads vs. one head thing.
"I want you to switch off your torches."
The Doctor leaves his on. Then, for just a second, he switches his off.
River: Are you sure about this?
Doctor: No.
When he turns it back on, all of the statues have turned toward them. Every single one of them.
"They're Angels. All of them."
Elsewhere in the maze, Bob is starting to get even more nervous than before. He gets a message from one of the soldiers, the same one that the other did earlier. The impersonation.
Like the others, Bob follows the sound of the voice. And he walks straight into the Angel.
Nobody knew why the people who lived on the planet before the humans terraformed it died out. Until now.
The Weeping Angels in the catacombs don't look like the normal ones because they've been down there for centuries, starving. That's why they're so slow too.
"We're in the middle of an army, and it's waking up."
Father Octavius calls Bob on the radio, and he answers. The Doctor can tell that something's up, though, so he grabs it from the bishop and starts talking to Bob. He knows that, usually, the Angels displace people in time.
Unless they need the bodies.
Doctor: How did you escape?
Bob: I didn't escape, sir. The Angel killed me too.
They're going to try escaping through the wreckage.
Ouch. Father Octavius points out that, when the Doctor had disappeared, he'll still have to explain to his men's families why they're dead.
(On that note, would it have killed them to throw in a few women as well? I mean, really, it's the 51st century.)
Doctor: Angel Bob, which Angel am I talking to? The one from the ship?
Angel!Bob: Yes, sir. And the other Angels are still restoring.
Doctor: Ah, so the Angel is not in the wreckage. Thank you!
And he goes rushing off... only to run into Amy.
Her hand's turned to stone.
Elsewhere in the catacombs, the others have found the ship. It's a good thirty feet over their heads.
Doctor: You looked into the eyes of an Angel, didn't you?
Amy: I couldn't stop myself. I tried.
Doctor: Listen to me, it's messing with your head. Your hand is not made of stone.
Amy: It is! Look at it!
Doctor: It's in your mind, I promise you. You can move that hand, you can let go.
Amy: I can't, okay. I've tried, and I can't. It's stone.
Doctor: The Angel is gonna come, and it's gonna turn this light off, and there's nothing I can do to stop it. So do it, concentrate. Move your hand.
Amy: I can't!
Doctor: Then we're both gonna die.
Amy: You're not gonna die.
Doctor: It'll kill the lights.
Amy: You've gotta go. You know you have. You've got all that stuff with River, and that's all gotta happen. You know you can't die here.
Doctor: Time can be rewritten. It doesn't work like that.
[They both stare at the Angels behind them that are moving closer and closer.]
Doctor: Keep your eyes on it. Don't blink.
Amy: Run!
Doctor: See, I'm not going. I'm not leaving you here.
Amy: I don't need you to die for me, Doctor. Do I look that clingy?
Doctor: You can move your hand.
Amy: It's stone.
Doctor: It's not stone!
Amy: You've gotta go. Those people up there will die without you. If you stay here with me, you'll have good as killed them.
Doctor: Amy Pond, you are magnificent, and I'm sorry.
Amy: It's okay. I understand. You've got to leave me.
Doctor: Oh no, I'm not leaving you! Never! I'm sorry about this.
At which point he bites her hand, convincing her brain that it's not made of stone.
Amy: You bit me!
Doctor: And you're alive!
The two of them quickly go running to catch up with the others.
River: There's no way up, no way back, no way out. No pressure, but this is usually when you have a really good idea.
Doctor: There's always a way out.
Angel!Bob calls the Doctor on the radio.
"You told me my fear would keep me alive, but I died afraid, in pain, and alone. You made me trust you, and when it mattered you let me down."
Doctor: [to Amy] Trust me?
Amy: Yeah.
Doctor: [to River] Trust me?
River: Always.
Doctor: [to Father Octavius] You lot, trust me?
Father Octavius: We have faith, sir.
The Doctor asks for his gun.
"I'm about to do something incredibly stupid and dangerous. When I do, jump."
Oh, come on BBC One. Stupid cartoon ads during the climactic end of the first part of a two-parter? That's the type of thing I expect from American TV.
Angel!Bob: Sorry, can I ask again? You mentioned a mistake with me?
Doctor: Oh, big big mistake. Really huge. Didn't anyone ever tell you that there's one thing you never put in a trap. If you're smart, if you value your continued existence, if you have any plans about seeing tomorrow, there's one that you never ever put in a trap.
Angel!Bob: And what would that be, sir?
Doctor: Me.
The Doctor aims the gun at the floating light above them, hitting it straight on. It explodes instantly.
And the episode ends.
Thanks for all the well-wishes and virtual hugs on my previous posts. I'm just not ready to respond individually at this point (and, if possible, I'd really love it if everyone kept their comments to this post Doctor Who related rather than getting into RL). I did the same thing last year when my grandfather died; denial until the funeral, that's my way of coping.
Watching TV makes a good distraction. Especially when it's good.