Dark Water
Nov. 2nd, 2014 02:24 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
daibhidcHoly flippin heck!
Okay, I predicted (and by "I", I mean the entire internet) that Missy = Mistress = Female Master back in "Deep Breath".
And then I got bored of that, and came up with a theory that the Nethersphere was exactly what it appeared to be and Missy was Death from the New Adventures. So the reveal that she was in fact the Master actually did work as a stunning revelation. Even when we learned she was a Time Lady[1], part of my mind was thinking "So that's it then, we were right", and part of it was thinking "The Rani? Please, don't be Evil Romana!"
The lesser reveals were all nicely done as well. The skeletons are really Cybermen[2]! Danny (and all previous "guests" of the Nethersphere) aren't in the afterlife at all, they're having their emotions purged to be downloaded into Cyberbodies! 3W isn't a facility from a dark future at all, it's under present day St Paul's and its history is all a set-up[3]! (Oh, and Cybermen on the steps of St Paul's! Of course!)
Michelle Gomez was excellent with more to do than be enigmatic in a stinger, although she seemed to be getting more John Simm the more obvious it became who she was. But I suppose that's been the character since Anthony Ainley.
Clara complaining that the mundane death of her boyfriend was "boring" was a bit on-the-nose. "The Body" didn't need to do that, but then "The Body" was actually about a mundane death intruding on a fantasy show, not a fantasy show co-opting an apparently mundane death.
Another nitpick: The Doctor can't go back in time and save someone he knows died; fair enough, that's been established. He can, however, decide to make an attempt at visiting the afterlife to see if he can get them back. Which raises the "So why didn't he do that for previous dead companions/people?" question all over again.
Basically, though, one of those episodes where the whole thing made enough thematic sense that I wasn't too bothered by the bits where it didn't make sense sense.
And no "Next Time" teaser! But then, we never got the "There never was a Clara" scene, so I suppose that's next week. Another week of hoping it's not what it seems to be.
[1]In a stunning example of Moffatt sneakiness, even though it was very obvious the Missy we'd seen so far wasn't a robot, memories of "Time Heist" did lead me to think that M.I.S.I. was a robot built in Missy's image.
[2]Okay, I predicted that one as soon as Dr Chen said "invisible exoskeletons", but it was still exciting to see happen.
[3] Another neat Moffat trick; the idea of the TARDIS telepathic circuits taking the TARDIS somewhere without the occupants knowing where it is has already been done, so the fact they're doing it again doesn't seem like a blatant set-up to them not being where they think they are.
Okay, I predicted (and by "I", I mean the entire internet) that Missy = Mistress = Female Master back in "Deep Breath".
And then I got bored of that, and came up with a theory that the Nethersphere was exactly what it appeared to be and Missy was Death from the New Adventures. So the reveal that she was in fact the Master actually did work as a stunning revelation. Even when we learned she was a Time Lady[1], part of my mind was thinking "So that's it then, we were right", and part of it was thinking "The Rani? Please, don't be Evil Romana!"
The lesser reveals were all nicely done as well. The skeletons are really Cybermen[2]! Danny (and all previous "guests" of the Nethersphere) aren't in the afterlife at all, they're having their emotions purged to be downloaded into Cyberbodies! 3W isn't a facility from a dark future at all, it's under present day St Paul's and its history is all a set-up[3]! (Oh, and Cybermen on the steps of St Paul's! Of course!)
Michelle Gomez was excellent with more to do than be enigmatic in a stinger, although she seemed to be getting more John Simm the more obvious it became who she was. But I suppose that's been the character since Anthony Ainley.
Clara complaining that the mundane death of her boyfriend was "boring" was a bit on-the-nose. "The Body" didn't need to do that, but then "The Body" was actually about a mundane death intruding on a fantasy show, not a fantasy show co-opting an apparently mundane death.
Another nitpick: The Doctor can't go back in time and save someone he knows died; fair enough, that's been established. He can, however, decide to make an attempt at visiting the afterlife to see if he can get them back. Which raises the "So why didn't he do that for previous dead companions/people?" question all over again.
Basically, though, one of those episodes where the whole thing made enough thematic sense that I wasn't too bothered by the bits where it didn't make sense sense.
And no "Next Time" teaser! But then, we never got the "There never was a Clara" scene, so I suppose that's next week. Another week of hoping it's not what it seems to be.
[1]In a stunning example of Moffatt sneakiness, even though it was very obvious the Missy we'd seen so far wasn't a robot, memories of "Time Heist" did lead me to think that M.I.S.I. was a robot built in Missy's image.
[2]Okay, I predicted that one as soon as Dr Chen said "invisible exoskeletons", but it was still exciting to see happen.
[3] Another neat Moffat trick; the idea of the TARDIS telepathic circuits taking the TARDIS somewhere without the occupants knowing where it is has already been done, so the fact they're doing it again doesn't seem like a blatant set-up to them not being where they think they are.
no subject
Date: 2014-11-03 01:24 am (UTC)"So why didn't he do that for previous dead companions/people?"
I think Occam would handwave it as the first time the Doctor is presented with a case of actually having a possible method of tracking someone after they died, being that Clara has demonstrated before that she can track Danny through the vortex with the TARDIS when linked to the telepathic circuit.
The Doctor's train of thought will have gone, "Is there anything about this dead person whom I would rather have alive that might assist in locating him through the vortex in the afterlife?" With most people, the Doctor will review what he knows about the person and not turn up any tracking means. This time he'll have answered himself, "He's a soldier. He's a
mathsP.E. teacher. His timeline turned up when I was trying to track Clara's. Bingo!"In a case in which the sought party wasn't in the Mistress' secret Cyberman hive under St. Paul's, the method would have failed in some manner to advance whatever that story's plot was.
no subject
Date: 2014-11-03 12:08 pm (UTC)