Heaven Sent

[daibhidc]

Woah.

That was definitely the most intense episode of Doctor Who I've seen for a while. And no characters except the Doctor, the entirely silent monster, and voice/back-of-head Clara.

We will start with the niggle; all the sand and the monster's viewpoint appearing on screens and it turns out this has nothing to do with the Sandmen from "Sleep No More"?

That aside (and the judgement from the internet at the time would suggest that very few people will be disappointed by a failure to link something to "Sleep No More") the whole visual of the revolving castle was nicely done. And the monster as the inevitability of death - I've complained a couple of times this season about monsters not fitting their conceptual role in the story, but this one nailed it.

I liked the Doctor going into his mental TARDIS to work things out - a bit of Sherlock creeping in, Moffatt? Except Sherlock wouldn't tolerate the idea of John hanging around his mind palace asking questions, whereas the Doctor needs someone to show off to. And it made for a good visual with unconsiousness/death being represented by the TARDIS powering down.

The explanation of what's actually been happening is clever. And not really timey-wimey, which surprised me. It also gets into all that philosophical stuff about is a copy the same as the original and so on which I studiously avoid on the Transhuman Space discussion boards, so I'll ignore it again here. (You do have to vaguely wonder about the first Doctor, who must have managed to work it out at least as far as using himself to power the teleporter without any clues. And the following ones probably wouldn't have had several of them.)

And the final reveal: the Doctor was inside the Confession Dial. I'm not entirely sure how much sense that makes; I thought the Confession Dial already contained his confession, that was the point of it. "A Time Lord's Confession Dial contains a castle that will force him to confess if he's teleported directly into it" doesn't really work for me. On the other hand, another great visual.

And the final final reveal, the Confession Dial was outside the Capitol! It's all going to kick off now...

No, wait, final, final, final reveal: the Doctor is the hybrid! Is half-human canon? And why was he freaking out everytime someone could concievably be described as a hybrid if he knew that all along?

Comments

[capriuni.livejournal.com]

Well, by my count, there are (at least) three different hybrid variations within this specific season (Timelord/Dalek, Ashildr/Mire, and Zygon/Osgood/?? in chronological order)*, without having to refer back to a TV movie that aired before most of the audience were even born.

I liked the Doctor going into his mental TARDIS to work things out - a bit of Sherlock creeping in, Moffatt?

Actually, the mnemonic technique that's often called the Memory Palace (its official name is method of loci (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Method_of_loci)) has been known and used since at least the days of Cicero in ancient Rome. And it makes sense that both Sherlock and the Doctor would use it. Sherlock likely read about it. The Doctor would probably claim he taught Cicero how it works... ;-)

*And maybe Rasmussen/Sandman, depending on how you count.

[daibhid-c.livejournal.com]

Oh, I know (there's a very nice portrayal of it in a Deep Space Nine novel, with Bashir losing his intelligence being portrayed as finding rooms have been boarded up and so on), it just struck me as Sherlockian in this case because Moffat's often said his Sherlock and his Doctor have similarities (although they approach them from opposite directions).