Doctor Who Commentary – 6.13 ‘The Wedding of River Song’

Caleb WoodbridgeSwithun Dobson and Sarah Burrow discuss ‘The Wedding of River Song’ , episode 13 of Doctor Who series 6. As the Doctor heads to his almost certain death, something has gone very wrong with time, thanks to a woman…

We discuss alternate realities, guns’n’eyepatches, Indiana Jones, the Brigadier Alastair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart, time loops, the motives of the Silence, the legend of the Doctor, stepping back into the shadows, story arcs and more, plus we look forward to the Christmas special and beyond!

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Seven Ways the Doctor Could Cheat Death in ‘The Wedding of River Song’!

Caleb Woodbridge looks ahead to ‘The Wedding of River Song’, considering seven possible (or impossible!) ways to cheat death when you’re a Time Lord!

Theories covered include:

  1. “I woke up and it was all a terrible dream”
  2. It’s the Doctor’s ganger!
  3. It’s the Tessalecta!
  4. “Regeneration juice” and other technobabble
  5. “Time can be rewritten”
  6. “To be fair, the universe did blow up”
  7. The love of a good woman?

Listen to the evidence for and against each one, let us know your predictions, and check back in a day or two’s time for our commentary on the finale!

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Doctor Who Commentary – 6.12 ‘Closing Time’

Caleb WoodbridgeSwithun Dobson and Sarah Burrow discuss ‘Closing Time’ , episode 12 of Doctor Who series six, which sees the return of both of Cybermen and James Corden in the latest tale from Gareth Roberts!

As the Doctor’s death approaches, he makes a social call on his old friend Craig Owens, but soon finds himself saving the world one last time. We discuss the Doctor’s parenting skills, Cardiff filming locations, sentimental endings, and much more, as well as responding to your feedback on The God Complex!

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Doctor Who Spoiler-free Review – 6.12 ‘Closing Time’

Caleb Woodbridge previews ‘Closing Time’, episode 12 of Doctor Who by Gareth Roberts.

Two hundred years later, and the Doctor is preparing to meet his end at Lake Silencio. As part of his “farewell tour”, he calls in on Craig Owens (James Corden from The Lodger) to make a social call, but with mysterious power shortages and disappearing shop attendants, he can’t resist investigating one last mystery…

After exploring the darker side of travelling with the Doctor in The Girl Who Waited and The God Complex (don’t forget to check out our audio commentaries on those episode), we’re back to a much lighter action-adventure in this week’s encounter with the Cybermen. The domestic humour combined with something sinister in a department store harks back to Russell T Davies-era Who, especially the first episode Rose, which is no bad thing in my book.

As might be expected from the pen of Gareth Roberts, who brought us last series’ The Lodger, as well as the witty The Unicorn and the Wasp and The Shakespeare Code, the jokes come thick-and-fast. The bromance between the Doctor and Craig reaches new levels (and the return of the so-called “Gay Agenda”!) One of the Doctor’s new abilities from earlier in the series provides a great running gag too.

James Corden is one of those comedy guest stars, like David Walliams last week or Catherine Tate before, who tend to polarise opinion. I really enjoyed both Gavin and Stacey and The Lodger, and Corden’s turn as the hapless but likeable Craig Owens is just as entertaining a second time round, though sadly Daisy Haggard only gets a cameo as Sophie. There’s a fun reappearance for Lynda Baron, making her third guest showing in Doctor Who: she was Captain Wrack in the Peter Davison story Enlightenment, and sang ‘The Ballad of the Last Chance Saloon’ all the way back in 1966 for The Gunfighters!

Some might find the ending a bit too sentimental – the Doctor says as much! But I really enjoyed it – it’s fun, touching and scary in the right places. The Cybermen get treated properly as monsters and are nicely effective, even on a small scale.

Although an unashamedly fun episode, the shadow of the Doctor’s impending death looms large, and the closing moments lead directly in to the events we saw back at the start of the series, where the Doctor was struck down by the Impossible Astronaut. Closing time indeed…

Check back on Saturday night for our audio commentary on ‘Closing Time’ and to let us know what you thought!

Doctor Who Commentary – 6.11 ‘The God Complex’

Caleb WoodbridgeSwithun Dobson and Sarah Burrow discuss ‘The God Complex’ , episode 11 of Doctor Who series six, penned by Being Human writer Toby Whithouse.

The Doctor, Amy and Rory face their nightmares in an infinite hotel, but has travelling with the Doctor finally become too dangerous? We discuss nightmares, blogger stereotypes, religion in Doctor Who, Rory’s lack of faith, the question of what the Doctor believes in, the departure of Amy and Rory Williams, and much more.

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Doctor Who Review – 6.10 ‘The Girl Who Waited’

James Willetts brings us his review of ‘The Girl Who Waited’! Don’t forget to check out our commentary, and let us know what you think!

What can you say about The Girl Who Waited? Well first of all, it’s brilliant. Secondly though, it’s yet another chance for the cast to showcase just how great they are.

I was speaking to someone the other day who complained that since RTD left Doctor Who hadn’t been the same. They were right. It’s got better. This has been touted as a little bit like Turn Left, but it’s as superior to that as the Original Trilogy is to the Prequels.

This isn’t just look what happens if the Doctor dies, if you make the wrong choice, go through the wrong door. This is what happens if that wrong decision is compounded again and again. None of it malicious. This wasn’t a trick to make things deliberately worse. This wasn’t a world threatening sequence of disasters. It was one woman who pressed the wrong button and ended up in a different time stream. That’s it.

In fact the whole theme of this episode was choices. It opens with Amy making the wrong choice of what button to press (but it was one that Rory and the Doctor could easily have made too), hinged upon Amy making the decision to work with Rory to save her younger self, and ended with the Doctor leaving Rory to make the choice about which wife to save.

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