Hello, dear listen, and welcome back to Flight Through Entirety
the only Doctor Who podcast, which can't remember your name mere
minutes after we were 1st introduced.
I'm Nathan.
I'm James.
I'm Peter.
And I'm Simon.
Well, this week we're talking about an episode in which our heroes
spend half an hour running away from statues, which would be
surprising if exactly the same thing hadn't happened last week as
well.
Still, it's a pretty riveting half an hour, as you'll soon
discover when we discuss flesh and stone.
You know, one thing that we failed to mention last week is how
well this is directed and how solid the production is.
It's amazing.
Do you know I wrote about this story for the Doctor Who magazine
our 1st 50 Years Special, where we compiled the big survey.
That's a flex.
And when I wrote about it, I was dissuaded by a certain DWM ex
editor from saying that I think this is the most confident
production that Doc 2 has ever mounted, but I stand by that.
It is.
I think maybe there might be a production or 2 later on, maybe
world enough and time in the Doctor Falls, which are better all
round productions, but this is amazing in its cohesiveness.
And it looks like it's had the longest and most in-depth tone
meeting in the world.
It's interesting you say that because Adam Smith hated making the
story, by all accounts, he found the weeping angels incredibly
difficult to shoot because, you know, their people in costumes
like he found it, like he found it so frustrating to try and shoot
them in a way where you couldn't see them moving.
And, I mean, the end result is brilliant, but it was apparently
very painful.
Well, it's the James Cameron experiences.
No, you don't have to have a lot of fun shooting something for it
to be a brilliant end.
Tase Avengersani versus twin dilemma, I seem to recall.
Correct.
Sparkle.
I think in Blink, they very frequently had to kind of just pause
things.
There were slight movements with the people in costume.
And they had to freeze the frame.
Yeah, yeah.
You'll freeze the part of the frame.
I mean, there's all that sort of magic they can do, but
nevertheless, even so, despite that magic, what a spectacular job
that those women did dressed up as the angels not moving.
I mean, at no point do I think, except when their heads are
turning when Amy's fallen on the ground.
At no point do I think that these are not statues?
Yeah, and like kudos to the make-up artists, like the effects
because that's all paint.
It's not them, like their arms are their arms.
They're not in sort of fibreglass shells or anything like that.
They painted their arms for 3.5 , 4 hours every day to get that
effect.
2 AM makeup calls kind of thing.
To use a slightly wankery term, the Mise on the Seine in these
episodes is incredible.
It just kind of slightly wanky.
You know me, James.
I think everything fits together so well, including the effects.
I mean, we've had good effects in the past in New Doctor Who, but
there's some like photorealistic about the effects on this episode
and the way that they, the way that they fit into the live action
which is incredible.
Even minor things like the transporter effect from last episode
and at the end of this episode where the soldiers teleport down to
the planet, has done with this incredible swirling dust effect
just in the background with it's incredible.
Interesting, but not dominant.
Yes, exactly.
The Wicked Witch of the West to appear.
Well, yes.
And I mean, again, sorry to talk about last episode, but those
upper levels of the maze of the dead, which look like they're part
of the location.
They fit so well into the scenes.
The only thing, I suppose, if you want to be really, really, really
nitpicky, and it's not really that important, but where you do get
those shots of Amy's feet where she's trudging through the forest
it does look like potting mix.
Like it's the soil is too rich. rather than it being a kind of a
natural.
It's that thing of it looks like a forest in a studio rather than
a forest in a forest.
It is a real forest.
It is a real forest. you're kidding me.
It's puzzlewood.
Right.
It's actually a real location.
Well, that's the richness of the English earth for you.
Very recent...
The reason you think it might be a set is that it's backlit so
well.
Ah, right.
At the risk of repeating myself from a previous episode that I did
Planet of the Dead, about spectacle.
And I'm not opposed to spectacle at all, but I think why this
story does it so well is that it's not about the spectacle.
Everything looks spectacular and fantastic.
But that's not the reason you're watching it.
It's casually so.
And I think that's why, you know, doctor is not about the
spectacle.
It's about the story, but in the modern era, of course, it all
needs to be made in a spectacular way.
And I think that's the emphasis that I'm trying to heat on and I
think this hits on it perfectly.
The Cliffhanger resolution has one of the most surprising effect
shots that we've ever had, which is that unbelievable pullback
where, you know, we don't know what the doctor's plan is at the
Cliffhanger.
And then when we come back, we don't actually see the cliffhanger
again, we just have the last time on Doctor Who, then the opening
credits, and then suddenly we're standing on a different surface.
The doctor claims we're in exactly the same place, but Amy doesn't
know what it is.
And then we pull back and the camera does a 180.
And so it is literally the story turns upside down.
And that shot has not only the surface that they're standing on
which represents the nose cone of the Byzantium, it has the cave
that they were in, and you can see the stairs and things that
they've been climbing up.
And it's a thing that Russell does as well, which is giving a
story verticality, because the studio floor is flat, because the
ground is flat.
This story, both halves of it are going up and the, the flip, you
know, the, the big change between episodes is this sort of sudden
change in their points of view.
And I think that that shot, which is a deliberately spectacular
effect shot, not a subtle sort of background one, which you might
not notice.
But it's telling the story.
Totally in service to the story.
Yeah, exactly. what I mean.
And the other most spectacular effect shot, which is at the end
which has just all of those angels falling into the crack.
Again, I just think is remarkable looking.
It looked great when they did it in Army of Ghosts, Jimsday as
well.
But one of the reasons why that shot, the 180, the spinning out
and around, looks so good is the detail.
They've thought about it all.
And also when the doctor actually gets into the nose cone and, you
know, all the gravity's the other way, it's actually so simply
done and so effectively casually brilliant.
Without some, yeah, casually brilliant.
But, you know, thank goodness it wasn't some stupid kind of wobbly
thing there. and he kind of all floats around and then he's
standing upright.
Like you don't actually see the instant where you flip the
garrity.
And that's why I think it's just it's just nice.
And, of course, the gravity, which is the thing that resolves the
cliffhanger and the very 1st thing that we're playing with is the
thing that resolves the story.
And so it's set up straight away.
So there's shenanigans about gravity and then he pays it off by
making that the way that they resolve the plot.
And you know, good direction in modern Doctor Who is not just
about being clever with your camera work.
It's also about editing.
And I think that's something which is often slightly lacking in
Doc 2 and in a lot of mid-budget television as well.
Graham Harper gets the rhythm right in scenes and shots, and I
think maybe later, Rachel Talele will as well.
But here, Adam Smith, especially when you look at scenes like when
they're in the spaceship corridor and the lights are going out and
the angels are at the end and it's all just illuminated by gunfire
the editing on that is whip smart and, you know, is responsible
for all attention in that scene.
Yes, it's not just good shot choices.
It's not just getting the good performances.
It needs to be edited in such a way that is engaging, but also you
know what's going on.
It's covered.
You know that this is happening after that and this person's
looking in that direction and talking to that person.
Sometimes you're right.
I think in a lot of sort of mid-range modern television or mid
range television generally.
Sometimes it's a bit sloppy.
That's right And here it's absolutely crucial to get the spatial
relationships between everything right because that's entirely how
the plot resolves itself.
And so we're going what looks like uphill.
I mean, it looks like that hatch is opening into a well that you
could plummet all the way down.
And there's even dialogue about that.
And of course, it's not, but it needs to be for the resolution of
the story to work.
It's tremendous.
You know, the resolution story was not achieved by building that
set and having them hang off.
It was a wind machine and wires pulling their legs off the
ground.
Wow.
Yeah.
It's a good thing they didn't fall and might have gone all the way
down into the swimming pool.
That scene in the control room, if we're going chronologically
through the story, Matt entirely inhabits the character, in that
moment, that you've just had moments of incredible drama and
tension, and he just slumps into that chair in the middle, casually
puts his feet up and starts talking to Angel Bob, and you think
you've nailed this character, and this might be, what, 2 weeks
after those scenes on the beach, and he's just there.
He's got sort of the best of Tom Baker and David Tennant, all the
good things that they brought to the role, and they just add
something else where he can change on a dime.
It's incredible.
It's a changing on the dime that I think is makes him very
powerful.
See, my favourite thing is how he manages to convey anger or
menace without the sort of David Tennant teeth acting in a very
very low key way.
And the fact that he's normally playing at that register that
makes it so shocking when he actually does shout.
It makes his anger seem righteous.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
We already talked about it in the beast below where that nobody
human has anything to say to me today, which is absolutely
terrifying, partly because it's directed at Amy.
But here, towards the end of the episode, and he's shouting at
River and he's sort of hugely, hugely stressed.
I just think it's incredibly good.
And she, her reaction to it is sort of like properly taken aback.
He's really scary when he's actually angry, but also he's written
with black humour.
And it's something which Doctor Who hardly ever does, Tom Baker
gets it.
Like, you know, the line about Auntie Vanessa, have you seen her?
Well, a little of her.
And so Matt gets lines in the story, which are very dark, like
when he says to Angel Bob, how's life?
Sorry, bad subject.
And I'd love lines like that.
They're just thrown away.
Also, the sort of using sort of humour to diffuse the tension, like
not just in a scene, but like on an emotional level to the
character, when Amy is lying on the ground in the forest and she's
got 12nd left to live and she's scared and he says, oh, you're
dying. you dying.
Shut up.
Yeah, yeah.
Yeah.
So we soon see that there's this incredible forest in the middle
of the spaceship.
It's an oxygen factory.
Yes it's a forest.
But isn't that a clever bottle on a spaceship in a maze?
I love that line.
Have I impressed you yet, Amy Pond?
It's so good.
But isn't it a very clever way as well of changing the setting?
Without it being, 0 my god, more caves, more spaceship corridors.
We're going to go into forest now, and yet it's all entirely
consistent, and it's fairy tale.
Fairy tales take place in the forest.
And the thing that prevents this from being aliens is that the
villains are statues of angels and Amy has to close her eyes in
order to avoid getting attacked and sort of walk through a
forest.
They still have terrible teeth.
So it's still aliens.
But it's lovely that she has to walk through the forest as if she
can see.
So it's like the angels don't freeze because there's something
coming out of your eyes that stops them from moving.
They can see them.
And that's actually very, very interesting.
Yeah, I think that there is that sort of, you know, the observer
effect.
You can't observe something without changing what you're
observing.
Yeah, that's right.
So I think it is initially that, and there is some dialogue there
saying, oh, they're busy or preoccupied or scared, and so they're
just going to assume that you can see them so act like you can.
Do you think if a tree fell in that forest that it wouldn't have
happened because no one could see it?
No, it didn't happen because the crack ate it. true.
And that's the other thing here too.
We've seen the crack every episode since the 11th hour.
It's appeared.
And this is the 1st time that Amy and the doctor see it.
So in that control room, we sort of see it up there.
We know it's been pursuing them and that it's been present in
every location where they've appeared.
But now we actually see that.
And so this, even though it's not an arc story in any sort of
proper sense, the arc intrudes in this story and actually becomes
very important to its resolution.
I love that word you used intrudes because it's very early on in a
typical season for the arc story to become quite prevalent.
And Moffatt just, there's that word again.
He's just clever in the way that he introduces it.
It becomes intrinsic to this story and yet doesn't feel like it's
not self-contained.
And you've also had 4 years of sort of these arcs which are kind
of conceptual or floating around in the background and hinted out
and you don't really get to them until episode like 11.
And this is, well, you think that the arc is going to kind of
float around and eventually pop up instead of episode 910 and it
pivots the season.
Yeah. and resolves the end of the story.
I think it's a little bit like, so my previous favourite arc is
the series 3 arc where the master travels back in time to sort of
towards the end of series 2 and then he's sort of there throughout
series three.
That's funny because mine was the arc.
And that does intrude in the Lazarus experiment.
So we do actually get the arc affecting the story and the Lazarus
experiment.
But it's nothing like this and the arc is nothing like any arc
that's happened before.
And initially it is just a shape and some of it sort of doesn't
make any sense.
I don't know whether we're supposed to understand that, you know
for instance, Craig and Daisy Haggart are going to be eaten alive
by the quick in their wall, you know, after the doctor leaves
clearly that doesn't happen.
So it's not quite clear what's happening.
We just end on his this shape again.
They were quite grateful to have the crack because it ate the damp
spot.
You know, the crack was inspired by a crack in Moffatt, one of
Moffatt's son's walls.
He noticed this sort of crooked smile crack in the wall.
Oh, it sounds like about the design of that. crack. looks quite
ominous.
But he didn't tell his son that looked like a smile because he
wanted him to be able to sleep again.
Well, I mean, the crack does look like a scary mouth and it's got
jagged edges and stuff.
And it eats things.
Yeah, yeah.
And it eats things. absolutely.
When it opens and closes in the 11th hour, it looks like a mouth.
And so here having it kind of appear in the forest and having it
eat people up.
It does actually become quite scary.
And this is the 1st time that the doctor kind of recognises what
it is.
It's the end of the universe.
There's a key difference too, though, the way Moffatt does the
arcs versus RTD in that Moffatt starts them from the very
beginning.
Like the crack in the wall is kind of what the 11th hour is all
about.
It's not like the others, which just gradually appear and dropped
in as kind of teases throughout the season.
I have to say that if you're going to do an arc, and I'm not a
huge fan of them by and large, but if you're going to do them, I
think this is a much better way to do it.
It feels more real rather than kind of stitched on.
Yeah, well, I mean, Bad Wolf, you know, like there's a clever
reason why the word's Bad Wolf keep appearing through series one
and that's all sort of fine.
But in practice, what we get is just people repeating a word.
So that's not all that exciting.
Yes, it is a repeated meme.
Whereas here, it resolves episode five.
It plays a huge role at the end of the Silurian 2 parter, and then
we find out something about it in the finale.
So it's always visible and we learn more about it before we
actually end up confronting it at the end.
There's a bit of a missed opportunity in this season to rip off a
Star Trek episode, which sort of briefly happens when, you know
Amy's sitting there with her eyes closed.
The TNG episode.
Remember Me, where, you know, Beverly's trapped in a kind of an
Alton universe, which is gradually contracting.
You could have done a whole episode, like one of the kind of
doctor light type episodes where gradually everyone around them is
disappearing.
There's something wonderful about who are you talking about?
No, they were never here.
What's that?
It's actually really, really good.
That is one of the best TNG episodes ever.
I love that episode.
And I know it would have been a ripoff, but Doctor Who rips stuff
off all the time.
And you do, for that, sort of, 3 or 4 minutes when Amy's realising
that everybody's disappearing.
Yeah, and the idea of being left alone in the world is a very
primal fear.
It's what I am legend is based on that you're the last person.
There's no one to help you and you're totally alone.
It's also the dark forest. you know, like the forest is where
fairy tales happen.
This is a dark forest where she's defenceless and people are
leaving and disappearing.
And again, that disappearing thing, like it, science fiction
whatever.
It's magic, isn't it?
And already we're introducing the theme of memory of forgetting
and remembering, which resolves the entire series at the very end
and which is hugely important all the way through.
Dry run for the silence.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
The silence do the same thing.
And, you know, day of the doctor where the guy turns up to work
and he thinks it's his 1st day because he can't sort of remember
it because they've got those...
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
I mean, we even had it in The Beast Below, where Amy literally
votes to forget.
And this episode, the focus shifts from the doctor to Amy.
So the episode's about Amy.
And I think it's so good for her and it's so good for Karen, who
really pulls it off.
So making Amy blind is a very Sarah Jane thing, and I don't just
mean because of the brain of Morpius.
It allows her to be vulnerable but brave at the same time and
that's the DNA of the archetypal Doctor Who companion.
And so Moffat zeros in on that.
I really like too, the acting that she's given the opportunity to
do when she's counting down.
And it's so cleverly done.
Another casually brilliant thing.
So good because it is scary and ominous, and we discover the
angels are making her do it because it's scary and ominous.
Yes.
But the way it works is someone will mention a number in dialogue
like Matt or River will say a number and then... something that
sounds like a number.
Yeah, yeah.
And she'll say it.
And then there's that wonderful line where she says no, she says
I'm five.
No, no, no, I'm fine.
That's right.
I'm fine.
And she kind of realises it, which she hasn't before, and she's
scared, but she's also trying to hide it.
I think she's incredibly good in this episode.
Yeah.
She carries this episode, I think.
The scene where she falls over in the forest, she can't find the
communicator.
You've had in dialogue earlier that like the transmat is kaput.
There's no way of saving her.
And then she falls over.
And she's blind.
She can't open eyes.
She going to die.
And the angels start turning their heads and the fear that she has
in her voice.
Like, she is going to die, except for that, like, the Deus X
Mashina that sort of saves her. is brilliant.
We did briefly mention that now for the 1st time, the audience
don't count as observers and so we can actually see them moving.
And I think the reason in story that we see them moving is that
Amy can't see them, is to emphasise how defenceless she is against
them, because she can't see them, we're able to see them move
around her.
And it's super shocking when we 1st see it, isn't it?
I think it's possible to watch Blink and not realise that we don't
see the angels moving even when no one else is observing them.
It's a super clever conceit in blink.
And then just to have it happen here just absolutely amps up the
tension.
And it's super, super terrifying that scene.
And it's just wonderfully resolved.
We have had that sort of conversation between the doctor and river
where river says that the teleport is kaput that it won't work.
And then the doctor comes up with the plan of getting her to walk
to the control room.
And River says that's never going to work and the doctor just
absolutely turns on her and shouts at her.
And it's so shocking.
Yeah, and actually it's the doctor who says the teleport won't
work and it's River who says, no, I can make this work and does.
Yeah, that's true, actually.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
And of course, she's not useless.
Like she's as good as the doctor.
And of course she wasn't going to let her mother die.
Well, we don't know that yet.
Spoilers.
It's nice when the angels start to move because it flips the
perspective.
Normally, in Doctor Who terms or in scary story terms, if you're
the person who's hiding from the monsters, you keep as still as
possible, and if you think they're gone, you might slowly start to
move to peer around a corner to see if they're there or whatever
it's the other way around, the angels are still, because Amy's
there, and they're very slowly starting to move to check his.
Can she not see us?
Are we okay to kill?
right over there?
She got muddy shoes.
One thing that we didn't touch on when we were briefly mentioning
the scene where Amy's dying, you know, the doctor and river are
there with their iPhone, sort of whatever, checking her pulse and
stuff like that.
Mini-chlo level.
Yeah, we've got the latest Apple Watch.
So, you know, they head off and then the doctor comes back.
And we don't know that that's actually from a later point in his
timeline.
Yeah, we think it's continuity error.
Yeah, yeah.
So when he reaches out to grab her, his sleeves aren't visible, you
just see his arms grab her and then he's speaking to her.
But in the background, you can see, and it's just part of the shot
that's out of focus, that he's wearing the tweed jacket that was
taken off him by the angels.
And a less confident director, an episode would have shown you
that costume in full to beat you over the head with it.
Yeah, I think I think that's right.
And it shows an understanding of how the show is watched in an era
when there's the internet.
And so a couple of days time we were all talking about why he's
wearing the jacket when it's not there.
And the assumption was it's a continuity.
There was a pickup and they stuffed it up.
Yeah, yeah.
But the things that he says to her, don't actually properly make
sense in the context of the episode because he's talking to her
about you have to trust me and you have to remember.
Remember what I said to you when...
But that's the brilliant thing about it, is that he hasn't had
that conversation with her yet.
We assume he's talking about the 11th hour.
Like something he said to her when she was 7 in his 1st story, but
he's actually referring to a conversation he hasn't had yet in the
season finale.
Yeah.
And like I'm going to lay my cards on the table.
I think the season finale is extraordinarily brilliant.
Oh, yes.
Massively, massively interesting.
If only because they destroyed one of those terrible darling
props.
We're getting ahead of ourselves.
You know, I've done a fair bit of bitching about Ed Thomas over
the course of the new series, the fact that he was always heading
out to Cardiff Alleyways and that paper mill.
I think he lives there.
But what a great job he does on this episode.
The spaceship interiors are amazing.
The forest may be, and I know that that's a location, but the way
that it's presented on screen is absolutely incredible.
Um, and I think, you know, if you doubt that the importance of
design to Doctor Who, go back to an episode like The Doctor's
Daughter, where it fails the episode completely, and compare and
contrast with this episode. victory of the Daleks.
Yeah, pretty much.
It must be quite difficult for them to get that set up.
The ship whole in the forest.
It's in Puzzlewood, uh, It's a heritage listed forest, like it
would have been quite difficult to not damage it. contemplated
grass.
Yeah.
So the scene in the secondary control room where we look out onto
the forest is obviously it's all just...
Green screen.
Yeah, yeah.
But there is the scene where Octavian is killed has the wall of
the primary control room visible.
Yeah, do you know, I think it might be green screen on occasions.
There might be one or 2 shots where you've got it green screened
into the back with Matt, but I think it might be simpler than
that.
I think they might have set up that little bit of the door on
location so that the actors could physically walk out of it.
And if you're going to ask me any one thing.
I didn't like about this two-parter because I think it is
magnificent.
I might home in on the fact that I think that's a little
simplistically covered.
It's very shot reversed.
It could have been done a little bit more seamless.
Well, just stepping over the threshold into the forest.
That's right.
And then cutting back to the spaceship and then cutting back to
that, you very rarely see them in the same shot.
You know what it reminds me of?
Nightmare of Eden?
Yeah, that's what Brian wanted me to say.
Well, exactly.
I said, if I'm going to defend the original series.
I can't be using Nightmare of E. as an example.
I have to say that I think there's a bit of confusion about just
the physical relationship between everything because it looks like
where the doctor and river have gone is where the crack is, but it
clearly is sort of off to the side somewhere.
And I think it's probably a bit hard to sort of establish that in
the forest where we are.
But I did kind of get a bit lost in the sort of spatial
relationships and stuff this time.
Yeah, I did too. when I watched it through.
But not, no, no, no, yeah, yeah.
I think that scene with Father Octavian is absolutely
extraordinary.
And the interesting thing I noticed this time is it's entirely the
doctor's fault that he gets killed.
So he's saying let's go in through the hatch and the doctor's
standing there theorising about what the crack is, you know, and
and thinking allowed and all of that sort of thing. performing to
an audience that isn't there at the other side.
Showing off.
Yeah, exactly showing off.
And then suddenly he's caught.
But I will say, because, I mean, Ian Glenn is not someone who I
particularly like as an actor only because of Game of Thrones.
Every time he pops up on the screen, I just keep seeing him saying
Khaleesi.
And it just sort of, you know, it was just sort of endlessly
repetitive, but he's very, very good in this, in this story and
his death sequence is, is actually really well done.
For someone who's basically saying, no, doctor, go save yourself.
Leave me, I'll just die here and keep the head them off.
It's actually a nice version of that.
And it's a restatement of the character.
Exactly.
And his principles.
And it's the Keeley whores rule from It's a Sin.
It's weird overcasting for what he's done so far in the story, but
then it's made by that final scene.
And then you hear the crack of his neck as the doctor rushes.
I think too, you know, the doctor has been dismissive of the
church's attitude towards sort of sexual ethics, but the story
absolutely kind of locates his bravery and his ability to face
death within his religious beliefs.
You know, there's a there's a kind of redemption there.
You know, this is a church that's an army, they're sort of crazy
and maybe the bus of some sort of low-key jokes.
But he's super brave and spectacular in that final scene. stoic
because he believes he's going on to something else or something
better.
And is there not an exchange of dialogue?
I can't remember who says which line about, I wish you'd seen the
best of me.
No, so it's Matt.
It says to him, I wish I'd known you better.
And he says, I think you've seen me at my best. and that's a
beautiful exchange.
And think about, you know, the many, many times that David
Tennant's doctor says, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry.
Whereas Matt says, I wish I had known you better because he was
sort of a bit dismissive of him as the kind of lead soldier.
And then Matt tears up.
You know, like it, Matt tears up before going into the thing.
Like, it's incredible to have the doctor that affected by the
death of a minor character.
The thing I like too, about the, you know, the doctor doing a bit
of teasing and being a little bit dismissive of, you know, the
religion and the military sort of stuff is I think it pictures
that sort of thing at the right level as well in terms of, you
know, that there are certain things about religion and about the
military, which are problematic, but at the same time, you know
there's a lot of good about them, et cetera, et cetera.
And I think that they get the tone wrong later.
And well, they have gotten the tone wrong with that at other
times.
And I think this is this is kind of a, I think hits it on the
right spot.
Isn't there always a sense the new doctor wipes the slate clean a
little bit and has like a fresh start?
And this is almost like the 1st time this series that Matt is
facing the fact that the 11th doctor is facing the fact that his
actions have consequences?
Yeah.
I think that there's no particular problem with just wiping the
slate clean.
When we do the lodger later this season, it's really apparent that
the doctor doesn't really know how human beings interact with one
another. despite the fact that John Pertwe spent, you know, 3
years or 5 years or whatever, exile to Earth, and I don't care.
At the club with top.
Sorry, just that other thing about Ian Glennon, about Octavian, is
that wonderful line where he says to the doctor, something to be
I'll be the one who has to tell their fam- think about that when I
have to tell their families about their death.
It's a lovely...
It sort of shows that the doctors missed something.
It's nice.
It's a point that's been made before too.
And it's also one that Moffat returns to in series 10.
I think in thin ice where there's a whole exchange between Bill
and the doctor about you just move on and Bill has to deal with
that and process that.
So the angels all sort of fall into the crack and close it, because
they're a complicated space-time event, which I think is a
terribly magical and bid median sort of way of describing.
It's great. the anti-technobabble.
Yeah, yeah, it's really good.
But that actually happens quite early in the episode and we
actually do have the time to say goodbye to river for a start on
the beach in a scene that I think is also really magnificent.
You, me, handcuffs.
Why does it always have to end this way?
My favourite line is where the doctor says, can I trust you?
And she says, if you like.
Which I would be the fun in that.
It's so wonderful.
It's so great.
And that's where, you know, it's made very clear that it's the
doctor that River's going to kill.
And I think the doctor probably realises that as well.
It's romantic comedy banter 101.
That's squarely in Moffatt's wheelhouse.
It's the biggest indication, I think, that kind of dialogue of the
shift from Russell to Moffat because that's dialogue that
Russell's not that interested in, but Moffat can just reel it
off.
Yeah, yeah.
It's that scene that made me fall in love with Moffatt's version
of this show. is just the dialogue and the interplay between the
characters.
And I was not totally on board until the end of this episode.
I think it's beautiful.
I also think the doctor and Aemia are really wonderful together.
You know, the revelation that she's climbed down with her eyes
closed. because he hasn't mentioned.
I told you, like, you know, in dialogue about 45 minutes ago.
That's the thing with Mickey keeping his finger on the switch
isn't it?
I forget to tell him to take it off.
But there are some beautiful shots as well of the 2 of them
standing together.
In a way, it almost looks like a publicity shot or a statement of
this is what the doctor and his companion look like.
You know, you know, every season so far, we've had a big publicity
shoot and we've seen what the doctor and the companion look like.
And here, there's a real definite sense that they're equals, you
know, they're the same height.
They're both young, you know, they're both attractive.
And just that scene where they're shot from behind and they're
looking out over the sea, I think, is beautifully composed.
That's also only important things that this story does.
And I have to think it was intentional on Moffat's behalf.
In the 1st few episodes, Amy is in awe of the doctor, and here, by
looking at the example of River, her daughter, as we'll find out
she ceased being in awe of the doctor, and she is now knows that
she can treat him as an equal in some ways, and prod him a little
bit, and it sets the template for the rest of their
relationships.
Are you being Mr. Grumpy fixed?
Yes.
I actually think that that's already there a little bit.
I've mentioned it before.
It's that moment where the doctor's eating fish custard and little
Amelia just looks at him and it goes, hmm, funny.
Like, and I think too, that that is some of the source of the fan
discomfort about Amy is that she refuses to be in awe of the
doctor.
But I mean, that was what we liked about Donna, was that you had
this sort of grandstanding showboating doctor and Donna's
constantly sort of puncturing him.
This is a much more low key version of the same thing.
And I think it's just tremendous.
And possibly the problem that people picked up on with Martha.
You know, there was never any great problem with Martha, but the
fact that she is too in awe of the doctor.
Yeah.
Yes, it's just not very interesting.
So, we should talk about the final controversial final scene.
Speaking of not being in awe of.
I think that Moffat has gone on record saying he wouldn't have
done this now or he thinks that it was a mistake.
Not necessarily that the scene wouldn't have happened, but the
writing it as a screwball, almost literally, comedy. was the wrong
move.
I mean, Moffatt always does that, and rule one is that Moffatt
lies, and he's constantly kind of going back and saying, no, I
didn't like what I did here.
I'm you know, I'll do something different going on.
But I actually think that the scene works in a way.
I'm not super on board with the idea that Amy falls in love with
her imaginary friend, um, and that she seems to, um, you know, she
seems to already fancy him in victory of the Daleks.
There's a dialogue about it where she's talking to Bracewell.
But I think it is a pretty funny scene.
I think Moffat had a problem with that as well.
He regretted writing that bit as well.
There's also the sequence in 11th hour where she watches him
undress and says, look away.
No.
I don't I don't read that and I don't think it's supposed to be
read as she's in love with him.
She's just like, oh, this funny raggedy man that, you know, was my
imaginary friend.
He's kind of hot.
Yeah, she is playing sexual desire.
It's not it's not love.
And that's what this is.
I mean, that's what this is.
She has sort of nearly died.
And something important has happened in this episode to change
their relationship because she's been running away from her
wedding, from her impending adulthood into the arms of her, you
know, imaginary childhood friend in order to be sort of
irresponsible.
And I think she says that it's because she sees river, his
relationship with river, he's running away from river, he's
running away from his wife, you know, as well.
And so she admits to him what's happening here.
And so this is this is kind of the low point of Amy and Rory's
relationship.
So when we 1st meet them, she's embarrassed about Rory and won't
admit that he's her boyfriend.
And here, she admits that she's not marrying the good looking
one.
Oh, that thing with the nose, which was ad-libbed by by by Matt
Smith.
He's nice too.
And then she sort of tries and gets her leg over the doctor.
And I think it's actually, it is properly funny.
I appreciate what it's trying to do more so than I did at the
time.
I've had a todd evolution on this.
It used to be a four.
It now a 7.2.
I like the boldness of it because it's really Amy's, Amy's running
away from her life and this is her last ditch attempt to just turn
her back on it and move on.
Whereas the doctor correctly identifies.
You can't turn your back on it.
You've got to face it.
Tony, it's a little bit jarring with the rest of the episode.
I think that's intentional.
The bigger problem, I think, is that it's slightly icky in a Me
Too world, because Amy is clearly making moves on the doctor that
he doesn't want, and I think that hasn't worn well.
But it does end with that wonderful line.
The most important thing right now is Amy Pond is that I sought
you out.
Jesus.
That's what I've been telling you.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Which is funny. you know, it's great rom-com kind of, you know
snafu.
It just, it slightly misses.
It doesn't miss by a long way.
It's slightly misses.
I actually secretly love the line where he's explaining that
there's 2 lines where he's explaining that he'll change and doing
that whole thing that he says to Sarah.
Say, you know, I'll, you'll grow old.
I'll just change.
And she goes, oh, doctor, how sweet that you thought I was
thinking of something, you know, or I wasn't thinking of something
quite so long to...
And also the where he says, I'm 907 years old, do you know what
that means?
She says, well, it's been a while.
Like all of that is actually properly funny and it's where the
doctor kind of leaps into action and decides to fix their
relationship.
It's again, it's an example of what we were talking about before
where the humour is being used to, as a relief, as a release from
the tension of the whole episode.
It's like things can get better.
You can try and jump your your imaginary friend from when you're 7
years old.
Yeah.
I think it's also possible to sort of take it a little bit too
seriously as well.
I mean, yeah, I wouldn't have done it.
I probably wouldn't wish they didn't do the sequence, but, you
know, at this moment, Rory is on his bucks night, which, you know
the doctor's about to crash by bursting out of the cake.
Now, it would have been some kind of scant-clag young woman, I
imagine, who was going to be bursting out of the cake.
Tracy.
She's a diabetic.
Oh, I do beg your pardon.
But the point is all Amy is doing is asserting her kind of
sexuality and having the last fling, as it were, which men have
been encouraged to do for many a year, less so now.
But the tradition of the bucks night is to basically, effectively
have your last extra marital affair before you get married.
And all Amy's doing is kind of taking that bull by the horns and
doing it herself.
As she says, she's not after anything long term.
She just wants to have a shag.
She had this incredibly impossible adventure where she almost died
have a shag and move on.
And the doctor is hot, you know, like Matt Smith's doctor isn't
weird looking, but he is young and pretty in a way.
If you fancy drunk giraffes.
And the show has long since decided not to ignore that fact, you
know.
And I think that's perfectly fine.
Do you think Moffat is having fun at Russell's expense with the
companions falling in love with the doctor?
Yes.
Maybe, yeah.
Maybe, I don't see it.
It's refreshing that she's not in love with him.
She thinks he's hot and she wants a shack.
And he plays the emotional basis, the whole underpending of
previous seasons as a one scene joke.
Yeah, I think I think the other thing too, which is sort of fun, is
that that David Tennant's doctor is kind of sexually confident.
Like he has, he's had Queen Elizabeth I, you know, which Moffat
keeps going back to, actually.
Whereas this doctor is absolutely kind of clueless and I just
think that's kind of super funny.
My my feeling about this scene is that it works.
It's super funny.
I think people get annoyed at Amy for being so much more sexual
than any previous companion.
Do you know what I mean?
I mean, that's yeah. effectively what I was meaning.
Yeah, I agree with that.
And I think she is.
I also think she takes it slightly too far.
The character does.
Yeah, but I think that he just kind of gets carried away with the
joy of writing rom-com dialogue.
Yes, and there was no one there to tell him to dial it back
basically.
Then you're so good at it.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Why not?
But I think its problem is not the scene itself. because of the
seasons we've had before and the fact that Rory is not just going
to have been in one or 2 episodes, he's going to join the Tartar
crew.
And I think it just for a moment undermines their relationship in
a way that you're always questioning for the rest of the time
whether Amy's actually falling in love with the doctor.
I mean, and there's whole sequences about Rory questioning whether
she actually feels for the doctor more than she feels for him
except that I think that we'll have vampires of Venice next week
then we'll have Amy's choice, and from then on, it's sort of an
ever given a choice between the doctor and Rory, Amy unfailingly
chooses Rory.
Until the Dalek story. in series.
No, but even then, do you know what I mean?
And again, this is the doctor fixing their relationship and he
does exactly the same thing after being told that the doctor, your
job is to fight monsters, not to fix our marriage, but he fixes it
anyway.
This is very empathetic and self-aware for a doctor who in the
lodger won't even know how to coexist with somebody else in a
flat.
How could you coexist with James Corden?
Yeah, yeah.
And I'm not saying that what you just said is not wrong because
it's entirely right.
I'm just saying that it's easy to kind of forget that that's all
the structure and how it evolved. you know what I mean?
You keep remembering this.
And you remember this because you remember the fact that Rose and
Martha were in love with the doctor and wanted to shag it every
time.
That what I'm saying.
I just feel like, oh, here we are again.
I think because this season is about Amy's relationship with her
own adulthood.
You know, we see her as a child.
We see her as a child again.
You know, she escapes the night before assuming the adult role of
wife with her childhood imaginary friend.
And the resolution of the entire series is her accepting her
adulthood and integrating her childhood sort of fantasy world into
that as well in a sort of really sort of triumphant synthesis.
So I think her sexuality is an important element of that arc.
So you might almost say that the emotional arc of the series is
Amy's choice.
All right, so it's part two of a two-part story.
So it's time for peaks of the week.
James.
Well, my pick of the week, surprise, surprise.
Have you met me?
is a big finish audio.
It was released about 5 years ago.
It's from their classic doctor's new monsters range.
It's a 5th doctor story featuring Michelangelo and the Weeping
Angels.
It's called Fallen Angels.
It's quite enjoyable.
And you'll like this, Peter.
Sasha Dawan plays one of the bit part characters, your future ex
husband, I believe.
So yes, I check that out.
Or any any of the Diary of River song.
Brilliant.
Peter?
My pick of the week is Bridgerton, simply because series 3's a Joa
Ando, fabulous, and time heist, Jonathan Bailey, hot, and there we
go.
And naked, yes.
Which one, Joe?
I think this one may have been mentioned before, but I think it's
definitely worth mentioning again, is the time traveler's wife.
It was originally a book in 2003, but it was made into a film in
2009 with Eric Banner and Rager McAdams, and it's that thing of
these 2 people are having a relationship in the wrong order
because Eric Banner's character is floating through time, and it's
obviously where all the inspiration has come from for River song
but it's good to see it. having seen all of the Doctor Who related
stuff because it obviously has does have a different take on it
and it does work differently.
And the film is actually very, very good, but it just kind of
disappeared a little bit when it was released in 2009 didn't get
much much. into a crack.
Yeah, that's what happened.
Well, I'm going to pick something fairly obvious, which is it's a
sin, which by the time you hear this, it will have been out for
some months.
And if you've already watched it, watch it again.
Well, one of the things is that I had expected it to be sort of
fairly harrowing because the premise is that it's set in London, a
small group of friends in the 1980s, sort of as HIV becomes a
thing and as gay men start dying of AIDS.
And so it seems like it's going to be a premise that's super
upsetting.
And it is, it is quite upsetting, but I would go back and watch it
again in a heartbeat because I adore those characters and there's
some real warmth and humanity and some proper lessons that we've
forgotten about perhaps the way that gay men were treated and
regarded in the 1980s, things that we find it easy to forget now
but that are definitely worth remembering.
We were, some of us, well, all of us were around in the 1980s, um
to something.
I'm from 1980.
That's right.
And so some of us perhaps experienced some of this stuff early on
but just being reminded of the scale of it is absolutely
worthwhile.
In an interesting kind of turn of fate.
I'm rereading all of the tales of the city.
I just hit significant others, which is the book where Michael
Tolliver tests positive.
And I haven't watched It's a Sin yet, but I find that diff- that
book's so difficult to start because it's so, it is so harrowing
but the humour by the end of it has, you know, lifted you out of
that.
And even away from the melancholy of it's a sin and the upsetting
content and the real moments of comedy.
It's the best iteration.
I think I've seen of that phenomenon where gay men historically
maybe not so much now, but historically, um, were rejected by
their families and so had to create their own family, um, and it
just feels incredible for that. can cause that the logical
family.
Yeah, yeah.
Your biological family, a neological family.
And it's a huge, It's a very good example of it in it's a sin.
It does all of the things that Russell does so well, including
making you very scared and upset.
But it's not, it's not cynical or exploitative.
And like I said, I would gladly watch it again.
I think it's extremely good.
Well, there, listen, that's all we have time for this week.
We'll be back next week to watch the doctor take on the exciting
new roles of Stripper and Relationship Counsellor in the Vampires
of Venice.
In the meantime, you can find us wherever you get your podcasts
and you can keep up with us at Flightthrough Entirety on Facebook
at FT Podcast on Twitter, and on our website, FlightthroughEntirety
com, where you'll find links to our other podcasts, Bondfinger, and
Jody into Terror.
Until next time, may you always find yourself holding on to
someone lovely when the gravity gives out.
Thank you very much for listening and good night.
That sounds like my last Saturday night.
Good night.
Bye for now.
That was Flight for Entirety, starring Nathan Bottomley, Peter
Griffith, Simon Moore, and James Selwood.
Theme arrangement by Cameron Lamb.
This episode, Spatial Relationships, was recorded on the 6th of
February 2021 and released on the 11th of April.
Fans of the complex asynchronicity of the Doctor and River's
relationship can recreate the same experience in their own homes
by watching Doctor Who under the guidance of the Randomiser, which
you can find at the Randomiser.net and on Twitter at DW
Randomiser.
I think the season finale is extraordinarily brilliant.
Massively, massively interesting.
If only because they destroyed one of those terrible darling
props.
We're getting ahead of ourselves.
I have to say that because Brendan says it.
Oh, right, okay. trademark.
Well, it's so spectacular because it's the 1st one that's, you
know, good.
No, no, no.
All the previous ones are marvellous.
But this is marvellous in a completely different way.
It's marvellous because it's actually good.
We think there's some cleric scene because that was heresy.
I like to stir.
What do we need to talk about?
Oh, by the way, can you think of a, I should have, this is me
throwing it at you.
The thing, pics of the week.
Yeah, don't do it now.
No, but I need to...
I need to know whether I need to know whether it's one that you've
done before.
Have you done Time Traveler's Wife?
No.
Okay, well I'll mention that then.
Oh, maybe, have we?
Well, I mean, he did W1I and I read that.
So, yeah, yeah.
Just do it.
It's been a while ago.
Yeah, yeah.