Here we are at the finale of the fifth series of Doctor Who. It’s the first penned by Steven Moffat and the first starring Matt Smith as the Doctor. Perhaps more than any of the other finales that had come before, this one brings together almost every prior episode in the run. We start off by revisiting some of the characters and locations from earlier episodes. For example we start off by seeing Van Gogh in a great deal of pain – having painted a picture of the Tardis exploding. Then throughout history we see Winston Churchill, Professor Bracewell, and Elizabeth X looking after the painting, ensuring the Doctor gets to see it.
At that point the story becomes a kind of whirlwind for the rest of it’s run time. More than most other stories, this one never stands still for very long to let you catch your breath. The Doctor and Amy, now joined by River find the location of the Pandorica which legend states contains the most dangerous and feared being in the universe. I love the idea of it being contained underneath Stone Henge. I’m also really keen on the way that the stones continue deep underground. It’s a really cool set and looks mystical enough to contain the mysterious Pandorica. Whereas every finale thus far had featured a ‘big bad’ threat foreshadowed throughout the episodes – this finale instead opts for having a huge army of already established villains. It’s an original way to go that makes these episodes feel very epic indeed. We get to see Daleks, Cybermen, Sontarans, Silurians, Pilot Fish, Sycorax, Judoon, Atraxi, Hoix and Autons. On top of that we are told by River that also surrounding the planet are Slitheen, Draconians and Drahvins. Those are all of the ones that I picked up on anyway. It’s a right old knees up for all of these baddies. At first the Doctor thinks that they are all here to fight over the Pandorica – but in fact they have all made an alliance to trap the Doctor inside it – reasoning that he will one day cause the destruction of the universe when his Tardis explodes.
Still with me? It’s going to get a lot more complicated than that. Aside from that, Rory has come back from not just death but his erasure from existence entirely. He is in fact extrapolated from Amy’s memory and is a Roman Nestene duplicate. Arthur Darvill gets some good material to work with here, he has to first react to seeing Amy not even remembering him anymore, and then with accidentally killing her once she does remember who he is. The Doctor is clearly happy to see Rory back too, even though he doesn’t fully understand quite how it’s happened.
I’m rather please that they didn’t feel the need to update the look of the Cybermen just yet. By this point I believe that it’s generally accepted that the original Cybermen from our universe have joined forces with the parallel universe Cybermen from Earth, although the ones that we see here still sport the Cybus ‘C’ logo on their chests. The Cyberman guard’s appearance is foreshadowed by seeing random body parts lying around the place. But when we see the main body of the deteriorating Cyberman, it doesn’t have a head attached. The unattached Cyberman head then spits out the skull that it already contained and tries to eat Amy’s head – Pacman style. Let’s not think too much about the fact that if it succeeded in this, then Amy would have the helmet on backwards. If a Cyberman suit is able to walk and operate by itself without any organic matter then what exactly separates them from any other robot? I’m not keen on that idea.
In order to buy them time from the surrounding ships, the Doctor goes up and gives a speech. This has got to be one of the defining moments for this incarnation of the Time Lord. There’s a moment just before the speech that I always adore, just as he’s leaping up to give this badass speech, we hear him accidentally drop the transmitter. It’s not done for a big laugh, but perfectly sums up this version of the Doctor for me. He’s completely alien, great at thinking on his feet and ultimately very clumsy. Not to mention that when he says “Remember every black day I ever stopped you” You can feel every previous version of the Doctor speaking through this young guy’s mouth. Yes he’s the same man as before, and he’s amazing.
The excitement of seeing the Pandorica open for the first time was huge. I can remember being really worried that we weren’t going to get to see what was inside until the second part of the story, and would have to wait another whole week to find out. We hear a voice inside the Tardis saying that Silence will fall. It’s a creepy male voice that sounds pretty intimidating, but who exactly is it supposed to be? We never find out and it’s never mentioned again. It’s an example of one of Moffat’s long story arcs, some of the details of which are never explained or ironed out. River is trapped in the Doctor’s exploding Tardis, the Doctor is trapped inside the Pandorica by the alliance (meaning that the Doctor is potentially the most feared being in the cosmos – ouch), and Rory is actually an Auton who has accidentally killed Amy. Quite a cliffhanger really. What happens next?
The answer to that question is that we skip forward by 1000 or so years to seeing Amy as a little girl once again. We see that just as the Doctor has predicted, the universe has begun to cease to exist. There are no such thing as stars anymore (once again the stars going out), and that the Earth is only still here because it was the ‘eye of the storm’. I have to say that the timey-wimey nonsense here is a lot of fun and this is probably some of Moffat’s best uses of the concept. The Doctor zips around with a vortex manipulator, stealing a drink from Amy in the past because she said she was thirsty in the future is a particular highlight for me. The Doctor escaping the Pandorica is a bit of a paradox though. The Doctor from the future zips back to give Rory his sonic screwdriver to let him out. It’s a never ending paradox really.
Most of the action in the second episode takes place in the National Museum in London. While it’s a kind of cool way to further the story, I don’t like how separate from the first episode it feels in terms of setting and tone. I’m a bit confused as to how the Doctor and Amelia never met in their original way; how did that get undone? Rory is allowed to prove his undying love for Amy by standing guard outside the Pandorica for 2000 years, protecting her. Once the Doctor rescues River from the Tardis using the vortex manipulator – the four of them are allowed to run around the museum, trying to work out how to fix the universe. A Dalek is accidentally healed by being in the light of the Pandorica which gives them something to run away from for a while.
The whole second episode has a bit of a Night at the Museum vibe to it. Once the Doctor has decided that he is going to ‘reboot’ the universe by creating another Big Bang; they realise that it will mean that the Doctor will have unwritten his own existence. Yet again by having the Doctor go back through a few of his more recent adventures, it ties all of this series together a little better. He revisits some of the locations in The Lodger, The Time of Angels/Flesh and Stone and The Eleventh Hour. After that the Doctor decides to give in and step into the crack. It’s a bit of a shame, imagine if we’d seen him revisit every single one of his previous adventures – do you think he would get as confused as I did when rewatching his activity in Ghost Light?
The episode makes a big deal over the fact that since causing the Big Bang 2, Amy’s parents have been written back into existence. We get introduced to Augustus and Tabetha Pond (yes I did have to Google the names). Amy is naturally very happy to see them again presumably after many years. I wonder how much we will get to see them in the future, or how they will react to finding out Amy’s relationship to the Doctor in the coming series. Answer – they are never even mentioned ever again, so what’s the point in trying to make it seem ultra significant?
Story wise, the main plot is actually done away with rather quickly into the second half of the serial. The remainder of the run time is dedicated to us seeing Amy and Rory’s wedding at last – at which point the Doctor is remembered back into existence by Amy. Not just once, but on two separate occasions, Amy attempts to kiss the Doctor while in front of Rory. This is supposed to be a character that we like! What’s going on there? I thought Amy’s Choice had made a point of her choosing Rory once and for all over the Time Lord. This comes directly after we see poor Rory dedicate 2000 years to protecting Amy inside the Pandorica – that’s how she repays him? Despite what River’s true identity transpires to be; I rather wish that Amy and Rory could have been left behind after this adventure. By the close of these episodes it sort of feels like their story is done.
Overall I would have to say that these episodes come across as being rather original. It’s the first time we’ve seen this many of the Doctor’s enemies work together against him which makes it feel epic in yet more ways than previous finales. The Pandorica story line has reached it’s end but we still don’t yet know who the Silence are, or how, why, or who blew the Tardis up. The serial is a lot of fun and is a very good end to series five as a whole. Therefore I’ll be awarding The Pandorica Opens/The Big Bang with nine ‘Stick around Pond’ post-it notes out of ten. Now let’s have a look at the series run down.
- The Eleventh Hour – 10/10
- The Beast Below – 2/10
- Victory of the Daleks – 5/10
- The Time of Angels/Flesh and Stone – 9/10
- The Vampires of Venice – 8/10
- Amy’s Choice – 9/10
- The Hungry Earth/Cold Blood – 8/10
- Vincent and the Doctor – 10/10
- The Lodger – 5/10
- The Pandorica Opens/The Big Bang – 9/10
That means that my series averages work out like this:
- Series five – 8/10
- Series one – 8/10
- Series three – 7/10
- Series four – 7/10
- Series two – 6/10
And so we come to the end of yet another series of Doctor Who. I’ll see you at the Christmas special. Oh yes, here’s the picture.
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