New Who 6.2: Day of the Moon

[strange_complex]

So then! Lots of interesting stuff going on there, and many story-lines clearly still unresolved. These are the things which I'd still like to know more about:

• Why was future-Canton so sure in The Impossible Astronaut that the Doctor killed by the space suit really was the Doctor?
• Indeed, how do we get to that shooting at all?
• I assume the space suit which comes out of the lake is the same one we've seen in these two stories - but does it have anyone inside it? Or is it an independent being in its own right?
• Could the occupant be the Time Child that Amy is apparently pregnant with - perhaps post-regeneration?
• What's with that pregnancy anyway - are we to understand that any baby of any species conceived on-board a TARDIS is automatically a Time Lord?
• Even though River said that the life-support systems on the space suit suggested she was human - albeit incredibly strong?
• How is the child going to end up back in the 1960s?
• Why did the Silence want to protect her (in the children's home)?
• Who is the woman whom Amy sees looking through the hatch on the door of the little girl's bedroom saying "No, I think she's just dreaming"?
• Why do the Silence say to Amy, "We do you honour. You will break the Silence"? Because she didn't really seem to do that in this story.
• And why exactly did the Silence want to go to the Moon in 1969? What's going on up there?

All in all, it's pretty clear that we're not done here. And perhaps that's partly why this story felt a bit incomplete in its own right? I did enjoy it, but somehow I felt rather unmoved by the whole - as though I was watching a series of cool scenes and teasers, rather than a coherent story with an emotional truth at its centre. Slickly put together, yes - but perhaps too focused on big-budget scenery and trying to replicate the iconography of The X-Files and Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and not well enough focused on the characters at its centre?

Most obviously absent was any scene in which the Doctor really tried to connect with or understand the Silence. We learnt that they could kill, that they were shaping human destiny for their own ends, and that they themselves thought that humans should kill them on sight. But this all seemed to be simply stated and accepted - never questioned. I'd have liked at least to have had some discussion about whether their relationship with humanity had been all bad - was it symbiotic, rather than parasitic? Now that we've learnt they were there all along, right from "the wheel and the fire", how can we be sure that humanity is even capable of managing without them? Why is the Doctor so blithely ready to assume that we are? As I say, without some exploration of those questions, the story feels emotionally incomplete.

I did very much like the thematic coherence created by the various mentions of empires, though - the direct comparison between the Silence's empire on Earth and the Roman empire, obviously, but also the quite careful suggestion that the moon landing was the first step in founding a Human Empire out in space. It's nice to get direct confirmation that Rory really can still remember his time as a Roman, and it is clearly going to have plot-significance too. After all, this is the second episode in a row that we've been reminded of it. I'm also pretty impressed with Moffat for inventing a new and clever solution to the constant problem posed by historical stories - why is there no other record of the threat / adventure which the story is purporting to show us? Simples - no-one can remember it.

And although I may not have been entirely convinced by this story as an emotional whole, I definitely did enjoy plenty of its individual moments. For example:

• Canton and Amy investigating the creepy Gothic orphanage in full-blown Mulder and Scully style.
• Rory's horn-rimmed glasses.
• Rory's under-stated devastation when Amy is lost - even before he believes that she's saying she is in love with the Doctor.
• Meta-referential use of television again - focusing on an iconic TV moment, the Doctor asking the Silence, "Have you seen what's on TV?"
• River's action shoot-out scene in the Silence's space-ship.
• Canton wanting to marry a black man - oh Gay Agenda, how we have missed you!
• What looks like yet another historical story coming up next week - and one which makes me glad I've seen The Smugglers.

Maybe the whole will work better on a re-watch?

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Comments

[caz963.livejournal.com]

Here via who_daily :-)

I did enjoy it, but somehow I felt rather unmoved by the whole

My thoughts exactly and the way I felt about almost all of S5, tbh.

There was some good stuff in the episode, as you've pointed out, but I do worry that Moffat is throwing all these questions, clues and red-herrings at us just because he CAN, rather than because they have any relevance to the plot.

[strange-complex.livejournal.com]

Yup. A lot of fans complained about RTD putting too much emphasis on pushing the emotional buttons - but I'm beginning to feel the absence of an emotional core to these stories. I'll certainly keep watching, especially because Moffat's story-writing style means that there may still be as-yet-unexpected emotional depths to what we've already seen so far. But I'm starting to feel that there is a happy medium between emotionally truthful writing and good plotting, and that neither RTD nor Moffat have quite hit it.