DOCTOR WHO SEASON 6 REVIEWS- 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13

Doctor Who is back!  It’s a good thing too, since I was starting to go through serious withdraws.  The 8000 episodes of Star Trek added to Netflix helped the pain a bit, but it was still a long summer.  So did Let’s Kill Hitler deliver?  In a word: yes.  In two words: F&$* yes!  In three words: Yes and No.

Confused?  Me too. Although I think this is my second favorite episode this season ( the first being The Doctor’s Wife )  it took several watchings to get me to that conclusion.  At first I was just spent by the whole thing emotionally.  I bought every red herring hook, line, and sinker, and because of that I couldn’t properly gauge how I felt till at least watch-through number 2.

At any rate, look below for my spoil-filled review.

“You named your Spoilers after your Spoilers.”

THE GOOD

* HITLER IN A CUPBOARD – Although many people cheered and giggled at the announced title “Let’s Kill Hitler” when it appeared in epic bravado at the end of Episode 7 I cringed.  I held out hope that the follow up to AGMGTW would be more River/Melody focused, and when the first 10 minutes of this episode seemed to be a standard historical romp with robot Nazi justice soldier I cringed even more.  Then Hitler got put in a cupboard, Mels was revealed to be Melody (how did I not see that coming?), and the whole episode become beyond what I was looking for.

* Melody/River – I read somewhere that Russel T. Davies, who got the honor of casting River for her first appearance in the 4th season, originally wanted to cash in a favor to cast Kate Winslet in the part.  I doubt the Oscar Winning Winslet would have ever returned had she been cast, and I wonder what the show would even look like now had that been the case.  Alex Kingston was brilliant in this episode.  It sort of reminded me of watching Buffy the Vampire after Angel lost his soul.  We are forced to watch one of our favorite characters as evil, but unlike evil Angel, Melody/River has a certain innocence that comes with the sociopathic tenancies.  Plus, she has the greatest line I think I’ve ever heard on Doctor Who “Well, I was on my way to this gay Gypsy bar mitzvah for the disabled when I suddenly thought, “Gosh, the Third Reich’s a bit rubbish. I think I’ll kill the Fuhrer.” Who’s with me?”

* ANTIBODYS – It’s hard not to like an entity that kills you so politely.  “Your death will now be implemented.  Please enjoy the music while you death party is being reached…”

* TIED UP LIKE A BOW – We get to find out why River didn’t regenerate when she dies in the library.  We get to see her first given the diary by the doctor.  We get to (I think) see where she hears the Doctor’s name (if that is what he whispers to her as he is dying.  We even get the first ever “Hello Sweetie!”

THE BAD

* CONFUSING EMOTIONS – So I am confused, sometimes in a good way, sometimes in a bad way.  I still want Rory and Amy to get their baby back.  It’s really weird to see Rory and Amy doing so well after there baby was kidnapped so traumatically in AGMGTW, and I hope as we go back into standalone episodes next week that it isn’t just brushed under the rug.  At the same time, do I really want them to find the baby?  Because if they do then the River Song we know and love might never have existed, Mels wouldn’t have pushed Amy and Rory together, or given them the name to name herself.  Again, it is confusing.

THE UGLY

It took the Super Justice Robot Squad that long to check there instruments and find out they were in the wrong year?  This seems pretty careless seeing as they had already spent a lot of time and resources killing a dude and assuming his identity.  I guess I shouldn’t expect much of the group that thought it was a good idea to make a security system that would kill them if they forgot to wear their WWJD bracelets, but someone is paying a lot of dough for this.  Transformers can’t be cheap.  Otherwise, we’d all have our own Optimus Prime.

BOLD PREDICTIONS

* You Accept and Know this to be true? So Silence will fall when the big, bold, first question will be asked.  The question is said to be in plain sight.  So our big question is what is that question?  Moffat likes to mess with mistaken dialogue a lot.  It’s not outside the realm of possibility that when Robot Amy confronts River/Melody by saying “You killed the Doctor by order of the Silence, the Academy of the Question.  You accept and know this to be true?” That it actually meant “the Academy of the Question: You accept and know this to be true?” As in You accept and know this to be true is the question in question, and the “this” refers to all of life.

FINAL SUMMARY

This was River’s episode, and after I knew that, I loved it.  When the red car came darting through the corn field I expected River to come out.  I was surprised when she didn’t, then surprised when I found out that she really did.  We had a lot explained, and next week we get to some creepy stand alone romps, which honest-to-science I am kind of glad for.  I have some plot fatigue.