Warning: Shut your eyes or you'll see spoilers! No, wait! Don't!
The Angels are not what creates the sinister feelings in this episode.
The sense of impending doom comes from the way in which it is written,
directed and acted. Compare this to the previous four episodes and ask yourself if you even needed to watch any of them? This is what it's all about. Yes, there's a whole load of paradox crap and timey wimey nonsense, but that's just something we have to accept is a part of the Moffat-driven era. The vibe here is what we want more of - the darkness, difficult choices and the Doctor's emotions and mistakes at the forefront of all that's going on, rather than his hilarious jokes and ability to run through corridors at lightning speed. Moody Doctor Who is best.
The Angels are right up there with the Daleks and the Cyber-men in modern 'Who' when it comes to which of the bad guys are the scariest. Fuck knows why - they're anything but scary! On paper, sure, scary as hell, but they're the sort of villain that would haunt your imagination if you were reading what they were up to. Your frightened little mind would fill in the gaps with stuff that's a lot worse than ol' Moffat can rub under our noses. On TV they play up to the camera in much the same way many of the dinosaurs do in Jurassic Park, giving 'evils' before they attack. Either they're moving super fast through the night, or incredibly slowly when we get to see it happen. And it always ends up looking shoddy (a bit like the cringey moment where the baby statue blows out Rory's candle). Angel-ranting aside, this episode is a turn up for the books as it actually has a meaty story that's fascinating to see unfold. Four characters, all with their own thoughts, feelings and worries, with their own paths and places they want to get to. They're thrown together, fighting a battle they have already lost, which means we get to see their weaknesses and that leads to chats that come across as genuine for a change. This may not last, but for this episode it really worked.
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| Can we read that rather than watch this? |
Rory gets the worst of it this time around, getting zapped back and forth through time by the Angels. The Doctor, Amy and River are able to chase after him with help from a book written by River after the event, published by Amy after that but before this, and then the whole show begins to vanish up its own backside. There are timeline issues that make certain elements of the 'overarching' story difficult to follow - but that's fine because, as with Looper, we love a challenge, right? Well, yes - under the right circumstances. Because, unlike Looper, Doctor Who tries to do a lot of explaining and it seems incredibly confident that it's always making perfect sense, even if we don't understand. Truth is, it isn't making perfect sense and it's hoping we don't quite follow so that we don't realise and then turn over to ITV1. We don't need all the ins and outs to see it though - it's obvious. 'The Angels Take Manhattan' is an episode where death happens, consequences happen, 'time cannot be re-written' happens. Whereas, the cube scenario last week was one where the sonic screwdriver trick happens, and 'everybody comes back to life' happens. It can't have it both ways. While this episode is fantastically menacing, come Christmas everybody will probably be doing things that aren't remembered, that have no effect on anybody, or on time or space. Moffat's got to stop picking and choosing where he wants his consequences to take place.
As a side note, why the hell is the Statue of Liberty able to move? Is it right to assume that at any given moment, someone somewhere is probably going to be looking at the Statue of Liberty? Or, at least, looking for it if it isn't where it should be. It therefore boggles the mind that it's able to quite happily crash, bang and whollop it's way through the city so that it can show its teeth to Amy & Rory.
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| "Good lord! You need a new mouthwash!" |
A 'reset button' trick features and it's enough to make you want to throw your TV out of the window, but it's soon revealed that it's not been much of a reset after all. Thank fuck. Amy has a teary eyed moment after Rory's snatched by an Angel where she says that all she has to do is blink and the Angel will take her too. This way she'll be with Rory, hopefully, forever. She then proceeds to blink around four or five times before turning her back to the Angel completely. At this point the Angel seems satisfied that Amy has finished her final speech and snatches her too, and the effect it has on the Doctor is heartbreaking. He's a real person, with real emotions and so far this run we've seen naff all of that side of his character. Too often the focus is put on the story, and needless comedy routines rather than the characters themselves. In the majority of episodes of Lost not much actually happens in terms of the island's 'story', but there's so much to sink your teeth into because all the characters have their own mahoosively interesting stories to tell. You've got a chap here whizzing about through time and space in a telephone box, so why does he have no depth?
After a nice little flip around at the end, putting some lovely book-ends on Amy & Rory's time with the Doc, we get a sneak peek at the Christmas special where we'll hopefully learn why Oswin didn't sound like a Dalek while she was talking to the Doctor and his chums for 40 minutes over the phone. That'll more than likely be HCTV's final episodic review of Doctor Who. Bet you can't wait! (Yes, yes you can.)
★★★☆☆
Roo