Is It Charlie?

Today is a big day for us. We've been calling him "Doctor" or "The Doctor" for all these years, but now, we finally get to find out what his real name is.

I have a guess.

 FRED 

The Story

After murdering 14 women, Clarence DeMarco finds himself awaiting execution by hanging. For some reason, Madame Vastra comes to visit him, and in exchange for suspending his death sentence (which Vastra can somehow do), he hands over some space-time coordinates.

Vastra and Jenni host a conference call, to which they invite Strax, Clara, and River Song. They chat for a bit and Clara gets the coordinates, but unfortunately, the call is interrupted when Jenni gets murdered and Vastra and Strax get kidnapped by the Whisper Men.

The Army of People With Socks Pulled Over Their Faces, or AoPWSPOTF for short.

The Doctor shows up at Clara's house, and the two of them go over to Trenzalore, where they believe Vastra, Strax, and Jenni's corpse are being held. The Great Intelligence is there, in Dr. Simeon's body and reveals his purpose - to get into the Doctor's tomb, where his Timey-Wimey scar tissue yields an opening into the Doctor's history, and destroy the Doctor's time stream.

After The Intelligence does this, dying in the process, Clara realizes that this is how she achieved her "Impossible Girl" status, so she runs in after the G.I., and fixes all of the problems. She is stuck there, but the Doctor, after a heartfelt farewell with Professor River Song, jumps into his own time stream to save her. And while he's there, he meets someone that he wishes he hadn't.

Wait, but the Doctor said that this guy wasn't the Doctor, and now the caption says he is the Doctor? Now I'm all confused.

The Review

I am extremely conflicted on this episode. It had a lot of major components, and each one that I can think of had some very good attributes and some things that really should have been avoided.

The Paternoster Gang

This has been their third episode this season, and I'm starting to realize what I really hated so much about them. 

I think they put too much padding in the actor's right sleeve.

Strax is at it again, with the stupid military jokes that are unfunny remixes of jokes that were effective in Snowmen. He adds absolutely nothing to the story, and serves as comic relief, even in scenes where comic relief isn't necessary or appropriate.

On the other hand, Jenni and Vastra are starting to grow on me again.

The two actresses really manage to convey their love and affection for one another. Just look at them in the image above. That look in their eyes.

"Would you still kiss me if I were dead and invisible?"

Now, if only we could get rid of that grumpy potato...

Jenni's Death

There is no better word than "chilling" to describe the scene where Jenni realizes that the Whisper Men have broken in and murdered her.

Don't you hate it when you get murdered in the middle of an important meeting?

That scene was brilliantly directed and wonderfully written in the most shocking way. In fact, it probably stands as one of the more effective blood-freezing scenes that I've seen in a long time.

Too bad it was completely erased ten minutes later.

"Did you enjoy your nap?"

This is the moment that Doctor Who has removed all tension from this episode and any further story. This is the moment that we find out that no character is ever really in danger, because there's always someone there to restart her heart, or go back in time and fix everything.

The Great Intelligence

It was kind of inevitable. Good ole' G. I. Joe had to return for one last big showdown. In fact, given his build-up during the two earlier episodes this season, I would have been upset if he hadn't been the villain in this one.

Little Walter finally has some friends, although they have to hide their faces in order to avoid being seen in public with him.

On the other hand, he was just about as uninspiring in this episode as he was in The Snowmen. Once again, we have a fairly boring villain whose only goal is to cause pain. He even says that he's perfectly happy to die in order to ruin the Doctor's life.

He's such an empty-headed villain.

Why the huge grudge against the Doctor, anyway? His first plot was foiled more by Clara than the Doctor, and his second one was basically just to restore himself. Now he's going to kill himself to get revenge against the Doctor for... delaying his restoration?

Which leads me to another positive thing about Name. I'm glad that they ended this character once and for all; I do not want to see him again.

The Final Showdown

Well-directed and well-acted in the extreme.

Even if the explanation makes absolutely no sense, Richard Grant did a wonderful job of conveying the emotion behind the desire to poison the Doctor's timestream. Everything about the atmosphere of that scene was perfect - the music, the acting, the staging.

I would make the exact same comments about the other two scenes, where Clara runs in and where the Doctor steps in. Each time, the music (which I could tell was being reused from Season 6) fits perfectly with the scene and the emotions being conveyed in each part.

I have to ask, though.

Why didn't the Paternoster Gang do anything to stop him? They just sort of stood there, unrestrained.

Professor River Song

Poor River. Poor, poor River. Alex Kingston does such a beautiful job of conveying this woman, a lonely, vulnerable woman, who is constantly neglected by the man around whom she's built her whole life, who covers up her insecurity with a sultry flair.

"This champagne makes me feel better about my neglectful husband who only married me in order to save the universe."

Her inclusion in this episode was great, more for her story than for the episode. I had originally hoped that she would have a long and complex story arc that occupied the background of episodes over the course of many seasons, but as of The Wedding of River Song, her story arc has pretty much concluded, and it's time to say goodbye. So I think it was a nice gesture to give her, and her fans, some closure.

"Goodbye, Sweetie"

There were a few things about this story that were horribly depressing. First, the fact that Clara had heard all about "Professor River Song", but didn't realize that she was a woman. When Clara makes that comment, you can see the hurt in her eyes, the pain that she tries so hard to mask with champagne.

The Doctor saying that she's "an ex". The Doctor has moved on, or at least shut her out. While she wants nothing more than some closure from him, he just wants her to leave him alone. Even his kiss and "heartfelt" expression of love to her at the end comes across more as exasperation than as actual affection.

"If I give you a kiss, will you finally go away?"

And finally, River's own repeated assertion that "He doesn't like endings". Anyone in a healthy relationship knows that that's not a mature attitude to take in either case. And yet it does come across as painfully realistic. She is struggling to reconcile the man she fell in love with, the romantic world-saving Doctor, with the reality that she sees, someone who has moved on.

None of this is to criticize the quality of this episode. The Doctor's relationship with River has always been like this, and to see it any differently would have been odd. Instead, what this does is highlight a key feature in the Doctor's personality: he is childish, both in his goofiness and in his inability to hold a real relationship with anyone, and River is so besotted with him that she doesn't see this huge flaw.

That said, Rest In Peace, River Song. You will be missed.

Although not by the Doctor.

The Impossible Girl

I was horribly conflicted about the resolution of Clara's arc. On the one hand, it does explain her mystery very well. She realizes it the same way that I did while watching it the first time. "But this is what I've already done. You've already seen me do it." It was so well-hidden and yet so obvious. How can she be here, and there, and have the same love of souffles and the phrase "run, you clever boy, and remember"?

The explosion is supposed to be a third of the way up her torso from there.

On the other hand, I'm not sure I'm comfortable with what it does to either her character or that of the Doctor. We already had a pretty stupid individual, whose entire personality resulted from getting Twittered. And now we find out that all of the other incarnations, including possibly the "original" one, were born for no reason other than to save the Doctor.

Why can't you just leaf me alone?

That seems like a kind of degrading position to be in for a supposed strong-woman character, born only for the sake of a man.

It also introduces a bit of a continuity issue within the Doctor's own character. If she was successful in saving Doctor in those earlier scenes where she shouts out to him, why doesn't he remember her? If nothing else, he should remember her from when he went TARDIS-shopping.

It's the 60s. Nobody remembers their sales associates.

Introducing...

When the old guy turned around, and that text appeared next to him with the audible beats, my wife and I burst out laughing, which I don't think was the authors' intent.

Okay, so humor aside, who is this guy?*

The way Clara was talking, it sounds like she only saw the first eleven Doctors - Hartnell through Smith. Does that mean that there won't be any Doctors after Smith? Does that mean that Smith will regenerate into Hurt, who will do something horrific that we don't know about yet?

Or maybe he's just a random person who needs medical attention.

Or is he the Valeyard, an incarnation from the Classic series, who supposedly comes between the Twelfth and Thirteenth Doctors? That would explain the hatred, whole not-calling-him-the-Doctor thing. In that case, the dishonest testimony in The Trial of a Time Lord could be a small part of the horrible things that Hurt's Not-Doctor has done.

Or could he somehow be the incarnation that destroyed Gallifrey, the most horrible thing that we know the Doctor's done. That could work, although he would have to come between McGann and Eccleston, which would force us to renumber Eccleston, Tennant, and Smith as Ten, Eleven, and Twelve respectively. Then, failing some magical explanation (River's extra regenerations, maybe?), Smith would have to regenerate into the Valeyard, and then into his final form.

I don't know if they'll go with one of those, or something else entirely. I think the Valeyard would be a magnificent choice, because it would be a really cool exploration into one of the more interesting parts of Classic Who mythology. On the other hand, I wouldn't mind if the show delved deeper into the Time War, an entirely NuWho phenomenon. Either way, I'm looking forward to seeing what the writers have in store for us.

The Feels

Three moments in particular gave me the feels.

When the Doctor says "oops", after cracking the TARDIS's window, it's a beautiful character moment. The Doctor is clearly trying to make light of his mistake, but it comes across as horribly sad, which I'm guessing is what the writers intended.

The second moment was the giant TARDIS.

It's bigger on the outside.

I never saw that coming, but having the "bigger on the inside" leak out when the TARDIS dies is a stroke of genius. I can imagine, over the course of decades, the dead TARDIS slowly expanding to fill whatever space is open for it, and reaching high into the sky.

The scene where the Doctor explains it was, like my previous point, profoundly moving. You can really feel the Doctor's pain as he explains the mechanics of a dying TARDIS to Clara.

At this point, I have to mention an interesting continuity point. The crack that the Doctor made when crashing is present in the TARDIS's corpse, which means that that crack is there to stay.

Finally, the Doctor's ... remains.

"What were you expecting? A body? Bodies are boring; I've had loads of them."

The Name of the Doctor

"You didn't listen, did you? You lot never do!"

Remember the twisty little wordplay about "It is discovered". Of course, you always thought the antecedent of "it" was the secret, until the Doctor says that it's his grave. 

That was a nice little meta-pun, since the title of the episode does the same thing. Of course you never thought we would find out the name on his birth certificate, did you?

"Hi, I'm Doctor Hartnell, although I usually go by Bill."

This episode has a neat little triple entendre, since in two ways, it's about the Doctor's name. First, there's the obvious, that Dr. Simeon Intelligence needs it to get into the tomb. Then there's the romantic, where River is the only one who knows the actual word.

But then there's the last one, the part at the end, the last thing he says. "But not in the name of 'The Doctor'". As much as this episode is about the name on Willrick Davester Ecclesmith's birth certificate, it's also about the promise implied by the name "The Doctor". The promise to rescue those in need, and to heal wounds that have been opened. The promise kept by Smith's Doctor, and, arguably, by Clara and the Paternosters, and the promise broken by Hurt.

Overall

Overall, there was a lot to like and a lot to dislike about The Name of the Doctor. I wasn't pleased with the casual dismissal of Jenni's death, the Great Intelligence was as boring a villain as usual, and Clara's resolution further contributed to the decline of her character.

On the other hand, as usual, the emotional and cinematic aspects of the episode were beautifully done. I especially liked the giant TARDIS-corpse, the affection between Vastra and Jenni, and the pure and unfiltered hatred from The Great Intelligence. I also thought that it was fitting to give River a last farewell, especially one from within the Doctor's tomb. And while on principle, I took objection to the explanation, I still found it both entertaining and very cleverly done.

And, of course, the clever wordsmithing behind "The Name of the Doctor".

Overall, in both the good ways and the bad, I think that The Name of the Doctor has been a fitting close to Doctor Who, Season 7.

Although, I just have to say... That ending... Gosh, that ending... The only thing I can really say is:

NEXT EPISODE: THE DAY OF THE DOCTOR

*As of the publishing of this post, I know who he is. My musings in this section are speculation made by myself and a friend shortly after The Name of the Doctor aired, long before any details of John Hurt's character were revealed, and I prefer to keep these reviews free of spoilers from future episodes.