Episode Report Card Tippi Blevins: C+ | 409 USERS: C+ YOU GRADE IT Merry Christmas and Goodbye
By Tippi Blevins | Season CS7 | Episode X | Aired on 12.25.2013
In a hurry? Read the recaplet for a nutshell description! Finished? Click here to close.A mysterious planet begins to send out a signal that nobody can decode, but that everyone finds terribly frightening for some reason. Species from all over the Whoverse are drawn to the planet, for reasons they can't explain. The Doctor, too, finds himself drawn, only to be summoned to Earth when Clara needs him to pretend to be her boyfriend for Christmas dinner. Luckily, this is only a brief interlude, although it involves nudity for no reason other than to titillate fans with publicity stills. Soon they're both heading to the mystery planet, which is being guarded by the Church of the Papal Mainframe, led by a dominatrix nun named Tasha Lem.
Tasha has shielded the planet, which is a good thing because its visitors include Daleks and Cybermen, and other baddies that would like to destroy it. At first, the Doctor receives some intel that the planet is Gallifrey, and he acts like this is impossible even though he was only recently quite hopeful that he would find it. Tasha sends him and Clara down there, where they discover a town called Christmas, because that's our tenuous link to the holiday this year. Everyone looks like they just stepped out of a Dickens story, and they cannot tell a lie because of a truth field being emitted from a nearby building. When the Doctor and Clara investigate, they find that rip in the fabric of reality that first appeared in Amy Pond's bedroom all those years ago. Turns out Gallifrey is on the other side, asking for the Doctor's true name as some verification that it's okay to pop back into existence, and that the planet on which they've found themselves is actually... Trenzalore.
If the Doctor says his name, then Gallifrey comes back and the Time War resumes, for some reason, and everything goes explode-y again, also for some reason. He tricks Clara into leaving with the TARDIS and stays behind to protect the planet from all comers. By the time Clara returns, the Doctor has spent many hundreds of years there, slowly growing into an old man. The town loves him dearly, even though he's kind of the cause of all their problems. Enemies assault the town, but are afraid to wipe it out from space lest the Doctor pull some last-second trick on them. It doesn't make a lot of sense, honestly. Something else that doesn't make a lot of sense is the Doctor's certainty that he's going to die there without regenerating again. Does he not remember seeing his older future self as the Curator? That would seem to indicate he survives.
All seems doomed when Tasha and the rest of her church -- including the Silence -- are turned into fleshy Daleks. The Doctor goes out to meet the Daleks for what he assumes is the last time, but Clara has other ideas. She goes up to the crack in the universe and asks the Time Lords to help the Doctor. Like he's been there for centuries now, and it never once occurred to him to say, "Hey Gallifrey -- it's not safe to come over yet, for some reason… but could you maybe back off because you're totally messing up this planet?" So the Time Lords pull back, but not before granting the Doctor at least one more regeneration. Thus endowed, the Doctor blasts all of Trenzalore's enemies out of the sky with bolts of regenerative energy. Seems like he could maybe just tell them the threat is over and there's no more impending Time War, so they can all go home peacefully now.
The Doctor briefly returns to his younger visage and retires to the TARDIS. There, he says his goodbyes to Clara, as well as to Amy, thanks to a bit of hallucination and/or memory. He rather quickly and unceremoniously turns into his next incarnation, who has no idea how to fly the TARDIS. It's a rushed ending to a jumbled, meandering episode. Stay tuned for the full weecap to see if things make any more sense on rewatch.
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Want more? The full recap starts right below!A pale blue planet with two moons and a ring system spins idly somewhere in unknown space. "This planet sent the universe a message," says a woman's voice. Hundreds and hundreds of ships approach the planet. "Although no one understood the message, everyone who heard it found themselves afraid, except for one man -- the man who stayed for Christmas." This man, of course, is the Doctor, who proceeds to teleport himself onto a Dalek ship followed by a Cyberman ship, without first checking to see where he's going. At least he's consistent with that sort of thing. As soon as he realizes his faux pas, he teleports away, shouting at someone called "Handles" for assistance.
When he returns to the TARDIS, he argues with a Cyberman's head that's been mounted to the console. It looks like something out of a Bjork video. "Handles, I said put me on a ship," the Doctor gripes. "I didn't say put me on a Dalek ship!" He grabs the head and paces around the console. "You did not indicate a preference," says Handles. Hee. The Doctor wonders why so many have come to the planet when nobody can translate the message. Even the Doctor doesn't know what it means. The phone rings on the outside of the TARDIS. After much bickering with Handles about the location of the phone, the Doctor finally goes to answer it. It's Clara, calling from Earth, where she seems to have cast herself in a sitcom. She needs the Doctor to pretend to be her boyfriend in front of her grumpy family for Christmas. There's much flailing and panic and hilarity that isn't actually hilarious. Also, the Doctor apparently once had an android boyfriend for a while. Anyway, Clara is quite frantic and the Doctor is quite frantic, although in his case it's because Cybermen are trying to kill him. He flails his way into the opening credits.
When that's over, we're on Earth with Clara. Her father and grandmother have come for dinner, along with a prissy lady who isn't Clara's mother, because Clara's mother is dead. Clara is overjoyed to find the TARDIS outside her apartment, but somewhat less pleased when she finds the Doctor naked inside it. He tries to give her a big hug, but she warns him away. "What's wrong?" he asks, hurt. "You're naked," she says, turning away. He explains he's going to church this way, but dons a hologram suit of clothes that only Clara can see. This means that when he bounds in to meet the family, they see him au naturel, which pleases Granny to no end. Or, perhaps more accurately, to the Doctor's end. Clara drags her naked "boyfriend" into the kitchen, where they decide they need to take the raw Christmas turkey to the TARDIS for cooking.