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Amy and Rory have just about settled into their regular lives when once again the Doctor drops in for a visit. This time, it's because millions of little black cubes have popped up all over the planet. What are they made of? What's inside them? What's their purpose? Nobody can answer any of these questions. Even the Doctor is stumped. He hangs out with Amy and Rory while waiting for the cubes to do something, but soon becomes monumentally bored. He passes the time by taking Amy and Rory for a few quick adventures, while assigning Rory's dad Brian to cube watch.
A year goes by and the people of Earth have come to take the little cubes for granted. They use the cubes as toys, paperweights, or else ignore them entirely. That's when the cubes finally activate. Some of them shoot lasers. Others play music. Still others merely scan people. Each cube seems to do something different. This whole time, UNIT has been keeping an eye on things. The organization is now headed by the Brigadier's daughter Kate, who seeks the Doctor's help. After a brief, synchronized countdown, the cubes all over the world open and zap the nearest people. This causes heart attacks in a third of the world's population. The Doctor gets zapped, too, but luckily he's got that second heart to keep him going.
The Doctor tracks down the masterminds behind the cube plot. They are the Shakri, a people he had heretofore assumed were a myth. They are intergalactic pest controllers of a sort, and they've decided the human herd needed thinning. Or something. It seemed rather talky and boring and convoluted on first watch. The Doctor reverses the charges that zapped everyone and effectively defibrillates all the cube victims back to life.
Along the way, there's lots of the Doctor being preemptively sad about his coming goodbye with the Ponds, and lots of Amy and Rory trying to figure out which life they should choose. In the end, it's Brian who makes the most sense, telling them to have their adventures and save the world and so on, because how many chances like that do people get? Stay tuned for the full weecap.
Want more? The full recap starts right below!Narrator Amy says, "Life with the Doctor was like this," and then there's hard rock music and flashes of all their crazy adventures. This contrasts this with her and Rory's everyday life, which consists of needing glasses and doing the laundry and cleaning out the fridge. They sit in the garden, chat, and realize they need to choose between their two lives. Right on cue, the TARDIS materializes and they decide they don't need to choose just quite yet. Narrator Amy says that although she and Rory became a part of the Doctor's life every time they left with him, he never stayed around long enough to become a part of theirs. This all changed during the year of the Slow Invasion, as she calls it. During her narration, a little black cube floats into her and Rory's bedroom and lands quietly on the nightstand.
The morning, Rory's dad Brian shows up on their doorstep all in a tizzy. He's got a little black cube of his own. In fact, there are little black cubes dotting the sidewalks, windowsills and just about every other flat surface around. They establish that nobody knows what the little doohickeys are or from where they came. All Brian knows is that they seem to be everywhere. Amy notices the Doctor perched atop a playground structure nearby, studying one of the cubes. "Invasion of the very small cubes," he says, smiling. "That's new!"
Clips from news broadcasts around the world lend an air of verisimilitude. The best is from Professor Brian Cox, Star of those "Wonders of the Universe" shows and quite possibly the most adorable professor ever. "Well, they're certainly not random space debris," he says, holding up one of the cubes. "They're too perfectly formed for that. Are they extraterrestrial in origin? Well, you'll have to ask a better man than me." Not possible.
The Doctor and friends have gathered in the TARDIS. The Doctor says all the cubes are all identical, right down to their atoms. Brian worries they may be tiny bombs, or alien eggs, or parts of some awful jigsaw puzzle. Honestly, they look kind of like components for Ikea furniture. Like somewhere there's a giant alien who can't finish putting together his new media center because a bunch of the pieces got shipped to the wrong address. The Doctor, either impressed or humoring him, tasks Brian with watching over a stack of cubes. Meanwhile, the Doctor sets up a makeshift lab in Amy and Rory's kitchen to run a few tests. He's somewhat shocked to learn that Rory and Amy both have normal lives when they're not with him. While Rory gets ready for his job at the hospital, Amy says she thinks she and Rory have been traveling off and on with the Doctor for ten years. The Doctor notes, with both sadness and pride, that Amy's all grown up now. The tender moment is interrupted when armed UNIT soldiers barge into the kitchen. One of them marches a half-dressed Rory into the kitchen. "There are soldiers all over my house, and I'm in my pants," he says, gesturing to his cute little boxer briefs.
All over the world, the cubes are becoming mundane. People use them as paperweights, coasters, or otherwise ignore them. A bunch of them still litter the streets. Like, wouldn't people at least sweep them away so they wouldn't run over them and get a flat tire? Or trip over them, as I surely would have done a thousand times over? Anyway, it's June of the year and Amy and Rory's friends have gathered at their home to celebrate their anniversary. Amy calls the Doctor and tells him via voicemail that the U.N. has classified the cubes as "provisionally safe." She doesn't get to finish her message, because the Doctor pops up behind her. He takes her and Rory to the Savoy Hotel in 1890. Amy and Rory both look gorgeous in their period duds. The Doctor promises to have them back to their anniversary party in no time, but Rory is so happy for the visit that he plants a big kiss on the Doctor's cheek.
They go on other little adventures, too, including one where Amy accidentally marries King Henry VIII, before finally returning to the party. "How long have they been gone?" Brian asks the Doctor. The Doctor plays dumb, but Brian, ever the keen observer, has noticed that Amy and Rory are wearing suddenly different clothes. The Doctor admits it's been seven weeks. He and Brian have a sad chat about what's happened to his companions over the years. Some leave, some are lost and a few died. The Doctor promises it won't happen to Amy and Rory, but he doesn't look like he believes it. Later, he asks Amy if he can stay for another visit. "I miss you," he says. She tries not to let him see just how tickled she is.
July. The cubes start doing stuff. Finally. Brian's spins a few times. A cube near Rory opens and closes. A cube in their bedroom pricks Amy's palm and measures her pulse. While the Doctor's playing around with the Wii, another cube floats around in front of him. He addresses the cube: "Whatever you are, this planet -- these people -- are precious to me, and I will defend them till my last breath." The cube opens up, reveals a little gun and starts shooting at him. Of course, he's just as happy as could be about this latest development. Rory heads off to the hospital to take care of the sudden influx of cube victims and takes his dad with him for some reason. At the same time, Kate summons the Doctor to the Tower of London. He brings Amy because, I don't know, maybe somebody will need to be insulted.
At UNIT's headquarters in the Tower, Kate tells them that all the cubes worldwide activated at the same time. They've got 50 cubes in isolation chambers and they're all doing something different. One belches fire. Another makes a woman cry uncontrollably. The most horrifying cube plays "The Chicken Dance Song" on endless loop. Kate says she's feeling lost. "Don't despair, Kate," the Doctor says. "Your dad never did." He reveals that he knows she's the Brigadier's daughter. She was Kate Lethbridge-Stewart, but dropped part of the name because she didn't want any favors. A tech guy who's been studying computer readouts says that all the cubes have all shut down at once.
The Doctor decides he needs some fresh air and goes up top to sit with Amy for a bit. The world is probably in imminent danger, but let's pause to talk about your feelings. The Doctor knows his current companions are thinking about quitting. Amy says the adventures are starting to feeling like she's running away from real life. The Doctor explains it's not running away at all. The way he describes his travels sounds like a bucket list. Not because his own time is running out, but because moments and places and people in the universe are fleeting. "I'm not running away from things," he says. "I'm running to them, before they flare and fade forever." That includes Rory and Amy, the girl who was the first person he saw when he became this person he is now. She rests her head on his shoulder. It's very sweet, but the placement in the story is clunky, making it feel shoehorned when it should feel vital.
The Doctor has a sudden insight about why the cubes shut off after scanning everyone and runs back to tell Kate. The power goes off in the Tower. In the darkness, Amy notices that the cubes are all lit up in blue with the number seven. As they watch, it changes to a six. Cubes all over the world bear the same number. The Doctor figures it's a countdown of some sort and advises Kate to get the word out. Amy wonders why the cubes are now, after all this time, suddenly counting down to something. The Doctor thinks it's because they were waiting for people to take them all into their homes, which seemed to have happened ages ago, but whatever.
At some point, the power came back on, so the Doctor scans the computers for any power fluctuations leading to the cubes. People all over the world start disposing of their cubes. Why would the cubes warn people with a countdown? Wouldn't it be smarter to just commence their devious plans? Stupid cubes. Anyway, back at the hospital, Rory sends his dad off on some errand. Brian ends up getting abducted by the Pentagonal Twins. Why do they take him? Who knows? Rory goes looking for him just in time to see the PTs wheeling him into a freight elevator on a gurney. The music is all tense and dramatic in the hopes that you won't notice how many nonsensical plot points there are. Rory follows them into the elevator and discovers that one of the walls is a portal that leads to a spaceship. The ship orbits high above the Earth, surrounded by some kind of energy field. The field is made up of interconnected hexagons. What in the hell is up with all the geometric shapes?
The Doctor locks himself into one of the isolation chambers with a cube, for reasons I'm not entirely clear on. A lot of time is spent watching the cubes finish their countdown. The little girl in the waiting room waits. Finally, the cubes open. "Geronimo," says the Doctor. He peers inside and discovers... nothing. He's confused and pissed. Video feeds all over the world show people dropping dead. The Doctor starts his usual "talk to himself until he figures things out" thing but then crumples to the floor in pain. He's having an attack in one of his hearts. He flails and mugs like he drew "Jim Carrey" in a game of charades. His other heart's still working, so he blathers on about the cubes' evil plan to destroy humanity by targeting people's hearts. Anyone who was near a box got zapped. A scan of the planet turns up a transmitter on each continent. "Seven stations, seven minutes. Why is that important?" asks the Doctor between flailings. They see that the closest transmitter is at the hospital where Rory works.
Rory passes through the portal onto the ship. He lands in a spacious area that would make a great observation deck if it were open to tourists. All the nice windows overlooking space. Rory sees his dad lying unconscious on the gurney. Other people are in a similar state, although lying on marble platforms. The PTs approach Rory with syringes.
The Doctor, Kate and Amy make their way through the hospital. "How many deaths have been recorded?" the Doctor asks. "We don't know; we think it could be a third of the population," Kate says. Professor Brian Cox better be okay, damn it. While Kate and a handful of UNIT soldiers go off to do... something... the Doctor and Amy go in search of the wormhole that the Doctor's sure is there. He waves the sonic screwdriver around while Amy holds him up. He finds the little girl with the freaky blue eyes. "Hello! You are giving off some very strange signals," the Doctor says. Her whole face glows blue. The Doctor scans her and announces: "Outlier droid, monitoring everything." Um... okay. He shuts her down. He flails about some more, so Amy grabs a nearby defibrillator, rips open his shirt and gives him a zap, all while he protests that it won't work. It does work, and he hops up to start dancing around like he's got a bad case of Saturday Night Fever.
Eventually he remembers they've got other things to do and they work their way to the elevator. The portal shimmers. He and Amy exchange excited grins. It's not like a third of the planet is dead or dying or anything. Take your time and enjoy the adventure! They clasp hands and jump through the portal.
They land in the ship and see Rory lying a platform with Brian nearby. Amy wakes them with some alien smelling salts. An energy weapon fires over their heads. As Amy drags Rory and Brian to safety, the Doctor looks up and sees their attacker. It looks like a geriatric Borg with a pair of earbuds embedded in his face. "So many of them," he says, "crawling the planet, seeping into every corner." His image flickers, disappears, then reappears in front of a series of hexagonal computer screens. The Doctor studies him more closely. "It's not possible," he whispers. Long story short: The guy is a member of the Shakri, a people the Doctor had heretofore believed were a myth, and there's something significant about the number seven but nobody says exactly what. The Shakri says they are "serving the word of the Tally," which is just a mystical way of saying they're in the field of pest control and humans are the pests. They're culling the human population before they can venture further out into space. Amy and Rory return to help out and ask more questions about the Tally. "Before the Closure, there is the Tally," says their host. "The Shakri serves the Tally!" The Doctor tries to make a case for humanity that sounds kind of inspirational, but not entirely convincing. The Shakri laughs. "The Tally must be met! The second wave will be released." They're going to drop a bunch of dodecahedra on the planet or some crap like that.
The Shakri flickers and disappears because he was really just a hologram all along. The Doctor sonics the Shakri computer and turns all the cubes into little defibrillators to restart the dead people's hearts. A third of the population comes back to life. The other two-thirds drop dead from being shocked unnecessarily. Actually, they don't, as far as we see, but the energy feedback causes the Shakri ship to overload. "Run!" the Doctor says to his companions. They leap back through the portal just before the ship explodes. Everybody is saved! Except for all those people on the marble platforms who were left behind on the ship. What were they doing there in the first place? Who knows?
Once again on Earth, the Doctor gets heartfelt thanks from Kate. "You really are as remarkable as Dad said," she says and gives him a kiss on the cheek. He then drops in on Brian, Rory and Amy for dinner, but soon excuses himself so he can go on the adventure. He doesn't invite Amy and Rory, explaining that he understand he can't give up their regular lives. "Actually, it's you they can't give up," Brian says. "And I don't think they should." He encourages the kiddies to go with the Doctor, because, really, how many chances do you get to save a bunch of other worlds? "Just bring them back safe," he says.
"So, that was the year of the Slow Invasion," Narrator Amy says. To say nothing of the hour of the Slow Episode. "Earth got cubed and the Doctor came to stay. It was also when we realized something the Shakri never understood -- what 'cubed' actually means: the power of three." Triumphant music plays as they pile into the TARDIS and head towards their heavily foreshadowed fates.
Tippi Blevins is a freelance time traveler. She dropped by 2012 to write this weecap. Email her at b_tippi@yahoo.com, or find her @TippiB.