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| Jude watches Dr Who. |
You know, it’s Christmas Day. You’d worked that out, hadn’t you: just by the date … ?
And, yes: I’ve already spent most of the day at my family’s place.
I’ll be back again, tomorrow: there’s a certain young man who’s had quite a LOT of presents, today. And who’s due to get more, tomorrow.
Well, Boxing Day’s Jude’s birthday: he’s either going to be sick of toy cars, or SWAMPED in them … !
~≈Ï≈~
At ANY rate, today is Christmas Day. Presents have been exchanged — my nephew, Jude, has had quite a lot of cars, trucks and tractors* — and everybody’s managed to get themselves well and truly stuffed.
So to speak.
I’ve also managed to get myself home: with the gifts I’ve been given. Including, I should add, a new mouse and keyboard.
Oh, and a t-shirt that says ‘Gallifrey University: Prydonian Chapter’.
You can’t be TO geeky, can you … ?
~≈Ï≈~
No, you can’t, can you … ?
Certainly not if you’re like me: a Dr Who fan, and one who’s home in time for tonight’s Dr Who Christmas special.
Matt Smith’s last episode. Peter Capaldi’s first.
The Fall of the Eleventh, itself.
And I have to say, I was impressed with that … !
~≈Ï≈~
Set an undisclosed time after The Name Of The Doctor, The Time Of The Doctor tells us of an initially unnamed planed that’s broadcasting a signal: a signal that none of the inhabitants of the orbiting spaceships can understand, and that the Doctor is told — by the disconnected Cyberman head he nicknames ‘Handles’ — is Gallifrey.
The Doctor, of course, knows damn well that it isn’t.
Which is confirmed by two things: by the words of Tasha Lem, Mother Superior of the Church of the Papal Mainframe, who tells the Doctor that the planet is Trenzalore.
And by the fact that — in a wall of the main tower of a Trenzalorean town called Christmas — there’s a very familiar looking crack …
~≈Ï≈~
Now … impressive … ?
Oh, lordy, yes … !
I know some fans have heap a touch of ire onto Stephen Moffat, for coming up with something of a confusing morass of plotlines.
Personally … ? Personally I can understand a certain amount of dissatisfaction: although not the sort of behaviour I’d heard had been flung at him.
I ALSO feel that that dissatisfaction may well be a case of maybe not concentrating enough.
However, I think those fans may well have little to complain about.
If they’ve sat down, today, and watched The Time Of The Doctor, I think they — like me — would have found would have found it — and The Name Of The Doctor and The Day Of The Doctor, which form a rough trilogy with The Time Of The Doctor — I think they’d’ve found an episode that neatly ties up the loose threads, and some nice writing, wonderful acting from the cast.
Jenna Coleman, I believe, is going to go down as a classic companion: she’s certainly put in the work and given a stunner of a performance.
As has Matt Smith: who’s given something of a stonker of a performance, over the past few years.
Perfect … ?
No, The Time Of The Doctor isn’t perfect.
It IS, however, everything that we come to expect in a regeneration story: emotional, touching, demanding, and giving us both endings to stories we’ve invested time in.
AND the promise of a fresh start.
What else CAN one ask … ?
* And had fun with both them: AND the assorted boxes they came in. I think I’ve got a nephew fascinated by the idea of putting things in things …
