Sunday, December 2, 2012

Doctor Who-The Wedding Of River Song
                                In London,all moments in history are happening all at ones. Mini coopers fly on hot air balloons,pterodactyls menace playgrounds and Winston Churchill presides over the Roman empire. What is the reason for all this discord? Due to foreknowledge of her killing of the doctor,River Song is able to trick out the spacesuit controlling her in order to save his life. However the doctor has by this time already learned that his death is a fixed point in time,and shouldn't have been prevented. He is further assisted in his travels to discover more about the Silence,the religious order intent on his death. Apparently they are trying to stop a question from being asked that would spell out the end of their order. Still the matter of the doctors life and death remain at hand.

                           While fighting paradoxical encounters with the Silence the doctor and Churchill,still totally displaced in time encounter an eye patched Amy Pond who still remembers the doctor,but realizes she shouldn't because she has no idea her husband Rory is still around her,but has no memory of who she is. She journeys with the doctor to Area 52 in the great pyramids where they find both Madame Kovarian and River Song,who herself is still determined to save the doctors life. After the Silence are able to break free from their holds below the pyramid,they manage to kill even their loyal servents using their eye patch. Even though Madame Kovarian begs Amy Pond for mercy,she elects not to spare her life. 

                            In the end it comes down to River Song sending a psychic transmission to the outside universe,where time is still moving normally,to every race of people the doctor has assisted. Still confused and irritated,with the knowledge of the reasoning for his death she agrees to formally wed him after he whispers something in her ear. This allows the doctor to be killed in Utah by her as planned and history to be set on it's proper track. Meanwhile Amy and River are at her and Rory's home discussing the matter Amy still remembers when River reveals to her that the doctor never actually died. One of the "friends" of his,the Teselecta,had concealed the actual doctor and took on his form. And it was the artificial doctor,not the real one,who was killed that day. Still the doctor had to confront his future,even if he was still alive.

                            This is the most densely written and fast moving Doctor Who story I've ever seen before. Once again the theme is paradox. Only of a much broader sort. What would happen if the doctor was supposed to die and didn't? All time literally occurred on Earth in one frozen moment and began to tare apart. So quite deliberately some of the dialog in this story makes absolutely no sense,because it's not supposed to. In this story however,Amy Pond's paradoxical memory serves as a help rather than a hindrance. Especially around the Silence,whose survival depends on ones lack of knowledge of their existence. Still the entire thread making up the core of this story.that "one important question" turns out to be the same one non other than first companion Ian Chesterton asked the first doctor after being bought from 1963 to the stone age on his first trip in the TARDIS: doctor who?
                        

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