Mark Watches ‘Doctor Who’: S02E04 – The Girl In The Fireplace

In the fourth episode of the second series of Doctor Who, Steven Moffat invades our nightmares. Again. Intrigued? Then it’s time for Mark to watch Doctor Who.

Steven Moffat is a genius. Easily. When I watched “School Reunion,” I forgot to stop the episode on Netflix before the next week’s episode was previewed. (NOTE: WHY DO THEY DO THIS. IT’S SO SPOILERY) When I saw those weird, masked things walking around, I’ll admit I wasn’t that excited to see the execution of this at all. Of course, once the title screen appeared and said, “by Steven Moffat,” I knew I should approach this episode with an open mind.

And what a doozy of an episode. Moffat’s writing is poetic, heartbreaking, and one of the more interesting monster-of-the-week plots I’ve seen yet. The set-up is also fascinating as well: The Doctor, Rose, and Mickey experience this episode in the span of just a few hours, while Reinette (Madame de Pompadour) experiences the events over the course of fifteen years.

It’s a context that allows this tragedy to unfold in an almost whimsical way, gradually building to the final, depressing moments of “The Girl in the Fireplace.” I like that Moffat chooses to start the episode near the “end” of the timeline; by giving us a context in which we see Reinette telling King Louis XV that the Doctor has been watching over her for her entire life, I expected this episode to operate almost entirely in flashbacks to various points in time, but this is the Doctor we’re talking about. Time isn’t relative to anyone but him.

Ending up in the 51st century, aboard an abandoned space ship, the Doctor, Rose, and Mickey end up doing some exploring, which reveals the “magic door,” as the Doctor so lovingly calls it. Well, it’s a “spatio-temporal hyperlink” at first, but “magic door” is so silly, isn’t it? This door, incidentally, is a portal to a very, very specific time 1727. Not only is it a portal to a specific time, but, as they discover, every magical door/window seems to follow one person: Reinette, more famously known as the Madame de Pompadour, the mistress of King Louis XV.

Unsure why this ship is essentially stalking this woman, the Doctor visits her the first time when she is just a child. (She looked older than six years old, despite that he first visits her in 1727. Weird.) In one of the most awfully creepy scenes ever, Moffat addresses the monster-under-the-bed trope when the Doctor realizes the pervasive ticking in the room is not coming from the clock, which is actually broken. Ugh, seriously guys, when he peers under the bed and there’s something there and all you can see are feet? NO. JUST NO THANK YOU. How on earth does Moffat take things as simply as white socks and make them so utterly terrifying?

The thing is, the preview for this episode seemed so silly, and yet the androids in this episode, with their unwavering dedication to their mission, their constant ticking, and their stilted movement, somehow aren’t silly in the slightest. They are just GODDAMN CREEPY.

You were right. This shit is nightmare fuel.

Aside from this (which actually doesn’t distract from the story!), I feel like Moffat’s “The Girl in the Fireplace” is my first chance to see the Doctor in love. I feel like he loves Rose, but he’s not necessarily in love with her. There may have been a time when he was in love with Sarah Jane Smith, but we don’t ever see that. Here, though, there’s something about the way that Doctor looks out for Reinette and even (temporarily) sacrifices himself for her that’s touching. Unfortunately, that means as the episode progresses, we get closer and closer to the inevitable heartbreak. The Doctor figures out that the androids have been using humans to rebuild their ship, unable to be moral about their decisions (they are robots, after all), and that they’ve fixated on one special girl to rebuild their computer system. On the surface, the idea that Reinette’s brain will be the same as as the computer and therefore compatible is, of course, completely absurd, but this episode seems to acknowledge that outright. In fact, it’s that absurdity that is used against them in the end, as the androids realize that without their ship, they have no purpose in life.

It’s never quite explained why the androids chose Reinette, of all people, but it might have been possible that there was only one magic door at the time the ship died, and the androids simply latched onto this concept and built more. Maybe it’s all a big coincidence. Either way, it really doesn’t matter. This episode was about two lives colliding, the Doctor’s love and Reinette’s “lonely angel.” Is it possible that the Doctor’s name means something so significant that he has to hide it? Is Reinette now the only human in all of history to learn exactly what the Doctor is?

All of these things contribute to the absolutely crushing finale of “The Girl in the Fireplace.” Using the fireplace that Reinette moved from her home to Versailles, the Doctor is able to get back to Rose and Mickey, telling Reinette to pack a bag and pick a constellation that they can visit. In just the span of thirty seconds, the Doctor returns to Reinette’s room at Versailles, only to discover that six years have passed in that time. He stares out the window with Louis XV as Louis tells the Doctor that Reinette is leaving Versailles for the last time…in a coffin.

Did I tear up? Absolutely. It’s a testament to Moffat’s script, which got me to believe that over the course of 45 minutes, the Doctor fell in love. And I certainly believed it and my heart ached to watch him internalize his heartbreak as he continued on without her.

Gutted, dudes. Steven Moffat, you win again.

THOUGHTS

• It was neat to see Rose have to deal with yet another woman in the Doctor’s life and it was even better to see her react in a much more mature manner than, say, when Sarah Jane was around. I think having Mickey around helped with that.
• I love Mickey as a companion, but you all know that already. I hope he’s around for a few more episodes too.
• “What have you been doing? Where have you been???” “Well, among other things, I think I may have just invented the banana daiquiri a few centuries early.”
• “No! You’re not keeping the horse!” “Why not? I let you keep Mickey!”
• “You’re my favorite, you are, you are the best, you know why? Cause you’re so thick! You’re Mr. Thick Thick Thickety Thick-face from Thick-twon, Thickania. And so’s your dad!
• “One may tolerate a world of demons for the sake of an angel.” UNF.
• “What’s a horse doing on a spaceship?” “Mickey, what’s Pre-Revolutionary France doing on a spaceship? Get a little perspective!”
• Sophia Myles, YOU ARE SO PRETTY. Good lord.
• Steven Moffat, seriously, your brain is amazing.