In the twelfth and final episode of the ninth series of\u00c2\u00a0Doctor Who<\/i>, the Doctor discovers who imprisoned him. Intrigued? Then it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s time for Mark to watch\u00c2\u00a0Doctor Who<\/i>.<\/p>\n
I won\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t parse words here at the start. I enjoyed the hell out of this episode, even if it contains a couple of things that Moffat and company had largely cast aside throughout season nine. The scope of this story is huge, the action was exciting, and Clara\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s final adventure was pretty damn cool. Plus, one of my issues was addressed just a bit: Clara gets to be her own character, and her fierce rejection of the Doctor\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s plan is one of the best things we\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve gotten from her.<\/p>\n
It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s not a perfect episode, and it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s one of the only episodes aside from \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Sleep No More\u00e2\u20ac\u009d that didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t totally work for me. Otherwise? Y\u00e2\u20ac\u2122all, I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m just so thrilled that series nine was so goddamn good. INCREDIBLY GOOD. LET\u00e2\u20ac\u2122S DISCUSS THE FINALE.<\/p>\n
Gallifrey<\/b><\/p>\n
I have no idea where this episode was filmed, but \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Hell Bent\u00e2\u20ac\u009d gives an eerie grandeur to Gallifrey, and it made me so excited to see more of the place. Unfortunately, that contributed to me feeling like Gallifrey was underused for the story, but it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a hard balance to strike. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Hell Bent\u00e2\u20ac\u009d starts off so large and so huge and ends in a locale that is the literal smallest place in the universe and in time. The scope of it might still be massive, but it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a fascinating choice for the narrative.<\/p>\n
Still, I loved seeing the city and the High Council and the Cloisters, all things that felt new and exciting to me. The return of Rassilon was a blast because HE GOT COMPLETELY DESTROYED. Y\u00e2\u20ac\u2122all, Rassilon is fucked up, isn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t he? He tormented the Master back during Ten\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s run, and now? Well, he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s back to tormenting again, since he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s responsible for Clara\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s death\u00c2\u00a0and<\/i>\u00c2\u00a0for imprisoning the Doctor in the Confession Dial. It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s understandable, then, that the military would reject Rassilon so completely. The Doctor is a war hero to all of them!<\/p>\n
The possibilities presented by Gallifrey are bigger than this, though. We see inside the High Council Meeting room; we learn of extraction chambers, which allow the Time Lords to \u00e2\u20ac\u0153extract\u00e2\u20ac\u009d a person right before their death; we see the Cloisters and Cloister Wraiths and the Matrix, which for me was a first. (I think? I can\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t recall seeing them before.) All of this is a red herring of sorts, not because it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s unimportant, but because the Doctor\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s intentions are hidden from the audience. We think he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s going to help the High Council and the Sisterhood of Karn determine who the Hybrid is, but his motive is much more personal.<\/p>\n
He wants to save Clara.<\/p>\n
The End of the Universe<\/b><\/p>\n
It was absolutely shocking to see the Doctor shoot someone. THAT IS HOW CONCRETE THAT ELEMENT OF HIS CHARACTERIZATION IS. Yet I believe Moffat employed it here to demonstrate just how far gone the Doctor was. Not only was he willing to violate his own personal mantra, but he was perfectly fine with the universe cracking in half and dying if it meant that Clara wasn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t dead. Once the Doctor leaves Gallifrey, though, this story shrinks in size as the universe does, too. It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s here that Moffat pulls out a really confusing \u00e2\u20ac\u0153twist\u00e2\u20ac\u009d in the plot, one we already saw in \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Listen\u00e2\u20ac\u009d and \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Before the Flood.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d As I understood it, a young Doctor once heard the prophecy about the Hybrid\u00c2\u00a0in<\/i>\u00c2\u00a0the Cloisters, and to date, he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s still the only person to have escaped them alive. (Well, Clara might count, but is she technically even alive?) It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s the reason for his fear of the Hybrid\u00c2\u00a0and<\/i>\u00c2\u00a0the reason he stole a TARDIS and escaped from Gallifrey.<\/p>\n
I think??? I don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t understand why the Doctor was so frightened by the prophecy. Did he somehow think he was the cause of it? What inspired him to run away? Moffat\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s vagueness here is what turned me off of series seven, and there\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s been so little of this series. It made the use of it in the finale all the more glaring, which is frustrating since there\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s so much good here! THE END OF THE UNIVERSE. The collapse of Gallifrey! The last surviving being is ASHILDUR\/ME!!! What\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s not to love about this?<\/p>\n
Well, it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s probably the utterly unsatisfying resolution of what the Hybrid is. The Doctor may have caused the rumor to spread in the first place, so it could be another bootstrap paradox. OR it was a self-fulfilling prophecy. Or it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s two people? Or one. Or none? Or it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s the way that Clara and the Doctor interact. WHO IS IT. WHAT IS A HYBRID. Nooooo, Moffat, you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve done SO WELL not dangling the carrot and then yanking it away at the end of your stories. WHY BRING THIS BACK NOW? It made Clara\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s return after her death seem silly in one sense. I personally liked it because she got to reject what the Doctor had planned for her. Additionally, I felt like the script was more or less criticizing the end of Donna Noble\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s stint as a companion by pointing out how unfair it was for the Doctor to erase a companion\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s memory without their consent.<\/p>\n
Even then? I really expected the neuro blocker to affect Clara, not the Doctor. That was an interesting twist, and I can\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t complain about the result. Clara gets to accept her death as a necessary and fixed point in time, but she also gets her own TARDIS. And instead of heading straight back to Gallifrey, she takes the long way around.<\/p>\n
WITH ASHILDR AS HER COMPANION. EVERYTHING ABOUT THIS IS PERFECT. I WANT AN ENTIRE SPIN-OFF MINISERIES ABOUT THIS, THANK YOU, I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122LL BE WAITING RIGHT HERE FOR THAT. This resolution works for me because Clara gets to leave on her own terms, rather than as a plot twist for someone else. Yes, it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s still frustrating that she\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s dragged out in the midst of the Hybrid plot, and that story isn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t even resolved. But emotionally, this finale works for me. It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s still sad; all of the Doctor\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s scenes in the diner from \u00e2\u20ac\u0153The Impossible Astronaut\u00e2\u20ac\u009d are bittersweet. He may remember pieces of the story; he might be able to collect the details. But it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s time for the Doctor to move on from Clara, who has her own adventures to have before she\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s done.<\/p>\n
And I need those adventures in my life. GREENLIGHT THE MINISERIES, BBC.<\/p>\n
The video for \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Hell Bent\u00e2\u20ac\u009d can be downloaded\u00c2\u00a0here for $0.99<\/a>.<\/p>\n Mark Links Stuff<\/b><\/p>\n – I am now on Patreon<\/a><\/b>!!! MANY SURPRISES ARE IN STORE FOR YOU IF YOU SUPPORT ME<\/a>. In the twelfth and final episode of the ninth series of\u00c2\u00a0Doctor Who, the Doctor discovers who imprisoned him. Intrigued? Then it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s time for Mark to watch\u00c2\u00a0Doctor Who.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[18],"class_list":["post-5630","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-doctor-who","tag-mark-watches-doctor-who"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5630","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5630"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5630\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5630"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5630"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5630"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\n– I\u00c2\u00a0will be at numerous conventions in 2016! Check the full list of events on my Tour Dates \/ Appearances page.<\/a>
\n– My Master Schedule<\/a> is updated for the near and distant future for most projects, so please check it often.\u00c2\u00a0My next Double Features for Mark Watches will be Death Note<\/em>\u00c2\u00a0and\u00c2\u00a0Neon Genesis Evangelion<\/em>. On Mark Reads, Diane Duane’s Young Wizards<\/i> series will replace the Emelan books.
\n<\/b>-\u00c2\u00a0Mark Does Stuff is on Facebook!<\/a>\u00c2\u00a0I’ve got a community page up that I’m running. Guaranteed shenanigans!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"