The Time of Angels/Flesh and Stone review [Steven Moffat]

"Didn't anyone every tell you there's one thing you never put in a trap? If you're smart, if you value your continued existence, if you have any plans about seeing tomorrow, there is one thing you never, ever put in a trap." - The Doctor

Answering a twelve-thousand year-old message from archaeologist Dr River Song, the Doctor and Amy Pond join an expedition into the site of a crashed space-liner; a Maze of the Dead filled with hundreds of statues and one very patient Weeping Angel.

The Doctor's Case:

• A Good Quotation:
  
• "I didn't escape, sir. The angel killed me too."
• "I absolutely trust him." / "He's not some madman, then?" / "[Pause] I absolutely trust him."
• Whilst the Delirium Archive and the Doctor using museums to "keep score" aren't very interesting and the set too plain, the cold open of The Time of Angels is perhaps the best of series 5. We met Professor Song as a sort of "cool aunt" archaeologist in Silence in the Library and we return to her as Dr Song, a female James Bond who is more overtly sexual than in her old age. The sequence isn't entirely necessary to the story but is an exciting start to the episode, reintroducing us to River and in a light we didn't see much of in series 4. There are hints in the TARDIS of an almost Fourth/Romana I relationship between her and Eleventh, with River doing her environment check on the scanner and the Doctor simply poking his head outside.
• You would never have guessed that this was the first story of series 5 to be filmed given how comfortable Matt Smith seems to be in the role (especially given that he seems far more unsure in The Beast Below and Victory of the Daleks). He's given the chance to show off a wide range of emotion in Flesh and Stone. Where was all this certainty in Victory of the Daleks? He won't let River lie to Amy about her dying to make her feel better. Karen Gillan is fine as Amy.
• Why are the Daleks boring? Because so few new things have been tried out with them. Moffat avoids that pitfall and tells us plenty new things about the Weeping Angels, emphasising the fact that the angels we saw in Blink were starving scavengers. The Byzantium angel is the real deal. That which holds the image of an angel itself becomes an angel; you shouldn't look into an angel's eyes as it's the doorway to the soul; angels are able to communicate using the voices of the dead... These are all new powers that don't feel like they've come completely out of the blue, but instead make them more formidable and scary. 
• A Weeping Angel hiding out in a series of caves full of statues is a genius idea. The statues being angels themselves is even better. 
• Rather than continue giving us a glimpse of a crack in time at the end of every episode (as there was in The Beast Below and Victory of the Daleks) a crack becomes a significant part of the resolution to the plot and brings up more questions - like what's the significance of the date of Amy's wedding? Series 1 had the Bad Wolf meme; series 2 had Torchwood; series 3 had Mr Saxon; series 4 had the missing planets, the 2009 specials had "he will knock four times"... None of these really had much, if any, effect on the plot nor any exploration or answers given until the end of the series. Moffat has chosen to go further than that, having the mystery of the cracks revealed bit by bit. We know now that they were caused by an explosion, apparently on the day of Amy and Rory's wedding. This is a far more interesting take on a story arc than having to wait until the end of the series for any explanation.

The Valeyard's Case:

• A Bad Quotation:
• "He thinks he's so hot when he does that." - River
• "Ooh, Doctor. You sonicked her." - Amy
• "I don't need you to die for me, Doctor. Do I look that clingy?" - Amy
• Amy stopping the angel by pausing the recording at just the right time was clever, but she's very self-satisfied and barely shaken immediately afterwards.
• "You're good," River tells Amy after she asks if she is the Doctor's wife. Is she really that good? It's obvious in the way she speaks to him and we the audience have already had major hints from Silence in the Library/Forest of the Dead, so complimenting Amy on her sharpness feels undeserved.
• "So you don't know who I am yet." Of course he doesn't. If the Doctor knew her then so would Amy.
• Iain Glen is a wonderful actor but, whether it's the acting or the script, Father Octavian doesn't make much of an impression. The clerics at least have function but Octavian is there to interact with the Doctor and River, yet he fails to interest.
• The final scene with Amy forcing herself on the Doctor is uncomfortable to watch and not remotely funny, especially when one considers what uproar there would have been if their genders had been reversed. Amy hasn't been the most engaging character since her debut in The Eleventh Hour, but here she proves that she isn't only a companion it's difficult to empathise with but also a morally corrupt individual. She's so undignified as to have a one night stand with a man she barely knows on the eve of her wedding, one of a number of cruel things she will do to her fiancé/husband in the course of her run. Perhaps like Gwen's affair with Owen in series 1 of Torchwood, this was supposed to show her feelings being stuck in a boring world and not being able to share her extraordinary adventures with anyone else. However, even if this was the intention it doesn't come off, with Amy not seeming to have any doubts in her mind. Wanting to get away from Rory in a moment of cold feet might make sense, but her wanting something that isn't "long-term" shows that this isn't the case.
• The fear factor with the angels is that you never see them move so, although a tense scene Amy's walk may be, it was never a good idea to show the Weeping Angels moving. 
  
• In the first part, we had the creepy Maze of the Dead and, whilst the revitalised angels aboard the Byzantium in the second part are threatening (at least until the Doctor escapes from them so easily) this episode lacks the same horror element.
• In Silence in the Library/Forest of the Dead, River played a considerable role. In this two-parter, however, she's somewhat superfluous. Yes, she followed the Byzantium and brought in the Doctor in the previous episode, but she had no real effect on the plot and no role in the resolution. She's something of a bookend, beginning the story in The Time of Angels with a superb scene that highlights her character and then ends Flesh and Stone by cryptically referring to events to come. Also, what happens to the sympathetic and comforting woman seen in the forest with Amy between here and the psychopath in The Husbands of River Song?
• The eeriness of the voice of one of the angels' victims speaking from beyond the grave through a walkie-talkie is one thing, but hearing the voice come from an angel is another. A far less eerie nother.

Stray Facts:

• River knows how to write Old High Gallifreyan. 
  

This Reminds Me...:

• The Tenth Doctor encountered the Weeping Angels in Blink. The Fifth Doctor fought them earlier still in Fallen Angels but already knew about them.
• The Doctor tells River that the TARDIS isn't a taxi service, something he said in his fifth incarnation to Adric in Earthshock.
• "You, me, handcuffs," River says. In Forest of the Dead the Tenth Doctor had been handcuffed whilst River sacrificed herself. "Must it always end like this."

I'll Explain Later:

• Do the Rani and the Master leave their breaks on as well? Their TARDISes make the same noise as the Doctor's during (de)materialisation.
• Surely if the clerics in the forest were wiped from existence, other clerics would have been sent in their stead? The cracks in time don't, strictly speaking, make much sense.

The Inquisitor's Verdict: Without a doubt the best story since The Eleventh Hour. Matt Smith is excellent and Alex Kingston makes a welcome return as a River Song just as good as in her debut. Amy is a loose end but the presence of River, the setting, the menace of the angels and the little twists and turns make up for her. The second episode in a two-parter always has the pressure of whether or not it can wrap the story that's been built up in a satisfying way and whether it can continue the quality of part one on the way. Flesh and Stone certainly does, being just as entertaining as The Time of Angels despite one or two missteps (the moving angels and lusty Amy). Overall, this two-parter has been a worthy successor to both Blink and, with respect to River, Silence in the Library and Forest of the Dead. This is undoubtedly River's best story in the Moffat-era. A*

Doctor Who (Series 5)

Victory of the Daleks  |  The Time of Angels/Flesh and Stone  |  The Vampires of Venice

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