Doctor Who – "A Good Man Goes To War" Review

This is it: the mid-season finale of series 6 of Doctor Who, as helmed by Steven Moffat. As he promised, this series would be split into two parts to heighten tension and allow more time to work on the show. While fans of BBC America will have to wait until next week to see the episodes, British fans (and American fans who ask their British friends to live webcast the episodes via Skype) have now seen the rather intense Moffat-written episode that brings this initial arc to a close, answering some questions, making older mysteries more mysterious, and adding in a few new ones.

Take a look behind the cut for some thoughts on the episode. As a note, big spoilers are discussed (sorry, BBC America watchers).

If there is one thing to be said about Doctor Who, it is that it is the most consistently entertaining show on television. It is also the longest running show on television, so I’m sure that any praise I heap onto the show will just get lost in the mass of praise that is already there and that is to come. Yet there is something to be said for a show with as stoic and grandiose a history as Doctor Who, a show that not only manages to randomly pay tribute to it’s past but also consistently reinvent itself in satisfying fashions as the show moves past 30+ seasons, myriads of specials, and a TV movie.

So. Demons run when a good man goes to war. This is the big important bit of this episode; our Doctor, who is a pacifist, is also the single most deadly creature in the entire universe. It’s an element of the character that Moffat has been working with very specifically since he first took over, with the Doctor’s legendary rage playing a large part in last season’s finale with the Pandorica. Now we are given an episode that very heavily looks at the Doctor’s own mythology, as he rounds up an army to go after Amy Pond’s kidnappers in a bombastic rescue mission against a still not understood enemy. Careful watchers will remember that the Church previously appeared in the Moffat-penned Time of the Angels episode, in which River revealed herself to be a member (thus adding all sorts of head tilting elements given this episode). The Church have kidnapped Amy Pond in order to use her child as a weapon against the Doctor, and boy, what a weapon they have ended up creating.

There is no real way to discuss the episode without getting into spoilers, so let’s just dive right in: this episode reveals that Amy Pond and Rory Williams who, after getting jiggy in the TARDIS on their wedding night, gave birth to the girl who would become River Song (and whose real name is Melody Pond (Oh, we get it now!)). River Song was then stolen by the Church and cultivated to be a weapon against the Doctor, because the Doctor is too dangerous to allowed to just be an entity roaming the galaxy and doing as he wishes. It’s a very proactive stance to take against someone who is rather reactive, but such is the way of man – shoot first, ask questions after. The episode is really contingent on the belief of a few things, specifically that the enemy here knows something we don’t know. Like River Song, there are many questions left unanswered by the end of the episode, but one thing is clear: The Doctor, when pushed the right way, really is actually dangerous.

This is one of the basic tenements that the episode hinges itself upon: if Matt Smith isn’t believable as an anti-hero, then none of this works. The Doctor even notes in character that “anger” is a new emotion to him (at least, this version of him), and he’s not quite sure what to do with it. Smith’s usual performance as a wacky scatter-brain is replaced with that as a devious and calculating leader, and while his intentions are pure and his heart is in the right place you can’t help but agree that the Church here may be right. Smith nails it as both the wacky and lovable Doctor who always tells people to run and the man who forces a Colonel to tell his army that he is a coward, and that speaks wonders both to his ability in the role but also the relationship between Moffat and Smith. Moffat is so incredibly specific down to the tiniest bit of minutiae when it comes to the Doctor, so that Smith and the assorted directors can pick up on that and get this point across is great for the show.

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It’s really Rory/Arthur Darvill that gets the real spotlight, though. The show has been harsh to poor Rory, the man always playing second fiddle to his much stronger wife. However, Rory the Last Centurion finally gets his chance to shine, with a wonderful opening monologue dedicated to him, a fantastic opening sequence starring him, and Rory finally breaking out of his weak shell into the man he was always meant to be as he rescues Amy and tearfully presents their child to her. Rory is a character who I initially didn’t root for as he just stood between the Amy/Doctor relationship (I don’t mean that in a romantic way, I just mean it was boring to watch a fiance/husband be jealous 24/7). However, Rory has become the single character to really root for on the show as he was the only one left with any major character threads open; the Doctor is the Doctor and Amy is pretty self assured as is. Seeing Rory the Roman look the Cybermen in the “eye” and essentially say, “I’m sorry. Did I stutter, bitches?” is fantastic. (Obviously, I’m paraphrasing.)

The episode itself is quite a pulse pounder, as well. While every episode of this season bar one has been generally good, theres one thing that is for certain: the stakes have never really been raised this high. We always ran the risk of people falling while the Doctor is around, but whenever Moffat is writing an episode you can be sure that nothing is sacred. Throughout the majority of the episode, we’re left clenching our teeth and sitting at the edge of the seat, worrying for every character on the show. Rory has the most to lose – is it possible that his time is up? Amy was replaced by a ganger in a devastating revelation from the last episode – is it possible more tragedy could befall the young couple? Ultimately the answer is yes, as the newborn baby is reborn to be a ganger and Amy is left alone with a pile of melted flesh. It’s rather heartbreaking, and before the eventual revelation/confirmation that River Song is her daughter, you can’t help but feel awful for Karen Gillan.

As Doctor Who wraps up this half-season, we are left with a lot of questions. That’s probably for the best. This episode doesn’t really wrap up “this arc” of episodes so much as it just shows a clear halfway point in the bigger story. There are no great answers aside from the River Song revelation. The break feels a bit awkward to be honest, and you can’t help but kind of groan at the fact that there is a break at all. It seems like, as good an episode as this was, that we should just see the whole season now and do away with the break. It’s not like the episode ends on an epic cliffhanger; it simply ends at the logical point for this episode to end, with the Doctor running off an errand and River Song standing with her identity revealed. So now what? What does this have to do with anything? Now that we know who River was, does this mean that the identity of the Impossible Astronaut stands revealed as well – that River, as a child, actually succeeded in killing the Doctor, thus fulfilling her purpose as a weapon? What does this have to do with the Silents, and their “fall” that was mentioned by an unknown voice in the series 5 finale? And what about the eye-patch lady and the Church – who exactly are they working for, and why? The government? Is there a greater villain in the background that we have yet to see? And what about the destruction of the TARDIS that we have yet to fully see? And what about that regeneration we saw back in the two-part season opener – was that still River, and if so what does that mean?

Suffice it to say, this is going to be a long and hard wait until “Let’s Kill Hitler!”

However, Doctor Who still manages to deliver with a great mid-season finale. It left me on the edge of my seat for the duration of the episode (honestly, I was expecting Rory to die, and I was nervous about the notion) and it has left me rather heavily anticipating what’s to come. That’s all you can really hope for with a show, right? If a show actively makes you want to see more, engages you in a stimulating thought process, and essentially demands your attention at all times then it is nothing if not a great success. Doctor Who is all of those things, and even after 777 episodes (according to Wikipedia) it still retains it’s attitude and style. Moffat has proved a decisive show runner post-Davies, and while the tactics Moffat is trying out with the show leaves me a bit uneasy, I can’t argue with the results.