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Doctor Who 6.05 The Rebel Flesh
As I said to ![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
relia earlier, "The Rebel Flesh" sounds like a romance novel. I thought "Rebel Flesh" sounded even more romantic, but she pointed out that with a comma it became an imperative "rebel, flesh!", sort of a "workers of the world, unite!" for post-Singularity times. Anyway, I am disappointed to report that The Rebel Flesh was not a romance novel. It was probably the most coherent ep of the season so far, despite being part one of a two-parter (the dreaded Moffat two-parter), and sort of played out like a low-rent but less bad version of The Hungry Earth. To wit:
- Solar tsunami? Solar tsunami?? Solar tsunami???
- The doppelgangers were Voldemort. All of them. Voldemort. Voldemort everywhere. HP's been out long enough that the makers of this episode had to know what they were doing with the noselessness, i.e. leaping straight into the Narmy Valley. It didn't bother me that much, actually, as I wasn't planning to take the ep seriously in the first place, but I guess if I was hoping they would be creepy the Voldemortness would bother me.
- I could actually follow what was going on during the whole thing and point A led to point B! It was also ragingly predictable, but given the choice between predictable and nonsensical I'm going to go with predictable. That was refreshing for this season. It's really sad how my standards have dropped.
- That being said, it really was The Hungry Earth -- race of not-quite-humans opposed to cast of panicking humans! Thunderbolts and lightning, very very frightening! Everyone's just scared! Some intolerant shrieky power-hungry woman character fucks it all up and drives them to war despite the Doctor's best man-warnings! Narmy lines are uttered! SyFy original movie unironic seriousness is exercised! Solar tsunami! Solar tsunami! I'm just going to repeat the phrase "Solar tsunami" until it really sinks in that this episode casually used something called a "solar tsunami" as a plot device!!
- Rory really liked his Cylon girlfriend. Actually, I think he likes his Cylon girlfriend more than he's liked anything so far on this show. It's made him marginally sympathetic for the duration of this ep, albeit tropeily The Helo protecting The Sharon. I'm just saying, is there going to be some halfassed explanation why Rory is so into Cylon Jennifer or is this just going to be an unfortunately overenthusiastic acting choice on Arthur Darvill's part?
- Similarly, I thought the Doctor's "forgetting about" Rory/getting annoyed he was being brought up was an indication the Doctor was a Cylon too, but I guess he was just being a dick, as Voldoctor is a later discovery.
- They really look like Voldemort.
- The Flesh, by the way, looks like Flubber, and I'm not sure how they all didn't see through the Doctor's SyFy film-esque bluffing (nor his companions' cluelessness) at the beginning but -- why am I asking these questions, okay, I should just be grateful this episode followed whatsoever and didn't involve any timey-wimey.
- They went to the UK? In the near future? No way.
- Solar tsunami.
- This episode was suffused with technobabble altogether, and I'm still not sure why there exists a factory at an isolated island monastery just to produce acid to disable their own factory in a solar tsunami, but I guess I've got a lovely bunch of coconuts, here they all are standing in a row.
- Can we get an Intolerant Leader Ruins Everything who's a man next time? Or a plot that isn't recycled from a SyFy movie or a Star Trek episode? Actually, I'm just going to give this one positive reinforcement: yes, keep writing eps that have some sense of coherency, even if Amy has like no lines and Rory is obsessed with Cylon Jennifer and there is a solar tsunami.
Also, at B&N in Philadelphia today I got a B&N bookbag with Stephen Colbert's image emblazoned on it. Walking around wearing the lilac and carrying Stephenbag was like, the most flaming statement of my identity I have ever gotten the chance to wear on my person. I was so happy.
relia earlier, "The Rebel Flesh" sounds like a romance novel. I thought "Rebel Flesh" sounded even more romantic, but she pointed out that with a comma it became an imperative "rebel, flesh!", sort of a "workers of the world, unite!" for post-Singularity times. Anyway, I am disappointed to report that The Rebel Flesh was not a romance novel. It was probably the most coherent ep of the season so far, despite being part one of a two-parter (the dreaded Moffat two-parter), and sort of played out like a low-rent but less bad version of The Hungry Earth. To wit:- Solar tsunami? Solar tsunami?? Solar tsunami???
- The doppelgangers were Voldemort. All of them. Voldemort. Voldemort everywhere. HP's been out long enough that the makers of this episode had to know what they were doing with the noselessness, i.e. leaping straight into the Narmy Valley. It didn't bother me that much, actually, as I wasn't planning to take the ep seriously in the first place, but I guess if I was hoping they would be creepy the Voldemortness would bother me.
- I could actually follow what was going on during the whole thing and point A led to point B! It was also ragingly predictable, but given the choice between predictable and nonsensical I'm going to go with predictable. That was refreshing for this season. It's really sad how my standards have dropped.
- That being said, it really was The Hungry Earth -- race of not-quite-humans opposed to cast of panicking humans! Thunderbolts and lightning, very very frightening! Everyone's just scared! Some intolerant shrieky power-hungry woman character fucks it all up and drives them to war despite the Doctor's best man-warnings! Narmy lines are uttered! SyFy original movie unironic seriousness is exercised! Solar tsunami! Solar tsunami! I'm just going to repeat the phrase "Solar tsunami" until it really sinks in that this episode casually used something called a "solar tsunami" as a plot device!!
- Rory really liked his Cylon girlfriend. Actually, I think he likes his Cylon girlfriend more than he's liked anything so far on this show. It's made him marginally sympathetic for the duration of this ep, albeit tropeily The Helo protecting The Sharon. I'm just saying, is there going to be some halfassed explanation why Rory is so into Cylon Jennifer or is this just going to be an unfortunately overenthusiastic acting choice on Arthur Darvill's part?
- Similarly, I thought the Doctor's "forgetting about" Rory/getting annoyed he was being brought up was an indication the Doctor was a Cylon too, but I guess he was just being a dick, as Voldoctor is a later discovery.
- They really look like Voldemort.
- The Flesh, by the way, looks like Flubber, and I'm not sure how they all didn't see through the Doctor's SyFy film-esque bluffing (nor his companions' cluelessness) at the beginning but -- why am I asking these questions, okay, I should just be grateful this episode followed whatsoever and didn't involve any timey-wimey.
- They went to the UK? In the near future? No way.
- Solar tsunami.
- This episode was suffused with technobabble altogether, and I'm still not sure why there exists a factory at an isolated island monastery just to produce acid to disable their own factory in a solar tsunami, but I guess I've got a lovely bunch of coconuts, here they all are standing in a row.
- Can we get an Intolerant Leader Ruins Everything who's a man next time? Or a plot that isn't recycled from a SyFy movie or a Star Trek episode? Actually, I'm just going to give this one positive reinforcement: yes, keep writing eps that have some sense of coherency, even if Amy has like no lines and Rory is obsessed with Cylon Jennifer and there is a solar tsunami.
Also, at B&N in Philadelphia today I got a B&N bookbag with Stephen Colbert's image emblazoned on it. Walking around wearing the lilac and carrying Stephenbag was like, the most flaming statement of my identity I have ever gotten the chance to wear on my person. I was so happy.