The Name of the Doctor

Last updated

239 "The Name of the Doctor"
Doctor Who episode
Doctor Who The Name of The Doctor.jpg
Promotional poster
Cast
Others
Production
Directed by Saul Metzstein
Written by Steven Moffat
Script editorJohn Phillips
Produced byDenise Paul
Marcus Wilson (series producer)
Executive producer(s)
  • Steven Moffat
  • Caroline Skinner
Music by Murray Gold
Series Series 7
Running time45 minutes
First broadcast18 May 2013 (2013-05-18)
Chronology
 Preceded by
"Nightmare in Silver"
Followed by 
"The Night of the Doctor" (mini-episode)

"The Day of the Doctor" (special)

List of Doctor Who episodes (2005–present)

"The Name of the Doctor" is the thirteenth and final episode of the seventh series of the British science fiction television series Doctor Who . It was first broadcast on BBC One on 18 May 2013. It was written by Steven Moffat and directed by Saul Metzstein. The episode was watched by 7.45 million viewers in the UK and received positive reviews from critics.

Contents

In the episode, an entity called the Great Intelligence (Richard E. Grant) kidnaps Victorian-era detectives Madame Vastra (Neve McIntosh) and Jenny Flint (Catrin Stewart) and their butler Strax (Dan Starkey) to force their friend, time-travelling alien the Doctor (Matt Smith), to go to the planet Trenzalore, the site of the Doctor's future grave. The Intelligence's plan is to trap the Doctor and then force the Doctor to open a door in time so the Intelligence can reverse all the Doctor's victories. It is the first appearance of John Hurt's War Doctor.

The episode features several references to previous episodes of the series. It was leaked after the american Blu-ray release of series 7b.

Plot

In 1893, Madame Vastra and Jenny Flint are given information concerning the Doctor by Clarence DeMarco, in return for a stay on his execution. They use soporific drugs to hold a conference call through time and space between themselves, Strax, River Song, and Clara, in a dream. Vastra repeats DeMarco's words: "The Doctor has a secret he will take to the grave, and it is discovered." During their conference, eyeless humanoids called Whisper Men kidnap Vastra and Strax and kill Jenny. The Great Intelligence tells Clara to tell the Doctor that his friends are "lost" unless he goes to Trenzalore.

The Doctor and Clara travel to Trenzalore, the planet holding his future grave, to save his friends. The planet is covered with tombstones, the result of a great war, while a future version of the TARDIS (having deteriorated and grown to enormous size) stands above the graveyard. The duo are attacked by Whisper Men. An echo of River, still telepathically linked to Clara, helps direct the two to an escape route that leads to the giant TARDIS. Strax, Vastra, and Jenny (who is revived by Strax) are awakened by Whisper Men and meet the Great Intelligence.

The Great Intelligence threatens to kill the Doctor's allies unless the Doctor says his name to unlock the TARDIS doors. The Doctor refuses, but as he speaks, River says the Doctor's name and unlocks the TARDIS. Inside, the Doctor reveals a pulsating column of light to be his time stream. The Great Intelligence enters it in order to undo the Doctor's past as revenge for all the defeats it has been dealt. The positive effects of the Doctor's travels begin to be nullified by the Intelligence's interference. Jenny disappears, while Strax, having forgotten his history with Madame Vastra, attacks her and she vaporizes him in self-defense.

Clara remembers the Doctor telling her that she has helped the Doctor in other places in time and space. She enters the time stream to restore the Doctor's timeline, bringing Jenny and Strax back in the process. Echoes of Clara fall through space and time and appear in adventures of the Doctor's previous incarnations. The Doctor enters the column of light to save the original Clara, guiding her from a place where she sees several previous incarnations of the Doctor. Reunited, the two spot another figure in the shadows which Clara does not recognise. The Doctor explains the elderly figure is another past incarnation of himself, but what he did in the past was not in the Doctor's name. The figure turns around, revealing himself to be the War Doctor, the incarnation who fought during the great Time War.

Continuity

Imagery of the Doctor's prior incarnations is used during scenes in which Clara and the Great Intelligence interact with the Doctor. Footage of the First (from The Aztecs , 1964, with dialogue from The Web Planet , 1965), Second, Third (both from The Five Doctors , 1983), Fourth ( The Invasion of Time , 1978), Fifth ( Arc of Infinity , 1983), and Seventh ( Dragonfire , 1987) Doctors was shown. Stunt doubles were used for some other brief appearances, including the Sixth Doctor walking past Clara while she is in a corridor. Several Doctors can also be seen running past her in the Doctor's time stream. [1] The opening scene also includes a representation of Susan Foreman and reference to the Doctor's original departure from Gallifrey (as a globed city, previously seen in "The Sound of Drums", and later seen destroyed in "The End of Time").

The Great Intelligence says that the Doctor has been "bloodsoaked" several times, talking about the leader of the Sycorax (whom the Tenth Doctor kills in "The Christmas Invasion"), Solomon the trader (whom the Eleventh Doctor sends to his death in "Dinosaurs on a Spaceship"), the Daleks, and the Cybermen. The Great Intelligence also states that the Doctor will be known as the Valeyard before the end of his life. The Valeyard appeared in the 1986 serial The Trial of a Time Lord , where he is described as an amalgamation of the darker sides of the Doctor's nature, somewhere between his twelfth and final incarnations. [2]

Production

The Whisper Men as they appear at the Doctor Who Experience. Doctor Who Experience (30943593585).jpg
The Whisper Men as they appear at the Doctor Who Experience.

Lead writer Steven Moffat stated that he wanted to have a new monster in the finale, after the series had seen the reappearance of old monsters such as the Ice Warriors, Cybermen, and Daleks. The idea of the Whisper Men came from "the thought of stylish, whispering, almost faceless creatures" which seemed frightening and appropriate for "an episode that looks forward and back". [3]

Casting

"The Name of the Doctor" stars Matt Smith and Jenna Coleman star as the eleventh Doctor and Clara Oswald respectively. [1]

John Hurt makes his first appearance as the War Doctor. [4] He would later appear in "The Night of the Doctor" and "The Day of the Doctor". [5] [6]

Broadcast and reception

Mini-episodes

"The Name of the Doctor" was released alongside various mini-episodes. "She Said, He Said" is a mini-episode that acts as a prelude to "The Name of the Doctor", in which the Eleventh Doctor and Clara each have a monologue about how little they know about each other and that they discovered each other's secret at Trenzalore. It was released on 11 May 2013 on BBC Red Button and online. Viewers using Red Button were able to access the prologue between 7:40 and midnight every evening, until "The Name of the Doctor" aired on 18 May 2013. [7] Also released to promote the episode were three "Strax Field Reports", in the first of which, subtitled "The Name of the Doctor", Strax informed the Sontarans of a great battle predicted to occur and admitting suspicions that it had to do with the Doctor's greatest secret. He informed Sontar that the operation was called "The Name of the Doctor". [8] In the second, subtitled "A Glorious Day Is Almost Upon Us...", Strax discussed a 'glorious day' in which death was likely. [9] The final field report – "The Doctor's Greatest Secret" – discussed the cliffhanger, commenting that this new Doctor had the appearance of a warrior. [10] This was the only field report released after the episode.

Leak

On 12 May 2013, a week before the official premiere of "The Name of The Doctor", it was announced that 210 Doctor Who fans in the United States had received their Blu-ray box set of the second half of the seventh series early due to a production error. After successfully requesting that they not reveal the plot, the BBC sent the recipients copies of an interview with the cast. [11] Moffat later complimented the "210 of them, with the top secret episode in their grasp – and because we asked nicely, they didn't breathe a word." [12]

Broadcast

Professional ratings
Review scores
SourceRating
IGN 9.1/10 [13]
New York Magazine Star full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svgStar empty.svg [14]
Radio Times Star full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svg [15]
SFX Star full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svg [16]
The A.V. Club C+ [17]
The Telegraph Star full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svg [18]
TV FanaticStar full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svg [19]

"The Name of the Doctor" was released on BBC One on 18 May 2013. The overnight ratings estimated that it was seen by 5.46 million viewers upon its initial release. [20] When viewers who watched the episode later on were taken into account, the figure rose to 7.45 million, making Doctor Who the third most-watched programme of the week on BBC One. [21] The episode received an Appreciation Index of 88. [22]

Critical reception

The episode received positive reviews. The Guardian described the episode as "the best episode of the season", and "possibly the best finale we've seen". [23] Mark Snow of IGN gave the episode 9.1/10, praising the final conversation between the Doctor and River Song, as well as the revelation about Clara; however he noted that the Great Intelligence was "a little underwhelming" and "not very threatening", and that while the Whispermen impressed initially, they did not "[make] a great villain." [13] Michael Hogan of The Daily Telegraph said that the episode was "even better" than the previous two. He noted that it was "momentous, moving and thrilling". However, he also noted that the episode had "a tad too much clunking exposition, the odd spot of creaky CGI and some unconvincing metaphors about soufflés and leaves." Despite this, he called it a "breathless, brilliant finale". [18] Some advance coverage of the story assumed the Doctor's name would actually be revealed in the episode. [24]

The episode was nominated for the 2014 Hugo Awards for Best Dramatic Presentation (Short Form), along with "The Day of the Doctor", An Adventure in Space and Time and The Five(ish) Doctors Reboot . [25] They lost to the Game of Thrones episode "The Rains of Castamere". [26]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sontaran</span> Fictional race from the Doctor Who franchise

The Sontarans are a fictional race of extraterrestrial humanoids principally portrayed in the British science fiction television programme Doctor Who and its spin-off series The Sarah Jane Adventures. A warrior race characterised by their ruthlessness and fearlessness of death, they were conceived by writer and future story editor Robert Holmes and first appeared in the 1973 Doctor Who serial The Time Warrior.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Time Lord</span> Fictional alien species in the Doctor Who universe

The Time Lords are a fictional ancient race of extraterrestrial people in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, of which the series' main protagonist, the Doctor, is a member. Time Lords are so named for their command of time travel technology and their non-linear perception of time. Originally, they were described as a powerful and wise race from the planet Gallifrey, from which the Doctor was a renegade; details beyond this were very limited for the first decade of the series. They later became integral to many episodes and stories as their role in the universe developed. For the first eight years after the series resumed in 2005, the Time Lords were said to have been destroyed during the Last Great Time War at some point in the show's continuity between the television movie in 1996 and the show's revival. In 2013, the 50th anniversary special "The Day of the Doctor" concerned this supposed destruction and their eventual survival.

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Great Intelligence</span> Fictional character in the TV series Doctor Who

The Great Intelligence is a fictional character from the British science fiction television series Doctor Who. Although the Great Intelligence has no physical form, it is capable of communicating, both by itself and through possession, with other characters within the series. The Great Intelligence was originally created by Henry Lincoln and Mervyn Haisman and first appeared in the 1967 serial The Abominable Snowmen where it encountered the Second Doctor and his companions Jamie and Victoria. The Great Intelligence tries to form a physical body so as to conquer the Earth, making use of Yeti robots that resemble the cryptozoological creatures. Initially the Great Intelligence used the Yeti robots to scare off curiosity seekers, only later using them as an army. Both the Intelligence and the Yeti returned in its sequel The Web of Fear.

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River Song is a fictional character created by Steven Moffat and played by Alex Kingston in the British science-fiction series Doctor Who. River Song was introduced to the series as an experienced future companion of series protagonist the Doctor, an alien Time Lord who travels through time in his TARDIS. Because River Song is a time traveller herself, her adventures with the Doctor occur out of synchronisation; their first meeting is with the Tenth Doctor, the Doctor's first and apparently her last. Kingston plays her in 15 episodes, as River becomes a companion, romantic interest and eventual wife of the Doctor in his eleventh incarnation portrayed by Matt Smith. From a production perspective, the Twelfth Doctor is the last incarnation to meet her, spending a 24-year-long night with her, before her first meeting with the Tenth Doctor. From the timeline perspective, the final time River meets with the Doctor, she is a hologram/echo from the library archives; she and the Eleventh Doctor part ways in the episode, "The Name of the Doctor".

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References

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