Doctor Who: The Day of the Doctor – review

• Doctor Who: The Day of the Doctor – review

  23 Nov 2013: First Gallifrey is destroyed. Then it's saved. And Billie Piper rescues everyone. Clear?
  
  

  
  

  First Gallifrey is destroyed. Then it's saved. And Billie Piper rescues everyone. Clear?

  
  

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  • The Observer, Saturday 23 November 2013 22.32 GMT

  

  Matt Smith, David Tennant and John Hurt star in the show. Click to see what else was on that day in 1963.

  Cancel all weekend plans, they said. Mark it in your diaries, they cried. For the day is nigh. "Our future depends on one single moment of one impossible day, the day I've been running from all my life. The day of the Doctor." The long-awaited, heavily hyped 50th anniversary of a peculiarly British phenomenon with 77 million viewers worldwide and the highest Audience Appreciation Index of any TV drama in the UK.
  Doctor Who first aired in 1963. Click to see what else was on that day in 1963. Photograph: theguardian.com So we did cancel all our plans. We gathered round with wide eyes and hopes and fears and Tardis pyjamas and Jaffa cakes. (Not me, the children. I'm doing a sugar detox.) And we weren't disappointed. Although we did get very confused.
  There had been arguments about the fact that we had no plans to see The Day of the Doctor in one of the 3-D selected cinemas across the UK. But although it would have made all the dreams of the 10-year-old come true, an evening cinema visit would have caused problems for those aged seven and three, who would have been up way past bedtime.
  So TV it had to be, content in the knowledge we were watching a "simulcast in over 75 countries from Canada to Colombia, Brazil to Botswana and Myanmar to Mexico." "The world is watching," intoned the continuity announcer, putting on a special spooky voice. Even the three-year-old knew what was happening: "It's the Day of the Doctor!"
  "Wow. It's the old theme tune. This is really old," said the jaded 10-year-old.
  It all started with a call at the school office and a date. What sort of a date is it when the other person is reading a book about quantum mechanics and proposing a trip to Mesopotamia? A pretty hot one if you're a companion. Seven minutes in and the three-year-old was already performing his own version of the show, using a nerf gun on the other side of the room while Arcadia was falling. The other two children are fans and were glued. Personally I am more of a Whatian than a Whovian. I still don't really understand who River Song is and why, if she is the Doctor's wife (is she the Doctor's wife?), that it's OK that he now seems to have taken up with the pretty Victorian lady/teacher/once-trapped-inside-a-Dalek one (Clara).
  Early on, as usual, I had questions. "Why have they banished him? What did they just say about his conscience?"
  "Shut up, mum."
  It was already slightly irritating that Elizabeth I turned out not to be River Song (Alex Kingston is even a lookey-likey). But Joanna Page heaving-bosomed and bareback with David Tennant will do. So much for the Virgin Queen. Ding indeed.
  "He's kissed thousands of girls," squealed the seven-year-old as they escaped from the horse-turned-rubbery-alien.
  By the time the fez had appeared three times and we had already been to the War to End All Wars and 1562 and had the Ventolin gag several times, I was exhausted. And we hadn't even had the merchandising shot of the sonic screwdrivers yet. But it was worth it for the triplet of Doctors shot: "I'm looking for the Doctor."
  "Well, you've certainly come to the right place."
  By this point, as it turned out the Ventolin inhaler girl was also a shape-shifter, I was looking at Twitter for reassurance. "Am I supposed to have a vague idea of what's going on or is that the whole point?" read one. "Relegated to margarita mixer as have absolutely no idea what's going on." Phew. Not just me, then.
  Beautiful acting, though. "Did you ever count how many children there were on Gallifrey that day?"
  "They're what you become if you destroy Gallifrey. The man who regrets. The man who forgets. The moment is coming. You have to decide." It was like Cup-a-Soups, except you add time. Right. And you could travel across time if you put yourself in a painting. Or something. I guess you have to do what you can when you don't have a Tardis.
  By the end I had so many questions. Is his real name "Never Cruel or Cowardly"? I was hoping for Graham. Are the Gallifreyan children all right? What does it mean if you fail at doing the right thing as long as you didn't succeed in doing the wrong? "Did you understand that?" I ask the 10-year-old. "Yes. He destroyed Gallifrey. Then he undestroyed it. It was brilliant." Three-year-old: "I think it was happy." From the seven-year-old: single thumb up (note: not double).
  Still, it was all worth it because, basically, Billie Piper saved everyone. And because we got this line: "I may have the body of a weak and feeble woman. But at the time so did the Zygon." I hope they did send Derren Brown some flowers, by the way.
  

  
  

  COPY  http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news