Talk and Relevant Discussions in Snark: Doctor Who “Kill the Moon” SPOILER Thread

Proceed for my thoughts, and yours…

-Keeping track of Doctor Who continuity since 1963 is a fool’s errand, as is expecting every episode to adhere to it. But I’m pretty sure this one ignored many established incidences of future history.

-Okay, I pretty much expected the spiders would turn out to be not-evil in some way. I didn’t quite call it as yet another variation of “The Beast Below,” but I’ll bet many of you did. I was thinking “Satan Pit” at first.

-Yes, Doctor, we all remember the episode “Let’s Kill Hitler.” But by all means say that a few more times.

-I know it’s been established in nu-Who since almost the beginning, but it is interesting how the modern incarnation lets companions live their ordinary lives while being companions, whereas before, they were stuck with the Doctor for an indefinite time until he either got them home or (more often) to a nicer place than they lived before. Reading perhaps way too much into it, is it a rape metaphor, maybe? We’re nowadays only comfortable if explicit, affirmative companion consent is there?

-I relate to the central allegory in this episode: as an editor, you want to train your writers to do the right thing themselves first time, rather than just jump in and fix things yourself. Probably true of a showrunner as well. But that isn’t really the Doctor, is it? If humanity could be left to its own devices, he’d leave us alone.

-“Disruptive influence” is named Courtney – gotta “Love” that, especially when the Doctor gets, y’know, curt with her. I do like the idea of her as companion; grandfather types and kids have a unique sort of bond that people with more active love lives can’t quite understand. Making her a borderline delinquent takes the cutesy edge off in the way a U.S.-based show would not. Now, if her name’s actually a tribute to Nicholas Courtney, a prior soldier who wound up teaching math, that’s cool too.

-Why do I have the horrible feeling that we will eventually see the day Danny decided he’d had enough of being a soldier – and it’ll turn out the Doctor was involved somehow?

-If the monster in the moon were in fact a giant flea or similar parasite, would that make it a Lunar Tick?

Your turn…