12.26: The Husbands of River Song

In which everything ends, perfectly. And then it’s not the end.

Broadcast: December 2015

Watched: April 2022

“Hello, sweetie” is one of those perfect moments that Doctor Who used to have when it was good. 

Actually, loads of lovely lines in this:

• “I think I’m going to need a bigger flowchart.”

• “The murder of a creature like that wouldn’t weigh heavily on my conscience, even if I had one.”

• River on men: “They’ll automatically believe any story they’re the hero of.” Ouch.

For most of its run time, after two seasons absolutely freighted with thought about the TRUE MEANING OF DOCTOR WHO, this is just a lovely silly romp. (One way in which it slightly continues the recent deconstruction: by having the Doctor get to play the companion and do the “It’s bigger on the inside!” routine. But that’s pretty slight.) It’s quite funny that for Moffat’s last episode he decided to look at what the Doctor’s wife gets up to behind his back, and it turns out the answer is “Bigamy and crime”.

Anyway, some great bits:

• First person we see is Nardole, who even the writer doesn’t currently know is the new companion. Cool. Also works as the Doctor and he are instantly made coconspirators by circumstances.

• Greg Davies as a disembodied tyrant’s head shouting from inside a bag is brilliant. The moment the head falls to the ground nose first is hilarious.

• The Harmony Shoal, with the opening heads, are horrible, but the moment Scratch says “This is not a public place!” and it turns out everyone else in the restaurant is the same is brilliant. Even better is the bit twenty seconds later when he casually announces they’ve only done this because they all love Hydrolax so much.

• The bit where they’re arguing over which of them is going to sacrifice themselves, before they remember they’re on a cruise which you have to have committed genocide to get onto, and even the staff are mass murderers...

• ...so finally, at the end of Moffat’s run, the Doctor just saves himself. Then he goes for a nice dinner with his wife. It feels like it would have been a metaphor if he’d finished, as intended. 

And then, at the end, there’s something else: a new end to the River story, which is perfect, even though we thought we’d seen the end at the very beginning. And that’s the final great bit: River knowing it’s the end, literally begging the Doctor to save her, him saying, “Not everything can be avoided - not forever”, perfectly in keeping with the last few episodes... 

...and then there is a get out clause, after all. Because tonight lasts for 24 years.

If this had been the end of an era, with a callback to the prologue to the Moffat era, it would have been perfect...

“All anyone will ever tell you is that when the wind stands fair and the night is perfect, when you least expect it but always when you need it the most there is a song.”

...but then he did another 14 episodes. Cool.

Other thoughts:

• Snow in the opening credits!

• It’s 5343. What is it with Moffat and the 6th millennium? I was going to say that by this time apparently intergalactic travel is apparently easy, but we have no reason to think humans can do it, and also only those of us who were bitten by a radioactive copy of Ahistory will care, so. [Lance Park’s guide to the franchise’s continuity, which is now on something like its eighth edition, is four times the length of the Bible and is constantly out of date.]

• River gives the Doctor the codename “Damsel”. Awesome.

• The TARDIS can’t close the door while someone is inside and outside at the same time. Considerate.

• Feel a bit sorry for Ramone.

• The way River is prepared for it to be any of the first 12 Doctors – which takes us, confusingly, up to the eleventh Doctor – suggests that, depressingly, all those BFs are probably canon.

• Misuse of the word parsec, it’s a measure of distance not another word for “sector”. Mind you, Star Wars uses it as a unit of time, so maybe it’s a reference.

• River married Stephen Fry? Twist.

• The restaurant bit is basically a shameless lift from Hitchhikers, with Hydroflax’s body/Ramone/Nardole in the role of Marvin. Cool. (Probably for the best we find out the Doctor undoes this, as euch.)

• The Forest of the Dead music plays when the Doctor gives River her own screwdriver. Oh.