WHO KNOWS: Looking Back At The MOON

Season 8, Episode 7 “Kill the Moon”

As we wait for tonight’s trip on the Orient Express (IN SPACE!), let’s take a look back at what has become one of the more… problematic episodes of the season, shall we?

The problem with “Kill the Moon” isn’t that the science is awful, even though the science is awful. No, the problem with “Kill the Moon” is that so much of it is so very good, that the terrible science stands out so glaringly.

I’m not going to discuss the terrible science. There are plenty of reviewers out there who have done it quite well, and can cover the mass-of-the-moon issues, the moon-spider-biology issues, and the lights-of-the-earth issues – although that last one we will touch on a bit here – and I’ll leave it to those who can speak to the science with far more authority than I can. But in short, gravity and mass don’t work like that, germs don’t work like that, and we know far too much about the Moon for there to be an Alien Space Dragon growing inside it.

But we don’t tune into Doctor Who for the science, do we? We tune in for the story.

And the story is pretty damn good, actually. Yes, there are a few problems, like the scientific community having completely turned their backs on space a mere 35 years from now, odd references to certain internet sites, and that turning-off-the-lights-thing. Which is cool and dramatic, and just a terrible way to get a response. Look, in 45 minutes, there will only be a portion of the Earth that would be visible from the Moon, and that kind of control over the massive power-grids would be all government based, so really, Clara wasn’t getting the response from the people of Earth, but from whomever had their hands on the power switches. And there simply is no way that, even in this world of near-instant communication, the governments of the Earth are going to coordinate responses like that. Which actually makes her ignoring their decision a little better, since in a way, Clara is guilty of doing what she’ll later be angry at the Doctor for doing, by trying to make someone else make the decision.

And what about that? So the Doctor, seeing that this moment is not a fixed point in time but one in flux, decides that humanity needs to make the decision as to what happens, and not, for a change, have it made for them by the Doctor. It is a good choice on one level, as it is humanity’s future in question, and shouldn’t that be in the hands of humanity? Of course, we’ve met humanity, and seen over and over that we make terrible decisions, so it’s purest optimism to think that we’d get it right this time, but then again, the Doctor was really leaving the decision in the hands of Clara, whom he does trust to do the right thing. That he didn’t explain to her what he was doing is, as she points out, a pretty awful way to treat a friend, and I really can’t blame her for lashing out at him, because he did put her in a terrible position.

Or was it? When I was watching this episode, I couldn’t help but think that there was a lot less threat here than first appeared. In fact, the biggest threat was from humanity’s terrible plan to blow up the Moon. Seriously, the rather sizable chunks of Moon raining down upon the Earth would be a bad thing. A very bad thing. But since the Moon was a shell for the Alien Space Dragon, which came apart and dissolved (I guess), and if the bombs went off and killed the Alien Space Dragon, then the shell would still have come apart and dissolved (I guess), and the bombs would have likely disintegrated the Alien Space Dragon… well, wouldn’t the biggest danger be here that there was no Alien Space Dragon?

And yes, we do have to talk about the Alien Space Dragon for a second. You know what would have solved most of the science issues here and the handwavium of the “new” moon?

30 seconds of dialogue.

“Look”, the Doctor says, “We know the Moon isn’t actually an egg, that would be silly, but there’s some sort of dimensional rift here, and this… Alien Space Dragon from another dimension, it really does look like a dragon, doesn’t it, NOT a chicken, be quiet Courtney, is currently occupying the same space, more or less, as your Moon. Quite the problem, isn’t it? Right. Fix it ladies, I’m off.”

And:

“Oh look! It’s flown away, and the dimensional rift is closing. The Moon is back to normal. Isn’t that nice.”

And you would still have had your conflict and debate and all the rest. Speaking of debate, there has been quite a bit of discussion about the abortion subtext of the story, and I’ll be honest, I didn’t see that at all when I first watched it. Part of that, I think, is that I know that the subject, while present in the UK, doesn’t have quite the scale of conflict and emotion that we have in the States. On repeated viewings, I can certainly see how one would have that as a takeaway. But I’m suspecting, since it’s the kind of subject that would have made more news in the discussions that Moffat and Harness have had about the episode, that it’s more of what we, the audience, are reading into it than anything else. And that’s good, actually, as it means that part of the story works on several levels.

And part of the problem here with the parts that don’t may be that, from some accounts, this episode was meant to be a Matt Smith story, and the more dark fairy tale vibe of his run might have let this play better, but the Capaldi series doesn’t have that feeling. The combination of the darker Doctor and a – relatively – feel-good fantasy-esque story doesn’t quite gel. One does wonder how audiences would have reacted to Smith’s Doctor acting like this, “abandoning” his Companion as Capaldi’s Doctor seems to do here. Of course if we look at this season and think about the change in the Doctor/Clara relationship, one gets the feeling that she might have been more forgiving of the Eleventh, not already being in a place where she was already questioning her relationship with him, but who knows (heh) where the writers might have taken us?

So what of the Doctor’s decision to let humanity choose its future? While it seems some people think the Doctor knew what was going to happen, it seems clear to me that he didn’t, and he was telling the truth when he said it was a “grey area” that he couldn’t see. We’ve had several examples of Fixed Points in Time throughout the series, but there have certainly been others where what happens can change the future we, and the characters, have already seen. The potential future of the Fourth Doctor’s “Pyramids of Mars” is a prime example, but so too is the Bad Wolf arc and the fate of Harriet Jones in “The Christmas Invasion”. Both, and quite a few others in the history of the show, involved futures that were supposed to happen, but were derailed by interference of some kind. Of course Harriet Jones’ fate was the Doctor being spiteful and rather cruel, because she was supposed to be a figure of hope and a three-term Prime Minister, and her biggest crime was defending the Earth.

And that’s the real question this episode raises.

Harriet Jones chose to destroy the Sycorax ship because the Doctor wouldn’t always be there to defend the Earth, and she couldn’t risk the chance they would return. The Doctor, who has blown up his share of alien invaders, destroyed her personal future and stole – yes stole – a period of prosperity and peace from humanity because she decided the Earth needed to be able to defend itself. In “The Waters of Mars”, the Doctor nearly destroys the future because he’s become so arrogant that he thinks the Laws of Time no longer apply to him. The Eleventh Doctor’s blindness to the fear he could raise in his enemies led to the Kovarian Chapter nearly destroying the Universe. The times he’s meddled, the times the Doctor has made the decisions for Humanity, have often worked out, but sometimes they haven’t. Sometimes they have led to disaster and death and destruction.

On the beach, the new Moon in the sky, the Doctor is flooded with “new” memories of the future. A future made possible by the choice Clara made.

Is she right to be furious with the Doctor?

Yes. No.

Yes, because he treated his friend very poorly, endangered her student, and left them both without a real explanation.

No, because he’s right. Humanity has to make its own choices, because the Doctor can’t always be there to save us.

Yes, because Humanity doesn’t have the perspective that those who travel in the TARDIS do. Clara chose to let the Alien Space Dragon live, but Humanity didn’t.

As they have been throughout this season, the performances make it all work. Capaldi continues to be wonderful as the Doctor, but this season has, in many ways, been about Clara, and Jenna Coleman is just amazing here. Her confrontation with the Doctor is just stunning work, as is her conversation with Danny afterwards. Samuel Anderson really has become a great part of this season, even if it’s a little writer-ly that he hasn’t revealed the reason he left the military yet. Seriously, that would be a conversation that would have happened ages ago in a non-TV relationship. Ellis George’s Courtney was annoying as all hell, but her character is supposed to be, and she is much more fun to watch than the horrible Maitland children. I particularly liked Hermione Norris’ Captain Lundvik, and her air of resigned fatalism, anger at the state of the space program, her willingness to die to save others, and her gallows humor.

And now we are left with the question of where Clara and the Doctor go from here. Because “here” is a sad place to be.