It ’s part of the ritual of Doctor Who these days : First we have to be introduced to a new time - journey companion ( for the third clock time , in the casing of Clara . ) And then , in her 2nd story , we have to get prompt just why she ’s so amazingly special and terrific . That ’s this week ’s episode , which is kind of mixed bag . Spoilers forward …
So of course , Clara is extra for a very particular timey - wimey - blimey understanding : she ’s been fragmented in sentence , and we already met two version of her , who perish in the far future and the 19th century . In this sequence , “ The Rings of Akhaten , ” the Doctor spies on Clara ’s parents ’ courtship and Clara ’s own childhood , endeavor to make up one’s mind if there ’s any funny business going on with her lifetime . What is it that ready Clara so limited ? The destruction of the episode gives us the answer : she ’s special because every human life is miraculous and wonderful , and our destiny can be work by something as small as a folio . Yes , it ’s kind of treacly and ridiculous . No , it does n’t really work in the remainder . But it has some nifty moments .
Anyway , as we were sound out — this is the traditional “ novel fellow traveller sees the universe and proves that she ’s SUPER GREAT ” instalment . The first 15 - 20 min felt like a recap of “ The End of the World , ” where the Doctor introduces uprise to a bunch of aliens , and then Rose give out off and meet a humble clean woman and they bond over being working stiffs . Bits of it also reminded me quite a bit of “ The Beast Below , ” Amy Pond ’s sophomore story , in which it ’s Amy who saves the day while the Doctor is hinder and shouty .
In this fib , Clara saves the day because she has the baseborn ( and amazingly well preserved ) leafage that blew into her pop ’s face , nearly causing him to die in a traffic accident and causing him to hook up with Clara ’s mum . Hence , the folio is “ the most important leaf in human history , ” if you take a rather Clara - centric perspective of humanity .
That leaf was in the front of Clara ’s al-Qur’an about position to see , which was a deal - me - down from her late mother , who died in 2005 when Clara was still quite young . She offer it up to a parasite god thingy , whose nature is left vague ( in all probability for the best ) but who feeds on memories and stories and songs and poppycock .
( Because your story is the same as your mortal , in this culture — which seems weird , because stories can be transmitted , plagiarized , repeated , copied and remixed , without any wildness to anybody ’s individual . )
Clara ’s foliage surcharge the parasite god thingy , because it contains not just all the poppycock that actually happened with Clara ’s mum and dad , but all the poppycock that never go on because Clara ’s mother choke too soon . This unrealized voltage is like monster ipecac .
Before that , the Doctor has been having one of his shouty second , snarling at the puppet about all his awful storage and all the things he ’s seen and the secrets he knows , etc . , etc . — the Doctor expects all this stuff to give the brute upset stomach , but it ’s not enough , until Clara establish up with her magical leaf . This form of build on something earlier in the episode , where they require an object with emotional significance to ante up an stranger for a flying mope , and the Doctor has nothing except his sonic screwdriver . All of these year of traveling , and the Doctor has nothing to show for it , that equate with Clara ’s memories of her mother .
So how do we get to this point in the first place , where the parasite god is woken up and demanding to consume people ’s souls / stories / songs ? It ’s kind of unclear . There are a gang of planets circling a superstar , where they believe all life in the macrocosm originated , and they gather for a big fete where the Queen of Years , who ’s a little light-haired girl , offer up a song that carry all of the histories and memories of these worlds to Grandfather , which is the “ alarm clock ” for the giant star parasite god .
The first 15 moment or so of “ Rings of Akhaten ” are note utter , and correspond Doctor Who at its best — the giddy play of visiting a whole new world and meet lots of stranger is not bad , and the sheer number of random aliens roam in and out of flesh feel sort of like the Cantina scene . Matt Smith is at his most wizardly , show Clara around a whole young world and introduce her to strange customs and eldritch mickle and sounds .
And if the destination of “ Rings ” is to cement the mother wit that Clara is “ OMG awesum ” as a companion , then the bit where Clara winds up on her own and meets a small girl in hurt is gross as well . She ’s way out of her element , but she still looks after the Queen of Years and keeps her obscure from her pursuers , then bonds with her over a metre when Clara got lost and felt scared . Jenna - Louise Coleman is terrific in these scenes .
It ’s only after the Queen of Years does her song , and it somehow miscarry to mollify Grandfather , that the episode starts to go a bit off the rails . Although the stuff where the Doctor and Clara slipstream to the Queen of Years ’ rescue is courteous , I sort of fall back the train of thought of what was guess to be run on here , even after watching it a few sentence . Did the song neglect ? Did Grandfather just decide that this time around , he ’d like a human forfeit in addition to the song ? It ’s not clear — the Doctor say the song did n’t fail . But mass seem simultaneously aghast and not at all surprised that the Queen of Years is being turn into a human forfeiture . The Chorister is terrified , and then he ’s resigned . The whole matter feel like we ’ve ventured so far into abstraction , we ’ve lose the ribbon somewhat .
And then the episode feel the need to tie everything up with a neat bow , have got Clara ’s grief over her female parent ’s expiry be the thing that redeem a bunch of planet from the demon god . It only really works if you think the sponge god has never encountered the concept of destruction before , or something . ( Plus the thing of “ it ’s a lusus naturae that flow on love / hope / fear / memory , so let ’s overfeed it until it dies of dyspepsia ” is one of those concepts that should really be retired . )
But in any case , the instalment starts off asking why Clara is so unique , and winds up telling us that everybody is singular . As the Doctor explains to the Queen of Years , we ’re all marvellous conglobation of molecule from remote starts , we ’re all a fugitive miracle , and so on . And none of us can be sacrifice .
We do n’t get any declaration on the genuine question of how Clara can have lived three different life , however . And there ’s a instant that rings awfully false at the terminal of the sequence . Clara of a sudden substantiate the Doctor was there , spy on her female parent ’s funeral . The Doctor explains that she face like someone else he used to recognize , and or else of being awfully creeped out or demanding answers , Clara just swan that she wo n’t be a “ bargain cellar ” permutation of anybody else . Which reach the Doctor a chance to annunciate , once again , the sequence ’s theme : that Clara is special because she ’s Clara , and that she ’s the one who saved the day . Look ! A burnished ring ! Stop asking question !
All in all , when the instalment focuses on making Clara feel like a genuine person , with actual emotions — like in the scenes where she ’s protect and comforting the Queen of Years — she in reality find like she deserves to be a companion . When the episode tries to put up a hoarding with letters ten foot high explaining that Clara is Super Special , it feels like it ’s reaching passably .
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