Closing Time (TV story)

Closing Time was the twelfth episode in the sixth series of Doctor Who.

Synopsis
In the last few days of his life, the Doctor pays a farewell visit to his old friend Craig Owens, and encounters a mystery. People are going missing, a silver rat scuttles in the shadows of a department store, and somewhere close by, the Cybermen wait.

Plot
In a department store, a worker checks the changing rooms for customers before they close. She hears something in one of the changing rooms. It is a Cyberman. She screams.

About the same time, Sophie leaves her house after making sure that Craig can cope with their son, Alfie. Craig hears a knock on the door. It is the Doctor standing on his doorstep, who says hello and then turns to leave, until he sees the power flickering on Craig's road.

The next day, Craig finds the Doctor working in a shop, searching for the cause of the electrical problems. People are vanishing, and the Doctor is sure there's a connection to the flickering power. The Doctor tries to get Craig and Alfie out of the shop in a lift, but they arrive in the Cyber-Ship, where a Cyberman stomps towards them. The Doctor reverses the teleportation before they are discovered, disabling the teleporter in the process. He tries to get Craig to leave him so he can investigate, but Craig believes the safest place for his son is by the Doctor's side. He refuses to leave.

The Doctor gossips with his co-worker, Val. She wrongly believes Craig to be his romantic partner and Alfie their child. Uninterested with Val's comments, the Doctor turns to leave. However, Val then comments that a "silver rat" has been sighted in the store. This catches the Doctor's attention and has him pondering what this "silver rat" could be. While Craig investigates, the Doctor catches sight of his old companions, Amy Pond and Rory Williams, who are shopping in the shop. A large sign on the wall, reading "Petrichor" has a large picture of Amy's head on it, along with the slogan "The girl who's tired of waiting"; knowing that the words are about him, the Doctor smiles as Amy, now rather famous, signs a piece of paper handed to her by a young girl.



Happy, the Doctor slips away to find Craig. That night, Craig and Doctor hide in the store and capture a Cybermat. It has been causing the power fluctuations by siphoning power to the Cyberman ship, but the Doctor is surprised by how little power it is drawing. He survives an attack by a Cyberman; it was made from malfunctioning spare parts. He is at a loss to explain how it could have returned to the store so soon.

The Doctor returns with Craig to his home to work on the Cybermat. When Craig leaves to get milk, the Doctor tends to Alfie's cries, telling the baby he will die the next day. The Cybermat activates and attacks the Doctor and Craig, but they comicaly manage to subdue it. The next morning, the Doctor returns to the store with the reprogrammed Cybermat. Craig soon follows after the Doctor with Alfie. The Doctor discovers that the Cyberman ship is not in space; rather, it crashed on Earth centuries earlier and is now buried beneath the store, accessible by a secret door in a changing room. The power lines installed for the store supply power to the ship. The crew of six plan to convert the entire human race when there is enough power. They capture the Doctor.

Craig leaves Alfie with Val and follows the Doctor into the tunnel. He too is captured and put into a conversion machine. The Doctor reveals his own impending death and urges Craig to fight, but the conversion appears to be complete--until Alfie's cries over the closed-circuit television echo in the ship. Craig fights the conversion, sending the Cybermen into overload as they feel the emotions they have repressed. The Doctor and Craig teleport away as the ship explodes. The Doctor slips away unseen, but Craig returns home to find he has used time travel to clean the mess from the previous night. The Doctor tells Craig that Alfie now has a much higher opinion of him, willing to call him dad, and leaves just before Sophie returns, taking some TARDIS blue envelopes from Sophie's stationery drawer and a Stetson hat from Craig as parting gifts. Craig assures Sophie that nothing out of the ordinary has happened while she was gone, but just then the baby utters his first word: "Doctor", making Sophie realize the Doctor had paid a visit.

Nearby, the Doctor tells the TARDIS this is their last trip and offers some parting words to a small group of children. In the far future, River Song, a new Doctor of Archaeology, reviews eyewitness accounts by those children, and also notes the date and location of the Doctor's death. She is interrupted by Madame Kovarian and agents of the Silence; Kovarian tells River that they are "her owners" and River is still theirs, and she will be the one to kill the Doctor. They place her in an astronaut's suit and submerge her in Lake Silencio to await the Doctor.

Cast

 * The Doctor - Matt Smith
 * Amy Pond - Karen Gillan
 * Rory Williams - Arthur Darvill
 * Craig Owens - James Corden
 * Sophie - Daisy Haggard
 * Shona - Seroca Davis
 * Kelly - Holli Dempsey
 * George - Christopher Obi
 * Val - Lynda Baron
 * Cybermen - Paul Kasey
 * River Song - Alex Kingston
 * Madame Kovarian - Frances Barber
 * Voice of the Cybermen - Nicholas Briggs
 * The Silence - Marnix Van Den Broeke (uncredited)

The Doctor

 * The Doctor mentions that a robot dog is "not as much fun as I remember" referring to K9.
 * The Doctor can make people quiet by simply saying "shh!" Craig suggests this is hypnosis.
 * The Doctor tells Craig that he has forgotten his identity before.
 * The Doctor says "Oh you've redecorated, I dont like it." That was previously said by the 2nd Doctor in DW: The Five Doctors.

Cybermen

 * The Cybermen attempt to convert Craig into a Cyber-Controller.
 * It appears that at least these Cybermen can't convert Time Lords, as the Doctor describes himself as "not exactly compatible", confirmed by some of the Cybermen not long after he said that. (also see the DW: Rise of the Cybermen)

Cultural references from the real world

 * When the Doctor tries to deactivate the Cybermat and discovers it has shielding, he says to Craig "Don't worry. I have an app for that", parodying the slogan used by Apple to advertise the iPhone's versatility.
 * When the Doctor is flying the toy helicopter, he says "It goes up-diddley-up, it goes down-diddley-down." This is a line from the theme song of the movie "Those Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines".

Fashion and clothing

 * Craig gives the Doctor a Stetson as a parting gift. The Doctor is later shown wearing this in DW: The Impossible Astronaut when he brings everyone together in America before his death.

Individuals

 * It seems Amy has become quite famous as she is seen giving an autograph to a little girl.
 * Sean and Melinda are mentioned.
 * Kovarian does not appear to be affected by the Silence's ability to make people forget their existence. This will be later shown to be because of her eye drive. (DW: The Wedding of River Song)
 * River Song does not remember Kovarian or the Silence from her childhood.

History

 * Craig is unfamiliar with the Cybermen, suggesting that either the Battle of Canary Wharf was erased by the cracks and doesn't exist post-Big Bang Two or Craig simply didn't see the Cybermen like Donna Noble.

Television series

 * Craig asks if the Cybermen's teleport is like "beam me up" from Star Trek. This is the second consecutive episode to feature a reference to Star Trek.

Theories and concepts

 * Posters seen by the Doctor in the department store indicate that Amy has taking up a modelling career. She is seen advertising a fragrance named "Petrichor".

Story notes

 * Given that in The Impossible Astronaut the different versions of the Doctor give their ages as 909, and 1103, the Doctor has lived for approximately two hundred years between these two episodes. Writer Gareth Roberts confirmed in an interview that this is indeed two hundred years after The God Complex for the Doctor, and that he spent these years "waving" at Amy and Rory through history books. (The Impossible Astronaut)
 * Part of the nursery rhyme that was heard DW: Night Terrors is sung by Madame Kovarian, with some new lines added.
 * Closing Time is the first episode produced by Denise Paul, who has been Associate Producer for several Eleventh Doctor stories.
 * This is the first time since the series revival in 2005 that episode 12 has not been part of a multi-part story written by the head writer, although the end of this episode does set up the series finale.
 * This is the first television story to feature a Cybermat since the Fourth Doctor story DW: Revenge of the Cybermen. They had been redesigned though, with human-like teeth.
 * This is the first single-parter episode in which River Song appears, and her first appearance in an episode not written by Steven Moffat. Her appearance, however, does link directly into the next episode.
 * This is also the first regular-season episode since the series revival in which the Doctor does not have an ongoing companion with him at some point.
 * Karen Gillan and Arthur Darvill were, however, credited in the opener as they had been during the rest of the season. This marks the first time in the series that any actor's name has appeared in the opening credits for less than one minute of on-screen appearance.
 * The BBC America and Space broadcasts also retained the opening sequence narrated by Amy Pond.
 * Arthur Darvill (Rory) doesn't have any lines in this episode.
 * Based on interpretations of dialogue in the episode, a case can be made for Craig to be considered a companion, as the Doctor indirectly refers to him as one.
 * The "app" for disabling the Cybermat used one of the "bonus sounds" found on the toy version of the Eleventh Doctor's sonic screwdriver, unheard on the show until now.
 * During one of the scenes, BBC Radio 1's Greg James was visible behind Craig. Greg James named his character "Carlos".GREGJAMES.png
 * This is the first television story since the series revival in which the Cybermen are not armed with any type of weaponary. The Cybermen who are seen have visible gaps in their forearm armour where they would normally have blasters and they are not seen electrocuting anyone.
 * This is the second time where Craig's affection for someone has saved the day. In DW: The Lodger , Craig's love for Sophie motivates his desire to stay where he is, enabling him to destroy the alien Time Machine. In this case, his love for his son enables him to defeat the Cybermen.
 * When the Doctor asks if the Cyberman would take the humans out with six Cybermen, they claim they could take them out with one Cyberman. This is possibly a reference to DW: Doomsday, where Dalek Sec says the Cult of Skaro could destroy the Cyberman with one Dalek.

Ratings

 * UK Overnight: 5.3 Million

Myths

 * Craig Owens may travel in the TARDIS. This proved false.
 * Craig Owens has had a baby. This proved true.
 * The events in the department store, etc. take place on or about 21st April 2011. A blow-up of the newspaper seen in the episode has the date of April 19, 2011.

Filming locations
to be added

Continuity

 * Craig recalls his previous alien encounter with the Doctor. (DW: The Lodger)
 * The Doctor can speak baby. (DW: A Good Man Goes to War)
 * Petrichor is part of the password given by Idris in DW: The Doctor's Wife.
 * The perfume "Petrichor" bears the slogan "For the girl who's tired of waiting", a reference to Amy and has been referenced across several stories. (DW: The Eleventh Hour, DW: The Girl Who Waited)
 * When the Doctor thinks that Craig has redecorated, he says that he doesn't like it, similar to the Second Doctor's comments to the Third Doctor about redecorating the TARDIS in DW: The Three Doctors and again when the Second Doctor saw UNIT HQ in DW: The Five Doctors. The Fifth Doctor similarly expressed dislike for a TARDIS redecoration on DW: Time Crash.
 * The Doctor takes some "TARDIS blue" envelopes from Craig's house, and Craig gives him a Stetson as a parting gift, which sets up events for DW: The Impossible Astronaut.
 * Aware of his impending death, the Doctor goes on another "farewell tour". (DW: The End of Time)
 * Craig successfully throws off the conversion process. Mercy Hartigan also did so shortly before her death in DW: The Next Doctor.
 * While talking about name tags, the Doctor suggests he sometimes forgets his identity. (DW: Doctor Who, Castrovalva, Time and the Rani, EDA: The Eight Doctors,)
 * When Craig resists the conversion, a light cuts down the centre of the Cyber head and it opens up, much like the Cyberman head that confronted Amy in The Pandorica Opens.
 * Though not referenced on screen, this is the second time the Doctor has had to deal with an alien menace based in (or below) a department store (DW: Rose), although this time when he blows it up, the store isn't destroyed. Torchwood Three also dealt with aliens in a department store in TWA: Department X.
 * The Doctor preforms his odd greeting kiss. (DW: The Lodger, Night Terrors)
 * The last time he encountered them, the Doctor also said "not a rat, a Cybermat!" (DW: Revenge of the Cybermen)
 * The way the Cybermen are destroyed is similar to the way they were destroyed in DW: The Age of Steel

For the Doctor

 * This story occurs after: DW: The God Complex and various misadventures noted in DW: The Impossible Astronaut
 * This story occurs before: DW: The Impossible Astronaut and The Wedding of River Song

For River Song

 * This story occurs after: DW: Let's Kill Hitler
 * This story occurs before: DW: The Impossible Astronaut and The Wedding of River Song

For Amy and Rory

 * This story occurs after: DW: The God Complex
 * This story occurs before: DW: The Wedding of River Song

Home video releases
The episode will be released on DVD and Blu-ray shortly after the airing of episode 13.