Talk:The Time of Angels (TV story)

Rory
Since when was Rory in this episode? Can you please find some evidence for this because I have seen it nowhere. Doctormatthew 9:28, April 23, 2010 (UTC)

He's in next episode, somehow. Simson. 01:13, April 27, 2010 (UTC)

But what evidence do you have to back this up? Doctormatthew 6:10, April 27, 2010 (UTC)

Spoilers!
just found this clip: www.youtube.com/watch?v=ECKMwGJNJLg It's from BBC America's 'Ultimate Guide' doc and it implies a few things about River Song in this episode, and what she already knows - Spoil a bit if you will, it's well confused me! Moffat's throwing us a few curve balls86.134.188.188 00:54, April 19, 2010 (UTC)

New Posters: If you make a post in the 'article' section, make sure everything is properly spelled and use proper grammer. Jedman67 02:17, April 21, 2010 (UTC)

I noticed that - I'd assume that whoever it was that went and changed the article (thank-you btw), they must have copied their spelling from the (now much older) comments on the link I posted (It was mainly Americans ;-)). I'd refrained from editing the article page because I'd considered it too much of a spoiler. There are no excuses for just copying someone else's spelling mistakes though. 86.134.188.188 19:45, April 24, 2010 (UTC)

Rumors about River Song: Source?
The following was posted in the main page under "Rumors":
 * 1) In a recent interview with Alex Kingston It is said that in Silence in the Library/Forest of the Dead it is shown that River will have an intimate relationship with the doctor, meanwhile in The Time of Angels/Flesh and Stone, it is speculated that she will be a danger to the Doctor.

If you've seen a source, please post it! Thanks! - Jedman67 02:11, April 21, 2010 (UTC)

51st Century
There is mutiple points all over the page stating that either River Song is from the 51st century and/or the the episode is set in the 51st century but where is the actual sources??? until reliable ones are shown I'm removing them. -- Michael Downey 11:51, April 22, 2010 (UTC).

It's probably just someone making a tie-in with the rumors that she may be a Time Agent, and they're known to be based in/around the 51st century. MrCatharsis 21:30, April 23, 2010 (UTC)


 * The Doctor confirmed "it's the 51st century" when telling Amy that the Church has changed. Can someone update the page? 86.190.16.11 18:31, April 24, 2010 (UTC)#


 * I'm terrible with dates and stuff. Can someone remember to add in the century 12000 years in the future from the 51st century (that's the 63rd century isn't it) when the Doctor and Amy were in the museum. Mc hammark 19:24, April 24, 2010 (UTC)
 * Nope, 12000 years is 120 centuries (12 millennia), so that'll be 51+120 = the 171st century.

The Doctor did indeed say that they were in the 51st century when on the 'Weeping Angel planet'. But the Infobox needs editing. It says 51st century and 62nd century. The 62nd century would only be c. 6100--a 'paltry' 1100 years later; when, in fact, the Doctor and Amy were in the museum 12,000 years later (ie: the year 17,000). DigiFluid 08:01, April 25, 2010 (UTC)

Is she Patience?
In the episode when Amy Pond asks how she knows so much about how to fly a TARDIS, River says "I learned from the first one"...

This could imply she learned from the first Time Lord, which according to history was designated as Omega. This might also indicate she is Omega's (and the Other's) former-wife, Patience. Patience was last seen in Omega's anti-matter universe when it ceased to exist. (PDA: The Infinity Doctors)

She said she learned from the best, but that this wasn't the Doctor. What this actually means remains to be seen. Raven&#39;s wing 21:15, April 24, 2010 (UTC)

Also, while either Omega or the Other could conceivably have been "the best", it seems more likely that Rassillon would have had that honor, since he's the one who invented TARDISes. More importantly, both of them were presumably gone long before the era of the Type 40. --Falcotron 09:37, April 25, 2010 (UTC)

Or she could have just been teasing the doctor; which she isn't beyond doing; and did indeed learn from him. --Bluesilver 14:34, April 25, 2010 (UTC)

But she didn't say "first one" ? She said "The very best" ?

Amy Pond refererence to "sir"
Did anyone else notice that Amy referenced the fact that the Doctor never lets people call him "sir", even though (as far as I can tell) Amy has never been in an adventure where the Doctor has told someone not to call him "sir" or salute. Even if she has, certainly she has not been in enough adventures to know that he "never" lets people do it. Just an interesting aside.


 * Well, he could have mentioned it to her at some point. But actually, there's more interesting here than just the "sir".


 * In the scene before this one, the Doctor actually salutes the Bishop. It could be taken as a flippant salute, or as the kind of thing an impatient General gives to a staff officer, but either way, it's a far cry from (at least some) previous Doctors' explicit hatred of salutes. And, in that same scene, he accepts being called "the equivalent of an army" without flinching. And Amy doesn't see anything to comment on in either case.


 * However, in the following scene, when he lets the "sir" pass, he's clearly distracted at the time, with bigger things to worry about, and Amy sees this as significant enough to guess that "Whatever a Weeping Angel is, it's really bad."


 * So, the 11th Doctor has no problem with salutes, or with being called the equivalent of an army--or, for that matter, with being around lots of guns, or even asking for and firing one. But he does hate being called "sir".


 * Put all together, this is pretty interesting. Enlisted men hate being called "sir". And the higher in the (non-commissioned) ranks or the more specialized they get, the more they hate it. Trying calling a Sergeant Major, Staff Sergeant, or Commando "sir", and then order him to stop correcting you, and he'll flinch every time you say it. Of course a Sergeant Major would never give anything but a perfect salute (he's responsible for proper disciple of an entire unit), but the others are frequently involved in looser situations.


 * We know from Series 1 and from The Doctor's Daughter that the Doctor was "a soldier", and "on the front lines", sometimes involved behind enemy lines, and possibly at times operating pretty far outside of the normal chain of command and given considerable leeway (or, perhaps, taking considerable leeway, but then getting away with it). In other words, he's a special-forces Commando. --Falcotron 09:33, April 25, 2010 (UTC)

I'm willing to believe that this is completely intentional. There's a distinctive pause after Amy says this, and the next thing the Doctor says, after pausing and thinking, is "Now that is interesting." Amy knows stuff she shouldn't know and she doesn't know stuff that she should know, which could be part of a larger problem. I wouldn't be surprised if this "sir" remark gets picked up on in the next episode. Hack59 19:12, April 26, 2010 (UTC)

Spelling mistake on set
When Amy is standing beside the door of the Bishop's command pod, there is a warning on the wall about a "Trip Hazzard". There should only be one 'z' in hazard. 86.150.251.215 08:30, April 25, 2010 (UTC)

Page seems to be fully protected, and has tons of minor errors
I created an account just to fix all the minor errors of spelling, punctuation, etc., only to find out that, despite being marked as "semi-protected" it appears to be fully protected, so I still can't edit it.

In addition to the typos and grammar problems, there are a two (minor) substantive errors:
 * When the Weeping Angel appears inside the dropship with Amy, there's no conclusive evidence that it's a hologram, but the article calls it one definitively.
 * The Clerics are referred to definitively as "Christian soldiers". But, while the most obvious religious affiliations are Catholic of Anglican, the episode never makes it explicit that they're Christian at all (e.g., they talk about praying, but never mention Jesus). The fact that "Christian" is a sacred name might mean something--but then so is "Bob", and that doesn't prove that they're SubGenii.

So, someone who has permission might want to run this article through a spellchecker (and maybe a grammar checker), pick a consistent way to spell "Angelo", pick a consistent capitalization for "Cleric" and "Maze of the Dead", and rewrite the bits about holograms and Christians. --Falcotron 09:08, April 25, 2010 (UTC)


 * Took care of the mentioned issues, hopefully satisfactorily. TweedJacket 09:41, April 26, 2010 (UTC)

The Best
In [| this edit], Drwhobg added the following after the bit about fans speculating that "the best man [River] ever knew" referring to the Doctor:


 * This proved to be wrong, because when River responsed to Amy's question about piloting the TARDIS, she said that she learn from the best. The Doctor said shy "Well, yeah", thinking that River's talking about him. Anyway, Song said that she sorries that the Doctor was busy then. So, the best isn't the Doctor.

But there's no reason that the best TARDIS pilot/instructor and the best man she ever knew have to be the same person. In fact, the two statements have nothing to do with each other, except for sharing one word.

If I learned how to write optimized 3D graphics code from John Carmack, I'd say "I learned from the best," but that wouldn't mean he was the best man I ever knew. --Falcotron 12:01, April 25, 2010 (UTC)

Also, actually reading the added text, it's barely in English. --Falcotron 13:24, April 25, 2010 (UTC)

to someone who can edit this page: the section where it is discovered that the statues are all angels states that everyone turned to see that the statues had moved. I'm quite sure that the doctor turns off his torch to see if the statues move. this could do with correcting. also, the page needs to be spell checked. - Lu-igi board

Weeping Angels Images (spoiler)
In "The Time of Angels", it is found that images of the weeping angels become angels. However, in the original weeping angels episode (Blink), the file Sally Sparrow gives to the Doctor contains photographs of the angels, which haven't come to life..
 * Don't forget that pretty much everyone in Blink had a staring contest with the Angels...CS1Energypyre 18:13, April 25, 2010 (UTC)
 * The Doctor does mention that the Weeping Angels that he fought on Earth were barely surviving scavangers so it is concievably possible that the ones in Blink didn't have the power to manifest themselves through images or take over someone's mind when they looked into their eyes.Doorofnight 18:50, April 25, 2010 (UTC)

Romana paralels
Has anyone else noticed that, especially in the scene with River flying the Tardis, that her relationship with the Doctor is depicted in rather the same way that Romana's is? Romana is characterized as being a lot better with flying Tardis's than the Doctor(much to the Doctor's annoyance, just like in this episode) whereas the Doctor has a lot more practical knowledge of the Universe and is really good at getting out of problems(much to Romana's annoyance, just like River's comment about hating it when the Doctor shows off by knowing what planet they are on just by sticking his head out of the door). I am not sure that this means anything, and unless they come up with some other explanation of how he doesn't realize it, the Doctor would presumably know if River was a Time Lady, but the relationship between the Doctor and Romana might have been at least partially the inspiration behind the relationship between River and the Doctor.Doorofnight 18:56, April 25, 2010 (UTC)

I think the ways in which they're similar are pretty much what you'd expect from any married couple where the man is anything like the Doctor, and the ways in which they're different are pretty much what you'd expect from a couple that's been married longer (especially with a woman who's a little wiser and more self-assured).

And, since these kinds of similarities and differences are exactly what Moffat's big hit series Coupling was about, it's hard to believe he wasn't consciously thinking about it.

Of course the Doctor and Romana weren't married. But they were stuck traveling around together, at one point even stuck with a virtual adopted son. And of course they were played by Tom Baker and Lalla Ward. Many critics pointed out that during their real-life courtship, their characters were very flirty, while after they got engaged and then married, Lalla often seemed to be taking her frustrations with her real-life husband out on his on-screen character. And how could the creator of Joking Apart and Coupling not find that fascinating?

The big question is, why is Amy wearing (a skimpier version of) Romana's outfit from her last story, rather than River? --Falcotron 03:50, April 26, 2010 (UTC)

Another thought: Wasn't there a bit in Joking Apart where there's a younger girl that the Moffat character thinks is interested in him, but she's really just watching him and his wife together carefully, because she's about to get married and wants to find out in advance what it's like?

Because Amy is definitely fascinating by "the future Mrs. Doctor", and stares at both of the two of them intensely at times. --Falcotron 03:56, April 26, 2010 (UTC)

Are the Weeping Angels A Bit Ruined?
Okay, in the episode, the Angel is revealed to have an ability to "enter the soul", while it is a statue. Does anyone else think this ruins them a bit? I mean, the whole point of the Angels is that if you look at them, they can't get you, as they turn to stone - they literally die. So this ability implies that they are still alive and well when they are statues, therefore defeating the purpose that was installed in 'Blink'. Also, in Blink, why when Larry looked at the Angel, and he definitely looked into the eyes, die he not get the side effects that Amy is experiencing?

Not really! The Doctor wxplained the Angels we encountered in Blink were scavengers and were not up to full power so their power probably wodnt have worked on him. Also the strange book said anything that takes the image of an angel becomes an extention of the angel. A sort of living copy and looking it dead in the eye it your eye makes a copy so that is how they get inside you.

In Blink, one of the Angels turns off a light while in statue form, which would imply they have always been 'alive' somewhat while still made of stone. They are at least psychically still alive. - TomJ 25th April 2010

I was thinking that only one image of the Angel can be "active" at a time. While the image on the TV screen is active, maybe the original doesn't move, and while the image inside Amy's mind is making her think her hand is turning to stone like a Pompeiian seeress, it also doesn't, and maybe that's why it didn't catch them despite all that time spent stuck there--it was trying to hold her still so one of the much-slower, not-yet-recharged Angels would have time to get to her.

There's really no evidence for that, beyond the fact that it didn't get to them in the blink of an eye, and I suspect the next episode will prove me wrong.

But, if I'm right, that would explain why the Angels didn't get inside Sally's head--because they needed their physical forms to herd them into the basement and physically get hold of the TARDIS. --Falcotron 04:02, April 26, 2010 (UTC)

Blinking with alternating eyes
I loved the way that Amy started blinking alternating eyes after told not to blink. It was my first thought back in the episode [Blink], when Sally seemed to try hard to keep both eyes open all the time. I wonder if that's Moffat acknowledging this obvious objection.

(Though actually, if you try doing it, it's still quite hard not to blink both eyes -- at least it requires a tremendous amount of concentration.) Hack59 23:00, April 25, 2010 (UTC)

I think it's him _answering_ the objection: "Amy is more fearless and in control of herself and clever and generally amazing than you and Sally Sparrow put together, and, even with the Doctor right on the other side of the door to reassure her, it took her a moment to think about it and she had a very hard time pulling it off. And you think, if you were in Sally's place, you would have done better?" --Falcotron 03:33, April 26, 2010 (UTC)

References to other Moffat stories
I'm sure I'm not the only one who've noticed, but this episode contains, like the others, a quick reference to the first - though non-canonical - moffat story "Curse of the Fatal Death", when the Doctor said he had once lunch with the architect...

Catching River in space
When the Doctor went to the coordinates that River said and caught her after she flew out the ships airlock, the show makes it seem like the Doctor was in a big hurry immediately after seeing the message to go to that time and place as if he was going to miss her. But even if he waited 20 minutes and then went, wouldn't he still have appeared at that same moment in time to catch her? Was this just added to create a sense of urgency and drama? 85.246.238.159 16:35, April 28, 2010 (UTC)

I think the Doctor was just eager to see River again...

Personally I think the Doctor was looking for adventure in the museum, and as soon as he found it, he had no reason to stay around. -- MrCatharsis 09:40, April 29, 2010 (UTC)