The Wedding of River Song (TV story)

The Wedding of River Song was the thirteenth and final episode of the sixth series of Doctor Who.

Synopsis
The Doctor makes his final journey to the shores of Lake Silencio in Utah, knowing only one thing can keep the universe safe: his death. But has he reckoned without the love of a good woman?

Plot
In an alternate universe London, air balloons dot the sky, carting cars beneath them. There is sunspot and solar flare activity. Children play in parks while Pterodactyls fly overhead. Roman centurions navigate the roads alongside automobiles. The War of the Roses has just entered its second year. Charles Dickens is interviewed about his new book on a morning show. And Winston Churchill, the Holy Roman Emperor, returns to Buckingham Senate on his personal mammoth. It is always 22 April 2011 at 5:02 p.m.

Churchill is attended by his personal doctor, the Silurian Malohkeh, who asks about his recent trip to Gaul. Churchill, however, is concerned about something else: he doesn't understand why it is always 5:02 p.m. on 22 April. Malohkeh is not bothered, commenting that that's how it's always been, but Churchill is not persuaded and calls for the soothsayer, who has been imprisoned in the Tower of London since Churchill last threw him there. Two Roman guards bring the scruffy soothsayer to Churchill, who insists that something has happened to time and that all of history is happening at once. He demands the soothsayer help him understand what has happened. The soothsayer raises his head to meet Churchill's eyes -- it is the Doctor, who merely answers, "A woman."

In the days leading up to his death, the Doctor confronts an injured Dalek, requesting information from its data core: he wants to know everything the Daleks know about the Silence.

Later, the Doctor shadows a man entering a bar on the docks of Calisto B. Inside, he asks the bartender if he can speak to Father Gideon Vandaleur, a former envoy of the Silence to whom the Doctor offers his condolences -- after all, Vandaleur has been dead for six months. He uses the sonic screwdriver to disable the Tesselecta, which has been impersonating Vandaleur since his death as a means of investigating the Silence. He asks Captain Carter what they have learned, and specifically requests the name of their weakest link.

The Doctor duels Gantok, an alien in Viking apparel who is also working for the Silence, in a game of live chess. The Doctor is about to defeat Gantok, who asks the Doctor to concede the game to spare his life. The Doctor requests information in return for this favor, but Gantok insists that the only one who can help the Doctor is Dorium Maldovar. Despite the fact that Dorium died at Demon's Run, Gantok promises to take the Doctor to him. The Doctor concedes the game.

Gantok brings the Doctor to the Seventh Transept, a series of catacombs bearing the skulls of the Headless Monks' victims. He warns the Doctor to be careful of traps. Gantok directs the Doctor to the box that contains Dorium's head, which the Doctor finds incredibly well-preserved and still capable of spech. However, Gantok suddenly turns on the Doctor, threatening to kill him, but accidentally backs up into a trap; he falls through a hole in the ground and is immediately devoured by a sea of skulls as the Doctor watches, horrified.

In the alternate universe, Churchill expresses some disbelief at the Doctor's version of events and wonders why he is listening to him. The Doctor informs Churchill that, in another reality, they were friends -- and Churchill is able to sense that, just as he senses that something has happened to time.

In the Transept, the Doctor impatiently asks Dorium for information about the Silence. Dorium tells him that the Silence is a religious order also known as the Sentinels of History. They want the Doctor dead because of his terrifying future: "on the fields of Trenzalore, at the fall of the Eleventh, when no living creature can speak falsely or fail to answer," a question will be asked that must never be answered, and if it is answered, Silence will fall. The Silence are determined to see that the Doctor never reach Trenzalore. When the Doctor wonders what the question has to do with him, Dorium agrees to tell him. Later, the Doctor, agitated by his new knowledge of the situation, brings the box containing Dorium's head back to the TARDIS. He is determined to continue running from his death, despite Dorium's insistence that everyone must die at some point, and the Doctor more so than most.

The Doctor and Churchill have made their way to the Senate room, though neither of them remembers why they desired to leave Churchill's office. The Doctor notes that his pulse is faster, as though he's been running, and questions why Churchill is carrying his revolver. Checking his wrist, he sees a single black tally mark.

In the TARDIS, Dorium reminds the Doctor that his death is a fixed point in time and must occur. The Doctor rejects this, claiming that there's much more that he can do to put off the inevitable; to prove this, he phones Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart at his nursing home and orders the nurse to fetch him because they're going out. The nurse sadly informs the Doctor that the Brigadier passed away a few months earlier, though he spoke of the Doctor right to the end and always set out an extra brandy in case he visited. The Doctor's bravado crumbles with this news, and he acknowledges to Dorium that "it's time." Later, he gives the invitations meant for his companions to the Tesselecta to deliver. Before he departs, the Tesselecta wonders if there's nothing it can do to help him.

Amy, Rory, and River receive the envelopes and meet the Doctor at Lake Silencio for their last picnic. Churchill questions why he would invite his friends to witness his death. The Doctor explains that he didn't have to die alone, and he wanted his friends with him because they'd always been the best part of him. He grimly realizes that there are two more tally marks on his arm, and warns Churchill that they don't have much time left.

On the shores of the lake, the Doctor and his friends watch as the astronaut rises from the water. He orders his friends not to interfere no matter what happens and goes to the astronaut, hardly surprised to find that it is River. River cries because the suit is acting of its own accord; she can't control it. He comforts her, knowing that he is meant to die and she won't remember it after its happened. As the suit raises its arm level with the Doctor's chest, the Doctor insists that he forgives her unconditionally and bids her goodbye. Five bursts of energy fire make him flinch, but when he opens his eyes, he is still alive and wonders what went wrong. River smugly brags that she drained her weapons systems, rewriting a fixed point by not killing the Doctor. As the Doctor protests, the scene dissolves and the world shatters.

In the Senate room, Churchill smells gunsmoke, and the Doctor holds a spear. He explains that they are defending themselves, blaming the memory-proof Silence. Hissing is heard above them. A nest of the Silence are preparing to attack, but before either man can react, a group of soldiers storms the room, their guns raised at the ceiling. Amy enters, identifying herself as the group's leader; however, as she steps into the light, the Doctor is horrified to see that she is wearing an eyepatch matching Madame Kovarian's. She levels her weapon at him and fires.

When the Doctor awakes, he is onboard a train racing to Cairo. Amy sits nearby, waiting for him to wake. When he sees her, he begins pleading with to remember their past adventures together, which she is capable of doing because she grew up with a crack in the universe on the wall of her bedroom; he does not notice the drawings hanging up around her office, featuring various creatures and scenes that they've experienced on their adventures together. The Doctor finally realizes her true loyalty and, once he changes his clothes, they happily embrace. Amy begins sharing what she's been working on: a whole team of people, which she commands, has noticed that time has gone wrong and are trying to figure out how to fix it. Although she remembers the Doctor, she does not remember Rory well and has not been able to find him in this alternate universe. She is also confused by the Doctor's death, which she remembers as happening twice and two different ways. The Doctor informs her that time is not just frozen -- it is disintegrating, and reality will soon fall apart. A guard enters the office behind them. It is Rory, though Amy only knows him as Captain Williams, and does not recognize him as her husband. He explains that they will soon be arriving in Cairo, and that their eye drives must be activated immediately.

The train arrives at Area 52 -- a prison for over one hundred of the Silence contained in one of the Great Pyramid of Giza. The Silence are kept in tanks of water, which insulates them and prevents them from drawing the electricity they need to attack. Upon disembarking from the train, Rory offers the Doctor an eye drive, explaining that it will help him remember the Silence even when he's not looking at them. The Silence become more active with the Doctor's arrival, which worries Rory, who orders his men to check the tank seals.

Amy brings the Doctor to the pyramid's control center, where various technicians monitor the time. River Song presides over the team. The team has also managed to imprison Madame Kovarian, who predicts the death of time and wonders why the Doctor couldn't die. River berates Madame Kovarian for her mistake: despite her best attempts to turn River into a psychopath, she was only brought up on the Doctor and was never going to fall in love with anyone else. The Doctor tries to touch River, as their contact would help time to progress normally since they are the two opposing poles of the explosion; however, River manages to have him restrained. Meanwhile, the Silence break through the seals of their tanks and escape into the pyramid, confronting various guards and soldiers.

Water begins leaking into the control room, and Kovarian smugly announces that the Silence aren't trapped; they have merely been waiting for the Doctor to arrive. The eye drives begin to malfunction, sending doses of electricity into the eye of the wearer; even Kovarian's activates, much to her confusion. As Rory barricades the room, River and Amy ask the Doctor if he will see what they've been working on, and he reluctantly agrees. Rory offers to stay behind and buy the group some time. Amy orders him to remove his eye drive because it's at risk of activating; he painfully informs her that it has activated, but he can't risk forgetting what's coming. However, as the aliens break into the room, he collapses. They prepare to kill him, taunting him that Amy will never return for him; however, she does, killing each of the aliens with a machine gun and removing his eye drive. As they depart, Kovarian pleads with Amy to help her, but Amy -- resentful of the fact that Kovarian took her child from her and "hurt her" -- merely reattaches her eye drive, killing her.

River takes the Doctor to the top of the pyramid, where she has built a distress beacon that has been broadcasting a message all across the universe: "The Doctor is dying. Please, please help." The reports of sunspot activity were false; the radio interference has been caused by the responses, all of which have been unanimous -- everyone wants to help the Doctor in any way that they can. But the Doctor is firm: there is no way to help him. River finally admits her love for the Doctor, insisting that she will suffer greatly -- more than anyone in the universe -- if she has to kill him.

Hearing this, the Doctor uses his bowtie to bind his hand to River's. He orders Amy and Rory to give their consent to his marriage -- to their daughter. Finally, he whispers what he claims is his true name in River's ear, explaining that because of that, they're now married. His first request to his wife is that she help him save the dying world, and she agrees. They kiss, and time is restored. River kills the Doctor on the shores of Lake Silencio, and his body is later burned by his companions in a traditional Viking funeral.

Sometime later, Amy sits in her back garden, still reeling from the Doctor's death. River materializes nearby and greets her mother, who wonders where they are. River explains that she just climbed out of the Byzantium and that Amy had been there, although she was much younger and had no clue who River really was. Amy informs her that the Doctor has just died, and admits to the guilt she feels for killing Madame Kovarian in cold blood, albeit in an alternate universe that was subsequently reversed and never happened. When she sees how distraught Amy is, River agrees to confess the Doctor's last secret -- which causes both women to rejoice. They are later joined by Rory, who is shocked by the news.

A monk in a hooded robe returns Dorium's box to the Seventh Transept. As it turns to leave, Dorium recognizes the monk as the Doctor, who promptly disrobes. The Doctor that was killed at the lakeside was, in fact, the Tesselecta. He never whispered his name in River's ear; rather, he asked her to look into his eye, where she saw the true, miniature Doctor waving back at her. The Doctor tells Dorium that he's going to step back into the shadows because he got "too big," even if that means letting his friends think he's dead. Dorium gravely warns him that the fields of Trenzalore and the fall of the Eleventh are still waiting for him, as is the question, which Dorium calls out to him as he leaves: "Doctor who?"

Cast

 * The Doctor – Matt Smith
 * Amy Pond – Karen Gillan
 * Rory Williams – Arthur Darvill
 * River Song – Alex Kingston
 * Madame Kovarian – Frances Barber
 * Emperor Winston Churchill - Ian McNeice
 * Malohkeh- Richard Hope
 * Charles Dickens - Simon Callow
 * Dr Kent - Emma Campbell-Jones
 * Gideon Vandaleur - Niall Greig Fulton
 * Gantok - Mark Gatiss (Credited as 'Rondo Haxton')
 * Herself - Sian Williams
 * Himself - Bill Turnbull
 * News Anchor - Meredith Vieira
 * Dorium Maldovar -Simon Fisher Becker
 * The Silence - Marnix Van Den Broeke
 * Carter - Richard Dillane
 * Nurse - Katherine Burford
 * Barman - Sean Buckley
 * Canton Delaware - William Morgan Sheppard (footage from The Impossible Astronaut)
 * Voice of the Dalek- Nicholas Briggs

Story notes

 * Following his death in February, this episode pays tribute to Nicholas Courtney, with the Doctor discovering that his character, Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart, died peacefully in his sleep, fulfilling the prophecy made by the Seventh Doctor in the 1989 episode Battlefield.
 * A prequel to this episode was released online.
 * This is the first time an episode of Doctor Who has aired on the same night as an episode of fellow BBC Saturday night drama, Merlin. The first episode of Merlin Series 4, The Darkest Hour, was broadcast right after The Wedding of River Song.
 * Meredith Vieira, co-host of the American morning news/chat programme Today, filmed her cameo during a visit to the Upper Boat Studios as part of a profile of Doctor Who produced for Today. That feature, which aired on 9 May 2011, contained several minor spoilers for this episode, including revealing the cameo appearance by Richard Hope as Malohkeh and the return of Ian McNeice as Winston Churchill. Appearances by several Cybermen served as a "false flag" spoiler suggesting they might also appear in the episode. They did not.
 * This is the first series finale of the revived series not to be a multi-part episode. In fact, it is the first series finale ever to only be one episode (with the iffy exception of DW: The Five Doctors).

Ratings
UK Overnight: 6.1 Million

Final: 7.67 million

Myths

 * The Doctor will get married. This was proven true.
 * Part of this episode will be set in Egypt. This was proven true.

Filming locations

 * Utah, USA (flashback footage from DW: The Impossible Astronaut)

Production errors

 * The Doctor's reflection in River's helmet shield is not reversed, as it should be.
 * When Gantok falls into the pit of skulls his hat falls off, yet it's back on right before he's devoured completely.
 * When River is about to shoot the Doctor, she begins raising her hand. In the next wide shot, it is risen fully and ready to fire. However, in the next close-up, she is still raising her hand.
 * Time was frozen at 05:02:57, and progressed to around 05:03:06 the first time the Doctor and River touch, but when the Doctor and River kiss later, a clock is shown on screen, with time resuming from 05:02:00.
 * When Amy and her team arrive to save the Doctor in the senate hall, the Doctor throws Winston Churchill to the floor and take a few steps forward. A second later he is shown on the floor right next to Winston.
 * When the Doctor flashes back to the picnic on the lakeside, he fills River's wine glass about a quarter full, but when they all say "Salut" the camera changes angles and the glass looks full; when the camera returns to its starting position, it is back to a quarter.
 * In the Impossible Astronaut, the Doctor speaks to the astronaut for a few seconds, a much shorter time than this episode.
 * It has been said that an image of a Weeping Angel becomes an Angel itself, so why is the one in Amy's sketch not coming to life?

Continuity

 * 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 one hundred and ninety four 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)
 * Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart is said to have died. This is consistent with the Seventh Doctor's assertion in DW: Battlefield that the Brigadier would die in bed. As no indication is given as to when the Brigadier died, it does not contradict the post-2010 continuity established for the character in the Virgin New Adventures and the Brigadier's death in the 2050s established in PDA: The King of Terror.
 * Charles Dickens appears. (DW: The Unquiet Dead)
 * Winston Churchill returns, this time as the Holy Roman Emperor. (DW: Victory of the Daleks, The Pandorica Opens)
 * The Silurian scientist Malokeh returns. (DW: The Hungry Earth / Cold Blood)
 * Dorium Maldovar returns as a head. He was beheaded by the Headless Monks. (DW: A Good Man Goes to War)
 * The Doctor mentions his former companions Rose Tyler and Jack Harkness.
 * Amy's drawings include the Krafayis, the Weeping Angels, the Saturnyns, the Silurians, the Daleks, the Minotaur, the Cybermen and the Smilers, self-portraits of herself from DW: The Curse of the Black Spot and of her emerging from the Pandorica (DW: The Big Bang).
 * The Teselecta returns, as does its captain. (DW: Let's Kill Hitler)
 * The Doctor again sports a beard. (DW: Day of the Moon)
 * When talking to Amy after the timeline has been restored, River mentions climbing out of the Byzantium. She is still in her combat fatigues and mentions that she has just seen Amy when she had no idea who she is. (DW: The Time of Angels / Flesh and Stone)
 * Amy is partially protected from some kinds of temporal changes due to her long-term exposure to The Cracks. (DW: The Eleventh Hour, The Big Bang)
 * When River says to the Doctor that time can be rewritten, he responds with "Don't you dare." This echoes what River says to the Doctor in a similar situation (DW: Forest of the Dead) and the First Doctor trying to stop Barbara Wright interfering in Aztec history (DW: The Aztecs).
 * River mentions "Rule #1: the Doctor lies." (DW: The Big Bang, Let's Kill Hitler)
 * A Silent calls Rory "the man who dies and dies again", referring to his deaths in DW: Amy's Choice, Cold Blood, The Curse of the Black Spot, and The Doctor's Wife.
 * When the Doctor meets River in Area 52, he greets her by saying "Honey, I'm home." River replies, "And what sort of time do you call this?" They had the same exchange in DW: The Big Bang.
 * The Doctor mentions Elizabeth I waiting for him in a glade to elope with her. (DW: The Shakespeare Code, DW: The End of Time, DW: The Beast Below)
 * The Doctor says "Geronimo!" again. (DW: The End of Time, The Eleventh Hour, The Beast Below, The Big Bang)
 * The Doctor asks River, "Why do you always have handcuffs?" (DW: Forest of the Dead, DW: Flesh and Stone)
 * Dorium tells the Doctor what the "question that must never be answered" is. The question was first mentioned in DW: Let's Kill Hitler.
 * The notion of "Doctor who?" being a dark secret rather than simply a question was previously explored in DW: The Girl in the Fireplace.
 * The barman on Calisto B is a red humanoid. Others have appeared in DW: New Earth, Gridlock, The End of Time, The Pandorica Opens and IDW: Agent Provocateur.
 * While held captive, Madame Kovarian expresses annoyance at River and the Doctor's flirting, as Amy did in Day of the Moon.
 * River mentions having to pretend not to recognise a space suit in 1969. (DW: The Impossible Astronaut)
 * A heavily damaged Progenitor Dalek appears. (DW : Victory of the Daleks)
 * The Doctor makes marks on his arm when he sees the Silence. (DW: Day of the Moon)
 * River says she is a child of the TARDIS. (DW: Let's Kill Hitler)
 * The Doctor reads a knitting magazine. (DW: The Impossible Astronaut)
 * River shoots the Doctor shortly after marrying him. Her father, Rory, shot Amy while they were engaged. (DW: The Pandorica Opens)
 * On Amy's office wall is a drawing of a red Dalek from VG: City of the Daleks.
 * The Doctor gives River important information by whispering into her ear. (DW: Let's Kill Hitler)

For the Doctor

 * This story occurs after DW: Closing Time
 * This story takes place during DW: The Impossible Astronaut
 * This story occurs before WC: Prequel (The Doctor, the Widow and the Wardrobe)

For River

 * This story occurs after DW: Closing Time
 * This story takes place during DW: The Impossible Astronaut
 * This story occurs before DW: A Good Man Goes to War

For River in the final scene

 * This story occurs after DW: Flesh and Stone
 * This story occurs before DW: Last Night (Second Future River)

For Amy and Rory

 * This story occurs after DW: The God Complex
 * This story takes place during DW: The Impossible Astronaut
 * This story occurs before DW: The Doctor, the Widow and the Wardrobe

Home video releases
This episode will be released on DVD shortly after the airing of the episode.