Space (TV story)

Space is a Doctor Who television story written by Steven Moffat for Comic Relief 2011. It is the first part of a two-part story.

Synopsis
The Doctor is doing repairs on the TARDIS with Rory's help, but thanks to Amy they make a mistake that could leave them trapped in the TARDIS forever.

Plot
Amy tries to get the Eleventh Doctor's attention while he fixes the TARDIS. She fails, but finds Rory is helping the Doctor with his routine maintenance by installing thermo-couplers. However, Amy thinks that he is helping the Doctor fly the TARDIS and they start to quarrel about Amy cheating on her driving test by wearing a skirt to distract her examiner. The lights go out. The Doctor asks Rory if he dropped a thermo-coupler, which he apologises for doing. Amy also apologises. Confused, the Doctor asks why. Amy points out that Rory was looking up her skirt through the TARDIS' glass floor. The Doctor can only respond, "Oh....Rory!"

The Doctor turns on the emergency materialisation to land the TARDIS in the nearest safe place. The lights come back on to reveal the TARDIS has materialised inside itself. As a test to see if things are as bad as he believes, the Doctor walks through the doors of the inside TARDIS, stepping in through the outside doors. Rory says that is cool. The Doctor tells Rory it's a good thing he finds it amusing because they have caused a space loop that has now trapped them inside the TARDIS forever. Another Amy walks through the TARDIS doors, telling them things are going to get complicated.

Cast

 * Eleventh Doctor - Matt Smith
 * Amy Pond - Karen Gillan
 * Rory Williams - Arthur Darvill

Credited on episode as broadcast

 * Writer - Steven Moffat
 * Producer - Annabella Hurst-Brown
 * Director - Richard Senior

Uncredited
to be added

Story notes

 * This story, along with Time, was written especially for Comic Relief 2011.
 * What question Amy wanted to ask the Doctor is not revealed in this episode, but Steven Moffat stated it would be addressed in the future. It was finally addressed in the "Good Night" segment of DW: Night and the Doctor, the series of mini-episodes produced for the 2011 DVD/Blu-ray release of Series 6. Amy's question involves why she's able to fully remember and accept the two separate timelines that were created for her as a result of the Doctor rebooting the universe in DW: The Big Bang.
 * Moffat, in an interview with Doctor Who Magazine, confirmed that the two-part mini-episode, just like recent Children in Need specials, is considered canonical.
 * DWMSE 29 says the mention of thermo couplings in this mini-episode was quote 'a linking element to the concluding scene of Day of the Moon (TV story) which this scene was supposed to follow (with Rory and the Doctor working on the TARDIS).'

Ratings

 * 10.26 million (BARB)

Filming locations
to be added

Production errors

 * When the Doctor steps "out" of the TARDIS, from the interior he closes it with his left hand pulling the door shut, but when we see him exit, he uses his right hand pulling the door handle.

Continuity

 * This is the fifth TV story to be set entirely within the Doctor's TARDIS. The first was The Edge of Destruction, while the most recent, Amy's Choice, takes place entirely within the TARDIS, but has settings outside of the TARDIS (although the Doctor, Amy and Rory stay within it). In between, the Children in Need Special mini-episode was set entirely in the TARDIS, though there were re-cap scenes at the beginning which take place outside the TARDIS. Time Crash featured the TARDIS intersecting with its own timestream, causing the Fifth and Tenth Doctors to meet. Music of the Spheres also takes place entirely inside the TARDIS, though it was designed for and originally aired during Doctor Who at the Proms and therfore could be contested as a TV story.
 * A similar space loop occurred in DW: The Time Monster, when the Doctor's TARDIS was inside the Master's TARDIS, and the Master's TARDIS was inside the Doctor's TARDIS. In DW: Logopolis, the Master's TARDIS materialised within the Doctor's.
 * Amy says, "OK, kids. This is where it gets complicated," as she did when she was released from the Pandorica in DW: The Big Bang.
 * This story is the third TV story to feature only the main cast. The others are DW: The Edge of Destruction and Children in Need Special.
 * This is the second multi-part charity TV story. The first was DW: Dimensions in Time.
 * Rory asks the Doctor if he's ever seen Amy drive, to which the Doctor replies in the negative. The Doctor actually did briefly see Amy drive, albeit in a dream, in DW: Amy's Choice. In that episode, Amy drove herself and the Doctor into a house. Rory states that Amy did the same thing when he let her drive his car once.
 * Amy indicates that she wore "this skirt" during her driving test, implying that the skirt belonged to her prior to joining the Doctor. In The Big Bang, Amy enters the TARDIS in her wedding dress. Either they stopped by her house off-screen to pick up her belongings, or some of her clothes remained on the TARDIS from her travels in series five.
 * A TARDIS within a TARDIS happens as well in Logopolis, and the Doctor theorises that other space time anomalies could cause the TARDIS to appear within the TARDIS, though within the context of that story it was the Master's TARDIS within the Doctor's.

Timeline

 * Space occurs after DW: Day of the Moon (TV story).
 * Space occurs before DW: Time.

DVD releases
This episode was released on the first disc of the Series 6 box set.

Blu-ray releases
to be added

Space