Couch Potato Chronicles: "Doctor Who" Season 5 Retrospective: the TARDIS

I told fellow Whovians La Parisenne and California Dreamer that I would do a massive end-of-season "Doctor Who" writeup, but now I'm thinking that the post would be just too long.  So I'm going to take each bit I had planned to cover in it, and I'll make each bit a separate post.  In the end, I'll do a post that links to all the other posts, K?

Focus today: the TARDIS (Time and Relative Dimension in Space)

The TARDIS is a character.  Absolutely.  It's as much an icon as the Doctor is, and we get a brand-new one.  

Remember how we see Eleven in Amelia Pond's backyard.  He's still in his regeneration cycle, still glowing, still in progress.  As he says himself, "I'm still cooking."

Now look at the TARDIS.  It's clearly "still cooking" too.  It had been severely damaged by the sheer force of the Doctor's regeneration, and it didn't merely land in Pond's backyard.  It crashed there.  It's lying on its side as smoke and steam billow out of its doors.  You can only imagine what kind of chaos is going on inside (the Doctor gives a deliciously evocative hint when he says "the pool is in the library").

One of the really brilliant details of the season opener, "The Eleventh Hour," was how it showed us both the Doctor seeing the interior of his new TARDIS for the first time and then, later, showed Amy in the same situation ... but we as the audience see it with Amy.

The hint is already clear from earlier that the TARDIS (and all that it represents) is going to rock.  Just look at the Doctor's face as he looks inside the newly-finished blue box.  Do you remember what he said then?

 

"Look at you!  You sexy thing!  Look at you!"

We're all used to new companions looking into the TARDIS and freaking out ("It's bigger on the inside--!").  It's become a running in-joke on the show (remember some hilarious exchanges between Ten and Martha and between Eleven and Rory?).  But we don't often get to see the Doctor himself feel some of that kind of wonder.  We do here, though, and it is just fabulous.

When Amy finally sees the TARDIS interior, she's apprehensive and curious all at once.  And so are we, all over again.  She's suddenly childlike again in her wonder and delight.  And so are we.  Brilliant.  (The PJs are a nice touch.)

And just look at this new TARDIS!   All curving walls and smooth glassy floors and inviting levels and coy corridors leading to secret places; she's all sleek shining seductiveness.  Look at that central console, tall and graceful as a calla lily!  (Yes, the technophiliac part of me is totally geeking out.)  Oh, the TARDIS.  She's not just a time/space vehicle to get you from point A to point B.  She's a glowing, bewitching beauty.

"Does he still stroke bits of the TARDIS?" 

-- Sarah Jane Smith in Season 2

 And look at their faces as the Doctor takes them off on their first adventure in time and space.  He's as excited as she is.  And so are we.

Given all that, is it any wonder that the build-up to the season finale included the TARDIS in the most terrifying way possible?   I cannot be the only person who felt actual fear at the thought of losing this new TARDIS that I had just begun to love ("No!  It's too soon!").

Oh, all right.  I can't help it.  This image of TARDIS, Doctor, and River is too awesome not to post.  Doesn't this just capture the essence of the Who fan's ultimate fantasy?  To be swept into the TARDIS and away on an adventure?  OH YES.  Cowboy, take me away!

All screencaps courtesy of Sonic Biro.