Dr. Who crosses the pond to American audiences

Doctor Who is credited as the longest running sci-fi series worldwide. The story centers around an alien simply called the Doctor who travels in time and space in his spaceship called the TARDIS (Time And Relative Dimension in Space) with at least one female companion at his side.

Each episode revolves around the aliens and creatures he encounters during his travels and usually ends with him — and his companion(s) — righting wrongs, solving the alien trouble that plagues the planet or time he’s visiting and generally saving the day.

The sixth season of Doctor Who begins with a death. The Doctor’s death, to be exact. Of course, producer Steven Moffat couldn’t just kill his main character within 10 minutes of the first episode, so the audience expected some weird “wibbly-wobbly-timey-wimey” (in the words of the Doctor himself) plot device.

After all, it’s Steven Moffat. He has a history of messing with his viewers’ heads and playing with the non-linearity of time and space.

But of course, that’s exactly what he does. It turns out that the Doctor who died was the future Doctor, and the past Doctor is just fine and dandy and must go to the Oval Office in 1969 to stop . . . well, it’s not exactly clear, and that’s just the way Moffat likes it.

It’s just a bit complicated, actually, with people in spacesuits running around, aliens that the characters constantly forget, children calling President Nixon on the phone and to top it off, Amy telling the Doctor at the end of the episode that she’s pregnant. And that’s in the first part alone.

Still, Moffat manages to pull it off and ties what seems complicated with a nice (or at least understandable) little bow while leaving the audience wanting to know more.

The episode is solid — it’s excit

ing, it’s riveting and ending on a cliffhanger means that the audience will be coming back next week for the resolution.

The second part lives up to the excitement, but anyone expecting a resolution would have been sorely disappointed. It seems like Moffat purposefully confuses his audience and messes with their heads.

Not only do questions arise about the secretive River Song, who has been around since season four and has been sewn into the very fabric of Doctor Who, but Moffat also leaves too many questions unanswered from the first two-parter.

Who is the little girl stuck in the spacesuit? Why does Amy see a picture of her holding the little girl as a baby? Who was the cyborg woman showing up once just to tell Amy that it was all a dream? And why, oh why can the mysterious little girl regenerate (a Time Lord way of changing into another body to cheat death)?

Moffat seems to be placing all of his eggs in one basket. It may have been better for him to introduce these questions slowly in the first several episodes so that he didn’t have to hit his audience with a barrage of facts and questions within the first two hours of the season.

Likewise, he may have his audiences expecting too much after these first two episodes and then be unable to deliver in future episodes, turning disappointed viewers away.

These two episodes felt more like finales than the first episodes, to be honest, and unless Moffat has something spectacular planned for the finale he may have played his hand too early.

Nonetheless, all four main characters have upped the ante on their acting this seasons. Karen Gillan has really grown into the character of Amy, metamorphosing from the girl who waited 14 years for the doctor to come back for her into a love interest worthy of being the doctor’s companion.

She portrays an emotional scene when the future doctor dies, and Arthur Darvill, who plays Rory Williams, may appear stoic but it is clear that he is hurting as well. It takes a special type of actor to be able to portray pain, sadness and loss non-verbally. Darvill is that type of actor.

Matt Smith spends most of season five playing a happy, fun, bouncy doctor, but this season viewers see his darker side, showing that Smith can play both types of characters adeptly. Alex Kingston as River Song has the right mix of sexiness, mystery and vulnerability surrounding her that leaves her panting for more.

This episode comprises more than just running and guns and aliens; there are several emotional moments as well. In addition to the future doctor’s death, the most notable event occurs when River and Rory talk about the doctor and Amy.

The viewers see a deeper side of them both (which is much appreciated) and while Moffat shouldn’t give up his flashy lights and scary monsters, these emotional moments make up the heart of Doctor Who.

Of course, as a British show taking place in America, Doctor Who makes expected jokes at America’s expense and Moffat certainly did not disappoint in this episode.

At one point, the aliens say that they “have no need of weapons.” The American FBI agent then retorts, “Yeah, welcome to America” before shooting said aliens. “The Impossible Astronaut” episode is filled with witty one-liners; Moffat knows how to write dialogue that lets the audience know plot events without needing any exposition or explanation by characters.

Besides, if there’s anything the audience doesn’t understand, they can just assume it’s something mysterious that Moffat will reveal in due time (and probably in highly dramatic fashion).

The beginning of the episode gives audiences pause; when viewers last saw Amy and Rory in the Christmas special, they were still travelling with the doctor. However, at the introduction of “The Impossible Astronaut,” they have apparently settled down in a nice little house in a nice little village.

Without any sort of explanation or segue, viewers are left to wonder how they jumped from travelling on the TARDIS to becoming domestic. This left a lot of viewers scratching their heads, but it wasn’t a big enough problem to turn them away from the rest of the episode.

Although this installment is an appropriate mix of mind-bending time travel, terrifying aliens and intrigue, Moffat does seem to reuse a lot of the aspects of his past episodes that he finds successful.

The disembodied child speaking into the telephone was seen in “The Empty Child/The Doctor Dances” of season one. The aliens you couldn’t turn your back on were used in every episode with the Weeping Angels (stone statues which could kill only if they weren’t looked at). The people in astronaut suits were seen in “Silence in the Library/Forest of the Dead,” (season four) though granted, they weren’t as scary back then.

Moffat should stop trying to draw from his own source material and come up with some new brilliant thing that will get his fans talking.

Currently, although they praise the concept and the acting in regards to individual elements in the show, they also talk about how they’ve seen it all before and how it looks like a giant compilation of his past episodes.

Steven Moffat has really grown into being the showrunner for Doctor Who. Last season had many mixed reviews, with some critics praising his genius while others lamented the loss of Russell T. Davis, but the overall reaction to this first episode of season six is an A+.

This episode should should garner significant increases in total viewership due to American audiences; Moffat has successfully hooked them with his first episode and leaves them wanting more.

The next episode of Doctor Who, “The Curse of the Black Spot,” airs on BBC America on Saturday, May 7th at 9 p.m.