Doctor Who: The Rings of Akhaten Review

rating: 4.5

Week 2 of 7.2 has come and gone, and Doctor Who has done what it does best: it's made us laugh, it's made us cry, and it's made us scream at the television in an attempt to try and figure out just where all of this is going. The Rings of Akhaten is Clara's first proper adventure as a Companion, so naturally we're going to a foreign planet, taking in the natural color, and ultimately trying to save a civilization from being destroyed. Just another trip in the TARDIS. The Pre-Credit Prologue this week is a rundown of the history of Clara's parents. From first meeting to first kiss, from the birth of little Clara to the untimely passing of her mother, we see it all. And through all of that, The Doctor is hiding in the shadows, trying to figure out just what makes "the impossible girl" so...well...impossible. So far, nothing's really sticking out, and The Doctor is puzzled as to just how this girl can be, yet at the same time can't be. While this is all happening, we find out that the leaf Clara carries around in that book of her's is so important: it was the leaf that hit her father in the face and caused him to meet her mother; a leaf proclaimed to be the most important in human history. Whether this is foreshadowing or just the product of a man in love, we'll find out sure enough. Also the book that Clara carries the leaf around in is important as well, as it's a book that belonged to her mother as a child. A book that was passed down to Clara at a bright young age. That book: "101 Places To Go". And yet, when we come back after the Prologue, Clara has no clue where exactly she wants to go. Perhaps it's the fact that with The Doctor's TARDIS being able to go anywhere, at any time, she's presented with an abundance of options. Too many to even begin to comprehend. Ultimately she tells The Doctor to take her "somewhere awesome". Interpreting "awesome" as "an alien planet where we'll stick out as a fish out of water (as he usually does), he takes her to the titular location. Located there is a huge market where the economic unit is the easiest to come by, yet the rarest to give up: an item of personal significance to the bearer. The significance of this economy isn't known at first, but it does tie into the big happening that our intrepid travelers have stumbled upon (in two completely different ways): The Festival of Offering. While The Doctor gathers knowledge through stumbling about the local scenery, Clara finds a scared young girl. A girl that's being sought out for a special purpose involving the Festival. You see this young girl is Merry, also known as The Queen of Years. Together with The King of Years, they sing "The Long Song": a lullaby to keep The Old God in a sort of slumbering stasis within his pyramid. Merry is scared because she's afraid that she'll sing the song wrongly, which has been linked to The Old God awakening and becoming vengeful. Clara tries to boost the girl's self worth and tells her that she'll do just fine, which convinces young Merry to stop running and return to her duties. The Doctor and Clara catch up with one another and attend the festival, Clara urging the little girl on with her song when she turns for comfort. Just as everything seems to be going well, and we learn that The Long Song has been going for an interminable amount of time, unending and with a string of vocalists switching in and out, something goes wrong on the end of the King of Years. This starts the process of awakening The Old God, which then causes Merry to be beamed to The Old God's pyramid for a further ritual. Naturally, Clara wants to save her and The Doctor sprints out of the stadium to get into action. Clara mistakes this for running away from the problem, but The Doctor teaches Clara one of the most important lessons of traveling in the TARDIS: when it comes to trouble, they "never run". Using Clara's ring from her mother as collateral (again, emotional connection is economy here), The Doctor rents them a jet ski and begins to pursue Merry; which lands them on the floating asteroid that houses the pyramid. The King of Years, futilely trying to keep The Old God asleep, is still singing to appease the local deity. That is, until The Doctor realizes that the ritual didn't go wrong; in fact, it was still going as planned. The Old God plans to feed on the soul of Merry, who as Queen of Years holds all of the local history and emotional information that he feeds on. Big reveal number 2 comes in the fact that the Mummy in the pyramid isn't The Old God... it's his alarm clock. Awakened, The Old God (which is actually the gigantic Sun in the middle of all of the rings) plans to feast not only on the Queen of Years, but the entire outlying population of Akhaten. The Doctor, in an attempt to prevent this from happening, offers himself as the meal; and in a heartbreaking monologue he catalogs all of the memories he has to offer. Memories of The Time War, of mutual extinction, of the beginning and the end of the Universe, of losing those he loves. All of those memories are still not enough, and as any good companion would, Clara steps in to save the day with her most prized possession: her father's leaf. She offers it as not only a token of all the history that was, but also a token of the memories that could have been. Its those unfathomable and infinite hypotheticals that ultimately vanquish the villain and save the day. The Doctor, still with no idea who she is, realizes that Clara is still quite clever. As a reward for her sacrifice, The Doctor gives Clara her mother's ring back, saying that the people of Akhaten want her to have it. It is at that moment that she realizes The Doctor has been with her through various points in her life, and has been acting strange on top of all of that. When asked to explain why, he says that Clara reminds him of someone who had died. Someone he'd known. She tells him to stop using her as a replacement, because she's not ever going to be that person. And with that little stinger, we close out this week's events. The Rings of Akhaten keeps puling us along the path that will eventually reveal who Clara really is and what she's capable of, and it does a fine job of doing so. The opening with The Doctor basically watching Clara's whole life up until then is cute, and not unlike anything we've seen before. However, at least this time, his activities tie into the general mystery. Clara as a companion, as well as a character, is shaping up to be quite the match for The Doctor; though now we have to ask ourselves "Why does The TARDIS 'not like' her"? I think it was simply because The Doctor probably locked the TARDIS, what with it being in a market and all, and Clara doesn't have a key yet to get in. Others seem to think she's like Captain Jack Harkness and she's some sort of temporal anomaly, which could be the truth, but so far I think it's too easy of an out. The central adventure to the episode is fun, but a bit thinly written. We move from here to there to everywhere, with at least two big "reveals", and with not much time between each development. I know it's an individual episode, but it's gripes like these that make me long for the normal continuous season model we're all so used to. Splitting down the middle leaves too little time to really build a story arc, and it forces you to play catch up when you're introducing a new character. It might have worked for wrapping up The Ponds, but it's not a good idea for introducing Clara. Maybe it's because they now feel they have to write episodes that can fit American television's "60 minutes, with commercials" model, just to be aired overseas, or maybe it's just the writer for this particular episode, but this felt like a skimpy, albeit fun episode. Finally, I have just one last gripe that really kind of wears at me: The Doctor searches himself for an item of personal importance when he's renting the spacial jet ski, and says all he can find is is Sonic Screwdriver. Yet, he's seen at several points reading with the glasses that Amy was wearing in The Angels Take Manhattan. Why don't those count? I won't take "The Doctor needs his reading glasses" as an answer, because he didn't need them until that episode. Forcing Clara to possibly give up her mother's ring for good instead of parting with his glasses seems selfish when you think about all of this. This isn't the particular sentiment you want to leave the audience with in an episode where we're supposed to get emotional over The Doctor giving up all of his memories and emotions, and yet he'll clutch a pair of glasses like a miser and a gold piece. Nevertheless, The Rings of Akhaten was adventurous, enjoyable, and overall another good reason why Doctor Who is pure appointment TV. Next Week: We see The Doctor and Clara board a Soviet submarine in the 1980s, and face off against an old foe from The Doctor's past. David Warner guest stars in the latest adventure from WhoLockian mastermind Mark Gatiss... it's Cold War. What say you, What Culture Republic? Did this episode satisfy your weekly Who craving, or was it rather light and fluffy like a Krispy Kreme donut? Also, am I overdoing it with the reading glasses/underdoing it with Clara's difficulties with the TARDIS? Send your theories, your critique, and your fondest personal memories of Doctor Who to the comments section below.