It's absolutely awful that this has even made it onto the list ("It's Matt Smith's last one, for God's sake! Who the hell do you think you are?!") but compared to previous regeneration episodes, it's all just a little bit too much, isn't it? That's said purely out of love, of course, because the Eleventh Doctor deserved so much more. The Time of the Doctor is supposed to be too much but someone really should've told Steven Moffat that you actually don't have to wait until the very last minute to resolve every story arc you've ever written. It's quality over quantity, of course, and, after not being mentioned since Series 5, the cracks are suddenly shoved down our throats again as it's revealed that the Time Lords are using them to communicate with our universe. Except they don't relinquish the opportunity to actually tell anyone where the hell Gallifrey even is right now, which in retrospect would've been slightly more productive. Trenzalore, holographic clothing, Clara's failed Christmas dinner, a menagerie of ultimately underused monsters... It's all just stuff (and not the fun 'timey-wimey wibbly-wobbly' kind) that detracts from the actual point of the episode, which should've been to honour and bid adieu to the man who has been one of the most popular Doctors to date. Instead, they shove the fact he's even dying into the last 5 minutes and then you go and literally blink and miss the actual regeneration. What... Where the hell did Matt Smith go?! Like breath on a mirror indeed.
Dan Butler is the Doctor Who Editor at WhatCulture.com. When he isn't writing his own articles or editing other people's, he can be found trawling the internet for gifs of Steven Moffat laughing. Contact him via dan.butler@whatculture.co.uk.
