For those of us here in the U.K. (and to a lesser extent, Americans on sites of disputable legality), the end of this half of the current season of Doctor Who has been and gone. With it has come a certain revelation about the true nature of one of our beloved characters, which changes the rest of them forever. Or it makes you look at their earlier interactions in a slightly different light. Whatever's good for you.
Okay, the revelation itself - if you've been anywhere near fansites in the last year or so, it was kind of obvious. It was actually spoiled on one of my earlier episode reviews by a commenter but considering that the last episode has only just aired in the U.S, I wouldn't go looking for it. The problem with this twist is that it wasn't much of one. I'd gone into the episode with as little foreknowledge as I could possibly manage and yet I could spot the hints from a mile away. If you have any talent for recognising the significance of names or word association, then you will also see it coming from a mile away. I'd like to stress that this is about half and half the fault of both Steven Moffat's writing and the bountiful source of 1s and 0s known as the Internet, as now everybody can get their theories heard. It was only a matter of time before somebody stumbled on the right one.
I'll be honest, if you haven't seen "The Almost People" then you certainly shouldn't be reading this review but if you have or you just want to read it regardless (if so, thanks), then I think I'm safe in telling you that the plot of this week's episode follows on from the last one. At the end of last week's episode, it was revealed that Amy Pond has not physically been with them for the entire season (her mind, soul, katra, whatever you call it has been, just in a duplicate body). We also found out that her real body was going into labour in the far future. "A Good Man Goes To War" is about the Doctor having an interstellar whip-round for allies to help him find Amy and her new-born child.
Finding these allies means that the BBC gets another chance to raid its Costume Department, as in "The Pandorica Opens". Indeed, we see most of the same aliens here (Judoon, Silurians, Cybermen and more). Perhaps the members of the alliance are keen to endear themselves to the Doctor considering what happened when they tried locking him up, although I am uncertain about whether the universe at large remembers that. One of my friends had a problem with the Doctor raising an army like that as he doesn't do armies. However, I find that it's an example of the writer making the character break their own rules to show how serious the situation has become. They did it all the time on Star Trek with the Prime Directive.
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