What Went Wrong With Kill the Moon?
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Your criticism of the Doctor's decision and behavior toward this high-stake dilmena and the way he treated Clara were way too harsh. I think you missed the point that Timelords essentially *cannot* in any way interfere with fixed points in time and history. You constantly remind about how the Tenth Doctor and Elevemth Doctor migjt have deal with what Twelfth said, did or did not in tbe course of the episode. But that's the point: the Twelfth Doctor is in dilmena between what he used to stand for ever since he outlived the Last Time War, even at the expanse of the universe, versus what a good man has to do. And sometimes, the best way is to do nothing. Tenth decided once to bow the laws of time at his will: it resulted into TimeLord Victorious and screwing with time. Eleventh Doctor used to lie about how he did not have to consider people less special than others, unlikely the maniac Tenth: it resulted into edging close from becoming a cosmic villain in The Doctor Goes To War, which led to fail from finding Melody Pond, which resulted into a domino effect of disastrous events that almost had time screwed once more. The Doctor wanted to be everyone's hero out of ego: it resulted into Rose, Donna, Amy, Rory, so many weaponized companions and allies lost in battle.
The Tweflth Doctor is the amswer to the Timelord choosing to conciliate both his past (Donna asking him to remember his huminity, to remember about others) and what he could be (by honouring Clara's asvice not to be a hero neither a warrior) . He's the Doctor. Sometimes, you have to take a step back and act cold to better diagnose and assess the situation. He left Clara not because he was being villainous or a jerk, but because he absolutely do have faith in Clara, Courtney and the rest of mankind. Twelfth Doctor is the Doctor who choose to take a leap of faith over a power step into the battlefield or to stride across a castle on his whyte horse (literally so) . And he's willing to do anything, absolutely *anything* to make that faith win: he didn't have to go full-on Hybrid this time yet because Clara was there. He trained her well.
Get a job
@@booradley8895 ??? This is my job, friend
@@HarboWholmes Just teasing
There was such an easy solution that classic Who would have done, but NuWho refuses to do when it should: MAKE IT A DIFFERENT PLANET THAN EARTH! We could all easily believe an alien moon could be an egg, and that they could still have had them as human colonists if you want the message on humanity.
What difference does it make if it's an alien moon or ours? This has always bothered me with fans. Why would you be willing to accept that another planet's moon could be an egg but not ours?
@@brucesimmons5517 Any changes to the Earth means that it’s a retcon, and if it’s a bad retcon then it’s gonna cause controversy. This mean that every time the Doctor has been to the Moon, it was actually a giant egg. They could’ve made it a throwaway planet that will never be visited again but instead it’s Earth’s moon. This means if the Doctor goes back to the moon in any future story, it’s a giant egg. Long lasting changes with no real value to them doesn’t strike well with fans most of the time
@@ibotmania4284 But what difference does does it make, for example, if you're watching Smith & Jones, and you know that the moon is an egg? It doesn't have anything to do with the story. Same with any future story that may feature the moon. When the Doctor visits Earth, do you think "Oh, man, this planet was created by the Racnoss ship!"?
@Bruce Simmons I just think the premise is stupid. It feels like a retcon, I can't buy the science, and it really annoys me how humans keep forgetting there are aliens. There are plenty of reasons for humanity to expand established before, and it's all ignored. Plus, to be honest, I really can't stand Clara. I never felt she deserved being as important as they made her, so I can't buy her relationship with the doctor.
It almost feels like people have forgotten New (sorry, New New New New New New New New New New New New New New) Earth exists. there's stuff you can still do there but since Gridlock it's just.....gone
Huh, I never felt this had a connection to abortion while I was watching it.
I thought it had more of a “Let 1 man on the tracks die, or divert the track and let 6 people die?” kind of message/theme.
That's the wrong way around but yes i got the same idea
@@littleredruri Whoops. 😅
@@littleredruri not if you're going for the high score
This episode was apparently praised by pro forced-birth groups. It was intended to be a trolley problem, but since the moon held an unborn baby, it accidentally became an abortion episode. I just don't understand how they didn't realise it
it definitely did, the abortion stuff is a bit of a tenuous connection
My biggest problem with this episode is that now we established that the moon is an egg. This means that whenever the moon is mentioned in Doctor Who it will have to be treated like an egg - it cannot just be considered a dead piece of rock with some moondust on the surface. It was the same with the 'reapers' in "Father's day", what bothered me most was why hadn't they appeared in all the other stories where the Doctor had created a paradox? I hate when things are considered rock solid facts in one episode and then completely forgotten there after.
RTD's writing portrayed paradoxes as something that must be avoided at all costs, but Moffat LOVES paradoxes, so when he took over as showrunner basically every other episode has some paradox or another that is seen as "Oh no! This can't happen! But oh well, it worked out in the end dinnit?" except for rare occasions where it would be dramatic if it didn't work out. Of course Moffat would retcon the creatures that would render 90% of his favorite plot pieces moot.
It was already hinted by Torchwood lore that there has some alien legends implicating that the Moon was a space dragon's egg hatched some 65 millions years ago. And even in Classic Who ever since the Tom Baker Era, it was strongly implied that the Moon hasn't always been there as the Silurians feared it and told they literally see the Moon coming out of the skies.
This episode, to me, was simply a means to dig a little further into that cosmological aspect Doctor Who's Earth lore.
Anyway, let's remind y'all that according Doctor Who, our planet was basically an artifically terraformed small rocky planet-sized egg created billions of years ago by an eldritch arachnoid-like humanoid Titanness older than Creation itself in order to cover her lasting offspring, which made of us all their cattle breed. Any evolutionary pathway in the multiverse converges into humanoid life as the pinnacle of life anywhere across the cosmos because Timelords had technomagically tampered with the laws of the Universe before they literally engineered timespace and logic as we know. And for some odd reason, we got a rift/interdimensional abnomality native from Gallifrey and related to the giant hole/hole in the fabric of the universe beneath their Capitolum wounding into our planet and its noosphere down Sydney, Australia to San Francisco, USA to Cardiff, Wales and when a geoup of Illuminati-like oligarchs that has never been seen ever again tampered with it over 70 years, all of humanity stopped dy*ng because it affected the template of mortality within mankind's bio-morphic field on such a metaphysical and transcendental level: so much so that even Jack Harkness, a time-travelling descendant of Humanity born 3000 years from now and not even on our actual planet who became immortal because a God-possessed magical girl doped on time vortex energy made it made so 150,000 years from now, turned into a mortal again.
@@anubis7457 Cof series 3 finale cof
Cof Waters of Mars cof
I think the reapers had some explanation like how the paradox worked differently to others. Think it’s a particularly weak point due to there being multiple doctors and roses present when changing time and causing the paradox. They did cause more than one paradox in the sense that rose wouldn’t have gone there if Pete didn’t die and rose wouldn’t have gone there again if she saved him like on her second attempt. I’m sure it still contradicts some other episodes but I’m sure there’s some slight wording in the episode making the reaper paradox/ fixed point out to be particularly weak for whatever reason, allowing them to appear
For the reapers, I've heard it explained that they are like scavengers that feed off the energy produced by the paradox. So while they are attracted to a paradox, they aren't always going to be at every paradox because either they are feeding of of a different paradox at the moment or are "out of range". I don't think this is a canon explanation but it makes the most sense to me.
The Doctor’s change from “everybody is important” to “you’re not special” totally made sense to me after I burnt out from hospice chaplaincy work. I think he spent too much time giving himself away on Trenzalor, so afterwards he was like, “nah, you can save yourself”
I’m now just realising that means that ‘Smith and Jones’ was set in a hospital on a giant egg.
It's raining on the egg.
A Judoon platoon on the egg just doesn't sound the same
This episode was shown in my Catholic school’s religion class as an argument against abortion. In middle school. Yeesh.
Made me want to become an abortion doctor.
Hopefully normal schools can follow their example and play more doctor who episodes in class
Laaadies, even if your baby is going to blow up the earth, you better keep it or else you both go to hell! -Catholics probably
@Sic Semper Tyrannis "the laws of time are going to obey me" and go home early
@@memelordmarcus I've heard that some schools play "Rosa" in class when talking about the civil rights movement.
I think this is one of the episodes I just pretend doesn't exist... I do still like Clara's monologue at the end, but the episode always rubbed me the wrong way in the writing department. I do agree it comes WEIRDLY close to being an abortion analogy though, the fact every other character in the episode besides the doctor is a human woman really doesn't help. The episode's fast pace doesn't really help it, I always feel like I have no room to breathe on trying to understand what's happening.
Anyone else being okay with the moon being an egg for some type of eldritch creature but rolling their eyes at the implication that using social media and having a phone is the reason why humanity gives up on going to the stars?
I always felt there was a touch of arrogance from Clara in the ending speech going "don't lump me in with the other little humans" as if her travels have made her more than other people
Well it kinda did. I love clara and she has the advanced brain from Bells of Saint John so she is advanced above other humans. Love the episode tbh.
thats why the doctor did it. She thinks she can be like him, so she can make the big choices
And why shouldn't she? She jumped into the doctors timeline to die saving his life over and over and over again. She encouraged the timelords to save 11 and give him another load of regenerations. So she saved him twice on trenzalore. And in between helped save gallifrey in the time war. And then he turns around and treats her like she's insignificant?? That dressing down from Clara was very well deserved!
I couldn't stand Clara through this entire series. She was fine in series 7b, but this season she became this glaring eyed angry and abusive monster, who kept slapping the doctor and threatening him, and he put up with it for no really good reason.
Absolutely. You can see her slow build to being... how she becomes by the end of her arc.
The life cycle of the dragon makes me so mad. If it lays an egg of equal mass to its own immediately after being born, then what was the point of it growing in the egg for a million years, if it can just generate mass? And why does the new moon have craters? And wouldn't that mean that the species never grows, since it's a one to one reproduction? And where did the egg even come from? It just kinda waved around.
I hate this episode.
i think it'd work better if the moon attract nearby asteroids and gradually twice heavier, then it splits into 2 cells and one fly elsewhere.
@@BarioIDL yeah! That's still abysmally bad science, but at least it doesn't invalidate the core dilemma of the episode. Plus, I don't watch this show for the science. Some things are just too far though.
I think you're really digging too deep. Although I will respect how intelligent you are and how you did bring up an interesting fact. But it's also bout a man in a box and inside the box is basically an infinite ship
I also love it when she says "do you have music in your head when you say stuff like that"... I can just imagine Murray Gold being like "yeeeeahhh, I'm just gonna leave you two for a bit".
Actually, there are single-celled organisms in real life that are BIGGER than the spiders in this episode...but they're way more simple and mostly resemble plants and sponges, these spiders are still definitely not single-celled with how complex they are.
Hermione Norris playing a character who is basically Adelaide Brooke 2.0 is amusing for me personally, since the first show that I saw her in after Doctor Who was Spooks, which also happened to feature Lindsay Duncan, specifically in the episode before Norris makes her debut.
Harbo: *Advertises the benefits of a standing desk in the first three minutes*
Also Harbo: *Sits for the rest of the video*
The downsides of pre-recording 😭
Despite the inconsistencies I actually don't mind this episode.
Doctor Who has always been a mixed bag of good, bad and great episodes, that's what makes the show great itself.
You could have an awful episode one week and an amazing episode the next, keeping you interested.
I think there was potential in this episode. In that it could be a way to show a companion what the Doctor has to do every single day, and if it breaks them, imagine what it must be like for the Doctor who's had to do this sort of thing for millennia at this point.
I don’t recall having good memories about this one in particular but you’ve pretty much hit the nail on the head yet again big man.
21:53 The issue is there's no time for that because The Moonbase is supposed to take place is supposed to take place less than half a century.
21 years, to be exact. The Moonbase is set in 2070.
'I'll smack you so hard you'll regenerate' has got to be my all time favourite companion line
... Is that really the one you want to choose for that? Not an inspirational quote, or a heartfelt one, or even a funny one? One of the worst of Moffat's companions-joyfully-assaulting-The-Doctor saga?
personally i think with just 1 major point being removed and a couple tweaks the story could have been downright decent.
lets say the doctor wanting to teach clara that being a timelord means having to sometimes put their own beliefs aside and do whats best by taking her to the day the earth lost its moon.
from his perspective and knowledge earth loses its moon forcing it to once again look to the stars for survival. so all throughout the story he is reluctantly on the side of blowing it up because as the missing moon is a fixed point he thinks nothing can be done and is actively holding clara back.
But if we simply remove the "the dragon lays another egg" bit at the end this allows for flexibility and thus allows clara to save the moon but the earth still has to go through the future events. This would serve to both teach clara that time travel is more than sight seeing and requires putting personal morals aside alot more than is comfortable and reminds a very pessimistic incarnation of the doctor that there is always another way.
Jenna is phenomenal in that scene. It's the single moment that made me love this episode despite all the criticisms.
Jenna's acting in that final scene between her and Twelve in this episode is just fantastic and yes, she should've gotten an award to that!
The German dub is also great capturing Clara's anger very well!
ua-cam.com/video/Jq-VA5hzCc0/v-deo.html
The main issue I had with that episode was the fact that if the moon left our orbit in a day , life as we know it on earth would end .
PS: The moon does not have Zero gravity . It has zero atmosphere .
This was my opinion too. So it is less the humans fear of the unknown, and fear of the reality that billions of people could die for a single creature.
I think that if the moon disappears then re-appears in like 5 minutes then it wouldn’t kill us
Because two moons sized things in the same spot with one being dozens of times heavier than the moon totally wouldn't cause massive mega tsunamis that would wipe out the surface of the Earth.
I never put the 2 together. I just like how crazy a concept the Moon being an egg was, I love sci fi that falls into fantasy, and a dragon that that is born and leaves an egg behind is that.
Ridiculous Isn’t it!!! Everyone knows the moon is made of cheese 🌖😂
@@CashelOConnolly I feel sorry for the man living there who had his house destroyed
@@booradley8895 😂he must be lonely and very bored with just eating cheese 🧀😂
@@CashelOConnolly
A dragon's egg made of cheese so the hatchling can be guaranteed a dish of welsh rarebit for its first breakfast. Isn't nature marvellous?
@@markpostgate2551 poor thing,with eating all that cheese it’s cholesterol is sky high,it keeps getting migraines and everyone hates it so much they’ve nicknamed it Cheesy CHIBNALL😂🐉🧀
Although there are things that I _do_ like about this ep, but yeah there are some problems.
One problem people don't talk about much is the description of how gravity was working while they are in flight. You can't _feel_ the gravity while in free fall. Sure, once you've landed, you can feel it.
In the Gatiss ep Sleep No More (which also has its problems), a similar gravitational anomaly is noticed, and the Doctor points out it makes no sense, so I think perhaps Gatiss was taking a shot at Kill The Moon.
That episode impacted my emotions by making my depression relapse.
These are one of the first episodes I watched. I loved the 12th.i started with the 12th and then worked backwards. And honestly the show has never let me down yet. Even the "bad" episodes I get to enjoy the story. To me it shows that even in real life not every adventure is going to be entertaining and it's not going to end good
7:42 Please correct me if I'm wrong but I thought that there is gravety on the moon, just not as much which is why we weight about a 1/3 less on the moon and can jump incredibly high and wide.
The Moon’s gravity is roughly 1/6 of Earth’s.
Mars is about 1/3 of Earth’s.
When the Doctor declared that the Moon had gravity, as if it were a mystery, I knew the series had hit its nadir.
Once again, to understand the nature of fixed points, you need to understand that Tennant's favorite Doctor was Davison, and therefore the infamous wibbly wobbly ball is a cricket ball, wibbling and wobbling as it rolls down the lawn.
Being a Time Lord is being able to tell how much wibble and wobble the ball can take as it rolls. How much room there is to change history in that moment.
He can't see this moment's outcome because it is the polar opposite of fixed. And any change he makes through the application of Artron Energy would have wildly unpredictable results.
That's why it has to be a human choice.
I think kill the moon should have been spit into a two part story., It would enable the story and characters to be fleshed out. Also I personally believe that the doctor's decision to leave Clara behind makes sense, as this could be seen as him leering from the waters of mars , to not get involved and therefore,follows the timelords rules, to just observe from a distance.
I just really wanted to know what the creature was like where did it originally come from
It really annoys me that so much was cut from this episode, and to be honest, it's kinda Moffat's fault. He told the writer to basically make a classic Who story, then gave him half the length of time one of those stories would have. And also... would anyone have particularly minded if we'd lost In The Forest of the Night to get a two parter version of this story, Hinchcliffian devices, character developments and better pacing, included?
I loved the conclusion of this episode in terms of what it did for the doctor and Clara. It was a lynchpin moment in establishing how Trenzalore effected the doctors outlook on his ability and where his responsibilities actually laid. After he was unable to save people for hundreds of years you could see how he would develop more of this kind of attitude. Also I loved the way Clara reacted to this, and how the doctor justified it as him respecting her to make the right decision for the whole of humanity who clearly made the wrong decision. Shows how highly he thinks of her and anyone he chooses to be his companion
You have to admit if the best part of the episode to you is 8:03
Something you describe as 'tell don't show' narrative, then that's an issue.
I appreciate the effort, but that's the problem.
Defending this episode takes more effort than went into the episode.
More effort than it would have taken to redraft.
Capaldi put in more effort learning to yoyo than the writers put in.
I knew very little about eggs. But I figured out DURING the episode that they wouldn't gain mass, because they're self-contained entities as opposed to mammals that inject nutrients and proteins to the baby through the mother eating and drinking for both.
If it took me less than 7 minutes from never even thinking about it to knowing exactly why it wouldn't work, then the writers have no excuse.
And then to make the episode mean Nothing by hitting the reset button Simpons style by having a 12-second-old baby lay an egg larger than her own body.
Um, maybe if you spent your budget on special effects instead of however much cocaine it took to write this draft, you'd be lucid enough to redraft and liquid enough to realistically portray moon gravity.
I WISH I had set up a DRW channel on UA-cam when this episode was still relevant.
I'd have torn them an arsehole large enough to pass a moon through.
13:32
Wait, what? Exquazimas?
They were going to call her Emma, but changed it to Courtney because they reread the script?
What does that mean? How does that work?
I'm not questioning you, I'm questioning whoever made that decision and why?
"You know what, I've just checked the script. We need to redraft."
"Sorry, I knew the egg plot sucked. I'll fix it immediately."
"What? No! That's fine. Gold star! The issue is the character count. As is, without spaces, the script only has 30,306 characters. We're only accepting scripts with 30,500 characters or more."
"Oh. Then I could change Emma to Courtney? That'll bulk it out a little."
"Wow, it's probably going to be hard to rewrite the whole script."
"Actually super easy. Barely an inconvenience."
"Oh really?"
The Doctor leaving kinda adds to the abortion allegory.
Is it a coincidence that the companion's long-lasting father/romantic figure says "Some decisions are too important not to make yourself." then leaves the three females in the room to decide whether or not to terminate the baby?
Yes, it's expected the Doctor would have a say. It's in character for him to have a say.
BUT! If your opinion in abortions is the father/partner HAS no say and it's solely the woman's choice, then it makes perfect sense for him to leave so his presents and opinion can't affect them.
I suspect maybe this was the plan all along, but in the heat of the backlash and people pointing out the pro-life messages, they backpedalled like crazy.
18:50
Again, take all your valid points and adapt it to a father/partner.
His partner/daughter wants HIM to decide if she should have the baby. She's casting off her responsibility and decision making to the man in the room.
Even IF this is something a woman in her place who trusts him so much might do, like it or not, some viewers will take that as an attack personally, or an affront to female independence and accountability.
This is why you REDRAFT when your plot revolves around a pregnant Moon You F**KS!
Even Clara lets humanity vote.
@ClaraDRW Posted:
I'm tots preggers! And my daddy is making me choose to have the baby or not 😱😱
Follow me at @ClaraDRW and vote if I should name it Danny, or get an abortion. 👻
Be sure to like and follow to keep up to date and remember to vote! 🤔🤔
Hey Clara, maybe you don't let Twitter decide this? You know your daddy is going to see the tweet and ground your ass. But maybe that's what you wanted. His attention, no?
I will agree the ONLY good part of the episode is the end when Clara rips into the Doctor.
I was ready. I had my skybox in hand and I was ready to rip it out and throw it in the bin.
The series thus far had 0 consequences for ANYTHING. And this episode was the final nuke in the womb.
I was done. I'm leaving! I'm cancelling Sky and my tv licence. I am out!
Clara goes apeshit.
Oh? What's this? Emotion? Feelings? Consequences for decisions?
Hmm. I'll stick around maybe.
Next episode, they're venturing into space again being all chummy.
F**K YOU!
Idea!: What if they did this story, but not with Earth? What if it was about them debating whether to destroy this moon that will effect another planet. By making it another planet, it avoids the disbelief of Earth's moon being an egg, as well as allowing the episode to end with consequences for the planet, because like Earth was ever going to be devastated. Might have made the episode better in hindsight.
It still makes it a dumb moment.
If the egg hatches and proper consequences are allowed, the planet is wiped out. It would be like the extinction of the dinosaurs x1000. Half the planet would flood, the other half would burn. Everyone dies. Obviously the death of billions of people wouldn't be an acceptable choice.
And they can't kill the egg because that's fundamentally opposed to the morals of the show. They're not willing to have 'kill the baby' be the right choice.
So the only possible option left to them was to ignore all the consequences, removing the entire point of the dilemma.
I really liked the standing desk .
Liked it then & now. Maybe it cd have been a 2 parter w the cuts you bring up. Looks like Citizen Kane compared to Flux.
8:24 That is very wrong, we are in the start/middle of the next big Space Race. We are going back to the moon, private company's are competing more and more, we are reusing rockets and there are more people in space at the same time than ever before
10:20 Also somewhat wrong, you could go from the moon back to earth (like in the series "For all Mankind", but only with the moons Gravity.
I am going through Doctor Who (the new series) for the first time so I really enjoy watching your videos every time I am done with a few episodes! Also... do I want to ask what feet lettuce is? 😅
The Artemis program called and asked if you have heard of it lol.
Thanks to you, I bought a standing desk. ❤
So at least something good came out of Kill the Moon. 😂
Utterly ridiculous episode compared to the more grounded ones like murderous giant glowing green maggots and Bertie Basset from classic Who or talking Dogs, fat monsters and cats as nuns in Nu-Who😂
P.S the moon needs to be put on the pill 💊😂
Should have hatched into the star whale from The Beast Below
18:24 I mean, I thought that reasoning was a great way of showing why the Doctor doesn't help humanity with their own big crises. The Doctor regularly saves entire worlds but all the suffering on Earth and he doesn't do anything unless it's an external thread. Why does he for instance care about fascism when it's the Daleks but not when it's happening here on Earth (and I'm NOT just referring to the fascism of WW2!).
My favorite part about this, is it basically states Mondas got ejected from orbit because of a space dragon.
17:36, thats exactly what happens, the doctor explains this later.
Sorry if this has already been brought up (I haven't read all of the comments and reviews) but the plot of this story is EXACTLY the same as that of a hoary old Superfriends cartoon from the 1980s called The Man in the Moon. Yes, right down to the humongous egg-laying creature. It seems unlikely that the writer of this Who episode was ever a Superfriends fan (hopefully not, or we're talking copyright infringement - the stories really are that similar), so probably just an unfortunate coincidence.
I loved this episode since it aired, yeah the space dragon reegging is weird but it's Doctor Who, whatever. What really got me was that this is directly the inverse to Waters of Mars. The Doctor becoming cold and walking away is him overcorrecting his passed mistake.
Last time he interfered the character took her own life, do you think he was afraid Clara would do that as well?
It's cute that you think we have the money for adjustable standing desks.
Even though I hate this episode and its moon egg concept, it did lead me to my favorite piece of head canon in trying to explain how the moon egg baby could possibly lay a new egg immediately after birth with the exact same size and mass of the old moon egg and actually more mass than its own body. My head canon explanation for this is that Doctor Who takes place in a version of the universe where the law of conservation of mass does not exist. Matter (and therefore energy) CAN be created from nothing or destroyed from existence completely. I love this head canon so much because it doesn't just explain moon baby laying a new full-sized moon egg. It also explains how things like time travel and FTL travel could work in the DW universe and just about every other thing that's scientifically inconsistent with the real world. Just about anything becomes possible when you get rid of the conservation of mass and energy, and if any Doctor Who writer ever uses this to officially explain something in an episode, I will love them forever.
wish the episode saw the return of the Eight Legs in this episode
This is definetly an episode I heavily dislike but that final scene is definitely top tier in retrospect. Doctor Who really didn't deserve the acting talents of Coleman and Capadi but I'm glad it happened anyway. I never took the story as an abortion allegory I'm more in agreement about the humans fear of the unknown which is a classic Doctor Who plot.
Kill the Moon wasn't well received at the time at all. It has a 6.7/10 on IMDb which is very low for a DW episode that wasn't brigade, and episode discussions on reddit at the time mostly say the episode is outright bad.
Yeah I remember it was straight up disliked from the go, no one thought the moon is an egg wasn't a stupid concept
How many people suddenly returned after 100 years stuck in the CAL mainframe of The Library? That had to lead to a variety of legal hassles for the Lux Corporation!
I don't really know if "looking up" is what we need rn between climate change and late stage capitalism lol. Especially when these days "looking up" can basically only be billionaires taking little expensive vanity trips upwards.
You're forgetting the fact that when the doctor decided to be the doctor victorious save those astronauts from that episode he still lost... And why because the astronaut who was the head of IT the woman who was the head of that particular group voyage whatever you want to call it came to the right conclusion in the fact that way trying to make sure that the three last living members of the expedition survived what was not survivable meant that was more of a that her granddaughter would never do the accomplishment that would get people out into space in the first place... In in a way she's a lot like both Donna Noble, but its Sarah Jane who's the first one to make the this kick in the but speach to remind him, that part of being able to grow to develop to become a greater person is the understanding that everything living has to die. That you can't always win sometimes you've got to lose and it's by doing that that we grow and become better hopefully. Donna Noble gives him pretty much a similar kick in the butt when he needs it and tells him look I'm not ask you to save everyone just save these people... I understand you can't save everyone, let's save these... And that is pretty much the idea that when you do something like that, what I'm talking about is a universal law, I am this in several different ancient cultures save a Life you save a world by that is that from saving them they will have children and those children will have children and in essence save them and who knows if it's a part of the world we desperately need would cease to exist... And she also gives him the part of his humanity that the doctor has lost over so many years to so much pain and sorrow, and that's always been the problem with the talk to him by this very person he saves taking her life, she tells him that his idea is that he's trying to be God and in a way yes he is shouldn't be the point this victory, because in so doing, you are no longer allowing to for things to happen as they need to happen because without a death that is necessary and she felt it was necessary without giving her the choice to stay there and die he was basically taking away her very right to make her choices and by doing so he was changing something that had to be if she suddenly didn't die her granddaughter would never accomplish the thing she needed to accomplish so that in future mankind chooses to go into space and settle on various planets and become the great people to quote number four doctor number four Tom Baker's doctor look at earth look at how you know how they're indomitability and their desire to survive well that would all be gone because she'd have never gone into space she did never have the desire to make her grandmother proud her grandmother the hero and that's the point he wanted to be victorious above everything rather than taking to the consideration the in order to be human beings need to progress to the point where they have something called humanity and I'm talking about the good stuff not the kind of humanity that basically believes genocide is a good thing. What I mean is the kind of humanity in which others would want to be human. Or maybe I should say this the kind of people others would want to emulate in the best possible way the best of humanity the good that is humanity not the lousy crappy stuff we've gotten used to on this planet but rather what is called the indomitable spirit what both Sarah Jane and eventually the doctor comes... For the doctor it is The motto by which she lives or has come to live never be cruel etc... And that's the problem have to be a time when the doctor can lay down his burden and rest or at least passes the burden on to someone else.
Something the BBC will ever let that happen
Well, I'd say it's nit a fixed point in time, because either way, there'll be a Moon and on a technical level, nothing changes.
Honestly, the big killer for me was Luna being an egg. I don't really have any good reason for it beyond a hatred of spacefaring life forms (THEY SHOULDN'T BLOODY EXIST), it just... doesn't feel right.
Maybe spacefaring life forms could exist feasibly. They are highly unlikely because they would have to be able to survive extreme cold and not require gas to breathe or at least go through long periods without gas. What would they eat? How would they breathe? How did they evolve? (Maybe their ancestors lived in the upper atmospheres of gas giants but there was evolutionary advantage in being able to stray further out from the planets atmosphere for longer periods, maybe to evade predators, until eventually they lost all dependency upon the planet of their origin. I don't think they should look like dragons though! The Zyglots in DWM was one of the first space faring life forms I remember reading about. Star Trek Voyager had some too. There are some extremophiles in nature like the Tardigrades, but to live in the vacuum of space they would have to be very extreme extremophiles! But Doctor Who has already established there are life forms in the actual time vortex. So... all bets are off. Let's say they are very rare, but clearly in the Whoniverse, even if not in reality, they are feasible.
Yeah this came across massively as being anti abortion and state enforced pregnancy.
Which is so weird given that doctor who generally has been quite progressive but a lot of issues still popped up around this areas
The whole moon being an egg thing completely killed the episode for me. For that alone this is pretty much the worst Doctor Who episode pre-chibnall
wait. 9 YEARS ago?????????????????????????
The fact that they were sent up there because the moons erratic nature of late (due to the creature) kind of tears down the argument at least from the perspective of humanity. Even if it’s just trying to be born it’s not innocent because it’s causing mass harm, accidental or not. So to them it’s not murder it’s threat mitigation, no different to putting down an animal that’s destroying a city. Like after surviving natural disaster after natural disaster, caused by this creatures very entrance into existence, they had every reason to be deeply worried about it finally hatching, for all they knew the destruction could’ve civilization ending
But it has no malice of forethought. We think of babies as being innocent, but their existence is not inconsequential and childbirth can kill the mother; not so often these days, but in the 19th century giving birth was a thousand times more dangerous than bungee jumping. I wouldn't stop anyone from bungee jumping if it what they want to do but I wouldn't want to mandate it. But of course, the baby, dangerous though it is, is utterly innocent without an evil intent or wrongdoing to its name.
7:39 just to clarify the moon does have gravity it just has less than earth.
1/6 less.
What happens in the episode is the mass in increasing making gravity stronger and that’s what it’s so earth like.
Saying the moon has no gravity is worse than any error this episode made.
I didn’t like Matt Smith’s era already, but this episode was the point where I properly accepted I really disliked Moffat’s Who. I fully lost interest in Doctor Who and let it out of my life. (Until this year.)
I refuse to believe it’s anything other than a satirical spoof.
Doctor Who might be science *fiction*, but some fiction is so stupid it should never, ever leave the writer’s notepad.
Yep, I bailed out after seeing this (after 40 years). Okay, DW has always had dodgy science but it was presented (mostly) in an entertaining way. But this was just pathetic and insulting to the viewer.
Honestly continue watching again there are some REALLY strong episodes after this with the 12th although there’s also some crappy ones
The moon is an egg, Clara
To me it's the status quo stuff that makes me dislike this episode. Hell I dislike most shows that go way too far just to keep the status quo in check. It's just that Kill the Moon does this big event thing only to quickly put everything back to how it was.
This episode is embarrassing af and as a woman I hated it. I love the idea of the doctor forcing the humans to choose their fate and morality, but this was just not the right way. I also hated how another moon just popped into existence the same size as before, how did this baby space dragon pop out another egg bigger than its entire body.
I don't think I believe the writer when he said this wasn't meant to be a pro-life story. A little bit of accidental thematic parallels I could maybe see but come on. The "I'm not killing a baby" line? The whole "humanity needs to make a CHOICE" thing that is then shown in the context of the story to have been a bad choice and they don't know what's best for themselves or the child the earth has been carrying all this time? The word "ABORTED" fucking flashing on the screen? This is not subtle. I can't see a way it wasn't intentional.
Well there is a difference between saying "this is not a pro-life story" and "this is not an allegory for the ethical questions surrounding abortion". He could be saying I did not intend a "pro-life" position (which is usually interpreted as being in favour of criminalizing abortion) to be the take home conclusion to this blatant abortion allegory.
Note: The moon infact does have gravity.
While this episode is very meh, this is the episode that out Clara In my top 3 companion's of the revival all cause she pushed back against the doctor in that she did. I wish it happened more, it's always great to see the doctor get challenged like that.
I hated this episode because I thought it was pretty boring except for the excellent final scene.
However, I totally agree that if there were consequences shown, I would’ve liked the episode more overall. According to some research I found, if the moon did disappear, it would have great ecological effects on the environment, some immediate and some that would take decades or centuries.
Tbh if there wasn’t so much “pro-life” rhetoric (even if it was unintentional), I don’t think this episode would be hated as much. You can see why it would offend someone especially in this day when many women die not getting access to the healthcare they need.
It needed to be handled so much more delicately, but there’s no nuance. It feels like the concerns from the earth astronauts was straight up dismissed. Normally the bad science in DW does not affect its quality, but in this case it certainly did. The real consequences of no moon are so fascinating!
My favourite part of this episode is when Clara calls the doctor out for abandoning her. "respected is not how I feel" great acting by Jenna. As the impossible girl who saved the doctor over and over again he treats her like just any other pathetic little human that needs to learn a lesson. Like, what??
That scene was so needed. Glad she went off at him.
Edited to add... I'm glad you talked about that scene in depth. It's positively heartbreaking!
Courtney woods and the moon being an egg. That’s what went wrong
Although I still really dislike this episode, you’re absolutely right that Jenna deserves an award for that scene. She’s such an amazing actress
I would be more inclined to believe that it's not an abortion allegory if they didn't have the Doctor as the mouthpiece for lines like "It's your moon, womankind. It's your choice". Either the writer is really dull and can't see how easy it would be to make the comparison OR they're cowards and are denying the blatant abortion allegory. I'm inclined to believe the second choice because the episode was so badly recieved and mocked for all the stupid science and concept that the whole abortion thing would be just another weak spot for them to make fun of so might as well deny at least one botched concept within the episode.
Coleman's acting was great in this episode, and that's all I can agree with from this video. I just want to say that the whole 'oh we look down at screens too much so we're scared of aliens' stuff is absolute bullshit. First off, this is completely handwaving away all that technology has done for us. Secondly, and more importantly, this argument is completely undercutting the fact that the entire existence of everyone ON EARTH was at jeopardy. This isn't 'an alien arrived on earth and we immediately beat it to death with sticks' this is a threat level beyond anything we can measure. Our moon being a ticking timebomb, and the blast radius is 8+ billion people. There could be a moral argument here, sure, and in a better writer's hands it could have worked, but blaming it on 'TECHNOLOGY BAD. SMARTPHONE MAKE ME SCARED OF DA ALIEN' is stupid. By that logic, the episode of the Twilight Zone 'To Serve Man' is obviously about how lack of smartphones kept us complacent and niave enough to allow ourselves to be captured and eaten by aliens. We as a society need to move away from the idea that smart technology is inherently evil, and I won't give credit to an awful episode just because the cut content laid all the blame for the cynicism and xenophobia on screens.
The Sarah Z video about this episode is what actually made me wanna start watching dr who last year
if the moon wasnt an egg this episode couldve easily hit the same high quality which all the other episodes had in series 8, cause damn ive recently really started to realise that its not series 9 or 10 thats my favourite... but series 8 instead.
I really like series 8 but Danny Pink is insufferable and brings down every scene he's in. Not enough to ruin a great series, but he spoiled a good thing.
This episode actually made me stop watching Doctor Who in 2014, both because I thought it was ridiculous but not in a fun way and because I was so annoyed by the you're not special line. I eventually came back to the series when Jodie got announced and ended up having Twelve as my favorite Doctor, but I still can't believe this episode exists
Regarding the kid being written all over the place, you have to realise that he had a different teenage girl in his mind, so it makes sense that she isn't what he had in mind but had to use.
A C ranking? Damn. Compared to Series 5 this is generous. I'd give it a D or an E.
Basically carried by the visuals and the final scene
You are not going to talk about series 10 ?,or yes but in 2026?
I always liked it. The science is wonky but I don't care. From the horror of the first half to the character drama of the second. who cares about the science,it's doctor who! Haha love season 8
If it didn't have such an amazing ending, I would say D ranking. But the ending for me is just too good to condemn to that fate :( C rank is it for me
sometimes i wish youtubers wouldnt stare at the camera it makes it really hard for me to watch them
Everything.
I disagree that the moon is a dull setting. It's one of the most exciting places you can set a sci-fi.
this story is decent to me. a lot of people have trouble suspending their disbelief but doctor who has basically been a science fantasy since like the mid 60s, especially during the Moffat era. taking a weird idea and just running wild with it behind all expectations is classic doctor who. and 12 saying the moon is an egg never fails to make me laugh and smile. I just don’t buy the abortion reading that many people argue for either. abortion-rights are about protecting the bodily autonomy of pregnant people. that isn’t an issue in this story where there is no pregnant creature being violated. it’s about how we become more conscious of uncertainty, potential outcomes and numbers when pulling the metaphorical trigger. it’s a classic trolley problem, not an abortion allegory. it exposes 12’s arrogance and pretentious moral high ground in a situation where there are no winners, which Clara rightfully calls him out on at the end.
i don’t love it because it’s pacing isn’t great and we don’t get any sense of consequence from letting the moon hatch. it really should’ve been two parts. but it’s a really interesting story that’s so overhated.
the whole idea of "one day mankind looked up to the sky" is already done better with water of mars, and i don't think an overgrown moth that destroyed the planet before it's even born would make people like space more
Mankind is best known to repeat itself and being way too bull-headed to learn from their errors. After all, we nearly tried to euthanize an ancient space whale who choose to carry us all on his back in 200,000 years from now.
From the rest of the universe's perspective, we're basically the Tupac of the Whoniverse. We ain't listening sh*t to anyone's best advice, even at our own expanse and when beasts are waiting for our demise in the shadows. If you head about Tupac's story, you'll figure out what I mean.
Nothing. This is actually one of my FAVOURITE episodes of the series. The thing is, when you look at MOST of the episodes this series and of cause the season finale which all had the THEME of death. In RE, I remember, this episode was so good at looking at this case study, my teacher brought it up as death is something touched upon a LOT in RE and philosophy and ethics. I was at a Catholic school, YET it WASN'T used as an argument AGAINST. I think it actually touched upon arguments FOR. But it's not about abortion, it's about euthanasia and the whole argument of life or death.
Honestly don't think this is an abortion theme. You'd first have to conflate that all living creatures are on the same moral level as humans, but at which point, nothing really matters anymore. Killing an animal is different to killing a human.
i kinda love this episode... though i understand the hate
Yeah, I do think a C rank is generous. You've pointed out some good things that make me willing to bump it up to a D, but going into the video I was thinking of it as an E.
I’ll never understand that people shit about the moon being an egg - when the basis of the show is about an immortal alien who travels around in a spaceship that’s bigger on the inside.
Like, yea, the episode isn’t great; but, like, don’t shit on it ‘cause the “science” isn’t right.
It gets an f for me
The most controversial opinion of the video is that Tiktok sucks 🤣😢
The Doctor pushing Clara to make the decision for herself is the best bit of the whole episode. This is what it is to be the Doctor. The struggle to make the right decision in the moment, knowing he has the power to change the course of the event and not fully knowing the consequences of his actions. The surprise is that Clara didn't grasp the purpose of the lesson, only the consequences of the setting.
Your criticism of the Doctor's decision and behavior toward this high-stake dilmena and the way he treated Clara were way too harsh. I think you missed the point that Timelords essentially *cannot* in any way interfere with fixed points in time and history. You constantly remind about how the Tenth Doctor and Elevemth Doctor migjt have deal with what Twelfth said, did or did not in tbe course of the episode. But that's the point: the Twelfth Doctor is in dilmena between what he used to stand for ever since he outlived the Last Time War, even at the expanse of the universe, versus what a good man has to do. And sometimes, the best way is to do nothing. Tenth decided once to bow the laws of time at his will: it resulted into TimeLord Victorious and screwing with time. Eleventh Doctor used to lie about how he did not have to consider people less special than others, unlikely the maniac Tenth: it resulted into edging close from becoming a cosmic villain in The Doctor Goes To War, which led to fail from finding Melody Pond, which resulted into a domino effect of disastrous events that almost had time screwed once more. The Doctor wanted to be everyone's hero out of ego: it resulted into Rose, Donna, Amy, Rory, so many weaponized companions and allies lost in battle.
The Tweflth Doctor is the amswer to the Timelord choosing to conciliate both his past (Donna asking him to remember his huminity, to remember about others) and what he could be (by honouring Clara's asvice not to be a hero neither a warrior) . He's the Doctor. Sometimes, you have to take a step back and act cold to better diagnose and assess the situation. He left Clara not because he was being villainous or a jerk, but because he absolutely do have faith in Clara, Courtney and the rest of mankind. Twelfth Doctor is the Doctor who choose to take a leap of faith over a power step into the battlefield or to stride across a castle on his whyte horse (literally so) . And he's willing to do anything, absolutely *anything* to make that faith win: he didn't have to go full-on Hybrid this time yet because Clara was there. He trained her well.
Lol at least in Star Trek the tribbles are born pregnant and it takes them a little bit to give birth