History Recap / DoctorWhoS31E6TheVampiresOfVenice

As the people panic around them on their way back to the TARDIS, Rory and Amy encounter Francesco, who decides to take the opportunity to fulfill his ambition and make a meal out of Amy. Still labouring under the impression that he's a vampire, Rory tries to ward him off with a makeshift cross, which Francesco responds to with no little contempt. Rory's attempts to distract him are unsuccessful [[YourMom until an ill-chosen crack about Francesco's mother]], which Francesco does ''not'' appreciate; Rory's feeble attempts at defending himself with [[WhatTheFuAreYouDoing Broom Fu]] pale in comparison to Francesco's expert swordsmanship, and Rory looks like he's about to become a Saturnynian feast until Amy distracts Francesco with a hint of sunlight catching her pocket mirror. This has the added bonus of blowing Francesco up. Amy takes the opportunity to critique Rory's technique and to kiss him passionately, and both make tracks to help the Doctor.

'''Rory:''' Yours is bigger than mine.\\

%% * GettingCrapPastThe Radar: Due to overwhelming and persistent misuse, GCPTR is on-page examples only until 01 June 2021. If you are reading this in the future, please check the trope page to make sure your example fits the current definition.

* NiceHat: Francesco has a big and elaborate one. He's pretending to be a noble after all.

* KillEmAll:
** There goes ''another'' species. No more "sisters of the water".
** Seriously, the only characters (whether they had any lines or not) who survive, apart from the main trio, are Carlo the steward, that remarkably lucky flower girl who typically might have bought it and the official at the start.

* IncestIsRelative: There's something a bit... {{Squick}}y about how Francesco and Rosanna interact with each other.

* OurVampiresAreDifferent: These are not the vampires from "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS18E4StateOfDecay State of Decay]]" or the Haemovores from "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS26E3TheCurseOfFenric The Curse of Fenric]]" or the Plasmavore from "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS29E1SmithAndJones Smith and Jones]]". They're actually a fish-like race called Saturnynians. The lack of reflections is a simple bug of their perception filters. The fangs peek through the filter thanks to a subconscious override of the filter due to the observer's survival instinct. The fact that there are also actual vampires in the Whoniverse is alluded to when Rory says that taking your blood and replacing it with their own is "what vampires do" and the Doctor says, "Yeah".

* OurVampiresAreDifferent: These are not the vampires from "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS18E4StateOfDecay State of Decay]]" or the Haemovores from "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS26E3TheCurseOfFenric The Curse of Fenric]]" or the Plasmavore from "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS29E1SmithAndJones Smith and Jones]]". They're actually a fish-like race called Saturnynians. The lack of reflections is a simple bug of their perception filters. The fangs peek through the filter thanks to a subconscious override of the filter due to the observer's survival instinct.

* EstablishingCharacterMoment: There is a scream; Rory and Amy run to help. Amy chases after the vampire, but Rory stays to help the girl because he's a nurse.

* GettingCrapPastTheRadar: "Yours is bigger than mine." Which is then [[LampshadeHanging lampshaded]]:
-->'''The Doctor:''' Let's not go there.

* {{Adorkable}}: Rory's lovey-dovey drunk call to Amy at the start of the episode is adorable. He's also endearingly hopeless during his fight with Francesco.

** Also, does Karen Gillan being in a [[Recap/DoctorWhoS30E2TheFiresOfPompeii sort of creepy group of young not-so-human girls]] sound familiar?

* BadgeGag: The Doctor pulls out a library card so old that it has a picture of his First Doctor incarnation instead of his psychic paper.

Written by Toby Whithouse.
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* RaysFromHeaven: At the climax, the clouds are roiling and storming and getting darker every minute as the end of humanity draws near. When the Doctor shuts off the storm controller to save the world once again, the clouds dissipate and sunbeams burst through as people celebrate.

* PatrioticFervor: Both Isabella and Guido attempt to intimidate the enemy with proud proclamations of being Venetian.

* BavarianFireDrill: The Doctor uses the Psychic Paper to claim he's ''UsefulNotes/ThePope'', that Amy is a viscountess, and that Rory is her eunuch. Later on it's used to give Amy a reference from the King of Sweden, but Rosanna sees through that one.

* AddedAlliterativeAppeal: Because "The Big Vicious Fish People From Space of Venice" isn't quite as catchy.

Guido causes a ruckus outside the Calvierri house, giving the Doctor a chance to sneak in through a back entrance. He ends up in a cellar, where he gets [[DistractedByMyOwnSexy distracted by a mirror]], before realizing that there are in fact five young women standing behind him, and none of them have a reflection. Ominous. They, quite understandably, demand to know who he is, only they do it in synchronization. More ominous. The Doctor tries to bluff his way out by using the psychic paper, but accidentally gets his extremely old library card instead. (As in, it's got his ''first'' face and his 1960s London address on it.) The girls display some rather impressive teeth -- oh, now that's not right -- and don't even have the decency to tell him the whole plan, so he decides to get out of there sharpish.

Satisfied at a job well done, Rosanna returns to her audience chamber -- only to find the Doctor, quite recovered from his shock and sitting on her throne. He identifies her as a Sister of the Water from Saturnyne. There follows a question and answer session where they learn things about each other and also answers some of the questions we've had about these not-vampires, such as why they don't show up in mirrors (the perception filter around them means that the brain that's being manipulated doesn't know what to fill the gap with, so leaves it blank). It also emerges that Rosanna and her people have had some encounters with the cracks, through which they saw silence and the end of all things.

The Saturnynians fled to Earth through such a crack, which closed behind them and supposedly destroyed their world. Rosanna intends to rebuild her race by any means necessary, and asks the Doctor to join her in her efforts. Unsurprisingly the Doctor says no, and is disgusted not just by the fact that Rosanna had Isabella executed, but that she didn't even ''know'' her ''name.'' [[HeHadAName That clinches the deal.]]

Our intrepid four have a brainstorming -- or rather a storming of the Doctor's brain, since he doesn't allow anyone else to chip in. They, so to speak, figure out from Rosanna's cryptic words that Rosanna plans to sink Venice and repopulate it with the girls she's transformed, as wives for her 10,000 male children that even now populate the canals and snack on anyone who displeases her. Even the Doctor's grossed out by that. You know it's bad when the Doctor's grossed out. He is then distracted as the people upstairs become rather noisy.

The Doctor storms into Rosanna's palace, cutting off her gloating by bluntly pointing out that the women she hoped to have mate with her children are dead; her plan has failed. Shocked, Rosanna flees, leaving the Doctor to dismantle the device which is reshaping Venice's environment, creating a storm and earthquakes which will in turn create a tidal wave which will swamp the city. Rory and Amy return; Rory's pledge not to leave the Doctor causes a certain amount of ire in light of his earlier declaration, but there's little time for an argument; the Doctor sets Rory and Amy the task of dismantling Rosanna's throne, which contains the controls for the device, while he climbs the tower and sets to work on the generator as the rain and thunder lash around him. It's a tricky, confusing clockwork device, and it's hard to figure out how to dismantle it --

-- Oh. Hang on a second. Turns out there's a simple switch which, once flicked, turns off the device. The rains stop, the sun comes out, and the Doctor takes in the cheers of Venetians.

As they head back to the TARDIS, the Doctor (in full StepfordSmiler mode) muses that maybe it's time to head off to the Leadworth Registry Office for a certain happy event. Rory, a bit glumly, just suggests dropping him off back where they picked him up, but Amy, clearly wanting to make him feel better, gives him a kiss and suggests that he stays on for just a bit longer. The Doctor has no objection, and Rory -- clearly thrilled -- agrees. Happily, Amy disappears into the TARDIS to put the kettle on -- and in doing so, misses the entire city suddenly fall deathly, unnaturally silent. Rory doesn't appear to notice anything amiss, but the Doctor, recalling Rosanna's words about the silence at the other side of the cracks, is freaked out, and the episode ends with a sinister zoom-in to the TARDIS keyhole as he shuts the door behind him.

** This isn't the first time Creator/HelenMcCrory has played [[Film/{{Casanova}} a Venetian woman concerned for her offspring.]]

* AristocratsAreEvil: The House of Calvierri is filled with deceptive Saturnyns who plan to flood Venice.

* BigDamnKiss: After they kill a Saturnyn together, Rory and Amy get their first on-screen kiss.

-->'''Rory:''' [[SugarWiki/FunnyMoments It says here I'm your eunuch.]]

--->'''The Doctor:''' She was frightened, I was frightened... But we survived, and the relief of it and... so, she kissed me.\\

** This [[Recap/DoctorWhoS30E2TheFiresofPompeii isn't the first time]] that an alien race fled from the vanishing of their home planet by the season's story arc and attempted to rebuild their society in an Italian city. Coincidentally, the Pyroviles are fire-based lifeforms whereas the Saturnynians are aquatic beings, and a character played by Creator/KarenGillan was threatened, directly or indirectly, to be turned into one of their kind in both stories.

** [[OverlyLongGag It isn't the first time]] [[Recap/DoctorWhoS5E1TheTombOfTheCybermen a death has been caused by an electric door.]]
** "I'll explain later" was used by the First Doctor and spoofed in ''The Curse of Fatal Death''.

* DarkIsEvil: The lead Saturnyns, Francesco and Rosanna, are both dressed in dark purple. Their true forms are also mostly dark purple in color.

* GameFace: The Saturnyns' fangs are explained as the survival instinct overriding a perception filter.

* GlamourFailure: The Saturnynians go on the fritz after they have been kicked by a feisty redhead.

* HeHadAName: "Where's Isabella?" At the beginning, the Doctor makes a point of asking if someone could bring in from the cold the bikini-clad girl who was ''supposed'' to be in the cake he burst out of in front of Rory, in the process revealing that he's learnt her name (Lucy) and that she's diabetic. Contrast with Rosanna, who couldn't even be bothered learning the names of the human girls she was converting into breeding stock for her sons.
* HeroicSacrifice: Guido draws the Saturnyns away, letting them corner him so he can blow up all that gunpowder we saw earlier, shouting: ''[[PunctuatedForEmphasis WE! ARE! VENETIANS!]]''
* HissBeforeFleeing: Only rarely do the Saturnyns flee. Usually, it's the people they encounter, but they do love hissing.

* ImprobableHairstyle: Isabella is black and lives in the 16[[superscript:th]] century, and yet her hair is perfectly straight.

* JumpingOutOfACake: The Doctor does this at the very beginning. Lucy, the girl who was supposed to jump out, was standing outside. The Doctor asks someone to give her a jumper.

* MissingReflection: The fish aliens don't show up in mirrors due to a technical result in their shimmers.
* MonsterMisogyny: An odd example, considering that the monster in question is female, and [[MarsNeedsWomen acquiring some more females]] was the entire point of her actions. However, Rosanna sends the converted girls to attack our heroes, instead of [[MenAreTheExpendableGender the thousands of available males]], even though their deaths could ruin everything. That being said, those males in question were Rosanna's own sons, while she wasn't shown to care one lick about the girls beyond their capability as breeding stock, so this could be justified.

** Apparently the Doctor accidentally crashed at least one incorrect stag[=/=]hen do by hiding in a cake before happening upon the correct Rory.

** The Doctor gets an OhCrap moment when he realises that Guido is going to use the gunpowder stored in his house to perform a HeroicSacrifice -- and he's standing right in front of said house.
** Amy has this expression a lot when confronted with a room full of Saturnyns, or one advancing on her menacingly.

* OutOfCharacterMoment: The Eleventh Doctor outright screams at Amy when she doesn't want to wait somewhere safe. It is a little odd since he is normally a lot nicer in this kind of situation and other episodes use TranquilFury to show this doctor's anger unless pushed to the extremes. It may be a result of it being one of his earlier episodes, before the character was truly pounded out.

** Some people have lambasted the appearance of Isabella and her father as [[TokenMinority tokenism]] and PoliticallyCorrectHistory. Venice was a port and trade city in RealLife, and it wasn't unheard of for African traders to move and set up shop there in the 16th century. See also a moderately well-known play called ''[[Theatre/{{Othello}} The Tragedy of Othello, the Moor of Venice]]''. Also [[Recap/DoctorWhoS29E2TheShakespeareCode an earlier episode]] points out the fact that even England in 1599 wasn't just fair youths by this point; there were a lot of dark ladies around as well.

* StealthHiBye: The Doctor pulls off a good one on Amy when they observe Francesco causing an incident while searching for his daughter.
--->'''Amy:''' Oh...! I hate it when he does that!

* VillainousBSOD: Rosanna's son is dead, her vampire converts are dead, and the Doctor has prevented the destruction of Venice. She feeds herself to her sons, rendering the entire Saturnyn species extinct.

* WeakenedByTheLight: The "vampires", due to actually being fish aliens. The young women they're converting develop this even before the transformation is complete -- Isabella is captured during the escape because she flinches away from a ray of sunlight hitting the door.

--->'''The Doctor:''' She'll be fine.
--->'''Rory:''' You can promise me that, can you?

** The Doctor has a minor case on his part when he first meets the Calvierri girls. He orders them to tell him the whole plan, before bemoaning that ''one day'' he'll get that to work.
* TheXOfY: "The Vampires of Venice"

* ForgotAboutHisPowers: It never occurs to anybody to use the [=TADRDIS=] to get into the school.

* BavarianFireDrill: The Doctor uses the Psychic Paper to claim he's ''UsefulNotes/ThePope'', and later that Amy has a reference from the King of Sweden. Rory's an eunuch.

* MundaneSolution: The Doctor shuts down the weather machine by... flicking a switch, amd a small one at that.

* PottyEmergency: The Doctor wriggles and holds himself in Calvieri's throne.

* MonsterMisogyny: An odd example, considering that the monster in question is female, and [[MarsNeedsWomen acquiring some more females]] was the entire point of her actions. However, Rosanna sends the converted girls to attack our heroes, instead of [[MenAreTheExpendableGender the thousands of available males]], even though their deaths could ruin everything.