History Recap / DoctorWhoS32E13TheWeddingOfRiverSong

Written by Creator/StevenMoffat. Has a [[http://www.bbc.co.uk/doctorwho/dw/videos/p00kn2y6 prequel]] video. The series 6 finale.

The Silence in their tanks are starting to crack. They weren't captured -- they were waiting. Waiting to activate all those eyepatches and electrocute the people wearing them. River and Amy manage to rip off theirs. Rory yells at them to escape while he holds back the Silence. He keeps his eyepatch on so he can see them. As Amy realises that this might kill him, she figures out who he is, and tells him to run before his patch activates. He tells her that [[IronWoobie it already has]]. Almost mad with the pain and with clenched fists, he stands his ground. But Amy, who he ordered to leave, manages to improvise an escape - by returning with MoreDakka and owning the silence, and on their way out they confront Madame Kovarian, who is ''extremely'' confused as to why the Silence haven't skipped her own eye patch and why her eye has been burned out.

** The ;;Teselecta;; crew are very eager to help the Doctor, considering that, the last time they met, his companions sabotaged the ship's intruder defence system, which is strongly implied to have led directly to the death of at least one crewmember. Then again, the ''Teselecta'' crew didn't exactly emerge from that episode unblemished, seeing how they nearly screwed up history big-time by attempting to kill both Hitler and River too early in their lives, so they probably want to make amends for that.

* BladeOnAStick: Nice spear, Doctor.

The city of London, 22 April 2011. Soaring buildings, glittering and mighty under a perfect blue sky, and life tumbling onto pavements below. Horse-drawn Roman chariots driving through the streets. [[{{Steampunk}} A Victorian steam train on a monorail]]. Hot air balloons carrying beetle cars. Pterodactyls in the park. And Creator/CharlesDickens appearing on BBC One's Breakfast. In short, RealityIsOutToLunch.

The city of London, 22 April 2011. Soaring buildings, glittering and mighty under a perfect blue sky, and life tumbling onto pavements below. Horse-drawn Roman chariots driving through the streets. [[SteamPunk A Victorian steam train on a monorail]]. Hot air balloons carrying beetle cars. Pterodactyls in the park. And Creator/CharlesDickens appearing on BBC One's Breakfast. In short, RealityIsOutToLunch.

The city of London, 22 April 2011. Soaring buildings, glittering and mighty under a perfect blue sky, and life tumbling onto pavements below. Horse-drawn Roman chariots driving through the streets. [[SteamPunk A Victorian steam train on a monorail]]. Hot air balloons carrying beetle cars. Pterodactyls in the park. And Charles Dickens appearing on BBC One's Breakfast. In short, RealityIsOutToLunch.

At the Buckingham Senate, at 5:02pm, Holy Roman Emperor Winston Churchill complains to [[Recap/DoctorWhoS31E8TheHungryEarth Silurian Doctor Malohkeh]] that time has got quite confusing. It's always 22 April 2011. And it's always 5:02pm. Churchill calls for his soothsayer to be fetched from the Tower. Greying, unkempt, bearded, older, tired but unmistakable -- it's the Doctor. Churchill asks him what's happening to time, and the Doctor tries to explain, starting from the beginning. What happened to time is a woman. "Hell in high heels."

The one where history looks like the mental image of a student cramming for their final exams.

** American news personality [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=89bRg50io9M Meredith Vieira]].

* RealPersonCameo:
** American news presenter Meredith Vieira says the line "Crowds lined the Mall today as Holy Roman Emperor UsefulNotes/WinstonChurchill returned to the Buckingham Senate on his personal mammoth."
** Meredith [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=89bRg50io9M did a news story on her cameo, too,]] as part of a larger piece ''The Today Show'' was doing about television in other countries.

* OnceMoreWithClarity: At the beginning of the episode, after the Doctor asks them to pass out the envelopes to his companions, the ''Teselecta'' ask him if there was anything else they could do to help, but the Doctor just sadly walks out the door. At the end of the episode, after it looks like the Doctor had been assassinated, it cuts back to that scene to show the Doctor had come back a second later, [[EurekaMoment realizing there]] ''[[EurekaMoment was]]'' [[EurekaMoment something the ''Teselecta'' could do for him]]; namely, let him borrow one of their shapeshifting {{Mobile Suit Human}}s.

* AllOfTimeAtOnce: The Doctor attempts to escape his apparent death at the hands of the Silence. River Song, whom the Silence had programmed to kill the Doctor, refuses, and they end up in an alternative timeline where all of time is running simultaneously and beginning to disintegrate.

* AmnesiacLover: A two-way example, with both Rory and Amy having forgotten their past relationship. They get back together in the end, with very little prompting.
* AnachronismStew: An intentional version. All of time is happening at once, and so you have dinosaurs in a 21[[superscript:st]] century park and classical authors on modern television. It's pretty awesome. The Holy Roman Emperor, Winston Churchill, even mentions music downloads.
* AndIMustScream: The skulls in the Headless Monks' catacomb are still alive, despite having rotted. Dorium at least had the good sense (and enough money) to fit his head with a media chip, and the tomb has great Wi-Fi. Because he's rich, his head gets preserved, while the others are reduced to living skulls. He even ''plays this trope for a personal laugh'' when the Doctor first opens his box.

** Alternately, what do you call asking someone to marry you? Popping the Question!
** Where as previously it was only a RunningGag, the final line of the episode also turns the [[TitleDrop show's name]] into an example of this. What is the First Question: Doctor ''who''?
* Area51: Area 52 is kept in the ''pyramids''.

** UsefulNotes/WinstonChurchill, Dorium, the Silurians and, most surprisingly, Simon Callow's Creator/CharlesDickens from back in "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS27E3TheUnquietDead The Unquiet Dead]]".
** There's a very brief Dalek cameo (the only time they've appeared in this particular season), and the Teselecta from "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS32E8LetsKillHitler Let's Kill Hitler]]" returns.

* BadassFamily: The Ponds, naturally, are made of warriors, and it's made even more badass by the addition of the Doctor. Rory in particular proves he is [[TheGoodCaptain badass]] no matter ''what'' happens to reality. He even takes Amy telling him that, in another reality, they got married and had a child (who is the woman in front of them that's quite a bit older than them) without any trouble.

** The Doctor's speech, "imagine you were dying, in pain, afraid, and alone," sounds like he's talking to the viewer about himself. Then it turns out he's speaking to the Dalek.

* BatmanGambit: The Silence were never really trapped in their water containers; they could have escaped at any time, and were just buying time until the Doctor is brought to Area 52 to get a chance to finally kill him.

** In "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS32E1TheImpossibleAstronaut The Impossible Astronaut]]", the Doctor threatened that instead of taking them to 1969 he could easily be learning how to knit. While he's waiting for Gideon Vandeleur, he's shown reading a book on ''knitting''.
* BusCrash: The Brigadier, who hadn't been seen in the new series, is revealed to have died in his sleep.

** An echo from ''last'' season's [[Recap/DoctorWhoS31E13TheBigBang wibbly-wobbly timey-wimey finale]].

* TheCavalry: How could the Doctor and Churchill possibly defend themselves from dozens of Silence right over their heads? By getting out of the way when Amy and Rory arrive with a platoon of heavily-armed soldiers and a smoke bomb.
* ChekhovsGun: The Doctor's bowtie is finally ''useful''. It serves a role in his marriage to River Song.
* ChekhovsGunman: The Teselecta is shown early as part of the Doctor's investigation. It later becomes his way out.

** In the scene in the Ponds' garden, Amy is wearing the jacket worn by Rory in "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS32E8LetsKillHitler Let's Kill Hitler]]". When River arrives she mentions she "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS31E5FleshAndStone Just climbed out of the Byzantium]]" and is still wearing her fatigues from that episode.

** A classic series example: in "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS26E1Battlefield Battlefield]]", at one point when it seems like the Brigadier has been killed by the MonsterOfTheWeek, the Seventh Doctor despairs that he was "supposed to die in bed". In this episode, the Eleventh Doctor learns the Brigadier has done just that. He apparently always "spoke often" of the Doctor and had them "pour an extra brandy" just in case the Doctor "showed up one of these days". Awwww!

** The Doctor tells Churchill, "I had to die. I didn't have to die alone." How did he die [[Recap/DoctorWhoS30E17E18TheEndOfTime last time?]] ''He died alone''.

* DelayedRippleEffect: The TimeCrash starts off on Earth, and according to the Doctor will eventually spread throughout the universe until it all collapses.
* DemBones: The heads of Headless Monks are kept in a tomb. Unless the one being beheaded is rich, in which case they are kept "fresh", they are left to decay. Regardless, the heads remain alive, and ''hungry''.

* {{Determinator}}: Rory (as usual). He keeps his eye-drive on so he can see the Silence coming so he is able to defend Amy, the Doctor and River, despite the fact it can kill or at least cause the wearer crippling pain. When he's reminded it could activate at any time, he says, fairly calmly, ''"It already has."''
* DisproportionateRetribution: The chess-playing Silence agent tries to kill the Doctor for beating him at a game of chess. It's evidently SeriousBusiness on his world, but still... Made all the more disproportionate when you remember that the Silence agent actually won the game -- the Doctor conceded in exchange for his help.

** The Teselecta crew are very eager to help the Doctor, considering that the last time they met his companions sabotaged the ship's intruder defence system, which is strongly implied to have led directly to the death of at least one crewmember. Then again, the Teselecta crew didn't exactly emerge from that episode unblemished, seeing how they nearly screwed up history big-time by attempting to kill River relatively early in her life, so they probably want to make amends for that.

* ExactWords: "Silence will fall when ''the question'' is asked." And what do you call asking someone to marry you? Popping the question!

** Which explains a failure on Amy's part. If she can remember so much, why doesn't she recognise Captain Williams as Rory? Well, if her sketch of him is anything to go by, she's expecting someone who looks a lot more like Brad Pitt.
* FakingTheDead: The "Doctor" shot by River was a Teselecta. (The Stetson, too.)

%% * 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.

* GoneHorriblyRight: Kovarian's efforts to turn River into a psychopath obsessed with the Doctor nearly end up ''causing'' the apocalyptic events she was trying to prevent (or rather, a different set of apocalyptic events), after River refuses to kill the Doctor, thus catastrophically breaking the timeline, and she refuses to put things right until the Doctor reveals that he'd already set a life-saving plan in motion using the Teselecta.
%%* TheGoodCaptain: Hello, Rory.
%%* GuileHero: Eleven.
* HellYesMoment: Both for the audience and Amy and Rory at the end, when River tells them that the Doctor is still alive.

* HopeSpot: Played straight and immediately subverted. The Doctor and Winston Churchill are saved from the Silence by the timely arrival of soldiers led by Amy Pond! Who is, unfortunately, sporting the Silence's villainous EyepatchOfPower -— and immediately shoots the Doctor. Turns out it was just a stun gun so they could avoid a lot of talking.

* INeedAFreakingDrink: Amy, upon realising that she's the Doctor's ''mother-in-law''. Cue thousand-yard-stare.

** Madame Kovarian does this when she begs Amy to save her because it's what the Doctor would do.

* KarmaHoudini: With most of the episode's events being subject to a CosmicRetcon when River "kills" the Doctor, Kovarian ends up escaping any actual punishment for the heinous things she did throughout the season, and it's likely that from her perspective, her plan to kill the Doctor went off without a hitch. The Big Finish audios later retconned this by establishing that Kovarian ''did'' remember everything that happened in the episode (including the Silence turning on and killing her), and was eventually brought to justice by River.
* KarmicDeath: Kovarian left her soldiers to die on Demon's Run and let Colonel Manton be humiliated. Here, the Silence leave her for dead by electrocuting her eye-drive along with everyone else's. And then Amy reattaches the eye-drive just to make sure. Slow, painful, and all alone.

* LastNameBasis: The Doctor pointedly asks Amy if she knows Captain Williams' first name. She answers, "Captain".

** River would break ''time itself'' to save her future with her husband. [[Recap/DoctorWhoS32E10TheGirlWhoWaited Just like her mum did.]]

* MeaningfulEcho: Alllll the way back to "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS30E9ForestOfTheDead Forest of the Dead]]", in the same situation, but reversed:

* MookHorrorShow: For the Dalek in the beginning. It sees its culture's equivalent of ''the Devil'' slowly approach it, taunt it, and then take it apart. We, the audience, have its perspective on this.
* MoralMyopia: ''River'', as seen by the Doctor's attempt at an ArmourPiercingQuestion. The Doctor is horrified and proceeds to call her out on it.

** Just ''how many'' stag parties ''did'' Jack have?

** Cleopatra seems to have met River, mentioned the Doctor and told her to "put down that gun", which River did. "Eventually". Just ''what'' did River get up to?
** It's implied that the Doctor may have previously visited the Brigadier in his nursing home.

* ObfuscatingDisability: The Silence are not ''captured''. They're pretending to be.

** The Doctor and Churchill when they realize that there are ''dozens'' of Silence roosting right over their heads.

** The revelation about the Silence contained at Area 52: "They're ''not'' captured."

* OnceMoreWithClarity: At the beginning of the episode, after the Doctor asks them to pass out the envelopes to his companions, the Teselecta ask him if there was anything else they could do to help, but the Doctor just sadly walks out the door. At the end of the episode, after it looks like the Doctor had been assassinated, it cuts back to that scene to show the Doctor had come back a second later, [[EurekaMoment realizing there]] ''[[EurekaMoment was]]'' [[EurekaMoment something the Teselecta could do for him]]; namely, let him borrow one of their shapeshifting {{Mobile Suit Human}}s.

* OutGambitted: The Doctor really outdoes himself by faking his assassination by the Silence, and on a ''fixed point in time''. The best part: They'll ''never know''.

-->'''Amy:''' River Song didn't get it all from you, ''sweetie.'' ''[replaces Kovarian's eye-drive]''

* RealityBleed: All of history is occurring simultaneously but time isn't moving.
* RedHerring: ''Lots'' of people theorised that the Doctor at the beach was the Flesh Doctor from "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS32E6TheAlmostPeople The Almost People]]" -- even Amy, in-story. Far rarer was the theory that it might have been the ''other'' entity from this series that could mimic form that perfectly -- [[Recap/DoctorWhoS32E8LetsKillHitler the Teselecta]].

* SmartPeoplePlayChess: The Doctor plays an agent of the Silence at "Live Chess", which is normal chess except the pieces have a current running through them that builds up if a piece is moved too many times in a row. The charge eventually becomes fatal. It's also played "live" in front of a crowd, gladiator-style.

* SpoilerOpening: [[Recap/DoctorWhoS32E8LetsKillHitler The Teselecta]], unlike the other minor returning characters, appears in the PreviouslyOn segment, hinting at its relevance. [[Creator/StevenMoffat Moffat]] manages to trick the audience though, since the Teselecta appears early on in the episode, allowing the viewer to think that that was the reason it appears in the Previously On segment.

* TakeAThirdOption: River, as the astronaut, tries to do this by discharging her weapons packs so she ''can't'' kill the Doctor. While the Doctor is protesting that his death is a ''fixed point'', time promptly breaks. Then we find out that he took a third option '''himself''' by getting the Teselecta ship to take his shape, so the him that was "killed" was actually a robot with him in it.

* TimeCrash:''This'' is why the Doctor doesn't (usually) try to change fixed points in time. It's a different sort of Time Crash from last year's, but the same general idea. Interestingly, while Series Five's finale had ''space'' collapsing due to an exploding TARDIS, Series Six ended with ''time'' going to hell because a certain Doctor just won't... die.

* TimeyWimeyBall: Time has collapsed into the exact time of the Doctor's apparent death, which means time has stopped but also ''not'' stopped at the same time. Every time River and the Doctor touch the events of his death start repeating themselves. Except all the messages responding to River's distress beacon inside the collapsed timeline are coming from outside of it, where time is apparently still working normally. [[MindScrew Good luck figuring out the mechanics of that...]]

** Amy. She has soldiers including Rory working for her, saves him from almost dying again by taking an assault rifle to the Silence, kills Madame Kovarian in cold blood when the latter begs her for mercy and proposes to Rory in a delightfully offhand way.

* TrailersAlwaysLie: The trailer for this episode heavily implied that River and Kovarian are the same person.
* TrickedOutTime: The Doctor made his way out of a nasty predicament, avoiding either dying or having all of reality frozen by asking the Teselecta to pose as him as he's offed by River, with nobody, not the Silence, or even ''history itself'', recognizing the difference. Well, he was on the beach, and he did get shot by River and burned on the boat -- he was just very, very tiny at the time.

* VillainsWantMercy: [[BigBad The Silence]] decide that their agent Madame Kovarian has [[YouHaveOutlivedYourUsefulness outlived her usefulness]] and trigger a device in her EyepatchOfPower that begins electrocuting her. She knocks it loose and then has the gall to beg Amy for help, but after all she's done to Amy and her family, Amy refuses to help her and ''puts the eyepatch back on her'', leaving her to die.

* WhatHaveIBecome: After time is fixed, and The Doctor is seemingly dead, Amy still can’t seem to live with herself for how she ended Madame Kovarian's life; even though it technically didn’t happen, she still remembers it.

* YouAreNotAlone: A brief moment where River tells the Doctor that she and Amy rigged a distress beacon to broadcast a signal outside the sphere of the TimeCrash's influence, and planets all over the Universe sent a response saying "Of course we'll help!" in gratitude for everything he's done for them over his long lifetime. Bonus points for this essentially being the opposite of the previous series finale, "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS31E12ThePandoricaOpens The Pandorica Opens]]", in which all the Doctor's enemies came.
-->'''River:''' "Those reports of the sun spots and the solar flares. They’re wrong. They’re aren’t any. It’s not the sun. It’s you. The sky is full of a million million voices, saying, “Yes of course. We’ll help.” You've touched so many lives, saved so many people, did you think that when your time came, you'd really have to do more than just ''ask''? You’ve decided that the universe is better off without you. But the universe doesn’t agree."

* YouShallNotPass: Rory versus the Silence. The device that lets him remember them is booby trapped and causing him ''agonizing pain'', but he keeps it on so he can remember them and cover the escape of Amy, the Doctor, and River Song once the Silence break in. Unfortunately, it gets too bad for even him once the juice gets cranked up. The Silence ''still'' don't get to pass, because Amy, who was told to run, comes back with a machine gun.

* OnceMoreWithClarity: At the beginning of the episode, after Doctor asks them to pass out the envelopes to his companions, the Teselecta ask him if there was anything else they could do to help, but the Doctor just sadly walks out the door. At the end of the episode, after it looks like the Doctor had been assassinated, it cuts back to that scene to show the Doctor had come back a second later, [[EurekaMoment realizing there]] ''[[EurekaMoment was]]'' [[EurekaMoment something the Teselecta could do for him]]; namely, let him borrow one of their shapeshifting {{Mobile Suit Human}}s.

* OnceMoreWithClarity: At the beginning of the episode, after Doctor asks them to pass out the envelopes to his companions, the Teselecta ask him if there was anything else they could do to help, but the Doctor just sadly walks out the door. At the end of the episode, after it looks like the Doctor had been assassinated, it cuts back to that scene to show the Doctor had come back a second later, [[EurekaMoment realizing there]] ''[[EurekaMoment was]]'' [[EurekaMoment something the Teselecta could do for him]]; namely, let him borrow one of their shapeshifting {{Mobile Human Suit}}s.

* EverythingsBetterWithDinosaurs: Pterodactyls are flying around London. They're treated as vermin.

* FakingTheDead: The "Doctor" shot by River was a Teselecta. ([[NiceHat The Stetson, too.]])

* NiceHat: The Stetson. Stetsons are cool.

'''Dorium:''' The first question! The question that must never be answered! Hidden in plain sight! The question you've been running from all your life! Doctor Who. ''Doctor Who?'' '''''DOCTOR WHO!?'''''

-->'''The Doctor:''' Imagine you were dying. Imagine you were afraid and long way from home and in terrible pain. And just when you think it couldn't get any worse, you look up and see the face of the devil himself.\\

-->'''The Doctor:''' Imagine you were dying and a long way from home and in terrible pain. And just when you think it couldn't get any worse, you look up and see the face of the devil himself.\\

** In the scene in the Ponds' garden, Amy is wearing the jacket worn by Rory in "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS32E8LetsKillHitler Let's Kill Hitler]]".

* ArtisticLicensePhysics: Amy's train is going into Area 52 way too quickly to realistically avoid crashing out the other side. It must be spacey-wacey due to the TimeCrash.

* BackToTheEarlyInstallment: The episode explores the start of "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS32E1TheImpossibleAstronaut The Impossible Astronaut]]" from the point of the Doctor who got shot and the Impossible Astronaut.

* ProtagonistCenteredMorality: River benefits from this. Her actions threaten the safety of the universe, and she claims that [[ItsAllAboutMe she'll suffer more than everyone else combined]] if she has to kill the Doctor. Normally, this act would be shown as one of horrendous selfishness, especially given that a.) her parents are included in the whole "everyone dies in agony" thing and b.) this also includes every single companion the Doctor has ever had (along with, [[DepartmentOfRedundancyDepartment again]], ''every single person in existence''). Aside from a quick WhatTheHellHero, River gets what she wants -- and what she's done is never brought up again.

-->'''River:''' You've touched so many lives, saved so many people, did you think that when your time came, you'd really have to do more than ''ask''?

** Also one to "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS30E9ForestOfTheDead Forest of the Dead]]":

(Dorium joked around for a bit, until the Doctor simply picked up the box and questioned Dorium's head further in the TARDIS. He could still do so much before dying. He was going to visit more friends. Could [[Recap/DoctorWhoS30E17E18TheEndOfTime go and enjoy his marriage to Queen Bess]]. Could have helped [[Recap/DoctorWhoS27E1Rose Rose Tyler]] with her homework since she wouldn’t have recognized him. Could have visited all of Captain Jack Harkness' stag parties in one night. He then called up a nursing home, and he wanted to ''finally'' see the Brigadier. However, he learned that Brigadier Sir Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart had [[WhamLine peacefully passed away]], after having waited for a nice visit from the Doctor for years. This means nothing at all to people only knowledgeable about the newer episodes, but trust us, it's sad. The Doctor couldn't even reply properly to the news and simply hung up. This made him realise that death was inevitable. He visited the Teselecta again and asked them to deliver his blue envelopes to Amy, Rory, River and himself, and went down to Lake Silencio in Utah to die.)

(Dorium joked around for a bit, until the Doctor simply picked up the box and questioned Dorium's head further in the TARDIS. He could still do so much before dying. He was going to visit more friends. Could [[Recap/DoctorWhoS30E17E18TheEndOfTime go and enjoy his marriage to Queen Bess]]. Could have helped Rose Tyler with her homework in disguise. Could have visited all of Jack Harkness' stag parties in one night. He then called up a nursing home, and he wanted to ''finally'' see the Brigadier. However, he learned that Brigadier Sir Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart had [[WhamLine peacefully passed away]], after having waited for a nice visit from the Doctor for years. This means nothing at all to people only knowledgeable about the newer episodes, but trust us, it's sad. The Doctor couldn't even reply properly to the news and simply hung up. This made him realise that death was inevitable. He visited the Teselecta again and asked them to deliver his blue envelopes to Amy, Rory, River and himself, and went down to Lake Silencio in Utah to die.)

* GettingCrapPastTheRadar:
** Blink and you'll miss it, but after the Doctor finishes changing into his usual clothes, he tells Amy that she can look again. [[FemaleGaze Only, judging from her position she never seems to have stopped.]] [[Recap/DoctorWhoS31E1TheEleventhHour Again.]]
** At the beginning, Churchill's talking about how Cleopatra is a terrible woman, but an excellent dancer. Doctor Malohkeh says he noticed, judging by Churchill's blood pressure.
** This gem:
--->'''Dorium:''' And River Song? In prison all her days?\\
'''The Doctor:''' Her days, yes. Her nights... well, that's between her and me, eh?
** This:
--->'''River:''' Drugged lipstick. Works wonders on [[TheCasanova President Kennedy]], and [[HomoeroticSubtext Cleopatra]] -- ''what'' a pushover.