History Recap / DoctorWhoS34E6TheCaretaker

** Clara covers up her shenanigans with the Doctor by telling Danny [[WesternAnimation/MonstersInc they're rehearsing for a play]].

JustForFun/{{The one w|ith}}here the Doctor parks the TARDIS in a shed-like room near a school. [[Recap/DoctorWhoS1E1AnUnearthlyChild Again]].

Written by Gareth Roberts and Creator/StevenMoffat.

** "Oh course we won't starve! The sand piranhas will get us long before that."

** Clara drops a couple hints about her "new boyfriend" and his resemblance to a certain time traveler, meaning Orson from "Listen". The Doctor, with characteristic narcissism, assumes she's talking about another teacher who happens to look a bit like the Eleven Doctor.

--->'''The Doctor:''' "I used to have a teacher exactly like you."\\
'''Clara:''' "Well you still do, pay attention."

--->'''Danny:''' "You're using her like a decoy!"\\
'''The Doctor:''' "No! Not ''like'' a decoy, [[GrammarNazi ''as'' a decoy]]!"

-->'''Danny:''' "Do you love him?"\\
'''Clara:''' "No."\\
'''Danny:''' "Really had enough of the lies..."\\
'''Clara:''' "[[HeIsNotMyBoyfriend Not in that way]]."\\
'''Danny:''' "What other way is there?"

-->'''The Doctor:''' "It's a start."

-->'''Clara:''' "What do you think? Say something."\\
'''Danny:''' "So, there's an alien, that used to look like Adrian. Then he turned into a Scottish caretaker and every now and then, when I'm not looking, you elope with him."

-->'''Clara:''' "Is there an alien in this school?"\\
'''The Doctor:''' "Yes. Me!"

-->'''Clara:''' "You're being mysterious, and do you know what means?"\\
'''Doctor:''' "I'm a man of mystery." \\

'''Doctor:''' "I'll see you when I see you."\\
'''Clara:''' "When's that?"\\
'''Doctor:''' "When I see you."

JustForFun/{{The one w|ith}}here the Doctor mockingly whistles Music/PinkFloyd. Also the one where the Doctor parks the TARDIS in a shed-like room near a school. [[Recap/DoctorWhoS1E1AnUnearthlyChild Again]].

Clara Oswald is a woman of two lives. She's a mild-mannered (OK, not ''that'' mild-mannered) English teacher at a secondary school in Shoreditch -- Coal Hill and also Danny Pink's girlfriend. She's ''also'' the Doctor's companion, professional intergalactic traveler, self-admitted "carer"/walking external conscience and [[TheWatson question-asker]], who has to zip off every now and again for fun adventures with FishPeople, or rather less fun adventures where she almost dies in the desert.

* AllPartOfTheShow: Clara tries this by telling Danny the Blitzer getting sucked into the Vortex was for the School Play. Not only does it not work, Danny takes it as an insult to his intelligence.

* AnswersToTheNameOfGod: Missy has this done on her behalf; when the PCSO looks out the window in the Promised Land and exclaims "My God!", Missy's assistant Seb sees her walk past and says she's a little busy at the moment.
* AristocratsAreEvil: Danny's reaction to the Doctor upon hearing that he's a Time '''Lord'''. He deliberately provokes the Doctor's anger by addressing him as a superior officer, telling Clara that how the Doctor was at that moment, that was who he truly was.
* AscendToAHigherPlaneOfExistence: The poor PCSO killed by Skovox ends up in the Promised Land. Missy is a bit busy, so her assistant aids in the transition this time.

* BlatantLies: Clara telling Danny the Blitzer being sucked into the Time Vortex was for a play.

-->[[AC:"Five stop intruder. Five stop intruder. Problem solution destroy."]]
* CantYouReadTheSign: Double subverted. The Doctor admonishes Courtney for ignoring his "Keep Out" sign. She points out that it actually reads "GO AWAY HUMANS", which while still pertinent is a bit harder to take seriously.

** When Clara exasperatedly says that "Human beings are not otters!" to refute the Doctor's argument about how he can blend in to human society, the Doctor replies, "exactly, it'll be even easier". The grin at the end of this sentence [[InvokedTrope shows that he's doing this intentionally]].
** Clara drops a couple hints about her "new boyfriend" (Danny) and his resemblance to a certain time traveler (Orson, from "Listen"). The Doctor, with characteristic narcissism assumes she's talking about another teacher who happens to look a bit like Eleven.

** The Doctor bearing the name of John Smith for the umpteenth time also qualifies as this.

** When Danny first happens across Clara and the Doctor's attempts to stop the Skovox Blitzer, he hilariously first assumes that Clara's an alien as well and that the Doctor is, in fact, her father. Given [[LoveTriangle the real]] [[AnchoredShip situation]], this just yields very squicked expressions from the both of them, but the first time he was undercover in the vicinity of the school, he was [[Recap/DoctorWhoS1E1AnUnearthlyChild indeed hiding there with a blood relative]] as extraterrestrial as himself.
** The Doctor mentions a NoodleIncident he had with [[Recap/DoctorWhoS32E13TheWeddingofRiverSong River Song]].

** The Doctor mentions once having a teacher like Clara, hinting at Barbara and Ian, the original Coal Hill companions. Then again, we never know if he's talking about ''himself'' or not. Maybe he's talking about his academy days and his mentor, Borusa?
** Another ex-soldier who became a maths teacher? [[Recap/DoctorWhoS20E3MawdrynUndead The Brigadier.]]

** Besides Mickey, another male companion whose name the Doctor's brain just refused to retain was Coal Hill's Chairman of the Governors, Chesterfield... er, Chesterton.

--->'''2[[superscript:nd]] Doctor:''' I want them broken up, or melted down. Up or down, I don't care which!

** Cloaking things [[Recap/DoctorWhoS29E12TheSoundOfDrums do not work]] on Time Lords.

* CrustyCaretaker: "John Smith" doesn't do a lot of caretaker work, but he otherwise fits the bill with his rudeness. [[WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons Plus he's Scottish!]]
** In the Extra, Capaldi spends some time pointing out that the Doctor somewhat likes the idea of being a caretaker, in the sense that it's a chance to impress people with his MrFixit skills.

* DeadHandShot: Skovox Blitzer's first and only victim gets a pretty gruesome one; severed from the arm with charred smoking flesh and bones jutting out.

** The Doctor is in fine form, constantly taking shots at "P.E.", or Danny, and how he's not going to bother "retaining" that he's actually a maths teacher.

--->'''The Doctor:''' I used to have a teacher exactly like you.\\
'''Clara:''' Well you still do, pay attention.

* DoppelgangerDating: Invoked: the Doctor assumes Clara is doing this with Adrian (who looks like his previous incarnation). You can ''see'' the blow to his ego when he's proven wrong.
* DressingAsTheEnemy: When his temporal mines fail, the Doctor rigs up a device that makes him appear as another of Skovox's model, intended to be his superior officer. He then orders Skovox to deactivate.

* EverythingSoundsSexierInFrench: "German is the Black Speech" subtrope. "Skovox Blitzer" is obviously intended to recall the word "Blitz" (which means "lightning" in German, but in England has particular [[UsefulNotes/TheHomeFront extra connotations]]).

--->'''Danny:''' You're using her like a decoy!\\
'''The Doctor:''' No! Not ''like'' a decoy, [[GrammarNazi AS a decoy]]!

-->'''Danny:''' Do you love him?\\
'''Clara:''' [[BlatantLies No]].\\
'''Danny:''' Really had enough of the lies...\\
'''Clara:''' [[HeIsNotMyBoyfriend Not in that way]].\\
'''Danny:''' What other way is there?

** The Doctor's jealousy regarding Clara's new boyfriend is undisguised throughout the episode and only gets worse when he discovers that she isn't actually dating a teacher who happens to superficially resemble his previous incarnation.

* IdenticalStranger: Downplayed. Adrian isn't perfectly identical to Matt Smith, but he has a very similar look, right down to the hair and bowtie.
* TheILoveYouStigma: One of the few occasions in which this is averted, with Clara stating outright that she loves Danny, but also admitting to Danny that she loves the Doctor, too ("Not in that way," she so very unconvincingly adds.)
* ImperialStormtrooperMarksmanshipAcademy: For a supposedly advanced killing machine, Skovox takes the phrase "spray n' pray" to a great extreme. The only person he manages to shoot is a stationary police officer.
* InformedAbility: The Skovox Blitzer is described as having enough firepower to destroy a planet. In practice, it can't even ''hit'' Clara.
* InvisibilityCloak: The Doctor's wrist gadget renders him invisible.
* JanitorImpersonationInfiltration: The Doctor undergoes one so he can hide some temporal mines at the school and lure Skovox there to get rid of him. It's not a completely straight example, as he actually got the job first, but he still had to remove the previous caretaker.

** The Doctor is ''amazingly'' rude to Danny when he finds out he's a soldier, calling him "PE", refusing to believe he's a math teacher who just teaches PE on the side, and nearly foaming at the mouth when Danny dares to get a word in edgewise. (The episode leaves it up to interpretation as to whether this is due to the Doctor's distrust of the military as established in "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS34E2IntoTheDalek Into the Dalek]]," lingering PTSD from the Time War, or outright jealousy regarding Clara; most likely it is all three).
** Danny is ''extremely'' rude when he finds out that the Doctor is a Time ''Lord'', as if he were some UpperClassTwit and deliberately antagonizes him. Unlike with the Doctor, the episode makes it less ambiguous that jealousy plays a role in his attitude towards the Doctor.

-->'''The Doctor:''' It's a start.

* KillerRobot: Skovox Blitzer kills everything it sees.
* KirksRock: During the opening montage Twelve and Clara are seen tied to pillars with a rock formation in the background that looks almost identical to Vasquez Rocks

-->'''Clara:''' What do you think? Say something.\\
'''Danny:''' So, there's an alien, that used to look like Adrian. Then he turned into a Scottish caretaker and every now and then, when I'm not looking, you elope with him.
* LeftYourLifesaverBehind: Our heroes are chained up in the desert on an alien world to be eaten by sand piranhas, and can't escape because Clara left the vibrocutters in her other jacket back on Earth.
-->'''The Doctor:''' Why do you have two jackets? Is one of them FAULTY?

* LoveTriangle: The Doctor's jealousy is palpable, especially when he finds out Clara isn't attracted to a teacher who resembles his previous incarnation. Although the context of this episode makes it appear as if the Doctor is being father-daughter protective. Danny also exhibits jealousy, outright asking Clara if she loves the Doctor (which Clara first denies, then modifies to "not in that way", BlatantLies either way).

-->'''Clara:''' Is there an alien in this school?\\
'''The Doctor:''' Yes. Me!

---> '''Clara:''' ''[to Danny]'' It's a thing!
** Also, this gold nugget:
---> '''Clara:''' ''[to the Doctor]'' You're being mysterious [and] making the mistake common to very clever people to assume that everybody else is stupid.\\
''[next scene]''\\
'''Danny:''' ''[to Clara]'' Don't be mysterious, I'm not stupid.

** Twelve and Courtney -- she's a "disruptive" influence; the Doctor is ''absolutely thrilled'' to find someone who is an ''equally bad influence.''
* MrSmith: The Doctor uses his traditional alias, although for the first time on screen he actually combines it with "The Doctor" (as opposed to "Dr. John Smith", which he'd used occasionally).

** The Doctor's ability to open and close the TARDIS doors with a snap of his fingers was established in Series 4 as A. Very. Big. Deal. Yet here we once again see Clara doing it as well, and rather casually, yet.

** Danny's intervention (removing several temporal mines) messes up the Doctor's plan royally.
** The Doctor's presence and his behavior towards Danny comes very close to sabotaging not only Clara and Danny's relationship, but Clara and the Doctor's as well.
** The Doctor says the Blitzer is hanging around the school because of all the "artron emissions" that have gathered there over the years, implicitly as a result of the Doctor's visits.

** The Doctor mentions having lived (well, sulked) among otters for a month after a fight with River Song. ''Why'' he stayed with otters, we don't know. Maybe River ran off with the TARDIS? Again.

** Danny mentions Clara turning up for a date once wearing a space helmet (we don't even get a glimpse of that one).
** Subverted when the Doctor corrects Clara on Creator/JaneAusten in front of her students. Clara thinks its because he had some grand adventure with her, but that's not the case. He simply read the bio on the back of the book. (This actually counts as {{Foreshadowing}} for Series 9, which references various noodle incidents involving Austen and Clara.)

* OffScreenMomentOfAwesome: The Doctor and Clara managed to escape the sand piranhas without the vibro-cutters. We don't see how.

** The Doctor's reaction when he realizes the time mines aren't working.

* OneDialogueTwoConversations: The Doctor revealing that he knows about Clara's boyfriend, saying that he reminds him of a "young, dashing time-traveller": Clara thinks he's talking about Danny, who is the ancestor of Orson Pink; the Doctor is actually talking about Adrian, who resembles the Doctor's previous incarnation.
* PaperThinDisguise: The Doctor thinks that ''putting on a different coat'' qualifies as "deep cover".

-->[[AC:"Nine stop query rescan. Target reacquired success success."]]

* RunningGag:
** The Doctor's impressive eyebrows get mentioned yet again, this time by Danny Pink.
** It's always "a thing" with the Doctor and Clara.
** The Doctor's oblivious digs at Clara's appearance continue. This time, she's in need of "washing up". We also get a return of him thinking she's old.
** "Bigger on the inside" turns up again, but this time it's Clara warning Danny of it in advance. After looking inside, he still has to look around it to make sure.
* SecretTestOfCharacter: While the Doctor really doesn't like Danny, a lot of his jerkish behavior is an attempt to find out if he's good enough for Clara. Danny spots this fairly early (probably around when he thought the Doctor was her dad) and calls him on it at the end at which point the Doctor confirms it.

* SelfDestructMechanism: When the Doctor fails to properly authenticate his shutdown order, Skovox activates a self-destruct sequence. Danny distracts Skovox long enough for the Doctor to correct the error.

-->'''Clara:''' You're being mysterious, and do you know what means?\\
'''Doctor:''' I'm a man of mystery. \\

'''Doctor:''' I'll see you when I see you. \\
'''Clara:''' When's that? \\
'''Doctor:''' When I see you.
* ShipperOnDeck:
** The Doctor is convinced that Clara is dating a fellow teacher who, not so coincidentally, slightly resembles his previous incarnation. Like many real-life shippers, he finds himself disappointed when this isn't the case.
** Courtney Woods and other students are well aware of Danny and Clara's relationship.

* ASimplePlan: Congratulations, Doctor. Your plan to lure the Skovox into the Time Vortex and send it 1 billion years into the future is no longer boring, because "P.E." removed the time mines.
* SpannerInTheWorks: Danny sticks around after-hours while the Doctor is trying to send the Skovox a few billion years into the future, finding some of his temporal mines. This disrupts the temporal field and instead sends the Skovox forward one day, in the middle of a parent-teacher conference, and renders the mines unusable because the Skovox has adapted.

* ThrownOutTheAirlock: The Doctor pitches the deactivated Skovox out the TARDIS door and into space.

** Apart from a couple shots of the Blitzer, every scene in the trailers was taken from the first five minutes of the episode. Except for one scene that, for some reason, is actually taken from "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS34E4Listen Listen]]".

* YearInsideHourOutside: Clara goes on adventures with the Doctor and is back a moment later, causing trouble for her dates with Danny. She didn't have a tan this morning.
* YouAreWhatYouHate: Danny posits that the reason the Doctor doesn't like him is because they're both soldiers; Danny's a grunt while the Doctor is an officer. The War Doctor did, after all, [[Recap/NewSeriesAdventuresEnginesofWar lead many Time Lords into battle against the Daleks]]. [[LeaveNoSurvivors It ended horrifically.]] That being said, Danny seems to assume that the Doctor was an "armchair general" type rather than the kind of person who led from the front.

%%* BigShutUp: The Doctor, when Danny suggests evacuating the school.

%%* BigBad: The Skovox Blitzer.

* BigBad: The Skovox Blitzer.
* BigShutUp: The Doctor, when Danny suggests evacuating the school.

* OverprotectiveDad: Danny thinks this might be what the Doctor is to Clara. He's preemptively judgemental of Danny because he used to be in a line of work that hits a sensitive spot for the post-Time War Doctor and Danny ultimately concludes that he's angry because he doesn't think that Danny is worthy of Clara. The trope is identified by name when Danny mistakes the Doctor for Clara's "space dad".

The one where the Doctor mockingly whistles Music/PinkFloyd. Also the one where the Doctor parks the TARDIS in a shed-like room near a school. [[Recap/DoctorWhoS1E1AnUnearthlyChild Again.]]

** PlayedForLaughs when Clara returns from an adventure involving a lot of running from hostile aliens, only to find a track-suited Pink outside ready to go jogging with her.

** Cloacking things [[Recap/DoctorWhoS29E12TheSoundOfDrums do not work]] on timelords.

** The Doctor is ''amazingly'' rude to Danny when he finds out he's a soldier, calling him "PE", refusing to believe he's a math teacher who just teaches PE on the side, and nearly foaming at the mouth when Danny dares to get a word in edgewise. (The episode leaves it up to interpretation as to whether this is due to the Doctor's distrust of the military as established in "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS34E2IntoTheDalek Into the Dalek]]" or outright jealousy regarding Clara; most likely it is both).

* YouAreWhatYouHate: Danny posits that the reason the Doctor doesn't like him is because they're both soldiers; Danny's a grunt while the Doctor is an officer. The War Doctor did, after all, [[Recap/NewSeriesAdventuresEnginesofWar lead many Time Lords into battle against the Daleks]]. [[LeaveNoSurvivors It ended horrifically.]]

Clara promptly goes into panic mode, but by then an adventure's already happening -- the Doctor's hunting a Skovox Blitzer, an alien robot superweapon packing enough heat to take down the planet [[AwesomeMcCoolName (and incidentally has a really awesome name).]] Sure, they can save the world, but can Clara save her secrets? What's gonna happen if Danny Pink finds out?

* AwesomeMcCoolname: Skovox Blitzer.

** The Doctor is ''amazingly'' rude to Danny when he finds out he's a soldier, calling him "PE", refusing to believe he's a math teacher who just teaches PE on the side, and nearly foaming at the mouth when Danny dares to get a word in edgewise. (The episode leaves it up to interpretation as to whether this is due to the Doctor's distrust of the military as established in "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS34E2IntoTheDalek Into the Dalek]]" or outright jealousy regarding Clara; most likely it is both.)

* LoveTriangle: The Doctor's jealousy is palpable, especially when he finds out Clara isn't attracted to a teacher who resembles his previous incarnation. Although the context of this episode makes it appear as if the Doctor is being father-daughter protective. He's not. Danny also exhibits jealousy, outright asking Clara if she loves the Doctor (which Clara first denies, then modifies to "not in that way", BlatantLies either way).

* NotSoDifferent:
** Danny and the Doctor are very alike. Both have been soldiers and both have tried to become better men. Because of this, Danny understands the Doctor far more than the Doctor would like to admit. In addition, the two also share in common their affection and concern for Clara, with both mutually concerned about the influence the other might have on her.
** Clara and Twelve. In this episode, both she and Danny do plenty of (understandable) complaining about his bossy attitude, but once the KillerRobot returns and the action begins, she acts much the same way while busy distracting the monster. Danny ends up proving himself more useful than either of them expected...
---> '''Clara:''' ''[to Danny]'' It's a thing!
** Also, this gold nugget:
---> '''Clara:''' ''[to the Doctor]'' You're being mysterious [and] making the mistake common to very clever people to assume that everybody else is stupid.\\
''[next scene]''\\
'''Danny:''' ''[to Clara]'' Don't be mysterious, I'm not stupid.
** Clara's slow progression to becoming a DistaffCounterpart to the Doctor continues as she once again demonstrates the ability to open and close the TARDIS' doors with a snap of her fingers.
** Twelve and Courtney -- she's a "disruptive" influence; the Doctor is ''absolutely thrilled'' to find someone who is an ''equally bad influence.''