12 Great Moments From Heaven Sent

Mark McCullough picks out 12 faves from the 11th episode of Series 9.

This week’s episode was an adventurous one, taking on a format that had never been tried in the show before. Unlike Sleep No More, which I also enjoyed, this episode seems to have been a resounding success. A few weeks ago I mentioned that The Zygon Inversion for me set a standard that I doubted the show would ever reach again, turns out it only took three weeks to beat. So I stand corrected. So without further ado, let’s get stuck in to twelve highlights from the episode:

12. The Doctor’s Confessions

Technically three separate scenes, but for convenience I’ve decided to group them together here because they were so similar differing only in content of the Doctor’s confessions. The first confession was one which actually humanised the Doctor and made him a lot more relatable. He may be a Time Lord, but that doesn’t stop him from fearing death like the rest of us. As an aside, it can also provide an in canon reason for Ten’s behaviour too. As for the other two confessions, in relation to the Hybrid, give a new light on the Doctor. His real reason for running from Gallifrey is now established as the fact that he is scared he would destroy it if he stayed.

11. The Confession Dial Revelation

Of all the twists and turns in the episode this should have been one of the easier to guess, yet I completely missed it, despite picking up on the Time Loop early on. In light of the fact that the Veil was only stopped by the Doctor confessing a piece of information, the nature of the setting as being the confession dial makes a whole lot of sense. When you also consider the design of the castle, and the rotation of its elements, you can spot a lot of patterns present on the confession dial. But this too raises a lot of questions: Why was the dial on Gallifrey? And why was this the Doctor’s last will and testament?

10. Clara

I’ve put our companion on the list, but not high up because I’m quite mixed on her appearance here. On one hand I loved the fact that she was in his head an occupied all of his thoughts to the extent that when bouncing his ideas, it was off her rather than off himself. It also reinforces what the Doctor said in The Zygon Inversion about once Clara gets into his head, she will never leave. This was quite a nice touch, but I feel it should have stopped short of dialogue from Jenna. Not only was it a reiteration of Amy from The Time of the Doctor, but it also meant that Jenna’s last words from Face the Raven no longer stand. Ideally next week will feature Clara in influence/reference only rather than actually having lines.

9. The Veil

This week we have possibly the best new monster of this series in the form of the Veil, not only was it creepy but it made me jump on numerous occasions. The story of how it was conceived, the rotting corpse of a dead woman on a hot sunny day is unsettling at best. The rules established around the creature were also very effective in maintaining a tense atmosphere throughout. The knowledge that it would always come and there was no escaping was sufficient to establish it as a realistic threat. The addiction of the television cameras to show you it was coming added to the sense of inability to escape.

8. We Take Forever to Die

After the Veil catches up to the Doctor and essentially kills him, we have a slight delay in which his body is lying there. Obviously he was never going to really be dead, but the possibility was hard to shake. In this instance I was fearful of a deus ex machina resolution to the narrative where the Doctor’s death was actually what freed him. Instead we got something much better with the revelation that Time Lords take longer than people think to die. This adds a lot of gravitas to The Day of the Doctor where Time Lords are struck down by Daleks. Because we see humans die quickly, we would never have thought that the victims of the Time War suffer on long after the killer blow is delivered and that is quite an unsettling thought

7. Pre-Titles Scene

The Doctor’s narration at the opening of the episode is interesting in that it appears to perfectly describe the Veil within the episode. In that sense it is a similar style to Before the Flood where the pre-titles acts as mini summary of what happens in the episode. However in retrospect I don’t think the object referred to was the Veil, rather death, who the Veil was meant to personify. The other aspect of this scene was the flash back to Clara’s death (thanks for that Moffat) which great way to reopen the wounds of last week and establish an emotional gravitas behind the Doctor’s declaration that her death did not make him weak.

6. Who is behind the Castle?

The actual antagonists of this episode are never actually revealed, and logically we have to assume that they are the same people responsible for Clara’s death. There are a couple of things that don’t add up within the episode which we have to attribute to whoever is behind it: the extra set of the Doctor’s clothes, the painting of Clara, and the grave with the message at the bottom. I assume this will be addressed next week, and with the conclusion being on Gallifrey the obvious candidates are the Time Lords. However this doesn’t really make sense, why would they isolate the Doctor in a state of grief, make him think they are responsible and essentially weaponise him against them? Why would they do this, and then give him a direct passage to them? Something doesn’t quite add up. Yet!

5. TARDIS Mind Palace

The scene where the Doctor jumps out of the window only to end up in his TARDIS was one of the most exciting for me. Obviously something didn’t add up as we knew the fate of the TARDIS in the previous episode. Instead what the scene was used to do was to demonstrate the Doctor’s thought patterns to the viewer. Both Moffat and Talalay deserve immense credit for this scene as small details such as dropping an object or the timing of a splash come back to play a huge role in how the Doctor thinks. With that in mind one could nearly analyse every scene featuring the Time Lord in the entire series and try to think like he does.

4. The Cinematography

There are so many moments that I could choose from this episode that were breathtakingly beautiful. So I’ve decided to give one of the moments to celebrate the amazing work this week by the undoubtedly talented Rachel Talalay. I am really excited to see how she brings Gallifrey to life next week, but it will take one heck of an effort to better this week. I don’t think it is a stretch to call this the most beautiful episode the show has ever produced and that deserves a lot of credit. A particular highlight was the scene where the Doctor was underwater and discovers all of the skulls. I can also say that I have never seen the TARDIS utilised as well as it was this week. More of this next week please.

3. The Shepherd Boy

I’ll admit to having to look this one up because it intrigued me. The Shepherd Boy is actually a fairy-tale, which the Doctor quotes here. Anyone with knowledge of the fairy-tale may have been able to make the leap from the clue of Bird, but I doubt it. The only reason I bring up the fact that it is a real world story is because of how it reinforces River’s comments in The Pandorica Opens about fairy-tales ultimately being the Doctor. This montage scene was very intelligent and gave the episode a satisfactory conclusion that felt believable and actually had stakes for the Doctor in that it cost him billions of years of life. The effect that has on him mentally promises to be next week’s topic for exploration.

2. The Gallifrey Reveal

A scene which could have been so much better than it was, but for someone in the BBC deciding that it would be a good idea to mention Gallifrey in the episode synopsis! Whatever the reason behind this mind-blowingly annoying decision, it did not take away from the phenomenal scene too much. The sheer excitement as the camera panned to reveal the famous Gallifreyan Citadel was just perfection. The Doctor is home, and he means business. That prospect is something more exciting than anything since The Day of the Doctor. Another masterclass from Moffat too was bringing the Doctor to Gallifrey rather than utilising the trope of a search for the planet.

1. “The Hybrid is Me”

So far this series has had some absolute belter cliff-hangers but this one takes the proverbial biscuit, as Mr Moffat himself said it would. The hybrid has been teased all series, and the butt of several jokes within the community, but now it finally appears that it is in fact the Doctor! Not only that but the way this sets up next week’s episode where the Doctor will logically attack his own planet, is just astounding. It certainly makes the wait until next Saturday agonising. Unless of course he meant that the hybrid is actually Ashildr’s new moniker, which would certainly be a lot less interesting. Opting for the infinitely more likely former, it looks like we have an extremely satisfactory resolution to that particular arc, even out doing last year’s Missy reveal.