Sunday 5 April 2020

Space / Time (2011 Comic Relief Special)


In which Rory is helping the Doctor carry out some maintenance in the TARDIS. He becomes distracted by his wife's miniskirt, as he is working under the glass floor as she stands at the console above him. He drops the thermocouplings and the ship is plunged into darkness. The Doctor makes an emergency materialisation, and when the lights come back on they are shocked to see that the TARDIS appears to have materialised inside itself. The Doctor enters the Police Box, but enters the console room through the doors. He fears they are caught in a space trap, and could be stuck here forever. A second Amy then walks in through the doors, telling them that things are about to get complicated...


The second Amy explains that she entered the Police Box in the near future, but it has drifted back to the present. She tells Rory that he will enter the Police Box after his wife slaps him in the face. Rory asks if he has to remember everything which the second Amy tells him, and the Doctor explains that if they don't then they may be stuck with two Amys. When Rory looks pleased at this idea, his wife slaps him. The future Amy enters the Police Box, but reappears at the doors with a second Rory. The two new arrivals are pushed back in to the Police Box, whilst the Doctor decides to create a controlled temporal implosion to reset everything. However, he doesn't know which control to use. A second Doctor from the future appears and tells him which lever to pull. The original Doctor runs into the Police Box whilst the second Doctor sets off the implosion. Space and Time are reset. The Doctor orders Amy to change into trousers before they resume their repairs.


Space and Time were written by Steven Moffat for the BBC's Comic Relief charity night, first broadcast on 18th March, 2011.
Moffat had previously contributed a Doctor Who themed piece for the 1999 event - The Curse  of Fatal Death. The 2009 event had featured a mini episode of The Sarah Jane Adventures - From Raxacoricofallapatorius With Love.
The story features only the three regulars and the TARDIS console room set and Police Box.
Although broadcast prior to the start of Series 6, the two mini episodes are actually set between Day of the Moon and Curse of the Black Spot. The former episode had ended with the Doctor asking Rory to help him with the thermocouplings, and he is wearing the same shirt.
Moffat claimed that the episodes should be regarded as canon, so they can be viewed in the same way as the extra "Night and the Doctor" sequences which feature on the Series 6 DVD box set.


Things you might like to know:
  • This is the third time we've seen a TARDIS within a TARDIS, although it's the first time that the same TARDIS has been inside itself. On the two previous occasions - The Time Monster and Logopolis - it was the Master's and the Doctor's TARDISes which were inside each other.
  • Only two full stories are set entirely within the TARDIS - Edge of Destruction and Amy's Choice, but a couple of other specials have been set entirely in the console room - Born Again and Time Crash, both of which were produced for Children In Need.
  • Amy's "This is where it gets complicated" mirrors exactly what she told her younger self at the beginning of The Big Bang.
  • These episodes, and the aforementioned "Night and the Doctor" DVD scenes were all filmed together over a two day period.
  • The episodes had a mixed reception, with some complaining that they relied too much on sexist humour.

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