Day of the Moon
"Day of the Moon" is the second episode of the sixth series of the British science fiction television series Doctor Who. Written by show runner Steven Moffat, and directed by Toby Haynes, the episode was first broadcast on 30 April 2011 on BBC One in the United Kingdom and on BBC America in the United States. The episode is the second of a two-part story that began with "The Impossible Astronaut" on 23 April.
Not to be confused with Transformers: Dark of the Moon.214b – "Day of the Moon"
Caroline Henry
Marcus Wilson[1]
- Steven Moffat
- Piers Wenger
- Beth Willis
2.2
2nd of 2-part story, 45 minutes
30 April 2011
In 1969 America, alien time traveller the Doctor (Matt Smith) along with his companions Amy Pond (Karen Gillan) and Rory Williams (Arthur Darvill), archaeologist River Song (Alex Kingston) and FBI agent Canton Everett Delaware III (Mark Sheppard), attempt to lead the human race into a revolution against the Silence, a religious order of aliens who cannot be remembered after they are encountered.
"The Impossible Astronaut" and "Day of the Moon" were designed to be a darker opener to the series and were partially filmed in the United States, a first for the programme. Moffat was keen on incorporating Area 51, the Apollo 11 Moon landing, and President Richard Nixon (played by Stuart Milligan) into the plot. The episode received final viewing figures of 7.3 million in the UK. It received generally positive reviews from critics, though many worried about the number of questions that had been left unanswered.
Plot[edit]
Synopsis[edit]
The Eleventh Doctor and his allies, Amy, Rory, River Song and ex-FBI agent Canton Everett Delaware III, escape the girl in the space suit, and spend three months tracking down the alien religious order the Silence and find they exist across the entire planet, and have the ability to place post-hypnotic suggestions in humans they encounter. While the Doctor alters part of the Command Module Columbia of Apollo 11, Canton and Amy visit a nearby orphanage in Florida, hoping to find where the girl in the space suit was taken from. The Silence kidnaps Amy, taking her to an underground control room. Canton shoots and wounds one of the creatures, and from it the Doctor learns the Silence's name.
Analysing the now-empty space suit, River realises that the girl possesses incredible strength to have forced her way out of it, and that the suit's advanced life-support technology would have called President Richard Nixon as the highest authority figure on Earth when the girl got scared. The Doctor realises why the Silence have been controlling humanity; by guiding their technological advances, they have influenced humanity into the Space Race for purposes of building a space suit, which must somehow be crucial to their intentions. Meanwhile, Canton interrogates the captured Silence member, who mocks humanity for treating him when "...you should kill us all on sight". Canton records this using Amy's mobile phone.
The Doctor tracks down Amy's location, and lands the TARDIS in the Silence's control room five days later. As River and Rory hold the Silence at bay, the Doctor shows them the live broadcast of the Moon landing. As they watch, the Doctor uses his modification of the Apollo command module Columbia to insert Canton's recording of the wounded Silence member into the footage of the landing. Because of this message, humans will now turn upon the Silence whenever they see them. The group frees Amy and departs in the TARDIS, while River kills all the Silence in the control room. Amy, telling the Doctor that while she is not pregnant, she worries that if she is pregnant, her travels in the TARDIS might affect her child's development. As the trio sets off, the Doctor discreetly uses the TARDIS scanner to attempt to determine if Amy is pregnant. Six months later, the girl in the space suit is in New York, dying. She starts to regenerate to fix her body.
Continuity[edit]
The Silence's 'time engine' set was previously used in "The Lodger".[2] The Doctor describes it as "very Aickman Road", a reference to the house the ship occupied in that episode.[3] When the Silence reveals their name to the Doctor, the Doctor has flash-backs to "The Eleventh Hour" and "The Vampires of Venice", the first mentions of the Silence.[3] The "Eye Patch Lady" (Frances Barber) appears for the first time in this episode, and makes similar appearances in "The Curse of the Black Spot"[4] and "The Rebel Flesh"[5] before her connection to Amy is revealed in "The Almost People".[6] The Doctor uses the TARDIS's scanners to detect Amy's alternating pregnancy state. The Doctor repeats the scan with the same results in "The Curse of the Black Spot"[4] and "The Rebel Flesh".[7]
The Doctor and Rory discuss both being present at the fall of Rome. As an Auton, Rory guarded the Pandorica from the Roman era to the present day in "The Big Bang",[8] and the First Doctor indirectly instigated the Great Fire of Rome in The Romans (1965).[9] The Doctor is held captive in Area 51, which he had visited previously in the Tenth Doctor animated serial Dreamland.[3]