Discount Lodger – Closing Time Review

[u/ZeroCentsMade]

This post is part of a series of reviews. To see them all, click here.

Historical information found on Shannon Sullivan's Doctor Who website (relevant page here) and the TARDIS Wiki (relevant page here)). Primary/secondary source material can be found in the source sections of Sullivan's website, and rarely as inline citations on the TARDIS Wiki.

Story Information

• Episode: Series 6, Episode 12
• Airdate: 24th September 2011
• Doctor: 11th
• Companions: None
• Other Notable Characters: River Song, Amy, Rory, Craig, Sophie, Madame Kovarian
• Writer: Gareth Roberts
• Director: Steve Hughes
• Showrunner: Steven Moffat

Review

You know, when I was little like you I dreamt of the stars. I think it's fair to say, in the language of your age, I lived my dream. – The Doctor

One of the odd things that happens when you watch, say, a television series multiple times is that you come to realize that you have different reactions to individual episodes each time. For instance where as in the past "Closing Time" was an episode that I thought of as a sub-par but largely harmless follow up to "The Lodger", in watching it for review I really took against it. "Closing Time" came across to me on this viewing as an incoherent mess of a story that could never decide on a tone.

"Closing Time" vacillates pretty wildly between trying to replicate the humor of "The Lodger" but failing because the jokes aren't nearly as good this time around and trying to capture the melancholy of a Doctor who has decided it's finally time to face his fate at Lake Silencio. When it hits the latter it generally does succeed, but as I said the humor just isn't landing. And in a better episode the humor would have served as an effective contrast against the melancholy, but in this episode the humor feels like it's working against it. It's a bit too broad, too goofy. One minute the Doctor is reflecting on his mortality, the next we're getting a bit about how a shop employee thinks that Craig and the Doctor are actually a couple. It just doesn't work together.

Not helping is the fact that, by this point, the story beats that "Closing Time" goes through have been absolutely rammed into the ground in Series 6. I haven't talked about it much, but Series 6 has a running theme of parenthood. One that was entirely accidental from what I can tell, but it's there nonetheless. This is the fourth story this series to include as a key plot point the love between a father and a son. And in another notable pattern, mothers not named Amelia Pond barely getting referenced. After "Night Terrors", this is the second time this series that we've had a mother introduced at the beginning of the episode only to not feature again until the end. Though at least in this case it's because Daisy Haggard, who played Sophie both here and in "The Lodger" had a play she was rehearsing for when this episode was filming, so wasn't available for most of the episode. Still, it's a weird pattern.

At least this time I do somewhat buy James Corden in his main role. In this episode Craig is trying to cope with being a father. He feels like he doesn't know what to do, and so to try and prove that he can cope, he's had Sophie go off to relax with her friends and he'll take care of the baby all on his own. And then the Doctor shows up, and Craig knows well enough to know this probably means trouble. This in spite of the fact that the Doctor actually just showed up to say goodbye to Craig before going off to die (technically there's a whole thing about some specific cosmic event the Doctor wants to see but that's not really important). Point being, while Corden struggled in the role of romantic lead in "Lodger", here he feels more at home in the role of well-meaning father who feels he's in over his head.

That being said, we also lose a lot of what made "Lodger" work as well as it did. There's no real reason for the Doctor to pretend to be a normal person in "Closing Time". But we still get kind of an equivalent to that with the Doctor taking on a job in a shop selling children's toys to investigate power outages that he's tracked down to that shop. That material feels more than a little bit superfluous. It is funny to see the Doctor, presumably after working for a single day, having seemingly gotten close to everyone from the other salespeople to the security guard, but it just doesn't feel as meaningful as the stuff from "Lodger". Also, all of the characters at the shop feel very one-note.

Which goes back to the issue of the humor in this episode just not landing as well as the humor from "Lodger". The closest we get is when the episode is focused around Craig's baby, Alfie, or as he'd prefer to be known, Stormageddon, Dark Lord of All. Yes, as established in "A Good Man Goes to War", the Doctor speaks baby, so we get a lot of fun sequences where the Doctor translates Alfie's feelings for everyone else. It's not the best material, but it's fairly amusing. A running gag where the Doctor can temporarily get people to be unable to talk by doing a "shush" feels a bit off, like if this is an ability he has (it's introduced as something he can do to get Alfie to stop crying, but he quickly starts using it on adults) it either should be used more…or is really unethical and just shouldn't be used. Still it's a gag probably best not taken seriously, similarly to how I didn't question the head butt of knowledge transfer in "Lodger".

As stated above the best bits of the episode are its quieter more contemplative ones. There's a scene at Craig's house where the Doctor is talking to Alfie, reflecting on his life that is just brilliant. Matt Smith plays this scene so well. It's got a grandiosity, but mixed with the sadness of the Doctor sincerely believing his life is nearly at an end. Later when everything's over and the Doctor and Craig are saying their goodbyes (Craig providing the stetson and blue envelopes from "The Impossible Astronaut"), there's a resignation to the Doctor as he leaves. The Doctor's nametag from his time in the shop is recontextualized ("I'm the Doctor. I was here to help. And you are very, very welcome") turning a pretty unfunny gag into an emotionally resonant moment. I even like the reports from the older children that River Song collects, with the best joke in the episode unquestionably being the last one ("I really liked his hat").

But that's kind of all the episode has going for it. The plot is…nothing. The Cybermen are hiding under the shop (why not) grabbing people out of it as raw material. They've been worn out and are trying to reestablish themselves. There's a worthwhile idea about a group of barely functional Cybermen trying to restart. But, like in "The Next Doctor", this idea just doesn't get much examination amidst everything else going on. The end result is that this episode just kind of happens to have Cybermen in it. Apparently the Cybermen were put in by the writer because Series 6 would have otherwise had no returning monsters, and boy can you feel that they were here so that they could be here.

The climax of the episode tries to repeat the ending of the Lodger, with love once again saving the day (it's made explicit this time), in this case the love of Craig for his son Alfie. Craig has been sealed inside the Cyber Controller suit because the Cybermen think he's smart (sure…) but on the monitor the Cybermen have of the shop, Alfie starts crying, and Craig, hearing this, has an emotional surge that the Cybermen can't erase, instead it backfiring on them, causing their emotion to return. I remember when, in "The Age of Steel" the Cybermen having their emotions forced back on them was treated with gravitas (and, admittedly, heads exploding). Here it's just kind of a thing that happens.

But the real problem is that it doesn't entirely feel earned. In "The Lodger" I never fully bought the relationship between Craig and Sophie, but at the very least the ending works because it feels like it's the natural culmination of the episode. When you introduce the Cybermen into proceedings you're just adding a lot of baggage. On top of that…we've never really seen much of the love Craig has for Alfie. That's not to say it feels like he doesn't care for his son, but more that that's just not been the focus of the episode. The episode has been focused on Craig feeling like he doesn't know how to take care of his son. That's a feeling born out of love, because he wants to do well for his kid but feels inadequate. But we've still not seen much of that love. It leads to an ending that feels contrived.

And I do want to speak about how Sophie is handled in this episode. Now, like I said above, I can't fault the episode for deemphasizing Sophie when Daisy Haggard wasn't available to do much filming. But it does feel off that the plan was to lie to Sophie about what had happened while she was away. The Doctor puts in a bunch of effort to fix up Craig's house after what happened…so that Craig won't be in trouble with Sophie, rather than because he doesn't want to be responsible for wrecking their home. As a reminder, not only does Sophie know the Doctor, she's arguably his friend too. Honestly I wouldn't be remarking on this except that "Night Terrors" kind of pulled the same thing.

After everything is wrapped up we get a scene that…honestly should have gone into the next episode. I mean that episode needs something to happen. But the point is it's a cliffhanger for the next episode that has nothing to do with the plot of this one. It does serve to remind us that River only became an archaeologist to hunt after the Doctor which…yeesh. And also it's got the return of Madame Kovarian who's still doing her out of place scenery chewing thing. Oh and the "tick tock" rhyme from "Night Terrors" makes a return here entirely because Steven Moffat liked the thing even though it doesn't really work outside its original context. So, no it's not a good scene, although the Silents remain intimidating as in this episode two of them are hanging out and doing their usual thing.

On the whole, I'll admit I came out of this review thinking less of "Closing Time" than I have in the past. Never a favorite of mine, I've kind of come to the conclusion that this is just an empty episode. I've made a lot of comparisons to "The Lodger" but that's because "Closing Time" so desperately wants to repeat what made that episode work and really can't pull it off. The humor is just so pervasive in this episode and it's not any good. When the episode takes a moment to reflect on where the Doctor is as a character at this point it gets really good, but those moments are just not integrated well enough into the episode to give it too much credit for them. I don't think much of this one.

Score: 3/10

Stray Observations

• As Steven Moffat intended to abandon the two part format for the Series 6 finale, he decided to commission an episode that would serve as a "calm before the storm". Hence the return of Craig.
• This episode was meant to take place roughly 200 years after "The God Complex" in the Doctor's personal timeline, accounting for the differences in the ages of the two versions of the Doctor seen in "The Impossible Astronaut". My only thought about this is that, even to a Time Lord, 200 years is a lot of time and maybe it's too much for the emotional sides of this, and especially next episode, to fully land.
• As this episode was produced alongside "The Girl Who Waited" it, like that episode, had to limit the amount of time given to certain members of the cast, in this case Amy and Rory.
• This dual production also meant that this episode needed a separate producer from the show's regular producer at the time Marcus Wilson. Line producer Denise Paul was promoted to producer for the episode.
• The Cyberman costume used for the episode was one of the ones that were originally created for Series 2. It was in a dilapidated state, which fortunately suited the needs of the episode anyway, and the suits were in fact further distressed.
• The production team did finally remove the Cybus Industries logo, unlike what was done in "The Pandorica Opens".
• Scenes in the shop were filmed in Howells Department Store in Cardiff. The production team could only film after the store closed at 7 PM, which meant that filming would take place over the course over several nights. This filming was rough, at one point going until 6 AM, and, according to James Corden, left the cast and crew feeling "lightheaded" and "hysterical".
• The house meanwhile was owned by a couple, who agreed to let their new home be used for filming because they thought their two young boys would appreciate it. Apparently this filming also tended to run into the morning.
• On the first day of filming, Matt Smith hit one of the Cybermat props harder than he should, requiring that the thing be repaired.
• The Doctor shows up and upon seeing Craig's new house says "you've redecorated…I don't like it." This is of course a running gag from previous multi-Doctor stories, though it's kind of odd to have it show up at Craig's house.
• It always feels a bit odd to have Karen Gillan and Arthur Darvill's names show up in the credits in an episode they barely feature in.
• When he and Sophie first moved in to their new place, Craig checked upstairs and with both of his neighbors to make sure they were human. Understandable, given what happened when we met Craig.
• Amy is working as a model, where she's advertising a scent called "Petrichor" with the tagline, "For the Girl Who's Tired of Waiting". Okay a few thoughts here. One: That is way too many references to the show in a single poster. Two: Is Amy really famous enough to have her own scent? Strikes me as unlikely, especially since she'll later change careers. Three: the Doctor clearly hasn't seen this advertisement even though he works at this shop (admittedly it's his second day, but you'd think a giant poster of his friend would stand out).
• That being said the scene of the little girl asking for an autograph from Amy while the Doctor watches on, clearly not wanting to interrupt Amy and Rory's lives is well-done, though I don't know if I'd have had the Doctor say "Amelia Pond" at the end of it. Just feels weird, and I don't need to be reminded of the character's name. Actually, given how last episode ended, it might have worked better if he'd said "Amy Williams", reflecting that change in relationship, but oh well.
• The Cybermats were redesigned to have a fleshy mouth with teeth. This was Steven Moffat's idea, wanting to give them a bit more menace. I like it, suits the Cybermen's whole cyborg thing.
• The Doctor shoots a laser beam out of the sonic screwdriver to defeat the Cybermat. I don't care if it's technically got some alternate techno-babble explanation (though actually all the Doctor really says is "I've got an app for that"), that's what happens. I'm not usually one to complain about the sonic being overpowered, but this is pushing it, even for me.
• Alfie's first word appears to have been "Doctor".
• The final scene between River Song and Madame Kovarian was written by Steven Moffat

Next Time: We get almost all of the answers to the dangling questions over Series 6. They aren't necessarily good answers, but they are answers

[u/AlbertTheAlbatross]

This is another episode that I don't mind, but it's obviously not great. It's an OK watch in my opinion.

First thing to say, I really like the use of music in this one. It's something I don't always notice but I did here. Also whenever James Corden appears in Doctor Who I find him really likeable and charming. I don't like him in basically anything else, but in Who I do. I have no idea why, but oh well.

This episode was meant to take place roughly 200 years after "The God Complex" in the Doctor's personal timeline, accounting for the differences in the ages of the two versions of the Doctor seen in "The Impossible Astronaut".

I did not pick up on that time skip at all. Obviously the Doctor certainly sounds more weary and is making sounds like he’s (emotionally) ready to regenerate again, but I interpreted that as being a response to the stress of the last couple of episodes. You're right that 200 years is still a long time, I struggle to figure out what he's been doing for that time if Craig's house made it to one of the top spots in his farewell tour.

I'm not a fan of the whole “I speak baby” thing, it just doesn’t land for me. This is something that happens a few times in the 11th Doctor's run - someone (Alfie/minotaur/horse) is making sounds that don't seem like language, to the extent that the TARDIS doesn't even translate it, but then somehow the Doctor can understand it and translate it into full sentences. I dunno, maybe I'm just being picky, but it doesn't work for me.

Finally, I don’t like how cybermen seem to now just be a suit that goes around a fully-intact person. It removes a lot of the horror of them if a cyber-conversion can theoretically just be undone after the fact by getting the person out of the suit.

[u/[deleted]]

Not much else to say about this one. I enjoy it a bit more than you do, but that's probably down to the fact that I enjoyed The Lodger more than you did, and it does feel like a lot of this story's humor is reliant on how much good will you have towards that episode. There really are only three jokes: dads are incompetent, the Doctor speaks baby, and people think he and Craig are a couple. Only one of those is really funny, but I think Smith and Corden still have good chemistry, at least it was nice seeing Lynda Baron on Doctor Who again.

[u/Ryanookami]

Another wonderful review, albeit for an episode I’m also not a fan of. It has a few moments where a joke or two lands, but by and large I just feel disconnected with the story in the wake of the past two being much more emotionally packed and deeper explorations of the Doctor’s nature and the ways in which he lies to and fails his companions. It just feels a bit like tonal whiplash, especially as we’re so close to the end of the season, when you would think that these more deep explorations of the Doctor’s nature are lead ups to the series finale. But nope. That’s really not what series 6 really is, I guess. They really went to a great high point and then sort of crashed for the last two episodes of the series. Oh well, it’s not the worst thing the show has ever done.

Also, off topic, why do your reviews seem to keep getting deleted? I very much look forward to when I see they’ve been posted, only to find when I click on them they’ve been removed. I can understand this happening once or something on accident, but it happens so frequently! It’s really silly, as your reviews are both interesting, insightful, and definitely subject matter that belongs here!

[u/Baron487 → u/Ryanookami]

They're not deleted, it's just that posts on this sub have to get approved by the mods first. So if you follow u/ZeroCentsMade and regularly check her page for new reviews, if a new one is there and recently posted it will be listed as "removed" but it's actually just that it's technically been posted but not approved yet so that's why you can't read it immediately.

[u/Ryanookami → u/Baron487]

Ahhhhh okay, that totally makes sense. Thanks for the explanation. I hadn’t run into something like this before. Appreciate it!

[u/Iamamancalledrobert]

I really don’t like this episode. I think this is the one where you can see that the “Britain that seems to resemble the real one” has been swallowed up and replaced by a more tourist-friendly version— the scene where everyone loves the Eleventh Doctor in a toy shop is just so far away from anything resembling the real world in any way. 

I know a lot of people are fine with that or think it’s great. I wasn’t one of them. I think this might have been the episode back in 2011 that made me think “we can’t keep a lid on the bleak parts of Britain forever; if we don’t face up to them honestly they are going to destroy us in the end.” So bad it made me correctly predict the future 

[u/CaineRexEverything]

Closing Time, like Crimson Horror and Sleep No More, is one of those episodes of Who that just does not retain memory in my brain. I’ve watched them a few times over the years - not a lot, because all three are pretty dreary to me - but enough that for other episodes I recall bits from them. I don’t remember anything from Closing Time, besides Linda Baron being in it. Even the climax involving the Cybermen basically being defeated by love I’d forgotten, and now you reminded me I do remember being really quite annoyed by that denouement when the episode aired.

So yeah, closing time. I’d rate it low if I could remember enough of it to rate. I did quite like The Lodger though.

[u/jessdrippingwet]

Craig and the Doctor have chemistry but the Cybermen felt like a last minute afterthought shoved into a sitcom script. It is basically a fun hangout episode that forgets it needs a villain until the final ten minutes.

[u/Baron487]

Yeah that title of yours is very fitting, because that's what this is. It's The Lodger, but not as good (and The Lodger wasn't even that great to begin with).

What I like:

I mostly like Craig as the everyman type of person and his worries over being a good father. I also still mostly like his relationship with Eleven. Their best scene is at the end where Eleven talks to Craig about him being a good friend to him. They also do have some funny moments as a duo.

The first joke about Alfie in regards to the whole "I speak baby" thing is kinda funny. The scene where Eleven holds Alfie and delivers a little speech is also quite good.

The Cybermats here are pretty cool and hey, we actually get the Cybermen doing conversion here and not being too murder-y.

Eleven's monologue before getting into the TARDIS at the end. The tone is definitely weird in this episode, but that is a serious moment that really works.

What I don't like:

The way the episode wastes the Cybermen. Looking past the fact that they're "just kinda there", they at least are characterized well here. Holed up and desperately trying to survive and every now and then they kidnap people in the mall who wandered a bit too far away and convert them. That's good. We even get Craig being subjected to the horror of conversion. Quite good. But then they're defeated by the power of love. I don't usually have a problem with that kind of solution if it makes sense. Night Terrors had a being whose emotions were tied to its alien abilities so there because of how the episode establishes the Tenza's "rules", I think it makes sense. Emotion defeating the Cybermen in Series 2 and even before that The Invasion makes sense because they get hit with an overflow of "emotional energy". Here, it's just one person's love for their child being enough to defeat highly advanced alien technology. I don't buy it.

While there are some funny parts, it's not as funny as The Lodger and yeah there's a lot of faffing about with no clear direction. The worst part is the awkward scene with Craig talking to the mall employee. I get that he's still a bit of a socially awkward guy but seriously he comes across as just a creep and it doesn't fit his character at this point in his life at all. He has a girlfriend whom he has a child with and yet he talks like he's never interacted with a woman, let alone a human being, before.

The "I speak baby" jokes get old very quickly and just start feeling a bit like "lol xD random"-type humour and it doesn't work for me.

I guess it's not a 100% fair criticism considering that you revealed in the review here why this is, but yeah I wish Sophie got to be more present as not only is Alfie also her son but she's basically just as much of a friend of Eleven as Craig is.

Kovarian still has little presence. She appeared in all those weird little "cameo" moments at first and then she finally got to do stuff in the mid-series finale before vanishing again. She's here physically now again, but only at the end to set up the finale.

Overall it's quite a mess yeah. Not the worst ever, but not all that great either even if it has some stuff that I do like quite a bit. Also it's not Gareth's worst episode...

3/10.