The Angels Take Manhattan (2012)

The end here. After over two years, the Ponds have left us. The question that seemed to be in the air was ‘Will the Ponds be killed off?’. It seems impossible now that people can leave the Doctor with a simple goodbye. To my knowledge, only Martha has had a nice exit so I was wondering what sort of exit the Ponds would get. I must admit I was slightly annoyed that River Song was going to be returning as I felt that she had been overused in the previous series. So with that minor niggle I looked forward to this story which saw the return of what I think are the best monsters of the new era of Doctor Who. The Doctor, Amy and Rory appear to be on holiday in New York where the Doctor is reading a book which as we learn is written by his wife (still seems odd to be saying that) and its pretty soon before chaos takes centre stage.

The Angels are just as creepy as they always are. I found the child statues to be more creepy that the fully grown up ones. However what I found most amusing was the Statue of Liberty turning into an angry statue. To be honest it was obvious from the moment that I heard the title because it’s the most famous statue in the world and its in the right part of the world so it would have been silly not to include it. The reason why the Angels seem to have chosen New York was a little bit odd because quite frankly they have chosen any city in the world but the idea that they feed off the energy produced is quite a good one.   

Despite my issues with River Song I thought that Alex Kingston was rather good in this and seemed slightly toned down compared to previous adventures that she has been in. It didn’t distract you from the Ponds’ departure. There was still some amusing flurting between the Doctor and River but it was mild. I did like how its clear that River has been released from prison because she never killed the Doctor as the Doctor has wiped himself pretty much out of people’s memory. It means that everything that happened in the last series can been left there and everything that happens with River from now on is going to be a little less complicated.

Matt Smith was very good and dealt with the various moods that the Doctor had to be in very well.  It’s been a good set of stories for Smith and he dealt with the exit of Amy and Rory very well. In their departing story, both Arthur Darvill and Karen Gillan made up for being in the background in previous stories. Yet again Darvill gets given the short straw and is the one that suffering continues with finding out that gets thrown back in time. The scene where he and Amy are going to jump off the roof was possibly the best that he and Karen Gillan have done. Gillan played Amy pretty much the same as she has done since her very first episode and its been one of the reasons why Amy has been so popular.
The way that Amy and Rory were written out of the show was the only way that they could have left. They were never going to leave the Doctor and it wouldn’t have made sense to kill them off so putting them in a situation where the Doctor ‘cant’ meet Amy or Rory again but they get to spend time and die together was the most satisfactory conclusion which might be easily compared to Rose’s exit. The scene where they leave is very unexpected and superbly dramatic. Rory disappearance by the angel was unexpected but Amy’s was different because it was nice how River was pretty much telling Amy to go but the Doctor was trying to talk her out of it which was never going to work.

The Angels of Manhattan was a perfect way to end this part of the series. I would happily argue that this was the best story of the series because it was creepy, action packed and managed to write two very popular characters in a way that did them justice and it was at the end of the episode that it would be interesting to see how Oswin (Jenna Louise Coleman) would compare long term against Amy. Roll on Christmas!!