Doctor Who/Recap/S32/E11 The God Complex: Difference between revisions

Unfortunately alone, Amy opens up a door that calls to her. The Doctor happens to open another door (to Room 11) that has called to him, and glumly recognizes what is waiting for him. We never get to see it, and he puts a "do not disturb" sign on the door.

 

 

When the Doctor finds the security booth, he begins scouring the screens for signs of the Minotaur, but sees only Rita finding her door again and walking in. It has her father in it, mocking her for average grades. The Doctor calls Rita's room on the phone, begging her to let him find her and save her. She refuses, telling him that the hotel's shifting rooms would keep them miles apart. As the Minotaur approaches, the Doctor's pleas for Rita to save herself go unanswered. Rita hangs up and begs the Doctor to look away while she dies, in order to give her some final dignity. The Doctor sonics the screen off as Rita bravely faces her death.

The Doctor, Amy, Rory, and Gibbus return to the hotel's bar. The Doctor comes to realize that the beast is not feeding off of fear at all. It's feeding off the strong faith of each of its victims. Joe, the gambler, was savvy to luck; Howie was a conspiracy theorist that stuck to his convictions, and Rita was a devoted Muslim. He tries to rationalize why the others haven't been affected: Gibbus, being from the most cowardly race in the universe, naturally worshipped his conquerors, but would be too timid to hold any convictions of his own. Rory just has no faith to speak of. The Doctor suffers of bit of a [[Heroic BSOD]] when he realises that he's been ''encouraging'' the gang to focus on their faith, and that he's now caused their deaths. He's interrupted, though, when he hears that Amy is now uttering "praise him". Her faith in the Doctor is what brought them to the hotel in the first place and what is being challenged right now.

 

 

As they watch, the hotel starts to dissolve around them, revealing it to be a digital simulation within a large ship. The Doctor talks to the beast, a relative of the Nimon, in its own language. The beast tells him that for such an ancient creature, who caused so much destruction and has the blood of a billion galaxies on his conscience, death would be a mercy. The Doctor agrees. The beast curtly tells him that it wasn't talking about itself; it meant the Doctor.

Some time later, the TARDIS arrives in England, outside a townhouse. The Doctor presents the house, and a new car, to Amy and Rory as a gift, but Amy suspects that something is up. As Rory checks out the house, the Doctor tells Amy that they must stop travelling with him, as only death and destruction come to those that accompany them. The Doctor makes for a quick goodbye and disappears back into his TARDIS before Amy can protest.

 

* [[Alas, Poor Villain]]: The Minotaur feeds because it must, and wishes it didn't. The Doctor pities it as it dies and it pities the Doctor. [[Who Wants to Live Forever?|Because he won't die.]]

* [[Alpha Bitch]]: Howie's worst fear is a room party full of them.

* [[The Door Slams You]]: Happens in the episode. [[Butt Monkey|Not surprisingly, to Rory]].

* [[Double Meaning Title]]: The "God Complex" describes not only the Doctor's and Minotaur's need to be adored, but also the hotel itself: a prison to contain a deity.

* [[Emotion Eater]]: The obvious idea that the Minotaur feeds on fear is subverted. {{spoiler|It presents its victims' fear, causing them to use faith to strengthen themselves, at which point the Minotaur converts that to faith in itself, and drains it from the victim.}}

* [[Failsafe Failure]]: The whole reason anyone can escape in the first place is because the prison is broken. Instead of adjusting itself to match its victims, it's stuck in the form of the hotel. It also can't purge anyone that gets trapped, so their fears build up in the rooms, meaningless to the new victims.

* [[Genre Blindness]]: The Doctor still hasn't learned that offering companionship in the middle of an episode is basically signing the person's death warrant.

* [[Genre Savvy]]: This marks the first time in the new series the Doctor has {{spoiler|sent companions home}} without some kind of horrible accident happening.

** Amy and Rory: {{spoiler|He just left them with a new car and an apartment, still sane and whole.}} He must be catching on.

*** {{spoiler|Sane, but not unchanged. All the traumas they endured over the past two series will still be with them, from [[Doctor Who/Recap/S31/E13 The Big Bang|being stuck guarding the Pandorica for nearly 2000 years straight]] to [[Doctor Who/Recap/S32/E07 A Good Man Goes to War|being kidnapped and giving birth in captivity, only for their daughter to be stolen away]]. He's trying to let them lead a normal life on Earth while they still have the chance.}}

* [[Hell Hotel]]: It's actually a prison. One of the prisoners does actually believe it to be Hell, at first.

* [[Hello, Insert Name Here]]: Gibbis's species' national anthem is entitled "Glory to (Insert Name Here)."

** He also complains of being hit by a shoe when he spoke ill of the Doctor in front of her.

*** She had to bend down and unlace it first!

** The [[Ironic Nursery Rhyme]] is the same one used in [[Nineteen Eighty-Four]]. Also [[The Wicker Man]].

** A tiny one. The Doctor is trying to catch Howie's attention while he's being mind-controlled. He taps on the table four times.

* [[Sorting Algorithm of Mortality]]: Subverted with [[Dirty Coward]] Gibbis surviving.

* [[Soundtrack Dissonance]]: The cheesy muzak being piped into the hotel corridors.

* [[What the Hell, Hero?]]: Done to the Doctor by ''himself''.

* [[Why Don't You Just Shoot Him?]]: The crazy worshiper who won't shut up. They tape his mouth shut.

* [[Zero-Approval Gambit]]: {{spoiler|The Doctor does this in order to save Amy from the monster — he tells her he's not worth believing in, and that he's done more harm than good to her. He was a bit nicer about it than he was [[Doctor Who/Recap/S26/E03 The Curse of Fenric|to Ace.]]}}

 

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