Doctor Who "The Rings of Akhaten": Memories and Melodies

It's been a while since I have enjoyed watching a Doctor Who episode this season and The Rings of Akhaten showed us the first real adventure of the Doctor and Clara. I mostly say this because of the months of hiatus we had to survive to get to this point. What I really liked though was the idea was exploration of another world that didn't involve having to save earth, but rather exploring another world and saving the planet from a memory eating old god. There was also a lot of singing, which makes me wonder if this counts as a Doctor Who musical episode? Anyways, the Doctor and Clara make quite the duo and it's a real enjoy watching them together.

So The Rings of Akhaten begins off with the Doctor beginning his research of Clara and watching her grow up to assure himself of her existence. You know, to make sure she just didn't appear out of nowhere. In present time, Clara is waiting for the Doctor to come, and when he does, she steps into the Tardis. The Doctor asks Clara where she wants to go, and she answers, "somewhere awesome". Thus landing on Akhaten and the Doctor takes her to explore the world. There the Doctor shows Clara all the different species of alien, while explaining it all. While exploring, Clara and the Doctor get separated when Clara notices a young girl running from something. Clara goes looking for the girl and finds her hiding. Clara finds out that the girl is running because she's scared she'd mess up and Clara talks the girl into not being scared anymore. The Doctor and Clara reunite and head to a ceremony that quickly goes wrong, and the Doctor takes action. The Doctor and his companion quickly head over to the temple in order to save Merry from the old god.

The Rings of Akhaten had once again reminded me of why I loved watching Doctor Who so much in the first place. When the Doctor travels to a new world, along with the companion, we get the joys of exploring the new world and the wonder it beholds. This is real credit to the writers themselves who create the world and everything within them. So when the last few episodes were set on earth with various things trying to destroy it, the subject begun to get a bit overused. So this new world of Akhaten was a real breath of fresh air. I am really liking the new companion as Clara has set herself up as a strong, loyal, and independent woman as the companion to the Doctor. She already has placed herself in the Doctor's good book by coming back and helping him. Now the villain of The Rings of Akhaten was really interesting as it was an old god who feed on the memories of people and required a sacrifice every 1000 years. In order to keep him from awakening, it was required that the queen and her priest sing a lullaby to send the god back into sleep. When the god did wake and grabbed Merry, the Doctor's rage (aka the Oncoming Storm) was awaken as he set in motion to save her life. There is a nice twist in this that the writers pull off that you don't suspect, but you love when it does happen. Not to mention the beautiful moments that follow.

Now what didn't I like about The Rings of Akhaten? Well there was a lot of singing which had me asking, "does this count as a musical?" Not that I don't like a musical once and a while, but the singing was just thrown in there. Also, not sure if there was a reference about religious beliefs in general there when the Doctor was explaining what the beliefs of the system was. Also about the ending of the episode, is it going to be a normal thing for the Doctor to pick up and drop off his companions? A few seasons ago they used to be with him all the time, and now the Doctor separates himself from them. Is it because he wants to separate himself from that world? Or is it because he wants to continue investigating Clara on his own?

Interesting episode of Doctor Who no? Clara and the Doctor are a really good little duo there, and its real fun watching them. Also who thought it was funny that Clara couldn't get into the Tardis? Well it made sense since she didn't have a key, and no one can get into the Tardis without a key. Best interaction of the night goes to the little banter Clara and the Doctor had when he locked them in with the old god ("Did you just lock us in?" "Yep." "With a soul-eating monster?" "Yep." "Is there actually a way to get out?" "What, before it eats our souls?" "Ideally, yeah." "Possibly. Probably. There usually seems to be.") See you all next week.

Did you enjoy a world that's not earth? What was your favorite moment of The Rings of Akhaten?