The problem is that she's judging him for slightly the wrong thing. He should have said that he had no idea what was happening either from the get-go……

But this Doctor has the need to BE judged….he WANTS the slap in the face so he can be sure he's not turning into the Valeyard.

Again, we have the fundamental problem of hanging around with an ALIEN meddler: his perspective is so bizarre as to confuse, anger and terrify the people he slums with. Thus, we have the companion…whose job is to tell him vociferously when he's acting like a bit of a shit. Still though, I can't help but feel that…

Kuvira seems to be that very scary thing called a smart person who knows what she wants, knows how to get it and knows how to deal with the people who might be in her way. Five yuan says that she knows that the Avatar is taking an extended mental-ill-health break….

Well, at least Tennant doesn't sound like he's Emmett Tracy of International Rescue. That's something.

Well, at least Jeremy doesn't have to pretend he likes that jerk Rocker any longer. I hope he wins because he's as frustrated with these people living with them as I am watching them. Then again, the only reason I watch this show is the reason I sometimes watch TLC: I likes me having people I can loathe with a clear…

Something does occur to me that might have been lost in the whole Archie/Meathead dynamic the Doctor and Danny have. For all of his talk of who lights fires and who pulls people out of them, it's obvious that the Doctor was trying to put a particular fire out in such a manner than no one would know it existed…..only…

I half-way expected Krusty to be setting on the couch asking "What the Hell was THAT?!"

That highlights the fact that we're not actually dealing with a human being. He might look and sound like a Glaswegian stick insect but he's not built to realize that the short-lived people he's trying to protect can see things he can't.

And then we have it from the other side as we look at Danny's reaction to her wandering the cosmos with what he sees as Space Field Marshall Haig.

The good thing, the interesting thing about this episode is that we're finally getting a deconstruction of the Companion. We already have a fair idea of what it would really like to deal with a well-intentioned aristrocratic alien meddler; now we're asking the question "What sort of person would willingly travel with…

The interesting thing about Wes's need to man-crush on Rocker is that his dad thinks that the guy's a major-league ass.

Oh, yes. "How I betrayed my fanbase because schmalz and Hallmark rule the world." It reminds me of the equally horrid ending of the comic strip "For Better Or For Worse" wherein Elizabeth and Anthony settled for one another so that the Patterson family could marry a car dealership. The last episode should have been…

And again, we're left dealing with the fact that maybe the Doctor doesn't actually want Clara to trust him all that much. It bothers Twelve that people take insane risks in order to impress him far more than it did the others.

The interesting thing is that one of the people he really hates can also be redeemed. Trying to tell him this, however, actually would inspire a Malcolm Tucker-esque rant.

We not only get that he's at his core a frightened little boy who wants to explain away the shapes in the dark, we get a hint as to his real problem with soldiers: he was going to become front line infantry if he hadn't run away.

Well, given the whole 'terrible purpose' thing, probably yes.

Nine hundred years of having to be a legend amongst people he lived with really eroded his faith in the power of myth…thereby making him lose sight of the fact that his name is not only a killing word, it's a healing one.

The methodology was sound; the problem was that for it to work the way he'd intended, he'd have to find a mind not tainted by the fear, hatred or disgust the Daleks seem to bring out in pretty much everybody. As for Clara's summation, she's just summed up who he is at his core: a morally-compromised man trying to do…

I have a queasy feeling that Missy is short for "Mistress." Not, of course, as in paramour but as female MASTER.