The Time of Angels
In the episode, the Eleventh Doctor—a time travelling alien played by Matt Smith—and his companion Amy Pond (Karen Gillan) are summoned by River Song, a mysterious woman from the Doctor's future.
With the help of Father Octavian (Iain Glen) and his militarised clerics, the Doctor, Amy and River Song travel through a stone labyrinth to reach the ship.
She contacts Father Octavian and his militarised clerics to help capture it to protect a large population of human colonists elsewhere on the planet.
Amy finds that she cannot move, and the Doctor realises that the image of the Angel still exists in her eye and is making her believe this; he bites her wrist to prove she is still mobile, and they continue to flee.
[2] The two-part story was intended to show the worst possible instance that could occur with the Weeping Angels, which was the inability to see, as explored in the second part, "Flesh and Stone", when Amy must keep her eyes closed.
[4] Executive producer Piers Wenger thought that the Delirium Archive, the museum the Doctor and Amy visited at the beginning of the episode, needed to be explained, therefore Moffat named it "the final resting place of the Headless Monks" and sent it to him via text message.
[6] Moffat also brought back the character of River Song from his fourth series episodes "Silence in the Library" and "Forest of the Dead".
Moffat used this inspiration in his episode "The Girl in the Fireplace",[10] but Alex Kingston,[11] as well as reviewers[12] have compared River to The Time Traveler's Wife.
[15] He decided to have the interaction between the Doctor and River Song resemble that of an old married couple, bickering like "mum and dad arguing over directions in the car".
[16] In the script it was not written in that River would land on the Doctor when she flew into the TARDIS; it was an idea that Matt Smith came up with in rehearsal that proved difficult to film.
The scene was filmed on a greenscreen with Kingston hooked up on wires that pulled her up and backwards as a wind machine was blown to create the effect of the airlock.
[19] In the UK, preliminary overnight viewing figures showed that 6.8 million viewers watched the episode, which made it second for the night behind Britain's Got Talent.
[28] Graham Norton himself went on to parody the incident in his own show by placing a similar banner at the bottom of the screen and having a Dalek exterminate his own cartoon caricature.
[32] Gavin Fuller's review for The Daily Telegraph praised the suspense and "the revelation that all the statues were Angels" which he called "genuinely shocking".
He wrote that the "only real disappointment" was the "inference that the TARDIS doesn't really have to make its celebrated 'vworp, vworp' noise on landing", asking "How can you do that to us long-time fans, Steven Moffat – that sound is part of the warp and weft of the programme!".
He thought it started out with "arguably the most impressive opener to any Doctor Who yet" and also praised Amy for being "cheerfully free of the emotional baggage that mired her predecessors" so far.
[34] Matt Wales of IGN gave the episode a 10 out of 10 rating, calling it "huge, silly, scary, gorgeous, gripping and – most importantly – fun".
"[35] SFX magazine reviewer Dave Golder gave the episode five out of five stars, praising it for being "superbly paced, the changes in tone happening gradually and organically".
[39] Pearson Education published a novelisation of this episode and "Flesh and Stone" under the title The Time of Angels by Trevor Baxendale for school literacy programs in May 2011.
