The Husbands of River Song
I suppose a temporal
adventurer must take her ‘Happily Ever Afters’ where and perhaps more
relevantly, when she can; what’s more, if you’re going to attempt a
relationship with another time traveler then it’s probably best to keep your stories
straight and your diary updated. Because,
as we know, ‘we’re all stories in the end’ and if your parents were also time travelers
and you’re a sort of Hybrid possibly
with a Time-Head conceived in a TARDIS and born on an asteroid called Demon’s
Run then it falls to you to make it a good one.
Yes The Husbands of River Song was a little
continuity heavy but was all
the better for it (despite the fact my favourite argument is that Doctor Who is a delightful continuing serial precisely because it has no continuity). Having said that, it took a subsequent, post-Christmas viewing
free from the hazy effects of alcohol and mince pies to really appreciate what
it was doing. That is, to present us with the lovely Christmas present of a
dénouement for the bitter sweet romance that has been the Doctor and River
(Otherwise known as The Time Traveler's Wife which makes this story’s title even more meta-ironic).
I think we can safely
ignore the first 40 or so minutes which consisted of a moderately enjoyable
screwball comedy space romp with multi-headed androids and stunt-cast comedians.
Although the meta-symbolism of River marrying a series of replacement heads
alongside her unfolding picture wallet of previous Doctor’s head shots (In
handy chronological order) probably warrants a closer reading at some point.
So, although it’s not
strictly the case that their time lines have been travelling in opposite
directions the Doctor and River’s parallel narratives have often been about
beginnings and endings. Way back in 2008's Silence in the Library, River Song’s
last meeting with the Doctor and his first meeting with her (hold on to
something secure, any passing monolith will do, this is going to get
complicated) she greets the tenth Doctor with a ‘Hello Sweetie’, mentions having dated an android and then checking
her diary ascertains that it's early days for the Doctor because he ‘looks so young’ and that he hasn’t yet experienced the Crash of
the Byzantium or the Picnic at Asgard all of which are referenced again in The Husbands of River Song. In Forest of the Dead, the second part of
the story, River’s final speech is this -
‘Funny thing is, this means you've always known how I was going to die. All the time we've been together, you knew I was coming here. The last time I saw you, the real you, the future you, I mean, you turned up on my doorstep, with a new haircut and a suit. You took me to Darillium to see the Singing Towers. What a night that was. The Towers sang, and you cried’.
All of which we see come to pass in
this episode where the Doctor’s final speech to River is -
‘Nobody really understands where the music comes from. It's
probably something to do with the precise positions, the distance between both
towers. Even the locals aren't sure. All anyone will ever tell you is that when
the wind stands fair and the night is perfect, when you least expect it but
always when you need it the most there is a song’.
Echoing River’s final voice over in
the coda of Forest
of the Dead
‘Now and then, every once in a very long while, every day in a million days, when the wind stands fair, and the Doctor comes to call…Everybody lives'
‘Now and then, every once in a very long while, every day in a million days, when the wind stands fair, and the Doctor comes to call…Everybody lives'
The secret of this tale though, to be discovered like a sixpence in a plum pudding or a diamond in a brain, was hidden in plain sight and found at the end. Indeed at the risk of invoking that most irritating of River’s catch-phrases “Spoilers!” we need to look beyond the end of the narrative and examine the final caption.
Of course it’s there
to cement the concept of River and the Doctor’s love story being like a fairy
tale and naturally invokes its companion caption ‘Once upon a Time’ a favourite
trope of show runner Steven Moffat. But isn’t every Doctor Who story about ‘once
upon a time’ or at least ‘time’? Once again we get the concept of a discrete pocket
of time like the two billion years inside the Confession Dial in Heaven Sent, the space between
heartbeats of Clara’s post death adventures and the fateful immortality of Maisie
William’s Ashildr. This time it’s the 24 year long night at the Singing Towers
of Darillium where the Doctor and River get to share their happiness.
Actually the idea of ‘Ever
After’ is interesting in itself. Suggesting a time that comes after time, the contradiction
of a continuation of the story after the narrative has ended.
So…
And They Both Lived Happily Ever After
This then wipes in a
disintegration of snow or stardust to leave -
And They Both Lived Happily…………
Then finally the only
word left is -
…………………….. Happily……………
As must we all eventually, even if we live to see the End of Time, which, incidentally, the Doctor has visited on numerous occasions, most recently in this very series finale. It must be getting a bit crowded there, if only with versions of himself.
So if there was a moral to this sweet Xmas truffle of an episode with a bitter sweet coating it might just be that everybody's story has its beginning and its ending but not necessarily in that order and time-travelling adventurer or not, in matters of the heart it’s very easy to lose your head.
RIVER: No, Doctor, you're wrong. Happy ever after doesn't mean forever. It just means time. A little time.
.
