Nightmare in Silver

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238 – "Nightmare in Silver"
Doctor Who episode
Official poster
Cast
Others
Production
Directed byStephen Woolfenden
Written byNeil Gaiman
Produced by
  • Denise Paul
  • Marcus Wilson (series producer)
Executive producer(s)
Music byMurray Gold
SeriesSeries 7
Running time45 minutes
First broadcast11 May 2013 (2013-05-11)
Chronology
← Preceded by
"The Crimson Horror" 		Followed by →
"The Name of the Doctor"
List of Doctor Who episodes (2005–present)

"Nightmare in Silver" is the twelfth and penultimate episode of the seventh series of the British science fiction television series Doctor Who and was first broadcast on BBC One on 11 May 2013. It was written by Neil Gaiman and directed by Stephen Woolfenden.

In the episode, the alien time traveller the Doctor (Matt Smith) and the nanny Clara Oswald (Jenna-Louise Coleman) bring Clara's charges Angie (Eve de Leon Allen) and Artie (Kassius Carey Johnson) to an extraterrestrial theme park, where an army of cyborgs called Cybermen reawaken centuries after their defeat in a war. The Cybermen discover the Doctor, and attempt to transform him into a "Cyber-Planner", which creates a split personality fighting for control of the Doctor's body with a game of chess.

The episode was the first to feature the Cybermen since the episode "Closing Time" in the previous series. It was watched by 6.64 million viewers in the United Kingdom and received generally positive reviews from critics. Though thoughts on the Cybermen's return was more mixed.

Plot[edit]

The Eleventh Doctor takes Clara, Angie and Artie to an extraterrestrial theme park. They find the park is closed down and occupied by a punishment platoon, Webley, the theme park's museum curator, and Porridge, a little person who runs the museum's star attraction – a Mechanical Turk-type chess apparatus with a deactivated Cyberman in place of the Turk. There are a number of these deactivated Cybermen around the park, as they were defeated a thousand years ago. The Doctor convinces the platoon that he is an ambassador working for their missing Emperor, and is allowed to stay. An army of Cybermen that were hiding under the park and slowly upgrading their parts wake up and kidnap Angie and Artie. The Doctor puts Clara in charge of the troops, warning her not to let them destroy the planet while he rescues the children.

The Doctor finds the kids, but he is partially upgraded into a Cyberman, sharing the Cyberman super-consciousness. This gives him a split personality as both the Doctor and the "Cyber-Planner", who names himself Mr Clever, share the same body and each control almost half of the brain. The Doctor and Mr Clever agree to play chess for the complete control of the body. Mr Clever is temporarily stopped by the Doctor placing a golden ticket on his face, explaining that the Cybermen's weakness to gold is still present in their current code; Mr Clever soon installs a patch to overcome this weakness.

Clara relocates the platoon to elsewhere in the park and they take stock of minimal arms: one large anti-Cyberman gun with a limited charge, five hand pulsers, and a planet-imploding bomb. The Doctor returns with Angie and Artie, and demands that Clara tie him up to let him finish his chess game, while the platoon hold off poorly against the Cybermen, who can quickly adapt and upgrade to overcome any obstacle. Mr Clever destroys the bomb trigger, leaving the group defenceless. The Doctor uses a hand pulser to remove Mr Clever from his mind. Angie reveals that Porridge is the Emperor — she recognised him from an imperial penny and a waxwork model. The Emperor activates the bomb verbally and signals for an imperial spaceship to teleport them away. At the Doctor's request, Porridge retrieves the Doctor's ship the TARDIS just before the planet implodes, destroying the Cyberman army.

Production[edit]

"Nightmare in Silver" was written by Neil Gaiman and directed by Stephen Woolfenden.[1] The episode had the working title of "The Last Cyberman".[2] Gaiman had previously written the series 6 episode "The Doctor's Wife", which was positively received. Lead writer and executive producer Steven Moffat contacted Gaiman about writing for the series and asked him to make the Cybermen "scary again". Gaiman announced his return to Doctor Who during his Hugo Award acceptance speech for "The Doctor's Wife", commenting that "only a fool or a madman would try again – so [he was] on his third draft now".[3]

Some location filming took place in early November 2012 at Castell Coch. The Castle was previously in "Journey's End" as a UNIT base and in "The Vampires of Venice" as a the Calvierri Castle.[4]

The episode stars Matt Smith and Jenna Coleman as the Eleventh Doctor and Clara Oswald respectively.[5] Warwick Davis, who potrayed Poridge, stated that it was a "thrill" to be in Doctor Who, especially in an episode with the Cybermen written by Gaiman.[6] Angie and Artie, the kids Clara babysits, were potrayed be Eve de Leon Allen and Kassius Johnson respectively.[7] de Leon Allen and Johnson previously appeared in "The Crimson Horror".[8]

Cyberman redesign[edit]

The redesigned Cybermen as they appear at the Doctor Who Experience.

On redesigning the Cybermen, Gaiman thought back to classic series serials The Moonbase (1967) and The Tomb of the Cybermen (1967) and decided to "take the 1960s Cybermen and [incorporate] everything that's happened since".[9] However, Gaiman said that he "got completely side-tracked by a mad, strange romp".[10] Moffat stated that the Cybermen were redesigned because they did so often in the classic series, and yet had been consistent in the new series.[11] The previous design of the Cybermen also appear in this episode, but are not the primary threats.[12]

Gaiman was motivated to provide a "rationalisation" for the Cybermen in current Doctor Who continuity. The classic series had depicted the Cybermen as alien cyborgs, while the revived series initially depicted them as human cyborgs from a parallel Earth;[a] Gaiman opined that his Cybermen stemmed from an encounter and amalgamation of these two types of Cybermen.[14]

Lost script[edit]

During filming at Castell Coch, a copy of the readthrough script was found in a taxi in Cardiff. It was marked as being De Leon Allen's copy and had the working title of "The Last Cyberman", which was subsequently changed. The script was found by Hannah Durham, who posted a picture of the script to Facebook with the caption: "found Dr Who script in the back of a taxi. Cheeky spoilers anyone?" It was then posted to Reddit by Dan Rowling with the caption: "Look what a Facebook friend found in a taxi in Cardiff on Monday".[15][2] Arrangements were then made by Hannah Durham and Dan Rowling to return the script to the BBC.[16][17]

Broadcast and reception[edit]

Broadcast[edit]

Professional ratings
Review scores
SourceRating
Den of Geek[18]
IGN7/10[19]
New York Magazine[20]
Radio Times[21]
SFX[22]
The A.V. ClubB+[23]

Overnight viewing figures estimate that the episode was watched by 4.7 million viewers,[24] rising to 6.64 million after calculating the final ratings, making it the ninth most-watched programme of the week on BBC One.[25]

Critical reception[edit]

The episode scored 84 on the Appreciation Index, indicating that the public enjoyed it.[26] Media critics gave generally positive reviews to the episode, and Matt Smith and Warwick Davis' performances were universally praised.[27][28][19] Though the return of the Cybermen was met with mixed opinions.[29][7]

Dan Martin from The Guardian stated that "The Cybermen are back – and scary for the first time since the 60s, thanks to a whimsical but effective script from Neil Gaiman."[29] Ross Ruediger of New York Magazine wrote that Gaiman "created an amazing yet believable world here — one that felt otherworldly and yet close to home. The designs of the amusement park captivate", and praised the cast, especially Davis' performance.[20]

Sarah Crompton at The Daily Telegraph gave the episode 4 stars out of 5. She felt that Gaiman succeeded in making the Cybermen scary again, though the episode "could have done with more variation in pace and tone". She also praised Smith and Davis' performances.[28] Simon Brew of Den of Geek called it "a very good episode, and it's worth having a second watch to pick up some of the lovely nods to Who past that have been fused in." He wrote that "You can't help but feel the influence of the Borg from Star Trek in here", and referred to their Borg-like adaptation to specific threats as something that is both "familiar" and which "works in making them feel less beatable".[18] IGN's Mark Snow gave a positive review, though he felt that the episode was somewhat underwhelming but still worked as the return of the Cybermen. He also praised Davis' performance.[19]

Neela Debnath at The Independent called it "another episode which failed to live up to the hype". She felt that while Gaiman's writing for the Doctor and his internal battle was good, other characters felt "superfluous and two-dimensional". Debnath but praised Smith's performance, saying that it partially redeemed the episode.[27] Patrick Mulkern of Radio Times was very critical of the episode rating it one of five stars, describing it as an "almighty Cyber flop". Mulkern compared it to the 1988 serial Silver Nemesis, which he labeled "execrable".[7]

Notes[edit]

  1. ^ The alternate universe origin was dropped following "Doomsday", afterwords Cybermen used their original origin.[13]

References[edit]

  1. ^ Tartaglione, Nancy (7 November 2012). "Neil Gaiman To Pen Upcoming 'Doctor Who' Episode That Marks Return Of The Cybermen". Deadline Hollywood. Retrieved 16 May 2024.
  2. ^ a b Reporter, Metro TV (18 November 2012). "Lost Doctor Who script returned after student finds it in back of cab". Metro. Retrieved 16 May 2024.
  3. ^ "More Details about Neil Gaiman's Brand New Doctor Who episode". io9. io9. 3 September 2012. Retrieved 13 May 2013.
  4. ^ Mulkern, Patrick (21 October 2013). "14 Doctor Who locations that were recycled for new episodes". Radio Times. Retrieved 16 May 2024.
  5. ^ Green, Aidan (15 July 2023). "Remember When Neil Gaiman Wrote for 'Doctor Who' and It Was Kinda Bad?". Collider. Retrieved 16 May 2024.
  6. ^ Golder (24 January 2013). "Warwick Davis On Doctor Who And Star Wars Sequels". SFX. Retrieved 1 March 2013 – via GamesRadar+.
  7. ^ a b c Mulkern, Patrick (21 October 2013). "Doctor Who: Nightmare in Silver ★". Radio Times. Retrieved 16 May 2024.
  8. ^ Mulkern, Patrick (21 October 2013). "Doctor Who: The Crimson Horror ★★★★★". Radio Times. Retrieved 16 May 2024.
  9. ^ Jeffery, Morgan (9 November 2012). "'Doctor Who' writer Neil Gaiman: 'I want to make the Cybermen scary again'". Digital Spy. Retrieved 1 March 2013.
  10. ^ "Neil Gaiman Interview: Part One". BBC. 8 May 2013. Retrieved 9 May 2013.
  11. ^ "Steven Moffat on the Finale, New Monsters and More!". BBC. 27 April 2013. Retrieved 27 April 2013.
  12. ^ "Next Time: Nightmare in Silver". Doctor Who TV. 4 May 2013. Retrieved 18 July 2013.
  13. ^ Hickman, Clayton (2011). The Brilliant Book 2012. BBC Books. p. 142. ISBN 978-1849902304.
  14. ^ Setchfield, Nick (7 May 2013). "EXCLUSIVE – Neil Gaiman Talks Doctor Who And Cybermen". SFX. Retrieved 12 May 2013 – via GamesRadar+.
  15. ^ Rowling, Dan (7 November 2012). "Look what a facebook friend found in a taxi in Cardiff on Monday". Reddit. Retrieved 25 March 2013.
  16. ^ Pahle, Rebecca (8 November 2012). "Script to Neil Gaiman's New Doctor Who Episode Gets Left in the Back of a Cab; Rescued by Good Samaritans". The Mary Sue. Retrieved 9 November 2012.
  17. ^ Rich Johnston (8 November 2012). "The New Neil Gaiman Doctor Who Script Found In The Back Of A Cab In Cardiff". Bleeding Cool. Retrieved 9 November 2012.
  18. ^ a b Brew, Simon (11 May 2013). "Doctor Who series 7: Nightmare In Silver review". Den of Geek. Retrieved 16 May 2024.
  19. ^ a b c Snow, Mark (11 May 2013). "Doctor Who: "Nightmare in Silver" Review - IGN". IGN. Retrieved 18 July 2013.
  20. ^ a b Ruediger, Ross (12 May 2013). "Doctor Who Recap: Upgrade Is Progress". Vulture.com.
  21. ^ Mulkern, Patrick (21 October 2013). "Doctor Who: Nightmare in Silver ★". Radio Times.
  22. ^ "Doctor Who: 712 "Nightmare in Silver" Review". SFX. 11 May 2013. Archived from the original on 20 July 2013.
  23. ^ Wilkins, Alasdair (11 May 2013). "Doctor Who: "Nightmare In Silver"". The A.V. Club.
  24. ^ Golder, Dave (12 May 2013). "Doctor Who "Nightmare In Silver" Overnight Ratings". SFX. Retrieved 19 May 2013 – via GamesRadar+.
  25. ^ "Top 30 Programmes". Broadcasters' Audience Research Board. Retrieved 26 May 2013.
  26. ^ "Nightmare in Silver AI: 84". Doctor Who News Page. 13 May 2013. Retrieved 27 May 2013.
  27. ^ a b Debnath, Neela (12 May 2013). "Doctor Who 'Nightmare in Silver' – Series 7, episode 12". The Independent. Archived from the original on 13 September 2015. Retrieved 18 July 2013.
  28. ^ a b Crompton, Sarah (11 May 2013), "Doctor Who: Nightmare in Silver, BBC One, review", The Daily Telegraph, retrieved 16 May 2024
  29. ^ a b Martin, Dan (11 May 2013). "Doctor Who: Nightmare in Silver – series 33, episode 12". The Guardian. Retrieved 16 May 2024.

External links[edit]

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