Let's Kill Hitler

Welcome. You will feel a tingling sensation; then death.

An advantage to being somewhat late to the party of Doctor Who fandom is to have avoided some of the frustrations of the past. Let's Kill Hitler brought Series Six back from a summer hiatus and for many folks it was a bit of a disappointment. The episode is an out and out, slightly bawdy comedy that tries to get a little poignancy in the end. If it had aired immediately after A Good Man Goes to War, it might have been received a bit better as it's lighter tone does provide a bit of a lift after the darker ending in the prior story.

Plot Summary

The Doctor arrives at a crop circle created by Amy and Rory to summon him. They are hoping to get an update on the Doctor's quest for Melody when their old friend Mels arrives in a stolen car. Mels had grown up as Amy's best friend and was privy to all the tales about the Doctor. She then pulls a gun on the Doctor and demands a getaway in the TARDIS.

Mels fires the gun, whilst taking off causing the TARDIS to spin out of control. They crash land into Adolf Hitler's office in 1938, inadvertently saving his life from the Teselecta, a justice machine run by a miniaturized crew. The Teselecta had been commissioned to kill Hitler shortly before his death in 1945 but had gotten the year wrong. Emerging from the TARDIS, the Doctor, Amy, Rory and Mels realize where they are when Hitler thanks them for saving his life.

Seeing the Teselecta, still disguised as a German officer, rise, Hitler pulls a gun and shoot at it. The Doctor disarms him and has Rory lock him in the closet. The Teselecta is undamaged but pretends to faint to go into observation mode. Mels on the other hand is hit. Knowing that she is dying, she reveals that she is actually Melody Pond, having escaped and regenerated in 1970. She then regenerates into River Song, although she is unaware of that name yet. Her regeneration confirms her identity to the Teselecta crew who shift priorities to capture and kill River for the murder of the Doctor.

River's conditioning by the Silence kicks in and she makes several attempts to shoot the Doctor before kissing him with a poisoned lipstick. Realizing the problem, he sends Rory and Amy after her while he crawls into the TARDIS. River steals a motorcycle and several guns and heads into downtown Berlin to grab some new clothing. Amy and Rory follow her as does the Teselecta. They catch up to River in a restaurant where she has stolen the cloths of all the patrons and is now trying them on. The Teselecta transforms into Amy and then miniaturizes Amy and Rory, placing them inside the machine.

In the TARDIS, the Doctor activates the visual interface in the form of Amelia Pond. He gains enough pain relief to be able to transport the TARDIS to River's location. Upon arriving, he finds the Teselecta having frozen River and preparing to execute her. He tries to stop them but the poison saps his strength. He urges Amy to stop them as they begin to kill River though maximum application of pain.

Amy uses the sonic screwdriver, which the Doctor had given her before chasing River to begin with, to deactivate the safety devices for the crew. The Teselecta's antibody probes then move to attack the crew, forcing the captain to order the immediate beam out of the crew to the mother ship in orbit. However, this leaves Amy and Rory at the antibodies mercy.

Amy calls out for the Doctor's help but he is too weak to do anything. He begs River to help them and moved by his compassion to keep helping others as he dies, she takes the TARDIS and the TARDIS walks her through how to fly it. She materializes the TARDIS around Amy and Rory in the Teselecta and then back outside.

As the Doctor's life ebbs away, he calls for River and asks her to deliver a message to River Song. She is moved by his words and asks Amy who River is. Amy orders the Teselecta to show River Song and River sees her own face mirrored by the machine. Realizing what she means to the Doctor and vice versa, River uses her remaining regenerations to heal the Doctor from the poison.

The Doctor delivers a weakened River to a hospital in the future, leaving her an empty diary. He, Amy and Rory then leave knowing that it is too dangerous to have her come with them as they know too much about her future. They set off for new adventures while the Doctor buries the fact that he accessed the Teselecta database to learn of his own death at Lake Silencio. River meanwhile, recovers and enrolls in a university program to become an archeologist.

Analysis

In addition to the overall tone of the story, I think a lot of people's animosity towards this story stemmed from the retconing of Mel as a friend so significant that Melody was named after her and yet had never been seen or mentioned before. The retconing is a bit ham handed and given the way Steven Moffat had fairly deftly included references to future events in past stories, it seemed even more hackneyed.

There is also the small matter of discontinuity in that Melody is last shown regenerating in 1970 New York, yet is shown growing up in Leadworth in the mid-90's, nearly unaged. This is rather sloppy writing and requires the use of individual head cannon (such as an older River transporting her younger self across time and space using the vortex manipulator) to solve such a major plot hole.

But, aside from that, it's not a bad episode. It's funny in it's casual undercutting of Adolf Hitler and reducing him to an ineffective clown that is dispensed with in the first ten minutes. There is also nice bit-play between the Doctor and the psychotic River as she tries to kill him.

I also enjoyed the Teselecta and the concept of dispensing vengeance just before the natural end of a person. The somewhat sloppy controls of the Teselecta and the problems the crew seem to have with piloting the machine give an extra semblance of realism to it.

All that being said, the episode also pours on the treacle at the end. It's a little hard to believe that the somewhat psychotic River would be moved enough by the Doctor's words and attempts at action to use regeneration energy to save him. It's moving, but it clashes somewhat with the tone established by the beginning of the episode of a comedy romp. It doesn't bother me in the same way that The Romans' attempt to do it did, but I could see how this could irritate a person.

On the whole, I have no major objections to this story. Is it great? No. Is it a colossal raging disappointment? Also no. It's a good little story, it just doesn't have the depth that people wanted for what should have been such a large payoff. But if you can get past that, it works well as an overall story and I have no problem revisiting it now and again.

Overall personal score: 3.5 out of 5