Doctor Who: Closing Time

Spoilers!

For all that “Closing Time” was a stand-alone, companion-less episode (“filler,” as I’ve seen it called online), I really liked it. The Cybermen plotline seemed rather secondary to me, but I think it showed a great deal about the Doctor. I juxtapose it against “Waters of Mars,” which was the stand-alone, companion-less episode before the Tenth Doctor’s regeneration, and the contrast between the two is stark. In his desperation, the Tenth Doctor turns into the Time Lord Victorious; the Eleventh Doctor, though facing what he views as his final death (not just regeneration) and fighting a desire to squeeze in as much as possible before he dies, seems to be quintessentially Doctor-y: talking a thousand miles a minute, conversing with children, saving the world, caring for his friends, continually getting distracted. He is aware that he will die, and that knowledge makes him feel very old at times, but he approaches death in a way different from he has in the past.