The Wedding of River Song (TV story)

The Wedding of River Song
Doctor:	[[doctor::Eleventh Doctor]]
Companion(s):	Amy, Rory, River
Main enemy:	Silents, Kovarian
Main setting:	Alternate timeline on 2011 Earth
Key crew
Writer:	Steven Moffat
Director:	Jeremy Webb
Producer:	Marcus Wilson
Release details
Story number:	13
Premiere broadcast:	1 October 2011
Premiere network:	BBC One
Format:	1×45 minute episode
Production code:	2.13
Confidential:	[[confidential::When Time Froze|When Time Froze]]
Doctor Who television stories
← Previous	Closing Time
Next →	The Doctor, the Widow and the Wardrobe
Production order
← Previous	Let's Kill Hitler
Next →	The Doctor, the Widow and the Wardrobe

The Wedding of River Song was the thirteenth and final episode of the sixth series of Doctor Who. It explained to viewers how the Doctor survived his supposed death.

Synopsis

The Doctor makes his final journey to the shores of Lake Silencio in Utah, knowing only one thing can keep the universe safe: his death. But has he reckoned without the love of a good woman?

Plot

The War of the Roses enters its second year as London picnickers are warned not to feed the Pterodactyls and Charles Dickens is interviewed about his new Christmas ghost special. Holy Roman Emperor Winston Churchill returns to Buckingham Palace on his mammoth from a conference in Gaul with Cleopatra to wonder why it is always 5:02 PM on 22 April 2011. His Silurian physician, Malokeh, tells him it is always so but Churchill has his doubts. He orders his soothsayer dragged from the Tower of London. It is the Eleventh Doctor, who tells him why: "A woman."

In a flashback, the Doctor wants to know why he must die. Taking the data on the Silence from a dying Dalek, he finds Father Gideon Vandaleur, actually the Teselecta, who points him at Gantok, the Silence's agent. They play a game of live chess. To avoid checkmate or death, Gantok takes him to Dorium Maldovar's head in the Seventh Transept.

Dorium insists that if the Doctor lives, on the fields of Trenzalore, at the fall of the Eleventh, when no creature can speak falsely or fail to answer, a question that must never be answered will be asked: the first question, hidden in plain sight. He asks if his visitor wants to know the question. The Doctor nervously agrees.

Taking Dorium's head with him, the Doctor determines to continue his farewell tour. However, when he learns his old friend the Brigadier is dead, his bravado crumbles. His time has come. He gives the Teselecta invitations to deliver. He goes to Lake Silencio with Amy Pond, Rory Williams and River Song, where they drink a bottle of wine Napoleon threw at him. An impossible astronaut rises from the lake and he goes to meet it. It is River Song, trapped in the suit by Madame Kovarian and the Silence. She has no control over the suit as it prepares to kill the Doctor. He forgives her unconditionally, shutting his eyes as her arm rises to deliver the three deadly blows.

There are five bursts that make him flinch. The Doctor opens his eyes and demands to know what she has done. River smiles. She has discharged her weapons systems harmlessly and the world shatters.

The Doctor and Churchill discuss these events. They see they are holding weapons. Tally marks have appeared on the Doctor's arms. They look up. The ceiling is infested with dozens of Silents. Before they can attack, a grenade rolls into the hall and a company of soldiers under an eyepatched Amy Pond invade. She shoots the Doctor.

He wakes from the stungun in Amy's office on a train bound for Area 52 inside the Great Pyramid of Giza. Amy grew up with a Crack in her wall. She can remember both timelines and has drawn pictures of the other timeline, but cannot recall Rory is Captain Williams, a soldier in her force.

In Area 52, the Doctor and Amy walk past more than a hundred captured Silents to the King's Chamber, where River Song awaits them. Madame Kovarian is a prisoner, tied to a chair. They have used her eyepatch to create Eye Drives to let them remember the Silents when not looking at them.

The Doctor goes to take River's hand, but she knows they are the poles of an explosion waiting to destroy this timeline. She has him handcuffed and tries to convince him to live. The Silents escape; it is their trap the Doctor's friends have fallen into. As the soldiers retreat to the King's Chamber, their eye drives electrify and kill them. Kovarian mocks them, until her eye drive sparks too. Rory stays to hold off the Silents, while River, Amy and the Doctor go to the apex of the Pyramid to see what River has built. The door flies open; Rory falls to his knees as the Silents enter and begin to electrocute him, but Amy, at last remembering who he is, returns to kill them with a machine gun. She cold-bloodedly murders a terrified Kovarian.

Atop the Great Pyramid, River has built a beacon, calling the universe across all of time: The Doctor is dying. Please help. Every reply is "Yes, of course". The Doctor, however, insists that no one can help him. He must die to prevent all of time disintegrating.

River despairs and swears to suffer more than any living thing in the universe for him. The Doctor tells Amy to uncuff him. He uses his bow tie to marry River in a handfasting. He whispers a secret into his bride's ear and tells her she must never tell anyone what he has just told her: his name. As she looks at him in wonder, the Doctor asks for her help.

They kiss and time moves again. River shoots the Doctor thrice, preventing his regeneration. He dies. The distorted timeline vanishes.

Some time later, River, fresh from the crash of the Byzantium, arrives at her mother's home to split a bottle of wine. Amy wonders what the events in the aborted, frozen time line say about her, particularly her murder of Kovarian. She needs to talk with the Doctor, but he is dead. River disagrees. Amy notes that her daughter is still having adventures with him in the centuries before his death, but River tells her a secret which she probably shouldn't. As Rory joins his wife and daughter, they dance for joy until Amy realises to her horror she is the Doctor's mother-in-law.

A monk carries Dorium's head back to the Seventh Transept. Dorium recognises the Doctor and asks how he escaped. The Doctor explains that River actually shot the Teselecta, with him safe inside, waving happily at her. Now the entire universe believes him dead and it's time to step back into the shadows. He leaves.

Dorium calls after him the question the Doctor has been running from his entire life: "Doctor who?"

Cast

• The Doctor – Matt Smith
• Amy Pond – Karen Gillan
• Rory Williams – Arthur Darvill
• River Song – Alex Kingston
• Madame Kovarian – Frances Barber
• Emperor Winston Churchill - Ian McNeice
• Malohkeh- Richard Hope
• Charles Dickens - Simon Callow
• Dr Kent - Emma Campbell-Jones
• Gideon Vandaleur - Niall Greig Fulton
• Gantok - Mark Gatiss (Credited as 'Rondo Haxton')
• Herself - Sian Williams
• Himself - Bill Turnbull
• News Anchor - Meredith Vieira
• Dorium Maldovar -Simon Fisher Becker
• The Silence - Marnix Van Den Broeke
• Carter - Richard Dillane
• Nurse - Katherine Burford
• Barman - Sean Buckley
• Canton Delaware - William Morgan Sheppard (footage from The Impossible Astronaut)
• Voice of the Dalek- Nicholas Briggs

Crew

Executive Producers   Steven Moffat, Piers Wenger and Beth Willis

General production staff Production Executive - Julie Scott Line Producer - Diana Barton Associate Producer - Denise Paul Production Manager - Phillipa Cole Location Manager - Iwan Roberts Location Assistant - Geraint Williams Unit Manager - Rhys Griffiths Production Co-ordinator - Claire Hildred Assistant Production Co-ordinator - Helen Blyth Production Assistant - Charlie Coombes Production Secretary - Scott Handcock Production Accountant - Dyfed Thomas A/Production Accountant - Ceredig Parry Script department Script Editor - Caroline Henry Script Executive - Lindsey Alford Camera and lighting department 1st Assistant Director - Nick Brown 2nd Assistant Director - James DeHaviland 3rd Assistant Director - Heddi-Joy Taylor-Welch Assistant Directors - Michael Curtis, Janine H Jones Script Supervisor - Steve Walker Camera Operator - Mark Smeaton Focus Pullers - Steve Rees, Jonathan Vidgen Grip - Dai Hopkins Assistant Grip - Owen Charnley Camera Assistants - Simon Ridge, Svetlana Miko, Matthew Lepper Gaffers - Mark Hutchings, Stephen Slocombe Best Boy - Pete Chester Electricians - Ben Griffiths, Bob Milton, Alan Tippets	Art department Supervising Art Director - Stephen Nicholas Assistant Art Director - Jackson Pope Production Buyer - Ben Morris Petty Cash Buyer - Kate Wilson Set Decorator - Julian Luxton Props Buyer - Adrian Anscombe Concept Artist - Richard Shaun Williams Design Assistant - Dan Martin Graphic Artist - Christina Tom Standby Props - Phil Shellard, Helen Atherton Standby Carpenter - Will Pope Standby Art Director - Ciaran Thompson Standby Rigger - Bryan Griffiths Store Person - Jayne Davies Props Master - Paul Aitken Props Chargehand - Rhys Jones Dressing Props - Tom Belton, Kristian Wilsher Props Driver - Medard Mankos Props Makers - Penny Howarth, Nicholas Robatto, Alan Hardy Construction Manager - Matthew Hywel-Davies Construction Chargehand - Scott Fisher Practical Electrician - Albert James Graphics - BBC Wales Graphics Draughtsman - Julia Jones Costume department Costume Supervisor - Vicky Salway Assistant Costume Designer - Samantha Keeble Costume Assistants - Jason Gill, Yasemin Kascioglu, Frances Morris	Make-up and prosthetics Make-up Supervisor - Pam Mullins Make-up Artists - Vivienne Simpson, Allison Sing Prosthetics - Millennium FX Movement Stunt Co-ordinator - Crispin Layfield Stunt Performers - Nic Goodey, Andrew Merchant Casting Casting Associate - Alice Purser General post-production staff Post-production Supervisors - Nerys Davies, Ceres Doyle Post-production Co-ordinator - Marie Brown On-line Conform - Mark Bright On-line Editor - Jeremy Lott Special and visual effects Visual FX Producer - Beewan Athwal Colourist - Mick Vincent Sound Sound Recordist - Bryn Thomas Dubbing Mixer - Tim Ricketts Sound Maintenance Engineers - Jeff Welch, Dafydd Parry Dialogue Editor - Darran Clement ADR Editor - Matthew Cox Sound Effects Editor - Paul Jefferies Foley Editor - Jamie Talbutt

Not every person who worked on this adventure was credited. The absence of a credit for a position doesn't necessarily mean the job wasn't required. The information above is based solely on observations of the actual end credits of the episodes as broadcast, and does not relay information from IMDB or other sources.

References

• Rose Tyler and Jack Harkness are mentioned.
• Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart passed away several months before the Doctor phones the institution where he was staying; he apparently talked about the Doctor all the time and insisted on having a spare glass ready in case he should show up.
• Charles Dickens appears in the alternate timeline, being interviewed on television.
• Amy has an office on a train. The Doctor has never had an office and envies both the office and the train.
• A Timey-wimey distress beacon is built.
• The Doctor wears the Stetson given to him by Craig Owens throughout his investigation, up to and including the time he is hidden aboard the Tesselecta. The hat shot off his head by River in DW: The Impossible Astronaut was a copy made by the Tesselecta.

Story notes

• Following his death in February, this episode pays tribute to Nicholas Courtney, with the Doctor discovering that his character, Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart, died peacefully in his sleep, fulfilling the prophecy made by the Seventh Doctor in the 1989 episode Battlefield.
• A prequel to this episode was released online.
• This is the first time an episode of Doctor Who has aired on the same night as an episode of fellow BBC Saturday night drama, Merlin. The first episode of Merlin Series 4, The Darkest Hour, was broadcast right after The Wedding of River Song.
• Meredith Vieira, co-host of the American morning news/chat programme Today, filmed her cameo during a visit to the Upper Boat Studios as part of a profile of Doctor Who produced for Today. That feature, which aired on 9 May 2011, contained several minor spoilers for this episode, including revealing the cameo appearance by Richard Hope as Malohkeh and the return of Ian McNeice as Winston Churchill. Appearances by several Cybermen served as a "false flag" spoiler suggesting they might also appear in the episode. They did not.
• This is the first series finale of the revived series not to be a multi-part episode. In fact, it is the first series finale ever to only be one episode (with the iffy exception of DW: The Five Doctors).

Ratings

UK Overnight: 6.1 Million

Final: 7.67 million

Rumours

• The Doctor will get married. This was proven true.
• Part of this episode will be set in Egypt. This was proven true.

Filming locations

• Utah, USA (flashback footage from DW: The Impossible Astronaut)

Production errors

If you'd like to talk about narrative problems with this story — like plot holes and things that seem to contradict other stories — please go to this episode's discontinuity discussion.

• The Doctor's reflection in River's helmet shield is not reversed, as it should be.
• When Gantok falls into the pit of skulls his hat falls off, yet it's back on right before he's devoured completely.
• When River is about to shoot the Doctor, she begins raising her hand. In the next wide shot, it is risen fully and ready to fire. However, in the next close-up, she is still raising her hand.
• Time was frozen at 05:02:57, and progressed to around 05:03:06 the first time the Doctor and River touch, but when the Doctor and River kiss later, a clock is shown on screen, with time resuming from 05:02:00.
• When Amy and her team arrive to save the Doctor in the senate hall, the Doctor throws Winston Churchill to the floor and take a few steps forward. A second later he is shown on the floor right next to Winston.
• When the Doctor flashes back to the picnic on the lakeside, he fills River's wine glass about a quarter full, but when they all say "Salut" the camera changes angles and the glass looks full; when the camera returns to its starting position, it is back to a quarter.
• In the Impossible Astronaut, the Doctor speaks to the astronaut for a few seconds, a much shorter time than this episode.

Continuity

• In DW: The Impossible Astronaut the different versions of the Doctor give their ages as 909, and 1103. The Doctor has apparenmtly lived for almost two hundred years between these two episodes. Writer Gareth Roberts indicated in an interview that this is indeed two hundred years after The God Complex for the Doctor and that he spent these years "waving" at Amy and Rory through history books.
• Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart is said to have died. This is consistent with the Seventh Doctor's assertion in DW: Battlefield that the Brigadier would die in bed. As no indication is given as to when the Brigadier died, it does not contradict the post-2010 continuity established for the character in the Virgin New Adventures and the Brigadier's death in the 2050s established in PDA: The King of Terror.
• Charles Dickens appears. (DW: The Unquiet Dead)
• Winston Churchill returns, this time as the Holy Roman Emperor. (DW: Victory of the Daleks, The Pandorica Opens)
• The Silurian scientist Malokeh returns. (DW: The Hungry Earth / Cold Blood)
• Dorium Maldovar returns as a head. He was beheaded by the Headless Monks. (DW: A Good Man Goes to War)
• The Doctor mentions his former companions Rose Tyler and Jack Harkness.
• Amy's drawings include the Krafayis, the Weeping Angels, the Saturnyns, the Silurians, the Daleks, the Minotaur, the Cybermen and the Smilers, self-portraits of herself from DW: The Curse of the Black Spot and of her emerging from the Pandorica (DW: The Big Bang).
• The Teselecta returns, as does its captain. (DW: Let's Kill Hitler)
• The Doctor again sports a beard. (DW: Day of the Moon)
• When talking to Amy after the timeline has been restored, River mentions climbing out of the Byzantium. She is still in her combat fatigues and mentions that she has just seen Amy when she had no idea who she is. (DW: The Time of Angels / Flesh and Stone)
• Amy is partially protected from some kinds of temporal changes due to her long-term exposure to The Cracks. (DW: The Eleventh Hour, The Big Bang)
• When River says to the Doctor that time can be rewritten, he responds with "Don't you dare." This echoes what River says to the Doctor in a similar situation (DW: Forest of the Dead) and the First Doctor trying to stop Barbara Wright interfering in Aztec history (DW: The Aztecs).
• River mentions "Rule #1: the Doctor lies." (DW: The Big Bang, Let's Kill Hitler)
• A Silent calls Rory "the man who dies and dies again", referring to his deaths in DW: Amy's Choice, Cold Blood, The Curse of the Black Spot and The Doctor's Wife.
• When the Doctor meets River in Area 52, he greets her by saying "Honey, I'm home." River replies, "And what sort of time do you call this?" They had the same exchange in DW: The Big Bang.
• The Doctor mentions Elizabeth I waiting for him in a glade to elope with her. (DW: The Shakespeare Code, , DW: The End of Time, DW: The Beast Below)
• The Doctor says "Geronimo!" again. (DW: The End of Time, The Eleventh Hour, The Beast Below, The Big Bang)
• The Doctor asks River, "Why do you always have handcuffs?" (DW: Forest of the Dead, DW: Flesh and Stone)
• Dorium tells the Doctor what the "question that must never be answered" is. (DW: Let's Kill Hitler)
• The notion of "Doctor who?" being a dark secret rather than simply a question was mentioned before. (DW: The Girl in the Fireplace)
• The barman on Calisto B is a red humanoid. Others have appeared in DW: New Earth, Gridlock, The End of Time, The Pandorica Opens and IDW: Agent Provocateur.
• While held captive, Madame Kovarian expresses annoyance at River and the Doctor's flirting, as Amy did previously. (DW: Day of the Moon
• River mentions having to pretend not to recognise a space suit in 1969. (DW: The Impossible Astronaut)
• A heavily damaged Progenitor Dalek appears.
• The Doctor makes marks on his arm when he sees the Silence. (DW: Day of the Moon)
• River says she is a child of the TARDIS. (DW: Let's Kill Hitler)
• The Doctor reads a knitting magazine. (DW: The Impossible Astronaut)
• River shoots the Doctor shortly after marrying him. Her father, Rory, shot Amy while they were engaged. (DW: The Pandorica Opens)
• The Doctor gives River important information by whispering into her ear. (DW: Forest of the Dead, Let's Kill Hitler)

Timeline

For the Doctor

• This story occurs after DW: Closing Time
• This story takes place during DW: The Impossible Astronaut
• This story occurs before WC: Prequel (The Doctor, the Widow and the Wardrobe)

For River

• This story occurs after DW: Closing Time
• This story takes place during DW: The Impossible Astronaut
• This story occurs before DW: A Good Man Goes to War

For River in the final scene

• This story occurs after DW: Flesh and Stone
• This story occurs before DW: Last Night (Second Future River)

For Amy and Rory

• This story occurs after DW: The God Complex
• This story takes place during DW: The Impossible Astronaut
• This story occurs before DW: The Doctor, the Widow and the Wardrobe

Home video releases

This episode was released on DVD shortly after the airing of the episode.

External links