Meanwhile in the TARDIS (home video)

Meanwhile in the TARDIS
Doctor:	Eleventh Doctor
Companion(s):	Amy
Main setting:	The Doctor's TARDIS
Key crew
Writer:	Steven Moffat
Director:	Richard Senior
Producer:	Annabella Hurst-Brown
Release details
Release date:	8 November 2010
Format:	1x4 minute, mini episode

Meanwhile in the TARDIS were the titles of two minisodes produced exclusively for the Doctor Who The Complete Fifth Series releases for DVD and Blu-ray box sets. They were both written by showrunner Steven Moffat. They take place between two "gaps" in the episodes of the fifth series with the first episode immediately following from The Eleventh Hour and leading into The Beast Below and the second episode leads from the end of Flesh and Stone and immediately precedes The Vampires of Venice.

Plot

Part 1

Amy asks the Eleventh Doctor many questions without pausing: how does the TARDIS retain its air supply? Why did he label a time machine "police box"? Where are the other windows which are on the exterior of the TARDIS? What is a police box and is the Doctor a policeman? Has he seen his haircut? Shouldn't he change the bulb on top the TARDIS? She also thinks the box is made of wood and his bow tie is a cry for help.

The Doctor answers most of these questions. Amy asks again if he's an alien. The Doctor says that, from his perspective, she's the alien. Amy wonders if the Doctor is a space squid or a tiny slug zipped in a human suit, but the Doctor dismisses her theories, stating he's as human as he appears. Amy admits she's done with her questions, but the Doctor tells her she's just begun; he throws a switch on the TARDIS console, opens the door and show her outer space.

When Amy says it looks like special effects in a studio, the Doctor proves it's real by pushing her out of the TARDIS.

Part 2

At midnight, 26 June 2010, after almost being seduced by Amy, the Doctor forces her back into the TARDIS. She leans on the console with an expectant gaze directed at the Doctor, who ignores it and pulls the door release lever next to her to lock the TARDIS doors.

Amy asks if she did something wrong. She thinks she is getting "mixed messages" from the Doctor. She unlocks the doors. The Doctor re-locks them and asks Amy how she's getting mixed messages. Amy says he showed up in the middle of the night to take her for a ride in his time machine. Amy insists that it's an obvious signal, telling her to "Get your coat, love, the Doctor's in."

The Doctor hurriedly explains he didn't bring her with him because he found her attractive. He proudly insists that he's like Gandalf in space. Amy says he acts like a regular bloke, showing off for the girls and laughing at other guys, making fun of Rory's nose.

The Doctor tells Amy that he can't "see it" any more. He's made time and space his back yard for over nine hundred years, so everything about it is now just facts to him. But Amy can "see it", which lets the Doctor see it as well. That is his only reason. Amy wonders if there have been others before her.

The Doctor reluctantly admits that he's had "a few" companions, but Amy won't let go. She wonders how many were girls. The Doctor admits girls made up "a bit over half" of his companions. Amy tricks the Doctor into accessing the TARDIS's visual records. To his dismay, the TARDIS plays black and white visual records on the screen of many female companions -- leaving out the men and K9 -- from Barbara Wright to Donna Noble, in random order. Amy wonders about one of the Fourth Doctor's companions, Leela. She appears repeatedly in a leather bikini.

Embarrassed, the Doctor decides to collect Rory to have Amy focus on her life. Amy informs him Rory is having his bachelor party. With a smirk, the Doctor tells her, "Well, let's make it a great one" before starting up the TARDIS and flying to the early evening of 25 June 2010. (TV: The Vampires of Venice)

Cast

• The Doctor - Matt Smith
• Amy Pond - Karen Gillan

Crew

• Writer - Steven Moffat
• Producer - Annabella Hurst-Brown
• Director - Richard Senior

References

Individuals

• When Amy accesses the TARDIS's visual records of the inhabitants, the TARDIS plays black-and-white visual records on the round screen of many female companions, from Barbara Wright to Donna Noble.

TARDIS

• When asked why the TARDIS looks like a police box, the Doctor explains to Amy in detail how the chameleon circuit scans the surroundings upon materialisation, decides on the best disguise, but then disguises the craft as a 1963 police box anyway.

Story notes

• This story joins a handful of television stories that are entirely set within the Doctor's TARDIS, the first The Edge of Destruction was broadcast in 1964, however the entirely TARDIS-set TV stories have primarily been a post-2005 phenomena the format being used in short-form "minisodes" or other short format stories such as the Children in Need specials; Christmas in Need Special set after The Parting of the Ways and Time Crash. Alternatively these short format stories have been, like this story produced specially for the DVD/Blu-ray releases; Good Night and Bad Night.

Filming locations

to be added

Production errors

• The Doctor moves a lever on the console next to Amy into the up position. When Amy moves the lever down, the Doctor moves it back up again. When the camera cuts back to Amy, the level is still down.

Continuity

• These stories are set entirely in the TARDIS. (TV: The Edge of Destruction, Children in Need Special, Time Crash, Amy's Choice, Space/Time, Death is the Only Answer, Bad Night, Good Night, Good as Gold)
• At the end of this mini-episode, the Doctor pushes Amy out into (presumably) an air corridor in space. Amy is still floating outside the TARDIS, with the Doctor tethering her from floating away, in TV: The Beast Below.
• Amy continues her attempts to seduce the Doctor from the previous scene in her bedroom. (TV: Flesh and Stone)
• The TARDIS travels from Amy's bedroom, at midnight, 26 June 2010, (TV: Flesh and Stone) to a local pub on the prior evening. Sunlight is still flooding the pub when the Doctor fetches Rory in TV: The Vampires of Venice
• The Doctor's sentiments about having become blasé about travelling throughout space and time are echoed by Amy, a decade into her companionship, in Dinosaurs on a Spaceship. Likewise, she and Rory adopt the Doctor's fondness for seeing his less experienced, less jaded companions' view of his world, as shown when the three watch Brian Williams marvelling at the Earth from high above it while silently enjoying his afternoon tea in the same episode.
• When asked if the prior companions were old or young, the Doctor asserts that everyone is young when compared to him. Jack Harkness, however, was more than twice the Doctor's age in The Stolen Earth / Journey's End and their brief encounter in End of Time, having aged 1,982 years in Adam, on top of the 110 years he waited from before Fragments until the Doctor's return in End of Days/Utopia. The next day (Earth's perspective), Rory Williams would also be over two millennia old when his Auton timeline merged with his human timeline, leaving human Rory with both sets of memories. (TV: The Big Bang, Bad Night, et al.)
• Amy reminds the Doctor that he took her away in her nightie (TV: The Eleventh Hour, Meanwhile in the TARDIS 1) which he "did not let [her] change out of for ages." (TV: The Beast Below)
• The first episode immediately follows TV: The Eleventh Hour, and immediately precedes TV: The Beast Below whilst the second episode follows from TV: Flesh and Stone, and immediately precedes TV: The Vampires of Venice.
• This story occurs shortly [minutes, less than an hour] before TV: The Vampires of Venice, the Doctor having time to replace Lucy in the giant cake.

Home video releases

DVD releases

• These episodes were specially filmed for "The Complete Fifth Series" boxset.

Blu-ray releases

• The episodes were also released on the Blu-Ray version of "The Complete Fifth Series" boxset.