The Eleventh Hour

The Eleventh Hour was the first episode of Series Five. It featured Karen Gillan as new companion Amy Pond and Arthur Darvill as Rory Williams. Though not the first episode filmed of the 2010 series, it was nevertheless the public's first full exposure to a new production ethos, as shaped by then-new executive producers Steven Moffatt, Piers Wenger, and Beth Willis. It was also the public's first exposure to director Adam Smith's work on a Doctor Who universe programme. The episode was extensively previewed prior to broadcast, with special screenings in several British cities as part of a special promotional tour at the end of March 2010, and special pre-broadcast screenings on both the east and west coasts of the United States. The first minute of the episode was released as a special preview on the digital Red Button service in the week prior to its first BBC One broadcast.

Memorable Quotes
[the Doctor eats the bacon, then promptly spits it out] The Doctor: That's bacon! Are you trying to poison me? [Amy begins cooking again] The Doctor: Beans! [the Doctor eats the fried beans, and promptly spits them out] The Doctor: Beans are evil. Bad bad beans. [Amy butters a slice of plain bread] The Doctor: Bread and butter! Now you're talking. [the Doctor runs outside and flings the bread and butter out] The Doctor: And stay out! Young Amy: Yes. The Doctor: Everything's going to be fine.
 * The Doctor: Ahh! Bacon!
 * The Doctor: Amy Pond, there's something you'd better understand about me cause it's important, and one day your life may depend on it: I am definitely a mad man with a box!
 * The Doctor: You know when grown-ups tell you everything's going to be fine, and you think they're probably lying to make you feel better?

Synopsis
The Doctor has regenerated into a brand new man, but danger strikes before he can even recover. With the TARDIS wrecked, and the sonic screwdriver destroyed, the new Doctor has just 20 minutes to save the whole world - and only Amy Pond to help him.

Plot
The newly regenerated Eleventh Doctor is hanging from the edge of his damaged TARDIS, which is hurtling towards the city of London. The TARDIS nearly crashes into Big Ben, but the Doctor manages to use the sonic screwdriver to turn the TARDIS away from it. At Easter time in 1996, a young Scottish girl with red hair prays to Santa in her bedroom. There is a crack in her wall and she wants it mended. Suddenly, she hears a noise in the garden. She runs over to the window and sees that the TARDIS has crashed in her garden. The young girl, Amelia, comes to investigate and sees the bedraggled Doctor struggling from the burnt out TARDIS. He claims to love apples and as such Amelia gives him one. It actually turned out he hates apples, yoghurt, bacon, beans and buttered bread. Amelia helps him to find what his favourite food is. It turns out to be fish fingers and custard. He then goes and investigates the crack in Amelia's wall. He quickly deduces that it is a crack in time and space. Listening, he hears a voice saying 'Prisoner Zero has escaped'. He predicts that there is a prison on the other side of this crack. To fix it he uses his screwdriver to open the crack, as he knows that by opening it, it will soon close itself, sealing itself at the same time. While its open, the Doctor calls through, and a giant eyeball appears. It sends some blue energy through, which seems to zoom towards the Doctor's pocket. The crack then seals. The Doctor pulls his physic paper out of his pocket and sees that the words 'Prisoner Zero has escaped' written on it. He guesses that he has been sent this, because Prisoner Zero had escaped through the crack. He investigates the corridor and scenes he's missing something, on the corner of his eye. Just before he spots a room, he hears the cloister bells from the TARDIS. The Doctor then goes back to the TARDIS in an attempt to fix it. He promises he will be back in five minutes, as a quick trip to the future will help fix the engines and then promptly de-materialises. An excited Amelia goes to pack her things, not noticing that the door the Doctor was about to discover has mysteriously opened. The Doctor once again shows up at the bottom of Amelia's garden and runs into Amelia's house, exclaiming that he's figured out what he was missing and that Amelia's life was in danger. He is looking around the house when someone comes up behind him and whacks him on the head using a cricket bat. When he wakes, the Doctor sees a ginger woman dressed in a police uniform. The Doctor asks about Amelia Pond and the woman reveals that Amelia hasn't lived in the house for six months. The Doctor asks the woman to count the number of rooms on the floor. She counts five, however there is six as one of them is protected by a perception filter so that no-one but the trained few can see it. The woman is (understandably) shocked at this and investigates the room, ignoring the Doctor's warnings not to. She comes face to face with Prisoner Zero, seemingly in its natural form, as a floating eel-like creature. She dashes back to the Doctor and gives him his sonic screwdriver. As he tries to free himself Prisoner Zero breaks through the door and emerges as a human form with a dog. However, the creature doesn't seem to be able to copy two voices at once, and so both the human mouth and the dog mouth bark. While trying to keep the creature at bay, he says that the policewoman had called for back up, to which the woman, not realising that the Doctor was trying to gain time, tells him that the radio was fake, she hadn't called for backup, she isn't a police woman, but a kiss-o-gram, a job where she goes to parties and gets paid to kiss people. The Atraxi captain is then heard saying "Attention Prisoner Zero the human residence is surrounded" followed by "Prisoner Zero will vacate the human residence or the human residence will be incinerated" and keeps repeating it. Back at the local hospital several patients in comas keep repeating one word; "Doctor". One of the people in a coma is a direct double of the form that Prisoner Zero has taken.

The Doctor and the woman go outside to the TARDIS. However the Doctor can't open it because its repairing itself. He then notices the shed which he had previously smashed when he had crashed landed. He licks it and (using an ability he seems to have inherited from his previous self) deduces the shed is twelve years old. He asks the woman why she had said six months had passed, when in fact twelve years had. She then angrily asks why he said five minutes in a Scottish accent. At this point the Doctor realises that the woman is an adult Amelia Pond, who is now called Amy. Seeing that Prisoner Zero had left the house, they flee into the street, where they discover that the message from the Atraxi is repeated over and over again, on all wavelengths, throughout the world. The Doctor realises that that means that when the Atraxi are saying that they are going to incinerate the human residence, the human residence is not Amy's house, but the Earth.

Suddenly Amy, slamming the Doctor's tie in a car door so that he cannot escape, demands he tell her who he is. The Doctor persuades her to trust him by showing her the apple she gave him when she was seven, still fresh.

With the help of Amy and her "sort of boyfriend" Rory, the Doctor locates Prisoner Zero, and determined not to let him bring the world down in flames, uses his sonic screwdriver to attract the attention of the Atraxi. With light fixtures and telephone booths exploding, his plan seems to be working, until the already-damaged screwdriver overloads and burns out into a useless piece of charred metal. With the distraction gone, the prisoner escapes into a sewer and disappears. Figuring that it would take approximately twenty minutes for the Atraxi to power up their weapons and then incinerate the planet, the Doctor rushes Plan B into action: Using Rory's phone, he writes a virus to turn every single digital display in the world into a list of zeroes, uploads it to the web via a laptop, and confronts Prisoner Zero at the hospital. With nowhere left to turn, the prisoner attempts to take on the appearance of a young Amy with the Doctor, and is tricked into disguising himself - as himself. Before he is taken away by the Atraxi, Prisoner Zero snarls ominously at the Doctor "The Pandorica will open. Silence will fall... Silence, Doctor. Silence will fall".

With the threat ended, the Atraxi turn to leave but are summoned back under the rules of the Shadow Proclamation. The Doctor informs them that under no circumstances are they to ever come back to earth again - Earth is under his protection, and he is the Doctor. With the Atraxi gone, the Doctor notices that his key is glowing - the TARDIS has recovered and is waiting for him. Suddenly bursting with excitement, the Doctor, wearing his new outfit dashes off to see what is in store for him, and his eyes open with wonder as he beholds the newly repaired console room. Amy, realising that he is gone, runs back to her garden followed by Rory, only to find the TARDIS fading away. She is clearly upset.

Two years later, Amy Pond, dreaming of her younger self waiting for the Doctor to return, is suddenly startled awake by the sound of the TARDIS returning. Running out of the house in her night clothes, she finds the Doctor standing in the garden with the TARDIS. He said that he took the TARDIS for a "quick trip to the moon" to break in the engines. Amy angrily informs him of the amount of time he has actually been away for. Trying to mollify her, the Doctor states that she's waited long enough, and welcomes her to join him as a companion. Highly skeptical after waiting all this time, she initially refuses, but changes her mind when the Doctor snaps his fingers to open the TARDIS, and Amy sees TARDIS enterior for the first time. She relents on the condition that the Doctor brings her back to Leadworth by "tomorrow morning". The reason becomes clear soon enough, when her bedroom is revealed to contain a few slightly packed suitcases.... and a wedding dress hanging on the wardrobe door.