It looks like we’re in for a very exciting episode when Doctor Who‘s season finale, “The Doctor Falls,” arrives tomorrow. That’s because writer Steven Moffat and director Rachel Talalay have promised that there will be some “epic” action in the form a big old battle with the Cybermen.
Talalay spoke about her previous work in 2014’s season 8 finale, “Death in Heaven” and how she thought she failed to deliver a big action set piece in the episode. This time around, she made sure to rectify that.
“I always worried, in ‘Death in Heaven’, that we had this army of Cybermen, and then they take off into the air, and there’s never a battle so I was really thrilled, in ‘The Doctor Falls’, that we get to actually have them fight. They do battle. My approach was, you know, ‘Bring it on! Let’s blow up as many things as we can!’”
The director also talked about her preferred style of editing in order to keep things “moving” and to emphasize the “adrenaline,” saying the following:
“I like, if I can, to do a few epic, moving shots where a lot of things are happening, rather than hundreds of action cuts, so we did one really big Steadicam shot with Peter, where he battled through the forest.
It was important to me – and to Peter – that we got that all as one, even though we cut it up in the edit. The adrenaline that happens as you run, and things grab you, and all these explosions go off around you – the excitement! – just adds so much. It gives a visceral sense to it, and Peter really felt that. It is like being on a battlefield. The first time he went through, tons of dirt rained down on him. He came out the other end, with dirt all over him, and you should have seen the grin on his face! He said, ‘Yup, this is action-hero stuff.’
But Steven’s script is, of course, incredibly, ridiculously clever, in a good way, and it does also have the calm before the storm. I love creating that tension as well.”
Steven Moffat, meanwhile, promised that the heart of the finale will be the “tiny moments” in between the fighting and “the emotional consequences” of the big Cybermen battle.
“An epic battle, even if you’ve got all the budget in the world – and, let’s be clear, we don’t – has to focus in on those tiny moments. Those tiny losses. Those tiny victories. Otherwise it’s just not a story. Embedding the intimate in the epic is what Doctor Who is really, really good at – or expressing the epic through the intimate. The tiny emotional consequences of this vast battle.
“We all sort of know that the best bits in war movies are just before the battle and just after it. Those are the bits that stay with you forever; the final hours before the assault, and the consequences.”
