the prequel to Let's Kill Hitler

TV Find above (and at this link), as it says in the caption, the prequel to Let's Kill Hitler, the opening episode of second half of sixth series of Doctor Who which is apparently starting on the 27th August for six weeks. Or series seven. Or series thirty-three. Or whatever it is. Has identifying such things ever been this complicated. Anyway, go watching its two minutes then meet me in the next paragraph.

Are you back? Isn't that good? It seems unfair to kick a series when it's down, but there really is more majesty and excitement in those hundred and seventeen seconds than in the whole of the first half of Torchwood's Miracle Day. Just the few moments Matt's on-screen, smouldering with anger, fear and I think we can safely say regret against Karen's giddiness are some of the most powerful acting we've seen all year.

Of course the Doctor has an answering machine, of course he does, the message recorded when he was still in his carefree stage, probably not long after his latest regeneration. Just as when someone marries and has to get all of their documents changed, the Doctor as well as finding a new sense of style must also remember to rerecord, reprint and reapply for all kinds of identity related elements.

My answer machine message says "Hi, it's Stuart, you know what to do." I recorded it when I bought my first mobile phone back in the late nineties and I think I was quoting from a film or television show but listening back a few minutes ago so that I could transcribe, what I notice is how youthful I sound. It's the mid-twenties version of me, so full of hope, talking back.

Perhaps that's what happens for the Doctor. Judging by his library card (cf, Vampires in Venice) he doesn't always remember to renew these extraneous elements. Perhaps there was a moment when he listen back to a call and the voice of his Tenth incarnation and his recording instruction appeared. "Yes! I'm an answer machine! Brilliant! Allons-y!" Or some such.

That's bound to cause a potentially weird set of emotions. If, as was established in The End of Time, regenerations are something like death, would listening to his younger self be akin to hearing the voice of deceased relative or friend, perhaps after accidentally dialling the wrong number and the grief which flows from that? Or would he not give it another thought and press "delete" then "record"?

That also suggests a potential ambiguity in this clip.  On first glance we might imagine that we're hearing Amy leave the message and at the end seeing a Doctor who can't bear to tell her the truth of her daughter's fate.  But what if we're actually seeing the Time Lord re-listening to an already recorded message, reminding himself of the onslaught of Amyness because something catastrophic has happened to her?