25 November 2013

Day of the Doctor transcript

A transcript of the Doctor Who 50th Anniversary Special.



(We see and hear the psychedelic vortex and music of Classic episodes, and then a shadow on a stone wall. The camera pulls back, and we see that it is cast by a police officer walking past the famous junkyard of “I. M. Foreman / Scrap Merchant / 76, Totter's Lane” and the “Coal Hill / Secondary School / Shoreditch”. The sign for the latter reveals that I. Chesteron is the chairman of the governors of the school, and the headmaster is “W. Coburn”, a reference to Waris Hussein and Anthony Coburn, who directed and wrote the show's very first episode.)

CLARA (voiceover):
“Waste no more time arguing about what a good man should be. Be one.” Marcus Aurelius.

[cut to inside] (The schoolbell rings; class is dismissed. Clara begins erasing the quotation from the board.

A young man rushes into her classroom )

CLARA (noticing him):
Have you been running?

MAN:
Are you okay? There was a call for you at the office. From your ... doctor.

CLARA (smiling to herself, then turning to him):
Did he leave an address?

(The MAN hands CLARA a piece of paper. She takes it and rushes to her desk, grabbing her motorcycle jacket and helmet.)

[cut to outside] (A clock shows the time, 5:16, as she drives away from the school. That was the time the first episode of the show aired, on the 23rd of November, 1963.

We follow CLARA down several streets and through a tunnel out into the open countryside where, just a bit down from an intersection, she spots the TARDIS. She smiles and drives straight at it, honking her horn. The doors open just in time for her to drive inside.

The ELEVENTH DOCTOR, wearing reading glasses, looks up from a book on Advanced Quantum Mechanics.)

ELEVENTH DOCTOR (still reading, but feeling the breeze from the open door):
Draft!

(CLARA, though wearing leather riding gloves, manages to snap her fingers; the doors close.)

ELEVENTH DOCTOR (closing the book and turning to CLARA, maintaining a look of boredom):
Fancy a week in ancient Mesopotamia? Followed by future Mars?

CLARA (hiding her own excitement):
Will there be cocktails?

ELEVENTH DOCTOR:
On the moon.

CLARA:
Moon'll do.

(The ELEVENTH DOCTOR and CLARA finally grin. They are excited to see one another again; indeed, before a second has passed, their smiles have burst into little laughs. They rush to hug each other.)

ELEVENTH DOCTOR:
How's the new job? Teaching anything good?

CLARA:
No. Learn anything?

ELEVENTH DOCTOR:
Not a thing?

(They smile and clasp hands in a double high five. At just that moment, the TARDIS doors lock down and the console screens flash a warning: “Alert: TARDIS interference detected”.)

CLARA:
What's happening?

ELEVENTH DOCTOR:
Whoa! Whoa! We're taking off! But the engines aren't going!

[cut to outside] (We see that the TARDIS is being lifted, like a toy in a crane game, by a helicopter.)

31 March 2013

The Bells of Saint John transcript (Doctor Who S7 E6)

(This is a transcript of Doctor Who Series 7 Episode 7 : The Bells of Saint John. I thank Tardisblue.net for hosting streams of this episode, and hope fellow Whovians find this transcript useful.)



(We see a dark globe. Points of light mark cities, threads of light connect them, even across oceans.

Our view shifts: we then see someone's fingers typing on a keyboard, then a computer screen, as someone mouses over the wi-fi button. We flit around the globe, watching people connect to wi-fi.

We then see a MAN holding a sign, which reads “DANGER”, and speaking to the camera.)

MAN:
Danger.

(We see more people connecting to the internet, even via phones, then we see the MAN again, as if through a webcam.)

MAN:
This is a warning...

(The MAN holds up a new sign, which reads “WARNING”)

MAN:
...a warning to the whole world.

(We see people connecting to the internet even in moving trains.)

MAN:
You're looking for wi-fi, and sometimes you see something. Bit like this.

(He holds up a sign with blocky writing, which looks vaguely like 7 Γ U = /Δ M .

On other screens, we see similar writing, / [ ] V [ X , \\ ][ V X .)

MAN:
Don't click it! Do not click it!

(We see people clicking to log into the blocky particular wi-fi network.)

MAN:
Once you've clicked it, they're in your computer. They can see you. If they can see you, they might choose you. And if they do, you die.

(Around the world, we see the people who had clicked on the blocky wi-fi network collapse, lifeless.)

MAN:
In 24 hours, you're dead... for a while.
People's souls are being uploaded to the internet, [and] some people get stuck. Their minds, their souls, trapped, in the wi-fi...

(We see a Japanese person look up as, in the background, a voice says “I don't know where I am.”)

MAN:
...like echoes, or ghosts... sometimes, you can hear their screams. On the radio, on the telly, on the net...
This is real. This is not a hoax...

(Somewhere along a corniche, a vlogger says “I don't know where I am”.)

MAN:
... or a joke, or a story.

(More people cry out.)

MAN:
This is real, and I know that.... because... (he is emotional) I don't know where I am.
Please... please, if... if you can hear me... if you can hear me, I don't know where I am...

(The camera pans out, and he is seen to have been viewed on a small screen, in a bank of small screens.)



(The lava-lamp intro plays, introducing Matt, Jenna, and the title of the episode: The Bells of Saint John.)



(We see a quiet inlet, with “Cumbria 1207” floating in the waves to identify it. A monk is pounding upon huge wooden doors. After a moment, someone opens a small viewing-latch in the bottom of the door, from inside.)

MONK:
Wake the abbot! The bells of Saint John are ringing!

(The man closes the latch on the camera.

Our perspective shifts, and we see the monk standing in a courtyard a bit later. Other monks stand by him, and then two other monks come up behind him.)

OLD MONK (ABBOT):
We must go to him.

(The monks make their way down a stone corridor.)

MONK:
They call him the Mad Monk, don't they?

ABBOT:
They shouldn't... he's definitely not a monk.

(Entering the room, the abbot clears his throat to rouse a hooded figure, who has nodded off in a chair.)

ABBOT:
I'm sorry to intrude. The bells of Saint John are ringing.

(The hooded figure removes his hood: he is the DOCTOR.)

DOCTOR:
I'm going to need a horse.