Doctor Whohas always featured some horror elements in its science fiction mélange. The series blends genres with wild abandon and frequently nails several of them. After the universally beloved 2007 episode “Blink,” the showrunners realized there was a broad appeal for scary aliens. They brought back the Weeping Angels a few times, but the new nightmare for British youths was The Silence.
Doctor Whois a bit like the United States of America in that it’s an unrecognizable different entity depending on who is currently in charge of it.Fans hold some showrunnersup as heroes while burning others in effigy. The vast gulf between one group of seasons and the next is noticeable and shocking. It also means that story beats from one term might never appear after their absence.
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What are The Silence?
The Silence are a religious order and a race of aliens that hauntDoctor Whofrom 2011 to 2013. They were teased throughout the fifth series, but their debut came in the series six premiere, “The Impossible Astronaut.” They are humanoid aliens with gray skin and nightmarish facial features. Their eyes and cheeks are sunken to their bones. They don’t seem to possess a nose. Their index fingers are long and wide. Steven Moffat has mentioned Edvard Munch’s classic painting,The Scream,as an inspiration. They wear black suits, which give them an oddly human element. That aspect of their designevokes the “men in black,“the urban legends that also inspired the film of the same name. The Silence are popularly among considered the scariestDoctor Whoaliens.
The Silence have unique abilities that make them intensely threatening. They can only be perceived directly. Moments after one looks away from them, they are forgotten. It’s stated that TheSilence lived on Earthfor thousands of years but were never documented due to their amnesiac powers. Someone with previous experience would regain their recollections of The Silence each time they looked at one, but those memories would fade shortly after they looked away. A Silent can also gather electrical energy and project it from their hands in a devastating blast. This attack can reduce a human to cinders. The Silence can also hypnotize humans and force them to do their bidding. Human slaves that serve The Silence are fitted with devices that allow them to remember their presence. It’s believed that their influence on human development was massive. They may have engineered the moon landing.
What does The Silence want?
Mother Superious Tasha Lem started The Silence. She operated the militaristic Church of the Papal Mainframe for many years. The Church discovered a mysterious signal from the planet Trenzalore. She and the Doctor found that the message wasemitted by the Time Lords, trapped in a pocket dimension since the end of the Last Great Time War. The Doctor sealed his people away to protect them. The war was one of the most destructive events to hit the universe. Lem knew that any other species would destroy Trenzalore to prevent the Time Lords from escaping. She was convinced that the war would begin anew and threaten all life across all timelines. The key to releasing Gallifrey from its eternal prison was hidden in plain sight. It was a single question that every fan already knew, and its answer could spell the end of reality. The question was, “Doctor who?”. Lem dedicated the Church to preventing the Doctorfrom answering that question.
The main body of The Silence worked to ensure the Doctor wouldn’t speak his name on Trenzalore. Over centuries, a subset called the Kovarian Chapter broke away from the Church to attempt a different solution. They wanted to kill the Doctor through time travel. Theyblew up the TARDIS, creating a crack in time and leaving ominous hints throughout the season. This attempt failed because it initiated a “destiny trap,” inadvertently giving the Doctor a guaranteed escape from his intended fate. Their other scheme was much more convoluted. They stole Amy Pond’s daughter, created a clone, and raised her to assassinate the Doctor.River Song killed the Doctor, but she and her fellow clones turned against Madame Kovarian and saved his life. Rather than fight The Silence, the Doctor joined them to defend Trenzalore. The Time Lords altered the future by giving the Doctor a new set of regenerations. This action changed the timeline, undoing the Kovarian attempt to bomb the TARDIS and unmaking the crack in time that allowed the Time Lords to ask the question. Everything was neatly resolved, and the Doctor revived the Time Lords without incident.
Doctor Wholoves to tie up all its loose ends by traveling through time. The Silence arc was one of the more compelling storylines of the early 2010s. Itgot a bit frustratingwith its withholding and almost comical self-assuredness, but The Silence are scary enough to stand on their own. The Silence is a religious order dedicated to keeping the Doctor from saying his name. They kept him quiet, though they had to embrace some unusual techniques.
