...and now the episode kind of goes to shit in a lot of ways. For a sec. Not only does it make, like, zero sense, even with the half-assed "science" of time travel you might have previously put together if you don't give a fuck...I think it's like the "New Earth" thing, and you just kind of have to give in and say, "This is beautiful in a completely different way from the thing I was just watching, and am I strong enough to be okay with that?" and one hopes you don't say shit like "sexless anoraks" or "I don't write for nerds," because that leads to hateration. And there's nothing so embarrassing as nerdly hateration. So the first thing you hear is the sound of a motherfucking horse, whinnying in the distance. If -- and it's a pretty huge if -- you don't die of embarrassment right there, you can be sure that everything that's going to happen is what you think is going to happen. Reinette, the automatons, and the French are all like, "Bwuh?" And then galloping, thundering hooves, and then Arthur the horse bursts through a large mirror on the ballroom wall, the Doctor on his back.

Not three goddamn paragraphs ago. I mean...so now Arthur is like, a truck? Vulgar, gross, meaningless. "Smash the glass, smash the time window, they'd be no way back," he said. "Dumb, gross, vulgar idea," I said. Is this some kind of statement about love? Or...you got Rose and Mickey back on the cannibal spaceship, and they can't operate the TARDIS. So either there's something obvious I'm missing, or my entire concept of "love" is really fucked up, or the Doctor HATES Rose suddenly, and wants to fuck her over. Anyway, it looks pretty bad-ass so quelch the offended logic circuits if you can -- and remember, everything is going to turn out okay. The Doctor winks as he trots past Reinette in the middle of the ballroom, and finally drops to the ground: "Madame de Pompadour. You look younger every day." Louis gets his gorgeous mess all up in there wondering who the hell the Doctor is, and Reinette makes the introduction -- not the Doctor to the King of France, but the King of France to the Doctor: "This is my lover, the King of France." Compounding rudeness with rudeness, the Doctor sniffs, "Yeah? Well, I'm the Lord of Time." And he turns to the chief automaton: "And I'm here to fix the clock." He pulls the mask and wig off the creature, revealing its clockwork -- giving the group a chance to check out its hallways and mirrors and windows and tapestries and fireplaces for themselves -- and they gasp. The automaton points its weapon at the Doctor and he shakes his head: "Forget it. It's over. For you and for me." Behind the broken mirror on the wall lies only a brick wall. "Talk about seven years' bad luck. Try three thousand..." The clockwork looks up at the wall, and the mirror, and wonders why he's bitching about such small numbers.