The Time of Angels

"The Time of Angels" is the fourth episode of the fifth series of the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast on 24 April 2010 on BBC One. It is the first episode of a two-part story written by showrunner Steven Moffat and directed by Adam Smith; the second episode, "Flesh and Stone", aired on 1 May. Moffat utilised the two-part episode to bring back a couple of his previous creations: the Weeping Angels from his series three episode "Blink", and River Song (Alex Kingston) from the series four episodes "Silence in the Library" and "Forest of the Dead".

The episode is partly set in the 51st century. In the episode, the Eleventh Doctor—a time travelling alien played by Matt Smith—and his companion Amy Pond (Karen Gillan) are summoned by River Song, a mysterious woman from the Doctor's future. She takes them to the planet Alfava Metraxis, where the spaceship Byzantium has crashed. Hidden inside is a Weeping Angel, a creature that can only move when unobserved by others. With the help of Father Octavian (Iain Glen) and his militarised clerics, the Doctor, Amy and River Song travel through a stone labyrinth to reach the ship. On the way, they discover that all the statues in the maze are Angels, which are slowly restoring and planning to trap them in the labyrinth.

Inspired by the relationship between the film Alien and its sequel, Aliens, Moffat wrote the episode as a more action-oriented sequel to "Blink". It was the first episode to be filmed in the series; filming began 20 July 2009 at Southerndown beach, Vale of Glamorgan which was used as the surface of Alfava Metraxis. The episode was watched by 8.59 million viewers in the United Kingdom, received the highest Appreciation Index given to the fifth series at time of broadcast and was acclaimed by critics as one of the best episodes of the series.