The Doctor (Matt Smith) takes Amy (Karen Gillan) to a museum to see Vincent Van Gogh's exhibition of paintings. Amy comments the Doctor's being nice to her, well that's cos of Rory. (Arthur Darvill) Children point out the painting of a doctor who helped Vincent, but not our Doctor. The Doctor notices something in the church window of one of Vincent's paintings, The Church at Auvers. It's a face, he knows evil and he sees it in the window. He pulls out his ID and claims a Ministry of Art inspection, questioning the museum guide, Black (Bill Nighy) about the painting; painted between 1-3 June 1890. The Doctor comments on Black's nice bow tie. Doctor: "Bow ties are cool." Yet again, well of course they are, but they don't look good on just everyone.
They need to find Vincent Van Gogh so he can can take them to the church. He should be at a local cafe. Amy has a book with his paintings. A waitress (Sarah Counsell) tells the Doctor Vincent is mad and he never pays his bills. The Doctor points out he's a good painter and they laugh. The Doctor offers to pay for the drink or buy the painting. Vincent (Tony Curran) says he buys his own drinks and no one buys his paintings and Amy is cute. Amy buys the wine and they can share. The Doctor introduces himself as the Doctor, but he's not that sort of a doctor. Amy's hair is orange and she replies so is Vincent's. The Doctor asks if he painted churches. A woman shouts about her daughter, Giselle being murdered, throwing stones at Vincent, blaming him.
The Doctor calls Vincent kind for allowing them to stay with him. The Doctor points out the starry night, (which was one of his paintings.) The Doctor must remain with him until he paints the church. All of his paintings are there and Vincent refers to them as "clutter." The Doctor says he needs to be careful with his paintings as they're "precious" he's just "casually interested" in the church. Vincent talks of there being more wonders in the universe if you look really hard. Doctor: "You don't have to tell me." Amy has ventured outside all the time they were talking and is hit from behind. Vincent can see the creature and the Doctor gets thrown to the ground, twice. Can Vincent see the creature cos of his madness, or he just generally can, which is why he painted it.
Vincent paints over one of his works so he can show them what the creature looks like. Amy doesn't want the Doctor leaving cos he could get torn to shreds by an invisible monster. He takes the painting to the TARDIS and gallery photos of two of the earlier Doctors can be seen. Doctor: "Impressionists not accurate enough...not happen with Gainsborough or proper painters, sorry Vincent." I.e that he'd get a better painting so the monster could be more easily identified. The mirror gadget allows him to see the monster and none of the villagers heard all that noise. Vincent snores and Amy puts sunflowers everywhere - he could paint them. Vincent doesn't like sunflowers and they're a challenge. The Doctor identifies the monster as a Krafayis; scavenging in packs and then are abandoned and just kill.
The Doctor tells Vincent if he paints the church the Krafayis will come. This is Vincent's greatest year of painting and if they're not careful his paintings will disappear, at least half of the ones in the Museum D'Orsay, all cos of them. He's the greatest artist who ever lived. The Doctor says there's always hope in his experience. Vincent: "It will not end well." The Doctor witnesses Vincent's last decline into madness, he'll kill himself within months. Amy doesn't want him to say that. They'll have to go to the church alone. (She would have been going to a church with Rory when they got married.) Amy is sorry Vincent is unhappy, but he's not. Vincent can hear Amy's sadness, "you lost someone." And asks why she's crying, Amy doesn't understand cos she doesn't recall Rory.
The Doctor doesn't have a plan, "it's a thing, it's like a plan but with more greatness." The Doctor tells Vincent he's not sure he's mad, since depression is complex. He saw Michelangelo paint the Sistine Chapel and Picasso too in his Cubist phase, both were miserable, the Doctor doesn't seem to be able to stop talking. Doctor: "...Time passes really slowly." The Doctor realizes something isn't right and sees the Krafayis in the window. "Overconfidence, this and a Sonic" is what the Doctor has, 'this' being the gadget box of his. No one follows the Doctor inside, but Amy always follows him. Vincent confesses his love to Amy. The Doctor can't see the Krafayis as it's moved.
They hide in the confession box and Amy can't breathe any quieter. The Krafayis begins to tear down the box and he's got impressive hearing, the Doctor observes. Vincent calls to the Krafayis and the Doctor gets thrown again. Doctor: "Here's the plan, Amy, Rory." Amy: "Who?" The Doctor's force of habit calling out to Rory. The Doctor attempts to talk to the Krafayis and knows he can understand him. He doesn't belong on this planet and he's alone. "Trust me." They can reach an agreement. The Krafayis is trapped and moves around the edges of the room. Doctor: "I am really stupid." Amy replies this isn't the time to question his self-esteem. The Krafayis is blind which explains his perfect hearing.
Vincent stabs the creature with his easel, saying he didn't mean to kill it. Vincent was scared of the Krafayis like the villagers are frightened of him. Doctor; "sometimes winning is no fun at all." No and what happened to the Doctor's no one dying today line and there being no violence. Vincent, Amy and the Doctor lie beneath the night sky, holding hands to see what Vincent sees. He's alive (ironic) to see the world, the starry night sky again and as he describes it, it forms his painting. Doctor: "...nothing quite as wonderful as the things you see." Vincent gives them his self-portrait. He won't do so well on his own. The Doctor is thinking he'd like to take Vincent to the museum. The TARDIS is plastered over with ads. He shows Vincent inside the TARDIS.
Paris 2010 AD. Black at the museum recalls the Doctor complimented him on his bow tie and the Doctor asks where Vincent Van Gogh rates in the history of art. "Popular and great, the most beloved...used pain and passion to paint...world's greatest artist and greatest artist who ever lived." Vincent cries tears of joy. He's the first Doctor who ever made a difference in his life. Amy says she's not the marrying kind thus clearly showing she's forgotten she was engaged to Rory. She says "time can be re-written" but after they drop Vincent back home, the Doctor tells her there won't be any new paintings in the museum. The Doctor did make a difference and he calls life being about "a pile of good and bad things." The Krafayis is no longer in the window of the church and Amy heads for the sunflowers where she notices the flowerpot has her name written on it, "For Amy."
Amy recalls if they got married their children would have the reddest of hair, Doctor: "the ultimate ginger." Of course everyone knows Van Gogh killed himself and this episode is poignant in that they know it will happen anyway, even if Amy says time can be re-written, for our purposes, it can't. This episode reflects scenes of Vincent's struggle with his depression - what people around him thought of him, whilst interjecting with humour.
The song playing at the museum is Chances by Athlete. The first (William Hartnell) and second (Patrick Troughton) Doctors are visible in the Doctor's mirror gadget. The Doctor wanted to be ginger once himself and said this in the episodes The Christmas Invasion and The End of Time, when he generated into the tenth and then the eleventh Doctor. This episode was again filmed in Trogir, Croatia, at the same time as the Vampires of Venice.
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