"Raggedy Man…Good Night"…The Fall of the Eleventh

And so it all came back, Trenzalore, the cracks in the Universe, even, through the heart of the TARDIS, Amy Pond.

For those who thought that The Name of the Doctor did not live up to the prophecies of Dorium Maldovar, well…they were right. The Siege of Trenzalore was yet to come, though in the far past.

We saw the Doctor forced to stand his ground, for centuries--trapped in a stalemate between re-igniting the Time War, and abandoning his own people.

We saw the rule of twelve regenerations respected, accounted for, and re-set, by an act of grace.

I'll leave the reviewing and recapping to old friend and Who guru Vinnie Bartilucci

For me, the final sequence says it all--beginning with the now-aged (Hartnell-esque) Doctor, going to the tower to die, and, in so doing claim one last victory over the Daleks,by giving Clara the chance to scarper in the TARDIS--each life saved, he has learned, is a little victory.

And after the weaponization of artron energy (not sure how I feel about that, but in-story, it worked for me), the Doctor got to break our hearts one last time, especially--though not exclusively, in his parting speech:

CLARA: You, you are the Doctor.
ELEVEN: Yep. And I always will be. But times change and so must I…We all change when you think about it, we’re all different people, all through our lives, and that’s okay, that’s good you gotta keep moving, so long as you remember all the people that you used to be. I will not forget one line of this, not one day, I swear. I will always remember when the Doctor was me.

And so will we all.

And now to Capaldi!