Doctor: Matt Smith (Eleventh Doctor)
Companions
Karen Gillan (Amy Pond)
Arthur Darvill (Rory Williams)
Others
Hugh Bonneville – Henry Avery
Oscar Lloyd – Toby Avery
Lee Ross – The Boatswain
Michael Begley – Mulligan
Tony Lucken – De Florres
Chris Jarman – Dancer
Carl McCrystal – McGrath
Lily Cole – The Siren
Frances Barber – Eye Patch Lady (uncredited)
Production
Directed by Jeremy Webb
Written by Stephen Thompson
Script editor Caroline Henry
Produced by Marcus Wilson
Executive producer(s)
Steven Moffat
Piers Wenger
Beth Willis
Incidental music composer Murray Gold
Production code 2.9
Series Series 6
Length 45 minutes
Originally broadcast 7 May 2011
Following a distress signal, the TARDIS lands aboard a 17th-century[2] pirate ship stranded in the middle of an ocean. The ship's crew have been terrorised by a Siren-like creature (Lily Cole) who marks people with black spots on their palms after they are injured. Her song then lulls victims into a trance, making them want to go to her, which apparently disintegrates them. Rory Williams (Arthur Darvill) receives a cut during a tussle with the pirates, and finds a black spot on his hand, but is prevented from succumbing to the song of the Siren by Amy Pond (Karen Gillan) and the Doctor (Matt Smith).
Surmising the Siren is using water as a portal, the Doctor instructs everyone to seek refuge in the ship's dry magazine. There, they find Toby Avery (Oscar Lloyd), the son of the ship's captain Henry Avery (Hugh Bonneville), who stowed away on the ship in order to join the crew after his mother died, unaware of his father's illicit deeds. He too has a black spot on his palm due to a fever. In an attempt to escape, the Doctor and Avery board the TARDIS, but find it is acting haphazardly, and are forced to evacuate, and they watch as it dematerializes by itself. After another shipmate is taken by the Siren in a dry room, the Doctor realizes the Siren is using reflection to appear. In response they rid the ship of reflective surfaces, including the ship's stolen treasure.
When a storm begins, the crew start to set sail. Toby drops a polished crown while bringing his father a coat. The Siren is summoned and takes Toby. Soon, Rory falls into the ocean, and the Doctor rationalises that the Siren has shown intelligence and will likely get to Rory before he drowns and convinces her to save him. Believing the victims are not dead, the Doctor convinces Avery and Amy to prick themselves to get the Siren to take them. The Doctor's suspicions are confirmed when the Siren's touch actually teleports them to an alien spaceship, invisible in the same spot the pirate ship is located.
The Doctor finds the spaceship's crew long dead from exposure to a human virus. The trio then discover a sickbay where Avery's entire crew, Toby, and Rory are in medical care along with the TARDIS. The Siren turns out to be the ship's virtual doctor, caring for the injured humans; the black spots are tissue samples used as references. Amy convinces the Siren to release Rory into her care. Using Rory's nursing knowledge, Amy and the Doctor remove him from life support and are able to resuscitate him. Meanwhile, Avery decides to stay with his son and his crew, unable to go back to England himself while the ship will care for his crew. Avery takes the helm of the spaceship and, along with Toby and his crew, sets off to explore the stars.
Continuity
The historical pirate Henry Avery was previously mentioned in the 1966 serial The Smugglers, which deals with the search for "Avery's gold".[1] "The Curse of the Black Spot" re-asserts unresolved plot points from the previous two episodes, "The Impossible Astronaut" and "Day of the Moon"; Amy and Rory express concern over the Doctor's future death, Madame Kovarian appears briefly to Amy, and the Doctor again uses the TARDIS scanner to perform a pregnancy test on Amy, the results of which remain unclear
The Curse of the Black Spot