The Curse of the Black Spot

Boatswain (Lee Ross): He slipped in the bilge water, Captain, and fell under the rigger. His hand, I… I don’t know if he’ll survive.
Captain Henry Avery (Hugh Bonneville) seeing a slight cut: You’re a dead man, McGrath. {checks for the black spot on his palm}. Same as all the others. {hears singing} She’s here.
Boatswain: Oh, save all our souls.
McGrath (Carl McCrystal): We’ve got to escape.
Boatswain: We can’t go out there. McGrath, don’t listen for gods sake. The Siren is a callin’!

Captain Avery: Same as all the others. No sign of a struggle, no bones or blood.
Boatswain: We’re [?] by every single one of us stuck on the ocean, waiting.
Captain Avery: Until the wind changes. {banging sounds} What’s that?
Boatswain: It’s the creature, it’s returned. {the hatch swings open to reveal…}
The Doctor: Yo ho ho! Or does nobody actually say that?

Captain Avery: We made no signal.
The Doctor: Our sensors picked you up. “Ship in distress”.
Captain Avery: Sensors?
The Doctor: Yes. Okay! Problem word, seventeenth century. My ship automatically… noticed-ish that your ship was having some bother.
Captain Avery: That big blue crate?
Boatswain: That is more magic, Captain Avery. They’re spirits. How else would they have found their way below decks.
The Doctor: Well… I want to say multi-dimensional engineering, but since you had a problem with sensors I won’t go there. Look. I’m the Doctor. This is Amy. Rory. We’re sailors! Same as you. Rawrgh! Except for the gun thing. And the beardiness.

The Doctor: I suppose laughing like that is in the job description. “Can you do the laugh? Check. Grab yourself a parrot. Welcome aboard!”.
Captain Avery: Stocks are low. Only one barrel of water remains. We don’t need three more empty bellies to fill. {to the boatswain} Take the doxy below, to the galley. Set her to work. She won’t need much feeding.

The Doctor: If this is just because I’m a captain too you know you shouldn’t feel threatened. Your ship is much bigger than mine and I don’t have the cool boots or a hat even.
Captain Avery: Time to go.
The Doctor: A bit more laughter, guys.

Captain Avery: Put down the sword. A sword could kill us all, girl.
Amy: Yeah. Thanks. That’s actually why I’m pointing it at you.

Dancer (Chris Jarman): You have killed me.
Amy: No way. It’s just a cut. {a black spot appears on his hand} What kind of rubbish pirates are you?
Captain Avery: One drop, that’s all it takes. One drop of blood and she’ll rise out of the ocean.
Amy: Come on, I barely even scratched him. What are you all in such a huff about?

Rory: Ah, Doctor, what’s happening to me?
Captain Avery: She can smell the blood on your skin. She’s marked you for death.
Rory: She?
Captain Avery: A demon, out there in the ocean.
The Doctor: Okay, groovy! So not just pirates today. We’ve managed to [?] a ship where there’s a demon popping in. Very efficient. I mean if something’s going to kill you it’s nice that it drops you a note to remind you.

Captain Avery: The creature. She charms all her victims with that song.
Rory: Oh great. So put my fingers in my ears, that’s your plan? Doctor, come on. Let’s go. Let’s get back to the, uh—

Rory: You are so beautiful. I love your get-up. Oh, it’s great. You should dress as a pirate more often. Huh? Hey, hey. Cuddle me, ship mate.

Amy: What is that thing?
Captain Avery: A legend. The Siren. Many a merchant ship laden with treasure has fallen prey to her. She’s been hunting us ever since we were becalmed, picking off the injured.
Boatswain: Like a shark. A shark can smell blood.
The Doctor: Okay. Just like a shark. In a dress. And singing. And green! A green singing shark in an evening gown.

Captain Avery: The ship is cursed!
The Doctor: Yeah, right. Cursed. It’s big with humans. It means bad things are happening but you can’t be bothered to find an explanation.

The Doctor: And the gun’s back. You’re big on the gun thing, aren’t you? Freud would say you’re compensating. Ever met Freud? No. Comfy sofa.

The Doctor: It’s okay, we’re safe down here. No curse is getting through three solid inches of timber. {The Siren pops up} Ah! Hello again.

Captain Avery: How did she get in?
The Doctor: Bilge water. She’s using water like a portal. A door. She can materialize through a single drop. We need to go somewhere with no water.
Amy: Well thank god we’re not in the middle of the ocean.

Rory: Did you see her eyes? Like crystal pools.
Amy: You are in enough trouble.

Captain Avery: I don’t want you here.
Toby (Oscar Lloyd): You can’t send me back. It’s too late. We’re a hundred miles from home.
Captain Avery: It’s dangerous here. There is a monster aboard. She leaves a mark on men’s skin.
Toby: The black spot?

Captain Avery: There’s nothing wrong with the boy. He has no scars.
The Doctor: Yep. Ignore my last theory.
Amy: He has his good days and bad days.
The Doctor: It’s not just blood she’s coming for, all the sick and wounded. Like a hunter chooses its weakest animal.

Boatswain: We’re all cursed if we stay aboard.
The Doctor: It’s not a curse. Curse means game over. Curse means we’re helpless. We are not helpless!

The Doctor: She’s out there now, licking her lips. Boiling the sauce[pan]. Grating the cheese.
Amy: Okay. Well remember if you get an itch don’t scratch too hard.
The Doctor: We’ve all gotta go sometime. There are worse ways than having your face gnawed off by a dodgy mermaid.

Captain Avery: By all the—
The Doctor: Let me stop you there. Bigger on the inside. I don’t mind you if you just skip to the end of that moment. Oh, and sorry I lied by the way when I said yours was bigger.

Captain Avery: Wheel?
The Doctor: Atom accelerator.
Captain Avery: It steers the thing.
The Doctor: No! Sort of. Yes.
Captain Avery: Wheel. Telescope. Astrolabe. Compass. A ship’s a ship.

The Doctor: This is how the professionals do it! {nothing} It’s stuck. Not responding.
Captain Avery: Becalmed?
The Doctor: Mm hm. Yeah. Apparently. That’s new. You had to gloat, didn’t you!
Captain Avery: I’m not gloating.
The Doctor: I saw that look just now. “Ha ha. His ship is rubbish.”
Captain Avery: True.

The Doctor: The TARDIS can’t see. It’s sulking because it thinks space doesn’t exist. Without a plane to lock on to we’re not going anywhere.
Captain Avery: I’m confused.
The Doctor: Yeah, well. It’s a big club. We should get t-shirts.

The Doctor: Okay. Okay. Oh, oh… kay. TARDIS runs off on its own. That’s a bit of a new one. Bang goes our only hope of getting them out of here.
Captain Avery: Not much of a captain without a ship, are you?

The Doctor: The Siren legend, the curse.
Captain Avery: You said curses weren’t real.
The Doctor: Folklore springs from truth. She attacks ships filled with treasure. Where else would she get a perfect reflection?
Captain Avery: Polished metal.

The Doctor: Yes yes, I know. Very bad luck to break it. But look at it this way: there’s a stroppy, homicidal mermaid trying to kill all of us.
Captain Avery: How much worse can things get.

Captain Avery: No! No! This the the treasure of the Mughal of India.
The Doctor: Oh good, for a moment there I thought it was yours.

The Doctor: Not my most dynamic plan, I realize.
Amy: TARDIS?
The Doctor: It’s been towed.

Eye Patch Lady (Frances Barber): It’s fine. You’re doing fine. Just stay calm.

Captain Avery: To the rigging, you dogs! Let go the sails! Avanti! Put the [bunting in the sack] of the clews!
Amy: I swear he’s making half this stuff up!
Rory: Well we’re gonna need some kind of phrase book!

Captain Avery: Heave ho, you bilge rats!
Rory: Rats was all I could hear.

The Doctor: You couldn’t give up the gold, could you?! That’s why you turned pirate! Your commission. Your wife, your son. Just how much is that treasure worth to you, man?!

Captain Avery: We’re on a ghost ship.
The Doctor: No, it’s real. A spaceship trapped in a temporal rift.
Amy: How can two ships be in the same place?
The Doctor: Not the same. Two ships, two worlds. Two cars parked in the same space. There are lots of different universes nested inside each other. Now and again they collide and you can step from one to the other.
Amy: Okay. I think I understand.
The Doctor: Good. ‘Cause it’s not like that at all, but if that helps…
Amy: Thanks.

Amy: I don’t understand. If this is the captain then what’s the Siren?
The Doctor: Same as us. A stowaway.
Amy: She killed him?
The Doctor: Human bacteria.
Amy: What?
The Doctor: A virus. From our planet. Airborne, travelling through the portal. That’s what killed it, didn’t get it’s jahhh— {sticks his hand in goo} bs. Ah. Look.
Amy: What is it?
The Doctor: Sneeze. Alien boogies.

The Doctor: Ignore all my previous theories!
Amy: Yeah, well we stopped paying attention a while back.

The Doctor: We have to send this ship back into space. I mean imagine if the Siren got ashore. She would try to process every injured human.
Captain Avery: What about Toby?
The Doctor: Sorry. Typhoid fever. Once he returns it’s only a matter of time.
Captain Avery: What if I stay with him? Here? The Siren will look after him. I can’t go back to England. What home does he have now if not with me?
The Doctor: You think you can sail this thing?
Captain Avery: Just point me to the atom accelerator.

Rory: I know you can do this. Of course if you muck it up I am going to be really cross. And dead.

Amy: Good night, Doctor.
The Doctor: Good night, Amelia.
Amy: You only call me Amelia when you’re worrying about me.
The Doctor: I always worry about you.
Amy: Mutual.