The Doctor (Matt Smith), Amy (Karen Gillan), and Rory (Arthur Darvill) are having a picnic in New York’s Central Park, the Doctor reading a novel about a 1930s Detective named Melody Malone. A cherub turns out to be a Weeping Angel and Rory is sent back to 1938. He runs into River Song (Alex Kingston), who wrote the Melody Malone books. The Doctor and Amy find Rory in the book and try to go back to 1938, but the TARDIS cannot get there.
Grayle (Mike McShane) collects Weeping Angels. He captures River and Rory, locking Rory in the cellar with Weeping Angel cherubs, and has an Angel grab River’s wrist while he interrogates her. River uses her vortex manipulator to summon the TARDIS. Amy uses the book to find Rory, and River breaks her wrist to free herself. Amy finds the cellar empty, but the Doctor locates Rory in a nearby apartment building.
They enter an apartment and find an elderly version of Rory on his deathbed. The Doctor figures that the Weeping Angels are using the building as a battery farm, sending the victims into the past and feeding off the Time Energy released. Pursued by Angels and refusing to accept their fate, Amy and Rory jump off the roof, creating a paradox that destroys the building and the Weeping Angels.
The Doctor, River, and Amy find themselves near the TARDIS in a graveyard in 2012, where Rory finds his name on a gravestone. A surviving Weeping Angel sends him into the past again. The paradox prevents the Doctor from going back to get him, so Amy touches the Angel to send herself back to Rory. Her name suddenly appears on the gravestone. River declines to travel with the Doctor. As she always travels backwards in Time, she will speak to Amy. On the last page of the novel, the Doctor finds a note from Amy, imploring him not to travel alone. For her, he travels back to tell young Amelia Pond about her future adventures.
The story was created by writer Steven Moffat and actress Karen Gillan, after a great deal of work. During scenes filmed in Central Park, she improvised some dialogue with Matt Smith so as not to have anything written that could be photographed by the crowds of fans who followed them. The scene in which the Statue of Liberty appears as a Weeping Angel is, in my opinion, one of the great images from Doctor Who. “Englishman in New York” by Sting is part of the score. There is a distinctive opening logo. A great number of tears were shed by all concerned throughout the filming. Reviews were overwhelmingly positive, and it was thought the perfect swansong for Amy and Rory. It was nominated for the 2013 Hugo. Moffat and Gillen could not decide, for a long time, whether to give Amy and Rory a noble death or let them live together for the rest of their days. They managed to do both.