“The Impossible Astronaut” is the darkest Doctor Who series opener yet says Steven Moffat.

Amy, Rory, and River Song get invitations to meet up with the Doctor in America but the reunion is cut short when an astronaut emerges from a pond (possible clue) and shoots the Doctor twice, interrupting his regeneration and killing him forever!?

Fortunately this was actually a future Doctor. Amy decides to save him by convincing her Doctor to travel back to the 1969 moon landing without telling him why.

There they discover that the world has been infiltrated by aliens known as the Silent. Based on the famous expressionist painting The Scream, the Silent appear to scream when they attack but their flesh covered mouths make no sound.

As menacing as they look, the moment you turn away you forget all about them. This makes for some truly disturbing scenes, in which characters are oblivious to the danger lurking right behind them.

One of the Silent instructs Amy to tell the Doctor “What he must know and what he must never know.”

Of course, Amy instantly forgets. It’s not until she experiences stomach pains that she remembers what she has to tell the Doctor but strangely it’s not about his impending death, instead Amy reveals that she’s pregnant. In addition to the violent pain, the urgency with which she tells the Doctor suggests that this is no normal pregnancy. Before we can learn more, the astronaut reappears and Amy instinctively shoots unaware that inside is the space suit is a little girl.

Moffat told Doctor Who Confidential, “There are major twists in the ongoing plot line… It’s all about that pregnancy.”

But is that the only pregnancy? River shows similar stomach pains shortly after seeing the Silent. Are the Silent impregnating our women? And if so is the impossible astronaut actually Amy’s hybrid daughter? Who knows, only time will tell.