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Doctor Who: Time Of The Doctor |OT| 11's hour is over now... The clock is striking 12
- Thread starter infiniteloop
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Thought the episode was just awful. I liked Handles enough, but he was really only there to give Eleven another tearjerker scene which felt very forced. The ending, however, was great. It was a very fitting sendoff with wonderful last words and Capaldi's introduction makes me excited for the future, though it's time for Moffat to give up the reigns.
Jest Chillin
Member
I'm pretty sure he said it's a full reset in the dialogue but I'd have to watch it again to be sure.
CrimsonCrescendo
Banned
When do you guys think this'll go up on Itunes? I missed it 
PhoncipleBone
Banned
When do you guys think this'll go up on Itunes? I missed it
Already there now.
That's what I remembered also. It makes sense since they'd already established the Time Lords could grant a new regeneration cycle with the Master and this pushes the new limit far into the future so no one has to worry about it for a long time.
equippedwithtowel
Member
"I don't want to go" fit the character, Tennnant shouldn't have gone out like Smith and vice versa.
It means he's the Valeyard to Fiction's Doctor and Fiktion's Meta-Crisis Doctor.
It can't have been River. She didn't recognise Clara in the Name of the Doctor, and this was post-Library. I prefer to think it was the Blink girl, she works in a shop in London right?
Awfully handy of them, building a TARDIS and Doctor timestream like that.
What I meant was, maybe they put up something in 11th honour, and eventually he goes back or is taken back there.
Jest Chillin
Member
I thought about that when I was writing the post. That perhaps a later incarnation of the Doctor does die there and his Tardis dies as well and all that, just to set the pieces for Name of the Doctor to happen but I didn't mention it in that post because then the post becomes about throwing theories about rather than the point, which is that Time of the Doctor changing the future shouldn't be offensive.
User 100115
Banned
My reasons for thinking Lem is River (mostly remembering these quotes could get it wrong)
"You've been fighting a psychopath inside your whole life!"
The look they shared when he said 'Totally married her.'
"Flying the Tardis is easy, flying the Doctor was always hard."
Her gravestone being on Trenzalore in Name of the Doctor.
The flirting and kissing of course.
There might be more, but I've only watched it once.
All these doppelgangers are confusing me!
"You've been fighting a psychopath inside your whole life!"
The look they shared when he said 'Totally married her.'
"Flying the Tardis is easy, flying the Doctor was always hard."
Her gravestone being on Trenzalore in Name of the Doctor.
The flirting and kissing of course.
There might be more, but I've only watched it once.
All these doppelgangers are confusing me!
Nope. Filming doesn't start on S8 until next month.
And now you know how The Doctor feels every day of his life.
I don't know if I believe the Lem = River theory yet, but for some reason, Lem being backwards for Mel is strangely convincing...
The Blue Jihad
Member
I always figured he couldn't, because he didn't have a handy hand nearby to channel his regen energy outward.
paradox121
Member
Tasha Lem is too damn close to being an anagram that there has to be something there. I spent way too much time trying to work something out but all I get is:
AHA (i)TS MEL
or
THA(t)S MEL (with A left over)
or just
A HAT, MELS?
Which I'm sure is an entirely relevant question.
Glad I'm not the only one that thought that second dinner was weird. Not so much the story told, I understood how that's relate to the plot. Got to watch it again, but didn't the grandma lose her damn mind or something, remembering things differently or something. The animated GIF earlier of Amy hand makes me notice how prominent the ring was. I had a thought earlier that maybe it connects to granny fiddling with her ring, but then reminded myself that we saw Amy's grave.
StalkerUKCG
Banned
Lem being river was my first thought but then I remembered the fact she said "new body?" disproved it for me. river has seen that body since her change from Mel and river also had no idea who the silence was at first so this means she never seen them before she was river as we know and if it was after she wouldn't ask the doctor if it was a new body.
That said Moffat is predictable and cares little for plot holes so it could still be river.
Get ready for another "River lies" handwave
Auron_Kale
Member
After watching Time of the Doctor last night, I thought I was pretty ready to say goodbye but when the "Raggedy Man, goodnight," scene came... Nope nope nope.
Still, I'm looking forward to Capaldi's Twelve.
Still, I'm looking forward to Capaldi's Twelve.
Jest Chillin
Member
Blader's response would ring true of the Silence, certainly. River knew exactly what they were dealing with that entire time but didn't reveal it because things needed to play out a certain way for her to be who she was. If she knew the Space suit (which she later admitted she did) then she knew who The Silence were.
CloudyTuba
Member
Saw the episode. Messy at times, but overall I quite liked it. The ending was very emotional and I'm quite sad at the moment!
I was thinking, wouldn't erasing Name of the Doctor completely undo a lot of S7 - including Clara herself? If there's no TARDIS grave on Trenzalore, Clara can't travel into the Doctor's timestream, meaning she never appears in Asylum of the Daleks or The Snowmen - which also means she never attracts the Doctor's attention in the first place.
That's the problem I had with it, but I guess through the power of the Time Lords and because time isn't strictly linear or circular, they can rewrite whatever isn't a fixed point or time-locked.
Wibbly wobbly timey wimey
The way I look at it is that the Time Lords changed up stuff along with the new set of regenerations so things would remain roughly the same. Most of that Trenzalore never came to pass but they allowed the stuff with Clara to remain because it directly influenced the overall outcome.
It doesn't make logical sense in the end, I'd agree.
It shows that the Time Lords as a whole aren't as blood thirsty as every race thinks they are. They're just looking for a somewhat innocent way back into our universe, and that one weakness in the crack was a chance. The Daleks are damn resilient though. All of them dying when Gallifrey disappeared, the ones sucked into the void, and now the ones that got decimated by Matt's regeneration...there can't be a whole lot more knocking about right?
Exterminieren
Banned
The Name of the Doctor wasn't erased. It's still part of the Doctor's timeline. Thanks to the interference of the Time Lords, the physical location doesn't exist any more, but it still happened. Bit of a fourth-dimensional perspective.
So in that case, would the Wedding of River Song also still be a part of the Doctor's timeline even though that alternate history doesn't exist anymore?
Exterminieren
Banned
Yep. It still happened, the characters remember it later, and it has implications for ongoing character dynamics.
Jest Chillin
Member
If I'm remembering how that happened correctly, then yes. Though only Amy and The Doctor would remember it. Possibly Clara if she had a hand in it somewhere that we didn't see.
ScreenSplitter
Member
Do you think this would have been a little better if it was a two parter, or at least Time of the Doctor length? I think any writer would struggle wrapping up so many threads in 60 minutes.
There are always more
The Doctor's travels cover the entirety of space and time, and his timeline twists around itself so much he's not fighting them in a strictly chronological order anyway.
Oh from time to time he may wipe out this contingent of Daleks or that contingent of Daleks, and sometimes they'll wipe themselves out because that's how they roll, but there will always be one that escaped, or a few that were stashed away under a rug, behind a moon, a few galaxies over -- especially when time keeps shifting.
And if the Daleks ever get into really dire straits then in the extended universe there's also one that's explicitly in charge of time travel strategies so...
I think the pacing could have been served better by less rather than more. Off the top of my head, the episode could have run smoother if Moffat had cut out:
-the holographic clothing gag
-Weeping Angels cameo
-Tasha and the church being killed/infected by Daleks
-Doctor's alliance with the Silence
None of which add up to any significant amounts of screentime, but don't really lead anywhere and overly stuff the story.
Future Foundation
Member
DiipuSurotu
Banned
Yup, the next Angels episode after Manhattan should have been an episode where they are the main villains and the Doctor goes batshit berserk at them to avenge Amy and Rory. Their little cameo in TotD was unnecessary and didn't even make them seem very threatening.
ScreenSplitter
Member
What pissed me off about the Weeping Angels showing up was he showed absolutely zero recognition that last time they met, he lost one of his closest friends. Like, I was expecting some reference. That's why the Amy reference at the end felt a little forced; I loved it, but to bring back a character like that when you've had ZERO mention of her since her exit is just weird.
I generally liked it. Moffat was packing a lot into not too much time, and he mostly pulled it off (I get the feeling a lot of the plot's going to fall apart upon looking at it too hard). I'm not sure how I feel about the episode's central conceit of the Doctor spending hundreds of years guarding a single planet, but Smith played it as well as he could.
Coleman as Clara was also in pretty good shape. Clara's felt a bit bland since she was introduced, and she's still not quite there yet, but she felt more relateable and real than she has for much of series 7.
Minor quibble: they mostly reused music cues for Smith's final sequences. I think the only major new piece was when the old Doctor is hugging Clara goodbye just before going up the bell tower (and I think when he's up there slinging regeneration energy about). "Infinite Potential" from The Rings of Akhaten was a great piece to use as well, though, and I should've known we wouldn't get out without "The Sad Man in a Box" making a reappearance.
Speaking of reappearances, oh Amy. Only a few seconds, but a well-needed nod. (Not-Caitlin-Blackwood was a little distracting, though.) It really hammers home that this is it for Smith. He was the first Doctor whose whole run I caught live; I'm going to miss him.
But now Capaldi! Only a few seconds of him, but I'm already excited to see where he goes from here. And I loved the music for his scene - a hint of Twelve's musical stylings?
Coleman as Clara was also in pretty good shape. Clara's felt a bit bland since she was introduced, and she's still not quite there yet, but she felt more relateable and real than she has for much of series 7.
Minor quibble: they mostly reused music cues for Smith's final sequences. I think the only major new piece was when the old Doctor is hugging Clara goodbye just before going up the bell tower (and I think when he's up there slinging regeneration energy about). "Infinite Potential" from The Rings of Akhaten was a great piece to use as well, though, and I should've known we wouldn't get out without "The Sad Man in a Box" making a reappearance.
Speaking of reappearances, oh Amy. Only a few seconds, but a well-needed nod. (Not-Caitlin-Blackwood was a little distracting, though.) It really hammers home that this is it for Smith. He was the first Doctor whose whole run I caught live; I'm going to miss him.
But now Capaldi! Only a few seconds of him, but I'm already excited to see where he goes from here. And I loved the music for his scene - a hint of Twelve's musical stylings?
Future Foundation
Member
What is Mrs. Brown's Boys?
ScreenSplitter
Member
My guilty pleasure. Fucking love it.
From the sounds of it, a crappy comedy.
Exterminieren
Banned
Broad as a barn door sitcom.
One of the most popular in the UK, with only Miranda rivalling it. It plays for the cheap seats, and makes no apologies for it. I believe it's been popular in Ireland for a while, but it's broken out in the UK over the past 2 years, with the BBC co-producing.
Future Foundation
Member
For some reason, I thought it was another soap.
I have no problem with guilty pleasures. In fact, many of them are soaps.
Ah, thanks!
ScreenSplitter
Member
Lol no. Best of Clara? Whining over regeneration she knows is an inevitability and introducing the Nan from Benidorm isn't the best of Clara. She'll be forever reaching for cooky Oswin in Asylum of the Daleks, and she'll never get there. Terrible character. I welcome her speedy inevitable companion "death but not death".
Definitely don't agree with this one. It gave the Daleks a threatening angle and it led to a creepy reveal when she realised she had been killed but was still talking to the Doctor.
The others I do agree with though
ScreenSplitter
Member
I solemnly swear to stop ranting about Clara. Anyway, another great line;
"Any moment now... he's a' comin'.
"Any moment now... he's a' comin'.
Death period is an inevitability, does that mean people shouldn't be upset about it? She just doesn't want Eleven to go.
Oh dear.
paradox121
Member
I love that speech and the general air of...creepiness. Even before he appears Capaldi feels like some kind of threat. And when Clara asks 'Who's coming?' I love how Matt says 'The Doctor'. The way he pronounces that one word makes it sound like a whole new yet completely familiar character.
And upon rewatch I am firmly aboard the Tasha Lem= River crazy train. Way too many sly references for it to be a coincidence.
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