Sea Devils And Die: GeroniMoffat's Doctor Who In The 2010s

But yeah Gallifrey was doing perfectly fine when he made off with it.

Ok cool.

I'm not a Doctor, but I'm pretty sure that if I was on the verge of killing my people a little romp wouldn't swing me out of my bad mood. But that's why I say it's a difficult balancing act, because who wants Dr Who to be unutterably despairing and depressing (well, aside from big old gothy me)? Yet it's going to be disappointing if you're thrown out of your suspension of disbelief. But I reckon kids would be more believing of the weird mood-swingy thing, little kids perfectly understand the move from "waaaaaah it's the end of the world" to "oh, an ice cream! Yeay!"

/I thought he was mostly great. I definitely thought he was the right choice for a War Doctor. But the 'fun' aspect just didn't jibe with what the war-weary side should have been -> this is a problem with the writing, not the actor, and also a pretty big problem to balance.

A thousand times THIS. Which is why the Time War was a bad topic for the special. IMHO.

In Eccleston's first episode it's heavily implied he's just regenerated, so although he has survivor's guilt, he's a different regeneration to the Doctor who blew up Gallifrey, which we would have previously assumed to be McGann

I watched 'Rose' again a few months ago, and I don't see this at all.

Wasn't he worried about the size of his ears, and didn't know what he looked like until he looked in a mirror (disclaimer: haven't seen it for years)

Yeah he's closer to the Fast Show's "aren't Xs brilliant!" enthusiasm guy in that first episode xp

He looks in the mirror and says something like "big ears, but could be worse" so it implies he's just regenerated.

But doesn't Rose uncover loads of pics on the internet of Eccles in various historical locations, implying he's been Doctoring for a while?

wibbley wobbley timey wimey

yes, or he appears in all of those photos later in his own timeline or does it not work that way?

timey wimey

goes ding

lol xp

But then he would have to have been with Rose for all those photos, which I guess is possible if they're unseen adventures and she happens to have been (will have been?) out of shot in all of them.

Can't remember the Ecclestone backstory bits but Tennant and Smith both definitely had periods of many years that they lived separately from their companions, despite it seeming to said companions that they'd been away for a day, a month, or sometimes a few years. Perfectly possible that Ecclestone did this too.

There are no such obvious gaps in Nine and Rose's travels as far as I remember, though I could be wrong.

Yeah I think That may be what timey wimey refered to. except that maybe the story writers weren't paying attention to things and didn't provide gaps where they should have. I'm trying to think if there is a point at which the two are separated mid season since he's with her at the end.
& if he hasn't had a prior chance to see his own reflection, unless he is really vain it would seem strange if that had happened prior to his meeting Rose.

So looks like it was probably an oversight, or do the 2 part at the end of the 1st episode then he come back to pick her up for some reason, which might indicate it happened in that interval?
Of course it presumably wasn't known that he was going to quit in mid season before that sequence was shot giving him dotting throughout history. So maybe they were thinking there would be time afterwards to do that.

Or at least have announced the same before the season aired. Which is what I think happened isn't it?

Or I guess they could've split up and reunited between episodes.

I like the idea of Nine having had a period of lonely angstful wandering before being reconnected to humanity by Rose better though.

xpost

There's probably a racist/patronising/modern-centric explanation which says he was just never near a mirror until Rose, having been in remote places. (Which is clearly bollocks but, you know, Rusty.)

The real answer though is probably

HOOT! Wouldn't it be cool if The Doctor doesn't know what he looks like! And when he sees himself in the mirror he can make a joke about his ears, in a slight rework of the script in Robot and Spearhead! HOOT!
HOOT! A sad fat loser has been paying attention to what's been happening to the Doctor while he's been off television! He can have been at famous events in the past, like when the show did historicals, and the fat loser can get the wrong end of the stick! Then we can do sad music when the Autons shoot him! HOOT!
HOOT! HANDWAVE! HOOT!
QUEL DOMMAGE!

You missed "I totally want to fuck the Doctor" but other than that OTM

There are no such obvious gaps in Nine and Rose's travels as far as I remember, though I could be wrong.

At one point Ecclestone tells Rose about the bicycle he left for her one Christmas when she was a little girl, so there's at least one occasion for him to have been off on his own since having met her.

You missed "I totally want to fuck the Doctor" but other than that OTM

I actually think Moff wants it more than Rusty, myself. They take turns in the annoying sweepstakes.

Yeah, Moff was the one making Doctor action figures hold hands.

The Five(ish) Doctors was better than the anniversary episode. Which was fun, but also grim.

Anyone interested in a series of 50th anniversary polls to determine the best story of each Doctor? Not been done before right? I'd try and time it to culminate in an 11th Doctor poll shortly after the broadcast of his final episode on the 25th.

Obviously there would be no poll for Eight.

I ran some before, at least for the b&w era.

Eight could have three series of polls, audios, novels and comics

Saw the 50th in 3D again this arvo, still fucken great you guys

I know I'm slow, but... when he's in the future or present his bow tie is red, and when he's in the past it's blue? Just like the vortex's colours when the Tardis travels (blue when it travels into the past, red when it's in the direction of the future, green is when it's complicated)? Cool.

Holy shit--I had never noticed any of that. Nice one!

uh, when would you notice that? the bow tie thing definitely isn't true, and are there any episodes in which the time vortex behaves that way?

well, that would explain it, then

all the rushing to this thread tells me everyone else hated it as well

yes, sic, yes, yes i know, yep, yep, yes, yes i know, yes sic, yes, okay yes, yes of course, yep, yep, yes, yes sic you're right, yes i know, yep, yes sic, yes but it really was a heaving and utterly convoluted bag of shit from start to finish

people not rushing to thread because it's christmas and there's other things happening? i liked it. from top to bottom. best xmas special since the relaunch

Smith's Doctor going out on a perfectly pitched "well this has all been pretty good fun, hasn't it?" note, nice antidote to the crazily overblown Tennant exit

all the rushing to this thread tells me everyone else hated it as well

This hasn't been broadcast in the US yet and most of us are still enjoying our families anyway

i'm sure people jumped into this thread rather more quickly in previous years

anyway don't rush away from your families for this one

bah humbug, this was better than most of the series that's just finished. and probably more enjoyable than the 50th special

this was better than most of the series that's just finished

i agree 100%, but probably not for the same reasons

it was very good. great three story run at the end of smith's tenure, with name/day/time.

I liked it! I was glad the Grand Moff tied up all the loose threads hanging around and had me convinced for a few seconds that he had indeed had some sort of masterplan all along. I teared up a few times, so it was a successful Christmas Special in my book.

my wife cried when the bow tie hit the ground, I consider that a success (she is basically a reluctant fan who would never admit it)

Grandstanding nonsense, but mostly very effective grandstanding nonsense. I enjoyed it loads and found it moving in parts.

Waiting for more people to post and explain the plot to me.

Specifically what the hell the invisible crack timelords were after.

They were in the pocket universe waiting to see if it was safe to come out, in case which the Doctor would've told them his name.

For all the villains they packed in and apocalpyticism, this was remarkably low-key! TBH, Matt Smith's address to the camera was a lot too thick -- Moff trying to go for a Prospero's epilogue (oops Tempest spoilers) a little too obviously/fan-servicey -- but I was really affected by Clara's desolation at her dinner.

I was waiting till the Merkins had seen it before posting.

I enjoyed it about as much as I've enjoyed the rest of Moffatt's time but the plot REALLY doesn't stand up to scrutiny against Moffatt's own show logic.

Why didn't Clara try to kill the Silent, since all humans have had coded into them to kill Silents on sight since the Moon landing broadcast?

If regeneration energy kills a planet full of daleks then how could they have ever invaded Gallifrey? Surely after they killed the first Time Lord then BOSH invasion over?

So the Silents from the church here travelled back in time to the dawn of man and started influencing mankind's development and invent space travel to build a spacesuit to kill the Doctor? When they already had space travel and spacesuits and time travel and shit?

Hang on, doesn't his mean the Silents that killed the Doctor knew he was the final regeneration before everybody else did, because it was always their plan to kill him finally?

If this Doctor is the final one, how come he nearly regenerated in that episode (was it Day of the Doctor, maybe)?

Who put River Song's grave on Trenzalore, seeing as she wasn't there?

There's more, but wth I had fun watching. I am annoyed though that after months of Moffatt saying that we'd all missed something which would let the numbering make sense and allow for Capaldi, and it was definitely that we'd missed something, and we'd all kick ourselves when we found out what it was, and Moffatt had read lots of internet theories but nobody had got it yet, and we'd just missed something... It turns out to be a brand new handwave Maguffin that Rusty would have been proud of.

That last paragraph doesn't bode well for his "you've seen it, it happened, but no-one on the whole of the internet has spotted it yet" resolution he has up his sleeve for Sherlock (I didn't realise he'd done the whole "I am way smarter than EVERYONE ON THE INTERNET mwahahahah" thing about this as well). Bah.

It's a lot harder to handwave shit away in Sherlock though, because it actually has to follow real-world rules.

I saw a bit of this yesterday but there were lots of family distractions at the same time but there did appear to be a point where not a single person on Twitter was following what was going on. I enjoyed it when I watched it again today but it would probably have been better without the Christmas stuff shoehorned into it. Possibly just too much stuff in it for a Christmas special really.

I hope that's the end of the over-elaborate timey wimey plot that Moffatt's been doing for the entire Smith era but really it does just tie itself up with knots when the show would be just as enjoyable without it. The resolution was really "ah I don't give a shit about the rules" which is fair enough but if so why bother making the whole thing so complex in the first place?

Bits I enjoyed - the wooden Cyberman was pretty cool, as was the whole manic energy of the first few minutes. Clara's gran's speech at the dinner was surprisingly moving in the context of everything else. Also I was wondering if the Doctor's "I've been a bit rusty lately" line was intentional. After all the bombast of the burst of regeneration energy, the actual change was really fast, like Capaldi's face suddenly pounced on you.

Thank god Capaldi's Doctor will actually have a Scottish accent, btw.

Overall Smith has been a great Doctor but by-and-large he's been squandered as a result of dodgy scripts, for the last couple of years at any rate. The very first Smith-Moffatt season is probably the best nu-Who run, either that or the Ecclestone season.

Loved this tbh*, second best Christmas special ever. and no idea why ppl on twitter were going on about the plot not making sense when I was in an airport twenty hours ago**.

Why didn't Clara try to kill the Silent, since all humans have had coded into them to kill Silents on sight since the Moon landing broadcast?

yeah true, that's a biggie

If regeneration energy kills a planet full of daleks then how could they have ever invaded Gallifrey? Surely after they killed the first Time Lord then BOSH invasion over?

this was an entire cycle's worth of regeneration energy / a special assist from the Time Lords to help the Doctor win in this situation, not a regular regeneration.

So the Silents from the church here travelled back in time to the dawn of man and started influencing mankind's development and invent space travel to build a spacesuit to kill the Doctor? When they already had space travel and spacesuits and time travel and shit?

its_a_trap.jpg

Hang on, doesn't his mean the Silents that killed the Doctor knew he was the final regeneration before everybody else did, because it was always their plan to kill him finally?

Before who else? The audience?

If this Doctor is the final one, how come he nearly regenerated in that episode (was it Day of the Doctor, maybe)?

...Hurt regenerates in Day Of The Doctor, not Smith. He becomes Eccleston.

Who put River Song's grave on Trenzalore, seeing as she wasn't there?

What does this matter? It hasn't happened yet from the perspective of this episode, and might not for centuries. But pretend Capaldi goes and does it sometime next week, out of sentiment, if you need an answer now.

I am annoyed though that after months of Moffatt saying that we'd all missed something which would let the numbering make sense and allow for Capaldi, and it was definitely that we'd missed something, and we'd all kick ourselves when we found out what it was, and Moffatt had read lots of internet theories but nobody had got it yet, and we'd just missed something... It turns out to be a brand new handwave Maguffin that Rusty would have been proud of.

There haven't been months of Moffatt saying this AFAIK, just one sentence once, to a specific group of people. Can you link to multiple instances of him saying "it was definitely that we ie not the ppl on the panel at the Cheltenham Literature Festival in October'd missed something, and we'd all kick ourselves when we found out what it was, and Moffatt had read lots of internet theories but nobody had got it yet,"?

And all I've seen since he said that one line, is people going "ah, he's probably counting the time Tennant regenerated and didn't change." So.




* except all the ladies chucking giant wide-ons for Smith, zzz

** so, sorry for not addressing all of AA's specific and detailed and reasoned critiques at that moment