Day of the Doctor thread SPOILERS!
- Thread starter Objectable
- Start date
You know what? I'm having the Prometheus problem all over again. I left the theater thinking it was pretty good, but the more I thought about it and mulled it over, the less I liked it.
I liked the interactions between the Doctors, but the massive red RETCON stamp over the last 15-20 minutes of it is causing some major issues for me, and it's creating a galactic-core sized black hole of a plot hole that's sucking everything else into it. RTD's run might have relied almost exclusively on deus ex machina, but at least it bridge the gaps in a fairly succinct way, even if it relied on "because the author said so" too much. Moffat...Moffat is a decent writer (his attitudes about characters and relationships aside, anyway), but holy shit does he suck at long form. We have three seasons of unfinished endings that still have to be explained, we have another Doctor to introduce, and now we have Gallifrey Is Still Alive to deal with.
CONSISTENCY PLEASE.
Okay, so, maybe the The End of Time and the time-painting thing all happen in the same few minutes of time, due to some quantum mechanics thing and time being relative, fine, whatever, I'm trying to salvage things here, not let them erode further. All the terrors of the war happened before the Moment, since all the vaults are empty, planets have been consumed or destroyed, and random civilians on random planets flee for their lives at the very mention of a Time Lord. Nightmare child, Could-have-been-king, all that nonsense has happened in the recent past, but have been dealt with. Fine. I accept that.
But why are 13 Doctors present, when at most 5 (Hurt, Eccleston, Tennant, Smith, Capaldi) would have known about it? How does that make any fucking sense that he's trying to solve a problem he hasn't thought of yet for almost a millennium?
Why the hell are the Zylons even in this? What point did they even have, since their plot was just dropped halfway through, as was the business with the Queen, other than to provide a snippet of (pointless drivel of a) backstory about who did the painting and what the Black Vault was? Oh, wait, the Zylons are there to show things breaking out of the pictures, and for David Tennant to kiss one. How wonderfully purposeful.
Can we just let Moffat do a spin off show? A romantic comedy series where everyone can hook up to their hearts' content? One where a Dalek falls in love with a human for some silly reason? Because that's clearly all he wants to do. It would be a Doctor Who flavored version of Coupling, it would make him happy, it might even be worth a couple of laughs, and we could get someone in who doesn't write in plot holes as if they were commas.
I liked the interactions between the Doctors, but the massive red RETCON stamp over the last 15-20 minutes of it is causing some major issues for me, and it's creating a galactic-core sized black hole of a plot hole that's sucking everything else into it. RTD's run might have relied almost exclusively on deus ex machina, but at least it bridge the gaps in a fairly succinct way, even if it relied on "because the author said so" too much. Moffat...Moffat is a decent writer (his attitudes about characters and relationships aside, anyway), but holy shit does he suck at long form. We have three seasons of unfinished endings that still have to be explained, we have another Doctor to introduce, and now we have Gallifrey Is Still Alive to deal with.
CONSISTENCY PLEASE.
Okay, so, maybe the The End of Time and the time-painting thing all happen in the same few minutes of time, due to some quantum mechanics thing and time being relative, fine, whatever, I'm trying to salvage things here, not let them erode further. All the terrors of the war happened before the Moment, since all the vaults are empty, planets have been consumed or destroyed, and random civilians on random planets flee for their lives at the very mention of a Time Lord. Nightmare child, Could-have-been-king, all that nonsense has happened in the recent past, but have been dealt with. Fine. I accept that.
But why are 13 Doctors present, when at most 5 (Hurt, Eccleston, Tennant, Smith, Capaldi) would have known about it? How does that make any fucking sense that he's trying to solve a problem he hasn't thought of yet for almost a millennium?
Why the hell are the Zylons even in this? What point did they even have, since their plot was just dropped halfway through, as was the business with the Queen, other than to provide a snippet of (pointless drivel of a) backstory about who did the painting and what the Black Vault was? Oh, wait, the Zylons are there to show things breaking out of the pictures, and for David Tennant to kiss one. How wonderfully purposeful.
Can we just let Moffat do a spin off show? A romantic comedy series where everyone can hook up to their hearts' content? One where a Dalek falls in love with a human for some silly reason? Because that's clearly all he wants to do. It would be a Doctor Who flavored version of Coupling, it would make him happy, it might even be worth a couple of laughs, and we could get someone in who doesn't write in plot holes as if they were commas.
I loved it. I'm not one to pick at plotholes or continuity errors, and I loved it. The redemption of John Hurt's doctor was well done, and explained why the other doctors disliked him even though he didn't actually kill millions. Also, the tower door being unlocked = genius, as well as the mick take of Tennants regeneration.
I'm kind of disappointed at the lack of companions, whilst Donna probably couldn't be used without a massive retcon/made up bit (timelord/human thing) it would have been nice to see Martha, Rory and Amy back as well. Also Ecclestones doctor, my favourite of the new series (haven't seen any of the old, and I may be biased being a northener)
I think everyone complaining about the change to the war of time needs to think of the possibilities this now opens up to the writing staff (hopefully some new staff when Smith regenerates).
I want the master to find out about this. Now that could get interesting.
I'm kind of disappointed at the lack of companions, whilst Donna probably couldn't be used without a massive retcon/made up bit (timelord/human thing) it would have been nice to see Martha, Rory and Amy back as well. Also Ecclestones doctor, my favourite of the new series (haven't seen any of the old, and I may be biased being a northener)
I think everyone complaining about the change to the war of time needs to think of the possibilities this now opens up to the writing staff (hopefully some new staff when Smith regenerates).
I want the master to find out about this. Now that could get interesting.
Can Moffat please try to make the progression between his episodes make sense? The guy can write good individual episodes, like this one. However, connecting them is not his strong point. There was such a jarring sense of whiplash between this episode and The Name of the Doctor that I was left wondering if I'd missed an episode. What happened to the Great Intelligence with Simian dead (twice now?) How did they get out of the time stream? Are we just going to ignore River's dangling hints about Clara and not bring it up in this direct continuation of the last episode?
Nope, just going to tell a standalone story about the War Doctor, and forget anything and everything that happened before the last two minutes of The Name of the Doctor. Vasta, Strax and what'shername getting back to Victorian London? Never addressed. Clara nearly dying, laying in the Doctor's arms, ambiguous to if she survives? She's fine this episode, without ever commenting on the ordeal she went through.
It's a great episode, don't get me wrong, but it stands on its own so much that it feels like a detriment to what came before. Like they needed to take time off from their arc just to tell this one story. That'd be fine if this incarnation of Doctor Who focused on episodic stories or standalones, but Moffat wants his big story arcs, and this just falls through the cracks on its own.
Nope, just going to tell a standalone story about the War Doctor, and forget anything and everything that happened before the last two minutes of The Name of the Doctor. Vasta, Strax and what'shername getting back to Victorian London? Never addressed. Clara nearly dying, laying in the Doctor's arms, ambiguous to if she survives? She's fine this episode, without ever commenting on the ordeal she went through.
It's a great episode, don't get me wrong, but it stands on its own so much that it feels like a detriment to what came before. Like they needed to take time off from their arc just to tell this one story. That'd be fine if this incarnation of Doctor Who focused on episodic stories or standalones, but Moffat wants his big story arcs, and this just falls through the cracks on its own.
This is what I came to this thread, and read through all the comments, to address. I have no idea what is going on in the recent episodes at all, and this episode seemed to start like any of the more run of the mill series 7 stories, ignoring the fact that smith jumped into his own timeSoviet Heavy said:
That was supposed to make normal clara dead and a whole lot of other etceteras.
I am still glad that the ponds are now trapped in the past, though. I was really over the ponds.
@BehattedWanderer: I think the Zylons were there to explain why Queen E1 was pissed at the 10th Doctor (remember the Shakespeare episode), as a plot device, and to show that the human race isn't completely screwed without The Doctor.
-Though, pretty close.
-Though, pretty close.
That's actually an excellent point. I'd forgotten about that.Tanis said:
That's just simply not true.misterprickly said:
I wasn't counting the Tennant clone as a regeneration, I was counting the moment where he gets shot by a Dalek, goes into the TARDIS, explodes with regeneration light and only keeps the same face because he channels the regeneration with his own DNA.
He still prevented a fatal wound using his biology. I don't see how that isn't a regeneration.
On a completely unrelated note, it would be really handy if everyone just stuck to the quote button for replies so we actually see the reply show up in our inboxes. Also if anyone didn't know, it's relatively easy to quote multiple people. It'd be cool, that's all. No pressure.
I have a theory, that no one else seems to of brought up.
To me the moment is Bad Wolf.
When Rose became Bad Wolf she went throughout time (seen by the presence of Bad Wolf signs every where). My theory is that she went back and made the Gallifreyans believe the moment had became sentient. She also showed John Hurt who he would become and led the other Doctors back the the moment. Thus saving the Doctor in the greatest way possible.
To me the moment is Bad Wolf.
When Rose became Bad Wolf she went throughout time (seen by the presence of Bad Wolf signs every where). My theory is that she went back and made the Gallifreyans believe the moment had became sentient. She also showed John Hurt who he would become and led the other Doctors back the the moment. Thus saving the Doctor in the greatest way possible.
The main purposes of the Zygons were to introduce the "frozen in time" plot device so it wouldn't be pure deux-ex-machina/would make sense in the context of the show when it was used on Gallifrey (in the same way the scene with the sonic was used to hint toward the same "time to think about how to solve the problem" thing Moffat used back in Forest of the Dead), and to show how the Doctor's personality had been affected by the Time War - how he desperately needed to save everyone, to make up for when he (seemingly) couldn't save anyone. It was an episode about the Time War (the event that had defined the series since its reboot), but for me at least, the Zygons worked well as a more conventional enemy that lead up to the Moment when everything changed. Which makes sense, seeing as it was the Moment that put the War Doctor into that particular sequence of events to help him figure out what he had to do.Tanis said:
Honestly, my only issue with the Zygon plotline (aside from Ten consistently failing to identify them correctly, which just got annoying after a while) was the fact that if there were Zygons on Earth in 1592, why did the Zygons that first showed up on the show act independently of/not know about them? Haven't actually seen Terror of the Zygons, but that seems like a relevant point.
- - -
As for the resolution of the Time War itself, I believe that at some point in there it was mentioned that both the Time Lords and Daleks had been severely depleted by the war, and the Daleks were throwing "everything they've got" at Gallifrey. So I'm willing to believe that that covers the absence of the previously-named atrocities (the Nightmare Child and all that), because they'd already been used up (which left the end of the war 'standard' enough to not go into absurd special effects), and I'm willing to believe that while the Dalek race as a whole was not wiped out, any still fighting in the war were, with the freezing/vanishing of Gallifrey somehow setting off an explosion that destroyed the fleet surrounding because science. That also explains why the Daleks that weren't around for the end of the war survived past the Time War into the new show, and it could also open up the option for any Time Lords that wouldn't have fought in the war and stayed away from Gallifrey (the Monk, the Rani) to have survived past it as well, like the Master did.
...and as for the fact that it negated something that defined the show for the last 9 years, well, maybe that's why the saving of Gallifrey is for the best: the Time War defined New Who a bit too much at times, and being absolved of the genocide of his race gives the Doctor the opportunity to take a new path, play a new role, etc. It doesn't absolve his guilt entirely - he still would have pressed that button if the other option wasn't available, so even knowing that he didn't, he has to live with the fact that he was willing to do it - but it doesn't have to consume him anymore, the way it did (in different ways) for 9, 10, and 11. The Time War was a huge part of the mythology of the show, but if it was to keep growing, it had to move on. From a strictly objective/production point of view, the Time War came into play so that new viewers of the show wouldn't be overwhelmed with too much lore at once and be too confused to keep watching (which was part of why the FOX movie flopped), but now it's been long enough that the new fans have a decent enough understanding of the lore for the Time Lords to be properly brought back into the fold, providing a whole new set of circumstances to prevent the show from growing stale. For instance, now future Doctors will have to deal with the issue of what's to be done about the Time Lords - and what they were willing to do - when Gallifrey is found and brought back. There are whole new wrinkles to deal with.
(Apologies for the fifteen different points, I've just had a bunch of different thoughts about the impact of the episode since I saw it, and haven't really had anywhere to talk about it, so it all kind of came out at once here.)
Nope, not gonna jump on the love wagon for this. It was dramatic, well produced, and John Hurt rocks, but Smith and Tennant are excessively childish. My real problem with it is it doesn't change anything. It's all just compartmentalized, the one thing that truly haunted the new doctors has been neatly folded up. The doctor looses much of depth he had gained, but the planet is stuck in the phantom zone or some sh*t forever and won't affect the direction of the series (well they may do something with it, but it certainly, and specifically, doesn't affect a single other thing that's already happened).
I grew up with the tapes of the old show, and really liked the new, but after season 3 I'v steadily lost interest, especially in the season conclusions. It gets all wiblely wobely, any character worth the actors paycheck gets a cameo, a bunch of wierd stuff happens, and the status quo is restored. The end of season 3 was so terrible I actually repressed it, and the end of season 4, while dramatic with the re-introduction of the Master, still just ended with a bunch of wishy washy magic and a reset button.
I really didn't want to say it but since Steven Moffat became the show, it's gone downhill, I feel bad for Matt Smith, to be the face of the decline.
Last word, it's cool that Tom Baker got a cameo, but not that cool, Peter Davison's cameo with Tennant was much more interesting. Tom Baker is the epitome of the doctor, but his inclusion is just a nod to fan service.
I grew up with the tapes of the old show, and really liked the new, but after season 3 I'v steadily lost interest, especially in the season conclusions. It gets all wiblely wobely, any character worth the actors paycheck gets a cameo, a bunch of wierd stuff happens, and the status quo is restored. The end of season 3 was so terrible I actually repressed it, and the end of season 4, while dramatic with the re-introduction of the Master, still just ended with a bunch of wishy washy magic and a reset button.
I really didn't want to say it but since Steven Moffat became the show, it's gone downhill, I feel bad for Matt Smith, to be the face of the decline.
Last word, it's cool that Tom Baker got a cameo, but not that cool, Peter Davison's cameo with Tennant was much more interesting. Tom Baker is the epitome of the doctor, but his inclusion is just a nod to fan service.
In Terror of the Zygons, a Zygon spaceship crashed and they were in Scotland for centuries. Later they decided to conquer the world because they found out their own planet had been destroyed in the meantime, and that a big refugee fleet was coming and needed somewhere to stay.AliasBot said:
Also, zygons couldn't just take anyone's shape, it only worked when the original was stuck in a special machine (sorta like what happened to Kate).
The other thing is, zygons weren't immune to bullets. All those UNIT soldiers running around and those Elizabethian troops...if they'd not all wandered off, they could have easily have killed the zygons once they'd been identified.
This totally screwed up my carefully crafted Doctor Who/Star Trek crossover fanfic. 0/10.
In all seriousness, I quite enjoyed it, though I'm not surprised that it's polarized people. I'm a little disappointed when I see folks who not only decide they dislike it, but also decide that those who would like it, or love it, are doing so out of some irrational fanatical blindness, because frankly that just sounds absurdly pompous, but meh. There have definitely been a couple of sizable plot holes left, but to be honest, I've never exactly watched this series for its tight plot work. We are talking about a series that involves rampant amounts of time travel, a phenomenon which by its very nature is destined to be a complete pain in the ass for any sort of continuity. It's a running joke that whenever someone tries to figure out the complexities of time travel and it's numerous paradoxes, headaches and possibly bring explosions ensue. We're also talking about one of the longest running television series in production, so combine both those two elements and frankly I'm surprised they ever bother to try keeping things consistent at all.
In all seriousness, I quite enjoyed it, though I'm not surprised that it's polarized people. I'm a little disappointed when I see folks who not only decide they dislike it, but also decide that those who would like it, or love it, are doing so out of some irrational fanatical blindness, because frankly that just sounds absurdly pompous, but meh. There have definitely been a couple of sizable plot holes left, but to be honest, I've never exactly watched this series for its tight plot work. We are talking about a series that involves rampant amounts of time travel, a phenomenon which by its very nature is destined to be a complete pain in the ass for any sort of continuity. It's a running joke that whenever someone tries to figure out the complexities of time travel and it's numerous paradoxes, headaches and possibly bring explosions ensue. We're also talking about one of the longest running television series in production, so combine both those two elements and frankly I'm surprised they ever bother to try keeping things consistent at all.
That was in Waters of Mars - He tried to re-write it but it didn't work.008Zulu said:
Immediately after that dramatic speech
the person he saved suicided to preserve the chronology of events.
I think everyone is probably on the right track in terms of it being reconciled by everyone (including Tennant, Eckleston, and Hurt's doctors) thinking it had been destroyed.
The fixed point presumably only demands that a) the doctor think he destroyed it, and b) that Galiphrey be absent from the Universe.
Both of those requirements are fulfilled by snatching the planet as they did.
According to history, everyone died there, but the Doctor was able to save three of them. Though the Captain committed suicide on Earth. the Point was rewritten, just not as he had hoped.OneCatch said:
1) I absolutely agree with you, but I guess the whole, paintings are a frozen moment in time had to be explained somehow.Plinglebob said:
2) They really did need to linger on Eccleston's appearance a little longer. It really was the barest of attempts to even connect Hurt to Eccleston.
And no it was not wrong. I did the same!
But in my opinion the 50th was overhyped and underdelivered. But also left a really bad taste in the mouth when Moffat just broke his own plot. Just go back and watch the End of Time and you'll notice that Moffat created a nice plot hole. I am referring to Rassilon constantly making remarks about the continuous burning and death of Gallifrey. But due to the events of the Day of the Doctor, these are apparently just swept under the rug.
Am I missing something or has Moffat really screwed something up?
