The More Things Change... (Doctor Who)

[TimeLord]

So with the final episode of the 11th (12th, 13th?) Doctor, there have been a lot of hasty tie ups and resets. Let's have a gander at them;

The most obvious being the reset of the regeneration limit by the Time Lords. This is not a new thing. The Time Lords have been established as resetting a Time Lords regeneration limit in past stories, most notability the Master's own life.

9 is 10, 10 is 11 & 12, 11 is 13
This has been a talking point ever since the end of series 4 when the Doctor half regenerated into his spare hand. Until now it has never been brought up as a use of his actual regeneration, but there is now confirmation that it did count towards his limit. Which makes sense.
Also, while the War Doctor was not counted as a 'Doctor', he still used a regeneration out of his life. Pushing forward those in front of him to make Matt Smith the 13th Doctor.

The TARDIS explosion of series 5
Thrown away in a single line was the reasoning behind the TARDIS explosion and it's cause. They went back to try to kill him, failed, and caused the cracks that the Time Lords were communicating through that started the siege of Trenzalore. Destiny paradox.

New regeneration cycle
Something that struck me when it happened was how quick the regeneration itself occurred. One second and a new man steps into the Doctor's shoes. Not the drawn out change of Eccleston and Tennant. I preferred a longer regeneration to a shorter burst.

All in all I'm pretty happy about most of the tie ups and resets. It allows the story to start fresh with the only plot point being the search for Gallifrey. I'm a little sad that the TARDIS explosion was dealt with so flippantly but hey ho.
What do you think about the changes and resets from this Christmas Special?

I look forward to Peter Capaldi next year!
The more things change,
The more they stay the same.

 

[Albino Boo]

You are about 5 hours too late mate.

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/18.837695-Dr-Who-Christmas-Special-2013

 

[Soviet Heavy]

I'll stick with our resident timelord. I enjoyed the use of the Truth field to finally fill in some plot holes and give us some explanations. Though I'm still wondering how Clara and the Doctor managed to escape his time stream back in Name of the Doctor.

I enjoyed Capaldi's manic attitude. Hopefully he's a Tom Baker like eccentric.

 

[TimeLord]

You are about 5 hours too late mate.

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/18.837695-Dr-Who-Christmas-Special-2013

I'm not talking about the episode as a whole. This is a discussion on just the universe changing/resetting events and their impact on the future of the series

I'll stick with our resident timelord. I enjoyed the use of the Truth field to finally fill in some plot holes and give us some explanations. Though I'm still wondering how Clara and the Doctor managed to escape his time stream back in Name of the Doctor.

I enjoyed Capaldi's manic attitude. Hopefully he's a Tom Baker like eccentric.

I really hoped when Clara spoke to the Time Lords through the crack she would be forced to say his real name due to the truth field. She may have forgotten it but she still saw it in the book in the TARDIS library so it might have been buried in her memories somehow. I wonder if that will ever come up in a future episode...
I wasn't expecting it to be revealed out loud mind, maybe just a silent whisper or an off screen cut or something.

 

[Bizarre_Chicken]

I'm looking forward to Peter Capaldi as the Doctor. He's an excellent actor to begin with, and should bring something really special and fresh to the series, and as Timelord said, having the series resolve a lot of stuff down to only the search for Gallifrey left will be nice. I'm looking forward to it.

 

[Catfood220]

New regeneration cycle
Something that struck me when it happened was how quick the regeneration itself occurred. One second and a new man steps into the Doctor's shoes. Not the drawn out change of Eccleston and Tennant. I preferred a longer regeneration to a shorter burst.

I didn't mind the quick regeneration thing this time, he had already done the shooting regeneration energy out of his body thing to defeat the Daleks and save the day. To do it again to regenerate into Peter Capaldi would of been redundant.

Mind you, I would have preferred it for Clara to of walked into the Tardis and the new Doctor be working at a console or something and say "Come on Clara, time to go." But I suppose then people would be upset that Matt Smith never got say goodbye.

 

[Yuno Gasai]

I didn't mind the quick regeneration thing this time, he had already done the shooting regeneration energy out of his body thing to defeat the Daleks and save the day. To do it again to regenerate into Peter Capaldi would of been redundant.

You took the words right out of my mouth.

I'm actually really surprised he didn't just regenerate then and there, on top of the belltower. I would have liked them to have dragged his regeneration out just a little longer than a split second, but I still rather enjoyed watching Clara's face when Smith disappeared and left her with Capaldi.

I'm also interested to see if Capaldi will remember her (like Smith promised he would) or whether their relationship will start from scratch.

 

[TimeLord]

New regeneration cycle
Something that struck me when it happened was how quick the regeneration itself occurred. One second and a new man steps into the Doctor's shoes. Not the drawn out change of Eccleston and Tennant. I preferred a longer regeneration to a shorter burst.

I didn't mind the quick regeneration thing this time, he had already done the shooting regeneration energy out of his body thing to defeat the Daleks and save the day. To do it again to regenerate into Peter Capaldi would of been redundant.

Mind you, I would have preferred it for Clara to of walked into the Tardis and the new Doctor be working at a console or something and say "Come on Clara, time to go." But I suppose then people would be upset that Matt Smith never got say goodbye.

I was fully expecting Capaldi to come down the steps when Clara entered the TARDIS. I was actually a little disappointed that he didn't. Mind you, I did like Smith's farewell.

I didn't mind the quick regeneration thing this time, he had already done the shooting regeneration energy out of his body thing to defeat the Daleks and save the day. To do it again to regenerate into Peter Capaldi would of been redundant.

You took the words right out of my mouth.

I'm actually really surprised he didn't just regenerate then and there, on top of the belltower. I would have liked them to have dragged his regeneration out just a little longer than a split second, but I still rather enjoyed watching Clara's face when Smith disappeared and left her with Capaldi.

I'm also interested to see if Capaldi will remember her (like Smith promised he would) or whether their relationship will start from scratch.

Interesting thought since the Doctor has remembered his past companions but this is now a new regeneration cycle. I doubt he will have lost all his memories though. Saying that he seems to have maybe forgot how to fly the TARDIS. Even if it is temporarily.

 

[Ninjamedic]

Interesting thought since the Doctor has remembered his past companions but this is now a new regeneration cycle. I doubt he will have lost all his memories though. Saying that he seems to have maybe forgot how to fly the TARDIS. Even if it is temporarily.

I'm putting it down to post-regeneration weirdness myself, he's done crazier stuff in the past. Though I have to say, I loved how sudden the change was, just *BAM* -he's now Twelve.

 

[Remus]

It does make a bit of sense for the Doctor to use regeneration energy as a weapon. There's past precedent, with River Song and The Master. So seeing him explode like a volcano was kinda cool. As for the Doctor's name, I don't expect we'll ever know that. The Doctor is the name he chose, the one everyone knows him as, so his given name is kinda irrelevant. Did anyone else get the idea that the high priestess was River in a past regeneration? She is a closet psychopath after all.

 

[Thaluikhain]

Did anyone else get the idea that the high priestess was River in a past regeneration? She is a closet psychopath after all.

Er...apart from that, I don't see any reason to. She also died several times without regenerating, and didn't try to murder the Doctor.

 

[Ghostface2206]

I thought that the episode's plot was a bit rushed through, like one second he's simply exploring the town of Christmas, and not long after that the plot quickly has all the bad guys come down to attack the place, then all of a sudden the doctor lives there for years (even though Matt Smith's doc has been alive for a few hundred years, he stays around for a few decades and suddenly looks very old?) At this point, I really don't care about his name, I actually thought that they were going to reveal it to be Trenzalor at one point. I have honestly never cared about Clara because I think she's really boring and there's nothing special about her un-like previous companions, I also find her annoying and I hope she leaves next series. I thought that the Doctor would take that young boy (who grew up, I think his name was Bartholomew?) to be his companion.

I'm really happy to see Peter Capaldi, and can't wait to see him in action properly.

 

[e90grfvsyu7bk]

no wouldn't smith be 12, 10 may have regenerated twice but that doesn't mean the first time he turned into 11

 

[Rylee Fox]

no wouldn't smith be 12, 10 may have regenerated twice but that doesn't mean the first time he turned into 11

Technically it was his 12th incarnation at that moment since 10 was actually 11 because of the War Doctor, who was actually 9. This makes Smith the 13th incarnation.

 

[Something Amyss]

no wouldn't smith be 12, 10 may have regenerated twice but that doesn't mean the first time he turned into 11

That counted as a regeneration, so technically it was his 12th incarnation at that moment since 10 was actually 11 because of the War Doctor. This makes Smith the 13th incarnation.

Well, despite the number of regenerations he'd still the 11th Doctor because 10 was two regenerations. Smith's Doctor even calls himself 11 at one point, which makes sense. Then again, that seemed to be a part of series five's "the eight doctor was canon, no others (including the audio stories) count, deal with it" thing, so....Who the hell knows.

Then the special happens and he becomes 12, but there's still one more regeneration used than new incarnation.

Wibbly wobbly....

 

[Crispee]

I thought it was an ok episode. Every agrees that Steven Moffat writes story arcs and basic internal consistency by the seat of his pants, but I didn't care about that anymore, and I don't expect a lot of other people did. The explanation was terrible and rushed with a single line of explanation, but at least now I know they're not going to drag this plotline out any longer than three years, which was already a preposterous length for a story that I didn't care about, and can begin anew.

I thought Matt Smith's exit was sweet. It was less self indulgent than Tennant's, and I especially like his last words, "I will always remember when The Doctor was me.", because that speaks to both Matt himself as well as his fans. I think Capaldi's entrance was a bit rushed and didn't leave a lot of room to establish anything about his character, but I guess we'll see soon enough.

 

[Netrigan]

I think Capaldi's entrance was a bit rushed and didn't leave a lot of room to establish anything about his character, but I guess we'll see soon enough.

I think it's the second most verbose entrance in Who history. I think only Smith beats him.

The post-regeneration moment is really about saying "here's the new guy", they never establish anything about the character until their proper debut.