Before The Flood

[jphamlore @jphamlore]

The Doctor is already a rock star with one group of females as has been shown at least twice relatively recently:  Osgood and O’Donnell, the younger technically inclined ones who are familiar with UNIT and the Doctor’s work.  This is starting to be a trend.  Look at how giddy O’Donnell was to actually be able to travel to another time in the Tardis, especially when contrasted to her unrequited love Bennett.  And had Osgood lived I am sure there would have been similar excitement to see time and space.

And therein is the paradox.  The one who is likely to be the Doctor’s companion is not the one giddy with excitement who has worshiped the Doctor from afar, it is likely to be the one who tells the Doctor she has to think about it.

[Anonymous @]

@Supernumerary as I said: Beethoven, next to Bach, was a most feared extemporiser and improviser of his own, and others’ motifs. That Murray Gold did the same with the Doctor Who theme in Before the Flood was an historical nod to Beethoven.

Then you said: Now, let’s be fair, by that logic, anyone post-Beethoven who’s ever arranged someone else’s work, or quoted a theme, or paid musical homage, could be said to be giving a nod to Beethoven

I think that’s the point! I’m not actually sure of the ‘logic’ here -or whether you and I seem to be using the same logic. I just like it is all. 🙂 And due to Beethoven’s improvisatory troubles (he managed to get into a few fist fights as a consequence) it made some sense to me. Also, I suppose, they could have chosen a different work of Beethoven’s -but in answering @mudlark‘s post above, I would say that Twelve also said “this didn’t happen, by the way.”

However, if it did, it would be perfect: not for Bach or Mozart but for Beethoven because, unlike other composers, at the age of 22 (by which time Mozart was nearly done, with barely 11 years left,  -and not all of those hugely successful), Beethoven was a virtual unknown upon his arrival in Vienna.

If he had to have his ‘works published’ and needed to copy out each orchestral concerto and the piano sonatas (the Waldstein Sonata, in particular, a horrendously difficult piece of musicianship containing chords and movement changes which no composer used effectively for at least 75 years) it would make sense (well, OK, not really) to think “ah hah, someone else wrote this work: it’s just too damn clever” and he was, as I said, basically unknown (his grandfather’s work was relatively respected, however) so would any chap be necessarily suspicious of a composer arriving with a leather bag containing the first of ‘his’ scribbles  -but with the music and the copyright, as it were, belonging to someone else?

Of course the problem remains. And that’s that Beethoven was an astoundingly virtuosic pianist who composed as he went along. If one delves too deeply into this paradox it’s obvious that several decades of writing and copying just wouldn’t make any sense: so I took it as a jolly good laugh. I suppose therefore people might think  “golly this is silly, do we have to have this composer {again} and this particular piece of music?” I do get that point  @supernumerary but then I’m biased.  🙂

-it’s one way of connecting with the audience, I suppose and it makes me think that Beethoven, however small and “bullet headed” would have smashed the Doctor’s face in before copying anything out -or doing anything he was ever asked. Ludwig wasn’t the most polite fella.

All those movies of him shouting and carrying on, are probably true.

[jphamlore @jphamlore]

<span class=”useratname”>@purofilion</span>: Correct me if I am wrong because I probably have no idea what I am talking about, but it seems to me that Beethoven’s Fifth is worthy of being called a precursor to rock music because it marks a break with what Western music used to have as its function.  The Fifth is, unless it is turned into disco as in A Fifth of Beethoven, not easy to dance to.  It is not Italian opera.  It is not church music.  It does not fit the previous categories of being social music.  It is not music composed for royalty.

The Doctor wants humans to rock on and chill and is willing to introduce anachronisms to do it.  Why would he want to do this besides having fun and wearing cool shades?

Because the ultimate warlike species won’t be the monsters such as the Fisher King.  The ultimate warlike species might be humans who are so warlike they are willing to war with each other until destruction, as shown by the setting in an abandoned base where there were preparations for a war that had it occurred might have ended human civilization.

Missy already tried one hybrid of warlike species with humans in Cybermen tech.  After all weren’t the Cybermen originally from a sister planet Mondas to Earth.  And who knows what other horrifying hybrids humans can form, perhaps with Time Lords.

[Arbutus @arbutus]

@purofilion   Reading your post and remembering @supernumerary’s suggestion that the 5th was an overused choice, it has occurred to me… wouldn’t the opening of the Waldstein sound fabulous as performed by Capaldi’s electric guitar?      🙂

[TheBrainOfMoffat @thebrainofmoffat]

@sarah-jane109
<span class=”useratname”>@bluesqueakpip</span>

I only saw two posts from sarah-jane109. Are there more? I’d like to give him/her the benefit of the doubt on not being a troll, because at least one of the allegations in his/her first post seems true from my own experience, and his/her final post doesn’t strike me as something a troll would write, especially the part about removing oneself from the forum (which was subsequently done).

Said poster alleged, in his/her first post: “But what I’ve found is a forum void of any dissent – all opinion is positive or pettily questioning minor points.” While I’ve seen negative opinions of episodes or aspects thereof (i.e. criticism) expressed on this site, I don’t see them engaged with very much. I think that’s largely a function of the low number of frequent posters and of the place that Doctor Who, as a phenomenon, occupies in their minds due to their history with the show. This forum is more of a small club of regulars than a typical internet forum, and I think it shows in how off-topic and personal-detail-oriented many posts are (and the frequent back-and-forth of posts with such a nature). And while there’s nothing intrinsically wrong with that, it makes it a bit difficult for newcomers — especially those with dissenting opinions — to make the forum home, as the personalities and opinions of the regulars carry more social weight than they would on a more populated forum (e.g. one dedicated to video games, a very general category).

I’m not the type of person who gushes about media — whether it be TV shows, movies, or video games — on forums; I tend to do that in person, if at all. Thus, one might see a greater amount of negativity than positivity from me online. But it’s not the tribalistic brand of negativity that proclaims “if it’s not X, which I like, then it must suck!” Rather, it’s the kind of negativity borne of disappointment with something heavily invested in when it fails to please us. Examples includes a person being his own worst critic (if you buy the popular phrase) and a parent being more disappointed and critical of his/her child than he/she would be if a stranger exhibited the exact same behaviors that bred the disappointment. I don’t think sarah-jane109 was a troll, and believe he/she was expressing the kind of negativity I just explained, rather than the tribalistic kind. Heck, I was extremely disappointed in “Kill the Moon” in Series 8 and still badmouth it to this day — but that’s because my standards for what constitutes “good Who” and “good sci-fi” were violated in the extreme.

Now to address a favorite “troll” topic…. I love Moffat. More than RTD. But I think I find more fault with Moffat’s approach to Who than RTD’s, just because I think Moffat gets in over his head — and budget — with timey-wimey story arcs. In other words, I enjoy “what Moffat does” more than “what RTD did”, just due to its more cerebral nature, but I don’t think Moffat handles it particularly well technically (dramatically, he excels). If you try to logically connect all of the season beginnings and endings (as well as the important Christmas episodes and “Day of the Doctor”) in Matt Smith’s run as the Doctor, I think you’ll see the technical issues I’m alluding to. To some people, this failing might incite resentment, because they’re expecting the show to hold together better logically. Maybe this expectation comes from not having seen BG Who, but I can only speculate. Personally, the drama and particular plot elements make up for these deficiencies. Plus, the perceived deficiencies provide me with the kind of mental puzzle that I enjoy piecing together. But again, different strokes for different folks. And I’m not sure I can speak to people’s other reasons for disliking Moffat, since my only real criticism is the one articulated above.

To conclude this overly-long post:
I don’t think sarah-jane109 was a troll, and he/she did have at least one valid point about the forum.
It would be nice if a greater diversity of viewpoints were responded to, and responded to in good faith. I’m not saying we should “feed the troll”, but rather to recognize that Doctor Who doesn’t occupy the same place in everyone’s minds, and that everyone likes to be engaged with.

P.S. : <span class=”useratname”>@purofilion</span> Was your issue with the episode’s paradox resolved, or would you like me to go through how I see it? I will reiterate something I mentioned above: if you want extremely confusing paradoxes, watch the season openers, season finales, story arc-important Christmas episodes, and “Day of the Doctor” from Matt Smith’s run, and try to logically piece together their events.

[ScaryB @scaryb]

*waves @everyone!*

Late to the party… again! But thoroughly enjoyed catching up with all your thoughts; much to ponder on.

I really enjoyed this one, I found it compelling and very creepy, though I agree with those who suggested that the Fisher King is  a bit underdeveloped. I liked the character design, especially in the shadows, beautifully lit and directed scenes with him and the Doctor. His hissed “Time Lord!!!!” gave me shivers. Especially after his taunting of the Doctor as being just one man… uh oh! he clearly knows more about the Doctor than he initially lets on. It’s always problematic taking an actor in a costume into natural lighting, but I can see why it was necessary for the shot of him standing in front of the tidal wave.

@denvaldron I liked your analysis about FK’s race, and mostly agree. However, 1 small point – the hearse wasn’t Fisher King tech. It belonged to the Arcateenians who liberated the Tivolians from the Fisher King (before enslaving them in turn). It was the Arcateenian tradition to send the bodies of their vanquished to some wild, uncivilised outpost.

As you and several others have brought up – it’s intriguing re his name, especially for a series which has never had a problem with coming up with a wide variety if names for alien species. It does jump out. Everyone’s picking up on the Arthurian connection, but there was apparently an older, Celtic, version – Bran the Blessed (and I’m trying very hard not to picture him as big, bearded and very shouty!) – who had a magic cauldron which could reanimate the dead, but imperfectly, without the power of speech – much like the ghosts in this story.

Wikipedia article about Bran, and the Fisher King

Incidentally that article also references Bors, one of the 3 knights (with Galahad and Percival) who eventually achieve the grail (and who was known for having a scar on his forehead). Apologies if anyone else has brought that up already.

Another thing that struck me is that this is the second “baddie” in 2 consecutive stories to refer to the Time Lords as warmongering megalomaniacs – Davros also had a go at the Doctor on this theme. (And agree, not anxious to see a return of the Time Lords, but I trust the team to do it because they have a good story to tell).

And I liked Corey Taylor’s scream/growl/vocalisation.

 

 

[DenValdron @denvaldron]

@scaryb Forgive me for being imprecise. I thought I had made it very clear that the Tivoli shuttlecraft was not Fisher King tech, but the tech of the Tivoli culture – it’s basically mechanical, titanium and fusion, cast structure, bricks and mortar. The Fisher Kings are much more esoteric.

As to the muppet itself, I thought the Fisher KIng was a fairly classic example of the ‘looks terrific as a piece of art, but rendered as a full sized, 3D wearable costume, it’s pretty shit because you can’t actually do much with it’ variety. Does look good though, as long as no demands were made of it.

[jphamlore @jphamlore]

The suspended animation capsule looked perfectly sized for the Doctor, too small for the Fisher King to me.  That’s why I thought from the end of the first part the Doctor would wind up in that capsule.

[Anonymous @]

@thebrainofmoffat

Actually I’d love a run down of the plot’s timey whimey features -if that’s possible please?

Something simple for my brain 🙂

On the issue of trolls, I think there’s an incredibly welcoming space for any newbie on this site. I think there are regulars who happen to post a  lot -I’m one, at the moment, but that is partly because I have time on my hands. I recall, nearly two years ago, that were other regulars, as it were: I speak of @fivefaces @pufferfish and a number of others, who, for various reasons are busy and haven’t posted a lot recently: but it was the intellectual, compassionate and almost old- school approach to this site which brought me here and encouraged me to stay.

I noticed the critical mind at play: people could criticise certain issues within episodes. That particular troll, and despite claiming she wasn’t (who’s going to admit “oh yeah, I’m a troll. Whoo-ee!), demonstrated all the criteria of one; to the point where she hadn’t actually watched the episides and yet expected a polemic “of debate.” Debates definitely exist here but they’re safely backed by empirial data, which, if one judges her writing, suggests she’s also attracted to the need for empirical evidence but strikingly failed to present anything else rather than immediate confrontation and confirmation about her dislike for, and despair, with Moffat, in particular.

We certainly have a home for people who dissent regarding a set of episodes: last year you weren’t alone in disliking Kill The Moon. This year, certain posters including @jimthefish (welcome back, sir) have also discussed clearly and confidently why they believe the last episode or Under the Lake lacked sufficient motivation, clarity or objective narrative use.  No-one, I believe, has attacked them. In fact, @supernumerary and @blenkinsopthebrave who have watched the episode more than once (I think) insist that it lacks the necessary criteria to bring the episode out from behind it’s “timey whimey” focus and stand with a cohesive plot of its own.

Certainly whilst Mr Blenkinsop has been here longer than say, supernumerary, I would hope we’d all take on board the points that are being offered by both members because, in the end, it is as always about how one communicates as a whole. When posters say “production values are rubbish, casting is dire etc” (SarahJane109) then we have typical troll- like behaviour.

Stating “casting is dire” is an ominous concept: “dire” isn’t a ‘little’ word: it has inherent power. It turns heads. Therefore it creates momentum all of its own. She might have said instead “I have a problem with Clara. I always have, and in my opinion, I believe she hasn’t been strong because….” The key is what I’ve highlighted and frankly when I read anyone who says “no, I reject that” it’s infinitely irritating because there’s no room for debate or argument. By saying “I reject it” suggests that person’s outlook is somewhat superior or larger than that of another.

If someone rejects something, they should and ought, to explain exactly why. Not necessarily in 1000 word polemics (though we have that anyway and my particular fault is that I’m not concise) but with some evidence and explanation.

For what it’s worth I hope people are not thinking it’s difficult to ‘break into’ this Forum. So many new members have arrived, post and re-post and do so with others immediately saying “hi, welcome, jump in and enjoy.” I hope I’m not alone in thinking this is the case?

If it’s not, then I guess we need to take stock.

Kindest, puro

 

[ScaryB @scaryb]

@Purofilion Thanks for the detailed breakdown of the music (I was expecting nothing less as I was watching, haha).

I also like @bluesqueakpip‘s idea that the Doctor is using a video diary now – about time he caught up with 21st century tech.  However it also reminded me (and others) of Listen which also involved a bootstrap paradox with the words Clara says to the young Doctor being the same as he said earlier to young Danny about fear being a superpower. Or maybe the Doctor still thinks he has unseen listeners in the TARDIS. You can get that way when you’re surrounded by film crews, haha. 😉

(Wonder if Orson is a just a paradox who ceased to exist after Danny’s death. That would be a shame)

Back to Beethoven… there’s a portrait of him with something called a lyre-guitar

And the 5th on electric guitar does segue so nicely into the DW theme 😀 (Please add my vote to pile of those wanting more of this version of the theme).  The Doctor’s a busy boy music-wise – did 11 not claim some credit for Bizet’s Carmen in Asylum of the Daleks…?

And the other thing that links Beethoven specifically to this episode is that he was deaf.

 

[ScaryB @scaryb]

@Purofilion

Re trolls – one of their characteristics is to make you believe it’s your fault they feel unwelcome. But one of the first things you do if you’re being generally courteous, when you come into a new place with new people, is to take the time to listen to what is already being said, assess the tone and respond accordingly. It’s a bit rude to just run in and basically say “you’re all rubbish”!

So don’t feel bad. Sorry if you got a PM.

Re the episode – for a timey wimey wibbly wobbly bootstrap paradox it’s fairly straightforward. And despite the Doctor’s protests that he can’t change time, he doesn’t actually have much time-changing to do, assuming he wants to protect the Earth.  The village is already flooded at the time of Under the Lake – hence the underwater base. And the Fisher King presumably doesn’t survive as the humans haven’t been enslaved and the oceans drained.  We know from After the Flood that it’s the Doctor who makes these 2 things happen. Once the Doctor also realises that he must know that he’s not changing the future, but performing the actions he needs to do to preserve it (as we know it). But it’s the events in Under the Lake that lead to his going back in time in After the Flood to perform the actions that lead to the events in Under the Lake.  Causal loop. Which is why the TARDIS is clearly not happy at being in either the present or the past – the loop isn’t yet complete and in both episodes there are 2 Doctors present at the same time. She knows he has to be there but she’s trying to warn him to be careful.

He probably also knows that he’s not actually going to die – that he needs to create a hologram to pass on the message to himself that he’s not going to die but needs to create a hologram so he can be in 2 times at once. Aaah, did I say this was simple?! Ooops 😉

One thing that really stands out is the sense of Clara’s importance to him (also stressed in The Magician’s Apprentice/Witch’s Familiar). That is really brought out in the contrast in the way he treats O’Donnell. He does try to warn her, but he seems equally at ease with her making the choice which leads to her death. Bennett rightly calls him on this and he doesn’t deny it.  Her death wasn’t inevitable (and the Doctor doesn’t know she will die, just strongly suspects it), the future isn’t changed by it, she could have lived (if she’d stayed in the TARDIS) and returned to her own time without it affecting the outcome. Pragmatic, as Clara says, he (and she) does what is necessary without getting as hung up on it as 10 or 11 would have done. As we’ve already seen, and commented on it, for example in Into the Dalek last series.

 

[lisa @lisa]

@jphamlore

Your post about the Nethersphere as a possibility for Clara rang a bell for me. Michele Gomez
teased the idea that we might be returning to the location where Amy was in ‘The Girl Who Waited’.
That episode was where she got stuck in a clinic made for Time Lords and others that had a deadly virus.
So maybe like you suggested Clara does cross the death barrier and ends up in the Nethersphere which
implies Missy might have a part in Clara’s ending.
So now I have at least a minimum of 3 or more Clara theories.

[jphamlore @jphamlore]

@purofilion: My quibble for this season is why didn’t the Daleks, who were specifically shown casually flying over their city, simply fly away and escape in spaceships from new Skaro instead of staying to be eaten by their discarded Daleks from the sewers? 🙂

Or from the episode, why weren’t the Tivolan Prentis ghost and the O’Donnell ghost trying to kill the Doctor and Bennett back in 1980?  Did the O’Donnell ghost hang around under the lake until 2119, knowing to hide outside the Drum base to avoid a time paradox until it was okay to attack? 🙂

[ScaryB @scaryb]

@denvaldron

The hearse wasn’t Tivolian either – Prentis says it’s Arcateenian – the invaders who came after the Fisher King, who initially liberated the Tivolians then realised they were so annoying they enslaved them as well! The funeral arrangements were according to Arcateenian custom for a vanquished enemy. Prentis was just carrying out orders.

It’s a small point, I’m just being picky. Agree with you about the problems with 3D costumes – but I thought it looked great in the shadows.

[nerys @nerys]

It took two viewings before my head hurt a little less on this one. “Bootstrap paradox” still has my brain all atwitter. I think I need to read some posts here to understand it better. And watch it a third time.

Did O’Donnell remind anyone else just a tad of Amelia Pond? Something about her facial expressions and voice, and maybe her “fan girl” eagerness pushed my mind in that direction. I admit I caved to the thought that she might be a future companion … but of course that option was nullified.

[Anonymous @]

Why would he want to do this besides having fun and wearing cool shades? Because the ultimate warlike species won’t be the monsters such as the Fisher King.  The ultimate warlike species might be humans who are so warlike they are willing to war with each other until destruction,

@jphamlore I think you’re suggesting that Beethoven’s 5th is music considered without precedent? Yes: the symphony “is worthy of being called a precursor to rock music because it marks a break with what Western music used to have as its function.”

Certainly, the choice of Beethoven’s 5th was interesting.  I won’t go on too much and I apologise if I bore you to death here 🙂 but some of the motifs in the symphony come from French revolutionary songs. In it, Beethoven paints an evocative struggle and triumph over life’s deepest troubles. It’s demonstrated from the transformation from minor to major key and in that way is without precedent. I chose the portion of your post which mentioned a willingness to go “to war with each other until destruction” because Beethoven had those revolutionary motifs in mind.

People think only the 9th symphony, the Eroica, held that position -but the 5th has similarities to this sense of triumph over struggle;  quiet within the madness.  Teachers often ubiquitously refer to how the opening bars of the first movement happen to be the musical equivalent of the Morse signal for Victory, “V”.

In WW2, the French Resistance and the French armies, in general, used that motif to fight  Germans occupying their land.

I believe the choice of Beethoven in this rock-out opening of Before the Flood makes a great deal of sense when you place Beethoven in the historical weltanschauung of the time. Egmont, written by Goethe, with music set by Beethoven uses lyrics which segue nicely with Before the Flood:

“As the sea breaks through your dykes, so crush, tear down tyranny’s ramparts, sweep them drowning from the ground…I’ll step out eagerly toward the field of battle and victory….I will step… towards an honourable death. I die for the freedom which I have lived for and I am used to standing betwixt spears and beset by imminent death to feel my life blood coursing twice as quickly through my veins.”

How very Time Lord!

Also @supernumerary in terms of your issue with the ‘rocking out’ of Beethoven’s theme, it’s a shame perhaps that the Egmont theme or interlude couldn’t be utilized instead – but it probably wouldn’t have worked (Egmont is overlooked): those first four notes of the 5th, arguably, entertain the audience, connect with past memories and are held up as symphonic ‘notes’ for struggle over triumph.

So many good ‘classics’ have been covered by duos or bands. We have The Moonlight Sonata in Tucker’s Midnight Blue, Bach’s Toccata and Fugue pretty much covered a hundred times -and enjoyably. I also should add the latter’s little Kommsusser Tod Komm sel’ge reinvented by Gordian Knot.

These pieces, like Beethovens’ 5th, use the minor key or medieval ‘minor’ modes as they’re stark, isolated in tone, almost devious in evocation and frankly, quite beautiful, defying description. Using the Fifth as Whithouse did, perhaps implies that some things are better left unsaid communicated openly through the language of music ‘across the universe.’

[ScaryB @scaryb]

@jphamlore

Re the Daleks not flying away – maybe some of them did.  And there’s a partly rejuvenated Davros to contend with in the future.

Re Prentis and O’Donnell ghosts –  I wondered about that too, but then we also know they don’t appear during daytime, so maybe that’s why they don’t appear straight away, and we see only their bodies – something to be sad about, but not feared.

@rob Great to see you on here again – glad the superstrength caffeine is still working. Hope the mud isn’t restricting your access to wifi.

[Anonymous @]

@jphamlore

No, I wasn’t having a go at anyone’s critique of this episode – in fact I was making the point to @thebrainofmoffat that here, dissent is welcome. Quibbles with episodes are fantastic: this isn’t a place for people to blindly worship every stage set and quirk of dialogue. It’s not a cult and I was trying (probably badly!) to point that out. Certainly, beyond the insane theories which we’re proud to cook up 🙂 we observe what the episode is about and whether it works really well, partly or not at all.

I’ve watched it twice and I need to see it again because I’m interested in @Blenkinsopthebrave ‘s  impression regarding the picture deliberately chosen for this episode and yet it wasn’t referenced and whilst the person in the dragon’s mouth is wearing a skirt, this puzzle piece should, or could have, dropped into place and yet we’re still left ‘hanging.’  (much like the Tarot idea??)

I too thought about this Fisher King’s name. In Slav, they love the water: they are indeed water spirits as Mr Blenkinsop stated. I’d have liked more of this freakish monster and yet I wonder whether the episode was clumsily using the ‘Fisher King’ to move the arc regarding Clara ahead? That there were so many clues and adroitly expressed comments about death: “don’t you leave me, don’t die, wait until the next companion (or something of that nature was said by Clara I think) made me question the motivation behind the ‘A’ story in the episode.

However, in saying that, if an ‘A’ story/main story leaves your audience confused as to its function, then there’s a significant problem right there.

I’m wondering if the Tivoli undertaker, Prentis, and O’Donnell’s ghost didn’t try to kill Bennet and the Doctor simply because they returned to the Tardis as quickly as possible? Probably this happens around the time when both Tardis’ materialise?

As for this:

Did the O’Donnell ghost hang around under the lake until 2119, knowing to hide outside the Drum base to avoid a time paradox until it was okay to attack?

Bloomin great observation! I have no earthly idea. But I’m learning  – -as @scaryb has given me the necessary ‘map’ or coordinates to work out the timey-whimey nature of this particular 2-parter 🙂

To @scaryb thank you for that explanation – and welcome back -you’d been conspicuously missing from the boards during this initial airing and I was breathlessly waiting On the Sofa with a dust- buster for crumbs and a special treat in hand for our purple Yeti 🙂

Yes, young SarahJane started a little PMing first -very innocuous and the only reason I didn’t say “hi” back was that it was late and I had other things on! Next morning I check the posts and ‘whoa.’ In her PM she had said “oh, you’re very welcoming and so I’m sure you’d enjoy a good debate about the directors of the show”  -or something like that. I’ve deleted it anyway, and no harm done in any case. I did feed her and I’ve learnt, these days, not to be so ‘obvious’ but it was the PM that nailed it for me -it was a nice little set up as these things go.

Kindest, puro

 

[Arbutus @arbutus]

@purofilion  @thebrainofmoffat      Here’s the thing. When someone new joins the Forum, they most often start out by saying something like, “Hi, new poster here. Looking forward to lots of cool DW discussion!” Sometimes they show up on the Sofa to tell us a little about themselves. They almost always mention how long they’ve been a fan. What they do not generally do is announce themselves by saying, “Hi, I just signed up to express my disappointment, but I can already see that you don’t want to hear that.” Even if they are particularly unhappy with the current show, as you point out, it can still be expressed in a reasonable manner. As in, “I’ve been watching the show all through the current run, and consider myself a fan, although unfortunately I find I’m really not warming up to the new Doctor.” Or whatever.

As far as taking up debate with dissenting viewpoints, I think that happens here. We certainly have enough members with strong views that don’t mind a good argument. I will do it a bit, but it’s not really my nature to spend a lot of time trying to convince someone to change their opinion, because by and large I don’t find that I am successful at it! I am more inclined to respond to those views and ideas that either appeal to me or give me ideas of my own. But as we’ve had plenty of people sign on during the recent hiatus that seem to have had no trouble jumping in, my conclusion would be that this particular band of brothers and sisters just isn’t for everyone. Which is okay. The Universe is a big place.

[jphamlore @jphamlore]

@lisa: I have a theory that Missy trapped Osgood’s soul in the Nethersphere and that it is possible for her to come back if Clara offers to go to the Nethersphere.

[Arbutus @arbutus]

@lisa     Lots of theories are good. It increases the odds of one of them being right. Then, as discussed yesterday, you get bragging rights.  🙂

@jphamlore    @scaryb    The question of the ghosts and when they showed up is a good one. I’m adding it my list of things to think about as I watch through both episodes with fresh eyes. There’s a lot to keep track of here.

@purofilion     Your exposition of Beethoven’s music is wonderful. There’s a good reason that so much of it has become synonymous with the deepest and strongest emotions of humanity. Bernstein conducted Beethoven to celebrate the destruction of the Berlin Wall. Daniel Barenboim’s West-Eastern Divan Orchestra, combined of Arab and Jewish musicians, played Beethoven in their inaugural performance. Some of the piano sonatas, such as the Moonlight or the Pathétique, have been used and reused to express poignancy and sorrow. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that those first four notes of the 5th have come to represent a sort of momentous punctuation mark (my son and his friends used to hum them, in ominous tones, when reaching the climactic moment of a story). Perfectly suited, in fact, to their use here. Bootstrap… paradox… ba ba ba BUM!!!!   🙂

[ichabod @ichabod]

@arbutus et al   When someone new joins the Forum, they most often start out by saying something like, “Hi, new poster here. Looking forward to lots of cool DW discussion!” Sometimes they show up on the Sofa to tell us a little about themselves. They almost always mention how long they’ve been a fan. What they do not generally do is announce themselves by saying, “Hi, I just signed up to express my disappointment, but I can already see that you don’t want to hear that.”

What got me was that pouty little whine about “Here I’ve gone to all this trouble to sign up, and now I find — ”  Which means that not only did 109 (by her own admission) not bother to watch any of the S9 episode to their endings, but she’d also not bothered to familiarize herself with the discussion here before signing up.  She states outright that she’s just looking for a place to display her string of complaints about every aspect of the show in a bid for — sympathy?  And she’s pissed off to find that this isn’t that place.  She’s right; it’s not.

[lisa @lisa]

@jphamlore I know you also mentioned the notion of magical resurrection to me previously.
Well if Osgood is there and Danny and who knows who is trapped in that Nethersphere at least
that makes a good team that gets to be together.
I still think she is an epic loop of River’s making but possibly compromised by Missy?
In ‘Before the Flood’ the Fisher king drains the life force out of people so maybe that’s a
clue to what may happen to Clara. Then she gets saved to the Nethersphere? There have been
some other rebirth clues. But don’t forget that the Nethersphere is powered down. Although
I guess that could also be temporary. It occurred to me that in the first peoples myth that
I found about the raven and leaf that Missy may be the trickster raven that steals the light
which is Clara. The leaf would be River that the Raven swallows in the story.
So how do the Dalek nano bots fit this? Cause I still think they could be part of this too.
Those sonic glasses are made to watch Clara for something. Has to be that.

[ichabod @ichabod]

@scaryb   Nice portrait!  LvB looks very young there . . . how old was he when the deafness set in, do we know?  The death of O’Donnell is a kind of hark-back to MotOE, isn’t it — in this 2-parter, there’s a mystery to solve and no energy spared (by the Doctor) in mourning the already-lost or enormous efforts to keep the rest alive.  This is pretty cold (especially since the base crew are fleshed out and appealing, except for the corporate turd and we’re soon done with him — just thing, Schwerski, only dumber, and you’ll see that Pritchard’s not a stereotype — he’s a *type*, the type that gets ahead, in the corporate world).  It also highlights the Doctor’s concern for Clara, although he must know that it won’t help in the long run, as she’s riding for an inevitable fall.  Also O’Donnell’s fate and the Doctor’s part in it is reassurance  that the “mercy” setting often has to be turned on in this character (his default could be the alien detachment that keeps us aware that he’s not human), unless you happen to be the apple of his eye — at the moment, at least.  Does a very long life require a series of short attention spans if you’re to survive it with sanity?

Anyway, the cold edge is still there.  Good; I was hoping it would withstand the general relaxing of the very strung-out S8 Doctor into the cooler dude of S9.

 

[Miapatrick @miapatrick]

@TheBrainOfMoffat- I do also think they were a troll, or at least, someone looking for a place to moan and criticise. But they spent more time huffing about having apparently (before their own post) discovering their opinions were unwanted then they did expressing their opinions. This site was started as a reaction to the depressingly negative commentary on the Guardian thread. One prominent early member wasn’t, as I recall, a fan of Smith as the Doctor, but things remained civilized. I’ve even seen conversations get a little heated on this site, but then everyone seems to calm down and not declare war and that is a rare thing on the internet and worth protecting ;).

People tend to engage on the mad theories level more than on criticism, because that’s really what this forum is about. And I’ve seen since this forum begun people join and become key members whose opinions hold a lot of weight as people get to know them. So I hope people aren’t put off.

[Anonymous @]

@lisa I agree: the glasses are part of something else -something bigger that needs to be observed about Clara at a progressive rate.

He may say they’re the “new sonic” and of course they may be, but they could have a hidden added function.

@miapatrick. Spot on: they actually said they watched the episodes which means all they were after was confirmation of already pre-held negative ideas with no evidence and yet some fairly snooty remarks about “polemic”  -in my opinion they tried to raise themselves by standing on the necks of others. This is false intelligence, isn’t it?

[Anonymous @]

sorry @ichabod I didn’t know what the heck LvB was!

Beethoven started to lose hearing in 1796 between the ages of 25-27, possibly even earlier with the usual ringing in his ears which was only recently connected with some depressive urges and manic behaviour -that could have been caused by a significant amount of alcoholic ingestion which dried out the mucous membranes, and in the ears can cause dehydration that in turn causes problems for those who already have narrow ear canals. He would have been in significant pain beyond the tinnitus -hence his moody behaviour.

Kindest,

Puro

 

[Anonymous @]

@miapatrick ** I meant to say they (troll) “hadn’t watched the episodes” -that will make more sense with what I’m saying but it suggests significantly less sense for our drive-by…..person. 🙂

[ichabod @ichabod]

@lisa   You’re right.  He won’t run.  I just looked again at that phone call — “You made yourself essential — die on the one that comes after me — you *don’t* leave me — ”  Clara is still wrecked by Danny’s death, and the only thing holding her back from the brink is the Doctor.  He says we all have to go sometime, and she says she’s not ready to think about that yet.  Does she mean thinking about her own death, too, foreseeing it as the only possible ending for herself, if the Doctor dies or if he doesn’t?  That “the one who comes after me” is very ominous.  It hints at clear, if firmly suppressed self-knowledge: knowing that she’s still alive and functional because the Doctor is alive; and that at some point he’ll (probably) be alive and she won’t be, and there will be another companion.

But until then, the Doctor must not and can not jaunt off on his own and not come back for her as long as she’s alive, because that would be an unacceptable betrayal of that invitation: “Please — don’t even argue!”  She says it as plainly as she can, and he can’t deny it, so he says yes, he promises to come back, even though who knows.  They will be thrown apart from each other again, but now he’s committed to doing his damnedest to stay with her until it’s over and time for that “next one” that he’s been trying not to think about, and hoping she doesn’t think about either (only, damn it, she *does*).

So I guess I have to give up the idea that the 62 yrs that Old Clara lived before the Doctor dropped by in Last Xmas really was a dream-crab life, because clearly the acceptance of Danny’s death (and of the Doctor’s temporary desertion) that those 62 yrs of maturing won her is gone now.  Never happened.  The Doctor wiped it out by going back 62 yrs and returning for her very soon after Danny’s self-immolation instead, to take her traveling with him.

Here she is in s9, still raw with Danny’s death, taking chances, trying to be as tough as the Doctor can be over this regrettable death or that one (even Danny’s — “Yep, still dead”), bouncing back ready for anything.  The Doctor has successfully provided Clara with distractions, but he hasn’t healed her — or left her enough time (since the goodbye-lies in the coffee shop) to heal herself, before coming back to give her the stars and planets again, which is what he has to give.

You know, he really *isn’t* a very good doctor: Davros was right about that.

A great Doctor, though.  And Clara, poor thing, is on her way to being a great Clara, I think.  Whatever that turns out to be . . .

[ichabod @ichabod]

@purofilion  Beethoven started to lose hearing in 1796 between the ages of 25-27, possibly even earlier

Good grief — the poor fellow!  How horrible.  It couldn’t have been from syphilis, could it?  Wasn’t there a ton of that going around at the time, or was that later on?  The 19th c had so much going on in it that’s fascinating from an arts p.o.v. that it tends to telescope together in my (haha) memory.

[Anonymous @]

@ichabod

So by 1816 he was profoundly death  -at 31 (in 1801) 60% of his hearing had gone.  Medical advisors at the time said his “auditory nerves were shrunken with auditory arteries thickened and cartilaginous – as stretched as a raven’s quill” !

Basically it means he had internal lesions within the acoustic nerves. This is the case with the buzzing and particular whistling sounds he experienced. He used to chop off the legs of his piano, and laying down beside it on the floor, could differentiate the vibrations necessary to match his tonal impressions with something less imaginary.

[ichabod @ichabod]

@miapatrick  People [here] tend to engage on the mad theories level more than on criticism, because that’s really what this forum is about.

I think, from the comment in the private message to puro, that 109 wanted a place to pick apart the *structure* of recent S8 and 9, second-guessing and condemning decisions made by the creative team about how to keep DW DW but differentiate the new Doctor from his immediate, very popular predecessors — casting decisions, direction,  “poor: production values, etc.  It was an invitation to a glum and dolorous blame-game, IMO — everything was a mistake, so who made it, and why were they were so dishonest, “stale”,”lazy”, and so on, as to do so.  Blah blah, we’ve all seen it on other boards.

What I see around here isn’t that.  It’s lively discussions of the shape of the story on all its levels, its arcs and buried secrets to be revealed later (or never); analysis of how episodes work, and where they don’t and why; and ideas about the characters, who (and what!) they are, why they behave as they do, and where they’re going in the long run.  DW gives us such a rich feast of stories and characters, and we — well, we do like to play with our food.

Does that sound right to others here?  I’m a recent incomer myself, so . . . At any rate, that’s why I think that this really just wasn’t the right place for 109 (or others of like mind), troll or no troll.

[Anonymous @]

for someone steeped in music, and as a visionary in his art, the idea of losing one’s hearing and livelihood would be an unbearable loss.

[Anonymous @]

@ichabod regarding 109 (we should refer to all people in that type of  ‘code’  -109, you know!)

I totally agree. They existed to complain and not share. They needed their bias confirmed by others -but having arrived at the site -and read a few posts, thought this was a place where we adore and worship the Great God Moffat (“ohm ohm”) – and yet had she read any of yesterday’s posts there was plenty of disagreement about the way Whithouse went about his completion of the 2 parter,

I happened to really like it -but other’s opinions have stretched my capacity for  understanding and picking at the deeper layers.

[IAmNotAFishIAmAFreeMan @pedant]

Random (well, not so random) thought: The Doctor throws the term “soul” about in a fairly casual way.

So what is the soul in the Whoniverse?

[Mudlark @mudlark]

@pedant

The Doctor throws the term “soul” about in a fairly casual way.

That is something that has been bothering me, also. Other than their outward appearance, the ‘ghosts’ don’t manifest any characteristics of the people the Fisher King has co-opted – certainly nothing of the essential personality of the individual which might be termed a soul.  In fact for his purpose the only thing necessary is an analogue of the bit of mental wiring which has been altered in order to relay the message, plus the electro-magnetic simulation of a body capable of wielding metal objects as weapons.  And that appears to be all that the ‘ghosts’ are.

Perplexing.

 

[Mirime @mirime]

To paraphrase what the Doctor said in this episode, he’s talking to Clara when he’s seen her dead on a slab. He’s seeing her as a ghost. That actually ties in with Hide, when Clara points out that everyone is a ghost to the Doctor, because he’s time-travelled past all their lifetimes.

@bluesqueakpip and with The Magicians Apprentice where despite the big deal made over the Doctor’s last day when Clara said ‘which one of us is dying’ and the Doctor hugged my immediate thought was ‘Clara is’.

the meaning of the mural on the wall of the rec room on the base.

@blenkinsopthebrave  I’m hoping that ends up as being a clue of some kind. Didn’t it look like a woman (or at least somebody in a dress/skirt) in the serpents mouth? So could be something to do with Clara’s fate.

[Bluesqueakpip @bluesqueakpip]

@mudlark

certainly nothing of the essential personality of the individual which might be termed a soul.

I think that’s what’s angering the Doctor so. Moffat does seem to be allowing the Doctor to develop a concept of ‘soul’ – all those conversations with dead people, no doubt. 😉

Because Doctor Who can’t really use a religious meaning, Moffat seems to be using ‘soul’ as shorthand for ‘copy of the individual which is so good you can’t tell it from the original’. With added question mark: the ‘question mark’ being ‘was the ‘copy’ always in truth the original?’

So Rory-the-auton is a copy – but fights his programming in the same way that the ‘real’ Rory would. Then, later on, the ‘real’ Rory remembers being an auton for 1000 years…

The copy-River in the Library acts like the real River.

Danny in the Nethersphere is an electronic copy – but reacts to Clara and the boy in the self-sacrificing way that the real Danny would’ve done. Then dream-Danny (another copy) starts acting and talking not as Clara wants him to, but as if he’s the real person. And the dream-Danny remembers what the electronic-Danny did.

In all these cases there’s a continuity of both memory and essential personality. It’s as if there is such a thing as a Whoniverse ‘soul’, but that ‘soul’ can be contained in a physical body, an electronic avatar, or a dream-existence.

Even Missy doesn’t mess with that directly. She simply (like the Devil) tempts the souls she’s electronically co-opted, encouraging them by lies, by mental torture and by physical torture to effectively commit soul-suicide.

So the Doctor’s anger and fury might be because the Fisher King has co-opted the ‘souls’ he’s taken, has taken a person’s death – and instead of retaining the memory and essential personality, has simply converted it into a physical avatar with no option but total obedience. There’s not even Missy’s coerced choice.

What the Fisher King has done is worse than murder: because what if the reason that there is, seemingly, a continuation of memory and personality into all possible types of ‘body’ is that there is a life after this life? What if the Fisher King hasn’t just stolen people’s lives – but stolen their deaths?

It’s that age old question of ‘What if death is just the next big adventure?’ [Which may well have a bearing on Clara’s fate.] If it is, then the Fisher King just stole it from all those people.

[Bluesqueakpip @bluesqueakpip]

I’ll just add that it also ties in to another of Moffat’s long running themes: ‘death’ does not equal ‘defeat’. It’s not the worst thing that can happen to you: it’s simply the last thing that will happen to you.

[IAmNotAFishIAmAFreeMan @pedant]

So anyway:

The thing with sunken villages is they get sunken after the dam is built downstream from them. Water builds up behind the dam.

Blowing up the dam would very likely sweep the village away, but it would not leave it under water for 150 years. There would be some rubble and a river, and no need for an underwater mining facility.

Just thought I’d put that out there.

[Mudlark @mudlark]

@pedant

Blowing up the dam would very likely sweep the village away, but it would not leave it under water for 150 years. There would be some rubble and a river, and no need for an underwater mining facility.

*cough* May I politely draw your attention to post #44497?

[Anonymous @]

@mudlark @pedant Didn’t you end that post ‘lark with this:

Of course it is remotely possible that the dam held back water from a river which had been diverted from another course, and there was no outlet from the site. On reflection, perhaps it is best if I do not look to have all my Ts crossed and my Is dotted.  That way madness lies in the Whoniverse 

Just for fun and lightness: it’s 3 am where I am! Who-ee, indeed 🙂

 

[lisa @lisa]

@purofilion Night night puro ? — we’ll be here when you wake up 🙂

[Mudlark @mudlark]

@bluesqueakpip   I understand your point, and clearly that was how the Doctor viewed the matter, but I have difficulty, nevertheless, in seeing how anything which might be termed the soul was involved, since the ghosts did not appear in any profound sense to represent the person-hood of the dead they resembled.

I was never quite sure how auton-Rory worked, but the River who was saved to the library was the complete and essential ‘her’ in digitised form (or equivalent depending on how the computer memory functioned).  The nethersphere also stored the complete minds of the people uploaded.  In both cases the people continued to live in a disembodied fashion.

What puzzled me about referring to the ghosts in terms of souls is that they were copies only in a very incomplete and superficial sense.   The Fisher King – or the programme he had initiated – took from them only what was needed for his purpose; energy, a structural form and the bit of mental wiring imprinted with and primed to relay his message.  What did was bad enough,  depriving them of life and all its potential, and it was cruel also because of the impact it had on the people who had known the dead, but the essential being of the dead and whatever of it, if anything, continued beyond their deaths, was beyond his reach

[Anonymous @]

@lisa thank you -I hope so! But I need to get some winks shortly or I’ll need to be dalekised/cyberised

[jphamlore @jphamlore]

On the issue of souls and the Dr Who universe, that is why I mentioned recently that as far as I know, we the viewer know something the Doctor may not:  Unless Missy planned an elaborate ruse that didn’t work, we the viewer know for certain that souls and the afterlife exist in the Dr Who universe.  Because unless Missy went back in time, revived from the brink of death the kid that Danny Pink had seemingly killed sweeping the building, and saved that kid’s physical body specifically to torment Danny in the Nethersphere, where else did that kid come from?  Even if the kid is just a copy, SOMETHING apparently used to be sweeping the entire Earth to backup every living person.

It’s not clear to me that Clara ever completely explained to the Doctor the kid or if Danny completely explained to Clara why that kid was so important for Danny to save.

[IAmNotAFishIAmAFreeMan @pedant]

@mudlark @purofilion

*cough* May I politely draw your attention to post #44497?

Hmmph. You may.

*mumble**mumble*meddling kids*mumble*

I postulate that a global warming induced mini-ice age tilted the landscape, diverting flow in much the way that the last one diverted the flow of the Thames from the Vale of St Albans to its present course. Antecedent drainage, innit?

OR

There used to be two lakes, Lower Loch and Upper Loch, and Lower Loch was drained to make room for a fake Soviet town (because there is obviously no cheaper way to do it when the military is involved) and the breaking of the dam merely restored the status quo ante (which explains the musical outbursts).

[Bluesqueakpip @bluesqueakpip]

@mudlark

the ghosts did not appear in any profound sense to represent the person-hood of the dead they resembled.

I think it ties in with Toby Whithouse’s earlier God Complex. There, the never-seen alien society has created something that takes people’s deepest beliefs and uses them to feed a monster who doesn’t even want to be fed…

Here, the Fisher King has taken people’s very sense of self. Whatever it does obviously needs their ‘dying’ energy, that whatever-it-is that exits stage left when a person turns from a living being to a dead body. And it obviously does need that dying-energy, because O’Donnell doesn’t turn up as a ghost until she’s actually (and not potentially) dead and the harmless-if-icky Prentiss needs to be murdered before he can be used.

Further, the ‘ghosts’ look like the person, even if the body of the person concerned (Moran) is currently small crispy bits on the base floor. So it’s taking dying energy, it’s using some kind of self awareness, or self-image, and then it’s discarding the bits that aren’t needed.

Same sort of idea as the God Complex. In both cases something deeply personal, deeply important is taken, twisted, used for another’s purposes. The question is whether the essential being was still, in some sense, safe and beyond reach or whether the hollowing out of the Fisher King was a theft of parts of their ‘soul’.

[Anonymous @]

I think, @mudlark. that the last sentence you wrote, which I’ve copied and pasted, is the most important:

The nethersphere also stored the complete minds of the people uploaded.  In both cases [and I would add in all cases] the people continued to live in a disembodied fashion.

Certainly these ‘ghosts’ are as disembodied as anyone of the groups of people left ‘behind’ after death in Who: whether it be River or Auton Rory who seemed to ‘have the plastic’ (“trust the plastic, Amy”) and then presumably lost it after Big Bang 2. As they have these bodies -or part bodies then we can suggest they’re removed from living in any sense as we understand it. As life is clearly different for everybody, is death also going to expand our understanding and will there be as many types of ‘after life’ as there are grains of sand?

I would expect that continuing to use the term ‘soul’ can be dispiriting (no pun intended) in this context -but it’s an easy hand-wavy method for accessing, and then I suppose labelling these disembodied, powerless groups. Perhaps we can equate these people with passing time in a motionless purgatory.

In a horrifying and roundabout way, 🙂  it reminds me of Martha and the Doctor in Gridlock -that was a soulless existence to me, though it shouldn’t be: there were women giving birth to cats, people happily recycling their waste into crackers. And singing hymns, Grrr.

But yes, @mudlark it seems as if these ghosts were, for the first time, a replica of a replica -their actual personality, creativity and individuality: that which made them distinct, eccentric and altogether different and non-uniform in their humanity, is perhaps residing somewhere else – closer to our notion of a peaceful afterlife- much like Library River. As long as they’re not stuck in a motorway somewhere waiting for a fast lane.

[Anonymous @]

@pedant

when concerning the military you’re absolutely right: in the US and here, they will spend whatever is not necessary in order to ‘get the job done.’

V for Victory as I suggested 🙂

This is great to be up when others are having ‘tea’ -or is that dinner?

[Author]

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