On The Sofa (6)
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Craig 8 years, 7 months ago.
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13 July 2015 at 19:29 #41169
Anonymous @
Hello all!
Joined this forum so I could have a place to talk about Dr. Who without driving my friends crazy. I seem like the only person around who is a whovian.
13 July 2015 at 20:18 #41170@linds738 Not round here you’re not. Welcome. We have a few topics you might like to start with if you scroll down the Home page – your first memories of Who or your favourite companion.
Or just jump in to any thread you fancy.
Just remember, if you hear of any spoilers, they belong in the spoilers thread.
Look forward to reading your contributions.
14 July 2015 at 01:33 #41179I have a very simple question and I don’t know where to post it so I am going to post it here:
Can a Dalek lie?
15 July 2015 at 07:09 #41209Neat stuff, in case others here haven’t seen it yet, first two items on this DW news site today:
It’s hardly surprising, but is *very* nice to know, that S10 has already been green-lit for funding. Yippeeeeeeeee!
@bonkers2015 Good question — maybe it can lie to non-Daleks, but not to its mates? Have any of them lied to the Doctor?
15 July 2015 at 22:38 #41216@purofilion
Hi guys 🙂
I have four questions I want to ask you:
1- Is the doctor considered an atheist ?
I know that we talked about this issue, but this is the last one, I promise.
2- How long do you think Peter Capaldi will last as the doctor ?
3- Who would you like the 13th doctor to be ?
4- Do you think that Benedict Cumberbatceh will make a good doctor ?
15 July 2015 at 23:12 #412171. Earlier incarnations of the Doctor were definitely an atheist. The Smith Doctor also appeared thoroughly pissed off at God for not existing. The Capaldi Doctor? Not sure; there was such a religious undercurrent in Series 8 that I was beginning to wonder if Steven Moffat had been on an Alpha Course 😈 However, I’d still say ‘agnostic tending heavily towards atheist’.
2. Possibly until they cart him off on a stretcher – however, if they’ve planned the exit point, it may well be either the series before Moffat retires as showrunner, or the series after. Moffat’s mentioned how having to start with an entirely new Doctor/Companion/Showrunner team was truly terrifying for all concerned, so I suspect he’ll try to give any new showrunner a going concern that they can then change to their liking.
3. There won’t be a 13th Doctor. They’ll suddenly remember that John Hurt was the Doctor (for a whole five minutes), and jump straight to 14th. 😈
4. He’s too busy. The only reason they can find time to make Sherlock is because a) Cumberbatch and Freeman genuinely like doing it and b) Hartswood make sure they get to spend time with their families by casting their families. 🙂
15 July 2015 at 23:30 #41218As for question 1:
What about the time when the 11th doctor mentioned the best he referees to him simply as the devil ?
As for question 3:
What does Hurt have to do with this ?
he was the 8th doctor, and he appeared with the 10th and 11th, and it wasn’t the first time where three incarnations of
the doctor appeared together.
As for question 4:
But do you think he will make a good doctor ?
15 July 2015 at 23:58 #41219@xtremez – are you using a smartphone?
1. A belief in the devil (small d) doesn’t necessarily imply a belief in God, capital G. The Smith Doctor could simply mean that he now believes that the Beast was the being that is identified as Satan/The Devil in Christian belief. However, it doesn’t mean that he accepts any or all of the rest of Christian belief – just that he’s accepted that particular bit is based on reality.
3. Hurt is the ninth Doctor. Only he’s not, because Christopher Eccleston is the official Ninth Doctor. Paul McGann is the Eighth Doctor – I won’t direct you to the movie, because that would be cruel. However, the Eighth Doctor has many adventures available on audio, and his regeneration into John Hurt’s Doctor can be seen in this official webisode:
Technically, Peter Capaldi is the Thirteenth Doctor, but they’ve called John Hurt’s Doctor the War Doctor so that Capaldi can be the 12A th Doctor. That’s why I think they’ll either jump straight to Fourteen, or possibly have an official Thirteen as a one-story Doctor. Acting is nervy enough without a vague background feeling that you’re the ‘unlucky’ Doctor. 😉
John Hurt was, incidentally, the thirteenth actor to play the role of the Doctor on TV.
4. As far as I’m concerned, a ‘good’ Doctor has one, very important, requirement. They have to be willing to accept the part.
However good Benedict Cumberbatch is as an actor (and he is very, very good), I don’t think he’d ever accept the part (he’s hinted as much), and he certainly won’t accept a long running TV role while his schedule is so booked up.
16 July 2015 at 00:10 #41220No, I’m using a laptop why ?
About question 1:
I heard that one of the doctor’s incarnation, I think the second, use to pray to a god that the time lords pray to, that was either
a prose or an audio adventure.
Is that true ?
and if it is, is it canon ?
and by canon
I mean are the events that happen in the comics and prose are in the same universe of the show ?
And are the events that happen there happen to the same doctor that is on the show, or is he
another version of him ?
About question 3:
Wasn’t the war doctor the 8th doctor ?
16 July 2015 at 00:43 #41221Because your spell checker is coming up with different words than the ones you mean.
In the 1997 novel ‘The Murder Game’, the Second Doctor offers up a quick prayer (probably on the ‘no atheists in foxholes’ principle) to ‘the gods of his own people’. We do know that Gallifreyans have gods; however we also know that Time Lords encourage atheism.
All Time Lords (as far as we know) are Gallifreyans: not all Gallifreyans are Time Lords. 🙂 And the canonicity of the novels (which I distinctly remember discussing before) is in a quantum state of uncertainty. They are stories told about the Doctor, not events that ‘definitely’ happened.
Wasn’t the war doctor the 8th doctor ?
I’ve just told you who the Eighth Doctor was – Paul McGann. With video link. His image (as the Eighth Doctor) also appears in ‘The Next Doctor’, ‘The Eleventh Hour’ and ‘The Day of the Doctor’. You can also google ‘Eighth Doctor’ if you like.
The War Doctor is the regeneration between McGann and Eccleston
16 July 2015 at 00:46 #41222@blueswueakpipe
ahh, that makes seance know, thanks 🙂 😀
16 July 2015 at 01:36 #41224HI!
I’m new to this entire website, and I just wanted to familiarize myself with some of the forums.
*Grabs home-made cookies and sits down on sofa*
16 July 2015 at 03:56 #41225@xtremez @bluesqueakpip has been extremely patient with you. I’ve attempted a dialogue with you regarding this business about whether the Dr is an atheist. Yes, he is. Without a doubt, in my opinion. Also, up thread, I’m sure I gave you a paragraph on canon as did @jimthefish and Pip, above. These two are the best for answering questions.
So, in the spirit of asking questions, here’s some for you:
1. What proof do you have the Doctor is some Christian or of the Judeo, Hebraic tradition?
2. Is there a problem with the spelling or the spell check? (I say this because your laptop or smartphone is coming up with words like ‘best’ or beest when you might mean, ‘beast’?)
3. But who or what is the beast you keep referring to? Is it the one in the God Complex (a fav episode of mine)
4. I think Cumberbatch is OK but why do you personally think he’d make a good doctor?
5. Who is your fav doctor and why? Mine happens to be Mat Smith followed closely by Capaldi because he’s 56 and it’s about time we have a Doctor closer to our own ages. 😉
@petersanimations Hi and welcome back to you! Can I sit down and put up my feet and have a cookie too? I’ve had a rough day! Normally I’m not difficult to get on with but a few ppl have pushed my buttons by constantly bringing up the Doctor in terms of a God parallel and this is getting on my goat! Anywaaaay, this is a good place to start but also you could try the Memories page and the Companions thread. On the first, you can read about how people came to love the show; you can add your own experience if you wish. It would be nice to read.
So, have a glass of milk with the cookies!
Kindest, puro.
16 July 2015 at 06:37 #41226If the Doctor weren’t athiest, he almost certainly wouldn’t be an Earth religion anyway. But what does it matter? That kind of thinking seems only to separate people which is the opposite of what the show is about.
16 July 2015 at 07:16 #41230@wibblywobbly it seems to matter to a whole lot of people.
And I agree, he would ‘worship’ some other “god” but personally he’s not built that way, at all
16 July 2015 at 10:03 #41233@wibblywobbly I agree re Scaroth on the other thread: his goo was the building block of earth life. Which must mean something in terms, of you know, that…
16 July 2015 at 10:24 #41234@purofilion Oh, absolutely — the Doctor is about the least “worshipful” character on TV, at least so far (well, he damn near worshiped Clara in S8, but he did it with a lot of banter-y insults that most people don’t associate with the idea of “worship”, and besides, he really needed her to help remind him of what kind of guy he was.
Wait a minute — “his goo” — what?! Who?? Urg . . .
16 July 2015 at 10:27 #41236@purofillion
ohh questions, I like them 😉
Before I begin, let me explain something, my major is English literature, and I am doing my masters degree, my aim is to do it in
something modern and interesting, the doctor’s personality and behavior. hence why I ask too many question.
I apologies to you guys for not clarifying this earlier, and I want to thank @jimthefish, @bluesqueakpip, and you for being
patient with me, and I apologies for asking too many annoying questions.
1- As far as I believe, we don’t have any proof if the doctor is an atheist or has a sense of religion, that’s my personal opinion.
Let me explain.
In popular fiction, whatever the medium is, there is something called a time skip, those who watch anime know what I mean.
A time skip is an amount of time between two parts of the story. It is used to skip to the next part of the story, instead
of having to go through the actual time, unless the writer tells us everything that happen in between that period, it is left to our
imagination.
My theory here is that the Doctor who series has been going through several time skips, and will continue to do so because
of the nature of the show. As many of you know there are a number of adventures that happen in between the episodes, adventures
that we never hear about, what’s stopping us from believing that are other adventures that the doctor is not telling us ?
What’s stopping us from believing that those adventures affected the doctor’s personality ?
You might say the next episode, but about the amount of time that we have after that episode and before the next episode ?
You might also ask, what about the other series ?
They are based not based on time travel and does not have the same features of the doctor who show, the fact that he tells us
those adventures gives us the right to imagine anything.
2- I don’t know. bluesqueakpip said the same thing, but I really don’t know. But when I say beast I do mean beast.
3- this:
http://tardis.wikia.com/wiki/The_Beast_%28The_Impossible_Planet%29
4- I think he has what it takes.
He might be a mixture between Smith and Capadli. He played Khan and Sherlock, so he has the ability to play the doctor.
5- the 9th, 10th, 11th, and 12th
The 9th for his pain and for being the one after the time war, the 10th for his seance of humor and his ability to shift between serious and
funny, the 11th for his personality all around, and for his entire story, the fact that he there were two season that focus on his name makes
his adventures an odyssey rather then just adventures. The 12th for simply being an enigma
16 July 2015 at 10:43 #41237@xtremez Ah well, thank you, that explains a lot. I agree with you definitely about why you like particular doctors. And me too!
Yes, The Impossible Planet -a great 2 parter.
Kindest, puro
16 July 2015 at 10:58 #41239@purofilion What do you think of my theory ?
16 July 2015 at 11:36 #41240@XTremeZ–
Alright, let’s do this…
1- Is the doctor considered an atheist ?
Atheist to what exactly? To Rassilon? I’m presuming you’re meaning to Christian belief? But if he were truly religious it would surely be to the beliefs of his own people. Why would he be remotely invested in the set of creation myths of one daft wee subset (among hundreds) of one daft wee species (among millions) on one daft wee planet (among at least thousands)? There’s none at all that I can see. And from what we’ve seen, Time Lords don’t do supernatural belief. It’s interesting that their most ‘mythic’ figures — Rassilon, Omega etc that their actually historical figures who become mythic because of the magnitude of their acts. And if you allow the Cartmel Masterplan to enter into canon (and that’s a big ‘if’ for many people) then you have Time Lord society based on three major mythic figures Rassilon, Omega and the mysterious third one called The Other. The inference is clear in a number of places that this Other is meant to be the Doctor himself. So, asking does the Doctor believe in God is essentially asking ‘does the Doctor believe in himself?’ (And let’s not even touch the Cult of Pythia that predates this Triumvirate).
As said before, there’s no evidence in Who for the Doctor having any kind of religious belief. He’s an adherent of science and reason (just perhaps less stridently than in the show’s first 20-odd years). The Doctor isn’t human. He just looks it. I always imagine his relationship with humans to be not unlike David Attenborough’s with a tribe of chimps. There’s fascination. Definitely affection. But would your really ask Attenborough if he believed in the Chimp Deity?
2- How long do you think Peter Capaldi will last as the doctor ?
Three years seems to be the going Doctor duration at the moment, with both Tennant and Smith staying that long. It’s my expectation that Capaldi will do that also. Unless, of course, they spring a surprise regeneration on us this year, which I wouldn’t be massively surprised if they did. Personally, I think he’s doing brilliant work and would like to see him do longer and while he’s clearly having a ball, he’s also an incredibly talented and versatile actor who’s no doubt getting lots of offers and probably has lots of other projects he wants to be doing himself, so I expect the standard 3-year stint from him.
3- Who would you like the 13th doctor to be ?
My dream doctor has been and will continue to be Tilda Swinton.
4- Do you think that Benedict Cumberbatceh will make a good doctor ?
I think Cabbagepatch is an incredible actor — and the only thing that made the cliche-fest that was The Imitation Game remotely watchable. There’s really no chance he’s ever take the role of the Doctor though and frankly that’s a fact I’m quite glad of. He’s such an obvious and vanilla choice. We pretty much know from Sherlock more or less how he would play the Doctor. This is not a reflection on Cabbagepatch’s ability, as I say, and maybe he would try something completely off the wall, but I doubt it. We would get Sherlock in Space basically. Let’s have someone who will bring us some surprise, as both Smith and Capaldi have.
@XTremeZ–
On your later points:
we don’t have any proof if the doctor is an atheist or has a sense of religion
Not true. We have lots of proof. Much of it cited by myself and @bluesqeakpip above. I suggest you start with The Daemons, which is handily features in our BG rewatch section. Watch The Face of Evil (originally to be titled The Day God Went Mad, interestingly enough). Watch The Greatest Show in the Galaxy. Look at all the little asides about religion in the Tennant/Smith/Capaldi years. There’s nothing — including Smith’s one line about ‘the devil’ that suggest he’s found religion. As Pip says, it could just be metaphor or it could just be that the beast is of the species that founded the human belief in the Devil (although my money’s still on Azal for that one). Another story to check out in this context would be Pyramids of Mars — the Egyptian characters believe Sutekh to be their god Set, and even the Doctor makes that assertion too, but that doesn’t mean the Doctor suddenly believes in Egyptian gods — merely that he realises that the Osirans became the basis for Egyptian superstition.
A time skip is an amount of time between two parts of the story
I think most of us have grasped that what we see on the show is not absolutely everything that happened in the Doctor’s life ever.
What’s stopping us from believing that those adventures affected the doctor’s personality
Nothing, except that all we infer personality from actions, words and deeds and so far we’ve seen nothing — nothing — on screen to suggest that the Doctor has gone some kind of miraculous religious conversion in an unseen adventure. If anything, with Capaldi’s regeneration we’re seeing a Doctor who is even more dismissive of religious belief in others than his predecessors were.
It boils down to the fundamental concept of empiricism. (Something, incidentally, you’re really going to have to get your head around if you want to have any hope of completing your Masters.) If you want to make any kind of assertion — The Doctor’s a Christian, the Moon is an egg, energy is conserved, the force of gravity on Earth is 9.807ms2, then you have to back up that assertion with evidence. Not an opinion, mark you, but independently verifiable fact. Something that other people can go away, verify for themselves without special pleading, something that replicates your own findings to the letter and becomes true not just for you but for everyone who comes across it. The idea that the Doctor is religious emphatically does not stand up to that test. Not at the moment anyway.
I apologies for asking too many annoying questions
Questions are good. But continually asking the same ones in the hope that you”ll maybe get different answers, not so much.
16 July 2015 at 12:45 #41241@xtremez in answer to your question
What do you think of my theory ?
By this I presume you mean:
“My theory here is that the Doctor who series has been going through several time skips, and will continue to do so because
of the nature of the show. As many of you know there are a number of adventures that happen in between the episodes, adventures
that we never hear about, what’s stopping us from believing that are other adventures that the doctor is not telling us ?”
Answer: there is nothing stopping us from believing that there are other adventures the Dr is not telling us.
In between episodes, there is a life the Doctor leads, as do his companions. The series is not a film, although a film may also employ time changes: “Two years later” for example.
So, yes?
Kindest and best of luck. Post-grad is difficult. You have to move away from trying to twist facts to suit a theory. Which you’d know because you would have watched (maybe even read) Sherlock Holmes.
Puro.
16 July 2015 at 13:03 #41242@purofilion Twisting facts is not a way to do research and might led to an unreasonable and confusing work.
I know the fact that the doctor may not have any beliefs what so ever, I accept that fact with an open mind, heart and arms.
But what I am trying to do is expand the this single thing about our dear doctor and say “could this happen ?”
“why” “why not” putting in mind what happened before and after the events of the time skip. that’s all.
16 July 2015 at 14:50 #41243Congratulations on trying for a Master’s degree. You’ll feel right at home here – several of our prominent contributors have postgraduate degrees and some are university lecturers. Personally, I’m an actor by trade, but I do have a Masters in Comparative Religion.
Religion can be studied from either an insider or an outsider perspective, and I’d say that’s also true of establishing religious belief. If you argue that events we have not seen have changed the Doctor’s religious beliefs, then both my acting training and my religious training would expect a corresponding change in behaviour.
For example, if someone who’s previously been an atheist has a religious conversion experience, they’re likely to change certain aspects of their behaviour. They will probably start praying. They may start attending a church/mosque/temple/synagogue. They may read religious writings. They may help out at the local food bank. They might also change the way they dress, the food they eat … lots of things.
Equally, if someone who’s previously been religious has a loss and/or change of faith, there will also be a change of behaviour. They might, for example, start talking about Flying Spaghetti Monsters, or demanding that people don’t pray for them, or using the word ‘theistic’. 😉
So you can argue that the Doctor’s had an off-screen change of belief, but, until there’s a corresponding on-screen change in his behaviour, you have no evidence for this argument. Meanwhile, you will be competing against people who can provide evidence that there has been no off-screen change of belief – because the Doctor’s behaviour hasn’t changed from the period when we know he was an atheist.
Could this change happen off-screen? It’s very unlikely to. Artistically, it’s too major a change to happen ‘off-screen.’ Even if it was introduced in a novel or comic, and the current producer thought it was a terrific idea, the Doctor’s non-religiosity is so well established that any such change would promptly be given an on-screen story to explain it to the mass audience.
For example, we’ve seen a change in the Doctor’s beliefs – his movement from being aggressively ‘science explains everything’ to respecting people with a strong faith. However, we saw that happen on screen, in Time of Angels. The Doctor moves from poking fun at Father Octavian’s beliefs to respecting him deeply. Thereafter, the Doctor can be friendly with priests with no further discussion. The change in belief has caused a corresponding change in behaviour.
16 July 2015 at 19:40 #41246Cabbagepatch
Ah, Benedict Cumberbatch. The only actor where the parodies of his name aren’t as funny as his actual name. Also the only actor to play Sherlock Holmes who has a name even more stupid than ‘Sherlock Holmes’. 🙂
16 July 2015 at 19:56 #41247@bluesqueakpip — are you saying there’s something funny about that venerable name, that’s synonymous with a fine tradition of slave trading? 😉 I was just trying to spare old Ben’s blushes…
16 July 2015 at 20:11 #41248I think at the rate he’s accepting roles in anti-slavery films, he’s trying to change it to being synonymous with the fine tradition of opposing slavery. 😉
16 July 2015 at 20:42 #41249@jimthefish @bluesqueakpip The surname also derives from the name of a perfectly respectable village in Cheshire, the county which was the home of my mother’s family since time out of mind, and thus not a subject for mockery 😉
My personal favourite of the parodies is Cummerbund Bandersnatch.
16 July 2015 at 21:17 #41250@jimthefish and @mudlark
I think my favourite part in Series 3 was when we visited the Holmes family at, er, home. To discover that ‘Mycroft Holmes’ and ‘Sherlock Holmes’ were originally ‘Mike Holmes’ and ‘William Holmes’. Their parents had called them by perfectly sensible versions of their names; the boys were having none of it. 😀
17 July 2015 at 00:21 #41251@bluesqueakpip — I suppose we should be grateful that ACD was talked out of his original name for Holmes — Sherrinford Hope. God knows, what he would have called Mycroft.
@xtremez — forgot to say, best of luck on the Masters. I’m sure you’ll find it immensely rewarding and a lot of fun to boot….
17 July 2015 at 05:04 #41253I echo @jimthefish too in wishing you luck and all the other stuff you’re going to need for that masters -but it’s a worthy object in a world of subjects where learning “lacks validity.”
There is a belief that we may harbour thoughts and feelings contingent upon perceived emotional support and reciprocation from the subject of interest -which in this case is ‘our doctor.’ This is quite funny (to me) as this idea appeared in a psychiatric journal wherein scientists attempted to shed light on the ‘darkest corners’ of existence. This, essentially is what you are attempting to do by investigating the Doctor’s pre-and mid-existence: something happening within those ‘time skips’ you’ve alluded to.
I guess one element of your research stage is understanding how personality itself works and how the behaviour of the world influences particular people. Some scientists believe it is possible to fully understand the behaviour of the world. But unless we stop believing that we are all completely rational enlightened beings in full command of our actions, desires to eat and worship, then, ironically, we’re probably never going to reach that peculiar space of enlightenment. I think the Doctor himself, a highly rational being, derives much of his personality from the little people on earth who inhabit an era of strangeness: and so it is not unreasonable to act in accordance with its demands!
I think it is Kayser Soze (sic) in The Usual Suspects (and @bluesqueakpip both an actor and scholar would know this better than I) who claims that the greatest trick the devil ever pulled was convincing us all that he didn’t exist. But what is this devil? It’s not really the devil (Capital ‘D’) but perhaps pieces of the devil, scattered around, like a wasteland, and filled with “chocolate wrappers and electronic memories of our suffering” (see Silence in The Library and David Healy’s Let Them Eat Prozac). Our unconscious behaviour and the periods of time in which we either fail to properly inhabit a day (or a month or a year) and the time which no-one except ourselves is party to (such as the Doctor’s lonely travels amongst tribes who lack a language we understand) should cause a visceral change in action -personally, a harbinger of doom (but that’s just me).
How do we determine such a change has occurred except via action? And that action is communicated through words -according to Derrida, at least (yes, pass the frickin’ chocolate now) because meaning is the servant of language. Eventually though, “there is nothing [specifically] outside the text” (Bernard Keane). And this is significant when considering matching language and action with a character who not only deploys time skips but is part of a time-skip because he is a character in a TV show.
And I guess cultural studies in previously old-school English faculties made it possible to look for evidence in every cook and franny with any materials we had at hand. Derrida made it acceptable and even glorious, to “privilege the overlooked elements of a text, whether, film, music, fiction or non-fiction” (and he’s to blame for my interest in that bottle of wine right now). And I think that’s where you’re headed if you’re looking at what the Doctor might discover when we’re effectively not looking and he’s travelling with that tribe which possess no verbal means of conversing, for instance.
And some of that is OK -it can be acceptable to decide what a person is like because of what they’re not. They are a particular something -say, Person A, because they haven’t done something else -Action B. So people are made of the things that constitute what they are not -even their opposite and I think @jimthefish ‘ love for Tilda Swinton segues nicely here as Orlando was very much about identity and what creates it; the clothes we have; wear us, our language thus uses us and our personality exists in part because of what we’re not.
So of course the Doctor exists outside of televised life but the basic problem is that you are viewing an individual through a kaleidoscope of evidence belonging only on the page or script. To assume anything else is somewhat fanciful.
Nonetheless it is fascinating. Of course, I’m not really a fan of Derrida (possibly because that bottle of wine is closer and the chocolate’s gone) and one should interpret the above considering the position of the tongue in relation to the cheek and my inordinate love for, and friendship with, Helen Razer, who believes we are all mad, anyway 😉
Kindest, puro.
17 July 2015 at 08:07 #41254@Purofilion Ah good old Derrida. I wanted to do a masters thesis on Derrida. No-one at the Uni would agree to supervise. (For which I am now extremely grateful. I would have drunk far too much red I suspect had I followed that line of interest.)
Interesting discussion in the light of a conversation I was involved in this afternoon regarding the relationship between faith and culture. I was looking forward to following the discussion. Excellent points made by @bluesqueakpip, @jimthefish and Puro.
Cheers
Janette
17 July 2015 at 09:37 #41255@janetteb indeed. I remember in my last year composing a choral ode with 40 singers (a capella) ‘to’ Derrida along the lines of
dead derrida
dead derrida
derri-da-ra
derri-ra-dum
derri redundant
very resplendent
deri- despondent (aaaand I don’t recall the rest. ‘Drivel’ and ‘dwell’ also appeared somewhere)
Yeah, it only took a night: any more and I would have wanted hard cash.
Also, it was a bit crap
~<*\*>~18 July 2015 at 00:36 #41261@purofilion Wait, what? You mean we’re NOT all mad? And, yes, along those lines — we could have an episode or more of people desperately trying to figure out why the Doctor has retreated into a Silent order of Gramdillion monks, spends all his days there in prayer or weeding the rocksour beds and pinchfoot vines, and won’t come out . . . that is, what religion he’s joined and why, or if not, what *else* the hell he thinks he’s doing? An exercise in reading backward from changed behavior to previous experience.
@jimthefish So to whom do we owe the gratitude for *not*-Sherrinford Hope? Good grief!
@bluesqueakpip You mean Mycroft went out and *found* “Mycroft” and took it home and adopted it? I could see Sherlock coming up with “Sherlock” in a fit of absent-mindedness while doped up, but Mycroft?
@xtremez I think the Doctor does indeed have a basic belief, which is that everything has a “rational” explanation, if you just keep digging for it. But since the show is (IMO) Science Fantasy, fantasy elements (which sometimes appear supernatural) are often dealt with, not by accepting that fantasy is “real” but by slapping complicated (or simple) hand-wavy but scientific sounding “explanations” on them. He does tend to stop by here and there to unmask a “God” as a parasitical alien or some other type of con-artist, rather than becoming a follower of any of them.
But it’s Doctor Who we’re talking about, so IMO of course anything *could* happen — but it won’t be acceptable without a solid explanation that viewers find convincing enough to accept for the purposes of a good adventure.
18 July 2015 at 09:51 #41265why the Doctor has retreated into a Silent order of Gramdillion monks
Well, at the beginning of The Bells of St John the Doctor, frustrated in his search for the impossible girl, had retreated to live with a community of medieval monks and was even dressed in a kind of monkish habit. But when he got the telephone call from Clara he promptly decided ‘Don’t be a monk; monks aren’t cool’ clapped on his fez and was away 🙂
18 July 2015 at 13:38 #41266@purofilion – it’s actually a fairly old aphorism – C.S. Lewis has a variant in his Screwtape stories, and I think possibly Baudelaire as well. Right now, however, The Usual Suspects has the best known version.
@ichabod – no, Mycroft really is called ‘Mycroft’. The usual excuse for upper middle class families landing their offspring with names like that is ‘family name’. However, his parents (especially Mum) call him ‘Mike’.
So having been given the option during his childhood of the perfectly sensible ‘Mike Holmes’, he goes for ‘Mycroft Holmes’. 😉 It may also be a bit of a shout out to the super-computer ‘Mike Holmes’ (for those who haven’t read the book, he’s named after Mycroft) in the Heinlein novel The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress.
Sherlock, as he admits to Watson, is William Sherlock Scott Holmes. That’s using Baring Gould’s idea; presumably Baring-Gould was following a theory that nobody in their right minds would give a child ‘Sherlock’ as his first name, but ‘William Sherlock’ was a Dean of St Pauls and a theologian.
Possibly the fictional Holmes family are descended from the real William Sherlock. 😉
I have a deep respect for the Sherlockians; they started this literary game of bonkers theories based on evidence within the text.
But when he got the telephone call from Clara he promptly decided ‘Don’t be a monk; monks aren’t cool’
Which happens to be the usual reason for realising God isn’t calling you to be a monastic… 😈
18 July 2015 at 14:22 #41267@bluesqueakpip ah yes, the devil ‘quote’
Is it a trick and did he ‘unmask and deliver’ when we least noticed?
I think, vaguely, Soze not being Soze at all, is the neat trick Spacey’s character played?
I haven’t read much Baudelaire in ages! I love Flaubert and Montagne -so thank you: I’ll check that out.
@ichabod “He does tend to stop by here and there to unmask a “God” as a parasitical alien.” Of late he’s done that rather a lot, actually.
Gard it’s 11.30 Pm and I’m still up & about: time for shut eye. /*-*\
Kindest. puro
18 July 2015 at 14:48 #41268@ichabod — I believe it was ACD’S then wife who made him change the name. I believe the original name for Watson was something equally risible — Ormond Sacker.
@bluesqueakpip — I believe the new name might have been chosen after the violinist Alfred Sherlock or it might have been after a couple of cricketers of the time.
Quite a nice page about the whole thing here
18 July 2015 at 18:37 #41269the usual reason for realising God isn’t calling you to be a monastic
As no less a person than Tom Baker could no doubt testify 😈
18 July 2015 at 19:15 #41270Sylvester McCoy, as well. 😀
18 July 2015 at 20:53 #41271Just putting this out there. Made me smile. Earthshock part 3 coming tomorrow!
I am proud of Steven Moffat http://t.co/Fm3UJx7pZz
— Ian Levine (@IanLevine) July 18, 2015
18 July 2015 at 21:05 #41272Just something — I like it because it upholds the idea that I am not the only idiot who can not understand time travel in DW (or anyplace else, but that’s another story):
Huh. That looks kinda bare. I’ve got the page bookmarked so let me know if the link doesn’t work, and I’ll go get a way in through Google. Right now, *must* sleep.
18 July 2015 at 22:51 #41273Or there’s me. It’s an in-story view. 😀
19 July 2015 at 06:34 #41275For all the (potential) writers out there, the BBC have announced their window for drama script submissions:
We have just announced the dates for our next Script Room for the submission of unsolicited scripts in the Drama genre.
The Script Room will open on Monday 7th September 2015 at 10am and close at 5pm on Thursday 24th September 2015. **Please note that no late submissions will be accepted**
Good luck
19 July 2015 at 06:37 #41276thank you for the link to your original blog on Time.
I hadn’t read it before! Amazing.
Also I’ve never seen Time Crash. I’m assuming it has Tennant & it’s on the internet and probably as a DVD extra?
Kindest, puro
19 July 2015 at 07:49 #41277@jimthefish thanks for the Sherlock Holmes page — interesting to be reminded that in Conan Doyle’s day homosexuality was a crime. The idea that Sherlock, that rock-ribbed intellectual, would jeopardize his image (and self-image) as a staunch, brilliant, and even heroic upholder of the laws of Queen and country by allowing sexual urges to lead him into criminal behavior himself just makes no sense — not that it’s impossible, but the man who lived that kind of double life at that time would be some other man, not Sherlock as we know him. Bringing the characters into the present, with homosexuality de-criminalized, does free up the hitherto fairly blank territory of Holmes’ sexuality, but even in Steven M’s “Sherlock”, so far only a bit of (possible) innuendo has occurred. Don’t we live in a peculiar time — people yakking passionately away all over the net etc. about the supposed or explicit “sexuality” of entirely fictional persons . . . ? IMO it’s play, but a strange sort of game.
Bluesqueakpip Good piece on DW time travel. Thanks for the link.
@whohar Good luck to anyone here set to try sending in a script! Writers outside the UK seem to be excluded, which does make sense since DW is such a UK show — and I’m delighted to see it stay that way. I wouldn’t be tempted in any case — writing screenplays for TV requires a specialized skill set that I don’t have. Which suits me fine, actually; when I take in fiction for pleasure, I don’t try to write whatever form I’m enjoying, because I want it to *remain* a pleasure for me, not part of my working life. I’ve heard other colleagues say the same.
19 July 2015 at 09:11 #41278I think ‘Sherlock’ has currently got the sexuality of the characters absolutely right. That is, the question mark is over Sherlock.
Watson is definitely straight; but Watson is also someone not-scared of loving a man very deeply. He just won’t be sexually attracted to that man.
The running gag is that any strong love between two men must mean (in the 21st Century) that they’re a gay couple.
19 July 2015 at 09:52 #41279Morning all. I’m only in briefly as I travel again tonight. While I was away I was mulling the religious question, faith, etc. As ever, some wonderful responses to this question but I’m conscious that this is the third time (I think) a general question has been raised along these lines and we’ve had an extended discussion on the Sofa or another thread, reiterating very similar points.
A little nagging voice suggests to me that “all this has happened before, and all of this will happen again” (to paraphrase Battlestar Galactica). Given the level of knowledge and perspectives we have on the site, is it worth trying to open up a new forum thread – Say Faith, Philosophy, Myth and Reason in Doctor Who or a Blog? A Forum thread has the benefit that we can move existing posts (and potentially recurring discussions) to the appropriate place (we can’t do this on blogs). It may save a bit of time in the future.
While giving this some thought, I actually revisited some stuff I wrote a while ago about the old series, and particularly Religious portrayal and faith in the original series. Needs some work, but I’d actually forgotten some stuff particularly where the original stories are missing (there is an interesting period in Season 3 in which Stevens faith in the Doctor as hero is tested almost to destruction that is quite nice). Also the religious imagery in RTDs and SMs run (where “a” Church, or factions thereoff is a kind of big bad for series 5-7 and the Smith specials) – almost a conflict of mythologies.
Any thoughts? (and this is particularly directed to the original participants of the discussion or anybody else interested).
19 July 2015 at 12:33 #41284Hrrrr, I don’t know about a thread for Faith and Mythology. I suppose it would mean I’d steer clear of it then! I’m going to shift this response to people far more patient than I. To paraphrase your song offering on the music thread (playing currently as a little theme):
“It’s a another red-light nightmare…but I’m lonely….what am I gonna do?
Having said that, philosophy, mythology contains far more than Judeo-Christian strictures, so possibly, with @bluesqueakpip‘s knowledge and that of @jimthefish‘ it could be well worth it: I might even peek. There’s a lot for me to learn.
Enjoy your travels (even if for work),
Puro
19 July 2015 at 21:47 #41292https://medium.com/hackerpreneur-magazine/science-fiction-and-design-866178c1739e
I’m sharing a entertaining and fairly short piece about creating science
fiction and creating the Mars Onsight program.
This was very nicely ‘assembled’ -
AuthorPosts
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