S33 (7) 14 – The Name of the Doctor

[Timeloop @timeloop]

@juniperfish Well, then I must humbly apologize. I misread it as a fact, I’m sorry. I dont see her having any psychic though…. Just very informed and cunning.And I agree on everything else you said ^^. Sorry again, it’s been a long day for me.

[Pufferfish @pufferfish]

Nice to see that in CALworld, Issey Miyake does River’s wardrobe. Hope Kingston gets to keep the clothes. Everybody understands that she said the Doctor’s given name under cover of him yelling ‘please?’ at the GI, right? BTW I don’t think River and Clara are at all connected beyond each knowing the Doctor. ‘Spoilers’ only means that River is probably due another ‘live’ appearance in his timeline. She has to get his given name out of him, right? Besides, for all we know the History of the Time War book could name him as Mr. Song – especially if it was written by the wife.

Obviously the Doctor meets Clara out of order, but  linear order is restored the closer he gets to 10 April, 2013. It’s not like the Tardis hates her, because she has no problem with Victorian Clara, it’s that Clara Prime is directed away from going inside on her own unless it’s necessary. If she needs to get in, she gets in, just as the Tardis always takes the Doctor where he needs to go. And are we agreed that she didn’t really know what she’d done until she jumped into the Doctor’s timelines? Moffat’s been serving up characters who have their timelines tweaked by the Doctor in real time since before he took over, so it’s good turnabout to show that happening to the Doctor. Maybe series 8 will give Clara some family life/backstory – I can but hope. It’s my big complaint with Moffat’s women/companions, so here’s hoping she doesn’t find out she’s also her own mum or something.

For the Hurt Doctor, he could be Prisoner Zero – escaping under deep cover when all the other Time Lords did in series 4, or possibly when Ten regenerated so hard the Tardis nearly blew up. It definitely leaked/cracked (maybe he’s the ultimate ‘spoiler?’). That ‘silence will fall’ voice did remind me of a certain camp dragon. I’ve always thought the Atraxi caught a decoy in The Eleventh Hour (‘pay no attention to the patient behind the curtain’). He could be an anomaly between Eight and Nine, based purely on wardrobe. He could even be a massive impostor, just because of the tendency of Moffat to misdirect.

[Anonymous @]

@scaryb – re seeing the effects of timeline changes, not the changes themselves:

(to quote Carrie Fisher in ‘When Harry Met Sally’)

You’re right, you’re right, I know you’re right.  😀

And @juniperfish – @bluesqueakpip probably had the montage scenes nailed with that comment!  I trust her because I haven’t seen much pre-2005 Who (but even I have heard about the ridiculous hanging-from-a-cliff cliffhanger scene, somewhere on this site).  What a sneaky and totally hilarious thing if it’s true – they picked episodes that might have been improved (even just with the GI’s malign influence! 🙂 ).

[davemorris316 @davemorris316]

Ok, I think Clara could be the future Doctor.

1. River asks how she could be there if Clara is really dead…. psychic link with Clara, hence psychic link with The Doctor.

2. In the timeline, The Doctor says ‘there’s only me here, that’s the point’ – you see Clara there, but no other people from the Doctor’s timeline (including Simeon, who did exactly what Clara did).

3. The Doctor says – ‘It’s the name I chose, the name YOU choose.’

4. As someone questioned earlier in the thread – why did The Doctor have issues with paradoxes when in front of the time stream initially, but then seemed fine enough to stand, kiss and move into it? Because the paradox there was Clara? The Doctor collapsed at the moment he said ‘the ones I haven’t lived yet..’. This seemed to bring it about.

 

So, does Clara become the Doctor?

 

If she already has previous in relation to influencing her own birth, what if her final act of ‘saving the doctor’ is supplanting herself into a regeneration, and before this sounds selfish, what if it’s to prevent The Doctor regenerating into Hurt’s Doctor?

[Anonymous @]

@pufferfish – “here’s hoping she [Clara] doesn’t find out she’s also her own mum or something.”

Tee hee hee!

I’m losing interest in ‘extraordinary’ female companions in the Moffat vein, myself – crack-in-wall girl, impossible girl, it would be nice to have fairly normal girl (but of course strong enough physically and emotionally to ably assist the Doctor).

Seeing as how Moffat has to get both the Doctor and Clara into the next series without any knowledge of his future from their time swirling around in his timeline, perhaps the way Moffat achieves that will allow Clara to become a little more ‘normal’.  Or, the Clara Prime we saw at the end of the episode, is she ‘normal’ now, in the sense of all her other millions of incarnations have fully lived their lives and died?

(What am I saying … this is a time-travel show.  Are they going to be running into Clara-lites the whole next series?)

[Juniperfish @juniperfish]

@phaseshift Thanks for that clip 🙂 Nieve and Alex together – that’s fun.

Yes I would like to add to the blog section (different from a blog-roll @scaryb innit? Unless we now also have a “blogs we recommend” section that I’ve missed?) when I have some time – not for a while yet probably 🙁

@pufferfish Well hello there shy-fish and welcome to an epic post of your own!

I love the idea that the Doctor is named Mr. Song in the TIme War book and I did enjoy the reversal whereby River called the Doc “him indoors” this episode.

Well I would laugh at the circular ingenuity if Hurt Doc were Prisoner Zero. But why disguise yourself as a giant multi-form snake I wonder?! 🙂

@davemorris316 Clara as Future Doctor – maybe, maybe.  I do love the idea of the Doctor unwittingly flirting with himself. Not convinced this is where they’re going tho’.

[Anonymous @]

@davemorris316 – not a bad idea at all, this:

“what if her final act of ‘saving the doctor’ is supplanting herself into a regeneration, and before this sounds selfish, what if it’s to prevent The Doctor regenerating into Hurt’s Doctor?”

Re your points 2 – 4, goodness gracious, I’m going to have to watch this ep again!  I think I noticed that ‘you choose’ but will look out for it, also to confirm the timing on when the Doctor stops being so poorly – you’re right I believe, he did get up after Clara left …

[chickenelly @chickenelly]

Re: River’s & Clara’s psychic link.

I think @phaseshift is correct that there are certainly little clues in the Neil Cross episodes.  We’ve already seen a case of a psychic link across time haven’t we?  In Hide, the psychic Emma Grayling is connected to the first time traveller who happens to be a very distant relation a g-g-g-g-g, etc, grand daughter.

[wolfweed @wolfweed]

@scaryb – Ta for the Hancock. I think that ‘Spot the Clara’ Competitions will become a new artform in themself. For example, in this one she’s there on the Titanic, in the foreground, obviously watching Christopher Ecclestone’s Dr’s back!

[Pufferfish @pufferfish]

@Shazzbot – I certainly hope not, because whatever they do for the 50th/Series 8 will probably write over that potential future.

[Anonymous @]

Heya @wolfweed – where did you get that JLC picture from?

[wolfweed @wolfweed]

@Shazzbot – Titanic (The tv series).

http://i.telegraph.co.uk/multimedia/archive/02173/jenna-lou_2173500b.jpg

[Anonymous @]

@wolfweed – I don’t know anything about JLC’s acting background, so I thought I’d missed something in TNotD!  But she does look younger there.

[rema @rema]

@davemorris316 I don’t see the suits at the BBC allowing for a femail doctor for financial reasons – and I say the following as a girl who likes handbags and Doctor Who, so don’t shoot me but…

I teach 7/8 year olds and the kids who like Doctor Who are boys, the kids who bring in the action figures are boys, and the lunch bags, and the top trump cards etc. The girls in my classes for the past few years have had  all kinds of lunch bags, JLS, Hello Kitty, One Direction and many more but I’ve not seen a girl with a Doctor Who one. The merchandise must make up a huge income stream for the BBC and I’m guessing that most of it is bought for boys (and middle aged nerds – I’m ducking!!) I’d guess that a proportion of this lucrative audience wouldn’t be that impressed with a femail Doctor – I know they adored Amy but the Doctor is the ‘hero’ and I think the suits would not want to risk the ‘brand’.

I know you can say ‘well my daughter/sister/niece is a HUGE fan and has all the action figures etc…’ but I can only speak from what I have seen generally. Would the boys in my class love Doctor Who as much if its’ central hero was a girl, I’m not sure and I don’t think the BBC would want to take the risk. I realise the femail companion is a huge part of the show, and you could argue that a femail doctor is not that big a leap, but I’m not convinced.

[Anonymous @]

@rema – but wouldn’t a female Doctor bring in the girls?  If your assertions are correct and there’s some dropping in young boys’ enthusiasm for the programme with a female lead, surely the numbers could be made up by the increase in young female fans?

And as for the Dads – well, if the stereotype is that they watch for the companion, and the female Doctor were as cute as a companion is, then surely they’d stay onside  😉

It’s a big risk, I’ll grant you that.  But it wouldn’t have to be for an extended run, and in fact I just had an idea … what if Clara and the Doctor reversed bodies for a few episodes?  It would give the programme makers time to assess the impact of a female Doctor without committing an actress to the role for a few years.

And imagine Matt Smith playing a young human woman.  We know he has the acting chops to pull it off briliantly 😀

[Bluesqueakpip @bluesqueakpip]

@davemorris316 – yay, another convert to ‘Clara is the Doctor’. Good spots.

Yes, that she’s his future is a fully established bonkers theory. That’s why she can survive his timeline. Whether she is actually ‘him’ – that is, this Clara, Clara Prime has physical continuity with him – or whether the Clara we know is not Clara Prime at all, but an echo of his future self – remains to be seen.

One thing I’d point out is that Clara’s ‘Impossible Girl’ status does not explain why Jenna Louise Coleman and Matt Smith are often mirroring each other physically. It’s particularly noticeable in the Crimson Horror.

The other is that the audience is encouraged to believe that River is jealous of Clara because Madame Vastra and Jenny assume that she will be. But we don’t see River being jealous; we do see her being uncomfortable – and we also see her trying to establish where Clara is in her timeline; the question about ‘the Doctor must have talked about me’ is designed to see if Clara has yet reached the point in her timeline where she knows perfectly well who River is.

 

[wolfweed @wolfweed]

@Shazzbot – I was being cheeky using that pic! I’m suggesting that fans will Photoshop Clara into old Who – I would have used an example, but no one’s done one yet. They will come. An Artform I tells ya!

[rema @rema]

@shazzbot – I would hope that a female Doctor would increase young femail viewers, there is a market for shows with strong female leads – The Hunger Games come to mind – and girls are increasingly engaged with traditionally ‘male’ genres. The Avengers couldn’t have made that much money without them. So maybe I should have more faith in the young fan-girls.

[Anonymous @]

@rema – you spell ‘female’ as ‘femail’ and the only place I’ve seen the latter is in the Daily Mail newspaper.  Is that where you picked it up?

[rema @rema]

Oh dear, and I teach children how to spell, in my defence it’s late.

Don’t tell Gove he’ll quote me in a speech

[Anonymous @]

@rema – good use of the Edit feature on your previous comment!  😉

I have probably made more use of that edit feature than anyone else – I repeatedly find yet another spelling error once I see my submitted comment.  😀

[Bluesqueakpip @bluesqueakpip]

@rema – Sara Jane Adventures. Female lead who was in her fifties, and one of CBBC’s most popular programmes. It had an audience of both boys and girls.

I would expect the suits to be deeply nervous; if Clara is the Doctor that’s why JLC is being carefully introduced long in advance of any regeneration. I would be deeply nervous; we know there’s a section of fandom who would be very loudly against a female Doctor.

But the reason most of your little girls don’t bring in Doctor Who lunch boxes and toys is very simple; they know they can’t be the Doctor. Even in the show, Amy knew she couldn’t be the Doctor – she had Rory dress up as the Doctor, even though, in personality, Amy is a much closer match. Rory, you see, was a boy.

For SJA they had the female lead, and two boys (and another girl) as the sidekicks. It wasn’t a big problem. The only reason it’s currently a problem is that the Classic Doctors were all male, and it takes a bit of imagination to realise that there’s no real reason an alien can’t regenerate as female. Given the way gender roles have changed within my lifetime, I would imagine that we’d probably be wondering what all the fuss was about within a year or two of the first female Doctor  (providing she’s a good enough actress).

Strax probably wouldn’t even realise the Doctor’s gender had changed. 😀

[rema @rema]

@shazzbot – yes but I was too late for my previous post – arghhh!!

I do love an edit function, and spellcheck!!

[Anonymous @]

@bluesqueakpip – excellent points about SJA and Amy/Rory, and also the social and cultural changes over the last few decades.

Now that you mention it, is this why Clara had to become ‘the general’ in NiS?  So the audience had a chance to see her in charge, making decisions and taking control?  And is this what the ‘you’re the boss / I’m the boss’ business was in CH?

(and you’re right about Strax!  that could be a very funny running joke, if the Pat Gang are still around)

[rema @rema]

@bluesqueakpip – I think you make some good points about the girls thinking they can’t be the doctor and so don’t play with the figures (dolls!!) as much. But if, as you say, the long introduction of the female doctor might offset any ill will towards JLC and the particular incarnation of the doctor, then maybe Clara is the Doctor.

Still don’t buy it though, but you’ve convinced me it could be possible, maybe.

[Pufferfish @pufferfish]

I don’t buy it because a female Doctor would be played by a different and possibly taller/older actress.

[Bluesqueakpip @bluesqueakpip]

Now that you mention it, is this why Clara had to become ‘the general’ in NiS?  So the audience had a chance to see her in charge, making decisions and taking control?  And is this what the ‘you’re the boss / I’m the boss’ business was in CH?

@Shazzbot: I certainly did wonder – very much. She was playing what would normally be the Doctor’s role. Taking charge of the fight.

I think the ‘I’m the boss’ was a little joke; the writers are, after all, supposed to be the ones in charge of The Doctor – not the other way round. 🙂

[ScaryB @scaryb]

@juniperfish

Agh! You caught me out on my ignorance of these things. I blame @phaseshift – he keeps talking about blog rolls hehe

Btw – is it still a ship if it happens in episode? (I can’t believe how much my vocabulary has increased over this series 😉 )

While we’re on the subject – what about River?! That woman waited 300+ years just for a wee snog!

@rema @bluesqueakpip

Female Dr? ha! I still think it’d be worth it just to watch the reaction on the blogs, LOL. Some of them can’t even handle a female companion being pro-active.

On the subject of BBC “suits” – I would have every faith in Moffat to get that past them. Picture the scene as he presents the “OK the next couple of episodes are going to basically wipe out 90% of the established history of the programme” concept (of the finale and 50th) to them –

Moff: It’s brrrilliant – Tennant and Piper have signd up for the finale!!

BBC Suit : £££ 😀

Moff: And we’re bringing back a fan fave baddie, a new one…

BBC suit: ££ 🙂

Moff: … who’s going to jump into the Dr’s timestream and change everything, but it’s OK because the Impossible Girl – who’s going to be an absolute winner with the Dads – jumps in and resets it all again.

BBC Suit:?

Moff: And we’ve got Tennant and Billie lined up for the 50th with daleks and cybermen.. and zygons!!

BBC Suit; £££ 🙂

Moff: And… the best thing of all is we’ve got John Hurt… for definite, no kidding.. JOHN HURT!

BBC Suit: £££££££ 😀

 

[Anonymous @]

@scaryb – that was funny, thanks!

You’re right, though – Moffat selling this series surely had a harder time than he would/will selling a female Doctor.

[wolfweed @wolfweed]

Clara thinks: ”That Paul McGann didn’t hang about for very long!’

Then, suddenly…

[blenkinsopthebrave @blenkinsopthebrave]

Well, after a restful sleep, I have awakened to the detritus of the previous night. Time to clean up the makeshift Club Lounge in the apartment. Ah, but what an episode! As usual, Moffat confounds us all!

Brilliant use of the previous Doctors. As for who Hurt is:

Doctor: “I said he was me. I never said he was the Doctor.”

Clara: “I don’t understand.”

Doctor: “My name. My real name. That is not the point. The name I chose is The Doctor”.

OK, while I have been plowing through all the posts, apologies for missing those who have already discussed this, but: presumably the only known names that are big enough and bad enough are Valeyard and Omega. And Valeyard comes at the end of the Doctor’s time stream, while Omega comes at the beginning (if one reads time in a linear fashion).

More thought required.

[ScaryB @scaryb]

<waves @blenkinsopthebrave> Wild night in the old Club Lounge then? Ah, you just can’t get the staff these days!

Interestingly I haven’t noticed Omega’s name come up (or the Other) – could’ve missed it tho ; Valeyard’s been mentioned as you’d imagine. Concensus seems to be that it’s most likely “the incarnation we don’t talk about” between 8 and 9. But could be before Hartnell, or a future Dr.

 

Hope you enjoyed it as much as most people in here seem to have done. I loved the rewriting the Dr’s timeline gamechanger was brilliant – and how much does that open things up?!!, squeeing at John Hurt and sniffled an ambarrassing amount over River.

 

[wolfweed @wolfweed]

Okay- That Points of View is now available to watch. Hear Dr Who fans whinge that the show should be axed, etc.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b020svzy

[ardaraith @ardaraith]

@wolfweed – Where is McGann? I only see Troughton dashing about…

[wolfweed @wolfweed]

@ardaraith – He’s so quick you can’t see him!

This passed us by too (It’s a fan Photoshop GI meme).

[wolfweed @wolfweed]

@ardaraith – Here’s McGann:

 

[blenkinsopthebrave @blenkinsopthebrave]

@scaryb

Indeed I did love the episode. As I said (#9743) just after the episode finished in the colonies:

“Everything about the episode was wonderful. Everything.”

Back to who Hurt might be. Yes, I had thought of the potential Doctor between 8 and 9, who, presumably, fought/ended the Time War. But it also ocurred to me that he might go back to the beginning. If I recall correctly, the Doctor stated–in “Remembrance of the Daleks–that he helped Omega and Rassilon devise the Hand of Omega. Now, Hurt could be that third timelord, or even Omega himself.

Still more thought required.

 

[wolfweed @wolfweed]

Sorry I got muddled up – The GI meme IS from the show. (What was I thinking?) Bedtime, methinks!

[lbelanger17 @lbelanger17]

@jimthefish In regards to the regeneration rule, supposedly the Doctor only has 12 regenerations, and with John Hurt, that would put him on his 12th, but if you remember back to Let’s Kill Hitler, River gave the Doctor all her remaining regenerations when she healed him so I’m wondering if that was a plan from Moffat to get around the regeneration limit. It would give the Doctor at least 9 more regenerations.

[blenkinsopthebrave @blenkinsopthebrave]

@lbelanger17

12+9=21

Moffat ends his short piece in the Guardian (supposedly referring to the video chat between MS and DT) with the cryptic:

“Ten plus 11 gives you…”

Hmmm…

[WhoHar @whohar]

Bloody terrific episode. Nicely paced and tone was good – the humour worked well and not too jarring. Moffat making fun of himself with the Glasgow scene and the “Bring out your Women and Intellectuals” line.

Not sure if this has already been posted but my thoughts on the John Hurt Doctor: he could be

Pre-1

Pre-9

Post-11 (timey wimey and all that)

The Beast.

The Storm – hmm, wasn’t Doc 9 the Oncoming Storm. Then that would mean John Hurt’s Doc would come between 9 and 10, which can’t make sense. Doc 11 used the Oncoming Storm line in AotD too. Probably a red herring or an abbreviation of that name.

[TheNightmareChild @thenightmarechild]

Is the great intelligence the Valeyard that somehow escaped or is the Valeyard  just the evil version of the doctor?  He said he’s been thwarted every time by the doctor, but we’ve only really seen him like twice this series. And of course John Hurt is who the Doctor saw in the God Complex episode

[janetteB @janetteb]

Have spent all day, (when I should be working) catching up on posts. So many crackers I wanted to comment on but as usual have forgotten by the time I’ve read this far.

Loved loved the episode but I really want to rewatch. Funny I thought it totally trashed the theory I was going with that Clara was created by River using the Tardis but others now seem to be embracing that one. It seemed to me that Clara was just the ordinary girl who was splintered as a result of entering the timey wimey thing but of course she is a paradox, (love a paradox, almost as much as Moffat) having been the cause of the leaf which leads to her birth. I do feel that JLC has been holding back with her character, so as to give little away and feul the mystery so hopefully next series her character will gain depth. Clara now can be a continuing re appearing character. I don’t see her as a future Doctor. There were echoes of B.5 in this episode. (“Sinclair, I go because I have always gone.”)

John Hurt could be either zero Doctor or Doctor 8&3/4. I hope he is not going to turn out to be an older eight as that would hardly be fair to McGann. I would be happy with either option. I am already planning a Who based feast for 24th of November. (When I’m assuming it will be shown in Australia.)

re’ Truckles. I got drawn into the fray too and I have three cups of coffee to blame. I wondered if he is the writer that he mentioned who apparantly has a grudge against MOffat.

Cheers

Janette

[SatsumaJoe @satsumajoe]

Probably a minor thing but above clips – Two and Eight in the same era?

[ScaryB @scaryb]

For info, there’s screen shots and info about the sources of all the previous Doctors here

[SatsumaJoe @satsumajoe]

Ta @scaryb!

@thenightmarechild Is the great intelligence the Valeyard that somehow escaped or is the Valeyard  just the evil version of the doctor?  He said he’s been thwarted every time by the doctor, but we’ve only really seen him like twice this series. And of course John Hurt is who the Doctor saw in the God Complex episode

No? Yes he’s a future version of the Doctor (from past series), GI has been thwarted by other Doctors (or maybe just by one of them) and yeah he is!

Had the thought that he could be a version of Ten who hadn’t saved Wilf. Just a thought.

[overunder @jamesunderscore]

My head is still reeling from watching it yesterday – Can’t wait to watch it again.

A few thoughts occur:

Hurt Doctor can only exist at four points in The Doctor’s timeline:

Pre-Hartnell
Between Troughton and Pertwee (we never actually see that regeneration happen)
Between McGann and Ecclestone
After Smith

For every other regeneration we have actually seen the faces change and I don’t see them being able to retcon that away.

I think we can discount the gap between Troughton and Pertwee due to its obscurity, and given that Eleven knew what the Hurt Doctor had done, I think that rules out the future. As people have said upstream, The Doctor has always been upfront about the things he did in the Time War, and ultimately accepted that they were necessary to protect the innocents of the universe by stopping the Time Lords using the final sanction, so I think this means we are either going to find out that he’s not exactly been truthful with us (and, indeed, himself) about what happened during the Time War, or we’re going to find out just what exactly he did on Gallifrey that made him want to skip town.

RE. female Doctors – although TDW established that changing sex when regenerating is possible, I don’t think we’ll ever see a female Doctor. I think it would rather go against personality for him to decide to be a woman. That said, I’m not averse to the idea myself and I think there’s a great story line to be told in how the Doctor adjusts to the change, and perhaps also how his companion does. I also think a female Doctor opens up a whole new type of Doctor-Companion relationship (not the sapphic sort!)

RE. Clara – I really like her. I know there’s a lot of less than positive opinions about her out there, but all the different versions and sides we have seen of her have allowed JLC to show her range, which she has done with aplomb. I also like that she doesn’t shout too much!

A few other random thoughts:

I love the sequence with the un-chameleoned TARDIS falling through the time vortex. funny to think that they are so bland in their base state – just a cylinder with a door.

Trenzalor looked like a rubbish place for a holiday, but it was an excellent setting for this story – loved the giant TARDIS

Although I don’t usually like the whole “someone’s died – oh no, it’s ok, I’ve done CPR, they’re fine” as happened with Jenny, feeling that it’s something of a cheap trick to provide drama, I’ll forgive Moffatt on this occasion as I really want to see that Paternoster Gang spin off!

[bruinhoo @bruinhoo]

I just finished rewatching JttCotT (apologies if the following belongs in that episode’s thread) and had some revisionist thoughts about that one together with this episode.

WRT Clara having looked through a book titled “The History of the Time War”, and then in the final couple minutes of that episode, Clara asking the Doctor why he calls himself that; noting that he has a name which she has seen and the Doctor’s insistence that she will not remember, and not go looking for his name.

I recall there being some theorizing after that episode, as far as authorship of the book as well as significance of that bit based upon his name. Now that we know that an incarnation of the Doctor exists that cannot known as “The Doctor”, it might be of a greater significance.

If the TARDIS created the History of the Time War, it would have done so thoroughly and accurately, but might have shared The Doctor’s inability to reconcile the actions of Hurt’s incarnation with the promise of the name of The Doctor, and refused to refer to him in the book by that name. Assuming that the Hurt incarnation is not one already known (Post-Smith as The Valeyard, Pre-Hartnell as Omega, etc), and can not be called The Doctor, by what other name would he be referred to in such a history than his pre-“Doctor” given name.

Assuming that Hartnell’s really was the first incarnation of the Doctor and that he took that name before starting his travels, Matt’s Doctor knows that anyone looking for [his given name] can only find it among the actions taken by the Hurt Doctor, and that someone discovering that name would eventually be able to discover the secret of what that incarnation did.

In this theory, Clara did read something in that history that connected the [given name] ‘non-doctor’ (Hurt?) and Matt’s Doctor as the same person, but not enough to get the full picture of the non-doctor.

For that matter, his asking Clara at the end of the episode if she is afraid to travel with him could have been testing how much she read and/or remembered from the History – he knows that she read enough to link the existence of the ‘non-doctor’ to him, but does she remember that after that reality is erased, and/or did she read enough of his actions to be scared of what Matt’s Doctor might be capable of in the future?

Don’t know how or if that fits in elsewhere, just some more late night rambling. But something else that to me at least suggests a Time War Doctor

[WhoHar @whohar]

Some great wordplay in this episode:

(In the) Name of the Doctor

The Doctor taking his secret to his grave

The Fall of the Eleventh at Trenzalore – I can’t take credit for this – someone on the G blog (page 7) suggested that this was a description of the Tardis’s landing on the planet.

[thommck @thommck]

Wow! Where to start. Just got to the end of all these comments and what I thought was a fairly self-explanatory and conclusive episode seems to have triggered even more new bonkers theories than before!

I settled down with my family and a pack of Jammie Dodgers (they were half-price at Tesco 😛 ) and as soon as the pre-titles opened I was on the edge of my seat with excitement. It wasn’t just me either, my 1/2 interested wife and eldest son also seemed hooked by that opening! Great to so the non-police box TARDIS and even better to see the TARDIS Engineers. I take it these are non-Timelord Gallifreyans.

I thoroughly enjoyed it although I did give my wife an “oh-no-love-is-going-to-save-the-day” look when the Doctor sent the leaf after Clara. I’ve got so much I want to say but I’ll try and break it up so it’s readable!

The thing that struck me most about the episode is that it didn’t require any old-Who knowledge at all, while at the same time being very fan-serving with the flashbacks. This leads me to believe that the 50th will be in a similar vein i.e. no knowledge of old-Who needed but will be very rewarding for those in the know.

My final theory that I posted on the NiS thread was completely barking up the wrong tree! No pocket/parallel universes featured and Jenny wasn’t revealed as the Doctor’s daughter. I think that theory can definitely be put to rest know as Strax seemed to know she had 1 heart, plus there were no signs of regeneration (although you can never be 100% sure in DW!). I do get 1 point at least for suggesting the Paternoster gang get trapped in Trenzalore so that is why the Doctor goes there :D. [Side-note, isn’t it a bit weird how Jenny still acts like Vastra’s maid and calls her Ma’am even in private?]

So, here are my thoughts/observations on the episode broken down into some chunks

1) The TARDIS – Great to have the TARDIS fighting against the Doctor at the beginning. I bet she’s really going to have the hump with him now! However, they did land suspiciously bang on target at the graveyard so maybe she was guiding them all along?!?

I thought it odd how the Tomb TARDIS looked the same on the inside. Does that mean the Doctor never changes it? That will probably be explained as all the versions of the TARDIS console where there, that’s just the one they happened to walk in to. The secret entrance to the catacombs confused me. Who put it there? Was it in the Doctors last will or do all timelords get a secret entrance with their wife’s name on it!?! Clara And the Doc said they were walking through the broken TARDIS but when they re-emerged they were outside the doors. What went on there?

2) River Song – I need a diagram to work her part out! I think it would’ve been helpful to signpost she was the Library version from the start. It leads me to wonder why they chose to do that? Why not just have the real River?

Also, how exactly did Vastra summon a backup copy of River? More points to us for guessing the Doctor kept a backup copy! However, the Doctor said only he could see her, which meant he knew she was at Trenzalore all along and was just ignoring her! Pretty cold-hearted. Would he need to activate the copy of River or does she always haunt him?

Clara was linked to River through telepathy but Vastra & co couldn’t see her. This is more emphasis of the link between them as well as River’s last words but I’m not sure if this points to being a blood relative, future Doctor, or regen-clara? Or was the spoilers line because a younger River met an older ClaraPrime, meaning River knows the Doctor does save Clara

How could River open the tomb doors if only the Doctor & Clara could see/hear her? Are we meant to believe the TARDIS could also see/hear her? WHY did she open the doors when it would mean the Doctor would die! Dark-River perhaps? The only reason is because she knew Clara MUST be fractured in time, not to stop the GI but for some other future reason?

It certainly seemed like Alex Kingston said goodbye (she can’t stay looking that age forever!) but I don’t think that means an end to the character of River

3) Trenzalore – The planet seemed like a burnt crust, or dying star. You’d think the Doctor knew the name of all the planets so why was this a mystery to him. What was the battle about? Not at Time War standards but enough to make the Doctor resign. Was it the one that Hurt Doctor finally died at?

4) Hurt Doctor – I’m thinking he is a future regeneration. Purley because that is the most obvious answer (it’s what all my family thought). A Time War 8.5 Doc is appealing but I can’t see us ever going there, similar to not ever finding out the Doctors birth name (Plus it would be a bit of an insult to McGann!).

Do we definitely know Hurt was who the Doctor saw in his room in The God Complex episode? I didn’t get the impression the Doctor recognised him, it seemed more of an educated guess. Let’s not kid ourselves, the BBC couldn’t afford to keep Hurt as an actor for long. This makes me think he is either so far into the future we don’t need to worry when he is from, or he gets rewritten in the 50th.

5) Clara – Great to see Clara being able to act properly again without her mystery hanging over her head. I don’t see the paradox that lots of other people have mentioned. It seems all quite linear to me (in a timey-wimey-loopy way!).

I don’t see what Clara did as ret-conning the old-who continuity. It goes like this (IMHO)
a) Old Who happened,
b) The GI changed everything
c) Clara got rid of the GI timeline virus meaning they had not changed anything
In a time-travel world (like from the TARDIS’s point of view) this all happened at once). Clara jumping into the Doctor’s timeline effectively undid everything the GI had done so it was all a bit of a waste of time really! They should’ve just stayed in bed 😉

A juicy theory I have is that the Clara we saw in all this series episodes didn’t always have to be Clara-Prime. Could that explain the weird scene in Cold War? Does Red-Clara=Scattered-Clara?

Did you spot how young Clara in the victorian times was the same girl that was on the cover of the Summer Falls book! That’s mind-bending to think how come Amy, or the book illustrator, new that, or was it the GI that influenced Amy to write the book?

When Clara was fractured across time, did she always come in as a baby or sometimes as an adult? Would that mean she was always adopted?

How did the Doctor get the leaf? Was it just a memory or did he really pinch it from her timeline? That would create a paradox! Are we meant to think they are both trapped inside now or that they will pop out at the correct point in time, about half an hour after the events up to now? I have a feeling this will be the plot of the 50th special. Clara and the Doc jumping in and out through his timeline meeting up with old friends and foes while trying to get home.

6) The Great Intelligence – Wow there is another person with a pretty big grudge against the Doctor! Interesting to see a villain succeed where so many others had failed. When the GI jumped into the Doctor’s timeline did he just try once to stop the Doctor? He could have just killed him at birth. Or was the GI just meant to be reversing all of the Doctor’s past victories?

The GI mentions the Doctor’s other names There was the mention of the Valeyard (which I had always pronounced Vale-yard). I don’t know much about him apart from he was a “bad” version of the Doctor. That’s the first ref in New-Who so maybe that points to Hurt. He also mentioned Storm. Does that mean the Oncoming Storm as has been referred to before, or what about baby Stormageddon! That would make James Corden the Doctor’s dad :O

7) The Doctor – We never found out his birth name, hurrah!

The Doctor went to Trenzalore to save the Paternoster gang, yet when he actually had a chance to save them he didn’t. He was going to let them all die but River opened the doors and spared them momentarily.

@bluesqueakpip What do you mean about the clocks in 11th hour? I can’t remember that bit?

That’s me spent for now! I took far too long writing that so hopefully you will all find some value in what I’ve brought up!

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