Last Christmas
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janetteB 9 months, 4 weeks ago.
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3 January 2015 at 19:09 #36888
@elbalk-kev — I suspect @pedant will be along in a moment for a proper word, but in the meantime, I’ll have a nibble on this tasty bait.
The original concept of the show was to be a children’s’ science show
It really wasn’t. Historical educational definitely, but the scientific content has always been more or less total drivel.
As it matured, Doctor Who became the thinking person’s sci-fi show
Again, it really didn’t. It was largely a fantasy show, dressed in some of the trappings of SF. I’d argue you could count the number of stories in the show’s 50-year history that would count as bona fide SF on one hand.
but it did have incredibly good writing with meticulous internal logic
You mean like the Doctor just suddenly deciding to kidnap two teachers just for the hell of it? Or an alien intelligence that thought basing its operations in a) a Himalayan monastery and then b) in an underground transit system was a surefire plan for global invasion? Or how about the fact that the original Master’s plans for world domination were usually foiled by him suddenly realising that he’d be for the chop as well. The logic of the original show was seldom meticulous and was quite often as bonkers as anything that appears post 2005. And we kinda love it for it.
Then Davies left and took his beautiful, logical, lightening prose and gave it to Benedict Cumberbatch as Sherlock Holmes (2010 – 2014)
Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear.
Is it that people have simply given up expecting any logic from Doctor Who or from any media in general? Is it that people are so easily impressed by rich visual content that they are willing to overlook the sloppy writing? Or are people so distracted by their various devices and their need to tweet and blog and FB their every waking moment that they simply don’t notice the disjointedness of poorly thought-out plots
Careful now and down with this sort of thing! Your objections seem to have expanded from not just Who to the entire modern world. Is it not more likely we’re looking at some kind of rose-tinted spectacles scenario here? That you’re using Who to fondly look back at a simpler world where money came in shillings, apples came in pounds and megalomaniac monsters came in nice, comforting shades of green rubber and were easily recognisable by their two-dimensional bellowing. ‘Powarrr, Dok-torrr’.
Or has the show been purposely dumbed down to appeal to a more mainstream (i.e. North American) audience?
This is not only nonsense, it’s offensive, bigoted and condescending nonsense to boot. In terms of genre TV alone, in the past 20-odd years, North America has produced Buffy, Angel, Game of Thrones, Firefly, Fringe, the X-Files and the BSG reboot. And I’m afraid to say it, some of those shows wipe the floor with anything the original Who ever came up with (and quite probably anything the new series has managed either, although on occasion both iterations have had moments of massive inspiration and genius).
Hire a serious writing team and bring back the science and logic of Doctor Who
Yes, bring back those fish people, giant spiders that teleport via Buddhist incantation, robots that can grow to enormous size and then be destroyed by really, really fast rust, time-travel machines run by ‘zygma’ energy. (That Who uses these concepts is not a criticism btw, but is merely to emphasise that Who is not and never has been a straight SF show. It’s a fantasy show. And as such, Moffat’s take on the show is entirely consistent with the show’s past.)
And now I think of it, there seems to be something extremely familiar about this conversation….
3 January 2015 at 19:16 #36889@elbalk-kev While you aren’t the only viewer who would like to see a different approach to the science in Doctor Who, I don’t think it’s fair to simply reduce that criticism to a generic one of “bad writing”. I think that the underlying themes of AG Who have always skewed toward the metaphysical and emotional; RTD brought in the character-driven plots from the start. This, I think, is the reality of the show in the 21st century.
While there have been episodes this series that I felt contained plot holes, I really didn’t see it here. I didn’t see the number of dream crabs as something that needed explaining. There were six. Why not six? We know only the bare minimum about them, nothing about whether they are a society or act in a thinking way. We know that they infected the Doctor somewhere and followed his mind to Clara and earth. I had no problem with the logic of this.
You claim that there were never any plot holes or stretches in believability in the old series, but then you bring up the Master. As others here pointed out frequently during Series 8, the BG Master was frequently killed (apparently) and always came back with little or no real explanation as to how he survived. Moffat is just following tradition in this! Sometimes, I suspect, we call it a plot hole or bad writing when an event happens that we find unlikely or a character behaves in a way with which we don’t connect.
As a North American viewer of many years who has also seen the old series in its entirety, I can’t say that I feel the series has been “dumbed down” to accommodate me. I have had to adjust to a new style of story telling, as has everyone my age (and not just on Doctor Who, but in TV and film generally). I don’t think it’s fair to criticize Moffat for making TV for the current generation; that’s his job. Personally, I used to watch the show back in the day because, by and large, it made me happy. It still makes me happy. Sorry if that makes me a “sentimental apologist”. I actually don’t think I’m stupid. I don’t watch a lot of TV, and when I do, I pay attention. I can respect your view and understand that you aren’t happy with certain elements of the show today; I respect you less when you express that view in a manner that belittles my own enjoyment of the show.
3 January 2015 at 19:19 #36890@jimthefish Or how about the fact that the original Master’s plans for world domination were usually foiled by him suddenly realising that he’d be for the chop as well.
Has anyone ever compared the Master to Wile E. Coyote? Someone must have at some point; if not, I will happily claim it as a brilliant creative insight! 🙂
3 January 2015 at 19:40 #36893What are these dream crabs? Where did they come from
Explained here for the benefit of plot obsessives.
Well, I’m here to say that some of us are paying attention.
But not you, apparently.
It stood the test of time because the internal logic was respected
You have clearly watched very little Who. The amount of contradictory cruft built up in the backstory is staggering (and is a key reason the Time Lords are kept locked away)
It is coasting on the fumes of bizarrely uncritical fan adulation.
Only the most brain-dead fuckwit would make this sort of statement after spending any time on Who discussion boards – whether in general media like The Guardian or dedicated sites like Kasterbouros – having not spotted the sheer vitriol. Or, more precisely, the most fuckwitted troll.
Even so, you will see a huge array of views on this site and the only thing that is expected is that people make argument based on what happened on screen (or which can be reasonably extrapolated or deduced, or even imagined).
Some of the innumerable ways you are wrong include:
– The show was not created as a science education show, but to plug a gap after Grandstand. It was – always – a family show and Sidney Newman originally envisaged alternating “future” and “history” stories. Time travel was simply a plot aid. The history got dumped PDQ when the Daleks turned up.
It had almost no budget and no special effects
– It was always one of the BBC’s most expensive shows (one of the reasons it had so many enemies within the BBC).
– Why the absence of coherent plots
Your poor attention span is not the fault of the writers. The only recent story that was (very slightly) incoherent of Robots of Sherwood, for off-screen reasons.
There was no effort made to explain the basic premise of the episode:
Nobody on this board had any difficulty understanding it.
Moffat doesn’t write for the slowest kid in the room. I’m sorry that leaves you feeling left behind. My 7 year old niece had no trouble following it (when she wasn’t trying to protect me from the scary bits).
Now, let me sub-edit your post down to a more sensible length:
Mwaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!!!!!!! Moffat to complex for me!!!!
MWAAAAAAAAAA!!!!! I don’t know the history of the show!!!!
MWAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!! I don’t even know who writes Sherlock!!!
Mwaaaaaaaaa!!!!!! I don’t realise that North America os one of the most sophisticated TV markets on the planet!!!!
I leave it to the reader to imagine the foot stamping SFX
Now, your homework for the rest of your time in Secondary School is:
Learn the roles of the following elements of storytelling: Situation; Theme; Character; Plot.
So far you have demonstrated a very poor grasp of plot and no grasp at all of other elements.
D- Must try harder. Or, preferably, not.
3 January 2015 at 20:11 #368943 January 2015 at 22:22 #36897@arbutus The Master as Wile E Coyote – absolutely spot on! Brilliant 🙂
@elbalk-kev There is not much I can add to what has already been said in response to your post; I pretty much endorse the views expressed by @JimThe Fish, @arbutus and @pedant. The only authority I can bring to bear on the subject is that of someone who was (at least technically) an adult in November 1963 and who has watched Doctor Who on and off from the beginning. As such, I can vouch for the fact that the programme was never, from the first, seen as purely a children’s programme, even if it was shown in the Children’s Hour slot, and that, insofar as it had an educational purpose, it was the presentation of history via the imaginative medium of time travel, as @pedant pointed out (I suspect that the ‘educational’ aspect was primarily a way of selling the concept to the stuffier echelons of the BBC).
Long before Doctor Who first aired I was interested in science and an avid reader of science fiction. The radio serial ‘Journey into Space’ which I used to listen to in the early to mid 1950s, was science fiction, in that it aimed to be consistent with scientific and technical knowledge at the time, though now quaintly outdated. Doctor Who was not serious science fiction in that sense and I never saw it as such; it was and is, as @jimthefish says, fantasy with some of the trappings of science fiction, and tends to be at its weakest when it attempts a veneer of scientific credibility. Its strengths, and the reasons for its longevity lie elsewhere, and if I regarded it as science fiction I would not still be watching it.
As for your strictures on Moffat as a writer and show-runner; I can only say that, while I give all credit for RTD for reviving Doctor Who, I regard Moffat as the better writer and, while not uncritical, regard the imaginative directions in which he has taken the show as being as interesting and engaging as anything in its 51 year history.
3 January 2015 at 23:23 #36899@jimthefish @mudlark @blenkinsopthebrave
Am available for weddings and Bar-Mitzvahs. Reasonable rates.
(As an aside, I tend to think of Who as “soft” Sci-Fi, rather than fantasy. It has more in common with, say, Anne McCaffrey that, say, Terry Goodkind. Perhaps a discussion for another thread though)
3 January 2015 at 23:45 #36901Anonymous @
4 January 2015 at 01:27 #36910@elbalk-kev As already said I think others here have already summed it up. I basically don’t agree with most of what you say, but you do make some good points and I myself have rolled my eyes countless times at the bad science in Doctor Who. In particularly recently Kill The Moon and Forest Of The Night which just pushed things over the top over disbelieving for me.
But to call it originally a ‘children’s program’ and then the ‘thinking persons sci fi show’? I think now, as always, that is what it has been, it has been both of these and so much more. Ok sometimes the writing has not been great, ok sometimes the sets have let it down but the IDEAS behind the stories… THAT is what makes the show.
But…Internal logic respected? Oh my, I nearly spat my wine out at this point. The show is so riddled with inconsistencies. There is NO science and NO logic in Doctor Who if one views it over it’s entire run. That is both the reason I HATE it and LOVE it in equal measure (I am a partially OCD Engineer who pays too much detail to things and stuff!).
No budget and no special effects? Seriously? Do you have any idea how much the BBC spends on this!?
I think one of my favorite quotes from Moffat was something along the lines that you “had to keep it complicated enough for the kids, but simple enough for the adults to understand”.
I love that 🙂 pity I don’t think you got it.
(\(\;;/)/)
4 January 2015 at 12:02 #36923Things I love about this place
1) It’s a nice, positive environment where people discuss Doctor Who in a constructive manner
2) When they drive the troll out, they place on the east side of the forum a @pedant and a flaming keyboard that flashed back and forth to guard the way to the Thread of discussion
4 January 2015 at 14:09 #36924Just to reinforce a point, here’s a chunk of a review by Clive James from The Telegraph of 1975 discussing Who:
But nothing defines an historical period like its vision of the future, and Flash Gordon, with its thick hero, mad villains, cheap props and clumsy innocence, remains a useful pointer to how simple the world must have seemed in 1936. Switch to Dr Who (BBC1) and you can’t tell the heroes from the heavies, it’s all so sophisticated. ‘You’ve reached the point where your tissues are so massively hybridised that the next metabolic change could be the final one,’ Dr Who tells his friend. Imagine getting Buster Crabbe to deliver a line like that. It would have taken a week.
Similarly the technology has made giant strides towards authenticity. When Flash’s pal Dr Zarkov talked nonsense, it sounded like nonsense. When Dr Who talks nonsense, it sounds like Science. ‘He’s been infected with anti-matter. His brain cells have been destroyed. He’ll descend to the level of a brute!’ Dr Zarkov wouldn’t have known anti-matter from his elbow: he just concentrated on running up a ‘new ray’ out of old torch batteries so that Flash could blast the Lion Men’s Gyro-ship out of the sky and rescue Dale.
It somewhat gives the lie to the idea that old-school Who was considered as Asimov for Beginners…..
4 January 2015 at 14:27 #36927That is splendid!
4 January 2015 at 20:02 #36937[[@Bluesqueakpip Totally agree with 99% of your thoughts but not on board with the rock bottom part
[maybe]? This is because Clara sets high standards for herself.]]Thinking about Clara’s lies: I’m thinking that most of those lies are responses to specific situations that threaten her idea of herself and her ambitions — it’s not just a regular sort of childish lying-by-habit, so far as I can see. She lies to Danny and the Doctor in order to protect and preserve he access to two kinds of living, one of which she will have to choose over the other — but she’s putting off the choice as long as she can. With whatever lies she can come up with at the time. For me, this makes the lying less reprehensible: I’d lie too, if I had a great guy at work who made me feel safe and loved and normal, but also a charismatic alien on the side, a man-like person with a spaceship who’s essentially my pusher with regard to my adrenaline rush addiction along with forcing me to grow by means of the challenges he presents — as well as granting me my own air of mystery by virtue of the fact that a lot of the time he obviously doesn’t understand me at all.
I try very hard to keep my access open to both, and if lying helped me do that, I’d lie. And, of course, watching the Doctor operate is itself a crash course in lying to get the result you want in any situation.
5 January 2015 at 00:14 #36952About who ‘Dave’ is.. Clara’s dad’s name is Dave.
http://tardis.wikia.com/wiki/Clara_Oswald5 January 2015 at 00:26 #36953Flippin’ heck, @ichabod, nice words! Who wouldn’t want a charismatic, character building, adrenaline-pushing man-like alien!
Strangely compelling masculine figure right enough..
5 January 2015 at 03:58 #36956Barbara Lefty: just so. It seems very unfair to me that people (well, some fans etc.) get all judgmental about Clara for her “dishonesty”, good God! Seriously! It’s a tightrope walk she’s been doing, and not at all badly, I’d say, trying not to hurt Danny’s obviously quite vulnerable feelings, and as for the Doctor, who the Hell knows what might hurt *his* feelings and what would not, assuming you’d rust your own judgment as to what those feelings were — and *that’s* assuming that *he* knows. I mean, the creature has not one heart to figure out, but TWO. As it were.
I think I’m some sort of Obscuritantist (made up word, how’s that for wods!) at heart (just one). I think we live an enormous proportion of our lives in a shared mystery play, unsure of our own feelings and intentions, but sure we can read the feelings and intentions of others around us when a good deal of the time we are mistaken in both cases. Not to mention what goes on in our heads when we sleep and dream (and remember, or not, after we wake). It’s just astonishing to me that we stir from one spot at all — people blather on about faith in this, faith in that, when almost every step we take is taken on stilts, half blindfolded and wearing earmuffs! We see what we want to see, hear what we want to hear, and somehow most of us stagger to our conclusion in some semblance of order anyway. Talk about miracles! We are them.
That’s why we are so eager to look to art for glimpses of creative perception (a Sandman comic book, the Sistine Chapel, a beautiful dressage round, a Coldplay song, take your pick) into the continual chaos we live in what, if anything, it all “means”.
Can you tell I’ve had wine with my dinner? Well, I have. This is what happens . . . good thing two glasses put me to sleep.
5 January 2015 at 04:35 #36957Whoa nsgirl13 — Clara’s dad is Dave? Not Shona’s Dave, surely? That’d be timey-wimey with knobs on. Any other “Daves” lurking around out there? I like Shona; I hope she has a future with the show.
5 January 2015 at 04:42 #36959@ichabod – I really agree about Danny being her safe normal guy that helped her maintain a normal
girl life and all the lies were necessary to protect that lifestyle . But what will happen now that
this balancing act has crashed? She doesn’t get to stay in the Christmas dream [although for a moment
she tried resisting the Doctors attempts to wake her]. She still goes off to face challenges and wont
accept failure. She is trying to be like a Buffy – another alpha female tv character. Buffy had a mental
crash too but she also had a Scooby gang to support her back. Clara could use some of that!
or even an Orson maybe? It isn’t clear to me that Clara isn’t still lying to herself about how she feels?@nsgirl13 – I thought of her Dad but it puts her dad on the list twice then [I think]? Depends if
it was Clara’s or Shona’s list too.5 January 2015 at 05:25 #36960lisa — Well, the next season will likely show us how Clara sees her choices now that Danny is — so far as we know — very, very dead, gone with the collapsing Nethersphere. Realistically speaking, since Season 8 was in part about the Doctor dealing with several levels of PTSD — a very sharp regeneration from, say, State D to State O (that is, quite a reach) and its resultant confusions, plus whatever he’s carrying from the war and his part(s) in it that makes him react so harshly to Danny-the-soldier, I wouldn’t be surprised if Clara now has her own shock-wave of experience and emotions to try to come to terms with.
But this is fantasy, so she’s left with one very complex and more than usually frightening choice (bc. of all the Death in Heaven uproar, so who knows what crazy, scary, totally unpredictable stuff might come next in the Doctor’s company?), which is to get into the box and try to fly away from it all. The Danny choice is gone, and would returning to teaching at Coal Hill be attractive without Danny? Repellent because always reminding her of Danny and her failure to rescue him? Or she might ask the Doctor to take her to some (supposedly) quiet and restful place to recover from all this (ah, the planet of the bushes sounds likely– ? ); or he might just do that on his own, hoping to get some quiet recuperation time for himself too, and to put some buffering distance between Clara and whatever fall-out might be coming from DIH (can he really believe for a moment that MissyMaster is truly dead and gone?).
Or he could select one of his most troubling past “mistakes” and go see if there’s anything he can do about it: “And now for something completely different!” sort of therapy, for himself or for both of them. Truth to tell, I don’t see them traveling together for a while — too much shock, maybe disappointment in each other over the outcome, but also a much deeper and stronger bond between them on the level of war buddies who’ve been through WWIII driving the same tank — and that itself might be too uncomfortable for one or both of them. You don’t just get in your car and drive away from the Tunguska Incident, with or without your companion. No shock waves = selling your story short and mashing your characters down to “Flatline” dimensions.
But my own preferences in fiction are for the developments that happen among the affected characters in *between* the Big Events. That’s where you begin to see the true impact of the violence etc. that has occurred, IMO. That’s where people start to grow and change: in between the flashes of lightning and booms of thunder, or after the immediate crisis is over.
I like your idea that what Clara needs is a “gang” of her own to support her in whatever she does next; not sure the Doctor will have the energy and focus to help with that. Maybe Shona & crew, or just Shona, joining the Tardis passenger manifest? If Clara and the Doctor do continue to travel together, I agree that it would help (and be interesting) to have someone new in there trying to help (or hinder) the establishment of a new balance of some kind. In character terms, I think Dark Water and DIH left us with a super cliff-hanger, and you’ve put your finger right on it: What now?
5 January 2015 at 05:52 #36961Oh, yikes, please go here if you can!
http://www.reddit.com/r/doctorwho/comments/2rbhx0/a_unique_problem_for_pastors_who_are_doctor_who/
I can’t stop laughing —
5 January 2015 at 09:42 #36966@ichabod keep drinking that wine & don’t stop writing. I like it! – I should add ‘drink moderately’ but I’ll say ‘drink modestly’ instead. Nix that. As you were.
Regards, Puro.
5 January 2015 at 09:43 #369675 January 2015 at 10:15 #36968although for a moment she tried resisting the Doctors attempts to wake her
Don’t think she did. She was the person who stayed longest in the dream state – but I think that was because she wanted the Doctor to wake her up.
She still believes in fairy-tales at heart; Sleeping Beauty has to be woken by her handsome prince. But also, I think, it was that if it was all a dream; no Danny and no Doctor – she really didn’t want to wake up from it.
5 January 2015 at 10:46 #36969@ichabod
That rather reminds me of the Sunday School lesson I took – where my little bunch of 7 and 8 year olds ended up confidently explaining to the Rector that Heaven was ‘in another dimension’.😀
5 January 2015 at 11:17 #36970@ichabod – totally take your point about Clara’s tight-rope walking. In wish fulfillment land, of course you would. However, Clara is displaying all the signs of knowing it’s Not OK 😉 Sure, a lot of that is to do with Danny’s incomplete understanding of the situation. Then again, in terms of the pushing too far, putting in danger, he’s right on the money. And I give the Doctor some credit for feelings – but agree he’s not entirely aware of what they are!
He really has archived a lot of himself, but as so often with someone who is having trouble coping with aspects of themselves seems to have shut down a lot more than they really need to. Totally with you on the PTSD – which is where my series 8 wish list included Danny, further down the line of their relationship having a discussion with the creature who has spend approx 1200 of 2000 years at war on the psychological concept of projection. That and an Ian interaction/Susan in the school yearbook. I’m still hoping for a scene helping Courtney with her maths homework (“Ask your maths teacher!” “He’s DEAD!”) and commenting that it would be easier with 5 dimensions. But I think he’s managed to do a fair bit of unpacking so I do anticipate a slightly different Doctor in s9.
Which leads me to @lisa, I wasn’t immediately feeling your Clara heading for a breakdown as I felt we’d covered that, but in terms of protecting the relationship which has been developed between Clara and the Doctor in series 8, having the Doctor spend a fair bit of time trying to be supportive of Clara through series 9 would emphasise the paternal and give him a bit of a new focus, getting him away from laser-like
navel-gazingself analysis. And remember kids, no navel-gazing with high-powered lasers! It can only lead to tears. That’s.. crying.. not the other thing. So…I’m going for the helping someone else as a form of self- therapy through s9 but this is where I disagree with you @ichabod – I think that Clara’s loss and need to not be reminded of Danny, in story terms, provide the perfect excuse for some dedicated Tardis travel. I’m looking for some compelling off-world story.I like Obscuritantist: makes it sound like a bizarre religious order, perhaps the ones that the parsons of the Shepherd of Gallifrey are in 😉 I think we should have a Wholly day (!) during which we walk on stilts, with earmuffs on. Or perhaps not. I think they must be affiliated with the @apopheniac order, who sadly seem to have become a closed order. Anyway, caught the Sandman reference, are you familiar with the Invisibles? Quite the source material for we Obscuritantists, I think 🙂
As for wine, last night I was beating you by one glass – always brings out the fnarring in me 😉 All sober now but with the newly ultra strict drink driving laws here in the Littlest Socialist Utopia/Police State (depending on which view you take), I’ll wait a few hours before shopping.
And for my next trick I will be learning brevity…
5 January 2015 at 11:34 #36972And sorry mods, last post should probably be on the sofa..
5 January 2015 at 11:56 #36974I typed a post and then somehow managed to delete it … I hate it when that happens.
A belated Merry Xmas and Happy New Year to all.
Another good episode, real hide behind the sofa stuff. I was peeking at the screen through my fingers when Shona was dancing through the infirmary, so was relieved to see the Doctor and Clara. Only downside – Santa’s name wasn’t Geoff.
I was surprised, happily so, to see Danny. But given the dream within a dream within a dream storyline and the scary prospect of having to live with the knowledge there is a dream crab on your face, it isn’t surprising that Clara created a dream where all was perfect and safe. I agree with the others who have said this was a way for her to better deal with Danny’s death and I also think that it could mean she’s no longer stuck between her 2 world’s – the safe one with Danny and the ‘crazy’ one with the mad man in a box. Also agree that Clara’s ‘dad’ at the door is her ‘space dad’. I’m still wondering about Rupert and Orson though.
I also wondered if the tangerine on Clara’s window sill at the end meant that the dream wasn’t over and also when it began – earlier in the season? I can also see that it would be a nod to the kids that watch the show – yes, there is a Santa Claus. I’m going to be a bit bah humbug about it though and offer a third option. Just because the Doctor doesn’t like tangerines doesn’t mean Clara feels the same way, she could have put it on the sill herself as part of her Xmas decoration.
I wondered if the ‘scientists’ at the North Pole had, in some way, been aware of the dream crabs. I know they weren’t aware until the end that the people in the infirmary were them, but the fact that the dream crabs had been manifested in the dream suggests to me an awareness at some level. Maybe because they were all dealing with adversity on some level and this made them more sensitive to the presence of the dream crabs.
Like others here, I also noticed a link between Santa and the Doctor. But I’m not sure if it’s the Doctor’s contribution to the dream or Clara’s. Clara tells Santa that she doesn’t believe in fairytales, Santa is skeptical and then the Doctor appears. Later, the Doctor twice asks her if she believes in fairytales she says she does, as if her faith in the Doctor has been restored. Also, the Doctor asks Santa how he gets everything in the sleigh and Santa replies that it’s bigger on the inside – something, I feel, Clara would be cheeky enough to say if she were teasing the Doctor.
5 January 2015 at 13:20 #36977@IAmNotAFishIAmAFreeMan
Explained in-story. Just a few moments of sucker-face passed (except apparently for Clara, where it lasted however long ti took the Doc to Tardis his way to her).
Ah yes. I guess I did forget to account for sucker-face-time. 😉
5 January 2015 at 13:46 #36978@nsgirl13 Dave is not an uncommon name and I don’t think there is supposed to be any connection between Shona’s Dave and Clara’s Dad. I suspect that Shona’s Dave is a throw away Red Dwarf reference as a nod to the despair squid, another dream within a dream story.
I think that Clara has now put the problems of juggling two lives to rest. In this next series I hope that we will see her moving forward, managing to balance the “normal” with the fantasy threads in her life and finally to be happy. When she wakes from the dream she is choosing life signifying her moment of healing. I think in a way the Christmas special cleared away the baggage from the previous episodes laying the slate clean for the next series. there are still mysteries to be cleared up, most especially Orson and the toy soldier, but I think the Doctor and Clara’s relationship is now firmly grounded.
I am also hoping she won’t loose her job as I would like to see more action around Coal Hill mostly as a pretext for a cameo from Ian. Now we have had that name teaser in Day of the Doctor it would be very disappointing if we don’t actually get to meet up with Ian again.
Cheers
Janette
5 January 2015 at 16:30 #36980@purofilion OOPS! shoot me now – its gonna be ok puro
On the Clara topic- So yes really hope she can pull it together and no Its not clear to me that
she can yet – traumatic incidents always have a way of sticking with all of us thru our lives
In any case I cant wait for series 9 to see if it was too much shock for Clara that carries thru
but its definitely not the one main mysterious bits and pieces of stuff!
I have a very long and intriguing list of bits 🙂5 January 2015 at 18:48 #36981I can’t believe it’s taken me this long to get in a proper second viewing of this episode. I have to say that I loved it even more the second time through. Fundamentally, the complicated plot full of dream layers serves as a base for a lot of fabulous moments… great dialogue, characterizations, emotions, and Santa!
Christmas trash talk between Santa and the Doctor! I could actually watch Santa and the Doctor all day… all year, even. The Doctor’s nicely underplayed “Shut up, Santa” is possibly the greatest line in Who since Rory shoved Hitler in the closet and said, “Shut up, Hitler”. I just don’t get tired of the Doctor’s interactions with the Jolly Old Elf.
The opening scene at the base makes it even more clear on second watch that reality isn’t really hanging together. In hindsight, the whole notion of people’s fantasy worlds is really well done: Shona’s dancing saves the day, Clara’s math skills save the day, and so on. And of course, Badass Santa saves the day!!! 12 kinds of awesome. Every line out of Santa was brilliantly played: “That is why I feed mine… magic carrots.”
I have loved Capaldi’s Doctor since he first stumbled out of the TARDIS in Victorian London, but I really loved him here. We saw so many faces, so many sides of this incarnation. His wicked smile when telling Ashley that he travels by “phone kiosk”. (It’s difficult knowing fantasy from reality because “they’re both ridiculous”.) His (and Clara’s) underplaying of emotion as they realize they have both lied to one another, and that instead of giving one another comfort, they both grieved alone. His attempts to “one-up” Santa, even after seeing him for what he was! His pure, childlike joy while flying the sleigh.
Clara under the table was possibly the scariest thing I have seen in AG Who. The blackboard scene was also really well done. It was so sad seeing the lovely life that Clara and Danny might have had, and the moment when Danny remembers that he died shows us that in Clara’s dream, Danny is still the hero who loves her above all else. (It’s really hard to imagine how anyone else could ever follow that act for Clara!) Telling her she can miss him every day for five minutes felt so sad because we would all want the chance to say that to those we love if we had to leave them! And I caught my breath at the brief exchange with the Doctor: “Brave.” “Dead already.”
The return to reality of the three “scientists” was very moving as well. I wish we had seen a tiny bit more of Ashley, it’s not clear why she would be a candidate for dream-crabbing. She seems to live alone in a beautiful home. Maybe, like Clara, she lost someone? I can only imagine that a bit of that was lost in the edit, but I could have used a bit more of a clue. Like seeing Bellows in the wheelchair: a tiny moment only, but so expressive. And Shona, so obviously lonely even before we see her in her apartment: “You text me, we can go for a curry.” Like Clara, she didn’t want to let go of the dream.
Clara’s “just a little longer” to Santa reminded me of Arbutus Jr., who says something similar almost every morning, and I know that he has no intention of getting out of bed until I drag him out it. I don’t think Clara wanted to wake up. At that moment, she has no idea that the Doctor will come for her. She only knows that she doesn’t have him or Danny.
I’m not sure how I didn’t realize in the first place that “old Clara” had to be a dream. If the dream crab had stayed on her that many years, she would have been long dead by the time the Doctor came. And she wouldn’t have had that life. (As an aside, I wonder if Clara’s dream house is meant to be the house she was living in when we first met her in the Bells of St. John?)
I love the tangerine. It makes a clear implication when the Doctor says, “I don’t know who to thank”, that it was Santa who fixed things for him and Clara. But it is subtle enough that if we just aren’t happy with that conclusion, we don’t have to buy into it! Perfect “Miracle on 34th Street” ending. Altogether great Christmas special, possibly my favourite ever.
5 January 2015 at 18:55 #36982@barbaralefty I also believe that the Doctor has, for better or worse, come to terms with his past and present, and will be inhabiting his new incarnation with less angst going into Series 9. I had that sense already throughout Last Christmas, that we had really left the “Am I a good man” debate behind. Missy really did give him that gift, he knows who he is again.
@ichabod I have been meaning to say that I am really enjoying your posts! I haven’t had loads of time for posting as it has been Christmas break and lots of family stuff happening, but the sheer number of thoughtful and interesting remarks from you has been impressive! I loved the remark from the pastor about “Jesus of Gallifrey”. So hilarious.
5 January 2015 at 19:17 #36983If the dream crab had stayed on her that many years, she would have been long dead by the time the Doctor came
Not nessa-celery. It could have latched on to 80 year old Clara three seconds before the Doctor turned up, but her dream would still have been of being young and with Danny.
5 January 2015 at 19:59 #36984Lisa — Really good point, thanks — yes, if it was all (the whole body of the dreamindream story of Last Christmas) a dream, then no, she would not want to wake up from it (good heavens, what *for*, given the super-wish fulfillment nature of her dream — never gonna get *that* in waking life!).
Puro — Thanks for the friendly welcome, and not to worry about the wine, one way or another — a glass with dinner is about it, since I really can’t afford the time for a 2 hr. wine-nap in the evening, so moderation is simply required. As for writing here — I have a “noisy” head (nothing unusual in that, lots of people do, which is why various forms of meditation are so popular, in an attempt to quiet the chatter of the monkey-mind), and one way to calm it down is to grab onto something really rich to think about; and Doctor Who is an excellent Rx for that. I’m more likely to over-think it than not, at least for some tastes, but I really like thinking about the stuff I like thinking about, and thinking through fingers+keyboard in a congenial atmosphere is about as good as it gets.
So je suis et j’y reste, no fooling; with lots of writing (how *else* are we to pass the almost interminable wait for the next season?!). Lots of good heads around here = huge bonus
5 January 2015 at 20:23 #36985@pedant Agh. Of course, that’s it. That’s why it didn’t seem obvious in the first place. That’s what I get for waiting almost two weeks to watch again. I forget what I thought the first time through!
5 January 2015 at 20:43 #36987bluesqueak — love the class confusing the Rector about Heaven —
Lefty — yep, like your idea of a conversation bw the Doctor and Danny, now that the Doctor seems to have at least stepped over his anti-soldier hang-up and into a more reasonable space on the subject. I’m sorry Danny’s gone, although I hadn’t much use for him until he showed his true and admirable colors at the end.
And yeah, the Doctor may have already regained some of *his* balance (MissyMaster almost knocked him on his keester with that kiss, didn’t she?) with the moral question (Of course you’re a good man, you idiot) as settled as it ever gets. And he’s not one to go off alone and think about it, too much fizzy energy, strong action orientation even though for him “action” often = or includes thought, more than for most of us. So where’s he gone, and how long will he have been away when Season 9 begins (in terms of Clara-time)?
More importantly, *what does he know*? Was he really in the LC group dream, or did Clara imagine him there for the comfort of healing the breach between them, if only in her sleep? If so, then that breach *is* healed, and (providing she’s taken enough deep breaths to clear her head and maybe even her heart a bit and be ready to move on) Clara is really up for more adventures (she’s made her choice — but, in the dream, or after it ended?), and there’s no reason for him not to turn up at breakfast, have a crumpet, and whisk her off somewhere right from the get-go, with an occasional wistful look-back at Season 9 and its ending.
But if the dream was Clara’s dream, from sucker-face or otherwise, and no healing of the breach occurred in waking life, where do we all stand now? If LC was 100% Clara’s dream, with no actual Doctor involvement, then as far as he knows, they are done (signed, sealed and delivered each to their seperate lives on the basis of two whopping, uncorrected lies), and he has no reason to come back. On the other hand, if any part of the dream was real, chances are they both know they’ve been in touch and in trouble together since the Cafe of Lies, and they would have reason to meet and try to hash out what the hell *actually( happened, and where to go from there over — not coffee, for god’s sake, the Doctor runs hot and high strung as it is, how the hell is coffee a positive addition? Decaf? Yuck. Probably not crumpets, either — sugar high (or has that been disproven?).
I wasn’t thinking of Clara having a breakdown, really, but needing a *rest* — which, of course, is not what traveling with D is going to get her, no matter what their intentions. I like your idea that he would prescribe action, an adventure, to counter brooding on her part: the “let’s go!” of the dream would become “let’s go!” in reality, preferably “go” someplace far, far away for a change, to do a bit of “helping out”.
Oh, I can see the Obscuritant holiday parade now — don’t forget the blindfold (gauzy, so you can *sort* of see through) — but what comes to mind is the Autumn whatever-they-call-it parade in Seattle, their version of Halloween — I want once, loved it, very fey and imaginative and gothicky stuff. They would have to suspend their Rule of Brevity so the parade wouldn’t be too short to bring out spectators (but being Obscuritants, they have trouble discerning the nature of the Rule of Brevity, so it is most often ignored — oh, shut up, shut up, shut up, me, shuttety-up-up-up for crying out loud). I do have the Sandman comics around here somewhere, but haven’t read them in years, but they’re certainly apposite; Gaiman has done a script or two for DW, hasn’t he? Are Sleep and Death Invisibles? I don’t remember . . .
signed,
Jesus of Gallifrey (definitely not visible)
5 January 2015 at 20:50 #36988Papermoon — that damned tangerine on the windowsill — I think it’s a reply to D’s question just before he follows Clara into the Tardis at the end: she says it’s nice to see him smile for a change; he says something like, well look, here’s a second chance (for us, out from under dream crabs 62 yrs later, but you’re your young self again); I never get second chances, so how come there’s this one? “I don’t even know who to thank!”
Camara draws back, and there’s the tangerine on the windowsill, which I read as “Your second chance is what Santa brought you and Clara for Xmas.”
But where does *that* leave us, in terms of where the dream envelope of all the other dreams inside began and ended?
5 January 2015 at 21:09 #36990@arbutus and @Ichabod- 1 of my new favorite habits is reading your posts![and yes so many
amazing posters here too.] “But I really like thinking about the stuff I really like
thinking about” in regards to the Doctor – and absolute ditto that!
I guess I will have to do another re-watch and this time watch it as if it was
entirely Clara’s dream with both dialogue and incidents all being perpetuated out of her head.
Although it seems as though there was group participation and maybe there was some.
But its just this idea about how much do we allocate to the environment of Clara’s mind.5 January 2015 at 21:44 #36991Arbutus — I missed your post, so unwittingly doubled your take on the tangerine — it is nicely ambiguous, isn’t it? Santa is real and delivered a momentus gift to our friends — or he isn’t and didn’t, and for all we know one or both of them are still dreaming . . . There are probably camera things you can do to manipulate P.O.V. into telling us whose dream it is, but that would be oh so complicated. At the end, though, P.O.V. says it’s maybe Santa’s dream! Looking out through the window and down on the Tardis, after leaving his signature. Not for me — I’m allergic to the things, although I had no trouble scarfing down clementines in Italy a couple of decades ago, and I think those are Italian tangerines.
Loved that “Brave” from D. This was Danny showing a kind of courage D really respects because it doesn’t involve battlefields but relationships, *so* much more difficult and more so for D than for regular humans anyway. Respect is a point on which the natural Officer and the actual soldier can meet without clashing (at least in Clara’s dream). Dead, maybe not, so a longer exchange between the two of them is probably not on the menu. Which is too bad. I think now that some serious talk between D and Danny alone earlier on would have made Danny a lot more acceptable (and even likable) for many viewers who talk about how much they hate Danny. They don’t — what’s to hate? I think they’re reacting to the constriction of the character, in large part by his lack of direct connection with D. Of course, if they’d had some contact before, that would have taken away from the “big reveal” of Danny’s massive gesture of accepting command of the cyber-army from D and turning the army into a means of rescue for humanity.
Funny how easily we lose sight of the fact that no, you can’t have everything: every decision *for* something is also a decision *against* a myriad of other possibilities (unless you’re a Time Lord, I suppose — but then you save your ability to make two opposite decisions about the same thing for moments like The Moment), or you’d spend *all* your time reviewing and revising every decision to get to the “outcome” you discover in retrospect that you really wanted.
Which assumes that there is “an outcome” of every decision, when there isn’t. There is a widening field of outcomes that goes on for a very long time, spreading and spreading like the moving rings outward from a splash in water. And that’s as far as I can think it, which suggests that I am certainly not the stuff of which Time Lords are made . . . too much pudding, not enough brain.
5 January 2015 at 21:49 #36992Lisa (and everybody) — I am hanging out here way too much (speaking of addictions!), so many good thoughts flying around, for which thanks of my now. Only “procrastination” isn’t my middle name any more; it’s my first name, thanks to alla you guys here.
MUST go buy cat food. They insist.
5 January 2015 at 22:40 #36995@barbaralefty outstanding! (not the police state part- that’s sad)
5 January 2015 at 23:07 #37000I wish we had seen a tiny bit more of Ashley, it’s not clear why she would be a candidate for dream-crabbing. She seems to live alone in a beautiful home. Maybe, like Clara, she lost someone?
I didn’t get that one until the second viewing, either. She’s in a double bed. She’s sleeping on one side, as if she’s accustomed to sharing it – but the dream crab falls back onto an empty pillow.
The other clue is the one in the dream, when Santa says that her parents wanted to buy her a toy microscope – but he went for a real one. I’d guess that, in real life, her parents bought her the toy. Since they didn’t support that early ambition to be a scientist, she’s now an account manager. So her life is financially successful, professionally successful – but she’s now alone, and she’s not even in the career that she really wanted to be in.
Shona put a big tick besides ‘forgive Dave’. I wonder if Ashley’s going to decide on a change of career.
5 January 2015 at 23:10 #37001enjoying this thread!
Hi @ichabod – I have a vision of you trying to catch your thoughts in a butterfly net with them fluttering away on their rather beautiful wings. And like all butterflies, they’re rather wonderful thoughts! With you on board the coming months may fly by (and I mean all this in a good way)!
btw I think I agree with you @lisa that Clara tried to resist the Doctor’s warnings on the blackboards at least for a bit.
Now, I really must go to bed and dream of…. sheep?hmm, maybe angry dubstep-Dalek sheep…
5 January 2015 at 23:12 #37002@ichabod, @lisa @purofilion @arbutus we’re properly down the rabbit hole now! What fun, does this often happen? @ichabod, don’t take away our in-dream resolution by pointing out that it is, in fact, a dream…!!! I’m going with @arbutus here (if indeed I’m following all this at all!) that it is real because Clara’s refusal to leave was a tacit requirement to be ‘rescued’ just so she’d know one of her two options was still possible. And also, tangerines. However if in fact Santa represents the dreaming Doctor….
And yeah, how much sugar went in the coffee on the plane in DiH? I guess he had just had some downers.
Re Obscuritantia, I believe it is ok about very long processions as the law of Brevity is itself very, very, very, very, very long, so by the time they read it, the procession has passed.
And @purofilion, I’m rather in the other camp, and quite like my little Utopia. Although I’m not blind to its faults, I can’t fault its aspiration 😉
5 January 2015 at 23:19 #37005@bluesqueakpip Regarding Ashley – I think after witnessing the creature exploding on her
pillow she might want to ‘scientifically’ investigate what that was about ? I could see
that happening and then possibly finding her way into UNIT ? [I wouldn’t write that off
but it could also just be a bonkers theory]5 January 2015 at 23:21 #37006@barbaralefty outstanding! I also lean towards things, which we in Oz, call ‘other than liberal’: Labour. Even that tends to move ‘right’ year by year although I see Julia Guillard’s autobio is in stores so that should be a hoot!
5 January 2015 at 23:29 #37007@bluesqueakpip, @lisa, I know it’s fashionable to be in the Shona camp, but as I am a sort of semi sciency bod (lackey type only), I reckon your on that money and Ashley is the real deal.
@purofilion, I can only read the funny or outrageous political bios. Tried reading Tony Blair’s, kept wanting to punch things
@whisht where has the Dub step Dalek been all my life?! Of course they would enjoy industrial music!!
5 January 2015 at 23:58 #37008@barbaralefty I agree. I shall not read much of Julia Hulia’s autobio. I’m still on my fav which is Barry Jones. Terrific read: poignant, lefty, outrageous and literate. Yes, not a lot are that literate: it’s a toin coss.
Also, dub step: wunderbar!
Alone in a Beautiful Home? Of course she’s a candidate! 😉
6 January 2015 at 00:41 #37009Whisht — thanks! It’s all kind of exploding confetti inside the skull right now — with a stressful home situation at last resolved, I’m getting lots more sleep, and cutting back on stupid tranq dose as well. I’s as light as possible, but just cutting a pill in half seems to be boosting energy, and also endlessly fractally budding brain activity, all pleasing but also chaotic. I’m not usually this disorganized in my thinking, but as that’s what seems to be going on, I’m happy to ride with it; having a bit of company to play with helps tons!
Sweet dreams — no face-crabs need apply.
6 January 2015 at 00:53 #37010@ichabod well that sounds difficult! Also, just guessing, but it’s 1 am in the UK? You people never sleep? 😉 or are you wired from…overloaded brain activity from the other thing?
Regards, puro
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