Listen
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winston 12 months ago.
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9 March 2015 at 21:59 #38662
Yeah, Tom Baker was my doc, until Capaldi came along. On Season 8, I can’t decide among Listen, MotOE, Flatline — oh, they all had great stuff in them, sometimes per episode, sometimes as contributing to character arcs throughout the series. Good, good stuff, and good places to talk about it on line — what could be nicer?!
20 March 2015 at 02:42 #38981I don’t know if anybody else was confused by this episode. At the end, clara grabbed the boy’s foot when he put it down like in all those peoples dreams, so question one, Were all of the hands grabbing peoples legs in the dreams all clara, somehow?
And in the end it turns out that the little boy was the doctor as a child not wanting to be in the army, and when clara is saying how one day he “will be scared one day and come back to this barn” And it shows the John Hurt doctor walking to the barn in the ‘Day of The Doctor’ episode. So my last question is, If the little boy that clara grabbed from under the bed really was the doctor (witch i’m 101% sure it was) That means that was on Gallifrey also since the barn he came back to was in Gallifrey, So since it was on Gallifrey, how the hell did they get there in the TARDIS!!!??? Isn’t it sealed off by a time lock, unable to leave or enter from any time?? If there is an explanation, can somebody please explain this to me?
To be honest, almost all of season 8 highly HIGHLY disappointed me, they should have put more time and episodes into it, With Matt Smith, clara was my favorite companion, but season 8 sorta ruined her.
(And sorry if i’m not posting this in the right section, im new to the forum and this is my first post 🙂 )
20 March 2015 at 08:38 #38985Anonymous @
If I’m reading you correctly, you’re saying that Gallifrey is time-locked? You’d be right. But this was an earlier time and therefore it was possible to go there… The dreams were passed down by others and yet started in the one place. Hence everyone experiencing them: if it was the exact dream, I’m not so sure, imo, I think we all have similar dreams like that -I know that I do.
I’m sorry you didn’t like S8, I think most people did but I’m sure there’ll be plenty who were disappointed.
Nonetheless I’ll think you’ll find all the recent Who series since 2005 have had enormous time (and significant budgets) but most importantly have had 12 to 13 episodes for each year or series.
What did you not particularly like?
I like how Clara is now with a friend, an older man and not some cute 20-something doctor. The time for that ‘romance’ was well past and it’s good to have her grow into a responsible and fully coloured in character. I’m looking forward to this next series and assume it will be as good as the one we had.
Good to hear from you!
Regards,
puro
(You might like to go the Memories page or the Companion thread and say who your favourite Doctor was and who your fav companion has also been -not Clara then ? 🙂 )
20 March 2015 at 11:08 #38994Regarding the Time Lock – Steven Moffat’s clarified this a bit.
They didn’t make it a big thing within the series because it’s something that the characters haven’t really twigged yet. But travelling to Gallifrey and the Doctor’s past showed that when The Moment lifted the Time Lock, it stayed lifted. The Time Lock is gone; the problem is that the Doctor no longer knows Gallifrey’s present location.
It took me until the end of Series 8 to really reconcile myself to Peter Capaldi as the Doctor. Not that I don’t think it’s a good performance; he was just so very different. By Listen I could see that he was going to be terrific, but even up to Kill the Moon, I was wondering if he was going to be a Doctor that I wanted to watch.
Fortunately, Mummy on the Orient Express (IN SPACE!) reassured me and Flatline was pretty darn good as well. David Tennant and Matt Smith were both so instantly loveable that I’d forgotten accepting a new Doctor can take time.
they should have put more time and episodes into it
Uh, seriously? You do realise that the production office for a Doctor Who series typically sets up nine months before first broadcast, don’t you? Movie grade special effects take time. Who also lacks a big ensemble cast – which means the shooting schedule is constrained by the needs of the two principals to have time to learn lines, eat and sleep. 😉
RTD went sideways on the ‘more episodes’ thing; he set up spin-off series with independent production offices. Steven Moffat might well have been thinking of doing that – but then his wife persuaded him to do Sherlock for Hartswood instead. 🙂
20 March 2015 at 14:19 #39001when The Moment lifted the Time Lock, it stayed lifted. The Time Lock is gone;
I hadn’t seen Moffat’s clarification of this question, but it was certainly the understanding that I was left with at the end of Day of the Doctor. So Gallifrey is once again accessible at any time before the ending of the time war, and the events of Listen show that Tardis knows this, even if the Doctor doesn’t (yet).
The question remains, whether the Tardis also knows the current whereabouts of Gallifrey, or whether her awareness of spacetime is limited to the ‘normal’ universe. The events of The Doctor’s Wife show that she is capable of entering a bubble universe, but perhaps the alternate or pocket universe where Gallifrey is presumably now situated is different in nature.
My guess is that she knows but just ain’t telling (well, as far as we know, the Doctor hasn’t yet thought to ask her).
@bluesqueakpip It goes without saying that we all bring our individual understanding of the Doctor to Who, and the longer we have been watching, the more varied and complex our ideas are likely to be.; which is all to the good. For me Capaldi nailed it in the ‘see me’ moment at the end of Deep Breath, and he has been quintessentially the Doctor from then on. Of the four since the reboot, it was Tennant’s interpretation that I had the most difficulty coming to terms with, although I certainly didn’t reject his version.
20 March 2015 at 17:43 #39003@pinchofvortex Gosh, I couldn’t wait for Clara to grow up, which she did in Series 8, at last! Now I want to see how she develops as a person and a companion of Twelve in the next series; she wants things for herself (last season, to keep her teaching job *and* her boyfriend *and* her volatile and often baffling (and baffled) space person, and she did everything she could to keep them all in some kind of balance in her life, while figuring out whether she herself still *wanted* to travel with this new and rather scary incarnation of the Doctor.
As for that dream in “Listen” — I gotta tell you, even as an old person myself (I haven’t been able to seriously claim to be “middle-aged” for about 15 yrs now), I can still remember myself as a kid making sure my that no part of my body, especially my feet, stuck out over the edge of my bed while I slept because I *knew* anything projecting off the (somehow) safe island of the bed itself could attract the attention and the aggression of — whatever the hell might be under the bed. Actually, I think if was probably okay, sort of, if it was just a toe, or an elbow, and *the sheet still covered it*. That was about the same time that I would wake up and lie paralyzed in bed, sure that Frankenstein’s monster was in the hallway and would pop his horrible head around to look at me any minute now —
Of course I don’t have those worries now. But I do seem to always sleep without hands or feet hanging off the bed . . . hmmm…
20 March 2015 at 21:15 #39005@ichabod I, too, tend to keep my extremities safely tucked under the duvet, but that is because I prefer to sleep in an unheated room, and in winter it gets chilly out there 🙂
As far as I can recall, I don’t think that I was ever worried by things under the bed (other than dust bunnies, or perhaps the family cat). What haunted my nightmares at three/four years old bore a marked likeness to the thing under the blanket on Rupert’s bed, which lay in wait for me on the stairs or in the middle of the path ahead of me, and the sight of it here still had the power to send a shiver down my decrepit spine!
20 March 2015 at 22:13 #39007@mudlark — Yikes, I wouldn’t want that blanket-thing anywhere near me! Understand, my sister — younger than me by SIX YEARS — coaxed me into going to see “House of Wax” with her, and once I dove under the seat, more or less, she kept poking me and laughing and insisting that it was *only make-up* that was making Vincent Price’s face look as if it were melting. Sheesh, I *knew* that, I wasn’t an idiot — but I still can’t look at faces distorted for a horror effect even now, for fear that the damned images will show up in my (often very vivid) dreams, where shutting my eyes is not, as it were, a workable defense.
So, somebody ‘splain me please — what *was* the thingie under the blanket, in your opinion, and *why did the Doctor insist that they turn their backs* on it? I mean, if it was just about not *seeing* it, shutting your eyes would do. I just stepped right out of the story at that point, yelling, WHAT? WHY? And that’s why I don’t rate “Listen” higher than, say MotOE or Flatline.
21 March 2015 at 10:32 #39017@mudlark and @ichabod I used to also fear something under the bed as a result of a something I watched on TV when I was quite young. As I recall I was getting over that when I saw something else that frightened me even more and as a result I slept with my head under the covers for about two years. I think it might have been Dr Who but I have yet to identify the episode. It would have most likely been a Troughton story, one of the missing ones.
I am still uncertain as to what the thingie under the blanket was. I think the reason the Doctor asked them to turn their backs to it rather than just close their eyes was to indicate to “thingie” that it was safe and they weren’t looking. Just shutting their eyes would not have been a reassuring. Whether it was a kid or a monster “thingie” appeared to be just as scared as they were, if not more so.
Cheers
Janette
21 March 2015 at 10:48 #39018Ah, yes, I agree! I think someone said that we’d determined who the blanket monster was?
But I think that will remain in the dark, so to speak?
To turn their backs on it, was to remain united, to try to show an aspect of ‘not afraid’ as well as to calm the monster -yes, they are as afraid of us as we are of them. So people who tell me about ghosts and other haunting/ed creatures have claimed. So many people I’ve encountered talk quite frequently about ghosts and poltergeists. It amazes me!!
So far, I don’t recall any paranormal experiences (cross fingers)
But isn’t Listen just great? It’s possibly my favourite of the series. But then MotOE was terrific and so was Flatliners (not sure of the name!)
Kindest, puro.
21 March 2015 at 12:59 #39024@purofilion I agree that Listen was great. One of my all time favourite episodes. I have watched it about five time already. I like not knowing if “thingie” is a monster or just a pranking kid. One of the many things I love about Moffat’s writing is that he leaves things open. Not all mysteries must be solved.
Cheers
Janette
21 March 2015 at 13:18 #39027@janetteb Oh my you’re up LATE!
I’m thinking of hitting the sack. But for once it’s cool and I’m enjoying the pattering of rain.
Right: you ARE ahead on that! I’ve watched it 3 times and am still confused and quite ‘freaked out’. A perfect blend of terror and fairy tale: expressive, yearning, emotionally charged.
Love it. It really shows Sam Anderson’s ability to act there – in the passing of the (toy) soldier. A lovely, sad metaphor not to be fully realised till Death in Heaven. And perhaps not fully recaptured yet?
21 March 2015 at 13:24 #39028@bluesqueakpip I really shouldn’t have answered @Vortexes question because I got it all wrong!
So, it’s time-lifted (not locked) but the Doctor can’t find it -or, as others said, the Tardis knows, but aint telling in keeping with the “taking you where you needed to go” theme which hit me in the gut when I heard it said: beautifully rendered.
21 March 2015 at 13:28 #39029@ichabod @janetteb @purofilion
The way to deal with monsters under the bed, or in the closet, or anywhere else for that matter is, as Susan StoHelit would tell you, and everyone who has read Hogfather knows, to confront them armed with the weapon that slays all monsters: the fireside poker. There is just one problem with this remedy: nowadays, when relatively few houses have open fires, how many people still possess a poker?
As for the thing under the blanket and whatever was hammering on Orson’s capsule, I think the question was deliberately left open, for the viewers to supply their own answers. I don’t think the Floof described in Corner of the Eye were involved, despite the ‘corner of the eye’ reference. They are, we are told, above all adept at concealing themselves: never seen or suspected except as a flicker in the corner of the eye or a prickle on the back of the neck, and would never advertise their presence or manifest themselves unless forced into the open.
The thing under the blanket had substance and weight (the bedsprings sagged), and the rational explanation is that it was another child playing a practical joke. The Doctor told everyone not to look, which goes against the usual counsel (not to mention the Susan StoHelit solution), which is to confront one’s fears and phobias and face them down. But perhaps it was to allow the joker to leave without embarrassment to or retribution from anyone.
The banging on the hull of Orson’s capsule might have had an equally mundane explanation, as sounds generated by the warming and cooling of the metal. Or perhaps there really was something out there; but if so, what could there be at the end of the universe?
My preferred explanation, expounded way up thread, was that the uncanny phenomena, which all occurred in the vicinity of the Doctor, were manifestations of his unconscious mind, rather like the invisible id-monster in the film Forbidden Planet. In his soliloquy in the opening scenes of Listen, he is trying to construct a hypothesis to explain his sense of being ‘haunted’ by something or things unseen – which we later see might or might not be fully explained by his childhood experience in the barn. But at this stage of his post-regeneration life he is still probably in a slightly unstable and hypersensitive state, with his subconscious working overtime to sort out his residual identity problems, and this, amplified by the telepathic link which we know he has with the Tardis, could perhaps have physical manifestations.
21 March 2015 at 16:56 #39035@ichabod @Purofilion @Janette @mudlark and all — Emotional changes happen ‘under the
blanket’ of darkness. Its a sign of intelligence to be inquisitive about what is in the dark
as opposed to those that suppress knowing the secrets. But something that seems at least to
me to be even stranger is sleeping with stuffed animals like a teddy bear. lol no really!!
Ok so no judging here but are these creatures supposed to protect you from those other
potential creatures that you cant see in the dark or under the bed or in the closet?
I never did that but my daughter has 2! Its definitely a comfort mechanism for sure for some.
I wonder if there is anyone out there sleeping with a stuffed Doctor in bed?
In any case, I liked the way the Doctor and Clara tried to peel away the layers of fear for
young Danny. Very well done indeed!21 March 2015 at 18:07 #39039BTW – The more I think about it its a nice concept giving someone a stuffed Doctor as
protector against the strange and impossible and hostile incursions! ‘Their very own
angel from the stars’ In a bed or on the shelf — might have to fit 1 into my everyday
life 😉21 March 2015 at 21:47 #39048@lisa I like it when she bops his head to stop him scaring young Rupert with a too-grown-up-for-him take on scary stuff, so he shuts up and lets her take over. But he leans in himself, listening to what she has to say and how she says it. One thing I like so much about this Doctor — his uncertainty, his wobbly sense of self, makes him more of a student, a learner, than usual, and that makes him especially appealing to viewers who value that kind of open-ness more than the (often false) comfort of a (self-proclaimed) knowledgeable expert taking the lead.
The stuffed animal companion might be a stage of the spectrum of “invisible friends” that kids can add to their lives for a firmer sense of security, and later we look back and see them, sentimentally, as symbolic of the days when we did feel more defended and protected, even if that was largely an illusion fostered by parents who wish they really *could* defend and protect their kids from all comers. Doesn’t work — for reasons. “Don’t worry, I won’t let anything happen to you” can also mean, “Don’t worry, I’ll see to it that you don’t have to grow up” — get cut on the sharp edges of the big world, and heal up with the scars that all grown-ups carry as signs of increased wisdom gained from experience (well, we hope so). (e.g., KtM, for example . . . )
21 March 2015 at 21:56 #39049@mudlark — I like the “projections from the unconscious mind” theory, which the Doctor certainly expounds on in “Last Christmas”, doesn’t he? The banging on the hull, not so much, maybe — after all, he did get “attacked” or at least physically affected by something out there, and had to be brought back, unconscious, into the capsule. Could have been an accident, and nothing *should* have been left alive at that place and time — but the suggestion is, I suppose, that whatever is banging on the outside is something that we brought with us on the inside and then projected out. So — ?? Mystery! So delicious, if you’ve a taste for it . . .
14 June 2015 at 07:24 #40644Exactly. I used to have the same fear, and never stuck a foot out from under the covers.
14 June 2015 at 07:26 #40645I think that Listen is my favourite from series 8, closely followed by Flatline.
24 June 2015 at 19:23 #40802‘Listen’ and ‘Robot’s of Sherwood’ were my favorites of season 9. ‘Orient Express’ and ‘Flatline’ seem to be more popular, but they didn’t really grab me. I thought ‘Deep Breath’and ‘Death in Heaven’ were also very intriguing and exciting. I have really enjoyed reading all the comments, questions and theories on this thread. I’m new to this forum, so I have yet to figure out how to find the discussions on creative theories on overall story arc’s and character development. Does one find them through the episode threads, or do they live somewhere else?
25 June 2015 at 00:23 #40816Welcome and hello.
Most of the posts for each episode thread contain the discussions which you are looking for: ie, these are the droids which you seek. Then there are separate areas under Companions, Past & Present. But if you head to Forums and ‘click’ it will show the various doctors. ‘Click’ on these and it will lead you to the episodes relating to those Doctor iterations.
Arcs are discussed within longer – usually end of season or double episodes, such as Day of the Dr (which you found) and Dark Water or Death in Heaven.
Hope that helps.
Enjoy!
Kindest,
puro.
25 June 2015 at 04:14 #40819@purofilion Thank you! This was very useful and helpful info. 🙂
6 July 2015 at 07:34 #40981Probably my favourite episode. Very cleverly written.
I especially liked the reference to John Hurt and ‘The Moment.’
13 July 2015 at 21:59 #41173Hello all,
I don’t know about you guys, but this episode actually kinda freaked me out. I am slightly ashamed to admit this being a grown adult and everything, but I guess it goes to show you how great of a job they did on it.
The 11th doctor is my doctor but I am sure starting to like 12 a lot; he’s showing us growth and incredible acting skills. I say bravo to Capaldi. Despite unpopular opinion, I do like Jenna Coleman. I think what is happening is she has been around for too long and people are used to more change. For me, I will always be a Donna and Pond fan.
Thoughts?
– L
14 July 2015 at 01:16 #41178@Linds738 Listen is about how the Doctor, left traveling on his own too long, gets lost in that piano-sized brain of his and can end up freaking himself out, so it’s not surprising if the episode itself freaks us out too. No shame, no blame! It’s a handsomely built episode — I like the way he starts out with harking back to a fear shared by many children (I sure had it — could not sleep if any of my hands or feet were hanging out over the edge or end of the bed because of fear they’d be grabbed by a monster), is encouraged (literally!) by an experience of his own as a child of getting good advice from a future friend, and then passes that advice on to young Rupert Pink in the orphanage like a grown-up “Dad” doing his dad-ly duty with his dad-skills.
So pretty; sometimes there are elements of a DW story that you can follow the way your eyes follow a flat stone skipped across the surface of a pond.
I wouldn’t conclude, by the way, that hating Clara is a popular opinion: the minority (IMO, from what I’ve seen and read) who do the public Clara-hate shout very loudly, but I don’t think they’re representative of much (except the king of persistent yelling that typifies the kind of bullies who hide behind nasty words and anonymity — even “mean girls” have more guts, to slam their victim to her face). Sometimes I wonder whether part of this weird electronic ganging up on someone isn’t, in this case, in part a result of the fact that sniping at Peter Capaldi (for being “top old”, “too cold”, whatever) ran into a stone wall of people answering “He is an experienced actor with strong skills and a huge love of and knowledge of Doctor Who and he’s doing a great job, so quit whining — you sound like a fourteen-year-old fangirl/boy with a huge crush on Tennant or Smith, so try re-watching S8 to catch on to what you missed the first time.” More or less.
I think some of these people, finding less and less positive return for their investment of venom, deflected it onto Clara, about whom opinion is more divided. And I don’t think change in itself is the issue: in this case, it’s damned if you do, damned if you don’t. The people who still whinge on about her seem to be those who thought she was okay-to-just-barely-tolerable when she was what Steven M. himself has admitted was little more than a pawn being used as a plot-mover, but as soon as the writers of S8 gave her material she could use to grow a self, with goals and needs of her own, a lot of people became quite bitter about it: How dare Clara grow a life and a character strong enough to hold her own in a series written as a two-hander (two leads playing off each other as near-equals), because now that we can actually see and hear Clara herself, *it’s become the Clara Who show”.
There are reasons to dislike Clara, if you hate assertive women (or, negative versions, Drama Queens or Control Freaks), but complaining that she “obliterated the Doctor” is just idiotic: nobody obliterates an actor of Capaldi’s calibre just by becoming a better character for his character to play with/off of. Frankly, I think there’s a strong stink of plain old misogyny + very green eyed jealousy, coming off much of the Clara-hate. It’s pretty much B.S., IMO, and I give it no credit and as little of my attention as I can manage. Life is too short.
14 July 2015 at 03:44 #41181@Linds738
Hello and welcome if this is your first time here. It can be daunting but also huge fun. I’ve made a number of friends actually as this is not the type of internet forum where people whinge and complain. There are great debates and arguments -thoroughly and properly argued but mostly it’s just good old -fashioned fun.
I have a pretty serious illness so talking to people in this way gives my day a lot of colour and amusement. I love listening to people smarter than myself talk about Who. It’s such a challenging show and I think that Listen was one of the smartest episodes in a smart, neatly put together season.
For what it’s worth I don’t read any other forums. I’ve heard there’s the typical Moffat haters but I’m surprised ppl would dislike Coleman. She’s an assertive actor and as @ichabod has mentioned, misogyny hasn’t disappeared. I think she did a terrific job in Season 8, but in Listen she was particularly fine.
Listen has that ‘freak me out’ quality, doesn’t it? Even my 13 year old, who has grown too old to find the monsters freakish (so he says!), re-discovered the night light after that and I still wonder what or who was under that blanket in Danny Pink’s home!
The Doctor talking to young Dan about fear being a super-power is hugely important and I imagine thousands of dads saying the same thing to their own children when they’ve experienced night terrors or are nervous about an upcoming event.
I loved the back and forth timey whimey stuff and whilst I can never understand it (always drawing virtual maps trying to figure out where they are on the timeline), it’s even more interesting on a re-watch -where Clara is walking away from the restaurant and the Doctor says “ah, don’t worry, you look fine” her response is classic (and rare for a woman, these days): “I think I look goood.”
And she certainly does.
Also, travelling with the Doctor, or perhaps because she ended up tripping thru his timeline, has given Clara grace and wisdom well before her time. Talking to Danny, “caring” for the Doctor so he doesn’t “have to care” (about himself or others -although that’s a myth, for we all know he does care; sometimes too much) and showing compassion to Orson Pink (when he was terrified about staying in that space ship by himself one more night) has become Clara’s hall mark.
Listen had so much packed into it: we find out what the Doctor is most afraid of; we meet young Dan and Orson; we see Clara and Danny on their complex date; we visit the end of the universe, practically; and of course the Doctor meditating on top of the Tardis at the beginning of the episode is a gorgeous teaser. That would make one helluva poster.
Personally, I love the blackboards and the bookshelves in this episode. Watching that piece of chalk ‘wandering off’ across the floor is at once scary and funny.
The issues raised: should we confront our fear or look away? Is there something at the end of the universe, a parasitical creature that is frighteningly silent except at night? Do our own fears create a substantial ‘monster’ as if in answer to our questions? -are all wonderful discussion points to raise with each other and with growing children.
I have to check if it was Moffatt who wrote this, or another writer, but it was stunning in every way. The Mummy on the Orient Express is probably my equal favourite.
Kindest, puro
29 August 2015 at 23:59 #42152I think it’s about time we bring up Orson Pink again. Danny is dead and never coming back so who is Orson? He’s probably just a distant relative, and the time travel thing is a complete coincidence. But like the Doctor said, “Never ignore coincidences…unless your busy, then always ignore them.”
So because I’m not busy, I’m choosing not to ignore it. This forum is not only for realistic theories, but for the slightly insane one’s too. Here is my slightly insane theory. Clara is pregnant (and I know this wouldn’t actually happen), but that is why she has to leave the Doctor. She should leave by the end of Season 9 (she’s been on longer than any companion in new who) and this or her death are the only reason’s she would leave. Although, even death hasn’t stopped her before.
One thing that should be remembered is that Listen is written by Steven Moffat, and he is known for taking forgotten details and making them important later on. I feel like he wouldn’t put Orson in the episode if he wasn’t going to come up later. There are a lot of unanswered questions by the end of Season 8 that will hopefully be resolved in 9 including Orson’s story.
1 September 2015 at 03:01 #42213Re-watching this one and I’m just wondering about the planet that they found Orson on.
The Doctor says it the last planet at the end of time. I thought the last time we
visited the planet at the end of time there was the Jacobi master there with other
human and sort of human survivors. So how is it that now there is nothing? Or maybe
it was one of those semi-human creatures with the spiky teeth banging on the space
ships door. Weren’t they left behind when the humans took off on the rocket ship?
Then Orson says that the toy came to him from his great grandparents. Well what if
Clara just decides to go back on her time line at the end of this next season and
gets back with Danny and changes both of there futures? This was a great episode
but definitely very tricky! Because even though people on this thread have tried to
explain the toy soldier there is still a problem for me about how Orson and the Doctor
both have the same toy and how it gets back and forth between them. That still isn’t
working for me.1 September 2015 at 19:42 #42231Just watched this again. I’d forgotten how really good and scary and moving this episode was. Definitely a future classic. I’d also forgotten how massively irritated I was with Clara at the beginning. She just seemed so dense! So insensitive! So… Doctor-like.
@TheConsultingDoctor Yes. Watching the scene with Clara and Orson, I remembered why we were all so certain in the first place that Orson was Clara’s descendant. It was because of this scene, in which Orson behaved as though he new perfectly well that Clara was his great-grandmother. He didn’t act as though he suspected that she might be, but as if he were certain that she was. He earlier denied having seen photos but that only means that he didn’t want to share.
In light of later events, it seemed possible to assume that Orson was a red herring, some kind of relative of Danny’s but nothing to do with Clara. But that would be to ignore the evidence of this story. As you say, Moffat has left threads dangling through multiple series, and I’m sure that this is another such. I have no idea how it will be resolved, but it’s nice to think that Danny Pink’s arc might not end up leading nowhere, that he will have a significance beyond just the fact that Clara loved him and lost him.
@lisa I would guess that this is the planet after the humans and monster-humans were gone. Because, in fact, they all left, didn’t they? The humans left on the rocket that was supposed to take them to Utopia, and the monster-humans were taken away by the Master, to help him conquer the Earth. The idea of the end of the universe, of time, of everything, is massive and incomprehensible and terrifying, isn’t it? A suitable setting for a portion of this story, I thought!
2 September 2015 at 03:15 #42252@lisa I think this is just further towards the end of the universe than Utopia. In Utopia, I believe they say or imply that there are other planets and star systems with scattered, isolated human populations throughout, clinging on as the universe moves closer to heat death. In Listen they’re even further in the future, at the point where no life exists, presumably the stars have gone out and only one planet remains, which is not necessarily the one from Utopia.
16 September 2015 at 04:53 #42727Well, I’m proper scared.
It may be nearly 2pm but with the curtains drawn and the thing on the bed in Danny Pink’s room revealed very quickly, I find myself believing Who as part of the adventure/thriller genre.
As Capaldi says to Danny, “don’t look at it, turn around right now,” the blanket comes off and for a split second you can see a bald, pale pink/grey head with black holes for eyes.
I thought, initially, that the Doctor’s experiment about creatures who have perfected the art of hiding meant that someone had been with the Doctor, in the Tardis and had popped out with him as he entered the children’s home. Perhaps, though, this creature, knowing the doctor’s predilection for solving problems, manifests into another being, one which communicates with itself and so splits in two so it is also in Danny’s room wanting to frighten them and convince the Doctor his “conjecture” is fact, after all.
At the beginning, during the first date scene, I always wonder about the waiter who brings water and glasses to the table. For awhile, I thought this was meaningful -that he would be revealed as another ‘hider’ -but one hiding in plain sight, perhaps.
Still, I haven’t completed the whole episode, yet….
16 September 2015 at 04:55 #42729I fear, that with so many unanswered questions, we may never discover the identity of the red quilt ‘creature.’
16 September 2015 at 05:02 #42731@purofilion
I fear you are right. Doesn’t it give you the pip?
4 more sleeps.
Missy
16 September 2015 at 05:05 #42732I’ve watched this episode several times now and still love it.
Missy
16 September 2015 at 05:24 #4273516 September 2015 at 12:30 #42744@purofilion
Orson behaved as though he knew perfectly well that Clara was his great-grandmother.
He absolutely, definitely behaved as if he knew who Clara was. We all (including Clara) leapt to the assumption that this was because she was his great-grandmother. But, as I think I said several pages back, giving the toy soldier to your great-grandmother doesn’t make sense. She’s already about to get it – if she’d married Danny, it would’ve been in his possessions, and quite likely Clara would’ve given the original to her child.
What does make sense is if Orson knew that it was a family duty to pass the soldier on when a certain person turned up – and realised when he met Clara that she was that person.
However, I’m still wondering about the time travelling ancestor. But Moffat being who he is, it could simply be that we haven’t yet met Orson’s time travelling ancestor.
16 September 2015 at 16:36 #42750I completely absolutely loved “Listen”. The part where you see the little boy under the covers, just by watching every season since they came back with the 9th Doctor drops the hint. And in my honest opinion I think that with the new Regeneration of the 13th or 12th (however you want to look at it) is more of a fatherly figure to Clara. Also at the beginning of the episode it seemed liked they were going to have The Silence from Matt Smiths run on the show. But overall I think that Peter is doing a great job and look forward to more peeks into the Doctors past.
17 September 2015 at 01:45 #42761Ah yes, I recall those comments -I made a point of reading all the comments yesterday but for The Caretaker only (there were less and some were quite controversial!)
However, I’m still wondering about the time travelling ancestor. But Moffat being who he is, it could simply be that we haven’t yet met Orson’s time travelling ancestor.
I also think this is great explanation: Dan has passed and Orson is related to someone else. Unless of course this future no longer exists: the future time line in Listen has been erased. That is a possibility, I think? <<*\*>> Not that this is Back to The Future at all. 🙂
17 September 2015 at 05:08 #42764@bluesqueakpip I have a few theories on whom the Time travelling ancestor might be. Both @miapatrick and I on different threads suggested that Orson might be descended from Master/Missy. There are also are any number of former companions, Ian and Barbara being my favourites. Other (albeit highly unlikely) possibilities I have thought of are the Jenny, the Meddling Monk or Susan. Even River Song is a possibility and another could be the Maisie Williams character or someone else we are yet to meet. As you might guess I have devoted far too much time to pondering this question. I do think that Danny and Orson are connected though Danny is almost certainly not an ancestor of Orson’s. Clara pointing out the remarkable likeness to the Doctor implies that it does signify in some way yet to be revealed.
Another timey wimey possibility is that Danny is Orson’s son. AFter all Orson is mucking about with time travel. Anything can happen. I am still pondering on the significance, if any of the surname. Pink and Blue sound very much like military ranks. I wonder if any thought has been given to when exactly Into the Dalek takes places in relation to Orson’s failed attempt at time travel. (I know that Pink is an actual surname but still,, fun to speculate..especially as I am always wrong about the meaning of names in Dr Who.)
One of the great strengths of Listen is that it leaves the viewer with so many things to ponder and theorise about.
Cheers
Janette
17 September 2015 at 06:27 #42772@janetteb I love the idea that Danny could be Orson’s descendant, rather than the other way around as we assumed. It’s amazing, isn’t it, how easily we forget that this is about time travel. I thought that point was made beautifully way back in the Tenth Doctor episode “Blink”, when Sally finally met the Doctor, only to realize that the story hadn’t yet happened for him!
17 September 2015 at 14:05 #42776I agree: great theorising and a twist, Janette!
Another timey wimey possibility is that Danny is Orson’s son. AFter all Orson is mucking about with time travel. Anything can happen. I am still pondering on the significance, if any of the surname. Pink and Blue sound very much like military ranks….
I wondered about that too: the idea of Orson and Danny being in different non-linear time lines (to what we expect) and also where all these episodes actually fit in the current time stream…I did think that the eps could be tidily out of whack.
There was a sense that a few could sit either side of different episodes making them interchangeable. I felt that last year based on two random and silly things: the T-shirt wearing and the hair. Turns out though, that Capaldi being human, needs an occasional trip to the barber (I might add, what great hair!)
So I mentioned this: “Dan has passed and Orson is related to someone else” but this could be Dan after all! Then, as @bluesqueakpip said,
“He [Orson] absolutely, definitely behaved as if he knew who Clara was
And clearly, as Pip said, if Danny had been with Clara, the toy soldier would already be in her possession. That’s common sense (not that I possess any of it!) and fits perfectly but now, with Danny dead, there’s an alternative: well, not so much an alternative, as many other possible options.
Time for diagrams. Definitely.
17 September 2015 at 15:11 #42779OK, watched this again last night, and…am I correct in thinking that we first see the toy soldier in little Rupert’s box of toys? We next see the toy soldier when Orson gives it (a family heirloom) to Clara. And we finally see it when Clara leaves it with the young Doctor (almost 2000 years younger than he is now) in his bed in the barn.
So, does this mean that the Doctor had to give it to Rupert for Rupert to have it?
Is there something really obvious in its timeywimeyness that I am missing?
Has this been discussed above and I have forgotten (very likely)
17 September 2015 at 15:51 #42781And I sure this must have been discussed before, but the experience of the Doctor and Clara appearing in Rupert’s room would be the type of thing you wouldn’t forget. And yet Danny clearly does not recognize either Clara or the Doctor when he meets them.
Or is this just one of those times that Mrs Blenkinsop refers to as: “You’re not supposed to think about that”?
17 September 2015 at 17:19 #42785@ichabod, @Mudlark- I woke up the other night and there was a monster under my bed- we have a lot of boxes pushed under, and one of the dogs fell between the bed and the wall and couldn’t get out. @Purofilion- I even know people who go to spiritualist meetings. Personally I think they just make death seem deathly dull. However many years on this world, living in it, then eternally peering down from somewhere, passing on messages via dead Native Americans and living men in ill-fitting suits. Please, no. Unless it means I can have all my dogs back…
@Blenkinsopthebrave- I think the doctor says that Rupert’s memories are wiped. Probably for the best, Clara and Danny’s first date was quite awkward enough…
@JanettB, I like the idea of Orsan being Danny’s father. As for the soldier- it was in the set in his bedroom, it becomes ‘his’ because Clara say’s it is his. Clara gets it from Orsan who does seem, as @bluesqueakpip says, to know to give it to her. And that is entirely the kind of thing Missy tends to do when it comes to Clara.
17 September 2015 at 21:59 #42790And I sure this must have been discussed before, but the experience of the Doctor and Clara appearing in Rupert’s room would be the type of thing you wouldn’t forget. And yet Danny clearly does not recognize either Clara or the Doctor when he meets them.
Claricles didn’t recognize the Doctor when she met him either.
Danny might be a Danicle. I think if Clara is a Time Lady, then Danny could have jumped into her time stream.
Or is this just one of those times that Mrs Blenkinsop refers to as: “You’re not supposed to think about that”?
Ha ha ha… That’s a good one, Mrs. Blenkinsop. 😉
18 September 2015 at 05:12 #42799your questions inspired me to go back and read all 11 pages of comments. Boy, were there some trolls, some various newbies who absolutely despised the site and as usual, there were thoughtful, balanced, explanatory posts which helped explain the narration.
In my opinion, the Toy belonged in the orphanage: a box of toys passed around. Clara made it a super-toy (a guy without weaponry relying on courage, and understanding the important role of fear). It then stayed in the family like a charm bracelet. Orson gave it to Clara who then deposited with the Doctor. **
So, how is it a toy belonging in the orphanage if it goes back 2000 years?
I wonder if the Doctor, prior to sitting in the chair and vainly searching for Wally, drops it in the toy box.
I then have to ask, again: who is under the blanket?
Could it be the young Doctor or a young playmate? Somehow they place the toy in the box. In other words, the bonkers idea is that the Doctor, as an adult, ignores Clara’s plea to never look at where they were (the barn). He travels back, and perhaps the Boy Doctor travels with him taking his favourite possession: the soldier toy.
It is the young Doctor who ends up under the blanket and as the Doctor knows this he entreats Clara and Rupert to keep their backs to ‘it’.
Just as the Doctor told Clara to stay in the Tardis, the Young Doctor was also told to “stay put” but his request was ignored and he tip-toed up the stairs following Clara and into Rupert’s room where he ‘propped’ the toy. He recognised a frightened child in an orphanage and sympathised with him. And sympathised with him so much he decided to don a blanket and scare the wits out of him -but as the young Doctor, he had to ‘hide’
Of course, there’s now a big problem with the Loop. And the bonkers bit: waaay over the top.
I think the first part of my travels with the Soldier until the ** are correct….after that, it’s purely my conjecture. 🙂
On the second point where young Rupert doesn’t remember Clara and the Doctor, could the Doctor in putting Rupert to sleep with the story, have wiped his mind? – – as @miapatrick mentioned above also.
In re-reading the many comments I was struck by its importance. This story refers to Clara not knowing when her death approaches -which signposts for me the inevitable: that, perhaps, it’s soon?
On your first question again, I’m reminded of @bluesqueakpip‘s assertion that the last person you’d give a family heirloom to is the person who’s left it to you in the first place. In fact, it’s very significant, and so I placed in bold those statements in the first paragraph. Because they actually don’t make sense:
– it’s in the family and yet it’s given back to the ‘family.’ Or someone we think is family? Such as Clara.
Nope, that doesn’t make sense to me! So, it’s a signal, or some sort of code for later. Something which holds significance later down the line for Clara. Perhaps Orson understands, as Rose did, the sensitivity of knowledge about one’s future: written or unwritten.
Believe me, at one point (after a red or two) I thought the Skovox Blitzer was actually Danny who had morphed from Cyber man to Blitzer travelling around the universe and was therefore at Coal Hill School because he was drawn to a singular member of staff.
🙂
18 September 2015 at 05:31 #42801@purofilion
which signposts for me the inevitable: that, perhaps, it’s soon?
Quite possibly. There certainly are more than a few hints that way. However, I remain interested in Steven Moffat being so keen to retain Jenna Coleman for Series 9 that he was prepared to write a script with an alternate ending just so that he had to the last possible second to persuade her to stay.
To me, that suggests that he has a very particular arc in mind for Clara and that it hadn’t finished by Series 8.
Re: the Toy – I have the simplest theory in the world for that. It came from the toy box in the orphanage. Rupert then keeps it because he remembers it as ‘special’ somehow. It gets passed through the family to Orson. It is handed to Clara. It ends up on Gallifrey, with SmallDoctor.
And that’s it. It’s a linear journey, not a loop. The Toy is made in some factory on Earth in the 1980’s, and ends up on Gallifrey in whenever-it-was. It never gets returned to the orphanage to restart the journey.
18 September 2015 at 05:45 #42803OK. So it’s a one journey trip with the Toy (heck you’re up late or early?).
Starts in orphanage in the ’90s and then ends up with the Doctor in the barn at age 9 or thereabouts.
The toy doesn’t travel or else ….there is no other else, is that right? Should I be thinking that the Toy is with the Doctor, who puts it in the box….etc…or that it doesn’t travel beyond the Doctor having it as a child…..it’s DAWNING. That’s it. That’s all this is!
By George, after a year and 11 pages purofilion gets it….still I’m intrigued about the Perfect Hider: how that fits in as a second element to this story ? (now that you’ve elegantly dispensed with the Toy Soldier)
18 September 2015 at 05:53 #42805To me, that suggests that he has a very particular arc in mind for Clara and that it hadn’t finished by Series 8.
Aaaand….you wouldn’t have any theories of what that arc might be? 🙂
Is she a Clara Prime+?
To what extent will she be involved with Missy who we assumed was dead at the end of last season?
Will she sacrifice herself as Clara Prime (as she did being a claricle)?
Despite the end of Last Christmas wherein she looked ready and excited about more travels with the Doctor, has Clara reconciled Danny’s death? (insofar as that’s possible)
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