S33 (7) 11 – Journey to the Centre of the TARDIS

[PhaseShift @phaseshift Time Lord]

Evening all (and a big hello to newcomers!)

Sorry I’ve not had time to pop in. Real world interruptions. Just skimmed the thread, but need to digest over a long period I think when I’m a bit more alert.

I had a rewatch, but the only thing that lept out at me was the dialogue that @phileasf (don’t worry – we like long posts) quoted in his excellent post

“You call yourself Doctor. Why do you do that? You have a name, I’ve seen it, in one corner of that tiny–’”

It seemed she wasn’t particularly interested in his name but more why he doesn’t use it and the adoption of “The Doctor”. So perhaps that’s his big secret to be revealed? A story or hint at to why he took “The Name of The Doctor”?

[PhaseShift @phaseshift Time Lord]

@jimthefish

And, yes, RE. old truckles. I’m still convinced that TS is the newly regenerated form of Alexander

Truculent Sheep is indeed Alexander. @juniperfish has an excellent memory and reminded me that dear Xander used to link to his blog. On looking I found a link to when he directed people to his thoughts on JLC in 2012. Pretty conclusive.

I’ll mention @branfish in this post just as he may see it and realise he could waste his valuable time if he expects sensible debate (I just skimmed and saw he and @GuiltyBystander were attempting something of the type in your DEM thread).

Apologies all – pretty knackered, so I will leave the bonkers theorising to the night crew. See you soon.

[Juniperfish @juniperfish]

Waves at sleepy @phaseshift . 

@holymackerel Yes the Valeyard is one of the candidates on the list for “dark doppleganger Doctor”. Currently, Great Intelligence infected Doctor and dalekising Doctor are up there too.

Bring it on nightshift!

[WhoHar @whohar]

@juniperfish / Juniperchips

Ah ha! There you are
@holymackerel
 – all hail Omega-Fish etc. 🙂

Shouldn’t that be Omega3-fish? 😉

[WhoHar @whohar]

Realising the similarity with part of @haveyoufedthefish ‘s posts. CHECK.

Three further points.

Why couldn’t Clara touch the other Doctor? The one who seemed suspended and not in this world / time stream?

I also thought the cloth was perhaps parchment – a leaf out of the Time War book. A leaf with the Doc’s name on it. A leaf containing all future possibilities. Oh well.

If the Tardis is infinite, maybe it contains more than we imagine. Like Gallifrey. Or perhaps the Tardis is the Time Lock, keeping the war isolated from the rest of the universe. But what happens to all that when the Tardis explodes?

[HolyMackerel @holymackerel]

@whohar Time leaking both ways so perhaps untouchable Doctor was a future Doctor and dangerous for reasons yet unknown.

Intrigued by your idea of TARDIS being the time lock.

 

[chickenelly @chickenelly]

…bit late to the party but finally had time to watch it and it was great.  Two corkers in a row.  The toasted Clara was even creepier than the ‘ghost’ last week.

Went onto the Grauniad and it was full of people moaning how they were peeling off labels on dvds they were so bored.  I think I might be living in a parallel universe as I had real problems (as you know) with the kiddie singing episode but most Guardian posters were raving about how touching it all was.

It’s going to take me a while to catch up with everyone’s posts so won’t air my thoughts in detail yet as others have probably pointed the same things out.  Also this episode clearly needs a rewatch…

[ScaryB @scaryb]

@jimthefish Am with you on deus ex machina 😉 Usually trotted out by people who have at best half an understanding of the term and are criticising the “sloppy, lazy “writing.  I don’t know why I still react to it!

Between us, Guilty Bystander, @branfish, @phaseshift‘s friend Martin Belam, I reckon we proved the point tho. Probably around the time TS started going on about custard pies, LOL.  It’s still going on now btw, but it’s on to the direct personal insults. GB’s still trying, but you’ll never get the last word against a troll. We did get 1 person to concede it’s not a DEM tho 🙂

<waves @chickenelly; the rewatch is even better 🙂 >

[ScaryB @scaryb]

@whohar I wondered that too (about Clara not to touch the other Doctor). Unless she already had in an earlier timestream and it led directly to burning up or something not good.

@juniperfish Don’t forget to add the GI is a manifestation of the Doctor’s dark side (set loose in all the temporal mayhem they’ve just been through, and searching through time and space for the rest of himself (ie the Doctor (who is unbalanced for now as he has too much conscience and not enough dark side!))

[ScaryB @scaryb]

If the Tardis is infinite, where does everyything else fit in?

[WhoHar @whohar]

Just posted this on the G:

What if it was the 1st Doctor that escaped the Time War and engineered the Time Lock and therefore all subsequent Doctors (up to and including the 8th) are merely constructs designed to throw his enemies off the scent of who / where / when he really is.

Has Moffat got the cajones to do that?

[WhoHar @whohar]

@holymackerel @scaryb

I had similar thoughts about time leaking both ways. Maybe that’s all it is but I do wonder if it will be revisited.

[HolyMackerel @holymackerel]

@whohar I have been trying to work out the story links between the impossible planet, the impossible astronaut, and the impossible girl. But I should probably go to bed now. If anyone else has a coherent (or even better bonkers) theory on the link between these I would love to hear.

[HaveYouFedTheFish @haveyoufedthefish]

@whohar @scaryb – I know I keep moaning when they tinker with continuity (e.g. eye of harmony) but an infinite tardis also really bugs me; much of the premise of the first 2 eps of Castrovalva hinge on the tardis having finite mass (and thus being able to convert 25% of mass of the Tardis into energy to escape Event One). If the tardis has infinite mass, that’s trashed. And to what end?

Even if the tardis encompasses Gallifrey, every Bowship and every dalek cruiser in it’s hold, it doesn’t need to be infinite, just very big. And what would be the point of an infinite space? You could’t use all of it, or even visit all of it in all the 13.5Bn years the universe has existed.

Not to mention that you’d need an infinite mass means you’d need an infinite amount of energy to shift it, so you’ve also trashed the premise that the Eye could even power it, making the story not even internally consistent.

Ir.ri.ta.ted.

This is what happens when you let literature graduates write Sci-Fi. There should be a requirement for peer review!!!!!

If he simply meant “as big as ever needs to be” that’s what he should say!

[blenkinsopthebrave @blenkinsopthebrave]

@chickenelly. I’m with you. I cannot understand why anyone would not like that episode. I thought it was a corker. 

But like you, I need time to collect my thoughts and read all the posts. But a couple of prelimary reflections:

1. I am more convinced than ever that Clara is his (unearthly) child.

2. I am yet to be convinced that the Doctor will be revealed as dark. The Doctor remains the one constant for me. This is not to say that a dark version might appear (as it has in the past) but THE Doctor, I think, remains the moral core of the show.

Back later.

[WhoHar @whohar]

@haveyoufedthefish.

Tend to agree – my thoughts turned to Castrovalva too. I’m rationalising it by assuming “infinite” is figurative not literal, a bit like when someone says “everybody”.

The Eye of Harmony is not such a big issue for me – the Doc could have moved it as part of the Time Lock – this works well with my earlier post that the Tardis is the time lock.

[HaveYouFedTheFish @haveyoufedthefish]

Aaaaaaand another thing: ArchRecon can “build any machine”. Now, a good % of who stories are resolved by the Doctor building some contraption; he needed a big gun in Dalek, In Parting of the Ways he sets about building a Delta Wave generator – just 2 examples from a single nu who series.

So, why would he do any of that if he can just pop into the tardis, dial something up and have a cuppa while the Tardis bakes it up for him. Whole bunch of previous stories trashed, and that before we even start on Classic who: how could the Time Lords banish him to earth if he could just cook up his own dematerialization circuit in ArchRecon? How could the chameleon circuit ever be broken and never fixed? I could go on for hours!

My only conclusion is that he was exaggerating the capability of ArchRecon and in fact its limited to just manufacturing Tardis decor/parts (but that still doesn’t explain unfixed dematerialization and chameleon circuits). But how could that make sense, since telling a porky immediately lead the salvager’s to start vandalising the “eggs” (the very last thing the Doc wanted, you would assume)?

[badwolf99 @badwolf99]

Im sticking with my theory that Clara is impossible and she causes something impossible each episode and that will in time reveal her true nature.  My best guess is a living human paradox which has the effect of a (modern Mary Poppins) thus she is like magic in nature. Something the doctor is struggling to understand but I think hes starting to.

[Anonymous @]

@HaveYouFedTheFish  – ahh but let a nu-bie answer that conundrum for you.

The Tardis is a living creature, with a mind of her own – she always takes the Doctor to where he needs to go – and she is his Governess.  When one is a teacher, one can’t do all the homework for one’s students, but she can (at the very least) nudge him on his way.

The teacher can do all the assignments, but what is the point if the teacher does all of the assignments – the student(s) would not learn anything.  The Tardis stole her Doctor and it is her mission to teach him how to be a better Time Lord.

[Because she can see everything in the past and future and present, it makes it all the more delicious that she presented Clara in this episode with a ‘hideous creature’ that would make Clara scared.  Because that is what Sexy wanted to do, for reasons She best knows.]

I’m coming to the belief that the Tardis is the main character, and S Moffat is going to reveal what, exactly, she is.  THAT is the ‘big reveal’.  But I have all fingers and toes crossed that the Tardis doesn’t become in the Whoniverse some big ‘god’ creature.  We’ve seen 10 face ‘the devil’ already.  And all atheists can surely get onboard with the idea that there aren’t any gods, there aren’t any devils; there is only human nature (alternatively, name your species / phyllum / genus) which contains all of the ‘good’ and all of the ‘bad’ – the Doctor always has to fight the dark side of himself, which is what we humans are tasked with, daily.

[HaveYouFedTheFish @haveyoufedthefish]

@shazzbot – ah, wise words. The Tardis being pretty much an dumb machine (one of many, and a not very good example of its kind – it was scheduled for deactivation when the Doc stole it) from Edge of Destruction through to TDW has kind of stopped me from sharing your perspective. Its clearly not now quite the same entity it was in the classic series (Maybe its been fitted for battle?)

Anyway yeah the doctor looks like he’s somewhat afraid of her capriciousness and tantrums (not a feature before – if anything, he was simply baffled by her)

So, OK, I can go with the idea that she could make anything – but won’t

I think you might be on to something with the Tardis being given centre stage… The initial phase of the Cartmel Masterplan – especially Silver Nemesis – seemed to suggest that the Doctor had some kind of overall plan or mission (making the universe safe enough for SN to be given her freedom, perhaps?). However, maybe Moffatts update is that it is the Tardis that is the one with secrets and a hidden mission, and the doctor is a pawn in her game?

Skirts that bit close to Tardis being God and the Doctor being Sam Beckett though (TDW, with “I took you where you needed to be” is already dangerously close)…

[HaveYouFedTheFish @haveyoufedthefish]

Aaaaand another inconsistency this episode raises: How could the Eye of Harmony – an inherently non renewable power source, actually inside and powering the Tardis – possibly square with the Tardis being completely drained of power in Rise of the Cybermen (and gradually recharging, sparked off by the Doctor) and indeed with it needing to be recharged by the Rift in Cardiff in BoomTown?

Neither of these is consistent with a super-massive black hole trapped in stasis providing power…

[blenkinsopthebrave @blenkinsopthebrave]

The Eye of Harmony. Not sure if this has been raised in the hundreds of posts that preceeded the showing of the episode in the colonies last night, but if the Eye of Harmony is in the Tardis, what effect did this have when the universe was re-booted? At last count, were not three Tardises being proposed in that event at one point on this board?

If there were (are?) multiple Tardises out there, are we assuming that only one (the real one) contains the Eye of Harmony?

I am sure this must have already been dealt with…

[WhoHar @whohar]

@haveyoufedthefish

It’s a different Tardis.

[WhoHar @whohar]

@blenkinsopthebrave

Not dealt with in any detail I think.

Time for a summary of theories I would say.

[badwolf99 @badwolf99]

HaveYouFedTheFish
Participant

Aaaaand another inconsistency this episode raises: How could the Eye of Harmony – an inherently non renewable power source, actually inside and powering the Tardis – possibly square with the Tardis being completely drained of power in Rise of the Cybermen (and gradually recharging, sparked off by the Doctor) and indeed with it needing to be recharged by the Rift in Cardiff in BoomTown?

Neither of these is consistent with a super-massive black hole trapped in stasis providing power

 

For the sake of continuity Im going to suggest the eye isnt uncharged (ever) but that there is more than one type of energy the tardis relies on for power. Maybe the Eye mainly supports the dimension the tardis exists in  since I believe its in its own pocket dimension. It may be that some other energy is also needed at times to boost the Eye to achieve actual time travel which probaly requires immense energy.  We dont know the actual mix of energy so we cant assume the Eye can power everything the tardis uses. If that pocket dimension the Eye creates/supports is infinite in theory, I could see limitations in it being the only flow of energy  needed to also power travel.

[blenkinsopthebrave @blenkinsopthebrave]

The board seems strangely quiet in the antipodes.

So…I think the logical consequence of seeing the Eye of Harmony in the Tardis is that there is only one Tardis. And, I suspect, only one Doctor.

Now, I know that this sweeps from the table some wonderful theories of multiple Tardises, and multiple Doctors and even evil ganger Doctors, or even Dalekised Doctors. But, the Journey to the Centre of the Tardis just made meel feel that this was not so.

Mysteries remain: Who is Clara? Who is the Doctor? Why does the Doctor call himself The Doctor? What is the relationship between the Doctor and Clara (ok, I know that was me slipping in my theory there), and when are we likely to see a return appearance of Dorium’s head? (never, I fear)

But are there multiple Tardii and multiple Doctors out there? I need to be convinced.

[janetteB @janetteb]

@haveyoufedthefish If the Tardis is “Infinite” like you I have issues with that concept, though I am an arts graduate, (I’m on the defensive at the moment, 🙂 ) It occurred to me on reading your post that maybe the time war, ie Gallifrey and the Time Lords are contained within that infinite Tardis. He has locked them away inside his TARDIS, hence the eye of harmony.

I haven’t finished reading through all the comments yet and there are so many corkers I want to comment on them all, but a few ideas have emerged. M.S. gave “paintings” as a clue to this series but to me it appears to be books. Thus far only one paiting has featured unless it was a tiny painting that Clara was referring to.

The Dr compares her skin to parchment. is she in fact a literary construct? Something created by the pen of River Song who then gave her the phone number in the shop in BoST.

I like @HolyMackeral’s theory that the Clara is alternative TARDIS, maybe the Master’s.

Cheers

Janette

[Bobbingbird @bobbingbird]

Not all quiet in the antipodes, @blenkinsopthebrave. I’ve just rewatched the ep, and am feverishly and obsessively reading all the posts.

By gahd I loved this episode. The Big Friendly Button was a stroke of genius for me. It worked so well as an in joke (leaving many gnashing their teeth in horror about “reset buttons”), and as the solution to the story.  Very Star Trek TNG. Absolutely loved it.

@juniperfish mentioned The Doctor’s explanation about the two realities in the console room “running together for a brief second…” I think this Fish is right – we have been seeing more than one reality over the last three series, and at times they run together. This explains a number of oddities over the last three years: The Doctor turning up in a tuxedo in Let’s Kill Hitler (always bugged me, that); that double take of Rory’s in the God Complex; the lost three months in The Impossible Astronaut; Clara’s weird underwater experience in the Cold War. The list really is endless (not literally of course; that would be silly).

I’ve also  been cogitating (agreed, @jimthefish – great word) about Clara as a meta-narrative for Doctor Who the Show.

Imagine if Doctor Who – the show – had never existed: all those aliens, all those dangers would also never have existed. New Who has made many a reference to “where the Doctor goes, death and destruction follow” (this goes right back to Clive in “Rose”). In this reading, if you put the show and the man together, it/he is responsible for the birth of the Daleks, Cybermen and a multitude of evil that follows him. If neither existed, the universe would be a safer place.

Will we see an episode where the very existence of Clara and her history (read: the show) is deleted from time? Can the Doctor’s enemies rewrite time so he  never existed – making the universe safe from him and what he brings? Is his failing memory (if this is the case, I’m still to be convinced), an indicator of hime being erased from time  itself…

*Eats bird food, and has very pleasant dust bath*

[HaveYouFedTheFish @haveyoufedthefish]

@whohar – yeah I toyed with the idea he’s using a different tardis mid episode when it seemed it had been destroyed. But the doc seemed so genuinely distraught at being unable to save an old friend that I was forced to conclude this one is his, the one idris resides in.

Marked difference to the bombshelled but not grief struck way Davidson behaved in Frontios, btw. The relationship with the tardis has clearly evolved since then (meeting iris helped?). I’ve suggested the doc was/will be overcome with guilt if he lost Clara but actually it’s probably dwarfed by his feelings about loosing the t-box…

[janetteB @janetteb]

Over on the other side ardaraith commented on the children of Gallifrey. Could the Doctor have rescued the Children of Gallifrey when he time locked the planet. AFter all it wasn’t the children who were responsible for the actions of their elders and it is very unlike the Doctor to punish the innocent purely because of association. If so are the chilren either hidden within the TARDIS, is all of Gallifrey within the TARDIS. Is Clara a child of Gallifrey or is Clara the governess of the Children who somehow keeps escaping from the TARDIS. Not sure how to make that last idea fit. Have to think about it for a bit. Maybe Clara was scattered in time to care for the Gallifreyan children, perhaps there weren’t many of them. I don’t imagine Time Lords were too productive. Both families we have thus far seen her caring for have no mother. Perhaps T.L.s are born in test tubes. Also are there Time people? Assumably not all the citizens of Gallifrey are Lords. Are the non titled citizens also in posession of two hearts and able to regenerate? Do they only gain those atributes when exposed to the Medusa Cascade or the time vortex. If so then the children would not be unlike human children so where better to hide them than on earth.

Cheers

Janette

 

[ScaryB @scaryb]

It took me two days to get round to thinking about it (I have a small and finite brain!) but I agree with @haveyoufedthefish. “Infinity” is a massive concept 😉   Even the suggestion that he might have been exaggerating, just a teensy bit to impress the Salvagers, would have helped.   May take quite a few cups of caffeine to work this one out 😀

[ScaryB @scaryb]

But I like the idea that a few have mentioned that Clara may well have absorbed some of the Gallifreyan encyclopeodia when it spilt – otherwise why break it?

[ScaryB @scaryb]

@janetteb Hmm, interesting thoughts on the children. I’d always assumed the Time War got so bad that there were only (bonkers) adults left.

And if the Tardis is infinite, why would you go anywhere else? Does a definition of the Tardis being infinite not mean that there can’t be anywhere else?

[HaveYouFedTheFish @haveyoufedthefish]

@janetteb @whohar – I actually agree that the doc said ‘infinity’ in the casual, careless sense of ‘oh, endless’ or ‘everyone’ or ‘I walk in infinity’.

However that’s specifically what bugs me: it’s careless writing by someone with a poor appreciation of what infinity implies technically, I didn’t believe the doctor as an engineer/physical scientist would say that, at least without modification (eg ‘nearly infinite’) or self correction (‘infinite. Well not really, but might as well be, you know what I mean?’). It’s too engrained.

Basically, it comes across like this:

[HaveYouFedTheFish @haveyoufedthefish]

Don’t even get me started on why is there an open gantry going through such dangerous space as the eye, rather than a sealed, shielded tunnel, or why it’s so easy to fall through the banisters.

The bridge crossed by giant fans in the End of the World is equally fatuous. I though after Galaxy Quest, this kind of weak jeopardy injection had been thoroughly lampooned into history!

[ScaryB @scaryb]

@haveyoufedthefish

Don’t even get me started on why is there an open gantry going through such dangerous space as the eye, rather than a sealed, shielded tunnel, or why it’s so easy to fall through the banisters.

That one’s easy – old type 40, no health & safety regs programme; 1 of the reasons they made it obsolete

<goes back to pondering the infinity problem!>

 

[thommck @thommck]

@haveyoufedthefish This version of the Doctor likes his throwaway lines. In Sarah Jane Adventures he says to Clyde that he is something like 2000 years old. By describing the TARDIS as infinite I assumed he meant there are infinite configurations. I’ve always imagined the TARDIS is like a holodeck. A big empty space that has lots of ‘hard-light’ holograms to stop the pilot going mad and give him something to do! Another interpretation is that he meant it like a ring could be described as infinite, i.e. it has no start or finish but can be very small.

Regarding the Arch-Recon. I think it can “build” any hologram, like changing a door to a wall, or providing a gantry to walk past the eye of harmony. I don’t think it can build anything that you can take outside of the TARDIS

I’ve come to realise that whatever errors/mistakes the writers come up with the viewers can always cover it up with a bonkers theory! I hope that doesn’t encourage too much lazy writing :/

[ScaryB @scaryb]

New theory – The Doctor will be revealed to be fully human patient in a padded cell with delusions of being a time traveller in a magic box. Clara’s his therapist.

<still grumpy about the infinity problem>

[blenkinsopthebrave @blenkinsopthebrave]

Just re-watched–“infinite” is rhetorical.

Episode still brilliant!

[Bobbingbird @bobbingbird]

yes, and yes, @blenkinsopthebrave.

Let’s not worry too much about gantries and bannisters – it looked fantastic.

[WhoHar @whohar]

It’s about that time, I think, for a little recap on all the bonkers theories, mad ramblings and general lunacy that thankfully occurs in this special place.
To my mind there are three disparate threads, which may be loosely connected. We are still looking for the Unifying Theory though:
Clara
1a. Clara is the Doctor’s granddaughter, Susan.
1b. Clara is the next regen of the Doctor.
1c. Clara is Idris.
1d. Clara has been scattered by the Tardis explosion (see below) – not known if / why she was on board in the first place.
1e. Clara is a trap sent by the Daleks or possibly the Time Lords to destroy the Doctor in revenge for the Time Lock.
1f. Clara is a construct of the Doctor sent to save himself as he loses his memories.
1g. Clara is a computer virus sent to help the Doctor.
1h. Clara is a computer virus sent to kill the Doctor.
1i. Clara is a Dalek.
1j. Clara is the Doctor’s daughter (or possibly aka Jenny), hidden on Earth.
1k. Clara is the Doctor’s great granddaughter.
1l. Clara is the Doctor’s sister.

Dark Doctor
2a. The Doctor is becoming darker due to Dalekisation after exposure to the nanobots in AotD
2b. The Doctor is losing his memories due to exposure to the GI in The Snowmen / BoSJ.
2c. The Doctor is becoming darker because, well, that’s who he is.
2d. The Doctor is a criminal on the run.
2e. The Doctor is ashamed of something he has done in the past and even saying his actual name will somehow cause that something to be revealed.
2f. The Doctor’s name will cause some big event to occur and therefore should never be spoken.
2g. The 1st Doctor constructed the Time Lock and Docs 2-8 are constructs to throw his enemies off the scent.
2h. The Doctor is in a lunatic asylum and undergoing therapy.
2i. The Doctor is in the Time Lord matrix.
2j. The Doctor killed JFK, or something.
Tardis
3a. The Tardis explodes in tBB due to a paradox – River is inside the Tardis and one parent is dead and the other is plastic.
3b. The Tardis explodes in tBB due to some kind of interference from the Silence.
3c. The Tardis in tEH is exploding after coming into contact with the Tardis in tBB.
3d. Three Tardii – from tEH, tBB and one other (possibly Ten’s Tardis on the way back from dropping Rose and 10.5 in the alt universe) collide and explode.
3e. The Tardis is the Time Lock and the Time War is contained within it.

That’s all I have. I’m sure I can rely on you good people to add on anything I’ve missed off and have a superbly bonkers theory to tie it all in.
I’m going with 1g, 2g and 3e. For now.

[ardaraith @ardaraith]

@Shazzbot – really like the notion that Old Sexy is centre stage, and has her own agenda.

Who up there ^^ mentioned the TARDIS becoming militarised, or ready for battle?  Ages ago…before the Christmas special?…I watched an interview with Smith where he indicated just this – I think.  My memory tells me he hinted at weapons.  And we all know…if we can remember something….

@janetteb – “The Dr compares her skin to parchment. is she in fact a literary construct? Something created by the pen of River Song…”  OH!!!!!! But that is juicy!! It also fits with all the overt mention of narrative and story.  The episodes have all either had a distinctive “fictional” feel to them, or there are outright mentions of storytelling, e.g. Clara’s comment about “Good guys” not having zombies.

 

[janetteB @janetteb]

1m Clara as a construct of the TARDIS?

cheers

Janette

[Bluesqueakpip @bluesqueakpip]

Hmm… well, my BSc is Computer Science and a bit of sociology and my last lot of physics was first year uni – but I would say, given all these hints about mirror universes and reflections, and a split in the TARDIS leading to two Doctors and the TARDIS landing inside itself leading to two Rorys and Amys – that the TARDIS is in fact now its own universe. Possibly when Amy brought the Doctor back from the other side of the crack, she simply gave him a route back, via the TARDIS doors.

Step through the doors of the TARDIS and you really are going into the Land of Oz.

This would be in keeping with the universe of Doctor Who – we already know it’s a multiverse. The interior of the TARDIS is now one of the multiverses, though I doubt it was originally. The TARDIS was originally just very, very big – and is now infinite.

 

[Bluesqueakpip @bluesqueakpip]

Don’t even get me started on why is there an open gantry going through such dangerous space as the eye, rather than a sealed, shielded tunnel, or why it’s so easy to fall through the banisters.

Easy. Because the TARDIS is trying to stop them going through. When she wants the Doctor to go through the place has a nice shielded tunnel with an observation window. When he has to go in he finds the ‘Eye of Harmony Survival Suit’ in a locker by the door.

When she doesn’t want them to go through it has an open gantry, easy access to an infinite drop, and insane time zombies readily available.

😀

[Juniperfish @juniperfish]

Very nice work @whohar

And some enjoyable physics from the nightshift @bobbingbird and @blenkinsopthebrave @Shazzbot and a grumbly @haveyoufedthefish

You’ve missed, under Clara:

1m Clara is a regeneration of River Song

in Clara is River and the Doctor’s daughter

1o Clara is the Master’s TARDIS aka dark-IDRIS

1p Clara is connected to River via CAL and the Library

1q Clara is the Doctor’s mother

1r Clara is a computer programme operated either by a musical pass-key or by the phrase “Run you clever bou amd remember”

 

Under Dark Doctor:

2c should be amended to “aka the coming of The Valeyard” 

2k  Ganger Doctor is in the mix (two Doctors are running around at once)

2l The Doctor was scattered through time/ across fractured time-streams/ universes  in the TARDIS explosion and we are seeing some versions moving out from the Big Bang and some versions moving towards it (hence all the red shift/ blue shift symbolism)

2m The Doctor is an ancient God-being who has been through many regeneration cycles prior to the one he presently remembers/ is forgetting and he is now going through his latest Osirian death/ rebirth

Under TARDIS

3d Three TARDISes should be amended to – from tEH, tBB and TttCotT (because this episode is the third explosion)

Please amend accordingly 🙂

[Dr-Clara @dr-clara]

Long-time lurker here, signed up to post this…

@whohar

1b. Clara is the next regen of the Doctor.
1f. Clara is a construct of the Doctor sent to save himself as he loses his memories.

New bonkers theory somewhere between b and f:

1n. Clara is the Doctor.

Not the next regeneration but a different regeneration after Ten (or a regeneration of a different Ten due to multiple universes or multiple Doctors), meaning both JLC and Smith are Eleven.

Or… have there been any references to the Doctor’s two hearts recently? Could he have created a ‘construct to save himself’ using one of his hearts, and would that make both of them the same person? That might account for her empathy, and him as a ‘Dark Doctor’, and be signalled by all the red(/blue), but doesn’t help with so many other things! (Although it does call back to AotD: “What do you call someone who’s…”, “I see what you did there”.)

Or… taking it too far… the Doctor is the construct and Clara is the real Doctor but doesn’t know it at the moment for some reason. Definitely bonkers.

[Juniperfish @juniperfish]

Welcome to your first post @dr-clara and it’s a good one!

Goodness we seem to have a whole comet-tail of lurkers twinkling in the night – I’d love to know how many non-signed up folk read this little Whoniverse…

Yes in Hide our empath Emma told Clara the Doctor had “ice in his heart” singular, which @scaryb picked up on as possibly significant at the time. I initially poo-pooed her <hangs fishy heads in shame> on the grounds that Emma would of course assume one heart, not knowing the Doc was alien BUT then we got to thinking…

I like your idea a lot – that either Clara is an alternative time-stream Eleven or, a la Plato’s Symposium, the other half of the Doctor’s whole. 

We’ve talked before about red as the colour of love and blue as the colour of ice and Clara’s empathic qualities, so yes, maybe she is his empathic self as you say.  This also works, as has been discussed on her previously,  if she is his memory store –  if it is his memories, particularly of his companions and hence of love, which represent his “soul” and hence keep him from being “dark Doctor”.

Now we can have a lot of fun combining all the possibilities in @whohar‘s list because Clara could be both the Doctor’s granddaughter and the temporary repository of his memories etc etc…

[Bobbyfat @bobbyfat]

re the tardis infinity issue, time loops, and how the eye of harmony fits into the tardis,  can do no better than  refer to William Blake’s Auguries of Innocence:

 
To see a world in a grain of sand,
And a heaven in a wild flower,
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand,
And eternity in an hour.
 

[Anonymous @]

Right, anyone who mentions deus ex machina to me now is liable to an ass-kicking… 😉

oh, and apologies to @janetteb. I was in no way trying to cast aspersions on the quality of your degree. Honest.

I posted one of these in fan creativity but as they now seem to be quite germane to the discussions on this thread, I’ll post one here too.

Here’s a schematic of the how the dimensions that the TARDIS uses might work.

I’d recommend checking out the guy’s other stuff. Blueprints of what an uncamouflaged TARDIS might look like, War TARDISes and the like…

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