@mudlark  This: . . .  all the oblique and coded references in their conversation and their body language left me with a strong feeling, if not certainty, that the Doctor and Clara had reached a mutual, if unspoken understanding. When they parted he knew perfectly well who she was, even though she was no longer ‘in his mind’ and his memori…[Read more]

@Morpho                 @avaris             @Ichabod                     @ozitenor

Ok so this is my bonkers thinking..    I think this reinforces the notion that the Doctor

might have a bit of Human in his DNA?    Because just like in the episode when Amy

uses the shock box to revive the 11th ( in Power of 3?)  I think that was working on…[Read more]

Okay, now working my way through page 2. 🙂

@Avaris

I still think Clara should have died.

They didn’t earn a final death. Which makes considerably more sense now that we know it was ‘really’ a regeneration. For a classical tragedy, a death has to result from a fatal flaw in someone’s character. The ‘fatal flaw’ is presented as Clara behaving…[Read more]

@avaris  I think Clara can only die when she goes back to the fixed point in Face the Raven. I am not sure if it is fixed anymore. Only Twelve witness Clara’s Death, yet Twelve forgets about Clara.

An excellent point — thank you!  If a tree falls in the forest and only the Doctor sees it happen — ?

@puroandson  Son of puro, Her death is waiti…[Read more]

@Avaris     BBC can really do a Paternoster Gang and Clara Who Spinoff.  It will be quite (a-hem) interesting character relation between Vastra, Jenny, Clara and Ashildr. This will be just very weird. But I bet every episode will pass the Bechdel Test for sure.     Throw in River Song! How anyone can say that Moffat doesn’t write strong fema…[Read more]

If any bonkers theorist had come up with a short version of that plot ahead of the episode and posted it, I’d have thought they were in serious need of a long lie down in a darkened room with a pot of coffee and twelve jammy dodgers. But I thought it worked beautifully. For me, Clara’s original death was a big surprise. It had been flagged up all…[Read more]

@avaris

Like your lists

@pedant

well done Clara theory

So this was mostly to tie up the Clara story arc .   I was actually hoping for more ties to some

of the other mythologies.  So I was a bit underwhelmed  because I had been hopeful for that.

But I did enjoy this. It was a better departure for Clara than immediate death by raven.  I was…[Read more]

@avaris

She did die.  She’s just taking the long way there.

Well, that reading took awhile!  🙂  So much to comment on and think about. First of all, some wonderfully eloquent writing about the heights and depths to which we were taken with this episode. Succinctly summed up by @PhaseShift:   I wish more TV could dare to be this different.   Yes, indeed. And yes, not only arc-heavy but mytho…[Read more]

@jphamlore  I am sure Moffat did not intend this, but with the extreme suffering depicted that the Doctor underwent for billions of years, for me, the Doctor has paid in full for his actions in The Zygon Inversion. Thank you, Steven Moffat.

I’m not sure what you refer to as apparently blameworthy actions by the Doctor in “Inversion”, partly…[Read more]

I have read some interesting discussion here on the portrayal of Clara in this episode, and the suggestion that her fate suggests that the female companion can’t be too much like the male Doctor. Truly, this wasn’t my take at all. The Doctor said something like, “I’m less breakable than you”, and clearly it’s true. He is a Time Lord, Clara is hu…[Read more]

<span class=”useratname”>@avaris</span> I had similar thoughts (look on last week’s episode ‘Sleep No More’ thread) about Bad Wolf giving Clara as his guardian angel.

@ichabod Agree about the companion limitations, humans and alien, because at least two alien companions have died in sacrifice.

A little love for Puro everyone, she is back in the hospital and needs our warm thoughts.  Remember, she was in pain when she wrote that post.  Puro loves the show and this Forum and I’m sure it’s eating at her to be part of any disruption or hurt here.  I think she is just taking a break here because of her illness and stress.  I’m sure she wil…[Read more]

@bluesqueakpip  if Sarah Dollard has seriously written a script that says ‘Don’t try to be the Doctor, girls, you’ll only get yourself hurt. Your job is to be the companion,’ then she ought to be ashamed.

Dollard has nothing to be ashamed of.  The message you see here would be, IMO, better stated this way: “Don’t try to be a powerful, quasi-imm…[Read more]

Is anyone else concerned about the Doctor’s ponderous performance in Face the Raven? The Doctor was given assorted, big clues that he was walking into a trap, that the events around Rigsy were about the Doctor, rather than the Doctor being in the street to solve a murder mystery against the clock. Clara explains to him about “trap street” and t…[Read more]

An excellent episode. As with @pedant, I agree with everything that @avaris said. A wonderfully insightful reflection on the episode.

It is almost as if this episode, particularly given the “To Be Continued” ending, defies bonkers theorizing. I have no idea at all as to where this might lead over the next two episodes. But I suspect that Moffat…[Read more]

@avaris

I see her death as result of the lack of luck.

This. This sums up my feelings on the matter completely. She did something The Doctor would definitely do, and was just unfortunate this was the one time that wouldn’t work. Because sometimes, once in a blue moon, but sometimes, The Doctor loses.

What @avaris said, almost exactly.

@Avaris

Yes, I’d forgotten about Clara’s association with roses in the first series in which she appeared. I think that motif was definitely designed to spark speculation about her potential connection to Rose, now that Moff and co realise that what fuels engagement (for many) is spec. It paid off in that the Moment (in the form of Rose as Bad…[Read more]

@starla  the one who travels to New Mexico, is zygon Kate. We don’t see what happens to her once the police officer changes into a zygon

Well, not exactly — but our last shot of Kate — isn’t she holding up and looking at what sure looks like a zygon finger or something?  I thought, if she’s a zygon copy but a *good* one, she’s taken out a *ba…[Read more]