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@pufferfish  human beings who live the normal three score-and-ten are said to use only 10 per cent of the brain’s capacity (possibly 20 per cent, can’t remember exactly) but there are LOADS of stories that suggest immortality unlocks the unused portion (eg. Heroes).

Heroes is fiction, though; and new studies refute the theory of huge unused portions of the human brain, noting that electronic brain mapping indicates that all of the brain is involved in most functions of the brain, so there aren’t any unused rooms where the lights don’t go on.  Nobody knows how to measure the actual holding capacity of the brain, though, to compare with how much of that capacity we use in a lifetime (also not presently measurable), so I don’t think we get an “out” down that road.

@juniperfish  (tarot)  a judgement, of some sorts, is upcoming, and no doubt “the lovers” will make an appearance. It could also point eventually to the rediscovery of Gallifrey, as at last the Fool reenters the “World” at the end of the journey through the major arcana.

Neat; I like it!

@purofilion  Of the guitar: Also, it was a nice, off centre scene, without it being hugely foregrounded. It’s the Doctor’s way of winding down -last year it happened to be blackboards and chalk.

Oh, you’re right — I didn’t make the connection.  Sure; doing something seemingly inconsequential in down time is as likely to be a form of resting, mind and body, as not.  No need for people to make a fuss about it.

Quoting a post of mine as unintelligible: Most of GoT just glides along on T&A + lots of blood slick greasing the rails

Translation: “Most of Game of Thrones just glides along on Tits & Ass and gory scenes of violence pulling viewers along.”  My unflattering opinion of a whopping great TV hit show (I felt very much the same about the later seasons of “True Blood”, by the way; I’m just weird, actually.  I find splatterings of sex and gore in TV drama just — boring.

@nerys  As you say, it’s a bit of a free-for-all, with that selfie thing.

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@sirclockface  She could infact imagine all of this because it has happened to her. She was walking down a corridor while not being able to do something once

Valiant try, but a stretch too far for me I’m afraid.  Still, who knows?

I’m honestly surprised with season 9, it has been consistently excellent and entertaining.

Well, Moffat kept promising a corker of a season, and so far, that’s what they’ve delivered — really good stuff.

@pedant  The thing with her Game of Thrones role, is that it is one of only two genuinely interesting character arcs (the other being Peter Dinklage’s Tyrion). There are other arcs held up by very good playing by experienced actors, but genuinely intriguing arcs are very few.

Very true, IMO.  Most of GoT just glides along on T&A + lots of blood slick greasing the rails, and the people are two-dimensional at best.  Arya is reasonably interesting, and could develop into a *very* interesting character if the scripts will let her, and if she can run with it; but I’m not optimistic.  Of course I’m not a fan of heroic fantasy (ie these days, imaginary war stories with medieval-ish settings), so I was never an example of their target audience.

 

 

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@missy  I’d say she’s still too immature (emotionally?  Psychologically?) to have much range, but she did well enough in Part Two.  I’ve seen her in GoT, where she’s been pretty okay, but I see nothing of inspiration there, of shining talent, and without any of that, she’s an apprentice technician, in my view, at least for the time being.  Fortunately for her (and us), working with Capaldi she’d have to be a cement block not to jump a notch or six, which I think she did for Part Two, since the character is much more complex there.  Whether she can hold that place and pace or not, only time will tell.

Capaldi said somewhere between seasons, I think, that he enjoyed working the Coleman because she’s so good: “We;ll be rolling along, and I’ll look over at Jenna and think, oh, oh, now she’s really *acting* — I’d better up my game!”  Honestly, he’s so modest I’d like to slap him — suddenly I’m understanding Clara’s more outrageous behavior a bit better . . .

Cheers indeed

ichi

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@missy  I enjoyed this one, except for the actress playing Ashildr.  Is it only me, or do some of you think she can’t act? I thought she was awful

I thought she was pretty dull in Part One, but really came to life in Part Two.  She was an insecure child in Part One, but in Part Two there was so much more — loved the way she sashayed around in her fancy dress and jewels as Lady Me (“Me”, really?  I heard it as “Meade”, but maybe I heard wrong?), a figure masculine enough to look and sound like a highway man, but woman enough to have had (and lost) a husband and some kids in the past, and to go all Gracious Lady standing on the gallows platform with poor Sam, or take a soldiers outfit and fight as a male archer in the 100 yrs war.  It was made nothing of by anyone in the story, which I also liked.  Breeches or ball gown, she knows her way around and doesn’t hesitate.  I liked that, and I liked the adult tones of her confidence and her anger in this episode.  But the quality of her performance(s) has opened a divide among fans, some who found her terrible, others who are all admiration, so you’re far from alone in your opinion.

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@jphamlore  I think that Missy and Ashildr’s plan is to put Clara into hell, the Nethersphere, and dare the Doctor to try and get her back, possibly at the cost of his life.

@sirclockface  We never see Clara leave the dalek in S9E2 but we see Capaldi say “I’m sorry” exactly like how Tennant would say it before someone would die. We see her at the end of S9E2 in the same clothing, nothing different, but with no scars from where she was mentally attached to the dalek but she does have a straight line scar above her right eyebrow which was not there when she was in the dalek. I believe that the Doctor might have left her in the dalek because he could not have rescued her

I like both of these theories — but in the first, we have the problem that when Danny returned the Afghan boy, he told Clara, about the Nethersphere, “This place is dying.”  It’s possible, of course, that Missy transported herself back there from the graveyard and managed to revive the Nethersphere, but I’m thinking, from the lack of any indications (so far) to the contrary, that that bit is over-with.

In the second, yes, she could still be in the dalek and hallucinating the rest of S9; it just feels like a heck of a stretch to me (thoroughly appropriate for bonkerizing, of course).  Could Clara hallucinate the deaf woman’s experience of being followed down the corridor by the axe ghost for example?  Anything is possible, but . . . ?  Maybe I have missed a crucial step here?

@countscarlioni  I got two messages from Ashildr’s last conversation with the Doctor, in the pub: first, that as he wants to keep an eye on her to help her keep her reawakened moral balance (I suppose) but that she will also (somehow — though he’s not on Earth that often, compared to his farther-flung adventures) keep an eye on him, presumably to step in if he shows signs of losing his own bearings about affecting human lives and the scarpering.  I didn’t see anything in there about feeling in any way responsible for Clara, though of course she might try to meddle if Clara were to be involved as a point of leverage being used by others to force the Doctor to behave badly.

Second, seems to me her concept of “everyone you’ve abandoned” after, as he said, the battle — like her village, left with no warriors, and Ashildr’s own family, left with this resurrected young person whose appearance doesn’t change with time, or like these folks who came for a hanging and were scattered in panic by an attempted invasion instead, and might need some help, ah, *interpreting* what they saw so it makes sense.  But it could be the narrower definition, including only people the Doctor has personally saved and then left on their own — which could include Clara in future, though wow, is that unlikely!  Which doesn’t mean it can’t happen

Anybody else notice that the guy Sam Swift was having his post-resurrection drink and chat with in the pub at the end appears to be the hangman — big guy, soft floppy hat?  Charming, that, in a morbid way . . . a reminder of rougher times, rougher social codes.

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@arbutus  I don’t know about any of the other “posters of a certain age” around here, but I’ve grown hugely more sentimental as I’ve gotten older.

I know what you mean, though I prefer to think of it as growing more thoughtful about things (and a little less impatient and dismissive), and possibly a little kinder.  I hope.

the internet presence of Twelve/Clara “shippers”. This astounds me as there doesn’t seem to be anything in the episodes that would support it. But I suppose it shouldn’t surprise me.

Most of the evidence, I think, is in S8.  They see it in some of those awkward exchanges, pauses, the body language: Clara, flirtatious, hands darting to touch arm or shoulder or back, and shared silences and silent stares into each other’s faces.  If you’re looking for unspoken, smoldering, mutual attraction on a sexual level, you can find it; and to be fair, Moffat did make statements in interviews (“Oh, he fancies her, all right, that’s all those snipey jokes about her looks, trying to deny it” etc., in direct contradiction to what Capaldi was saying) encouraging this interpretation (canny fox, of *course* — that’s what lots of viewers had been watching for re #10 and #11!).  The Doctor’s constant and sometimes frantic fixation on where Clara was and how safe she was fed into this — though to me it looked more like dread of losing the closest, most firmly planted contact in his life at that point, which he *was* in danger of losing to a mundane life with Danny, if he didn’t pull himself together.

@spider  that was longer and far more over indulgent than I meant it to be but what the heck, posting anyways!

I beg your pardon, what *do* you mean?  I am *way* more self-indulgent than you are!  <ggg!>  Actually, I know exactly what you mean about your cat — I’m watching my eldest one eat less and lose weight, and there’s a little bump on his his right shoulder blade that might be a sign of worse.  He’s only twelve or so, but the males tend to die earliest.  I’m trying to get a better grip on being appreciative of the moment, too, but not doing all that well at it (I also tend to jump forward to worry at possibilities up ahead; impatience, my besetting sin, is a great stealer of the lived-in moment).  The Doctor’s S9 situation with Clara speaks very clearly to that very difficult place of knowing (to some degree) what bad stuff is coming, but trying to hang onto the bright present that’s already here.

Do you recall the movie they made of Lewis’s book “Surprised by Joy”?  Sir Anthony Hopkins played Lewis, and speaking of his wife (who died of cancer), said something like, “The sadness later is part of the joy now; the joy now is part of the sadness later.”

Time travel of the heart.

 

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@ramzeppilin  So to end this posting….I am sad to see Doctor Who become a vehicle for liberalism

I’m not, or wouldn’t be if it were, Mr. Underbridge.  This is certainly not the kind of place you’re looking for, so do kindly bugger off and take your non-agenda with you, there’s a good chap.

@nerys  Me/Ashildr is something of a modern woman, I agree. However, she disguised herself with a man’s voice, costume and a mask when she was doing her highwayman gig. She adapted in order to succeed. That’s a trait of human beings throughout history. So I wouldn’t call that having a liberal agenda, but rather trying to imagine what kind of person a young woman coping with immortality might develop into as she lives through the ages, and all around her die. It’s an intriguing puzzle, one that countless writers have taken on. It’s especially appropriate for Doctor Who, given its time-travel theme … not to mention how it addresses the Doctor’s tendency to abandon people like Ashildr, failing to stick around and really live that life, with all its ramifications and consequences, with them.

So well put, I have only to quote it in full.  And you have better manners than mine, but truly, in this instance, I do not care.  I’m in @pedant‘s contingent on this one, and sans courtesies or apologies.  The Underbridges of this world know nothing of either, so I won’t bother.

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@purofilion  Oh no, we can’t have “excessive emotion” ? Of course, and we must. We’ve had it and it’s worked.

I think I just answered this on the episode thread instead of here — ?? But this is great stuff, so, yeah!  I can’t, personally, imagine traveling with the Doctor, particularly #12 (I’m only 18 yrs older than PC), without becoming very attached.  Good grief, who could resist The Fool in all his glory?!

-but amiable, stable and gentle characters won’t cut it: the wild and erratic emotion, the ‘force 10’ hugs and the grasping need to hang on to the one other who seems human (but is a TL) is essential to communicate just how vast, ominous and bleak the universe can be -but also how majestic, noble and extravagant as well

Ex-damn-actly.  Could we really go spinning and lurching through all that vast magnificence and *not* react by reaching for a warm, bodily contact of some kind if it’s to hand?  Sure, our astronauts are trained to attend strictly to measurements and responses to tech signals, to attend outwardly rather than inwardly (or so it appears, from the way they communicate about the experience — they’re chosen to start with for their stability, self-sufficiency, co-operativeness, and amiableness after all).  For the untrained, the enormity of it all would be crushing, I think, without touches exchanged with another air breathing animal, preferably human(oid).  Extreme circumstances evoke extreme reactions . . . and that’s a *healthy* response, a life-saving and sanity-preserving response, IMO.  Wish we had more of it without the extreme circumstances . . . maybe as we mature as a species.

And yet — as a person who rarely initiates hugs, myself, I do respect the needs of some people most of the time and (probably) all people some of the time to pull back from the emotional swirl, stand aside and dive inward for a steadying touch to personal bedrock.  Not that I’m a solid example of one side or the other, really — from my dad’s side, coldness + passion, reserve, roving and cynical intellect, ambition, judgment both inward and outward, and warm touching used sparsely because it feels overwhelming when you do indulge  My mom’s family of Viennese Jews — all warmth all the time, hugs and communication a-plenty, the volatility never settles but is rarely mean or cutting, *great* roast chicken and knadle soup, invasive but loving concern from all, a passion for the arts, the life in my veins.  So I reckon I’m like my own companion + and my own Doctor.  How weird!  Must be time to grab some protein again . . . or maybe that’s how most people feel anyway?

@plainolddave   the male companion for action and the female companion for emotional attachment TO THE PLOT, not to the Doctor.

I dunno, but I don’t see how anybody could travel for long with the AG Doctors *without* developing some emotional attachment to them.  For me, being emotionally attached to the plot is more appropriate to the fairy tale or legend model — the characters are less complex because the action matters more and everything serves the outcome of the plot (that is, plot takes precedence because there’s only so much time and space involved and plot is big and takes up a lot of it).  If DW were just that or even mostly that — as perhaps it has been in the past, BG (I don’t remember), I wouldn’t be watching it because there would be no way for me to attach, emotionally, to the Doctor or anyone else in the story — and without that attachment, why would I care?  But that’s me, one among billions, so . . .

@purofilion   Although I also wonder if there’s some kind of other idea here: that men are “for action” and the “female companion for emotional attachment” -as if women are the emotional ones. Would you prefer the Doctor to not touch or hug? I can understand that it could be seen as ‘not manly’

I think that can be a strong factor, too, for people with a more traditional mindset.  Not so much that it’s not manly to be demonstratively emotional, but it doesn’t suit the heroic model of what a man should be.  In the States, popular culture is still very hung up on the square-jawed, fairly impassive hero figure who just grits his teeth and gets the job done (or doesn’t even bother gritting his teeth: see “James Bond”).  That template fits our plague of “action movies” so well, but is also so restrictive that anything else gets jeered at as “emo” (emotional, in a negative sense) and part of the (unwelcome) “feminization” of American men (to hear the Right wing tell it, anyway).  The loosening of gender roles in recent years is allowing people to get some idea of whether and how men *are* emotional, since showing any of that has been so taboo for so long in this society —  where emotionality in men has been (and still is) seen as weakness (can’t speak for UK culture, of course, though it seems it’s not that different).

I can understand and respect it may well be a generational thing and perhaps a ‘traditional’ role should be taken on by the Doctor whilst viewers expect the Doctor to meet that role and for that role to remain similar as those around him change. And that is fine.

It’s fine to hold that expectation, yes, but it also means you’re probably going to be disappointed a good deal of the time.  DW *is* about change, and it’s moving further away from that older ideal, as is much else in popular culture.  Not without strong reaction, of course, like hip-hop music in the States, all sex-guns-money).  Look at “Penny Dreadful”, Timothy Dalton’s Victorian adventurer Sir Malcolm Something, exposing the bleak underside of what “adventuring” and “exploring” meant in a colonial context and how the emotional consequences come back to tear his heart out; vs. Eva Green’s Vanessa, fighting off all kinds of restrictive expectations laid upon her by her society and insisting on exploring her own true strengths and weaknesses at any cost.  It’s not *just* ghoulies and ghosties, any more than DW is just monsters and space wars.  Tidal waves, indeed.

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@winston  After a while you think that the pain is not worth it and you decide “no more pets” I think this is how the Doctor and Me and all immortals must feel once in awhile. Shoud they take the risk and enjoy their companions lives ,however fleeting ,or give up and go it alone.

Yes, it’s a feeling very familiar to pet owners.  Most of us give in when the “right” furry face comes along and presents itself, and then the cycle starts all over again . . . it’s not settled that Sam Swift is immortal, though, is it?  Me asked about it, and the Doctor said maybe, but most likely not, and explained why; and she said, “You just made that up, didn’t you?”  And he says yes.  So, nobody knows, leaving open the possibility of a return, which is fine with me.  I liked the character a lot — usually I hate the “cocky, devil-may-care, macho outlaw” thing, but Hound let the vulnerability shine through the desperate wit, and that won me.

@counscarlioni  [of Clara]  maybe by now her death has been made too obvious for it to actually occur? Perhaps there is now an out with Ashildr watching her back, literally and metaphorically?

I got the impression though that Me is committing not to looking out for discarded companions, but for the normal folks that the Doctor leaves behind when an adventure ends (for him!) and he takes off.  So far, Me has no means of traveling in time and space, so how could she “look after” Clara?  Stuck on Earth, I think her only option is to look after us after the Doctor has zoomed through leaving hurricane damage, large or small scale, in his wake.

@ozitenor That forlorn stare from the Doctor after Clara says she is not going anywhere… Chills.

Oh, he knows a thing or two, but he’s not telling — because it’s not good, that thing he knows.

@jphamlore  This episode mentioned another dimension, so perhaps it is a sign of what I think will be the show’s evolution to showing more of the multiverse, time and spaces, not just time and space of this universe.

Oh, help — not til I’m gone, I hope!  I can just about keep things workably unscrambled  now, as it is!

@purofilion @pedant  Yes, the Doctor definitely works better when he is a sociopath incapable of empathy and caring.  Oh, wait… no he doesn’t.

With you both on this; IMO, the writers have successfully made the shift from “boyfriend” #11 to “not your boyfriend” #12, though it took some work and had some murky patches in the doing; even on tumblr, the Capaldi following that so devotedly shipped the Doctor/Clara through S8, have been murmuring among themselves rather plaintively that they should be able to continue sailing that particular ship without being called out for it even though S9 is plainly working on a space dad/beloved friend model (“duty of care” is pretty specific about the nature of the connection, and “romantic” it ain’t).  It’s very clear in the “spinny” hug — that has grampa written all over it, as I see it; and the hug at the end of “Woman”, I see as very familial in the same way.

@spider  . . . where Ashildr realises she does actually care made me think of when Twelve has his moment in Death In Heaven with Missy (when he announces ‘I am an idiot’). Ashildr being detached and uncaring has parallels with how the Doctor was in S8, and as she realises she does care she reengages with the world

Oh, good — yes, exactly, though I didn’t see it at the time!  It’s interesting how much like/dislike of various episodes seems to hinge on who can see the emotional story unfolding alongside the plot story, and who can’t.  I don’t think it’s a conscious choice, but perceiving and valuing the emotional story can come with re-watches and, often, discussion on the net, as many who changed their minds about S8 attested (and as I can attest, myself, in my own case about some S8 eps).  Which I think is wonderful.  And I’m glad not to have responded to your disappointment while you were still, um, half asleep . . .

           (sunglasses) thought the Doctor was wearing them too much and I hate that because we don’t see his eyes – but of course it mirrors the ‘mask’ Ashildr wears,

Oh, of course — I wondered why he risked breaking his leg walking into that house at night with sunglasses on, before igniting the candle.  But a mask, of course!  And the voice and body acting is so fine-tuned, I realized afterward that I didn’t even miss seeing his eyes — !

@purofilion  the Doctor’s script is marvellous and his delivery so spot on -that tonal colour he uses in his speech is quite superb and perhaps I could really listen to him reciting the worst lyrics to the worst song and nodding sagely! . . . We need affection: we thrive on it. Even the Doctor knows he’s a hugger -so the claricles have motivated him

Capaldi’s virtuoso instrument isn’t the guitar, it’s his voice, and he’s had decades as a professional to teach himself every nuance it’s capable of — and how to use it.  He’s a walking master-class in effective speech.

As for the hugging, yes, it’s clear now — he’s a hugger-in-waiting at points in his lives where he’s overstressed, deeply insecure, and hyper-sensitive because of it (S8).  When he’s desperately searching for his own boundaries and what lies legitimately within them, the last thing he needs is people glomming into those already wavery boundaries, so he freezes instead of hugging back.  Sudden physical embrace could be downright painful in those circumstances.  Now that he’s got his Doctor on properly, the newly refreshed boundaries can be relaxed to let the hug impulse out — and in (look how he reaches up almost absently in that last Tardis scene in Woman, covering Clara’s huggy hands with his own).

@juniperfish  When we saw Ashildr weeping before the cradles of her dead children, the Doctor’s cot of course leapt (as intended) to mind. The Doctor’s lost children are still very much in the narrative mind of the arc…

It didn’t leap to my mind, but now it does, so thank you.  Great insights here — lots I missed, to look for on re-watch (right now, problems with the download, can’t see it).

The Doctor has created an immortal (and perhaps unstable) conscience for himself!

But one with limited range, since she can’t follow him off-planet.  Still, it’s a great start.  And I do like “the slow path” since we are all on it, while the Doctor flits and flies as he chooses (although often the Tardis chooses for him, once he sets foot inside — which makes setting foot inside a particularly daring, even reckless thing to do, casting his fate repeatedly on the winds of Tardis/fortune — but that’s The Fool for you!).

@nerys  (of grandma hugs) They reassured me and made me feel the world was all right. And also that I was a person who was worth loving.

Oh, brilliant — yes!  The worthy-of-love factor — You’re so right: part of that hardening and rejection of hugs that we saw in S8 is also about fending off the possibility of being worthy of hugs, because once admitted, that validation- of-the-hugee-from-without can always be withdrawn again by the hugger.  Ugh, what he hell did I just write here . . . issues of trust come from issues of past betrayal, I think.  Don’t want to think so, but do.  I’m not a hugger myself, and now I have a better idea why.

@blenkinsopthebrave  It was an episode about damaged people–Ashildr, The Doctor, and in the coda, Clara.

About damaged people coping with their damage, yes; but never fully healed of it.  So part of the job of living is learning how to live well in a damaged state, since damage is inevitable in a physical world (entropy again).  As a friend of mine puts it, “Nobody gets out of life unscathed.  We come here to be scathed.”  Truer words . . .

@plainolddave  Companions are transient and the Doctor and (insert female companion name here) crawling all over each other is unseemly and out of character for the Doctor.

Note, though, who’s doing the crawling here: not the alien.  #12 appreciates the warmth and attention now, I think, but he also rarely initiates a comforting touch, let alone a hug, himself.  Just once that I can recall, in “Girl”, and then partly because everybody around him is expressing their joy with hugs.  I think the day the Doctor spontaneously and without prompting hugs Clara may be the day he knows she’s going to die, and there will be no other chances . . .

Sorry, this got enormously long, but I’m off for a bit and didn’t want to fall too far behind.

 

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@craig  Thanks for that, you’re very kind; and I appreciate it.  As for your desk, well — alas, you’re on your own!  Though I’d love to visit London again . . . maybe sometime before flying just becomes too much of a hassle.  Next time there’s a big SF con there, I hope to attend; missed the last one, for the obvious reasons.  And I’m sorry you have your own experiences to remember re death and dementia among those close to you.

@nerys  Oh, the clip of Clara’s Leap — glad to see it in a bit of context, too.  That was certainly a courageous moment, and a serious choice seriously chosen, not that larky bit of impulsiveness suggested by the phrase “she jumped into his time stream”

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Is a “suicide moon” a whole moon that somebody slings into a planet or space habitat to destroy same?  That wasn’t actually my first thought; my first thought was, oh, like “Gloomy Sunday” . . . ugh!

 

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@mersey  Clara certainly doesn’t spend much time (that we see) mourning or even thinking about her mother in S8-S9 so far.  That’s why I forgot . . . and I bet I’m not the only one!  I think the idea that her mother’s early death drives Clara is a good one and could make better sense of some aspects of her character — but that hasn’t been supported, IMO, in these most recent series.

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@mersey  @bluesqeakpip

S8 and S9 so far have, I think, neglected that early maternal loss, which I’d forgotten by this time to tell the truth.  When you add it back in as pip has done here, Clara’s intensity around the prospects (and facts) of death and loss is  strengthened and connected up with her current story-line much more effectively.  If that’s on the writers’ minds, they certainly missed a chance in The Girl Who Died to hark back to the tragedy of a mother dying, since Ashildr is herself motherless, so Clara might have said something to remind us.

I still don’t get the leaf-thing.  I will probably never get the leaf-thing, but it does give Clara more mystery of her own, which I tend to find frustrating, or delightful, depending on mood . . .

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@jphamlore  I think it was Clara — I recall her saying to somebody, as an explanation, I think, “He speaks dinosaur” so why wouldn’t he speak baby?  Can’t stop to check it out — dinner with friends tonight.

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@purofilion  Ah, wonderful music!  Thanks again.

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@purofilion  Thanks for your good wishes!

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@arbutus  It occurs to me to wonder how people can dismiss Doctor Who as “just a kid’s show” when it can inspire a conversation like this one! From plot points to “what is art” in a few posts. Nice.

The dismissors are crying down something that they themselves only understand on a surface level (if that) because knowing that there *are* conversations like this makes them feel stupid, and they don’t like it and need to invalidate these conversations to get all comfy again.

@countscarlioni  He says Ashildr is a hybrid — because of the Mire-tech chip?  Of from before that?  His being so struck by the familiarity of her fact back at the beginning suggests that he could know things about her from another encounter that nobody else knows, like that she’s always been a hybrid, or was made into one at some earlier time.

@purofilion  Thanks for your thoughts on this.  I share your gratitude for a show that blows people’s minds in such good and interesting ways, and stimulates us to discuss it with each other and widen our own perceptions as we read what others have to say.  It’s a blast in so many ways (including quiet ways, the ways of the buried bombshell that slow burns to the surface later — ) that I find myself feeling that I’m so lucky to be living in these terrible, awful, destructive times, when such multi-level artwork is being made and is widely accessible.

I think I’ve mentioned here how absorption in all of this helped me get through a bad winter (2014-15), the winter of the spouse of 45 yrs gone to a dementia unit and my own stupidly broken arm to recover from.  I couldn’t concentrate on work, on books, on anything much, slept all the time, but found that *this* show — S8, a set of stories about a character trying to decide what to do with her life after the loss of a loved friend to drastic change, and another blasted to smithereens by seismic change and desperately clawing himself back together again as a creature of integrity, sense, and purpose — well.  I could stay awake for that, and for absorbing discussions like these, and be reassured that my stunned ad beat-up old brain was in fact still capable of thinking, feeling, and understanding.

Enough of that — suffice it to say, I needed what the show was doing last fall, and how people were exploring it all winter and spring afterward.  S9 is different, and that’s fine; so am I.  Now I get to just relax and enjoy it, study it and find delights, shiver with delicious anticipation, and regard it as a kind of reward, for getting through to this point.  I’ve heard and read of a lot of teen-agers discussing how they feel that DW saved them at times when they were going through very tough personal times; well, they’re not the only ones.  I turned 76 today, and there’s work on my desk, and I’ve been *doing* it.  Instead of sleeping.

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@brewski  The fact is, sophisticated baby poetry SHOULD be hard to accept. But dammit, it was done so beautifully I’m totally buying into it. My own tolerance for believable is quite variable.

And the performance of that poetry was so beautiful (by an actor whose own mother died only a year and a half ago, as I recall, which may have added depth to his delivery) that it simply overwhelmed your “Oh, no, no baby poetry!” setting, in that one instance at any rate.

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@arbutus  What is and isn’t art? Can of soup, can of worms… a question that is almost impossible to answer without sounding unbearably snooty at times. But as you say, I think it is still right to ask the question. Just not to assume that there is ever only one answer! 

Yep.  There’s a frontier/border edge in all the arts, I think, at which someone (John Cage, Andy Warhole) declares “Whatever I draw a line around and point to and call art, is art”, including silence in the concert hall and giant soup can pictures on the wall.  If they do it with sufficient authority and whatever skill it is that makes it work, well, it works — at least for some of the people some of the time.  Then we get to argue about whether it’s art of not, while time and taste shift around (in in and through) us.

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@brewski  (That is the sound of Brewski eating his words. )

Don’t eat ’em, they’re fine — it’s a matter of proportion.  If the art is good, it captures the emotion, meanwhile eliminating or changing things that don’t add to the perception of the emotion.  A photograph also eliminates (and sometimes contains re-arranged elements, choices by the photographer about lighting and angles, etc. — so it’s by no means a closed question.  (I used to have lively discussions with my dad about this very issue, since as an artist he hated it when people treated photography as an art form.)  Great, sometimes merely good photographs can carry huge emotional truth, with or without manipulation of the bare reality (if there even is such a thing!).  Great painting can be all about surface and appearance, very little emotion involved (for most viewers).  So it’s a big ball of artsy-fartsy, reality-schmeality stuff, IMO, no word-eating required.

@pedant The search for emotional truth does not absolve the writer (or the photographer) of the requirement to avoid outright absurdity (unless absurdity is the point) or falsehood, for down that road lies Plot Mandated Stupidity (I’m looking at you Broadchurch 2) or Arbitrary Character Remodelling (ILAY the aforementioned BSG).

With you on Broadchurch, but I hated *both* parts because I found the characters dull beyond belief (well, no — there are plenty of dull folks in real life, so I do believe in their existence).  But it’s those questions about whether the search you mention has been successful or not that arguments about taste — “Yes, that clown on velvet is so beautiful it breaks my heart” and “Tosca is just a grubby little piece of trash” etc. — so that’s a scale that slides in so many directions and dimensions that those discussions also can go on forever, and probably should.

But a subjective approach is built into me as primary and perhaps less so in you — which is *why* these conversations rarely get settled (especially when you add in the dimension of time and how taste and perception changes).

 

 

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@mersey  Clara at the beginning was really undeveloped and that’s why I didn’t like her.

Same here; in an early pre-S8 interview, Moffat said it outright: that Clara was originally conceived of as a plot-mule, not a full-fledged character, and she pretty much remained that, IMO, until S8 began.  At that point, of course, lots of fans complained that she wasn’t perky and helpful and perfectly attuned to what the stories required of her but was suddenly all angry and demanding and lying, what’s up with that, anyway?  Alas; have a female character go from Mary Tyler Moore to somebody with an ego and a passionate soul and a determination to get her way at least *some* of the time, and presto!  She’s a bitch.

I liked her as soon as she showed some spunk on her own behalf, which was S8.  It was a bait-and-switch problem that set her off: here she’d gone and begged more life for 11, and what she got was — 12!!!  A half-crazy enigma with a lined face who barely knew who she was, at the start.  Well, it took a while, but she dealt with it.  I admire that.

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@delta  — hello!  That is a very bonkers theory!

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@purofilion  . . . a motor mouth in those early years -I wonder how much of that was the inexperienced actress -the higher pitch, lacking in pause, matching the whirly-gig of Eleven -instead of a balanced person using the language properly, the tone, the deft gesture to communicate -in the way Capaldi does – so expertly and effortlessly (though it just appears this way!)

Oh, good, yes — I think you’re right.  Working with this batch of creatives, let alone acting with Capaldi, has had a maturing and polishing effect on her (well, kind of like the passage of time, of course), and gives her better ways to present Clara to us.  Which is perfect for her story: if she were a real young teacher, traveling in time and space with a real alien for some years now, we’d expect to see her become more poised and articulate as part of a particularly rich growing-up process.  She’s doing wonderfully at being just what Clara should be now, given the events of the past.

I’m really going to miss her when she goes . . . and be glad we’ve had her company for so long.  Love to see a person grow in their craft and their understanding.  I think Capaldi is unfolding a professional lifetime’s accretion of those things, while Jenna is acquiring and trying out hers — and I don’t think she could have a better teacher, either.  Among other things, she’s spoken of Peter as being “afraid of nothing” in terms of trying a dozen different ways of doing a scene or a bit of business and then coming up with a brand new one for the take — and that kind of artistic confidence is one hell of a tool to add to your professional kit.

So much wonderful stuff going on here at so many levels — it all actually makes me forget about the twisted, dripping horror that is modern politics!  Except for the victory of sane Canada — congratulations, all here who are happy to see Harper get the boot!

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@countscarlioni  Ashildr also seems problematical: she has brought her village bad luck

But has she?  Her father says, she thinks that every bad thing that happens to this village is because of her; and the villagers don’t react to her the way small communities tend to react to people singled out as bad luck — just the opposite.  That bit doesn’t work for me.

he simply doesn’t know if he is about to create a serious ripple or a tidal wave when he breaks the rules (“Time will tell.”)

But this does; if he’s thinking in terms of cascading consequences of a “small” act of his (a resurrection), yes.  But “tidal wave” has been used by Clara in conversationg with the Doctor to mean HIM.  Clara: “*You’re* a tidal wave!”  Doctor: “Don’t say that!”  So I thought he meant that Ashildr might personally live to bring about big changes in the way that the Doctor has done in the past.  If it’s a natural cascade of change coming about automatically, not because of Ashildr’s personality, that makes more sense: it’s not that Ashildr is a (potential) tidal wave, but that the fact that she’s still around instead of properly dead creates ripples that mount up to a tidal wave.

@purofilion  . . . the death of Clara: a good death? A necessary death? Or a ‘no-death’?

Just so; and how much of the outcome will be up to, or in the aftermath down to, the Doctor and his decisions?  A rich and meaty arc, given the complex and for the most part fascinating relationship that these two have woven between them.  At this point, Clara stands to the Doctor as Ashildr stands to her loving father, Einar, and it’s to that symmetry (among other things) that the Doctor responds by taking the huge risk of restoring Ashildr’s life — and then, nota bene, running away to leave the consequences to fall as they may on Ashildr and her village and the world . . . Ah, Doctor (*sigh*).  What a *human* you are in your weaknesses!

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@purofilion  I think she’s held up rather well -as to throwing herself about, still grieving, with adventure after adventure, lapping it up and possibly making a balls up of it, that’s another question entirely.

I’m with you on this, puro — I like her better now than I did before because she’s different from S8 Clara, so there’s nothing to be bored by — she’s on the last leg of her story, shaped by harsh experience in S8 and so not the Clara we ended up with in S8.

Though I needed to see through the cheery competence/confidence facade before I realized the depths here — that was one of the purposes of the phone call in Before the Flood, when she almost came to tears fighting to make the Doctor promise to come back, not to leave her hanging and alone.  There’s the Dr. Action-Girl layer; then there’s the the emotional wreckage of the Danny debacle beneath that, like cold black water with all kinds of abandonment, sorrow, self-recrimination, and rage floating around in it, under a thick but brittle layer of ice; and below that is our knowledge, as audience, that she’s halfway to her ending, and we can’t be sure how much about that either she or the Doctor knows.

For me, all of this makes her very very not-boring at all, though I concede that that deepest layer is crucial.  I think that without an impending doom of some kind, she wouldn’t be as interesting.

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@rob  Hmm.  Maybe next week.

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@blenkinsopthebrave  I’m *always* on the look out for Silurians . . .

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@rob  Directions to Wooky Hole would be much appreciated . . .

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@countscarlioni   if he gives her the chip, Clara too has the potential to become another destructive tidal wave. The Doctor, as he shouts at the end of The Girl Who Died, can do anything, but here he grasps, after Ashildr has hugely sharpened his understanding of this, he shouldn’t save Clara. No wonder the Doctor has to go off by himself 

Yes — only how can he know by the end of “Girl” that Ashildr will in fact become a problem because of the chip he’s given her?  He know that he himself has, on occasion, been problematic to the universe (all right, remind me — does he remember now that he’s both destroyed Gallifrey and saved/hidden Gallifrey without destroying it?), but she’s just starting out, and she’s human, not a Time Lord with a TL’s knowledge or expertise, so — I get it that she could become very unhappy to outlive everyone; but how can she be a tidal wave as one young woman?

Does the Doctor tune in telepathically and see evidence that her budding shamanic gifts (of which she’s currently a bit ashamed and untrusting) will make her formidable in future?

@jphamlore  (de Stael) One must choose in life between boredom and suffering.

Well, if one has the option of a choice, which wasn’t all that common for the normal run of women throughout most of history . . . and even today in, say, Afghanistan.  I do like your Formidable Females in history, though!

@whisht  War Minister Hilda Ogden?  Yes, why not?  Well, it’s the 17th c when we see her next, so . . . unlikely . . .

@phaseshift  Let’s be honest, Vikings having horned helmets in the Whoniverse is actual ‘canon’ for those keeping score on these things. (I actually think that’s what the trouser reference was about,

I think fans tend to forget that the Who universe really isn’t the same as ours — for one thing, it’s *much* busier with space travelers than we are; there’s a reason we don’t have UNIT in our reality (unless — !).

@janetteb   @bluesqueakpip and @scaryb who have both been doing sterling work over on the Guardian taking on the ARSE commenters.

Our warriors!  Thank you for your sacrifice!  Really.  It can be such a cess pit of haughty and raging egos over there. You’ll need lots of showers.

@bluesqueakpip  I think the only problem with Jamie Mathieson’s Viking plot was that it came in way too short – 

Hmm.  Then they could have had time for a scene where Ashildr wakes up alive and gives some sign in her speech or behavior that the Doctor recognizes as ominous for her future (and far future) behavior, so that his concern that he’s made a bad mistake is kicked off by something real about *her*, not in the abstract.

@drben  And to be left on her own as her civilization collapses, having to make her own way for centuries while looking like a teenaged girl – yikes. I’ll bet she’s angry.

I keep thinking of the film, “Let the Right One In”, though the match to Ashildr’s situation isn’t solid.  I suppose yes, the chip thing if it repairs as she moves through time, will keep her young; hadn’t really thought about that.  Not just young, but young enough (modern science tells us) to not yet have fully developed her capacities for empathy and for realistic risk assessment . . . oh dear . . .

An immortal (or even mostly immortal) companion, I think, would represent a narrowing of options that the Doctor simply couldn’t handle. I think there is a dark part of him that recognizes that, ultimately, he will always get a reset.

Oh, now you’ve done it; yes.  That’s the other problem: people with great curiosity and energy often are easily bored, especially (over, as it were, time) with other people.  I think the Doctor knows he’s not supposed to travel alone; but he also *likes* to travel alone; and he may even sometimes enjoy being sorry for himself on account of being alone and losing people.  Melancholy can be its own reward . . .  Of course, I’m generalizing from human psychology here, but part of the point of human companions is that the Doctor is humanized by them, so it could apply.  Anybody see Jim Jarmusch’s vampire movie, “Only Lovers Left Alive”?  His vampire couple spend centuries apart deliberately, to overcome the boredom of being with each other, and so they can get together again and make out madly and then go out and suck some people dry.

On the other hand, family viewing — so we won’t go there.  Though Capaldi is super-capable of handling such an emotional reveal brilliantly.  I’d file this sort of thinking under what he means when he says in an interview (question about acting in a show partly aimed at kids and limited by that) something like, “Well, sometimes you miss opportunities to give your more mature acting chops a work-out”.

As for Clara — I’ve come to admire how much they’ve been able to do with this character too.  I wouldn’t say she’s shut down emotionally, though — that phone call between her and the Doctor in Before the Flood was pretty high- key for her — but she’s certainly compartmentalized the whole Danny/regular human life disaster.  That way she can divert energy from a bottomless sinkhole of grief and guilt (she did wait too long to try to tell Danny she’d chosen him, and then rushed the moment by trying to do it by phone instead of face to face) into attacking risks and adventures that at least give a rush of reward and validation that she’s good for *something*.

the war between the Doctor’s head (“these people having been dead for centuries and there is no point in getting involved”) and his hearts (“I’ve never met a person who wasn’t important”).

Nice and clear on that on-going conflict; thank you.

@spider  Your trip sounds great — thanks for the report!  Now go lie down and enjoy your jet-lag while you’ve still got it . . . !

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@lisa  This ‘burden of care’ he mentions a lot (the phrase is “a duty of care”, UK rather than US, and is about parental or state guardianship of minors, I think — but probably other situations of responsibility as well, like for elders)
now. I think he is wondering going forward that he will not be able to control her. So will he let something happen and not keep her safe? I think its reasonable to consider suspecting his judgments in respect to Clara’s end.

I agree; I think he’s also very worried now, post “Girl”, about whether he can control *himself*, meaning controlling defiant and passionate impulses to mess around with time in ways he’s not “supposed to”, and hat way somehow putting Clara in more danger than either he or she can handle.  It’s an increasingly risky situation with *both* of them so volatile now.  His “rebel” impulses, rooted in compassion, are manifesting in dangerous ways.  He just replaced Ashildr’s mortal death with conditional immortality — not what the Fisher King did to his ghost people, but an action of the same transgressive order: screwing with life and death.  Clara looks to me to be on the edge, inwardly, of dashing into some lethal situation not meaning to come out of it again, just to end the strain of not knowing whether she can control the Doctor — that is, keep him alive (and sufficiently unchanged) to make it worthwhile to her to stay alive herself.

 

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@denvaldron  Thanks for the extended take on the decline of the Viking/Norse culture — absorption as a far corner of Europe sounds about right.

I am sorry to hear about your father’s death.  I hope you’re able to take some rest when and as you can.

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@purofilion   Oh, yes, there was some erotic tension between S7 Clara and 11, but it had the weight of  “dalliance” — just funnin’ around on the surface of a connection that was way deeper than that per “my Impossible Girl”.  12 in S8 just dumped the flirty human trimmings and zeroed in on the central matter, a strong but very unequal pairing up blazing away under all the surface doings and sometimes right up through them (think conversation in the corridor in Mummy; no, most of Mummy).

In fact, I think 12 has rebelled here in a much crucial than any other defiance he’s offered: he’s formed exactly the kind of age-old friendship that Missy described re TLs, but he’s formed it with a human mayfly.  Sure, there’s an erotic component, as there is with the Missy/Doctor TL bond, but that component is casual, minor even, a transitory (to TLs) spark of attraction between physical bodies.  These people regenerate into new bodies, after all, while the core identity remains, so how important to them are those individual bodies and their flitting bio-chemical reactions?

So when 12 says “I’m not your boyfriend”, he means “Not only am I not your boyfriend — I’m so far beyond being your boyfriend, suitor, or bed-mate, that you can’t even imagine it [though Missy could]; which is awkward, because you’re still at boyfriend/girlfriend levels.  But I’m hoping you’ll catch up, somehow.”  Meanwhile, by and large it’s him doing the heavy lifting, keeping focus, not giving up even in the face of Danny, alive or dead.

Sometimes S8 Clara does catch up, for a bit, in those moments of light touches, shared glances, quiet thinking together without talking.  Maybe; who knows?  But the answer matters to her future.

If Clara is just Clara, a human woman with a weirdly complicated background, “the puppy” of Missy’s sneer, she’ll never catch up and become an equal partner in a TL type friendship, though she could die trying.  The species inequality isn’t immutable, exactly, but it’s pretty rigid: it’s why companions who are still human leave the Doctor.  On the other hand, if Clara is still in some way the Impossible Girl (whatever that meant), or if she’s a hybrid something-or-other, or if Ashildr gives her the second repair patch, then all bets are off.  Then it’s TL + (human/X), the second term being (so far) unknown to everybody concerned, including the Doctor, and us.  I think a regular (if  exceptionally capable) human Clara, which is what we seem to have now in S9, will die.  The exit of Clara/X? Anything is possible.

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@purofilion  — what a lovely idea.  But nah, we know better: I’m pretty certain that it really will all end in tears.

Time for wine: toast your Doctor’s girt to Clara of a charm-bracelet of wonderful adventures.

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@jimthefish  On which note, I for one am very glad that she didn’t turn out to be Susan, or Jenny, or Romana or whoever.

Me too.  Too much backstory, better to move on to something new, IMO.  @denvaldron  Thanks for the Viking overview — densely packed and concise; only what, exactly, does kaput mean in this context?  A swift and somewhat catastrophic curtailment of their ventures abroad and a contraction of population into the core of what goes on to become a northern kingdom for Hamlet and his uncle to quarrel over?  Or maybe a slow decline?

@mirime  The Doctor seemed to recognise Ashildr in some way, maybe that’s why. Maybe it was, in a sense, ‘supposed’ to happen, perhaps part of some bigger loop we can’t see yet?

Only it seems to be something timey wimey that *he* isn’t aware of either, because he keeps squinting back at Ashildr, trying to place her and failing, but knowing he knows her from *some-when*.

@jphamlore  It’s the ancient astronaut theory applied to the Dr Who universe. Only the Time Lords are the ancient astronauts. Because otherwise they cannot come back, so they must influence humans as spirit beings.

Wow, that’s a beauty — it doesn’t sit right for me because I just can’t see the TLs in general as that, um, competent, really.  I always felt they were a bunch of pompous clowns who would be right at home in the US House of Representatives, so if your theory is true, I’ll have to suppose that the TLs have matured a whole lot during their exile in the pocket universe (only aren’t they frozen in there — precisely unable to mature, or do anything else?  Oh.  Except give 11 a new set of Doctor-lives through a crack in the wall — oh, oh; ichi is lost in here, is this a pocket universe or something?).

But this, I absolutely get:  … Ashildr is important because even before she met the Doctor and Clara she was a born dreamer and creator of stories. She is a future shaman.  Whoever controls the story controls what can happen   — or what people perceive as happening, anyway.

and thanks for Aphra Ben, a fairly obscure reference in our day.  From the trailer, it seems Ashildr is an outlaw in 18th c England, with some kind of gang of her own — a reasonable response to centuries of managing as a female in societies in which you stand a pretty good chance of being treated as a cross between a slave and breeding stock unless you’re an aristocrat, which would be quite a coup to pull off.  But she started out with shamanic inklings, so maybe she’s developed defenses using more developed forms of special powers.

@221badwulf  I found it jarring that the Doctor had such a giant reaction to Ashildr dying, yet in the previous episode seemed to not really care if O’Donnell died..  

Einar and his special daughter Ashildr are a mirror of Doctor and he beloved “duty of care” protege, so the emotional resonances — reenforced by a couple of jolts of primal baby love energy — overpower the Doctor’s normal caution and amplify his need to protect (in this case, resurrect) a child who’s died in the execution of his plan.  That’s how I see it, anyway.  And there’s that still hidden connection between Ashildr and himself maybe at work as well.  His rationality and (even) cynicism is simply overridden for a moment — and then it’s too late to stop what he’s started, so he completes it by giving Einar the other chip, and acknowledges that yup, this rash did will indeed come back to bite him — whenever *she* pleases.

@blenkinsopthebrave  he was shouting at the Time Lords, but that he was alluding to The War Games, when the Time Lords punish him (by giving him a new face) for interfering in the life and death of others too much.  (and observations on trousers).

Oh no!  I didn’t make the connection: when the Doctor gets all defiant like that, he knows what he’s risking — obliteration by the TLs and a different bloke walks away (in those trousers, too).  That’s pretty risky.  You’d almost think he was Clara, in a reckless mood . . .

@mersey   She was strong when she started and now she’s cracked. Did you see in her eyes? ‘Why didn’t you give it to me’ look. She wants to be immortal! She wants to accompany the Doctor forever! You can say that’s her development (reverse I think).

I agree on Clara’s progression from plot pawn through angry partner to outwardly strong and decisive moved by her own will, not as an empty plot pawn — but cracked and broken inside by losses she hasn’t gotten over yet.  I’m not at all sure she wants to travel with the Doctor forever, or be immortal.  She’s suffering too much.  What if she’s immortal and somebody succeeds in actually killing the Doctor?  Then she’s left on her own forever, or as good as.  That line from Before the Flood, don’t you dare die on me, you do that with the next one, not me — she doesn’t see herself as being able to sustain the I’m-together act indefinitely, and I think she’d be much more accepting of her own death than she could be of the Doctor’s.

@purofilion  Again, because oh yes, I could see this happening (well it sort of did, to 11 on his cloud) to *this* TL, anyway: And death is his highway, it’s where he walks, I guess. No wonder he feels responsible for all those people, for the “loss” -and that he’s tired of it. I can see where TLs might simply lay down their fez’, chequered trousers, bow ties and say “it’s over for me now.”

Death is his highway . . . nice.  The cured wanderer again . . . Wherever he goes, some people die sooner than they would have, some later.  Wherever he doesn’t go, they die there too.  Hey, who’s stepped out of their normal good cheer around here now?  Huggums.

@lisa  http://www.radiotimes.com/news/2015-10-17/what-does-the-name-ashildr-reveal-about-maisie-williamss-doctor-who-character

Ha!  Spicy, that.  Pretty soon “the last of the Time Lords” might have enough near-immortal company to start his own village . . .

 

 

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Came across a very interesting review of this episode here:

http://reviews.doctorwhonews.net

Scroll down a bit to find it.  I’m thinking I have to back and read reviews on that site of the other episodes of S9 so far. Good ideas, I think — stuff I never would have come up with on my own.  Did anyone else see the transfer of Clara and Ashildr to Odin’s space ship as something effected by half of the broken sunglasses, triggered by Ashildr being told to “think, open!” by Clara?  I thought the Mire had sent them up with the warriors, but that does raise the question: why?  They’r not aggressive, testosterone carrying males.

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@purofilion  yes, I wondered if some ‘power’ aspect had been detected in Ashildr from awhile ago -perhaps as young a babe herself: maybe her cries were once the harbinger of doom? Her father was nonetheless loving and proud. 

There’s clearly a history there, of bad things that have occurred in the village that Ashildr has blamed herself for, though the avoidance of any detailed discussion of those things by the villagers can be seen as an expression of the love and acceptance they offer her despite her “oddness”.  Does make me wonder, though . . .

I cannot think of anything worse than ‘forever’ . . . Dreams about infinity and infinite numbers would terrify me at the ages of 5-7 so much so that I would go screaming and sweating to bed.  By 6pm I was already dreading the night-time hours. After the age of seven, any prolonging could have come from my mother’s unexpected death, but I’m told this particular fear emerged very early: certainly before long term memory set in.

My word, that’s *early* to have such abstract fears, isn’t it?  My California friend would say this might be a holdover from a previous lifetime, but a lifetime as *what*?  I can’t imagine.  A mathematician, alchemist, what?  By contrast, the earliest fear that *I* can remember is being terrified when I woke up in the morning that Frankenstein’s monster was going to stick his big square head into my bedroom and stare at me (my cousin had taken me to see “Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein”).  I must have been about seven.  That went on for weeks . . . says my notoriously unreliable memory.  A different order of anxiety, I would say . . .

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@purofilion  Sure thing; Lashner and Gruber both did work that impressed me, which is why their names, though not their titles, have stayed in my mind.  If you like the Belize gothic from Lashner, he has several other books about the lead character, a shady Philadelphia lawyer, that you might like too.  Gruber is a cut above, in my opinion.  Enjoy!

 

 

 

 

 

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@purofilion  Funny that you should say this, for I always feel you to be quite optimistic and ‘heart-y’??

I am, a lot; this has been largely a damn good life, and looking back over it (as you are forced to do when you really need to, as they say, “get your shit together”, ie documents etc.) I’m pleased.  On the other hand, I think I inherited from my dad’s line an inclination toward depression, which long perspectives both ease and exacerbate, so my background hum is low-pitched and in a minor key.  Luckily, I am also easily distracted.

@mirime  I thought translating baby might might involve some telepathy as well. It’s not really a language after all.

My thought, too.

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@purofilion  I recall, ichi, you once saying you had no ‘hand’ for the timey whimey stuff and yet I see you have far exceeded initial ‘abilities’! Wow. That would be tragic -not a dry eye. And certainly the Doctor would not be blamed.

Why thank’ee, puro; it was probably the wine last night, first glass in a while: cheap, red, a blend, very good!  As for blame, well, the Doctor would certainly blame himself for something inthere, but I think most of the guilt he now feels (“Oh, Clara, what have I made of you?” not to mention a dread-full bass line of What awful fate has travel with me insured for you?) would be relieved by this extreme time travel stratagem.  Then he could set off on his adventures in S9 as we are now coming to know them, only without Clara they would focus on the Doctor and his antagonists old and new, back in the groove of the adventure Doctor of old, with nostalgic memories of Clara only when he looks backward — which he doesn’t do much of, as I recall, for that very reason.

First we would have had S9 and its delights — which *we* could then mourn the loss of, as they’d be replaced by a new line of related stories (soon to veer off on their own of course) *without any Clara*.  Maybe a dream or two . . . We would have a “new” S9 (in fact S10) haunted by memory-ghosts of a beloved friend parted from after S8, who later died (a century ago) of old age . . .

Oh, ack, why does this line of thought (?) make me want to crawl back under the covers?  Maybe it’s just not having had breakfast yet?  But yes, as a large and scary, risky plan, it does have its bleakly yummy side . . . Anyway, glad you enjoy it.  It can’t happen, of course.  All over the world, fan heads would explode . . .

Oh, I think you meant 11 was the whirligig, right?

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@purofilion  Lashner?  Yes.  He wrote a brilliant sort of superntural gothic horror novel set in Belize that I remember enjoying very much.  His other work, what I’ve read of it, not so much.  Also check out Michael Gruber, three books about a detective involved in supernatural doings in the Cuban community of Miami — can’t remember titles.  Good books!

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@arbutus  I didn’t at the time equate this with the kind of male dominated situation that I know understand was a thing in the science fiction world, because having been raised by a feminist single mom and being a bit of a dreamy, isolated sort, I had the rather naive belief that gender was no longer an issue. 🙂

Oh, yes; still is, if you follow the literal attack made last summer on the Hugo Award system by a small gang of reactionary SF authors protesting the fact that none of their (for the most part, dreary) drivel has won the Hugo, but the award kept going to women writers, “liberals”, intellectuals — the usual suspects in a “liberal cabal”.  It’s clearly part of a bitter backlash by the left-behind, all male as far as I can tell, and judging by their work, all deeply misogynist and looking backward to a time when men were men blah blah blah.

@purofilion  She’s also ‘different’, a story teller, a loner. I also wonder what her age would be? About this time you’d think she’d be betrothed or even possibly married?

Not if she’s perceived as weird enough.  Groups with shamanistic traditions have tended to isolate the shaman, once identified, to keep all that magical power at a safe distance, and also many (certainly among the plains tribes in the US) were “two spirited” people, meaning androgyne or bisexual, as a sign of their power and difference from normal people.  I don’t think they married very often — it might interfere with their spiritual activities, what with supernatural lovers from the spirit planes and the like.

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@purofilion  So you’re saying that the Doctor would prefer Clara to not live forever?

No, but that he’s over-reached himself into a corner in which it becomes clear that for any tolerable future to survive, Clara must die, regardless of what he does or doesn’t want, ditto Clara herself.  And that he can’t stand the idea of coming back for her too late, as he did originally in Last Xmas just before her normal human death at 84 or whatever, so he arranges things so she has all those years without him (or Danny) that she describes to him in Last Xmas, while had sleeps through those years and only wakes when she is, indeed, safely and naturally dead — and he had no hand it in it, except to stay away til it was over.  That leaves the parting in the coffee shop, end of Death in Heaven, as his last contact with her (unless he goes back into her past later, to places where he wasn’t with her, to see her again while she was still alive).

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@winston   I also have a feeling that there is no original Clara just Claracles and the Doctor knows that. But I am usually wrong.

Or not . . . good grief, can you imagine finding out that you are a bootstrap paradox and have not beginning and no end?  WHAT?!!!!

@purofilion   It was such an internalised piece, made into external reflection with the norse, the Vikings (whomever..) as a backdrop to a bigger story: a Don Giovanni or a Magic Flute opera buffa where the serious quality and rich fabric is ‘in between the lines’ or behind the pages of this ‘story of the Vikings’ so that it sets scenes for future happenings.

For sure — inference, a brief touch, a quirk of the lips — gorgeous work.  You know, Capaldi isn’t the only one with dstinctive eyebrows.  Jenna Coleman’s are pretty brazen, too — dark and of a definite shape.

@countscarlioni  my money’s still on the story telling Ashildr (who, she told us, had brought bad luck to her village) turning at some stage into (or threatening to do so) the tidal wave the Doctor agonizes about in the last minutes of the episode. Has the Doctor just made a cataclysmic mistake? Indeed, Doctor, what have you done??

Oh, made a mess, as he usually does, impelled by having too much heart(s) and an admiration for humanity that I often find myself wishing I could share . . .

@bluesqueakpip  they’ve now had The Talk, where the Doctor explained that the companions who survive him are the companions who choose to walk away.

Maybe; or at least they’ve finally broached the subject, because they allude to it now pretty freely, compared to anything we’ve seen before; yes, it’s all going to end, and yes, there are negative issues as well as positive gains to even conditional immortality but different issues perhaps for each of them . . . I want to see more of this, but possibly it’s better, dramatically, not to do too much of it.  Let the context of the stories do it, through the actors’ excellent expressiveness.

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@nerys  Ashildr is still quite young. So mightn’t that be a problem, having someone who is immortal, but equipped with the emotional intelligence and self-awareness of a teen? If he thinks his emotions cause him to do irrational and/or unwise things, what of hers?

Mmm, that’s very nice — promising for when they meet again, next Saturday.

@winston  Having watched a second time I get the same feeling about the Doctor accepting Clara’s death. When the doctor is talking to Clara about losing her and how hard that would be, she never contradicts him or assures him of her lasting companionship. She only says again that he did his best and saved many other people.

It’s more and more apparent that they both are well aware that her term as companion has limits, and they are coming up fast.  This might even be a conversation they’ve had several times before, always coming down to the same thing: “In the end I fail,” vs. “You did your best (you’ll fail, but no one could hold that against you since you tried so hard).”  Which doesn’t really help when you end up holding it against *yourself*.

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@lisa  Must say though that Ashildr an Arya from Game of T. are extremely close in the types of characters to me so far.

Let’s see — daughter of a warrior culture, dad a reasonably high status leader (of his village, though not, apparently, of actual raids like the one that return with the two prisoners), could become a warrior herself (a shield maiden, or something else in future).  Smart, sensitive, outspoken.

But — Ashildr differs in being an artistic type rather than a “tom-boy” would-be warrior, an imaginative puppet maker, head full of stories and remembered dreams, feels like an outsider but comfortable in the local bonds of love and not at all interested in leaving her “safe” home where she has a secure and protected place.  It’s definitely a related type of character, but with a bit more depth (IMO, but I’m not a fan of GoT).

@bluesqueakpip  Ashildr had died heroically, in battle, trying to save her people. And the Doctor, largely for his own selfish reasons, effectively stole that death from her – and gave her eternal life in its place.

Ooh, yes; good!

I’m the Doctor and I save people.
But does that always mean that he has to save their lives?

Strictly speaking, could also be said to merely postpone their deaths, usually, since they will all die eventually, and if the rules of time are abided by, his postponing their deaths is just part of the pattern of their lives, which still leads inevitably to their deaths at a later time.  That didn’t work out so well this time (the best warriors got taken first thing and are all dead, and now Ashildr — “this village has had so many losses” says her father), so given the chance (the chips) he’ll restore her life and then some, and to Hell with anyone who disapproves.  Only he himself disapproves, very shortly thereafter (“a very big mistake”).

So what has he saved?  Not her human life.  He’s saved all of her potential future experiences of life (which she was supposed to have given up in order to rescue her village) and returned them to her as an open-ended future of conditional immortality.  He hasn’t saved her life; he’s transformed her into someone who lives much longer than any of her neighbors possibly can.  The act of heroism was the end of her human life.  I doubt that the villagers will regard what they see of her renewed life as human in the same sense as their humanity.

Just thinkin’.

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@arbutus  Oh, wonderful!  Thanks!

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@spacedmunkee  Is it just me or was Odin’s appearance in the sky very Pythonesque. I was half expecting him to send the Doctor on a quest to seek the Holy Grail.    Or a huge foot come stamping down . . . !

Would this Doctor consider changing other events from his own timeline. <insert bonkers River theory here>.

Well, now that he’s deliberately overstepped that line in a very defiant manner (completely in line with his old punk rocker-rebel style now), he’s certainly positioned to at least consider such a move — and lots of others: “I’ve made many mistakes.  It’s time I did something about that.”

@purofilion  At times, he feels or seems quite remorseful, deeply resentful, concerned and angry that he carries the endless weight of the almost-horrors of this immortal, lonely life: “where everyone except you, dies.”

Oh, definitely.  I see a flavor of “I have great fun with these fascinating humans, but on the other hand, why am I spending my time on these erratic and transitory mayflies and all the pain they inevitably bring with them?”

. . . questions that norse people faced all the time: what is death? what is a good death? How to fight and protect one’s own and, equally, to let one’s own go: much as the Doctor must soon do with his Clara . . . Whoa, midnight

Without midnight coming, would we ever get any sleep at all around here?  Heavy stress in this story on how death yanks humans and their emotions around, particularly father/daughter ones around Ashildr (“strange” as she is — or does that make her more precious to her village?  We don’t see that ugly “stone the weird one” thing at all here, very nice).  Beautifully put together story in that respect.  This whole season, I think, is going to be about that, openly or sub-textualy, as Clara’s exit is prepared.  No wonder they were able to persuade Coleman to stay on!

@lisa  My question is how did there come to be only 2 chips? There were a lot of mire. I have to re watch but it seems to me that there could have been more then 2 that the Doctor could have taken. I think I’m missing something.

No, you caught it — the old rascal probably stuffed a half dozen chips in his pockets!

@arbutus  The Doctor really is worried about Clara, isn’t he?

I think he’s seen enough of what that future will be — or almost seen, and retreated to worry and chew over what it must be — to be in already in a background state of deep panic and mourning while loving his time with her now (that lovely “I’m not the huggin’ sort”, sly grin, followed by a magnificent hug) and making the most of it.  She may know or surmise too, just because “the death of the Doctor” and “the departure of the companion” are built into all the Doctor’s stories.  The tension is being handled very well, IMO, and should draw this season to a smashing finish.

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@starla    This might account (potentially) for why the Doctor couldn’t use the Mire’s healing device on her – maybe it’s not compatible with dalek tech?  . . . I’m still hearing the occasional oddity from Clara that makes me think of Daleks – e.g the very start of this episode when she says ‘Explain’ on a fairly curt voice to the Doctor.

Oh, very neat — He might think this and be waiting for some opportunity to actually test Clara for Dalek nanotech before trying a (supposed third) chip on her, for fear of consequences.  Though lots of beings on DW bark “Explain!” instead of the Dalek other go-to demand, “What is happening?” or plain old “What the Hell is going on here?”

@purofilion  When she placed her hand on the Doctor’s cheek, it was lovely gesture.

And interesting: that’s what she did instead of saying, “No, in a pig’s eye, that’s not going to happen, between us we’ll find a way to stop it — ”  Not the old Clara here.  More grown up, for starters, even from Before the Flood: no protest, no false comfort.  So, also a heart-chilling moment.

@scaryb  . . . maybe Ashilde turns out to be Clara’s mum. That’s why the Doctor has to go with making her immortal (despite his knowing/suspecting that a lot of not-good will come from it) – otherwise Clara will cease to exist, and that’s too high a price tag for the Doctor.

Oh, the bonkerizing is going really well this morning!

. . . that’s 2 stories in a row which have had monsters as holograms; and electromagnetism (last week’s ghosts were explained to be electro-magnetic holograms – hence being able to pick up metal objects). 

Hmm.  How much dangerously strong magnetism might it take to keep two soft iron souls together when one of them has died or been vaporized etc. in the future?  Especially when one of them wants to run and run . . . Clearly, I need to go have coffee . . .

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@jphamlore  In last season’s Time Heist we have seen there is a thriving market in all sorts of tech. So how exactly would the knowledge of this immortality chip be kept secret?

That was definitely done too hastily, but my impression is that this was tech held by the Mire exclusively, and that as they’re such fearsome warriors, nobody had yet dared to grab it from them.  But I agree, much more should have been made of this before it suddenly appeared to save Ashildr.

@juniperfish  The gag about the testosterone quaffing Mire, and how the universe was “full of testosterone”, whilst, sure, it made me smile, disappointed me too. I really hate it when Doctor Who plays to gender stereotypes, in either direction. I want it to educate kids, and look forward, not feed them the old crap.

I thought that was pretty funny, and given the amount of war, invasion, and general machismo the Doctor has encountered in his travels (and taking “testosterone” as an umbrella term for macho-type aggressiveness wherever found, which is on the face of it nonsense), I kind of liked Clara tossing it out there as a cheery rebuke to the STFU haters out there who dismiss DW as irredeemable misogynist.  The lightness of tone on the surface of the story floats the foolishness reasonably well, I thought; it certainly didn’t interfere with my enjoyment of it, but there will be howling about this (as there would be howling anyway from those quarters, no matter what is or isn’t shown).

Is it me, or was it a bit of an ouch! moment for Clara, when the Doctor explained to her that now “practically immortal” Maisie W might meet someone she wanted to keep around, forever, so that’s why he’d given her the extra chip. It becomes apparent (surely to Clara) that the Doc could have given the chip to her. He may not want to lose her with one of his hearts, but the other seems ever more ready to let her go.

Not just you.  But set that against “Clara, what have I made of you”, a remark with large implications: can what traveling with him has made of her ever fit in anywhere else but as his companion (well, *he* certainly doesn’t fit in anywhere, and he’s “made her” like him, so . . . )?  Does his resultant “duty of care” extend to the rest of his, and/or her (potentially very very long) life now — in which case a) do either of them really want that?  Would the Doctor even consider “giving” Clara this (or any) kind of immortality without exploring the issues involved first (which I think, in a way, he’s trying to do by way of “trying it out”, without discussion, on Ashildr).  I can certainly see Clara giving him massive hell for just *doing* that with/to/for her without even obtaining her opinion first.

As for Ashildr herself, something is clearly going on there that’s not been revealed — he’s solved the riddle of his own face, but replaced it with another: why is he so struck by his initial sight of this “viking” girl?

@jphamlore  There is an out that would explain why Ashildr did not wake up screaming in agony: Adrenaline numbs the pain temporarily. 

I think the model is our own self-repair and immune system, which does a good bit of its “daily” fix-it work well below our pain threshold, so it’s not an issue; and she’s young and healthy seeming, so there’s probably not that much big, ouchy stuff to be fixing in her.

@ozitenor  Feel similarly about the ep, warts and all — totally jazzed by it.

I actually feel like the Doctor in the midst of figuring something out: I know there is something I am missing

Yes; there’s this Something Big looming over everything, smart talk and all . . . And he’s thinking, but not telling Clara (or us) everything about what he’s thinking, probably because he doesn’t know yet.

is Ashildr truly immortal? Not in the same way. She has tech that constantly heals her, but a disintegration blast from a Dalek (for example) would kill her, as it would disintegrate the healing mechanism too.

Exactly; it’s more like vampire life, toddling on until the stake or a bullet to the head makes the body decisively non-viable any more.  Even the Doctor has his limits in this regard.  A “scientific” view of the universe pretty much makes god-like immortality impossible, since science recognizes the basic significance of entropy.

@scaryb  So who is Ashildr going to reward/curse with the other “chip”? Wild thought – what if she gives it to Clara? I could be (ie probably am) wrong but I thought Clara was giving off a slightly envious vibe at the end when the Doctor explains what he’s done and produces the second chip. What if that is Ashildr’s revenge/gift? So it’s not Clara’s death he has to deal with (which we think is what is being foreshadowed), but her (endless) life…?

I am so with you on that!  Think about the Doctor’s motives in using the 1st chip on Ashildr: it’s apparently, “I am so fed up with losing the people I can’t save.  So I’m gonna save this one even though the time’s progress has just killed her, through my use of her to save these other people.”  Does that sound a little bit — *selfish* particularly from someone who knows the down sides of long life pretty well?  And how selfish would it be with regard to Clara, someone “dear to me” so he’s got skin in that game to a much greater extent?  Worse yet if he’s doing a sort of dry run on Ashildr for “saving” Clara this way.  Problematic, much?  No shit.

And a note on the Pompeii connection — we never have seen anything about the “future” consequences of saving that family instead of letting them die as scheduled, have we?  He didn’t make them immortal (so far as we know) even on conditional terms, but he did tear a rent in time to unlawfully (?) postpone their deaths . . .

Re explaining those eels — there’s always a way to reconcile if you want to!  Indeed; that’s why I don’t care to  get hung up on the smaller over-reaches.  It’s a story — like the stories Ashildr tells (“and then I *kill* the monster, gah, gotcha!”); artistic license is part of the deal, though of course hearers of the story each draw the line for themselves.

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@purofilion  I wonder @ichabod if there were DW meetings or ‘chapters’ where you were in the States?

Probably, but I didn’t know anything about it if so.  All I knew about DW fandom at the time was that when DW fans showed up at the SF conventions I went to from ’76 on, they dressed weird, hung out together and didn’t talk to anybody else, and had the reputation of being peculiarly intense and very prone to quarreling among themselves.  I hung out with the feminist writers and readers — they were my community within the community, and as far as I knew, there wasn’t any significant overlap.

There was (and still is) an active local SF club, but at that time it was dominated by very Old Guard men who didn’t mind having females in their club to fill out the numbers, but were very vocally resentful of female writers horning in on the territory of the male writers they adored — Asimov, Poul Anderson, Larry Niven, Phil Farmer, Fred Pohl, etc. — and the “New Wave” guys following Moorcock and others in Britain (Bob Silverberg’s name comes to mind, though he was going great guns well before the 80’s).  At least, but that’s who I recall right now.  The club was unwelcoming to women writers, as I recall, and I ignored them as they (mostly) ignored me and my own cohort, and if there was a specific DW club here, I didn’t know about it.

My husband and I watched DW on and off from the sixties onward — I think it was shown in the US by PBS-tv at the time, but we were only devoted viewers during Tom Baker’s time but didn’t talk about it much as it was considered by non-fans, anyway, a kids’ program; and the PBS viewership was comparatively small to start with, so it didn’t occur to us to go looking for fans locally.

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