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@mudlark I like your idea that the Scythra (I know it’s officially Skithra, but I like my spelling better) are a hive species.

@bluesqueakpip Yes, I can buy your distinction in terms of the Spyfall mind-wipe for tech-whizz Lovelace (as she’d seen the future) vs the lack of mind-wipe for tech-whizz Tesla. But, as you and @jimthefish and @mudlark…[Read more]

still need to catch up on loads of songs here!

But wanted to say well done to @jimthefish

This isn’t a great song (unfortunately) but the title at least makes sense

(but for a really good ‘doctor’ song then feel free to shimmy along to this!)

congratulations!

@JimTheFish  @juniperfish  @Bluesqueakpip

Yes, mindwiping is a hugely problematic concept because it is an assault on the person at a very fundamental level, and the Doctor, as a moral being with high ideals, should be above that. But how many assaults on individuals or societies as a collective have been perpetrated ‘for your own good’ or ‘for t…[Read more]

Goran Visnjic’s performance was inspired. Of course, it’s impossible not to take the side of the brilliant underdog, when he’s presented with such warmth and energy, and easy to see Edison as a stereotypical capitalist villain. But there was a nice moment when Edison made the absolutely valid point that for every idea, there needs to be someone…[Read more]

This was definitely an improvement over “Orphan 55” and it was nice to finally have an episode this season not end on a bummer note even with the bittersweet aspects.  But I agree with @jimthefish that Thirteen’s characterization is getting increasingly muddled in what I’ve come to assume are attempts to present her as more than an eternal…[Read more]

@bluesqueakpip, @jimthefish, the mind wipe thing is a can of worms – though as @bluesqueakpip says, there is reasoning behind why it might have seemed necessary for one pair and not the other. I think Ada and Noor actually did some coding work with the Doctor, explicitly learned the future development of their field, here the Doctor more or less…[Read more]

@Jimthefish

Yeah, I’m not sure I buy that personally.

In a moral sense, I don’t think I do. I seem to recall mentioning in the Skyfall episode discussion that Ada’s mindwipe was played in a distinctly disturbing way, very reminiscent of Donna’s. It’s just that I would argue there’s a possible distinction between the effect on the futures b…[Read more]

@Jimthefish

Dr. Fish –

they wanted to gloss over Tesla’s support for eugenics and compulsory sterilisation of the criminal and insane

Ah Ha! I didn’t know that!

Okay, so that’s now two stories (Skyfall and this one) where eugenics – not just the murder of the ‘unfit’, but the breeding of the ‘fit’ – is in the backstory. Skyfall with the N…[Read more]

@miapatrick Yes, I wish we’d spent more time with Lovelace. She deserved a whole episode of her own.

And also, glaring incongruity – why did Lovelace have to get her memory wiped, but Tesla (who saw the inside of the TARDIS) didn’t?

Just to re-ignite the ethics of the mind-wipe debate @Jimthefish was having earlier!

BTW, I don’t think the…[Read more]

@jimthefish

Allow me to join @miapatrick and @juniperfish in congratulating you on the award of your doctorate! I had somehow missed that when reading the posts. Given the erudite argumentation of your posts over the years, it all makes sense. While you will, not doubt, continue to be known on these boards as @jimthefish, I will, inevitably, like…[Read more]

@jimthefish congratulations, Doctor! Frankly I lack your willpower, I’ve posted more on here when I was working on my undergraduate degree, and now that I’m working on my postgraduate degree than I did the couple of years when I wasn’t studying.

@jimthefish

Maybe there should be some kind of plaque…

Perhaps there is a build-up of plaque on the teeth of Nu-Who.

<Blenkinsop furtively runs away after making terrible joke…>

@jimthefish

Part of me wonders if Chibnall likes wearing hair shirts. His younger self accused Pip & Jane Baker of producing a story based on the Doctor & companion running down a corridor. For his first Who episode in “42” that’s essentially what he has Martha doing.

@blenkinsopthebrave

All of which leads me to ask: are we witnessing the John…

[Read more]

@nerys

I did mean to post a response to your question earlier, but things happen.

In the BG episodes the mindwipe never happened. Well, once, but in a different way. And is wasn’t the Doctor who performed it.

When we finally meet the Timelords at the end of Patrick Troughtons’s run (The War Games), they mindwipe Jamie and Zoe (the companions)…[Read more]

@juniperfish     I think we’ve gotten used to After Gap DW, in which the Doctor’s connection to his companions has been much deeper than in the past. So far, at least, Thirteen has a warm but less intense relationship with her “fam”. I was never altogether comfortable with the angsty aspect of the Doctor/Companion dynamic that took over the After…[Read more]

@phaseshift

@jimthefish

@whisht

Can we all come together in a joint effort of hope that Phaseshift is onto something here. 🙂

I’ll just extrapolate this a little bit further.

Planet comes from the Greek meaning “wanderer”.

An orphan planet is one that wanders off away from the gravitational pull of it’s star.

Okay…stay with me now.

Do…[Read more]

@Jimthefish I’m not massively keen on Gallifrey’s re-destruction personally. It all depends how it plays out, of course

I’m not massively keen on it either. I LOVE Gallifreyan stories, but it feels a bit odd, after the long and wondrous arc of the Time War across Doctors Ecclestone to the War Doctor (and then Capaldi Doc’s search for the Gall…[Read more]

@jimthefish

My pet theory about Yaz is that she’s being set up to become disenchanted with the Doctor and switch sides to become the Master’s companion.

While that is an interesting idea, I don’t think it will happen. Mostly because, while we may be colour blind, it would be very bad optics for some.