@Morpho– I think there is a difference between the proposed use of the dial in the first and last episodes. Originally, when Missy had it, he did think he was going to die. He then got out of that for Clara’s sake. Later he was forced into the dial when he was nowhere near dying.

@morpho– I wonder if the party was to highlight the extent of his care for Clara- on discovering that he will, most likely die, he has the dial sent to the appropriate (odd way though that is to refer to Missy) person and throws a big party. When Clara dies he smashes his way out of the confession dial, stages a coup on Gallifray, betrays the…[Read more]

@puroandson, @tardisgrade- re Orsan. We don’t really know he is descended from Clara. He behaved as though he felt he had some kind of family link with her, but all we can be pretty sure of, balance of probability, is that he is related in some way to Danny. Danny the orphan, who made no mention of any siblings or other family when she saw him in…[Read more]

@mudlark– yes, at first I disagreed with you, but he would have to be stupid not to know who she was. I agree. He realises, but it doesn’t matter, and that is the sadness in both of them. The love is gone with the memory, though the reasons for love might remain with the information. She tried twice, in Face the Raven and Hell Bent, to persuade…[Read more]

@Ozitenor– that makes sense with Clara, definitely, good spot. But Captain Jack had to heal, I’m pretty sure at one point he got blown up and had to come back ‘the long way’.

@tardisgrade- oh right, I was confused as to why you’d think that. That’s dreadful! BBC subtitles translated it as tenth, but then, they have the script I suppose.

One thing though- what if he had said ‘twelth’? I don’t think the doctor would have shot him. Was he that keen to get back into a female body?

@tardisgrae- agree that the diner scenes were lovely.

And I think only the most churlish of fans could object to the guitar now.

@tardigrade– he asked ‘how many regenerations’. The man said ten. Therefore, not fatal.

@supernumery, @pedant, @jimthefish–

I don’t think Gallafray is quite ‘back’- though it can clearly be reached, and left- I have to admit I do hope they keep it to a minimum. I was watching some old Who episodes earlier, and decided I’m not a huge fan of the timelords on screen. Is the Doctor still president, though, or has he lost that for being,…[Read more]

@pedant– who owns the rights to the diner in space? Watching it almost felt like seeing Moffart saying to the BBC: go on, Cancel doctor who. I dare you…

at the very least I can imagine a one off or probably two parter episode where they encounter each other

@iusedtobethedoctorrs99- Glasgow in space!

I was hoping against hope they weren’t going to go down the half human doctor route. It always annoyed me. I mean, why would you cast Paul McGunn and then try to Spokify the character? But I loved the treatment of the ‘Me’ theory. ‘It’s an interesting theory’

This was a good send off for Clara. Not q…[Read more]

One question- so I’m reading the scripts for the first two episodes because I don’t have them saved on my catch-up and I wanted to binge watch before Saturday.

The part where he wheels into the room of Dalaks in Davros’s chair. The line is given as ‘face it, you’ve all had this exact nightmare’. I had thought the line was ‘WE’VE all had this…[Read more]

@jphamlore– yup, that’s what you get for wearing sunglasses indoors…

@hillforest and @puroandson– you’ve both made me realise how this scene relates right back to the Doctor’s first episode- Clara in the room with the clockwork man ‘I’ll stand a lot of torture before I give up the one thing that’s keeping me alive’. That was when he, seemingly, left Clara to look after herself. She really is in his head.

@Ozitenor– great comments. I agree about the dust and the extra suit of clothes especially, and the re-sets. Thinking about it, I don’t know why I was assuming that his death would trigger a re-set in the same way as his confessions.

Re the Tardis- I wonder if we are supposed to think he means the tardis is behind the- yeah, lets just call it…[Read more]

@mudlark– trust an archaeologist! (my mother is an archaeologist, and you never want to get her on the subject of bones…

A lot of people in t’other place claim an inconsistency that he took the long way and then confessed. I think in fact that is very doctor- assuming what he said when he got out of the dial was the truth- stubborn and bloody…[Read more]

@JimTheFish– I tried and failed to get into his ‘m’ books till he died. Then I binge-read them all, and I think he could have been a Douglas Adams to modern Who. I really liked ‘Player of Games’, I’m a major fan of ‘The glass bead game’, that is probably my favourite sci-fi, and I love the way the reader is expected to fill in the gaps.

Nifti- I love it.

@Jimthefish– which is why I said Ian Banks rather than Ian M Banks- but his sci fi in those two is my favourite Banks writing, over the real world in those books, and the sci-fi in his other series- though he never wrote a book I didn’t like, except maybe, confusingly, ‘a song of stone’

@Delta– why over complicate things by assuming that the doctor is wrong/is lying?

@Delta– then the doctor is manufactured during the first teleportation he ever underwent, and his first into the confession dial, and every one after that.