@tardigrade  The Doctor may be vulnerable right now, but he was still able to save the day without his sight in this story.  Perhaps he will find a way to work with/around his disability, however long it lasts.  But yes, this would also be a good reason to team up with the Master/Missy…especially since the next few episodes (possibly until the…[Read more]

Hey @pufferfish, the idea that the Doctor may have spent time traveling elsewhere between those last two scenes in “The Pilot” isn’t farfetched — or unprecedented.  The idea floated that the Ninth Doctor had a much longer life than depicted on screen was the basis for the short story “The Beast of Babylon” (from the 50th anniversary…[Read more]

At this point, with all the hints dropped in and out of universe, it is most likely The Master/Missy in the vault.  But since there’s still the possibility the Doctor is protecting him/her, what is it from?  Perhaps that’s the REAL arc this season, especially considering that Missy turns up again in the finale…the first half of which (“World E…[Read more]

@jimthefish  and others, the early reviews for Alien: Covenant have been dreadful, alas.

As for the trend you mention Jim the Fish, this is all too true, and not just with belated sequels.  The Beauty and the Beast remake was, in many ways, slavishly faithful to the original film even as it translated the look of a cel-animated feature into a dif…[Read more]

@kharis

Also, all this talk about how the Doctor would be mad at Missy, cause he now knows about her involvement in Clara, or any of that kind of theorising about the Doctor remembering things about Clara has a fundamental flaw – before that kind of theorising takes place we would have to establish he consiously remembers her in the first p…

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@mersey In the expanded universe of the Big Finish audios, specifically the New Eighth Doctor Adventures range, the Eighth Doctor and an older Susan Foreman interacted in several stories, but post-Last Great Time War her status is “unknown”.

@pedant, Of course another reason it’s probably not Clara in the vault is that having her be key to the…[Read more]

@mudlark  Good points about the relationship between the Doctor and the occupant of the vault.  I latch on to the idea that, as he sees it, they’re both prisoners.  I think the nature of the oath, who it was made to, etc. will reveal much about what’s going on.

As far as misdirection goes, well, look at what happened with the mystery of the Hyb…[Read more]

I liked this episode, particularly the strong reveals in the climax.  “Thin Ice” is still my favorite so far, but this built to something (and then tore it down to the foundations!).

There are definitely threads coming together.  There’s the Doctor’s deepening relationship with his mock-granddaughter…yet another menace that isn’t malicious, as < …[Read more]

@ichabod That’s a fascinating way of looking at the matter!  <3

@ichabod I agree with you that even though the first few episodes have been a bit lighter than we’ve come to expect from the Capaldi tenure, it’s probably building up to something big, perhaps sooner than we think.  At about this point in Series 9, we’d had the character drama of the Davros 2-parter and the base-under-siege horror fare of the…[Read more]

@whisht:

– the vault “what’s he told you?” seemed important; this won’t be a monster to fear, but one that deserves our sympathy. Maybe something that has taken 50 years to ‘cook’ (such as a body to be possessed by the next regeneration..?)

Hmm, this would be in keeping with the “monsters” so far this season…Pilot!Heather, the Vardy, the lo…[Read more]

I was particularly excited for this episode and quite pleased with it — I think it’s the best of the season to date.  Bill grilling the Doctor over the death and destruction he’s seen and sometimes perpetrated, and his responses, near brought me to tears.  Looking forward to “Knock Knock” next week, and what’s that knocking in the vault anyway?  😉

@pedant, I know the Hugo competition is a lot tougher these days than it was before for Who and it has no hope of winning this year.  It’s the downside of the peak TV era, everybody’s upping their game and catching up with it!  Still, Twelve’s era has one more shot next year and already there’s been “Thin Ice” this season…

I noticed @pedant, but I doubt it will win if “Listen” and “Heaven Sent” couldn’t manage wins in their eligibility years (they lost to episodes of Orphan Black and Jessica Jones, respectively).  Sadly, the Twelfth Doctor era looks to be the only one of the revival that goes empty-handed at the Hugos….he never catches a break, on or off screen!

I didn’t like this one as much as “The Pilot” — as the AVClub review noted, this the sort of a standard issue “breaking in the new character (either a Doctor or companion) by taking them to the future” episode we’ve been seeing in the revival since “The End of the World” (and there were stories like this in the classic series too) — but I liked…[Read more]

An intriguing question, @ichabod.  Perhaps it is not just that the promise has a strong hold on the Doctor, but his loneliness as well.  Nardole is a fine valet, but the Doctor’s loneliness after so much loss still runs deep.  Perhaps he was thankful for something to keep him “grounded”, as it were, instead of curling up into a ball of sorrow.  P…[Read more]

@pedant Excellent observation, especially given that the season finale is to be Cyber-centric.

@joshamus, That vault is a mystery!  Is it possible that whatever’s in that vault might need protection from the universe as much as the universe needs protection from it?  Or even more so?  😀

@jimthefish  Ooer, there’s too much vanilla entertainment right now, at the movies and stuff.  Though I like vanilla ice cream, so I’d use the word <i>bland</i> instead!  😉

@thane15 I hope you and Puro keep on keeping on!