[MissRori @replies]

@thane15  I meant that the blindness not being curable, given what the Doctor has available to him, didn’t make a lot of logical sense.  It’s like how I or others could think of other, safer options available to him in “Hell Bent” to bring back Clara Oswald (such as commissioning a Paradox Machine), but he went with the one that would blow up the universe unless he got really lucky or something.  😉

But you’re right that his blindness really isn’t a cheap device (having the sonic screwdriver not work at the thing it’s best at might be a better example of that!).  It’s made for an interesting arc these past few weeks, and come to this crisis point.  And similarly, in “Hell Bent” he had to take the option that might make the universe go boom by way of realizing how too far he’d gone in his love for Clara.

Your point about the TARDIS taking him where he needs to be…well, we discussed this a while back with “Oxygen” — the TARDIS didn’t have to take him to Chasm Forge if it wasn’t where he needed to be at that time, at that moment.  He and his friends needed to be there, to go through what they did.  And yes, the munks probably knew about that.  He’s clearly central to their simulations.  He has made himself indispensable to Earth, not just Clara Oswald!  😀

So the real question then is, what is it that the Doctor gains for (temporarily) losing his sight and this whole dirty business with the munks?  And what will Bill gain for these experiences?  Perhaps we will find out this Saturday…  😉

Thank you for your time Puro, and I’m sorry I’m so long-winded.

[MissRori @replies]

Only 1 in 3?  I’m surprised!  😀

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@pedant  I think you have a point about what the Monks really want.  It will be interesting to see how that plays out next week.

As for other sites, well, I do like to check out other opinions to compare and contrast.  I’m more io9 and AV Club than the Graun myself.  There’s a lot of chaff, but no small amount of wheat too, and I found it interesting how our issues with this episode aren’t that different than those the more casual viewers who frequent those sites had.  🙂

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@thane15  Well, Bill may not have much time to make better choices before she’s gone; I don’t think anyone knows if she’s going to make it to the Christmas show yet.  There are only five episodes left in the season, and I think next week is her one chance to carry the day.  Hopefully she will make the best choices this time.  It’s also a mark against the idea that we’re still watching simulations at this point — if all this was just fake, then Bill won’t have made any real character progress since “Oxygen”.

Indeed I think one reason the Doctor didn’t want to tell her he was blind — and he could have yet still hide it from the rest of the world, when one thinks about it — was because he didn’t want her to feel guilty about it, because he knew it was his fault she was in trouble.  He had nothing but bad choices where his relationship with her was concerned: Let her know and leave her with guilt, or hide it from her but risk that lack of knowledge getting them into trouble, and in the end…one choice led to the other, and things fell apart.

Sometimes all we have are bad choices…

EDIT: Or, he could have just got his eyes fixed, or further upgraded the sonic sunglasses.  A lot of fans elsewhere are getting really annoyed that he hasn’t just done the former. All of time and space in that box, his own people to return to, and he can’t get to a good sawbones?  If the show would just explain why he can’t get his eyes fixed, it would make a huge difference.  As it is, it does feel like a cheap device for drama at times.

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@tardigrade  I don’t think him not telling her about regeneration would have made much difference under the circumstances.  He was about to be blown to pieces at worst.  At best, well, Erica wouldn’t have been able to immediately get his body out of the room as it was burning.  He would have been flayed alive with burns, his lungs seared to a crisp and/or poisoned by smoke inhalation; he would have easily asphyxiated without precious, precious oxygen.  All that could easily  be too much for regeneration energy to overcome before his whole body shut down.  We know that in the alternate future of “Turn Left” he managed to drown; if the damage is that severe and that quick regeneration can’t do much of anything.  I think he would have mentioned he could regenerate to Bill if he thought it was possible for him to do so at that moment.

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@thane15 Deep thoughts as always Puro.  But if she takes the Doctor’s free will, doesn’t that make her no better than the Doctor was when he planned to mind wipe Clara, or later Bill herself, for their own good, when he felt there was no choice?  Hmm.

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@countscarlioni Well, the clocks were moving backwards again… but you do have a point that either way the Monks were still dangerous.  Still, I think I’d accept the Doctor’s loss and fight them myself rather than sell out everybody…

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@tardigrade  Oh, I agree with you that there were just too many issues with the script and story in this one for it to be satisfying.  The actors can only do so much, though with Capaldi that’s quite a bit!  I think you’re also onto something about budget issues — some of the special effects were quite poor (especially the withering plants).

The Monks have shown they can simulate the Doctor, so even the actual scenario of him intervening and needing himself to be saved might have been amongst those possible threads. That could potentially make it very difficult for the Doctor to do anything to save the situation, as his possible moves could have been foreseen.

Absolutely!  And going into this knowing it was part two of three made it worse for me, as it killed all the suspense.  This was ultimately an unstoppable march to doom, as many part ones (and occasional part twos) are, and trying to pin the tragic ending on the Doctor’s hubris — rather than, say, Bill’s good intentions but also her selfishness and fear, because he was willing to accept the consequences and die — didn’t work given what we and he knew the Monks were capable of all along.  Why, he was just a poor lamb to the slaughter, really…

And again, his mistakes may have contributed to the unhappy end, but so did everybody else’s often dumber mistakes.  We’re supposed to wag our fingers at the Doctor for his hubris and Bill for her faith in him, but Earth really is the Planet of the Pudding Brains and he really is the only one who can save it in times like these.  Heck, Clara chewed him out in “Kill the Moon” (by the same writer) for his having faith in her and humanity’s intelligence and ability to make the choices he would in a crisis and leaving them to decide their fate instead of just doing what HE thought was best based on what he believed would happen — arguing that because he has effectively adopted Earth as his home world, he has just as much a say in what happens and duty to protect it as any human.

Edit: Also, “Oxygen” just a few weeks ago was a far more effective, intelligent story about the Doctor’s flaws getting the better of him and his having to face the consequences as a result.  The situation he ended up in was all his fault, and no one else’s, and he knew it, and he faced it.  Even “The Zygon Invasion” did a better job of showing how the Doctor’s flaws could trip him up (i.e., his not paying enough attention to Clara to realize she was a little bit off…).

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@blenkinsopthebrave  If they can pull all of this together in a truly satisfying way it will make up for a lot.  If they can’t though, the last four episodes will have a lot of heavy lifting to do — especially with regards to Bill’s reputation.

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Here are some interesting theories about what will happen in “The Lie of the Land”:

Will the Doctor regenerate?

I don’t think there will suddenly be a reveal of Saxon!Master in this episode.  The shot of him from the final Series 10 trailer really does seem to match up with those shots of the Mondasian Cybermen from the season finale.

I still don’t understand why, in this episode, the Doctor is dressed in the same worn-out old coat he was wearing in the Missy flashback scenes of “Extremis”.  What could the significance of that be?

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Promo pics are up for “The Lie of the Land”.  Notably, there aren’t as many for this one as there have been for the previous two episodes, probably to avoid major spoilers.

DoctorWhoTV.co.uk — “Lie of the Land” gallery

My thoughts: Missy’s enjoying her piano inside what looks to be some kind of containment cube.  Perhaps it’s part of the Vault dismantled and rebuilt so she can leave it?  I think this episode will explain a lot about how the Vault works and why she hadn’t already escaped, especially given all those times the Doctor entered it.  Apparently the toilet facilities in the Vault aren’t much…  😉

Sorry folks, it looks like the boring invincible Monks are a standalone race with its own ruler, not a tool of a bigger/pre-established enemy.

It does look like a major plot thread is Bill trying to break the Doctor’s brainwashing rather than kill him outright, which Missy (in the Next Time trailer) suggests is the only way to break the Monks’ hold on Earth.  I’m guessing they bust him out of the place the Monks are holding him in — where the white room is where he broadcasts propaganda — and bring him to la resistance’s base, or something and hope Missy can get through to him where others can’t.  But assuming the regeneration-that-isn’t is the climax, then how does he get back to the room for that?  And how does Bill get to shoot him?  (The trailers really don’t leave much room for doubt that she’s the one who plugs him.  Ah, cruel, cowardly Bill.  You learned nothing from the Doctor in the end, did you?)

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@thane15  Hmm, I can’t say I thought the music was subtle, but then the whole episode was a doom-n-gloom buildup, and again I knew it was going to have an unhappy ending, so that affects things.  😉

Actually, I think a big problem with this episode was that it tipped its hand to the real crisis (the lab) way too quickly.  It would have been more exciting to figure things out with the Doctor.

@blenkinsopthebrave, I agree that Bill hasn’t been with the Doctor long enough — at least onscreen — for love to completely ring true at this point.  As DoctorWhoTV.co.uk has pointed out more than once, if one only goes by the televised canon, she’s had only two off-world trips (not counting the chase in “The Pilot”, which was a special case) and one journey into Earth’s past.  Granted, the Doctor has the Vault/Missy to look after and wet blanket Nardole keeps reminding him of that — never mind that the TARDIS has been pretty good about coming back on time even with the odd side trip on the way.   But then there’s their here-and-now adventure, “Knock Knock”, in which she felt he was an annoyance for his protectiveness, his hanging about with her friends — just unpack my stuff and go please!  The site points out that while she is smart and kind, she has no imagination, no eagerness to take advantage of everything the Doctor has to offer her, little wonder.  This may have been to differentiate her from people like Amy and Clara, but there is a sense that she still sees him as a tutor more than anything else.  Someone to learn from, not love.  She is not attracted to him romantically of course, and she doesn’t return his familial affections all that well bar the occasional hug.  This is a major reason I suspect this storyline was originally conceived as a season finale.  A few more episodes, a few more adventures, and her need for him would have rung more true.

Why did it take so long for her to figure out he was blind, and why didn’t she press the “What’s wrong” issue with him further?  She sees him at the university whenever she’s there, presumably, and would have seen him in his glasses all the time and wonder why.

Also, I agree there is a Doctor-y vibe in her deciding that it’s best to save everyone she can by asking the Monks to restore his sight.  Despite the fates giving him a hard time for his hubris and his sheer foolishness in letting Nardole leave the TARDIS and enter the contaminated lab, he really is the only person smart enough to stop them based on the evidence in this episode, which more or less proves that Earth is the Planet of the Pudding Brains, just like he thought from the very beginning.  😉  Two bad choices and I can see where this one did seem less bad.

(Aside: I don’t recall where I saw this pointed out, but his blindness really didn’t make that much of a difference until he got locked in the lab, thanks to his foresight in fixing up the sonic specs and willingness to ask questions of others.  On a good day he’s arrogant and brilliant!)

But attitude is important too; there’s also cruelty and cowardice there in her choice, if one thinks about it.  She lacks the courage to face danger without the Doctor by her side, to face the consequences of choosing to let him die even though the Monks appeared on the verge of just giving up.  She tells him he “better save” her planet.  She’s placing all the responsibility for what happens next on his slim shoulders.  She’s not going to help him, she doesn’t say “We’re all in this together.”  She is effectively establishing a condition for her making the deal to save his life and doesn’t consider that, given what they’re up against, he might not be able to to pay up no matter how much he wants to.  Is she going to blame him, resent him if his ability to help is compromised?  If so, that’s not very noble or kind.

Let’s compare this to the Doctor wanting to save Clara in “Hell Bent”.  They’d enjoyed years and years together, her becoming a vital partner to him, almost as clever and smart even.   He owed her his lives, even his homeworld.  He already couldn’t imagine facing the universe without her or accept the inevitability of the grief he’d have to endure as far back as “The Magician’s Apprentice” and when she finally faced the grave in a most unjust manner he couldn’t bear the prospect of it (“What about me?”).  She told him he’d just have to accept it and be brave and keep being kind.  After all, she had to face the consequences of her hubris.  But he was too emotionally broken by this — and the perils he faced in the dial — to hold to that; he was still too scared, too lonely.  So when faced with the chance to save her from the grave after all, even at the risk of all of time and space being destroyed, he decided to take it.  And he did intend to extract a price for it from her — the loss of her memories, so he could drop her off on Earth alive and safe, which was the one way he felt he could move on without her by his side.

And everybody including Clara regarded him as a selfish monster for his actions, for risking everyone else’s safety just to save one person no matter how important they were.  No one but Clara cared how he felt and had suffered; everybody else was more important than him.  Why couldn’t he have just contented himself with soup and rescue from execution, realized that there were others who loved him?

So now Bill decides to sell out humanity to the Monks because she won’t consider she can take up the metaphorical sword of the Doctor and apply what she learned from him to this situation, because she’d miss him even though she was just as likely to push him away as not, because she expects to be repaid by him.  She isn’t just saving him because he’s a precious life by virtue of his very existence.  It’s a well-meant choice, probably the best choice under the circumstances, and well, the show does need a protagonist…but she hasn’t quite learned the lessons he has to teach her entirely.  Not yet.

Virtue is only virtue in extremis…from the looks of things, she’ll have a chance to redeem herself next week with such a choice, but will she?

@steffstaff I have to say I liked your running commentary.

Whew, that’s enough for now.  Hope to be chatting under Spoilers/BBC Approved Spoilers shortly as we ponder what’s to come…  😉

[MissRori @replies]

Here’s more news and rumors relating to the Christmas special:

Moviepilot round up of news and rumors

The comment from Moffat was one I hadn’t seen before — the idea that after “The Doctor Falls” in the season finale, the Christmas/regeneration story will be an uplifting “tale of redemption, and hope, and deciding to carry on, instead of being a tale of the Doctor falling.”

(sniff)  That does sound beautiful…Talalay’s just gone on record as saying it’s a great script.

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(hmmm)  Looking over all these posts here and elsewhere, would it be safe to say that this is so far the most-poorly-received episode so far in Series 10?  Up to now I think “Smile” sort of had that reputation for being a bit thin, and “Extremis” was pretty controversial, but the sheer amount of complaints coming down on the logic and common sense gaps in this episode are really noticeable.  :/

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I really enjoyed “Extremis”, but I think this was a big comedown from that thanks mostly to the saggy, padded, illogical script, which didn’t hang together in terms of the story or the characters’ decisions, which this thread has had a lot of thoughtful commentary on (positive and negative, I must stress).  I’m glad I watched it but I was expecting too much after the somewhat similar “Zygon Invasion”, methinks.  I see what the writers were getting at in bold strokes, but they missed the mark in the detail work.  If the story and characters were more compelling I could overlook a lot of the little flaws — I mean, I loved “Heaven Sent” and wasn’t particularly bothered by all the tiny details regarding how the dial worked — but I couldn’t.  Ha — a bunch of little mistakes adding up to big trouble!  😀

Now without going into Next Time trailer details (feel free to chew those over with me on the spoiler threads, because I’m all ears), I can see where this whole story arc might turn out to be mostly a big ol’ mess of simulations and such.  It seems the writers have written this story into that kind of corner with the “all is lost” cliffhanger.  But unfortunately, if this is mostly an alternate reality, how much of it will affect the season surrounding it?  Will the Doctor still be blind and there will need to be another reveal to Bill?  Will Bill get any big character development in the “real” world?  I can imagine many fans elsewhere being livid about the rug being pulled out from under them three weeks in a row.

I also wonder if this storyline was originally conceived as the season finale, given that the revival’s previous three-parters all came at the tail ends of seasons (3, 4 if one counts “Turn Left” as a part one like “Extremis” is, and 9).  It has similar scope and scale, is thick with this season’s motifs (truth, eyes, “villains” who aren’t actually evil, promises, imprisonment/release, exploitation), resolved a major arc with the confirmation of who was in the Vault,  involves a fan-favorite villain, and pivots on how far the companion/Doctor relationship has come.  And apparently it was supposed to feature Kate Stewart, but her actress had a scheduling conflict.  Perhaps the powers-that-be realized that this storyline as a whole wasn’t quite Big Finale material and decided to move it to an earlier point in favor of coming up with something crazy awesome for Rachel Talalay to direct instead.  😉

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@pedant  Ah, point taken!  I really am annoyed by how this episode is being hyped.  It just leaves me waiting for the other shoe to drop.  And the show’s gone down this world-gone-mad route before.  In fact, this one sounds like  “Wedding of River Song” 2.0  (with some “Last of the Time Lords” thrown in): A woman didn’t kill the Doctor/let him die, so the world’s gone cuckoo and only a handful of characters remember the good old days.  An imprisoned Time Lord is consulted.  The companions lead a resistance.  The villains can mess with people’s perception/vision and have religious connotations.  Woman has to kill the Doctor, but he gets back up anyway without a full regeneration.  I have to wonder, between this and the many references to River Song this season, whether this is not a total coincidence.

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Yeah, I really would not be surprised to have an ending like that of “Last of the Time Lords” or “Wedding of River Song” (especially the latter, given all the conceptual beats it’s nicking) next week, or another offbeat reveal that allows the show to get away with a world-gone-mad and crazy!Doctor for a week.  The fallout from a situation like the one set up in “Lie of the Land” will logically take a long time to clean up afterward, but the back four episodes of the season don’t seem concerned with it.

And yeah, Nardole didn’t bring up the Vault once in this one, much less the Doctor.  And they never did explain why three of the world’s superpowers were in a military stalemate in Turmezistan, which one would think would at least be a passing concern for the guys, or maybe Bill’s friends.

Who’s zoomin’ who here?  😉

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@mirime  Oh, I agree that Bill felt some (unneeded) guilt over the Doctor’s blindness.  And yes, there’s some sense to figuring he was the last best hope for Earth, though the last line and the Next Time trailer suggest she’ll be disappointed.

But that brings up a big problem with the Monks — because they’re so powerful and all-seeing, the Doctor, much less humanity, couldn’t have won the day in any scenario they picked in the end.  It’s clear they were capable of pulling strings here and there if need be, able to pinpoint what everybody would do, aware of their flaws.  All they had to do was play into that.  The Doctor came very very close to outwitting them but still.  The story is supposed to be one of how ordinary mistakes and flaws that all of us display from time to time can end in tragedy, but the overall inevitability of the heroes’ failure (especially for people like me who knew this was part two of three), and the fact that so many characters besides the Doctor screwed up so badly (i.e. the badly designed lab), makes the Doctor and friends come off as lambs to the slaughter.

“The Zygon Invasion” handled this sort of lead-up to an all-is-lost scenario more gracefully.  It didn’t try blaming the Doctor for the bulk of things, even though he made some mistakes — the big one being that he didn’t notice anything strange about “Clara’s” behavior, perhaps blinded by love and trust.  The villains were extremely clever, but not all-powerful, and they had an understandable, even sympathetic, motivation.  It was a strong lead-in to an even better second half, with my favorite Series 9 villain bar none in Bonnie the Zygon.

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@bendubz11 Right, I think we’ve all heard chatter by now that the Twelve regeneration will be unusual.  IIRC, Moffat says it won’t be along the lines of the Ten and Eleven regenerations, and could be as simple as the Doctor getting a knock on the head.  Capaldi’s said his Doctor goes down fighting, which suggests that he won’t be a brainwashed puppet of the baddies at the time.

Perhaps his partial regeneration next week results in him, effectively, being terminally ill for the remainder of his run — more aware than ever he doesn’t have much time left, but trying to make the most of it.  Maybe there’s Something he has to do before he can completely regenerate, such as do his part to save Gallifrey in “Day of the Doctor”.

Also…am I the only one who finds it odd that he’s wearing the “Extremis” flashback coat — the sad, worn one that suggested he wasn’t taking care of himself after River died — in “The Lie of the Land”?  Brainwashed he may be, but why wear that old thing again?

Also, the synopses of the “back four” episodes of the season, starting with “Empress of Mars”, suggest that the Doctor, Bill, and Nardole just go back to having the usual wacky TARDIS adventures for a week or two after this traumatic storyline.  A trip to Mars?  Whatever happened to staying on Earth and watching the Vault?  Will they just let Missy go once she’s helped out in “Lie of the Land”?  And why would the Doctor keep traveling with the woman who shot him to (near-)death to fix her screw-up?  There’s a reason River Song wasn’t a conventional companion.  😉

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Thinking some more over “The Lie of the Land”, I agree with those who think it’s going to be “The Wedding of River Song” 2.0.  There’s a world gone mad because a woman wouldn’t let the Doctor die, and said woman has to shoot him dead to save the world — apparently, he’s the “link” the Monks needed to finish conquering Earth; if he dies they’re done for — and somehow he manages to live without completely regenerating.  We have a tricksy alien race that is a collective rather than individuals, too.  And River Song connections — Nardole, the coat the Doctor was wearing in the “Extremis” flashbacks…

Now, the awesome way this story could end would be with Bill not killing the Doctor even to save her own skin and humanity’s, because that’s the in extremis choice — “Without hope, without witness, without reward.”  That she lets him live because he’s a single precious life, even if he’s hopelessly brainwashed into doing evil.  And then that sets up somebody else shooting him and the regeneration-that-isn’t-quite-finished and the Monks are done for and the Doctor is sane.  It would be a beautiful bookend to the Doctor sparing Missy.

But that’s probably not going to happen because Moffat and company love making Twelve suffer unduly.  Incidentally why on Earth would the Doctor still be traveling with Bill after this?  She screws everything up and gets him brainwashed and then she shoots him and everything’s hunky dory?  Shouldn’t there be some real consequences for that?

[MissRori @replies]

Awesome news everyone!  Rachel Talalay has been confirmed as directing this year’s Christmas special in addition to the season finale “World Enough and Time”/”The Doctor Falls”!

[MissRori @replies]

@bendubz11  That’s an interesting idea, but remember that trailers don’t always tell the truth when it comes to Who, especially when it comes to who lives, who dies, and who kills who.

Also, it is a BBC approved spoiler to say that the Twelfth Doctor appears in all the remaining Series 10 episodes.  How can his death be a fixed point and yet he’s still having wacky adventures and fighting those old-school Cybermen?  If  he does regenerate, why doesn’t his appearance change this time?   How will this affect the numbering of the merchandise?  😉

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Looking elsewhere, this episode looks likely to go down as the “Kill the Moon” of Series 10 in the fandom — a seriously contrived storyline with a lot of bad science, and then Bill Potts had to go and do that thing.  Yeah, she’s plummeting in the companion popularity polls already.

(sigh)  I think the intent with her choice was akin to the Doctor’s choices in “Extremis”.  Knowing she has a chance to save the Doctor and humanity in one fell swoop, she takes it, saving every life she can.

In practice though, it doesn’t work as well.  It’s not “Without hope, without witness, without reward.”  She’s saving him because she doesn’t want to lose him and figures that he’ll “repay” her by saving her and all the rest of the people she’s just condemned to slavery — in fact, she demands she repay her — “You better save my planet.”  She expects to gain things for this.  And when you look at how similar situations were treated in other episodes — River Song in “The Wedding of River Song” with the Eleventh Doctor, the Twelfth Doctor himself in “Hell Bent” with Clara — well, she’s being just as selfish.

If Me can condemn the broken, mad Doctor for risking the universe “because you miss her”, sane Bill must face condemnation next week.  Instead, the trailers are suggesting the poor Doctor will get the short end of the straw again in terms of how he’s treated by the narrative.

Yay for our plucky heroine!  She better really redeem herself next week and make the in extremis choice when the time comes.

[MissRori @replies]

(weep)  Poor, poor Doctor.  His pride went before a fall — but as in “Oxygen”, he was willing to accept the consequences.

But Bill couldn’t, and as the AVClub review points out, she made a “never give up” decision by saving the Doctor’s life despite the terrible fate that will be revealed in next week’s episode.  That Next Time trailer…(sob)

[MissRori @replies]

Great covers!  And here’s the BBC synopsis of “The Empress of Mars”, Mark Gatiss’s script for the season, for those who haven’t yet seen it.

The Doctor, Bill and Nardole arrive on Mars, and find themselves in an impossible conflict between Ice Warriors… and Victorian soldiers. As the Martian hive awakens around them, the Doctor faces a unique dilemma – this time the humans, not the Ice Warriors are the invaders. When Earth is invading Mars, whose side is he on?

If this means another awesome monologue for Twelve, I’m all for that!  Also, could this turn out to be connected to the events of “Thin Ice”?  Brrrr…

 

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(bounce bounce bounce) I want to jump ahead to part two already and I haven’t even seen it yet!  The forum will be hot tonight!  😀

But, um, why didn’t anybody mention World War III was looming in the previous episodes?  I wouldn’t be worrying about moving into my own place at a time like that Bill!  🙂  And surely Nardole would have reminded the Doctor “Hey, you know about that U.S./China/Russia conflict, right?  Missy might get a little antsy…”  😉

Poor Doctor.  He could just tell the Monks he and humanity will die free, but babies don’t die with honor.  But protecting humanity by agreeing to the plan is a shame…unless he’s got something up his sleeve they won’t see coming!  But they see everything coming.  Or do they?  😀  I must know!

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@missy @countscarlioni The Daleks would be an interesting reveal, but so far I get the sense these creatures are either working on their own or for some other greater force.  Perhaps Missy’s found a way to escape the Vault?  Or the Great Intelligence is back?  It once employed human monks to do its dirty work.  I don’t think Time Lords are completely out of the question — especially as nothing related to following up on Gallifrey’s fate and the Doctor’s relationship with it has turned up this season. Maybe they’re a ruined, splinter sect?

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@arbutus  @thane15 Timey-wimey?  Perhaps….

Sim-Doctor said that using the special device only would grant him eyesight for a little while and come at the cost of later regenerations — at worst he might not able to regenerate ever again.  So assuming real-Doctor has a similar device, he doesn’t intend to use it unless a really really big problem comes along that absolutely demands he be able to see.  He seems okay, from what we’ve seen (ha!) so far, with just using the upgraded sonic sunglasses to deal with the Monks; that’s what he wears in “The Pyramid at the End of the World” at least.

Does he want them to not know he’s blind because he’s vulnerable, or because it might give him — at least for a while — an advantage over their abilities?

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Spoiler-free advance reviews are starting to come in for “The Pyramid at the End of the World”!

From the sounds of it, this has many similarities to the Series 9 Zygon story’s first half as the Doctor and co. investigate an extremely clever enemy and war looms.  Not surprising, since this is from the same writers (Peter Harness and Steven Moffat).   More straightforward storytelling than “Extremis”, but the stakes are getting high-as-can-be as the Monks reveal their nature and their so-well-researched plan…  😉

No returning characters aside from the Doctor, Bill, and Nardole — and of course, the Monks — according to the DoctorWhoTV.co.uk review.  The critic was disappointed that UNIT isn’t involved; I am too, since this sounds like a natural fit for Kate Stewart and co. and from the synopses of the remaining episodes I can’t see them getting worked into those.  But I suppose that would have made it too similar to the Zygon show.  How cool would Bill meeting Osgood have been?

Sounds like this one is a great showcase for Pearl Mackie in particular.  It’s heavy-duty drama but Nardole provides some levity and the Doctor’s guitar turns up too.  😀

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@ichabod and the story of the frog and scorpion:

Are we here to learn to be heroes — ethical, empathic, reasonable, and kind — by simply refusing to be scorpions?  Without hope, without recognition or reward and often without even success, to reach always toward the good because we choose to?

Well, the moral of the story I and others have commonly taken from it is “Don’t trust and help anybody you know is dangerous when they’re in need; it’s all your fault if they hurt you.”  I first read a version of it on an anti-drug bookmark back in high school.  So if the Doctor were following the Aesop, he’d have let Missy fry and happily guarded her corpse for 1,000 years!

But again, you may be right @ichabod.  Maybe that’s our purpose on this little blue-and-green ball.

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BBC America released its synopsis of “The Pyramid at the End of the World”, plus more pics and such.

BBC America summary

An ‘ancient’ pyramid appears overnight. Every clock in the world begins counting down to the Earth’s destruction. Three opposing armies lie ready to annihilate each other. An alien race stands ready to offer humanity a deal that could save them, but enslave them. It’s a terrifying race against time to save the world! Will the Doctor be forced to accept their help?

It’s part two of three, so…probably yes.  🙁

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@mirime, I’ve read a good theory on this, but I’m afraid that’s under the Spoiler thread.  🙂

@morpho, There is something substantial to this story — it’s confirming and expanding upon the most important element of the Twelfth Doctor’s character in this season, perhaps his whole run.

At heart, this is about his determination and willingness to do the right thing no matter what.  The two story threads aren’t much on their own, granted, but together they support and enrich each other.  Both the Doctor in the past and the Sim-Doctor are faced with darkness itself, hopeless situations.

The Doctor of the past is faced with executing a terrible person, a person who has caused grief for so many but most of all him.  And he’s killed enemies so many times before that he’s listed as a cause of death!  But she was his friend, and she is a life.  She has feelings.  She was not born/built to be a monster, like the Daleks or Cybermen who cannot be reasoned with or redeemed.  Has he the right to snuff out her life?  He won’t benefit from her living.  But that’s not the point of doing good, is it?

The Sim-Doctor is faced with, as the AVClub.com review puts it, “a world without hope”.  He and his fellows are all ones and zeroes, the unwitting slaves of the Monks, created for a terrible purpose — the invasion of the real Earth.  To try and save that world, those who realize the truth willingly die — if they aren’t killed first.  But Sim-Doctor realizes there’s something more he can do before the end: Send his real world counterpart a message, tell him to save the flesh-and-blood…especially his friends.  Either way, he will cease to exist; he has no promised land waiting him for his sacrifice, just The End.  He has no idea if the real Doctor will be able to stop the threat.  But with nothing left to gain or lose, why not do what is right instead of just giving in to The End?

Both men do the right thing.  The Doctor spares Missy and begins his guardianship of the Vault.  The Sim-Doctor dies…but he is the first hero of this unfolding story.

This is the mid-point of the season; from here on out the challenges for the Doctor and his friends will grow, of course.  But sad as this tale is, as scared as he is at the end, there is a kernel of hope in it.  That no matter how dark things become, he will still do what is right, no matter what.

And if he expects nothing for his goodness…then that only makes whatever happiness comes in his wake sweeter.

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@thane15 Ah, that does clear things up on my forgiveness question.  Thank you Thane!  🙂

Yes, the Doctor has much to teach us.  How well has Bill learned, I wonder?  😉

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@thane15  Sorry about that Thane.  I’ll try to be better in the future.  🙂

@ichabod  Glad to hear from you!  Yes, I was actually thinking about “The Scorpion and the Frog” earlier tonight/today (this is a day off from work, and I work odd hours).  Between this gloomy unfolding storyline — so much to anticipate and dread in the coming weeks!  — and the horrible news coming out of Manchester, my mood is very low right now.  Your sensitive “lecture” actually does make sense, and it’s probably the best answer to the questions I have than anything.  “Good enough”…

(hugs)

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@whisht  I agree that an episode that turns out to involve a Freaky Friday-style swap for the Doctor and Missy would be fun, but from the synopses of the remaining episodes this season I doubt that’s going to happen — first the Monks storyline has to be wrapped up with the next two episodes, then there’s the Ice Warriors episode, then an episode with a threat TBD, then the 2-part finale.

Isn’t having Saxon turn up at some point enough?  😀

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Oops — I meant “without witness” in that last quote.  Virtue looks to be the only thing the Doctor has left in the end!  😀

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And another thing!  😉

Let’s face it…the Doctor can’t trust Missy as far as he can throw her.  Letting her live could be seen as at least as big a threat to the space-time continuum as saving Clara from her death in “Hell Bent” was, thinking about it.

I understand the idea that the Doctor’s decision to spare her stems from his most virtuous, courageous, Doctor-y self recognizing that (bar wholly-evil, irredeemable creatures like Daleks) every individual life is precious and that true virtue is selfless. After all, it’s a major theme of the season.

But doesn’t sparing Missy, who will inevitably be free to slaughter again and can never be good no matter what she says, make him no better than say, the Landlord?  Isn’t it just as flawed as saving Ashildr/Me from death’s door in a risky way?  Isn’t it just as selfish an act as rescuing Clara from her unjust death was presented as being?  Wouldn’t River Song have understood him letting Missy fry?  Clara certainly would have.

At heart, I know he’s doing what’s right; I couldn’t bring myself to let another person fry either.  But “Without hope, without virtue, without reward”…if that is to be the Doctor’s fate in “The Doctor Falls” for doing what’s right, well, no wonder there are so few heroes in this world!

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Also, regarding the Monks’ simulations and abilities…if the prospect of a world war is central to the pyramid episode next week, why didn’t anybody bring this up earlier in the season?  You’d think the President of Earth would read the papers…  😉

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@tardigrade I agree, especially regarding the blindness issue — he can’t voluntarily regenerate just to solve that.  And if it’s cured before he regenerates, it will probably be a happy side effect of something else.  He lost his sight because he acted too rashly, yet nobly and heroically.  What would be the counterpart to regain it?…

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Yes, this disaster is another heartbreaker — it’s suspected of being an attack, and if it is, they were targeting preteens and teens…(weep). And then there’s the online reactions– ugly and cruel ones — on top of that. It’s so hard to see hope for the world these days.  I’ve sent up a Lord’s Prayer.

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@geoffers That’s a neat idea.  Michelle Gomez’s latest io9 interview today noted that she’s the kind of craven person who’d do anything to escape the Vault and save her own skin.  But this supposedly false Doctor is doing too good a job at being the real one then.  And it would severely diminish the Doctor and Bill’s relationship if most of the season she didn’t actually know him, and take away from developments like his blindness.  It would be audacious but make most of the season feel like a cheat.  And how would they swap bodies anyway?

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@tardigrade I was going to say the same thing — regeneration by suicide would be too dark and family-unfriendly for this show.

The next two episodes could both turn out to be multiple simulations or just one — I like the idea that another Sim-Doctor, or even the real Doctor, lets them conquer and then surprises them — but pulling the rug out from under us again at least once could really upset a lot of fans who are tired of those kinds of plot twists.  There seem to be a lot of fans of Series 10 who felt let down by this episode for being another “puzzle” story, and a grim one at that, when things had been so easy to follow and relatively light up to this point; feeling it was completely pointless aside from the Missy scenes since the sim plot only sets up the real storyline of the next two episodes and nothing more. (Though they seem to miss the parallels between real Doctor saving Missy and Sim-Doctor “dying” in hopes of saving the real world.)

On the other hand, the situation of “The Lie of the Land” — humanity and the Doctor, all (save for Bill — and why?) deluded by the Monks, let them put up their new world order in unknowing preparation for the slaughter, uniforms and all — sounds like something that needs to be “reset” at the end ala The Year that Never Was so the rest of the season doesn’t deal with its fallout…

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Now, going back to how the Monks storyline will be resolved (assuming they don’t figure into later episodes)…”The Lie of the Land”‘s official synopsis has it that the Monks put humanity and the Doctor under its spell and they are now slaving away for them without realizing they’ve been conned.  But Bill is immune and must convince the Doctor of the real Truth, or have to kill him since he’s on the wrong side and, from the Radio Times teaser quotes, is ready to kill her for not seeing the false “Truth”.

But how can Bill be immune to something powerful enough to deceive a Time Lord’s super-brain and the rest of humanity to the point that the Earth immediately becomes a police state with insignia of the Monks everywhere and little statues of Monks on desks as they ask the Monks to conquer all…a police state that presumably will instantly disappear after this story wraps up, ala the Year that Never Was?

The answer could be one of the following:

1. Bill has a special power she was never aware of until now, a natural defense.  Maybe she’s not human after all?  Or human, but with some kind of one-of-a-kind brain issue?  Might there be an explanation for her strange relationship with the photo of her mum, how she talks and even calls out to it?
2. The Doctor gives Bill something with which to see the Truth before everyone else is brainwashed, perhaps serving as a cliffhanger for “The Pyramid at the End of the World”.  But why wouldn’t he keep something like that if he only has the one, since he’s the Doctor and she isn’t?
3. Bill is the only one actually brainwashed into a complete illusion that the world has been conquered.  The Monks have realized that the Doctor is very powerful, and that he and Bill are very close, so turning her into their agent and having her slay him would help out a lot.  The Doctor and his cohorts are trying to help her, but she’s stuck in the delusion and she winds up shooting him, triggering the fake-out regeneration but also allowing him to 1) heal his blindness and 2) restore her sanity.  On the other hand, she’s still going to be a companion after this…
4. The Doctor is the only one actually brainwashed into the complete illusion, and it’s Bill trying to save him.  When he realizes what’s going on, to parallel what happened to his Sim-self he allows himself to partially regenerate, whether by letting Bill hurt him (she can’t shoot him fatally, else it would have to be the full-on regeneration) or voluntarily, despite the risks to future selves.

Well, we’ll see if it’s any, all or none in 2 weeks!  😉

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(hmm)  From what I can tell from what has been released so far — which is really just the Radio Times synopsis — the plot of the season finale “World Enough and Time” / “The Doctor Falls” seems to be that on a space station near a black hole, the Doctor takes the rashest risk of his lives out of friendship, when he witnesses “someone he is pledged to protect” die.  AKA Missy from what we’ve seen so far.  Somehow, trying to save her leads to a confrontation with the Mondasian Cybermen — billed as the Doctor’s “final battle”.

The black hole is probably the metaphorical pit mentioned in “Extremis”, and the synopsis had the episode’s teaser quote be “Without hope, without witness, without reward”.  I think the heart of this episode is the Doctor-Missy relationship coming full circle, and resolving Heather and the companions’ stories on the side.

The Christmas show could be the One/Twelve crossover adventure, but it would more likely — as has been rumored — be the story of how they each contributed to the rescue of Gallifrey in “The Day of the Doctor”.

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@frobisher I’ve actually wondered if they would try a Wonderful Life plot for Twelve, because it would fit into that Doctor’s character arc, or just revisit “The Tenth Planet”, but as you noted the ending would be rather grim even by regeneration standards.  Also, it would be rather similar to “Turn Left” conceptually.

The Doctor splitting into two has been floated elsewhere, but — and this is also an issue with revisiting One, at least over multiple episodes– it hinges on the modern-Who-only viewers and/or kids really caring about relatively obscure continuity.  One reason “Day of the Doctor” was centered on new series Doctors, though it featured vintage villains in the b-plot, was to make it accessible to both old and newer fans.

Also, I think there are enough things on the finale and Christmas show’s plate without an alternate continuity to deal with.  😉  Such as Nardole and Bill’s fates, the resolution to Heather’s story (which, as @pedant noted, seems to have to do with the Cybermen), and the Twelfth Doctor-Missy relationship finding closure.  At least on Tumblr there are a lot of fans hoping Twelve sees Clara one last time, if only in his mind’s eye as happened with Amy.

And what about Twelve returning to Gallifrey to mend his burnt bridges with his people and giving us the space opera other fans wanted “Hell Bent” to be?  And whatever happened to Kate and the Osgoods, and Ohila?

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One of the Radio Times’ many Who articles has a lot of evidence  that the clip of the “regeneration” is indeed from “The Lie of the Land”, the final part of the Monks storyline.  The Monks’ insignia is everywhere in the photos and clips, suggesting that this comes during the planet’s delusion that’s allowed them to conquer all.  And the Doctor’s coat is the same.

So…is this regeneration a delusion?  Does poor Bill shoot the hypnotized Doctor to save her skin?  Does she just wing him?  Will he get his sight back?  Is it indeed a 10-style partial regeneration?  Questions questions….  😉

Edit:  Oh, the 1st Doctor Xmas would be sweet, but would the newWho only fans care much?  🙁

 

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@blenkinsopthebrave  That’s an interesting possibility but as a Capaldi/Twelve fan I’ll be hurt if he doesn’t get a send off at Christmas like Ten and Eleven did.  He already had fewer episodes and no extra specials.

I don’t think he’ll fully regenerate before Christmas.  A lot suggests it’s going to turn out to be a slow regeneration, like a terminal illness.  Or the clip is from a fake out regeneration like Ten had.  Or it’s the Monks messing with his brain.  Or…

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Well, maybe it’s one person literally split in two?  😉

Meanwhile at io9’s review, the critic noted that the Doctor’s shabby coat in the Missy scenes is the same one he wears in the regeneration tease clips in the trailer for Series 10…

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@blenkinsopthebrave IIRC, that idea was being floated in the days of Pertwee but Delgado’s death nixed that or other ideas on what made them so close and yet so far from each other.  Moffat reviving something like that now…hmmmm….

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@thane15 Hey Puro, I see your point about his many past wrongs (as I noted yesterday he does seem to be an atoning Doctor from the start).  And yeah, he’s having truth issues with Bill, an interesting parallel.  But I’m still unclear on how this connects to “Hell Bent” and its events, and the point on forgiveness and the person doing it…Missy seems like a grudge-holder so why should the Doc waste his breath seeking it?  That just reminds me how Ohila and the General claimed he was cruel and cowardly exiling Rassilon instead of forgiving him the way he did, say, Bonnie.  Rassilon would never have been worthy of forgiveness, but the Doctor showed mercy instead of letting him fry or rot in prison…  Just wondering.  🙂

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