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@tardisblue And thank you for complimentary words. I’m afraid in many ways I’m not even out of primary school  re Dr Who (I’ve been there a long time though 🙂 )

 

Argh! Just realised this post was meant to be On the Sofa! Any mods want to move it, feel free

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@scatamonky I like your summing up. That makes sense to me.

@danmartinuk has a new article on Buzzfeed – some great gifs and screengrabs, and  a few things I missed. (I’m still not convinced about definitely seeing Hurt regenerate into Eccleston tho)

http://www.buzzfeed.com/paulaersly/greatest-easter-eggs-from-the-doctor-who-50th-anniver

 

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Yikes! (that was for @whohar (complete with little jump!) (and please keep your dodgy watery perversions to yourself in future – I have to go and buy ANOTHER bloomin keyboard. Next one’s going to be waterproof) 😉

@tardisblue

a section for SIDwhatever it is

SIDRAT (reverse the letters to get an easy way to remember 😉 (Check out The War Games (Troughton’s last story) for more info)

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@craig @Shazzbot @jimthefish @phaseshift @pedant and everyone

@tardisblue Thanks v much for your summing up and suggestions – a blog for especially long posts makes a lot of sense I think. It’s what we’ve done in the past for theses/PhD posts/life’s work publications that are longer, and slightly off the current topics.

Been a funny week this week – lots of new members to welcome  and  that post-Xmas feeling when the friends/family have gone back home, we’ve opened all the presents but aren’t sure which ones to play with. We’ve got a month till New Year, with a promised surprise, and some nasty Daleks threatening to teleport in and spoil it.

This space has always felt like a little DW family. Like the best families it has so far managed to accommodate a wide range of views and personalities. In the best sense we are “blind” – we interact on an intellectual level only. The downside of course is that we can miss all the little social cues from voice, body language etc. So it’s easy for things to be occasionally misunderstood, and disagreements to escalate.

I like to think we are a wide range of intergalactic species, with an equally wide range of abilities and disabilities. Some of us could be  hermaphroditic hexapods with one gigantic eye or tentacled heads in a glass dome needing constant life support.  We could include farting monsters, Ice Warriors or maybe even a cyberman or 2 rebelling against their conditioning.   We don’t know, but we are united in our membersip of this space and our love for this silly old TV show.

At any given time some of us will be hurting, grieving, be sick, intoxicated, panicking at RL, ecstatic, whatever.  We have different opinions on life, politics and Dr Who. It doesn’t matter.  It doesn’t matter if individuals have a strop from time to time, fall out, make up. It’s what adds colour to life. Sometimes people need their families more, sometimes less, but family is always the place you can come back to where they will welcome you and accept you as you are, unquestioningly. Like the Doctor we should aim to be the best we can. Sometimes we have to work at it.  Just a little.

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Aw, huge sympathies to @tardisblue It’s so easily done. (And yes @wolfweed‘s pic comment is spot on)

I’ve stopped googling Doctor Who now. I’d limit my internet access if I could, but some things just ain’t gonna happen! But I keep my specs off when I’m surfing!* (I’m even being cautious about whose posts I look at in here. Anyone who’s seen the spoiler won’t be able to stop it influencing how they think and post, even if they try)

You could always try copious amounts of absinthe in lieu of a memory worm (where are the damn things when you need them!)

 

*tribute to Douglas Adams’ wonderful invention of glasses that go completely dark when the wearer is in danger 😉

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@Shazzbot

Where is ‘our’ Doctor

Now the funny thing is, that for quite a number of us that’s exactly who Hartnell was from this very first episode! Our Doctor.

It’s hard to describe the impact on a 6 year old brain when those titles started way back then*.  It was a real calling card – shivers down the spine time. It looked and sounded quite unlike anything else, and the Doctor being a grumpy old git with an edge of danger put it just slightly beyond any other kids programmes at the time. We were used to “safe”. We were used to being brought “back home” at the end of a story – not delivered to 10,000 yrs BC with the ice age and decidedly unfriendly cavemen.  TV quality that was decidedly LoFi (only with hindsight tho). Fireball XL5 and supermarionation was cutting edge stuff!!

 

(There were rumours of something called Quatermass but that was years earlier, before even I was born, and nobody had a TV! Twilight Zone was USA and Outer Limits had only just started. But these were all for an older audience)

*Not to mention the hum as the thick doors opened… and roundels!

😉

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@wolfweed @jimthefish @all McWho fans

Anyone interested in a Glasgow Dr Who convention next year, please complete the short survey/wishlist on here http://glasgowdoctorwho.com/ (They’d surely get Strax at least as a guest!)

 

PS Wolfweed – was that the simplified version of the Doctors’ timelines..?

 

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@Shazzbot @phaseshift @bluesqueakpip @craig @everyone

I think it’ a great idea to have more communal viewings of BG Who (and I know Shazz is desperate to get going on the Mind Robber, LOL). But given all the flurry of theorising that’s going to be happening around ToTD, not to mention the small matter of Xmas itself, I think people may have limited time to do it. Sorry, I’ll rephrase that – I’ll have limited time!

But picking up again in the cold, dark month of postXmas January would get my vote. Perfect DW viewing time

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@Shazzbot

Bell’s of St Mary’s

That one took place in a branch line of an alternative timeline (manipulated by the GI then retconned by a Claricle)

🙂

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@Shazzbot Ahem! I said NORTH American very deliberately 😉 (Is including Canada in that not a bit like saying Scotland is part of England?)

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@bluesqueakpip – the TARDIS as battering ram – how good was that?! 😀 (Puts a different light on “I never take her into battle” in BoSJ)

And the threat that the Daleks were going to exterminate the cornered group, inc the little kids, felt very real. I realise it’s a lot to do with budgets, but I really like when they limit the number of Daleks on screen. They seem like a much bigger threat when you only show 1 or 2.  1 detemined grumpy Dalek is  all you need to kill you. And all your friends. They don’t need to move fast, they just need to be relentless.

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Oh, and happy thanksgiving to @Shazzbot and all our North American members 😀

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@jimthefish Agreed re fitting in Genesis etc as part of the War. Especially since DotD explicitly brought all the Doctor’s incarnations into the plan.

@bluesqueakpip Good quote

I suppose I’m reacting against the people who are clamouring to see the actual war in action, which I see as a craving for special effects, OMG dramatic visuals and a bit of visceral excitement at big explosions. Whereas I think what we got was much more powerful (the after effects of war, and how it affects the people who take part), and in keeping with the Doctor’s long history as peacemaker.

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@eltonjohn You’re likely to find something here, they have 1 or 2 items http://www.bbcshop.com/doctor-who/icat/drwho

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@thommck

I agree with you that the earlier stages of the Time War could have been like that – with the consequence on the rest of the universe of time constantly in flux – if you were caught in it, as collateral damage, you wouldn’t be able to live your life with any sort of stability or consistency. Maybe as in the Wedding of RS you would get times when “everything happens at once”.

But I also agree with @pedant that this is the Daleks we’re talking about – hatefilled, homicidal killng “machines” whose main motivation in everything is to “DESTROY”  Any manipulation of time they were doing was a means to an end – to get close enough to the TimeLords to exterminate them. (And anything else in their way)

You can only imagine the events that led up to this “last day”. (Incidentally – why is this the last day? (because the Dr (always?) ends it today, or because the Daleks are on the brink of victory?)). The Time Lords have used ALL their store of WMDs, except the Moment – how badly would these affect the innocent bystanders? They might not have the shootemup weapons the Daleks have (although we don’t know) but they sure know how to mess with people’s heads and timestreams.

As I’ve said elsewhere, we don’t need to see the details of the War onscreen. But we do need to see its effects.  We see it in the frightened, fleeing women and children. We see it in the exhausted and demoralised time- and war-ravaged War Doctor.  We see the effect the War Doctor has had, and the awareness that he’s probably been working as a guerilla-style lone wolf – the TimeLords are exasperated and a bit afraid of what he will do (but they have no solutions themselves (apart from Rassilon’s group who are busy making their own plans) and we see how effective he’s been against the Daleks who immediately stop the imminent extermination of the group of refugees they’ve rounded up when they sense the Doctor – their greatest enemy – is in the area.

And presumably once Gallifrey falls, the Daleks would indeed be masters of the universe, dedicated to destroying all “other” life.

Yet even he cannot find a way to finally end it. Until he meets the Moment. (Love it – the Ultimate Weapon, but it’s developed (I noticed they didn’t say it was deliberately built in) a conscience that will talk you out of using it!  (Does this suggest that TARDISes developed sentience also, rather than it being designed in?))

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@pedant @shazzbot

Christmas dinner – with stroppy teenagers (hello again to the Maitlands?) – maybe not hell on earth but I could see why Cybermen, the Silence and Weeping Angels might seem an enticing alternative.

😈

@devilishrobby Welcome, but just make sure that ANYTHING even remotely spoilerish only gets discussed on the Spoilers thread!  Better to be overcautious.  Thank you

@bluesqueakpip @thommck

Bow ties as infinity loops  – I like

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@denvaldron

I like your (very detailed!!) attempt to retcon the Curse and Scream into canon. Nice one.  Tom Baker’s scene at the end of DotD (and the Sisterhood’s reveal of choices available “now that Time Lord technology has moved on”) opens up a lot of additional (now legit) possibilities, and as you mentioned, the fact post War Doctor incarnations had blocked out that incarnation, certainly opens possibilities about other forgotten incarnations. He could even start as one Doctor eg Smith, go off and have the Curse incarnations and then opt to come back as Smith again ie as a “revisited” face.

Not that I think the show will, or should, go there, but it’s fun.

@billyboy1989

Welcome. We have, ahem, quite a lot to say! Hope you will too. Feel free to jump in whenever. But make sure ANY talk about spoilers only goes on the spoilers thread (some of us have a VERY low threshold)

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I agree that they are likely to be out of the timestream (for reasons I detailed on 50th thread a while back). so on my track record, that probably means they won’t be!

@whohar

it’s proabably not a standard cracker, more likely a Sontaran fragmentation grenade

Like it! (and just because a post wasn’t commented on, esp when there’s a deluge of them, doesn’t mean it wasn’t seen and appreciated! :rol: )

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Linda Lee looks shattered in this 🙁

Sorry – but it’s the first thing that struck me compared with the bouncey kid in the first videos she did.

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@pedant Ha! You’re going to be rivalling @wolfweed soon for keyboard repair claims 🙂

(meant to say, loved your 13 for 13 list (even tho I missed some of the links!))

You mentioned “A LOST SHOE REFERENCE!” – What was that? I missed it (too busy squeeing over false trails of family relationships 🙂 (I have a certificate in squeeing now, don’t you know!)

 

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@pedant

::hangs head in shame at being in the wrong timestream when your earlier post went up. I’m obv following the tracks of your trails round the newsfeeds – but a few timehops behind you 🙁  We do have the same good taste though 🙂 ::

All hail your pedantic awesomeness!

::crosses fingers that’ll keep him happy and he won’t bring out the troll-basher::

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@geoffers check out The Curse of Fatal Death, a special for Red Nose day 1999; while obv not canon, it’s a good insight into Moffat’s ideas on multiple Doctors, including the very definitely female Joanna Lumley!

If the Doctor’s changing gender or race, it needs to be first and foremost story driven, not done for the gimmick-factor or as a response to outside pressures.  And only if the actor is the right. As someone else said upstream Moff’s done more to make it possible, in-story, than anyone else (refs to the Corsair, and in the recent NightotD)).

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Our favourite show continues to impress with the numbers for the 50th.

This time it’s in the USA where a special cinema screening on Monday (2 days after a record breaking broadcast on TV) was second only to the Hunger Games ($4.8m ).  (Saturday’s screening in the UK saw it ranking 3rd after the Hunger Games and Gravity).  Will be interesting to see the timeshifted numbers for the TV broadcast. Would be great of some of the cash from this and the merchandising could find its way back to the production team 😉

http://insidetv.ew.com/2013/11/26/doctor-who-box-office/

 

 

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From Paul McGann’s twitter – Prize board at Rada – As he puts it “includes a future River Song and 2 TimeLords”

https://twitter.com/pauljmcgann/status/402787345578983424/photo/1/large

 

 

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@denvaldron @bluesqueakpip

It’s not that there’s anything wrong with the French – far from it. It’s just a traditional tease, between former enemies (and occasional allies), like the Scots/English thing. Like Canada/USA?

Ooops, this is how wars start 😉

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@bluesqueakpip @pedant

OK, OK… you’ve all convinced me that Osgood probably ( 😉 ) isn’t Kate’s daughter (dammit – another good theory bites the dust!)

@juniperfish

I am a firm believer that the creation/ the text is greater than the creator

I agree with that.  This whole site is based on it, haha!

I also agree that the 2 timestreams exist. It’s right that the Dr had to do “penance” for at one time condemning Gallifrey’s children to death (in the name of peace and sanity). He had to do the penance, so that when he gets the chance to do it differently he will sieze it. But it also takes Clara (the human POV) as the catalyst – she is the one who insists there must be another solution (even though she doesn’t know what it is). The Doctor(s) at that point were only going for reconciliation with their previous self – sharing the responsibility with him (which is a step as up till them they had been blaming him for their suffering). The final solution gives redemption to the War Dr as well as hope for the children of Gallifrey (now frozen in a moment of time, hidden away somewhere, as opposed to burning in a hell.

@geoffers

Agree that the Daleks we’ve seen over the whole 50 years of the series are not seen linearly.  Some are clearly more advanced than others. And agree that it’s very likely the timetravelling ones could have been participating in the Time War. Ditto re Genesis.

I don’t share some people’s need to see the Hoard of Travesties, the Skaro Degradations etc.  For all Dr Who can (now) do big SFX, it’s not a show that glories in showing battles, and visceral bits. What we need to see are its effects, to understand how far the War Dr has been pushed. This is the end game.   Gallifrey is a war zone, non participating peoples are as terrified of the TimeLords as they are of the Daleks, the Time Lords themselves are desperate – all their weapons (up to the Moment, which the Dr has just run off with) have been used up –  and not worked; the Doctor is a war-weary, battlescarred warrior, pushed so far by his experiences that the only solution seems to be to destroy everything, including the children.

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PS @denvaldron – Every country has a Celine Dion lurking in its attics 😈

 

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Yay!! Controversy 🙂

Am fine if people don’t see a closer relationship between Osgood and Kate, but it’s certainly open to that interpretation (for the reasons in my post above) – so in the absence of concrete evidence to the contrary, I’m sticking to it. 😀  (@shazzbot – O doesn’t look nearly familiar enough with her situation to have been around for long – certainly not long enough for Kate to have acquired the “inhaler!” instinct)

I MAY concede to @pedant that my ears have possibly been to a few too many loud gigs in their time 🙂

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@Shazzbot

ta for support, but ‘s ok – we were just batting actors back and forth.

But you and @denvaldron  both missed the obvious, and the reason I particularly namechecked BC – he was most recently on screen as a certain Sydney Newman! (In AAiS&T)

😀

Re CB – sadly the scripts mostly didn’t allow him to display very much in the way of charm! (I still say he could’ve been a great Master)

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@denvaldron

I’ll see your Star Wars Ewan McGregor and raise you a Brian Cox

🙂

 

PS Not knocking Lexx btw, loved it, esp first couple  of series. (Dr Who isn’t pure sci fi either, but they both include elements of SF)

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Recent tweet from McGann –

Paul McGann ‏@pauljmcgann 21h Staring out of a window and waiting for a phone call–doing what an actor does best.

An actor’s life indeed.

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@pedant

Nah. It’s a classic trusted PA trope. Important people have “people”. She is Kate’s  Clara to the Doctor’s..er.. Clara.

Doesn’t rule out a mother/daughter relationship tho. Bring your kids to work and all that. Osgood comes over more as intern than “trusted PA”. She’s hanging about, not quite sure where she fits in yet, she seems new to things, but very keen.

@thommck

If she is definitely her daughter, why not bill her as so*

Spoilers!!

😉

 

*As she’s Kate’s daughter (cos I say so!) her surname probably wouldn’t be Lethbridge-Stewart (love the anagram potential)

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@pedant

If it was just the pronunciation then I might concede ambiguity, but not when combined with “inhaler” – you don’t instruct an employee or an intern in that way. Kate knows without even thinking about it when Osgood needs an inhaler (which roughly coincides (in a meta-ref way) with fangasms in the audience, LOL). Plus she has Kate’s personal phone.

(And subtitlers have been known to get it wrong! 😈 )

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Lovely interview – when  Verity Lambert met RTD (a few years ago obv).  Some very interesting things to say about casting an older Doctor, haha

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@Shazzbot – you’re right tho – it’s Kate’s phone (which Osgood says when she answers). Don’t care whose it is – I want one!!

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@Shazzbot She definitely says “Mum”  Plus Kate’s “inhaler!”  That’s long-practised parental phrasing; and the “uh” pronunciation is unmistakable. (trust me on this! (@Bluesqueakpip will tell you I’ve been going on about it since we left the cinema 🙂 ))

 

Re similarities between the Moment and Idris – agree, that’s very clearly signposted. They are both highly developed (possibly the ultimate in) Time Lord tech.

 

Oh, and welcome back Shazz – we’ve missed your virtual self (tho your RL substitute was great 😉 )

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Oh, and re Osgood – she’s the Brig’s grand-daughter* (been trying to find the ref since Sat).  When she gets the phone call (at 02.28) – she has a TARDIS engines ringtone (I want one too!) – she runs off to Kate, “Mum, Mum… ” (02.33)   The other clue is Kate’s automatic reminders – “inhaler!” (very parental)

 

*Unless she’s adopted of course 😉

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@badwolfie @denvaldron

Was just about to post my agreement re choice of Rose as interface, but @bluesqueakpip got there first (and more eloquently than I would have put it)  😉

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@denvaldron

the reality is that the pool of English actors really isn’t that vast, and you do see faces coming back

AHEM!!!!! ::stamps foot::

That’s probably why Dr Who extends its casting hunt to include ALL the UK (3 Scottish Doctors and 1 Irish one so far; no Welsh one yet tho).

Thanks to @whohar and @janetteb for not making the same oversight 😉

 

PS Lexx’s internal logic was even more bonkers than DW

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Absolutely stonking review in the Metro (which of course we love!) “Perfect Doctor Who”  And they do a lovely shout-out to RTD as well, for bringing it back in the first place.

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@craig @Shazzbot @jimthefish @phaseshift

We seem to have a possible Zygon problem with @thekrynoidman – or maybe he’s a claricle – replicated over all of time and space. (Sorry,  just reporting multiple repeat posting – am assuming accidental)

(Phaseshift and @wolfweed – this site was left in your supposedly capable hands for a night – and you broke it!!! 😉 )

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@wolfweed – Great links as ever.

I am extremely impressed with Matt’s public appearances. He manages to project awareness that 1D are bandwagon jumping but can afford to be magnanimous.  Maybe he sneakily switched on the sonic to disrupt the broadcast.  His interview with Linda Lee is delightful – he turns it back on her, and asks her some questions instead. You can see the pressure sliding away from her when he does that. Note on Linda Lee – I feel just a bit uncomfortable about how hard they seem to be working her. Bring her to the convention by all means, but then they make her work for it. I’m sure she loves it, but she looks tired in the MS interview.  She’s only 5 FFS.  (Hope she doesn’t grow up hating the show).

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The numbers for Day of the Doctor are impressive –

Overnights of 10.2m, and a 38% audience share in its timeslot. Walloped the XFactor and will surely do the same to Strictly… when the timeshifted figs come in (Given that it’s still sitting rock solid at no 1 on iplayer this morning).   Even more impressive when you consider that a sizeable chunk of the usual TV audience was at the cinema!  (And that’s just the UK figs)

13,000 tweets in 1 minute on Saturday night – http://www.entertainmentwise.com/news/133622/Doctor-Who-The-Day-Of-The-Doctor-Generates-13000-Tweets-In-One-Minute (with an interesting 60:40 female:male split!), and a total of almost half a million tweets were posted in relation to the show (presumably more that weren’t properly hashtagged)*

 

*This comment in no way endorses the habit of tweeting thro programmes – I’m with Strax on this!

 

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:: waves hello to @ronprice::  (maybe @Shazzbot or another mod can sort out the formatting in your post which seems to have gone a bit loopy). Interesting post, from a slightly different perspective, thanks

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@wolfweed

Welcome, @nallie & @groovylord

From me too.

re the Police Phone box with the scarf  wrapped round it (you posted the photo the other day) – I passed it earlier and it seems to have acquired a fez as well 🙂  (I’ll try to check it later when it’s not so dark and get a pic if poss (or maybe someone else will))

LOL’d at the cartoon

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@chickenelly You saw it at the O2?? Me and @bluesqueakpip were there too. Shame we didn’t know beforehand.  We were the 2 in 3D glasses, fairly near the front, squeeing regularly throughout! 😀  Wasn’t it great to watch as a big communal experience with everyone applauding/laughing etc at the same time?

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@bluesqueakpip @ardaraith

Re still being in the timestream – and just when I’d finally theorised them out of it! (Took me 6 months that did!) May have to go back to sitting on the fence.

But  it can still work without them still being in the decaying timestram. Having sorted out his dodgy past, and presumably finally got rid of the angst, Eleven now has one more thing to sort out – his own death at Trenzalore (otherwise there’s not a lot of dramatic trension left in the series, so long as he never goes back there).  So he has to go back.   He (probably) won’t leave again. We (think) we know that Capaldi takes over in the Xmas episode.  We think there will be a regeneration.

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Still basking in the warm glow left by the 50th (just as well as it’s -5 outside (and yes, I know this is “warm” for some of the colonials)). Rewatched on 2D iplayer, and still loved it, possibly even more. I thought it was a brilliant show for a 50th anniversary.

It’s absolutely stuffed with references and resonances from throughout the series (as others have said too).

Picked up this lot from the first minute –

The First’s opening titles.  And the music. It whisked me right back to 1963, to seeing them for the very first time. Seeing it on a wide screen, in 3D came very close to generating the same feelings – of hitting the chills-spot on the back of the neck, realising this was going to be something very different… and that I wanted to go on for the ride. (Didn’t realise back then it was going to be quite such a long ride!) Seriously, they could’ve stopped it there and I’d’ve been happy! That was genius.

Then –

I. Chesterton is the Chair of  Governors of Coal Hill School (Ian stayed in touch with his old school)

W. Coburn is the headmaster (callout to Anthony Coburn who wrote An Unearthly Child (bit ironic when his son was threatening to sue the BBC recently).  Could the W be for C E Webber, who was also involved in the script, but uncredited?

Clara (or a Claricle?) is a teacher there. Took me a little while to unpick what she wipes off the board but it’s this –

“Waste no more time arguing about what a good man should be. Be one.”

It’s a quote from Roman emperor and philosopher Marcus Aurelius – but the bits that jump out are “No more” and “a good man” (ref to AGMGTW title?)

Clara leaves the school at 5.16 (which means the class must have been dismissed about 5pm – ahem! but that’s being ungrateful!) (time of the orig broadcast)

Skipping to the end –

When all the Doctors are lined up (interesting that Hartnell is not in the line – suggesting he is indeed the original?) – what planet are they overlooking – is it Gallifrey?

I thought it was lovely that the end credits listing for “The Doctor” names all of them, in order, from Smith back to Hartnell. Despite C Baker’s moaning, I think there was due reverence paid to ALL the Doctors. And as @pedant pointed out Delia Derbyshire finally gets a credit for the music.

We got all got a bit sidetracked with the fact it was John Hurt playing the Doctor that I think a bit of the significance of it slipped past. Well it did for me. For the 50th anniversary show, Moffat sneaked in a whole new Doctor! (in fact 2, if you include bringing McGann properly into the fold)

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In a strange timey wimey coincidence I found myself watching a bit of Spielberg’s TinTin tonight… part scripted by one S Moffat – his last job before he went off to showrun DW.

It features a mystery crossing generations, a man who has forgotten “how to be himself” (failing to live up to his ancestor’s standards). The bit that caught my attention as I was passing was when a character who thinks he’s a locked-in prisoner discovers the door is open all the time! Followed not long after by a flight in a small plane through a thick wall of dark clouds with lightning forking out of them – a monochrome time vortex looky-likey. My squealed pointing out of these exciting parallels was met by polite “so what” shrugs. ::sighs:: Back to reality 😉

::waves @hudsey:: Glad you enjoyed the Excel 😀

Just realised that if/when gallifrey is found that the Master will be there won’t he? Just sayin’

Maybe. But maybe not!

re the roundels on the wall at the end. Indeedy they would appear to be TARDIS inspired, but are they not actually like that in real life? And therefore yet another legacy of DW.  (But agree, I noticed they were rather TARDISy looking too).  Some of the  floors at the Excel also features lines of  small roundels (sorry, should’ve taken pics). They are everywhere and as a design motif that can be traced back to 1960s DW. (OK, someone prove me wrong!)

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@bluesqueakpip You said of the Doctors –

The casing may be different, but the software’s the same.

I really like that.

Also like @jimthefish‘s theory that T Baker at the end might still be the Moment. (love how Gallifreyan tech seems to have a habit of becoming sentient).

Sorry to disagree with those who feel the Zygon sub-plot is weak.  I agree that they are more like a band of shipwrecked pirates rather than a full-on invasion force – they no longer have a planet cos of those dam’ TimeLords and Daleks.

I really liked the whole resonance with real life that I thought vibrated all through the story, and that I posted about above.  On top of the BRB moral dilemma (ultimately protect the children) there’s a story about migrants – incomers – the Zygon/human negotiations. The more you think about it, the stronger it becomes – each side has to negotiate  a fair outcome when they don’t know which side they’re going to end up on. Plus – there are Zygons living amongst us. NOW.  We don’t know who they are – they could be your next door neighbour…  When they’re in copy mode, does that mean they also eat what the originals  eat?  So are really indistinguishable.

The moment when all 3 Doctors are going to press the Moment button together is wrong – we in the audience know that this doesn’t feel quite right. It’s reconciliation but not redemption.  And it takes the human perspective (albeit a very special human) to point it out.

 

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