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Forgot to post about how much I enjoyed this!  It’s been a while since I was creeped out enough by Doctor Who that I was tempted to pretend I was watching and look at something else during some parts. lol.  Since I live alone, this is entirely silly but parts of this spooked me!  No mind-blowing theorising coming from me, need to go back and read what your lovely brains have managed to fire out.

So far, this series is impressing me more than the last one.  I still enjoyed aspects of Capaldi’s first run but the whole time, I felt like what I was really waiting for was something to make it all worthwhile.  Some sort of pay-off that never quite came.  I certainly wouldn’t say I hated it, but already this series has coaxed me into watching each episode multiple times.  Excited to see this week’s!

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Rewatching it again now.  The whole afterlife theme is definitely strong during Capaldi’s reign so far, my mind keeps drifting to Omega, who is another figure I admittedly have always kind of hoped would put in an appearance again.  Seems like he’s appeared in a lot of audio stories since his television finale, which I didn’t know about!  Of course, his anti-matter reality is another form of afterlife in a sense, which is what made me think of him, and then we had Missy’s little venture.  The Doctor might not have believed in ghosts before but his fellow Timelords sure like to make the most of life after death!

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@bluesqueakpip   Oh, I’m not critical of them for it.  Far better the opportunity exist at all, and the pair of them are fantastic.  And it ties well to a swelling theme, as you mention.  I was more-or-less just generalising about the lack of roles for perceived minorities that place their condition/impairment/nationality/sexuality/species hehe as secondary to their involvement in the plot.  And I’m not even necessarily berating the industry for it, it’s more an observation.  At least, in this episode, her impairment seems linked to the events that unfold and don’t seem related to the position she holds.  She doesn’t seem to have been set up as having been employed BECAUSE she’s deaf, right?  That’s always nice to see, especially when we are flooded with excessive “this is a remarkable story about a remarkable woman who, despite being overweight and frumpy, finally got her big break and the guy all in the same week.”  lol

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@ludwig  As an Australian, I don’t think any swipe at Peter Andre is harsh enough.  lol.  Especially not in regards to that song, which was bad enough the first time around, let alone being rereleased!

@bluesqueakpip  Whilst I would love to think they included a hearing impaired character just as  a character, I think it is likely to be a plot device at some point.  Whether or not that has been used up already by her ability to lip read, I’m not sure.

I really enjoyed this.  I didn’t realise it was a two-parter, so my reaction at the end was very ‘HOW DARE YOU’ but in a good way. lol  No bonkers theories yet, time to rewatch it.

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@purofilion  It is possibly wishful thinking on my part, but I’ve been expecting it for ages!  I anticipated a Big Ben angle of that magnitude when the pocket watches first appeared, but it’s just my bonkers theorising at work. lol.  I’m not sure I have any solid evidence for it, though I could probably concoct some if I tried hard enough.

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@purofilion  I am still waiting for the moment where Big Ben sounds and a huge rush of regeneration energy seeps from the Clock Tower and all the Timelords hiding on Earth have their Chameleon Arcs unlocked. XD

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@nerys  No worries!  It’s always nice to have backup. lol

@spider  I think it also warrants a mention that a lot of the Clara that people seem to reference is Smith’s Clara.  Last series, we saw her thrust into a lot of situations, often entirely intentional on the part of the Doctor, and at one point she actually loses it with him entirely for it and tells him to go away and never come back.  We don’t see a very in-control Clara at that point, in fact I feel that it has been made reasonably obvious that her trust in this incarnation is not as immediate as it was with Smith’s.  Clara has been rattled since Capaldi turned up and, if we believe that the companion is the audience’s access to the show, then perhaps we have been invited to be unsure and less confident along with her.  I would say it’s working okay for me, given that there was a split second there when I actually thought the Doctor might shoot Clarek, (I made that up), and herald Coleman’s unceremonious exit from the show in the second episode.  I don’t trust this Doctor entirely either, which is what makes him so delicious!

Whatever the case, I don’t feel that this is the first time we have seen Clara shaken up and scared since Smith’s Doctor departed and, since her trust in this incarnation is requiring a lot more work on her part, being stuck inside a Dalek, on the Daleks’ home planet, having been undermined the entire time by the woman who killed her boyfriend, with this man she knows but doesn’t pointing a disintegration weapon at her is probably just cause for concern. lol

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@mudlark  Oh, I know, and when Davros said that, my next thought was ‘well there goes that theory.’  lol  But it does occur to me that we’re assuming Davros is right, and that he is privy to fact rather than opinion or personal interpretation.  Just because Davros thinks the prophesy means Daleks and Timelords, does that make it automatically so?  Probably.  In the grand scheme of things, I can see it being the more satisfactory story arc.  I wouldn’t push my first assumption as a particularly viable one but it is probably a symptom of being a member of these forums that my mind went there at all!  lol.

@denvaldron  It is a shame you found the writing of these episodes unsatisfactory.  It is certainly frustrating to be in that situation as a fan, I feel quite grateful not to be faced with it.  I hope the rest of the series does not continue to disappoint you.

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@denvaldron  Is it possible, and this is just a wild theory, that Clara is terrified most of being inside the Dalek because a part of Oswin lingers in her timestream?  She is, as far as we are aware, Clara Prime.  She may not recall explicitly things that happened to the fragments of her scattered through The Doctor’s timeline, but perhaps there is enough subconscious recollection for her to have a very personal reason to be horrified at the loss of her identity in this way.

Just a suggestion.

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I am on my phone so I have no capacity for a long response, only to say when the hybrid was first mentioned, I immediately thought it was a misdirection to make us assume it was Timelord and Dalek when, in fact, it is really human and Dalek. Davros mentioned two warrior races, I think? And so far the hybrids have been with humans; Rose activated one, Oswin became one, the whole Manhattan thing …and there we have Clara masquerading as one. Or is the prophesy less precise and Davros has interpreted it to include the Daleks when it is really about humans and Timelords? Is Clara a bit of both? Are we revisiting the idea of the Doctor being a bit of both? Either way I can’t help but wonder if we have been intentionally mislead!

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@221badwolf  Really, it was the one part of the episode I wasn’t big on.  I don’t hate it but I find it a bit silly.  Still, nothing to say that’s a bad thing, I just didn’t see that it added a lot of value.  Maybe I will be proven wrong!

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The interesting and delightful majesty at play here is that, as callous and awful as Missy trying to get the Doctor to kill Clara was, it did serve a purpose.  The Doctor was able to discover the Daleks’ ability to conceptualise mercy, it guided him back to young Davros to ensure the wheels were set in motion.  Since we don’t know how much this is going to change the Daleks in the future, we have no way of knowing the implications of that single act of ‘nastiness’.  Was she being a wicked witch, or did she simply place enough faith in them to figure it out and set into motion something absolutely pivotal?

That’s what I love about Missy, and Gomez’s portrayal; it’s probably a bit of both.

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No time for bonkers theories yet, I need to rewatch it first!  But as first impressions go, that was a fantastic start to the series.  I live alone and I will happily admit Gomez made me laugh out loud more than once.  I hope we see a lot of her, she’s delightful.  Davros was perfection at its finest; I knew he’d set up a trap and I was still feeling sorry for him!  The shades of grey represented here make for very powerful storywriting, I think, I look forward to seeing how it plays out for the rest of the series.

The Doctor in Davros’ chair, Clara inside a Dalek…  My heart.  Our two protagonists seated on dark thrones.  I still get shivers.

I may never forgive them for releasing that Coleman is exiting “some time” this series though because I am not ashamed to admit I was very worried for a moment.  Very worried.  Thank god for a little mercy!

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Not sure if it’s been mentioned because I’ve been trying to keep up with the wonderful speculation via my phone, but with the theories surrounding Clara’s significance, (fueled by the fact that we know Coleman makes an exit some time this series), has anyone thrown into the ring the possibility of the device being another form of Chameleon Arch?  With so much still seeming to be unanswered about how Clara fits into the bigger picture, and all the previous pondering regarding the significance of Susan etc, could the disc contain not something pertaining to the Doctor but Clara instead?  I’m trying to find deeper connections to tie the theory into and my brain doesn’t want to work, but I think a lot of us have been expecting some sort of final reveal about her identity.  IS she a Time Lady parading as a human!  With River reputed to be back this season, daughter of The Doctor and his Wife seems at least a possible final conclusion.  Or perhaps just wishful thinking on my part. 😉

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@blenkinsopthebrave The Doctor does acknowledge the disc, however, when Clara questions him about where he sent it.  He doesn’t corroborate exactly what is on it but we at least know he sent it to Missy.  That’s a start. lol

@whisht  There is an episode of Tom Baker’s with a yo-yo that deals with gravity.  I think it might have been The Ark in Space.  Did he also use it in Kill the Moon?  Trying to recall.  Can’t remember if he jumps around or not though!

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@ichabod

An excellent point well-made!  I like that explanation, and I can certainly see its merit.  I guess I wasn’t refuting the legitimacy of The Doctor’s remark, more that it just struck me as a poignant and perhaps-significant thing for him to have said.  The phrasing in particular seems interesting.  “When do I not see you?” isn’t the same as “When have I not seen you?”, because the change in tense does shift it more towards their present relationship than the past ones.  It may have just been a reaffirmation of the effort he now makes, as you say.  With all of his personas present and represented, as per his claim, we may just have been seeing a flash of Smith’s incarnation returning.  One thing is for sure; I am very impatient for Part 2!

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Rewatching the episode and this line in particular struck me as interesting.  The Doctor goes on to say in this scene that ALL of his incarnations are invited to the party, and yet most of their previous contact with the Claricles has involved them not seeing her at all!  Even Oswin was never actually seen by The Doctor, only what she’d become.  Of course, it could be a sweet, throw-away line but it does seem an odd thing to say to her of all people.  Their relationship through time and space has been characterised by him not seeing her.

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I get the tingles every time I read all your theories.  I missed this!

I hadn’t really thought about Oswin in all this, and now I am wondering if the Daleks have any prior knowledge of Clara.  Also, it struck me as rather un-Clara-ish to run as she did, at least before attempting to talk herself out of it.  That motor-mouth tendency to attempt to negotiate at breakneck speed has been a pretty pivotal part of her portrayal to date.  I do understand that being faced with a room of Daleks is pretty scary, and she didn’t have The Doctor with her, but to run in silence as she did seemed off to me.  Further support for it just being a trick to mess with The Doctor?

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Hooray, a new Who series!  More craziness!  More bonkers theories!  The best part!

I really enjoyed this.  Gomez stole the show for me and I am really looking forward to seeing how this dynamic plays out.  With the news that Coleman is on the way out for good this time, is it too much to hope that the Master and the Doctor might actually end up adventuring together for a while?  I think it would be delicious.  And of course Missy was sent the Doctor’s will; what is it the Doctor has to leave behind?  The T.A.R.D.I.S. might not count as property, she has a mind of her own after all, but in terms of tangible objects, she’s his most valuable.  Materialistically, the Doctor probably has no use for a will.  But beyond that, there is his legacy.  His duty.  His name.  Not something he’d ever send Clara’s way.  Something he’d probably only ever wish on his worst enemy.

(Wait, that just makes it sound like Missy is set up to become the new Doctor…  Oh lord, what have I done.)

Overall, a great start to the season and I love the fact that it’s a two-parter because I am definitely champing at the bit to know what happens next.

 

 

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Hello glorious Whovians!   Just thought I’d swing by, it’s been a while since I poked my nose in.  Counting down the days ’til the next season, I can’t wait to start reading bonkers theories again.  I truly think our creativity was what made the last season memorable at all, since rewatching it hasn’t really left me with a fantastic impression.

All is well here, though very busy.  Work is nuts and my relationship has taken a few health turns for both of us that has monopolised time.  There’s a whack of distance between us at the moment too, and the AUD doesn’t stretch so far when you’re trying to help out an American.  Any expert fundraisers out there?  Finding it a challenge to promote something that doesn’t target our close circle who already do more than enough.

But life is good mostly!  How are you all?

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@purofilion   Still alive and kicking here!  Real life has been extraordinarily busy, this has been perhaps the most hectic Term 1 that I can recall and, to top it off, I’ve been sick for most of it!  On holidays now and making myself feel better by rewatching Tennant’s first season.  “Who” cures all!   I hope you and your family are well. 🙂

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@IAmNotAFishIAmAFreeMan

Pratchett certainly writes with a unique style that may not appeal.  As @mudlark mentions, his ability to paraody and to weave analogy into his narrative is where his brilliance really shines for me.  I love figuring out what he’s referencing and delighting in the ways he’s made it work, though absurdly so in many instances.  As an Australian, The Last Continent is a delightful read but I think my favourite story, and it’s really hard to choose, is Small Gods.  I find it impossible to target a favourite character, though I do hold an affection for Death.  The newer stories, with the newer characters, have taken me a little while to get to but I am halfway through his latest and enjoying it.  It shall be my airplane reading when I head back home this Thursday!

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@janetteb   Terry Pratchett remains my favourite author of all time, I think, and the Discworld series are books I have read and reread, sometimes in an endless rotation!  I hope you and your boys enjoy them.  He really is a brilliantly creative man.

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http://www.cultbox.co.uk/news/headlines/jenna-coleman-confirmed-to-return-for-all-of-season-9

No idea where to post this, no idea if it’s been posted anywhere else, but this showed up on Facebook and so now I’m having a little celebratory dance!  I will admit that Season 8 did not make it easy to like Clara but that’s why I feel she needs at least another season.  There’s something untold here, something unfinished.  And now, maybe, we’ll get it!

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Oh, were they wrong!  I missed that part. *lol*  I was having to stream the episode on ABC iView directly after it aired because my parents were watching something else and thus I was watching on my computer with headphones.  I didn’t understand The Doctor’s line and so maybe that might have shed some light!  Thank you for clearing that up.  (Ironically, primary school teacher here.)

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Oh, one thing I’m not sure has been mentioned, which means there’s probably an obvious answer I’m missing….

What was the thing about Clara being awesome at mental arithmetic all about?  Has that come up before and I’ve just forgotten?  Or does she just long to be a super smart mathematician and that was her dreaming of numerical glory?  *lol*  Or has she still retained the uplink from the WiFi?  I really do think I’ve completely missed a previous reference or ten!

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About to rewatch it again.  All your bonkers theorising is going to make my head explode and now I feel like I need to rewatch the entire series to figure out if they’ve been asleep and dreaming for all of it!  Lol!  Looking forward to being able to watch the scene with ‘old’ Clara again without suffering a mild heart attack that she really was leaving and we weren’t going to get any answers to all these breadcrumbs still be laid about her.  The part where he helps her with the Christmas bonbon is going to get to me again though, perhaps even more now that I know it’s supposedly The Doctor’s dream.  It goes to show how much it meant to him that she was there to do the same for him back on Trenzalore.

I really am glad she’s staying.  I wasn’t necessarily happily, in the end, with the whole Danny arc but there is something about these two.  A very strong sense of family and I’m enjoying watching The Doctor develop as a result of it.  Oh well, off to watch again!

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First of all, Merry Christmas everyone!  It’s been a while since I had time to post so it’s good to be back.

As for the episode, I just finished watching it and would like to watch it again before I say much.  I am overjoyed, however, that Clara is remaining, mostly because there has clearly been so much laid down about her that is yet to be explored/explained, I’m glad to be able to look forward to finding out where all this is going.  I also love her and Capaldi’s Doctor and now that they seem to have finally stopped lying to each other maybe, next season should be worth anticipating!  I do hope for more than what this recent series turned into, much as I found a way to enjoy the episodes anyway.  I would dearly love for the focus to be back on their relationship so hopefully that is what we will see.

A great way to wrap up the year nevertheless.  Here’s wishing you and yours all the very best for a safe and happy journey into 2015.

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Okay, I admit it.  I nearly cried quite a few times but the Brigadier returning as the Eternal Protector pushed me over the edge.  I met Nicholas Courtney briefly once and was left with this overwhelming feeling that I had met Santa Claus incarnate.  (Relevant!)  A beautiful soul who exuded gentleness and compassion, the very embodiment of Lethbridge-Stewart’s final act.  Unashamedly sobbing like a baby here!

The rest of it finally felt like the pace and tension and action and ‘omg’ moments that I’ve been waiting for all season.  I admit I’m surprised that anyone was actually confused about whether The Master is dead or not, I assumed he/she most definitely is NOT because the colour that enveloped him was blue and not orange.  Looked more like a transportation to me.  Clara’s claim that she never lies to The Doctor is a bit mind-blowy, if only because it seems so blatantly obvious that it’s not true from previous episodes.  Is that Clara just unable to help herself and lying like a trooper once more or will it turn out that she’s technically not been lying all those times it appears she has?  After all, it felt like she was lying to him at the end when she said she and Danny would be fine, but I suppose that depends on your definition of ‘fine’.

Mind-asplody indeed.

I have to admit, I still don’t get why Missy.  Like, at all.  I really loved her performance, she felt like an actual genuinely palpable threat, (noooo Osgood!), instead of just a rampant lunatic pulling strings from afar, but her entire motivation is hardly explained.  Her entire existence isn’t explained either and, whilst I do think that was the entire point and I applaud the suspense of it, it’s still an annoying itch.  After an entire series and the revelation of her identity, we still really have no bloody idea what she’s up to other than gathering The Doctor an army.

Wild bonkers theory:  Has The Master been female in the past and has she, therefore, been one of The Doctor’s previous wives?  There was a good deal of desperate affection in her performance this time around, I felt.

The part where Clara is ranting at CyberDan, not realising it’s him, broke my heart.  His entire performance broke my heart.  Clara, whilst her performance was excellent, actually came out of this a little less likable than in other episodes I think, though it’s clear from all those sticky notes that something messy is going on with her at the moment.  I wonder how much of being inside The Doctor’s timestream is still scrambling her head, or if there is some impending doom on her horizon as she approaches the end of a theoretical countdown.  (We’ve hypothesised before that all the Claricles died at roughly the same age.)  Is she pregnant?  Is she ill?  Is she pregnant AND ill?  What is this bad news?  I don’t think we’ve been told yet, and I guess we’ll have to wait until Santa Claus can help us find out!

Gallifrey.  I don’t think it’s that easy.  There was only darkness outside that door.  Santa didn’t seem impressed with either of their reassurances either.  Both of them lying to each other for each other’s perceived benefit, wishing each other a happy ending whilst they return, alone, to their own nightmares.  Can’t wait for Christmas!

 

 

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One thing of note:  there were a few theories going around, yes, that this series contained a lot of non-reality, right?  That things didn’t feel quite ‘right’ and that people were questioning if bits really did happen or whether or not it was Clara just creating it?  I think that’s what I read people saying.

Well, apparently The Doctor has a patch that makes her dream so vividly, she thinks it’s reality.  >.>  That might be…important.

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@purofilion  I was doing Halloween duty at my cousin’s house so that they could go trick-or-treating and still have someone dishing out candy from their door.  There were a few tiny vampires and pumpkins floating about but most were put-off by their steep driveway, I feel.

I am not actually a fan of the fact that the commercialisation of Halloween has infested Australia, it was never even a thing when I was a kid.  But the world will keep on spinning no matter what I think and the kids had fun at least.

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I absolutely loved it, it’s the first episode this season that has really given me a strong sense of nervousness that might almost be thought of as ‘the willies’.  Of course, the fact that it’s a two-parter is really helping the pacing issue that I’ve always found impeded some of the earlier episodes and there’s nothing like a good cliffhanger!  The performances are fantastic, the humour is pitched perfectly, and Granny Oswald!  She’s not quite Wilfred but it was still lovely to see her.

The biggest problem I have, if the disclosure at the end is to be trusted, is that Missy ended up being my second least-favourite option.  (At least she’s not River.)  There’s still room for further development but I’m going to assume we know who Missy is now.  It’s not a deal-breaker, I still think she’s a well-performed villain and I look forward to seeing more of her, I just kind of wish…  I don’t know, for a different threat.

Cybermen in the water.  I’ve seen the shots of Missy with Cybermen and I still didn’t put two-and-two together.  I cannot wait for next week’s finale!

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I actually enjoyed this.  Given that we are almost at the end of the season, I will say that overall I think I’m going to wind up with mixed feelings about Capaldi’s first run but I certainly haven’t hated it.  I do feel a bit sorry for this episode now though because, despite finding it quite a fun watch, the spoiler for next week blew it completely out of the water and now I just want next weekend to be here already. *lol*

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@purofilion  I cannot claim to have actually laid eyes on her but I was in her presence!  From all accounts, in particular the photo the girls had with her, she’s tiny.  I mean, the 9-year-old is petite and the shortest in her class and even she nearly reached Jenna’s shoulder…

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@bluesqueakpip  I’ve often wondered if she was adopted too.  Clara seemed to be reasonably old when her mother died, she was probably at least 8 or 9 during that swing scene featurette and her mother was still alive then.  I always wondered if it was intentional, therefore, that she was an only child.  Of course, if her mother was ill with a slow killer then that could also account for it, but her mother’s illness could also have kept her from having children at all.  (Did we ever find out what she died from?)

The only part about the theory that bugged me was that The Doctor spent so much time obsessing, so much time investigating, so much time practically stalking Clara through her timeline that it seems really, really weird he didn’t go back to confirm the actual pregnancy. Did he and it wasn’t shown?  Does he know more about her origins than we realise?  If so, why didn’t that fuel his suspicion back when she was The Impossible Girl?  So many questions!

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So I tried to scroll through all the comments on my phone and nothing much has sunk in.  I apologise if I wind up repeating anything that’s already been said, I had a super hectic weekend that culminated in taking a 5-year-old and a 9-year-old to meet Jenna yesterday.

Yes, I met Jenna Coleman.

Which is to say, two little blonde pixies wearing Doctor Who t-shirts charmed her whilst I tried to pacify the greasy, squirming 2-year-old that wanted nothing to do with being held.  Not my finest hour but it was all over very fast as it so often is during these photo sessions and, thankfully, I didn’t actually go IN with them, their father did.  So when I say I met Jenna, I was standing two metres away from her at one point but she was behind a curtain.  That counts, right?

Then we went to take our own photos beside the TARDIS and a smaller TARDIS that didn’t make sense until last night’s episode!  Yes, they also had the first of the smaller TARDIS’ from ‘Flatline’, the very first one they climb out of.  Plus a K9, a Pandorica and a scarf amongst other things.  My little Whovians were satiated.

Now, onto bonkers theorising!  My brain is still processing stuff but it did occur to me that there is a very strong case now for Missy being Gus, which I am SURE has already been mentioned and discussed.  We never found out who was the mastermind in the Orient Express episode but we did find out that ‘Gus’ had been trying to entice The Doctor in before, up to and including calling him on the TARDIS phone.  (Which is apparently very difficult to do.)  Who else is better qualified, therefore, to have given Clara that exact same phone number later on?  (Or earlier on, as the case may be.)  Now that it seems more and more likely that Missy is the Woman In The Shop, I wonder if she has not been present in all episodes, even the ones without a direct reference, and if The Doctor himself isn’t more aware that someone is meddling, hence all his scribblings and such.  I wouldn’t even put it past this incarnation to be using Clara, in a sense, to try and draw out this mystery manipulator.  Don’t get me wrong, I have no doubt he cares about her greatly, but he’s been very ‘means to an end’ so far and he really does seem to be training her up for something.  Again, I hark back to earlier statements I’ve made about The Doctor either knowing or at least sensing that ‘Something’ is coming.

And a good soldier prepares for war carefully.

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That was great fun!  So much so that I’m annoyed I left my iPad at my cousin’s because I want to rewatch it on iView right away.  The season finale seems to be approaching at a much faster rate and the more we see of Missy, the more sinister she seems.  I really do get the feeling that all of this season is going to make sense once we see it in its entirety and these gripes that are arising, even from me, about choices that have been made and who does and doesn’t have the limelight, will make sense when the final curtain closes.  At least I hope so.  It at least seems like we’re being set up for a rollercoaster ride to the end.

Next week’s looks fun too!

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Just watched it again and one thing stood out; anyone notice that Clara outlasted everyone when the cabin decompressed?  What is it with her and her impressive lung capacity!

@gothamcelt  Nobody’s speaking for you, PhaseShift quoted the one thing he was responding to, which was your attempting to assert what Capaldi should be doing.  The rest of what you said wasn’t touched so nobody is trying to deny you an opinion.  I can honestly understand why elements of this series would grate with fans because if I have any qualms with it, it’s usually for the same reason.  I think you will find, in general, that people’s opinions are respected here if they are voiced in the spirit of the forums, which doesn’t exist as a place to vent.  I hope the series eventually delivers something that you can enjoy, life isn’t much fun without Who!

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I don’t have time to read responses right now or time to add much of my own but I just wanted to yee-ha! my way in here because I really enjoyed this episode, on first watch no less!  It had the tension and pace that was missing from the last two episodes for me and was Doctor-centric for most of it, which again proved to be great.  As for Clara’s wobble?  I think that’s fine.  I think it would have been weirder for her to just accept this version of The Doctor, who is vastly different to the three this version of herself as met.  Some of the things he’s done, or at least the way he’s done them, and the lack of reassurance that he’s willing to give, would have made me react too.  It’s entirely understandable that she has taken some time to make peace with the way he handles things, she’s having to learn how to see beneath the surface of this incarnation because he doesn’t wear his heart on his sleeve like Smith often did.

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I have a lot of catching up to do, you guys have been busy whilst I’ve been buried under school work!  I read something just then about The Doctor having faith in Clara and believing absolutely, when he left her behind, that she would make the right decision.  I don’t disagree with that, I think he’s shown time and time again that he depends on her and has the utmost faith in her, but not just to do the right thing.  Part of what has started to feel a bit odd about this series is that it’s almost Clara Who, she’s the one in the driver’s seat, and I think that’s probably not an accidental metaphor.  I don’t think it’s just that The Doctor trusts Clara implicitly to do the right thing, but perhaps he doesn’t trust himself not to do the wrong thing.  There’s something going on with him, something buried and only revealed in the nuances of his expression at times, but if Rule #1 is that The Doctor lies, then perhaps another on the list should be ‘The Doctor doesn’t always get it right’.  I refer you back to my previous example of Waters of Mars.  He might not have screwed up history but he surely didn’t really walk away the hero from that particular decision.

This is a Doctor who has all-but admitted that he is scared.  He has shown some consideration for his moral status and seems altogether too eager to stand aside and let brutal practicality determine his choices.  His faith in himself has always been on shaky ground but maybe he really has lost his nerve this time.

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Okay, so a second watching at least let me absorb a lot more.  I realised how very little I actually watched this morning through my bleary eyes and lack of caffeine, I think I had my eyes closed for half of it.  There’s no doubt there were some fine performances, I’m not sure there were any I outright disliked.  I still felt as if the storyline felt crammed in and rushed and that, once again, we have what feels like an anticlimax.  I sort of understand what you mean, @purofilion ,about this all feeling somehow surreal and other-worldly.  At the end of each episode of this season so far, I have felt as if something was incomplete and I’m starting to suspect it lies in The Doctor’s behaviour and motivations.  Yes, he’s been erratic.  Yes, he’s been abrasive.  Yes, he’s been caustic and dismissive and egotistical.  There are so many shades of his ‘younger’ self shining through that it’s been easy to get swept up in the nostalgia and delight at seeing a much different personality to the one we’ve been dealing with for much of this reboot.

There’s something….else, though.  I can’t shake the feeling that he senses something, or knows something, or fears something about what’s coming.  There is such simplicity to his abruptness at times that it almost seems like a charade, as if, to go back to the chess analogy, he really is moving the pawns around with such subtlety that he’s desperate they not find out his purpose…yet.  I suppose it’s just a belief that there is always method in his madness and that, somehow, The Doctor always exists in the ‘bigger picture’.  Every now and then, I am not convinced he is the big, bad Timelord he is pretending to be.  Then, other times…

As I watched tonight’s episode, I realised that the sentiment behind his behaviour and choices wasn’t really something that his previous incarnations wouldn’t have shared.  In ‘The Waters of Mars’, Tennant’s Doctor makes it nearly through the whole episode convinced that he shouldn’t interfere, and we are left without much doubt of his utter arrogance when he finally does.  The notion that The Doctor feels the pressure of being the one always having to make the big decisions isn’t necessarily a new one, but it is his chosen delivery in this that makes it seem so much harsher.  Clara is used to the overly-apologetic, emotive, desperately-passionate Smith incarnation who would have handled the same decision much differently.  Instead of making it seem like she should thank him for his trust, (and he did sort of genuinely seem to believe that he had acted out of extreme faith and trust in her), he likely would have apologised, looked at her with those puppy-dog eyes and practically pleaded with her to understand.  Clara, I have noticed, always responds best when she feels The Doctor needs her help.  In essence, that is who The Impossible Girl is, and the closest she’s really seemed to this version was his vulnerable moment in Glasgow, pleading with her to see him.  There’s still a neediness to him, but it comes with arrogance and sheer emotional efficiency and she appears to be lost.  Understandably, perhaps, but it still struck me as at least an indication of how much personality flavours these things.  It’s been easy to sit back and think, ‘Oh gosh, he’s being a jerk again!’ but I do wonder if he really has changed that much.

Anyway, that’s one great long ramble that I got from watching this again.  I still think we’re going somewhere big with all of this, I hope it’s worth the journey!  (It’s Who; of course it will be.)

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@badwulf

Oh yes – definitely politics – I forgot about the votes of Africa, Asia and Australasia not counting because it is daytime there.

I can’t speak for the rest of Australasia but we Australians are a hardy breed.  After centuries of crocodile wrestling, spider farming and kangaroo riding, not to mention being locked in an eternal war with the sharks, snakes, jellyfish, bugs, rabbits, dingoes and ultra-violet radiation, a little thing like the moon hatching and possibly ending all life on Earth as we know it really seems like a bit of a whinge and possibly even just an excuse for a poor Ashes performance.

😀

I’ll put my boxing gloves away.

(Though you’re right, the more I think about it, the more this episode seems to be full of holes and inaccuracies.  I can suspend disbelief quite a distance but I guess the plot did feel a bit constructed around a central theme.  Out of cardboard and masking tape, no less.)

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Well…

It seems over-said now that I have to watch it again to get a feel for it but the fact that this is becoming a reoccurring requirement is interesting.  I can’t decide if I think it’s a good thing or a bad thing that I can’t tell whether I like an episode on the first watching.  What I do know is that I have emerged from the last couple of episodes feeling somewhat underwhelmed and though it’s not bad enough that I would complain and say the episode wasn’t worth watching, it does at least make me contemplate the limitations of this one-episode storytelling.  There are always great moments and a lot of underlying themes that are great to ponder on but it seems lately that the show has run out of time to really build any tension.

I wasn’t sold on Courtney’s performance necessarily but I did like the fact that she was written as a normal teenager who did exactly what you’d expect of a 15-year-old.  The tumblr stuff made me giggle.  Clara trotted out some brilliant moments again and our Doctor truly has reverted to alien status, which is refreshing and unpredictable and remains a highlight.  Without including spoilers, next week’s episode looks like more opportunity for this so I am hopeful for that.

Overall, I will watch it again but something is missing a beat for me at the moment.  Maybe it’s just Daylight Savings stealing an hour’s sleep from me!

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@handles

I suppose all I meant was that I am keen for Danny to be able to experience the time travel for himself, to see what else it brings out about him, but also because I just suspect that all this is leading somewhere big and I’m impatient to get there!  *lol*  I can certainly agree that it wouldn’t lead to very smooth sailing at the moment, probably; I don’t think he’s inclined to see The Doctor as a positive influence in Clara’s life.

Now, onto my Type 102 theory!

You’re right, of course, now that I’ve read further.  This is definitely a Missy theory rather than a Clara one, and delving further into links from Compassion’s wikipedia page, I found this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_City_of_the_Saved

Sound familiar to anyone?

For those of you who don’t want to read the entries, the basic premise is that, in the books of the Eighth Doctor, he travels with a woman who transforms into a ‘living’ TARDIS called Compassion.  These are later referred to as Type 102.  In the entry on the above link, it talks about a city in which humans are ‘saved’, “a secular, technological heaven in which all human dead have been resurrected”.

It is revealed in Of the City of the Saved…that the City is actually the body of the sentient timeship, Compassion, who has resurrected humanity in its entirety to save it from a universe-spanning war.

You can see why Barnable and I are starting to get quite excited!

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@scaryb

She then flew away towards the stars and has not been seen since, although it is strongly hinted that the character of Madame Xing of the planet Espero in Halflife by Mark Michalowski was Compassion in disguise. At the conclusion of The Gallifrey Chronicles by Lance Parkin, the Doctor sent K-9 on a secret mission to Espero, possibly to seek out “Xing”.

Could be!

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Just reading through the comments about The Doctor ‘bullying’ Clara and I thought I’d throw a random thought I had whilst skimming into the mix.  What if The Doctor is trying to influence her into leaving and leading a normal life, as much as he seems to be having separation issues of his own, (he keeps turning up and snatching her away at inconvenient times.  So much for every Wednesday…), but it’s because he has a sense of foreboding about what the future holds for her.  Clara knows that other versions of herself have existed but it’s never been established what, if anything, she remembers from being inside The Doctor’s time-stream or if she has any residual memories of her other selves.  The Doctor, on the other hand, has lost two of her already that we’ve seen and know that he has registered and reacted emotionally to, and he has an awareness that there have been many, many other versions trailing him through time and space.  It is entirely feasible, and just a bit precursor-ish, that some of this endless speculation we have about Clara’s continued significance, (is she Missy?  Is she Susan?  Is she related to The Doctor? etc, etc), is actually true and The Doctor is getting a sense of it the closer they move towards the final resolution.  Maybe he’s being spiky and rude because he lacks the social graces to know how else to handle impending panic.

Also, I have a new theory for Clara!  I have never read any of the books that existed and kept the series alive whilst it was off-air, but I know that the Eighth Doctor’s travels are where the Time War takes place and that a lot of it was canonised by RTD when the series rebooted.  I also know a bit of general stuff because my ex-boyfriend was an intense Whovian.  So, I present to you, exhibit A:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compassion_(Doctor_Who)

Clara is Compassion.  Or, at least, a Type 102.

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Okay, so upon second watching, I have some fondness for this episode.  Even after the first watching, I wasn’t unhappy I’d seen it, I was just missing the sense of adventure and any real science fiction element because, frankly, that robot wasn’t scary.  (To me.)  Maybe if it had gone on a mass rampage or there had been just a little more to its story, it would have satisfied me but, whilst I am all for simpler storylines that leave room for the greater narrative, (I loved Deep Breath for this), this episode really did feel as if The Doctor had concocted the most lame-ass reason to spy on Clara.  *lol*  Maybe that was the point.  At any rate, there was some great character development here, which I loved, it just didn’t quite feel like I was watching a science-fiction show.

That being said, I suspect it will have a strong place in the final line-up when the arc is resolved, (as much as Moffat ever allows), and the pieces of the jigsaw are slotted together.  The humour and chemistry between the triangle was a pleasure to watch, I am definitely sold on Danny being allowed to go adventuring with them now.  There were a couple of moments where I laughed, sitting alone in bed, and it was nice to have yet another episode where it really feels like The Doctor is stepping into his own.  I realise the story premise was still very Clara-centric but The Doctor is calling his own shots a lot more and seems to be less of a bystander in his own life.  I guess the regeneration is finally settling down.

Clara’s age/the timeline of this episode comments have interested me because I hadn’t thought about it.  This does feel like it takes place some considerable time after Clara and Danny first met, their relationship seems to be fairly established.  Enough that he can get away with playing the wounded second-choice and she doesn’t find it weird or possessive at least.  I guess that would easily mean she’s been travelling with The Doctor for a couple of years, if not longer.  I mean, at what point did she go to university and end up with a teaching degree? >.>  I think I missed all that…

Anyway, I just woke up from a dream that culminated in Clara dying somehow and Missy teleporting her up to ‘Heaven’ in which there is a grand hall full of other Claricles.  Needless to say, I was very annoyed that I woke up then!  I could have had all the answers at my fingertips, if only I hadn’t needed the bathroom. XD

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Well, I just watched it for the first time.  I actually forgot it was Sunday, (shock, horror!), so I’m a little late to the table.  I will watch it again before I post any real response, other than to say that I found plenty of interest as per usual but I do think it’s probably my least favourite of this series so far.  That’s not to say I hated it, I’m just not sure what the payout was for such a very contained, basic little action plot.  Maybe a second watching will help.

Though I do wonder just how angry Danny is going to be when he finds out, if he ever does, just HOW much Clara’s given of herself in the name of the Doctor. XD

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Am I just imagining things when I think that it’s been hinted at that The Doctor had a wife and children back on Gallifrey at once point in his early life?  I cannot remember for the life of me why I think that, my brain isn’t so great at remembering details or where they come from.  If that’s the case, and I think it’s been touted before, might Clara be his wife?  Would make Susan her granddaughter too.  I like a lot of the other theories, emotionally if not logically, but I am still left with the uncomfortable feeling that The Doctor flirted horrendously with his own daughter at some point if I subscribe to them. LOL.

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@thommck  Susan has definitely been dangled in front of us.  I was almost sold on the idea that Clara’s mother was Susan and that Clara’s been chameleon-locked since birth for her own protection or something but, as much as that sounds nifty, I also struggle to make it fit.  Does that mean her mother didn’t die but regenerated?  Did Susan just sort of disappear into the background?  Did Clara’s father know he’d married an alien?  There’s something about it that seems off.

So how about Susan being Clara’s daughter instead!  In keeping with what I said before, about it not being clear that Susan actually is a Time Lady, and given that Clara is now bouncing around all inside the Doctor’s timeline as far back as his childhood, is it inconceivable that Clara’s daughter might be delivered to Gallifrey to be raised and kept safe?  I can’t decide if the timey-wimey stuff is too bonkers but, since this is Who, I’ll just assume not!  I don’t know why this would happen, mind you, I think I’m just determined that Clara be related to her in same way.

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