@puroandson
when people are say, doing magic, they are misdirecting people: not sure they’re needing empathy to do this?

In the sense of understanding how they will react, a magician does. Oddly, so does the observer of the magic- the autistic spectrum person who doesn’t follow the normal cues, and say follow the magician’s gaze as she mimes t…[Read more]

@lisa

I can’t equate that with a lack of empathy. Seems to me he has buckets of empathy. It drives his choices but its not always critical to success. He’s still the alpha leader. He still manipulates the action and he’s positively confident and clever. Yes, he’s definitely agitated because Clara isn’t getting a pulse and Clara had in a prev…

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@morpho

Interesting. I didn’t see the dalek, cyberman or weeping angels as being in the Matrix but rather like external memory.

Probably correct- they don’t seem to be integrated like the TLs in the matrix, or arguably the sliders. Perhaps the cloisters rather than the Matrix proper would qualify as the hybrid. I was thinking that the exp…[Read more]

Been offline for a couple of days, so only catching up properly now. Thanks to those who responded to my concerns- a few follow-ups:

@mudlark

What fuelled his determination to hold out against the interrogation, even to the extent of enduring repeated torment over billions of subjective years, was above all his hatred of and rage against the…

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I decided a rewatch was in order to clear up a few things in my mind, and I found I enjoyed it rather more the second time- freed from the expectation of what it could have been, I was free to appreciate it better for what it was. Plus I knew a few of the things that would rankle me, so didn’t get the internal cries of “What?” drowning out what…[Read more]

It’s occurred to me that Rassilon’s resurrection was never explained (to my knowledge). Had assumed it was a ‘timey-wimey’ thing, but following this episode, it seems more likely that he was restored from the matrix somehow. In the episode, the General does chide his soldier for using the term “sliders” within hearing of Rassilon. He’s not a…[Read more]

@lisa

It seems to me Missy gets something out of this more than just a tortured Doctor. She wouldn’t just hand the Dial over without compensation. The regeneration was part of some other ‘trade deal’ so I wonder what she asked for?

I speculated that her freedom might have been part of it, plus maybe getting rid of the drum. Plus she might have…[Read more]

@bluesqueakpip

Missy’s perfectly happy to torture the Doctor, but she prefers it to be more hands on and/or on video stream. And it’s for fun.

I think she might well be on video stream watching what’s happening in the dial. On getting out, the Doctor does address the dial, speaking to someone presumed to be listening in, then separately sen…[Read more]

@bluesqueakpip

I suppose in that theory, she used the time she had the confession disc in her possession to adjust it as torture chamber, thus ensuring that the Doctor would not be a happy little Time Lord when he finally got back to Gallifrey.

Yes, it’s a bit hard for me to see how Missy could not be involved, since she was the one with the…[Read more]

@morpho

Having watched both Day of the Moon and Let’s Kill Hitler again recently, sorry to contradict but that’s incorrect. Both of Melody’s regenerations were of the standard reboot format a la Eccelston-to-Tennant.

Took a look to see what you mean- and yes, River’s regenerations appeared basically as refined versions of the Ecclest…[Read more]

@countscarlioni

Would it matter if he’d not taken the hints? Once the Doctor, assuming he truly did not remember Clara in the diner scene, got back into his own Tardis, would he not immediately search the Tardis’s data banks for “Clara” and recover at least some of the lost memories? For him, it’s surely only a temporary loss of some memories.…

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SPOILER, SPOILER, SPOILER...

@lisa

Don’t forget that the coordinates Missy gave the Doctor were correct in space. Just not in time.
She didn’t lie to the Doctor about where Galifrey was except for timeframe. So how did she know?
To me this implies collusion with the TL’s and Rassilon too.

Missed that, so that’s another connection. And of course the Doctor sent Missy his c…[Read more]

@rob

Also during Rasillon’s visit to the barn he stated…..

How many regenerations did we give you, I’ve got all day

Strongly suggesting a more than just another full set

Or possibly less. The terminology used at the time was giving him a new cycle of regenerations, from which you’d initially think 12. But if you remember the circums…[Read more]

@ichabod

I need to re-watch to see if there are signs that the Doctor does indeed set things up deliberately to destroy his memories of her rather than vice versa, releasing both of them. He’s that clever, all right, but is he that perceptive?

He does look at the neural block, and might have known what it would actually do, but rather than m…[Read more]

@puroandson

Ah Son here (mum is resting again). Yes, I love zombies. I will be seeing some Walking Dead soon -I don’t know it at all well.

Off topic, so I’ll keep it brief, but I much prefer the WD graphic novels over the TV series- the TV series was too drawn out and I gave up on it quickly. They diverge quickly in terms of significant plot e…[Read more]

@puroandson

No, no I was joking! I was smiley facing an’ all! I’m totally with you and get your point of view 100 %

It’s all OK- I thought you’d pick up from me calling her a zombie that my response wasn’t terribly serious either 🙂

This is Son speaking: if the pulse isn’t working then her heart’s not working then how does anything happen.…

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@geoffers

upon reviewing this scene, i did find it odd that ashildr/me remembers the events of “face the raven” so well, given her terrible retention. perhaps the time lords brought her forward in time, as well, and those events aren’t all that long ago to her, now?

The point of her being at the end of time was that she was the last of the immor…[Read more]

@ozitenor

3. This is what REALLY confuses me…

I’ll have a shot at explaining what could have happened…

Perhaps Clara dropped the Doctor’s tardis off somewhere remote, so that it’s out of the way and to stop UNIT finding it and dragging it off the dark archives or something daft, and left the Doctor somewhere near it in the US. The Doctor c…[Read more]

@countscarlioni

I don’t have even any wildly desperate hand-waving, speculative tries to answer that. Though based on a second watch, when the Doctor travels to meet Me, he does not say how much farther forward in time he’s travelled (or did I miss it?).

No- it’s not clear, but the TL general said “Gallifrey is currently positioned at the ext…[Read more]