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docbeard
Jul 19, 2011

twistedmentat posted:

I am legitimately confused at this episode.

Clara was the one under everyone's beds after all?

Clara was the one originally under the young Doctor's (unless it was someone else) bed who set this whole chain of thinking into motion.

There may or may not have been a monster.

Also, I think it's safe to say that Clara knows about regeneration, however clearly she remembers the Jump Into The Doctor's Timeline incident. But one of the things she knew is that post-regeneration, the Doctor tends to become, and certainly thinks of himself as, a different person, and she didn't want to lose her friend even if he was going to be replaced by someone else with the same name and broadly the same values. That's what made Twelve's reference to Eleven's phone call at the end of Deep Breath as something he did so significant.

docbeard fucked around with this message at 00:55 on Sep 15, 2014

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docbeard
Jul 19, 2011

Irony Be My Shield posted:

Is it known whether The Doctor himself is legitimately a Time Lord, or could it just be a self-proclaimed thing?

He was enough of a Time Lord to be President of the High Council for about ten minutes back in the day. I think it was established that he did get into the academy but didn't do well there.

docbeard
Jul 19, 2011

I liked Listen a lot, it might be my favorite one so far this season. But there's something I can't put a finger on that it's missing that would flip it from good to phenomenal, though. (Maybe it's a bit of writing THAT HAS EVOLVED PERFECT HIDING DUN DUN DUN.....OF DEATH).

Still, I liked it a lot. I love character studies best, I thought the ambiguity was used well (and ambiguity of this sort is really easy to gently caress up), and I was even fine with the cursory look to the Doctor's past. I think that's the sort of thing that should be done sparingly, but given that this is only the second time the revival (and, indeed, the series as a whole) has gone to that well, I think that fits any reasonable definition of "sparingly". I think that scene would have been a little stronger had it just been left at Clara grabbing his foot from under the bed and telling him it was all a dream, but I think it's truer to her character to not have her walk away from a sobbing child, so fair enough.

It's the kind of episode that makes me wish that Moffat was no longer the showrunner. Because (as I think even he has observed) he basically never gets to write things that aren't part of some big clunky metaplot any more, and the strongest writing he's done has always been stuff that was comparatively free of those outside ties, Day Of The Doctor being the only notable exception I can think of. Maybe The Beast Below. I think Listen doesn't quite rise to the level of Girl In The Fireplace or Silence In The Library or The Empty Child or even that episode of the Twilight Zone he wrote called Blink, but it's head and shoulders above most of his work since taking over as showrunner.

A fun game: Watch the Doctor's face at all times. Watch his reactions to things. I started on rewatching the last fifteen minutes of Robin Hood Vs The Daleks (the script for which even now Mark Gatiss is scribbling furiously onto every available surface) and it's quite an education. Watch him when the Sheriff falls to his robo-death in the pit of molten gold. It's a triumphant moment for everyone else and he is loving horrified. He's also none too pleased when the robots' ship blows up in orbit, even though it's the outcome he was (sort of) trying to bring about.

Oh, and whatever else you can say about the Doctor's little insults, I don't think they're very good writing, they're not especially funny, and they're demonstrably not communicating whatever point they're meant to about his character since I've read about fifty different theories over the last three hundred pages as to what that point is meant to be. I'm not going to quit watching over them, I'm not even going to complain that loudly (though I can see why others might) but I sure wouldn't miss them if they disappeared in the next episode. Though I assume Clara isn't going to put up with that forever, and maybe we're in for a satisfying payoff.

docbeard fucked around with this message at 03:01 on Sep 16, 2014

docbeard
Jul 19, 2011

Yeah, I liked Smith's take on the character a lot, and would not have complained in the least about more stories, but I am not sorry we have Capaldi now.

For that matter, I liked David Tennant a lot, Chris Eccleston a lot, Paul McGann for the hour and a half or so I've seen of him (must listen to some of his audios), and...look, my favorite Doctor tends to be the one I've most recently seen, okay?

docbeard
Jul 19, 2011

It's another "probably doesn't hold up if you think about it too closely" episode, but it carried itself pretty well on charm and action, and I liked the two new kids (and wouldn't mind seeing them again). Agree that the budget probably wasn't up to making The Greatest Bank In The Galaxy look like anything of the kind, and that's a bit of a shame, but it sounded very much like the bank made its name with a combination of intense screening of everyone who arrived on-planet, a guilt-sensing telepathic alien and utter ruthlessness at dealing with anyone they caught (all of which we did see), so I don't mind so much not seeing elaborate sci-fi locks or whatever.

It's the first episode this year where Clara didn't have a lot to do, but that's probably my only real criticism. Come to that, isn't she meant to be insanely good with computers? I guess that's rarely been touched on since, but it feels like it should have been relevant here.

docbeard
Jul 19, 2011

Republican Vampire posted:

I'm not sure if that stuck. It only really came up in The Bells of St. John.

In retrospect, I have a feeling it was only there to explain how "Oswin" was able to gently caress with the Dalek Cloud Server to erase their memories of the Doctor in Asylum before they quietly swept that whole thing under the rug. I could have sworn it came up at least once since then, though.

docbeard
Jul 19, 2011

WE WILL REMOVE PAIN.
WE WILL REMOVE FEAR.
WE WILL REMOVE ENJOYMENT OF THINGS WHILE ACKNOWLEDGING THEIR FLAWS.
YOU WILL BECOME IDENTICAL LIKE MOFFAT'S FEMALE CHARACTERS.
YOU WILL BECOME LIKE US.
WE WILL SURVIVE.
WE WILL SURVIVE.
WE WILL SURVIVE.

Etc.

docbeard
Jul 19, 2011

Jerusalem posted:

The Beginning Boxset is also good as it (loosely) details the gelling of the original group of travelers across the first three stories.

I keep meaning to watch more of this, because I dig Hartnell, but I end up getting caught up in the commentaries on An Unearthly Child and never actually going on to the rest of the episodes. I don't normally care that much about making-of stuff, but I find the circumstances in which early Doctor Who was created to be endlessly fascinating for some reason.

(And now I want to watch An Adventure In Space And Time again.)

docbeard
Jul 19, 2011

DoctorWhat posted:

Well it'd really be three threads, three posts from a thread that was never made, and a Sliders thread in a wig.

And a Doctor Who thread from 4chan would be brought in to rescue them.

docbeard
Jul 19, 2011

Doctor Who as screwball comedy. I love it. Gareth Roberts's episodes tend to be a bit hit or miss for me, but this one worked so well.

Danny's I HAVE TO BE ABLE TO HELP YOU attitude there at the end was pretty drat off-putting, but that's not a criticism of the episode. Quite the opposite. As long as the show doesn't leave it there, and I'm fairly certain it won't, just judging from Clara's reaction to it.

Between that, though, and the way he interacts with and talks about the Doctor, I do feel like I have more of an idea of broadly what must have happened in his soldiering past now, and it's all developed rather more subtly than the HELLO NEW TEACHER DID YOU EVER KILL ANY CIVILIANS classroom scene we got a few episodes ago.

The show's not been perfect, but the writing's been really smart this year, and I hope it continues.

docbeard
Jul 19, 2011

Jerusalem posted:

That episode wasn't quite as good as this one, but it had the same "problem" where the interactions between Doctor, companions and other humans is really strong and interesting and the requisite alien menace stuff is not only sidelined but poorly executed to boot.

The Van Gogh episode had a similar problem, where there was clearly only a monster because There Has To Be A Monster.

To say nothing of:

docbeard
Jul 19, 2011

Jerusalem posted:

I give that one a pass because every other part of the story is incredible. I do wish the monster had turned out to all be in his head though since that was kind of the point, that he was struggling with his own depression.

Yeah, it's really more "it's funny that they think they have to do this" than "oh my god that ruined an otherwise spectacular episode", for me.

In this last one, I thought the ludicrousness of the threat worked with the general tone of the episode. It needed to be just credible enough to give the Doctor a reason to hang around being weird and to not want to involve Clara for once, but not something that would overshadow the actual meat of the episode. Make the unpronounceable robot a malfunctioning Dalek (which is what it broadly was), and suddenly the episode is about "oh poo poo, there's a malfunctioning Dalek" and not "Clara's double life is unsustainable" or "Danny views everything, including Clara and the Doctor, through the lens of his own trauma" or whatever.

That said, I think what you said before, that it would have been better had the "threat" been some other sort of problem the Doctor had to solve rather than a rampaging alien menace he was trying to head off, is a pretty good point.

Jsor posted:

So what are we betting? The Library computer?

It feels a lot like this to me. Maybe not the actual Library, but a similar form of technologically simulated "afterlife" is almost certainly what they're going for, in my mind.

docbeard
Jul 19, 2011

The_Doctor posted:

I'm sad there were no Remembrance references. Would it have killed them to have some burrrrnmarks on the playground still? <:mad:>

Given that Remembrance was set 50 years ago, I'd be a little concerned about Coal Hill's maintenance budget if there were still burn marks anywhere.

docbeard
Jul 19, 2011

Irony Be My Shield posted:

Looking forward to an episode where the antagonists are a human army attacking aliens

Isn't that broadly what The Doctor's Daughter was? Though it wasn't quite that one-sided, obviously.

In any event, I'm convinced they're building to something with the Doctor's current attitude toward soldiers.

He seems to specifically have a problem with the 'mindlessly follow orders' aspect of soldiering, which weirdly is exactly the problem that Danny appears to have with the Doctor. That in particular isn't out of keeping with the Doctor's general ethos, but he's never reduced all soldiers to that before, and I'm curious to find out why. Maybe it's optimism talking, but, given both Moffat and Capaldi's long-standing fandom, there's no way they don't know that this attitude is something of a departure for the Doctor

docbeard
Jul 19, 2011

I'm officially reserving judgement about Capaldi's portrayal of the Doctor until the end of the season. Like, right now, I think he's doing a fantastic job of portraying a character I don't like very much, but I have some faith that they're building to something more profound than THE DOCTOR IS AN rear end in a top hat NOW, DEAL WITH IT NERDS.

I liked this episode, scientific absurdity and all. Clara was fantastic, of course, and that blow-up at the end was a long time in coming. As I've opined before, the first half of Deep Breath was fundamentally important specifically because the first thing anyone tells Clara about this regeneration is that she needs to unreservedly accept the Doctor, however he's changed, and that was bad and wrong advice, and I think that one of the themes of this season is about how bad and wrong that advice actually was. This episode was the other shoe dropping. The Doctor's having an identity crisis, and, again, having a doting companion who indulges it would be the worst thing possible for him. And it would absolutely be the worst thing possible for Clara.

Even more than the thing where three women are left to decide the fate of the Earth, this episode (and I think this season) are explicitly about Clara not being the Doctor's pet or his child or his girlfriend, but his equal. In this episode she represented the Doctor's traditional morality (as expressed most recently in Day of the Doctor) of "no I'm not going to accept that this is an impossible situation and the only way out of it is deeply unpleasant, I'm going to make something better happen, don't ask me how, but I'm going to." (And the Doctor represented the traditional 'don't interfere with the kids' morality of the Time Lords that he so strongly rejected once upon a time. I refuse to believe that wasn't deliberate.)

For that matter, it's about how, after two thousand years, give or take, around humans, the Doctor isn't really allowed to get away with playing the OH I AM AN ALIEN WHO DOESN'T UNDERSTAND YOU STRANGE HUMANS card any more. Maybe he recognizes that too, and is recoiling from it.

This post started out with me not being sure if I liked the episode or not. But yeah, I liked it. Not the best of the season, I think that's probably Listen, but potentially one of the most important.

LividLiquid posted:

But whether or not this aspect of the story is personally appealing to viewers is entirely up to them, and I understand and respect both sides. I'm only excited by it because I very much want Twelve to have his I Am The Doctor moment. Smith got one every episode. The music played, and he triumphed. Like, all the time. To my current favorite theme song ever. This season feels like we get to see him be wrong over and over, then finally have his triumphant, awe-inspiring moment.

Yes, this, exactly. I think that's what we're building toward. I hope that's what we're building toward.

docbeard
Jul 19, 2011

Jerusalem posted:

I still think this episode "failed" where it was important, in terms of drawing me in and connecting with me - but the themes it explored had a ton of potential and the part where it best realized this was in that final angry confrontation between Clara and the Doctor.

This could be a pull quote for the entire season, I think. The thematic stuff they're doing this year is, I think, some of the best the revival's ever done, but I think there's an alienating quality to even the best episodes, possibly even as a result, and it's hurting the show to a degree. With one or two exceptions, I think every episode has left me a little cold at first until I sat and thought about it.

docbeard
Jul 19, 2011

DoctorWhat posted:

... You know what? Good. I've had enough of Doctor Who-as-crowd-pleasing-instant-gratification for a while. I'm glad its becoming more considered and reserved and thought-provoking.

I think there's a balance to be struck, and I don't think they've quite got there (though I have some confidence that it will). But the stuff that works really works.

I will never fault a creative work for its ambition, though. I'd rather ambitious failures (and I don't think current Who is anything of the sort) than lazy successes.

docbeard
Jul 19, 2011

They should have done something realistic like having it be all part of an alien plot to hollow out the moon to turn it into a spaceship.

docbeard
Jul 19, 2011

The science in this episode is not the most ludicrous thing that Doctor Who has ever done (let's start with loving time travel and work our way forward from there, shall we?), though I'll grant that it's somewhere up near the top.

But what the episode really needed was an unambiguous moral dilemma, a situation where everyone involved understood that if we do this monstrous thing, everything else will be okay, and if we don't, it won't. Without that, you don't have any of the character dynamics that were so crucial to the episode. You don't have Astronaut Lady's angry advocacy for the truth that life sucks sometimes, you don't have the Doctor's 'sort it out yourselves' moment, and you don't have Clara being the one to champion the moral position of "gently caress the lesser of two evils" that the Doctor has sort of made into his battle cry over the years. And most importantly, you don't have Clara tearing the Doctor a very justified new one for his behavior.

That's clearly what the episode was trying to do. I don't think it quite succeeded in making that happen, and maybe that's down to the dodgy science, though I think it's just clumsy writing. I still think it's a strong episode, but it's strong in spite of that rather serious flaw, and pretending the flaw isn't a flaw does no one any favors.

docbeard
Jul 19, 2011

Talking about things I liked in the episode, I thought Capaldi's performance of "well yeah, if you NUKE THIS INFANT everything will be fine, just be sure you place your bombs just right to MURDER THIS INNOCENT ALIEN BABY" was phenomenal.

docbeard
Jul 19, 2011

Yeah, I mean, I don't think people seeing an abortion metaphor are out of their minds, but I don't think it really works as a parallel, since (a) there's no mother in the story whose wishes can be respected or disregarded and (b) unless you're some kind of Malthusian fanatic, the birth of a child isn't an immediate and direct threat to the surrounding populace. (Also, abortions don't tend to happen at the same time as the child is actually being born.)

I mean, it could be a really clumsy abortion metaphor, I suppose, but I don't think it was meant as anything other than a variant on the classic 'is it okay to kill one person to save a thousand' dilemma (to which the Doctor's answer has traditionally been 'gently caress you I'm saving 1,001 people today').

docbeard
Jul 19, 2011

If you really want to do this...

One can assume that the critter's actual mother wanted its egg to hatch (assuming it's still around and capable of wanting things).

Clara was respecting the mother's wishes.

:colbert:

docbeard
Jul 19, 2011

Bicyclops posted:

My philosophy on literally any time that the Doctor is talking about his age is that he's just making up a number, which is at least loosely supported by the actual show. It's enough to know that he is ancient by human standards and the details as to how much time he spends in each regeneration are mostly unimportant. Why would he even bother measuring his internal age in Earth time as a time and space traveler, anyway?

I love the line Eleven has where he admits he can't even remember if he's lying about his age any more.

docbeard
Jul 19, 2011

So I have some ideas about what's going on with Twelve.

Eleven's life, from start to finish, was about losing, or putting aside, so many trappings of his identity as the Doctor. He was brought face to face with the impact he had on the lives of his companions in a way that no previous Doctor ever* has, and in the wake of that swore off the whole business of gallivanting around the universe with humans or others in tow entirely at one point, only to be dragged back in. And even then, he held Clara at bay, picking her up for short trips rather than just travelling with her as he always has.

He was attacked in an unthinkable way, and saved in an equally unthinkable way. And there's no way that didn't leave scars.

And then he faced up to his own past, found a way to reverse the act for which he hated himself the most, only to become more deserving of the name War Doctor than Hurt ever was.

All the while, Trenzalore was looming, and with it his inevitable and inescapable death. No last-minute genius plans, no cheats involving miniature giant robots, no River Song trying to destroy the universe to save him. Nothing could prevent him dying on Trenzalore. He was going to die, and there was nothing he could do about it. And he died doing the most Doctory thing of all; defending a handful of people from every enemy he's ever had, fighting a fight he knew he would lose. Not fighting to save the universe; his enemies were doing that. But fighting because the alternative was either to surrender the lives of innocents to the worst of the worst or to bring back the worst conflict the universe has ever, can ever, know. And oh yeah, the people of Christmas Town were in harm's way entirely because of him.

And then, impossibly, he lived. He didn't just live, he got an entire new lease on life. And everything was back to the way it was before, except how could it be? What would a Doctor look like who's been through the wringer the way Eleven was, for as long as he was? what would a Doctor look like who fought for so long that he probably can just barely remember a time when he wasn't fighting any more?

I imagine he'd be, well, lost. Angry. Trying so hard to recapture the old magic and failing frequently. I imagine someone who'd fought an unwinnable war for centuries, a war that had to have had casualties, would absolutely recoil from the idea of getting close to soldiers now, even though some of his closest friends have been soldiers. (Not just the Brigadier, but Jamie, Leela after a fashion, Jack Harkness after a fashion, Ace if you don't instinctively recoil from the New Adventures, and others I'm certainly blanking on.) Not because he hated them, but because he didn't want to see them die, and especially not because of something he told them to do.

And I imagine he wouldn't be very nice to the people around him, and that he'd run his friends through the wringer.

I have no idea if any of this is what Moffat et al have in mind this year, but it makes so much sense to me. It's a massively risky bit of storytelling, and a lot will be determined in how well it pays off.

___
*Outside, perhaps, of the audios; I'm only starting to listen to those.

docbeard
Jul 19, 2011

I can't decided if I liked The Holy Terror or not.

Is this normal?

(It wasn't Frobisher. I liked him. Shapeshifting space penguins in every story please.)

docbeard
Jul 19, 2011

Obligatory tired of the ceaseless negativity in this thread etc. etc.

I was honestly expecting this one to be this year's "let's give one of the actors a break" episode, and was pleasantly surprised to see that Jenna Coleman was in fact in it. And then, just when it was looking like the episode was going to sideline her, she had what was arguably the most pivotal scene in the thing. So yeah, pleasant surprises all around.

And yeah, the Doctor actually felt like the Doctor this time around without losing that lost/broken aspect they've been developing all year, which is a delicate balance to strike. I don't think I've ever been so impressed with the way Capaldi played him (and I was already a huge admirer).

That conversation they had on the rocky shore at the end was pure gold, especially the Doctor being completely honest with her about not actually knowing if he could save Maisie, and what he would have done if he couldn't.

And that cover of Don't Stop Me Now holy poo poo. It was already one of my favorite Queen songs.

More of this, please.

Davros1 posted:

You know, it's funny, while watching Mummy, I thought for a moment what if Capaldi was actually the Master pretending to be the Doctor? Kind of like Alex McQueen in UNIT: Dominion?

Or the Master (or someone) possessing the Doctor. Would put a huge spin on that talking-to-himself scene.

(I don't think this is actually happening, and I don't really want it to be happening. But my brain is even now manufacturing reasons why it could be.)

docbeard
Jul 19, 2011

Myrddin_Emrys posted:

Im sure the reference line of 'this train seems to be full of doctors and professors' had something to do with that. It made me think of The Master.

That line made the part of me that hopes for impossible things hope that somehow all thirteen* Doctors were on the train at the same time.

___
*"No, sir! All twenty-six!"

docbeard
Jul 19, 2011

Irony Be My Shield posted:

e: what about :siren: THE VALEYARD :siren: though?

The Valeyard was a terrible idea and absolutely no one anywhere wants him back or has ever wanted him back. (Though I always thought that putting your "like the Doctor but EEEEEVILLLL" character in an episode with the Master was pretty funny.)

I am almost certainly wrong about this, aren't I?

It's going to be the loving Valeyard, isn't it?

Actually I'm going with the comedy option of Omega.

(Actually actually I sincerely hope Omega shows up sooner or later.)

docbeard
Jul 19, 2011

RBA Starblade posted:

For anyone else with access to it, is this episode not up on Xfinity On Demand for anyone else? I could just throw down a couple bucks to buy it on Amazon but I'm wondering why. It's usually up day after. It didn't air late or something did it?

No, it's not up for me either. Weird. Aired as normal on BBCA last night as far as I could tell. The Intruders finale (which airs immediately after) is up, so who knows?

docbeard
Jul 19, 2011

Maxwell Lord posted:

Yeah I was scared that it'd be Voyage of the Damned all over again but that mid-episode twist was a doozy.

It's the episode that Voyage of the Damned should have been.

docbeard
Jul 19, 2011

I don't know if Caves is the best Doctor Who story (though it is absolutely one of my favorites) but the third episode cliffhanger is without question one of Doctor Who's finest moments.

docbeard
Jul 19, 2011

I just listened to Minuet In Hell .

No one Everyone Drunk people Probably no one should listen to Minuet In Hell except you need to understand.

docbeard
Jul 19, 2011

Spikeguy posted:

Watching The End of Time again, and for all the craziness, it might be my favorite performance in the entire series by Tennant. His utter fear of the end, and the way he portrays it hits me every time. It's interesting that it's been kind of written off as his vanity since he doesn't really die, but I think as humans who have to ask some very hard question about their mortality we can all appreciate where he's coming from.

Tennant's performance, particularly his scenes with Bernard Cribbins, is why I will always defend The End Of Time, whatever its other flaws.

Hell, for that matter, I can just about justify the existence of Voyage of the Damned for that one angry moment where he shouts "but I can do anything!" Just about.

docbeard
Jul 19, 2011

It was less that Capaldi didn't feel like the Doctor to me (though I may have put it that way before) but that I didn't really have much of an idea of who his version of the Doctor was. Which, in a season that's about, broadly, him figuring out who he is, is to be expected I suppose.

Mummy isn't the first time he felt like a coherent character to me, but it's definitely one of the clearest portrayals we've had so far.

I'm kind of nervous about the use of the a-word at the end of the last episode, because ham-fisted addiction metaphors rarely work out well. But everything else, including Clara deciding that yes, gently caress it, she can in fact have a normal life and crazy adventures simultaneously (and of course she probably can't), felt real to me.

docbeard
Jul 19, 2011

What a fantastic episode. And on the heels of listening to Minuet In Hell, it was so refreshing to see something that mixed comedy and horror without diminishing either half of the equation so effortlessly and flawlessly. Restored my faith in humanity or comedy or something, that did.

docbeard
Jul 19, 2011

Aside from a bit of unhinged dialogue, has Missy actually done anything especially villainous?

Though if we're still playing "which classic villain is she" then I will put in a vote for her being the Master... of the Land of Fiction

Or Omega.

docbeard
Jul 19, 2011

Big Mean Jerk posted:

The BBC isn't going to let an upcoming release from a niche radio play company prevent them from bringing an iconic character back to their hugely popular worldwide tv show. C'mon, guys. Seriously.

I suspect that the rationale is that the BBC wouldn't allow that niche radio play company to use the linchpin of the latest season of their hugely popular worldwide TV show rather than that Big Finish has any veto power over TV Who.

Not sure I buy it either way. I'd think they'd welcome the cross promotion opportunities but then I am not a UK network executive.

docbeard
Jul 19, 2011

It was ridiculous and inconsistent and not very well thought out in places and had some dubious (and I assume unintentional) messages.

I loved it.

docbeard
Jul 19, 2011

I think what we've got, for the first time this season (yes, including Kill The Moon which was fine if you ignored the science, and the first half of Deep Breath which was actually well done and important and I will defend it to my grave and gently caress you all) is some astonishingly, almost criminally clumsy writing.

I don't believe for a second that Doctor Who was advocating the idea that mental illness isn't real and shouldn't be treated any more than it was advocating the idea that trees are fireproof. Which isn't to say that they didn't gently caress up, only that it's worth looking at how and why they hosed up.

The idea of (in this case) psychic phenomena being mistaken for mental illness is pretty common in science fiction. Hell, the kid arguably is still mentally ill; that her distress comes from telepathic sensitivity rather than a more mundane form of hosed-up brain chemistry doesn't make her suffering any less real. Making use of that suffering in aid of gaining more insight into what was happening is perfectly in keeping with the unpleasant form of pragmatism this iteration of the Doctor has demonstrated all season, and I'm sure that's what was intended. But they communicated it really goddamn poorly and now here we all are.

They don't get a free pass, of course, for that rather unfortunate, if unintentional, subtext.

As for what people will be casting as Clara cackling over the slaughter of the Earth's children any minute now, again, I think it's another mishandling of what was meant to be presented as an impossible dilemma, but which fell apart when exposed to reality. Clara's question of what sort of life these kids would have, alone on an unfamiliar world and deprived of their families, is a valid, poignant one, though it's a question that any of us can think of satisfying answers to. (As an example: "We'd be lost in another universe. Frozen in a single moment. We'd have nothing." "You would have hope!")

(On the other hand, one might as well take the Doctor to task for not herding the entire population of every planet he visits into the infinitely-large TARDIS, where they could live lives free of disease, want, and strife.)

I still liked the episode, but what a mess.

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docbeard
Jul 19, 2011

Doctor Spaceman posted:

Haven't they used the same idea before, regarding various invasions of Earth?

At this point the world being covered with trees isn't a story for the ages, it's Tuesday.

Yeah, this has long been the show's go-to explanation for why people haven't been well aware of hostile aliens since the '60s or so. Which isn't to say it's an especially satisfying answer.

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