Doctor Who (everybody else is doing it)

[chrisvenus]

So, season finale and all that stuff... I just have a few points I am confused by...


So, my first big question and really the one that I posted this for is this: Dalek Khan said that he manipulated time to bring them all there because he'd seen the dalek empire and what it had done and thought that it should be destroyed or whatever...

So if in travelling into the time war he saw all this then why on earth did he bring davros out and allow him to create a new dalek empire? Why not just leave him there?

Second question if all these people were going "Oh poor donna, your fate sucks" throughout the series then err... well, how does that work? I can kind of understand that archaeologist woman because she was from their future so actually knew but there were people from the shadow proclamation (or whatever) who seemed to somehow know and I just don't really get what the logic behind all of that was. I can see as a narrative foreshadowing (I mean, a clumsy foreshadowing but nevermind) but I don't see how it made sense in terms of the doctor who universe...

And just in terms of story was the second doctor actually necessary? Was he just there to get Rose to piss off again? I mean, given that donna I am fairly sure was taught to fly the tardis he wasn't necessary to save the tardis. The device he made to invert the bomb thing back on the daleks got destroeyd so was kind of pointless. I am not sure if there was any reason why they couldn't have just had Donna do the thing with the hand to get the regeneration energy and then had her pilot the tardis to where the doctor was just to see if she could help? Would that have been that much worse?

And I am not sure Rose and the parallel universe was necessary but there was a certain amount of coolness to having a companion-rich episode. Having ecclestone turn up would have been awesome. Maybe we can get "the two doctors" (yeah, I know that story name has gone) with the next series... ;-)

And the random ending for donna was just awful. Writing her out of the series - I mean, fine. If that's the way the contracts went, etc. But why not do it in a better way? She could easily have kept all of those memories and gone off and done stuff without the doctor. At that point she didn't *need* the doctor any more. She could go off and do her own thing. Would that have been so bad? And it would have left scope for her appearing again in the future much like Rose and martha have. For donna to reappear in the future is basically undoing the big climax at the end of this episode... Oh, except they did that for Rose didn't they so never mind...


Oh, and as a random extra thought, did Rose ever look for a doctor in her parallel universe do you think? I mean, I see no reason why there couldn't be one...

And lastly having just got it playing in the background I've just noticced how real doctor distracted rose while doing a runner. "Look over there! its a human doctor!" *Rose snogs* *Doctor Runs* Win!

I did enjoy it but thought it could have been better but I guess its all a matter of personal perspective really.

Oh, and the thing that everybody else says aboout how donna had a time lord's mind in a human body and that was fatal but then New Doctor had Time lord mind in a human body... Poor rose...

Comments

[cultureofdoubt.livejournal.com]

And what about the reality bomb destroying all the parallel universes, but that Rose's universe had already had the stars going out... that's all confusing too?

[chrisvenus]

I figure that you can get away with strange explanations when you are talking about time in different universes... I figured that it was just that some property of the thing meant that the universe in which it was detonated went last...

Its basically more an unexplained thing rather than necessarily not making sense...

[cultureofdoubt.livejournal.com]

But but but... it wasn't detonated in the end!

[chrisvenus]

PARADOX! Yeah, it is a bit confusing. I guess its possible that in all the parallele universes there was a reality bomb but in that case how did stopping it in one stop it in all the others... Umm....

[kissifa.livejournal.com]

That would have been an even better ending:

Rose and the 2nd Doctor stand arm in arm looking at where the Tardis has just disappeared.
Rose: I'm looking forward to spending the rest of our lives together.
2nd Doctor: Me too. Shame it's only going to be about two weeks until the Reality-bomb wave hits, but still, I'm sure it'll be fun!

I did feel sorry for Donna at the end, but I kind of felt even more sorry for the 2nd Doctor. He's got to stand there, watching the woman he loves plead for another man to stay, and complain about how he's not the man she loves, and then she's stuck with him (even though he knows along with the doctor that technically they are the same). Not the best start to a relationship.

[neoanjou.livejournal.com]

Because Rose's Universe is slightly ahead of ours - that is to say the events of our Universe happen a few days/months/years after they have happened in Rose's.

But yes - there is a question as to why the Universe would be destroyed at the same 'absolute', not relative time in both.

[cultureofdoubt.livejournal.com]

No, my point was that one of the properties of the reality bomb was supposed to be that it destroyed all parallel realities too, wasn't it? So Rose's going off should have had the same effect in ours, affecting ours earlier as Rose's universe is ahead.

[innokenti.livejournal.com]

I think that they tried to solve that by throwing the 'Medusa Cascade' at us. It is wibbly...

Yes, alright, of course it doesn't make too much sense.

[neoanjou.livejournal.com]

I wanted the 'new' Doctor and Donna to go off and forge a new race of time-lords; humanised somehow without the arrogance of the previous generation. Donna would have 'died' ('death' seems to mean something different in the Who-ni-verse) because the Human Donna would no longer exist.

Plus doesn't the, erm, 8th (TV Movie) doctor mention being half-human. It would have been cool if he could have been a descendent of the 'new' Doctor instead. (Although he did have two hearts, but in the Neil edited Universe the 'new' Doctor and Doctor-Donna would be able to regenerate, and maybe two hearts re-asserted itself in a later regeneration.

[chrisvenus]

Did anybody ever count how many hearts donna had? If her mind had been rewritten then I don't see why the body couldn't have been in some way... And as for regenerations, well, both of them have had regeneration energy coursing through them so no reason they shouldn't be able to regenerate still...

And yeah, I was wondering about the 8th doctor thing too. I assume that was just ignoring continuity though which the writers seem happier to do than the fans. ;-)

[becky-spence.livejournal.com]

I believe (okay, I'm making this up) that if her body had been re-written too, then she wouldn't have been going loopy-brain-fried thanks to having Time Lord brain, because she'd have been better able to handle it (being a bit more Time Lord-y). Being just a human with a Time Lord mind was breaking her.

The 8th Doctor thing is apparently (so I am told, since I am not allowed to stick my fingers in my ears and hum about the whole affair) down to a botched Regeneration, and got itself fixed by the time Ecclestone came around.

[chrisvenus]

I have heard the botched Regeneration somewhere else but is there any actual canon stuff that supports it or is there just a fan explanation of it?

The doctor-donna thing I reckon is just bizarre. My main complaint is with the OOC writing rather than necessarily the IC explanations. The IC stuff isn't great but I can just about justify it. I'm just wondering if RTD did do it just to be ridiculously over-dramatic since other things would have needed less explanations and attempts to rationalise.

[apotropaios.livejournal.com]

Well, every regeneration has been a bit tricky. The Doctor just seems a bit rubbish at regenerating (especially next to Romana). He's normally loopy for an episode or so afterwards.

[chrisvenus]

Yeah. Regenerations are rarely smooth for the doctor but as you imply its usually a mental thing. The idea of a regeneration going wrong to the extent of writing alien physiology into his system randomly seems a bit further from that than I am really happy with.

[kissifa.livejournal.com]

(Disclaimer: the following is personal opinions from someone who's read Wikipedia and watched one or two episodes including the last one - not a massive fan who's seen every episode.)

For my money, with the second doctor and Donna, I figured that the 2nd Doctor starts off with Timelord DNA and brain structure etc. and has some human snuck in there to give him only one heart and be vulnerable to ageing etc., whereas Donna starts with a human's brain structure and DNA etc. and gets some Timelord snuck in there, which is eventually going to overwhelm her brain-meats, so there is an appreciable difference if you understand it that they've not become an identical sort of creature, as the human and timelord bits are in different ratios.

For Dalek Caan's part, I am lead to understand from Wikipedia that managing to get into the timelocked war sent him a bit loopy - so while he originally intended to do the normal dalek thing of getting Davros out and re-starting the Daleks, and destroying everything, the process of getting to Davros and pulling him out sent Caan mad, and gave him the image of all-time, where he finally saw what the daleks had done, and came to his decision about it all. As to just sending davros back, or killing him on the spot, I'm putting that down to him saying that he only helped events which would have happened anyway, he knew Davros would be out and the daleks would rise once again, he also knew the 2nd Doctor would kill them, so he decided to get in on that pre-ordained goodness and do his bit to help. Plus he's mad. :)

[chrisvenus]

Yes, I suppose insanity is a very good argument (and corrected spelling duly noted - it does mean going "Khhhhhhaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaannnnnnn" is less of an option though). :)

It is quite possible that Caan just wanted to be a saviour of the universe in his insanity and so he had to let davros create an empire so he could help destroy it...

And lets face it - the season finale would have been rubbish if they had got there and there were no daleks or anything like that... ;-)

[becky-spence.livejournal.com]

The second Doctor appears primarily to have been there to give all the fans of Rose and the Doctor being a OTP the kiss they were all dying for.

The Companion rarely learns to fly the TARDIS though :) Occasionally they learn how to jump start it.

[chrisvenus]

I'm sure at the beginning of the Sontaran episodes the doctor was teaching the donna to fly the tardis or something. I don't remember precisely but I remember expecting it to be a plot point in there. It might not have been fully flying lessons but enough to travel through space a bit maybe...

[apotropaios.livejournal.com]

re: Rose's dimension's Doctor.

If we're being pedantic (and this is the internet) then there has to be one. Because Rose's world has its own Torchwood, and Torchwood was only founded by Queen Victoria because she ran into the Doctor at the Torchwood estate. Also, if there were no parallel doctor, surely Rose's world would be just as big a mess as the Turn Left alternate world, but even moreso, because there would have been no Doctor in pre-The Runaway Bride to stop everything else he's ever stopped. Maybe Rose's Doctor just never met Rose, but travels with somebody else, and what with him being all anywhere in time and space, and him having never met her, it's her Doctor that she wants (hence crying when he might regenerate)

[glamwhorebunni.livejournal.com]

Unless...

Rose's world is different from ours in that the Doctor died or something between the founding of Torchwood and the current day. Which explains how they managed to get to such a fucked up state (Cybermen etc) without the Doctor interferring- he wasn't there.

Or maybe Rose doesn't want her dimensions Doctor because they never met. After all, there wasn't a Rose in that world when the whole plastic-shop-dummy thing happened. So Nine might have regenerated into someone totally different, and not Ten. And Rose like Nine, but only loved Ten?

[chrisvenus]

Good logic, I like. I have to admit I always assumed there was a doctor in every universe but I've never really thought about it that hard. :)

[onebyone.livejournal.com]

I think the Doctor transcends parallel universes. There is only one Doctor across time and universes. Think Zelazny's Amberites.

Just an opinion, and of course if the Doctor clones himself then there's more than one, but I think it's neater than trying to figure out where all the other Doctors are and why ours didn't just hand Rose over to the "proper Doctor" in her new universe in the first place, as a good candidate to be a companion.

This Who concept of multiple universes isn't very well formed though: it's not even clear whether the shut-offedness of Rose's universe is normal or not. We also don't know how alternate universes are formed: perhaps Rose's "branched" after the critical Doctor-related events which formed Torchwood. Or perhaps Torchwood formed in that universe without the intervention of the Doctor. I don't think it's a stretch at all to say that in the Whoniverse, effects can precede causes. So maybe the Doctor bumped into Queen Victoria in our universe because Torchwood is something which "has to happen", rather than our Torchwood being a fluke.

[onebyone.livejournal.com]

Just read evath's point that clearly there was an alternate Doctor in Donna's pocket reality.

I'd still claim this doesn't mean there are alternate Doctors in all universes. Fundamentally though the question is open for future writers to do whatever they want with - nobody Doctor Who writer ever thought "hang on, if we do that now then that means it should have happened back in that previous episode too, but it didn't, so we can't do it now".

[frazzylou.livejournal.com]

Just jumping in here. Dunno if you saw my post about this episode or not.

Mostly I think all the shipping and general romance stuff is largely to do with RTD and the fact that he has a giant crush on the Doctor (well, it seems like it anyway). I also don't think he's the best writer ever. Granted he's had some good ideas, but if you compare RTD's episodes to Moffat's then they just pale into insignificance. The ending with Rose and the two Doctors is clumsy at best, and really just left me feeling disappionted and irritated.

No companion has ever been taught to fly the TARDIS properly. I think Rose got the furthest with it, but it was more like a parent letting their kid hold the gear lever while the parent changes gear. Besides the fact, as they said in the episode, the Doctor is linked to his TARDIS (psychically), and Donna certainly wouldn't be able to feel all the little nuances the Doctor can. As for the ending for her, I would have preferred it if she'd died. I'm really not too bothered about old companions coming back, infact having them come back constantly bothers me more. But really, given how much Donna had changed it seemed more in character for her to do what River Song did and refuse to let the Doctor take her memories. I definately don't think she could have stayed as a Time Lord though.

I did a little bit of research on this alternate reality Doctor thing and I found out that, just like the TARDIS, Gallifrey was contained within its own separate dimension. They originated in this universe but as they got more advanced they slightly separated themselves off - hence why there are no Time Lords for the Doctor to run into in alternate universes, and no alternate universe Doctors.

Oh, and the Rose coming back thing. The Doctor said it was impossible for her to come back (at the end of Series 2) because of breaking the universes. The Time Lords used to have a safe way of doing it, but that doesn't exist anymore. The Human way of 'jumping' is too dangerous, but I'm guessing after the Doctor had healed all the rifts jumping back and forth a little bit wasn't going to cause too much damage. Just my two cents there really.

And I agree with Kissifa on the DoctorDonna thing. :)

[evath.livejournal.com]

"I did a little bit of research on this alternate reality Doctor thing and I found out that, just like the TARDIS, Gallifrey was contained within its own separate dimension. They originated in this universe but as they got more advanced they slightly separated themselves off - hence why there are no Time Lords for the Doctor to run into in alternate universes, and no alternate universe Doctors."

I've heard the first bit before (but not sure if it is true), but I think your conclusion is wrong, before RTD Dr Who, I am fairly sure even then Gallifrey was in another dimension and due to the fact it wasn't in the time war they could jump to parallel universes, just as stated in the cybermen episode it is no longer possible as the tardis looses power.

Also there are alternative universe doctors, you saw one die in the alternative universe donna.

[frazzylou.livejournal.com]

Well, I got that information from this huge (I mean really huge) Who resource which pools all known knowledge about the 'Whoverse' and organises it into a Time Lord time line. Apparently it's 'common knowledge' that there is only one Gallifrey in the whole of existence.

I'm not sure I understand what you mean here:
"I am fairly sure even then Gallifrey was in another dimension and due to the fact it wasn't in the time war they could jump to parallel universes, just as stated in the cybermen episode it is no longer possible as the tardis looses power."

Also, as for Donna's alternate universe, I thought that was supposed to be a 'wrong' version of this universe due to that time bug thing.

[chrisvenus]

Any chance you could find where you got that from? I'd be interested to see the reference. The one I usually end up coming across is http://tardis.wikia.com/wiki/Gallifrey whcih mentions nothing of the whole one gallifrey in all the unvierses type argument...

[frazzylou.livejournal.com]

I honestly can't remember. I stumbled across it about 2 years ago so it might not even exist any more. I distinctly remember reams and reams of stuff on Rassilon and it was all colour coded on a black background.

The closest thing I can find is this one: http://www.islandnet.com/~dascott/intro.htm
Maybe if you type Doctor Who Timeline into google it'll pop up. Am tidying the flat today for an inspection so I can't look for it myself. :(

[onebyone.livejournal.com]

I thought that was supposed to be a 'wrong' version of this universe due to that time bug thing.

Even more than that - the Doctor said that normally the universe manages to accommodate the changes made by time bugs, and that Donna's case was unusual in creating an alterniverse.

[frazzylou.livejournal.com]

Mm, true. I'd forgotten that bit. :)

[chrisvenus]

No companion has ever been taught to fly the TARDIS properly.

I must go back and remind myself what the heck I was thinking of. Nobody else seems to remember this bit that I have quite clear in my mind. ;-)

[frazzylou.livejournal.com]

I think it was mentioned in the confidentials for (new) series 1 or 2 that it was unsual for Rose to be taught how to fly it. Also, it's supposed to be flown by more than one Time Lord, so even if he did teach them in the past it was probably a very basic knowledge.

Then again, I haven't seen that much of the 'old' series. Could be wrong.

[ao-lai.livejournal.com]

I think at the beginning of the first Sontaran episode Donna was shown operating the controls somehow, and saying that she couldn't believe it, and the Doctor saying that neither could he...

(Pedantically speaking, I believe Romana was able to fly the TARDIS, and did so in at least Shada, but that may not count. It was also implied that Adric knew how, but I don't remember if he ever actually does it alone.)

[onebyone.livejournal.com]

f all these people were going "Oh poor donna, your fate sucks" throughout the series then err... well, how does that work?

The ShadowPact Proclamation is in some sense outside time, on account of being important in the Time Wars. Clearly that doesn't mean they're omniscient, or they'd have found Davros's cunning hiding place immediately, but it can explain why they "know stuff". The Doctor made it quite clear at the end of the episode that galaxies would sing Donna's praises for ever. The Ood seem to be prescient. So it's conceivable that someone in the ShadowPact Proclamation could have heard something about Donna.

in terms of story was the second doctor actually necessary?

No, but something doesn't have to be narratively essential (a) for RTD to think it's cool, or (b) for it to happen. Yes, I think he was there largely in order to do-over Rose's ending.

He was also there in order to commit genocide on the Daleks. Not that the proper Doctor hasn't (tried to) do that any number of times already in New Who, but in this episode the Doctor was a pacifist (unlike, say, the Pompeii episode where he blew up the bad guys and a city without much angst). So on this occasion someone else had to push the button. Obviously any of the companions would have been perfectly happy to, but making the clone-Doctor do it is part of RTD's theme that no matter what he says or thinks about it, the Doctor in reality is a destructive force too.

And the random ending for donna was just awful.

It was tragic, and the tragedy took a fair bit of brute force to contrive even though it was clearly intended all series. It could have been done much more neatly. I admired the attempt to do something different, though, and the courage to shaft Donna arguably even worse than Rose was shafted in her first "ending".

I wouldn't be surprised if Moffat comes back to Donna, but I guess it depends a lot on Catherine Tait and how much Moffat personally likes the character and the current state of affairs.

Oh, and the thing that everybody else says aboout how donna had a time lord's mind in a human body and that was fatal but then New Doctor had Time lord mind in a human body

As others have said, I don't think the two are necessarily comparable. If RTD had wanted them to be the same then fair enough, but if he wants them to be different then fair enough also. I don't know what a "Time Lord / human meta-crisis" is, but fundamentally the clone-Doctor's body was created out of nothing by "regeneration energy", and so might reasonably be assumed to be up to the job known at the time to be required of it. The changes to Donna are not at all clear, and seem to be accidental, so there's no reason to believe that they shouldn't be fatal.

Also, the Doctor's sudden ability to alter memories is not explored in the least. How many previous plots could he have solved had he used that ability before? Why is his ability good enough to put Donna in a state where she can see his face without remembering all that Time Lord stuff, but not good enough to put her in a state where she can travel with him? W, in short, TF?

Clearly the answer is "in order to contrive the ending": if he'd had a better ability then he could have de-Time-Lorded Donna completely. If he'd had a worse ability she'd just have died. Either ending would have been more like what we're used to.

What I found most most surprising was that Catherine Tait was better at imitating the Doctor than David Tennant was at imitating Donna.