All New Who

I just think the implication means that a woman would be more mates with her assistants, just cos. That a woman Doctor would not have the same alien distance, that the assisants don't have to prove themselves worthy, as all the others have had to.

The Doctor needs to remain alien!

yep otherwise its not Dr Who.

My cousin was there! I expect a full recap when he gets back.

{{And we expect a full recap of the recap Forest }}

Of course, Doctor Who insights are best fourth-hand, after all.

{{ Really enjoying this series of documentaries. Fan made but of professional standard, excellent journalism and research, great archive footage, clear and concise narration.
Each episode covers a different Doctor, this is the 4th Doctor one because, well he was my Doctor, and because Tom's such a fascinating guy and a lot of great stories. }}

First we will deal with memory as provoked by nostalgia in the viewer, for the most part the nostalgia stuff is just that and has no bigger part in the theme, but it is of course still there throughout, from the small such a name of a 1^st Doctor companion on a sign in the background, to the very large, such as seeing an old Doctor again. Its a celebration of the shows history and as such its filled with little nods to its past. Far, far too many to go into so rather just take it as read that this aspect of the episode is persistent throughout.

In many ways the 50^th is all about memory- its diving into the one big memory that really haunts the Doctor since the 9th- the Time War, its solution leaves the Doctor (well War, 9, 10 and 11 to this point) with a false memory of how the War ended

The War itself and the consequences are summed up in the one symbol, or rather one question- how many children were on Gallifrey the day the Doctor burned the planet?

“One day you will count them. One terrible night. Do you want to see what that will turn you into?”

This question comes to a head in the scene where all three versions of the Doctor are locked up together. Here we discover that whilst 10 did count how many by this point in his life as 11 he has chosen to forget it.

You forgot? Four hundred years, is that all it takes?

I moved on.

Where? Where can you be now that you can forget something like that?

Spoilers.

No. No, no, no. For once I would like to know where I'm going.

No, you really wouldn't.

This exchange is important for a few reasons. Firstly we get a clearer picture of the Doctors reaction to the Time War post. 9 which was immediately afterwards and trying to bury the whole thing but it kept coming out in powerful and sometimes dangerous ways, such as in Dalek where he finally breaks down at the end admitting openly his loss to Rose-

It's changing. What about you, Doctor? What the hell are you changing into?

I couldn't. I wasn't. Oh, Rose. They're all dead.

Just as he is about to shoot a Dalek in the face, admitting the truth of the situation to himself for the first time out loud. 10 tried his damnedest to run from the whole thing, have adventures, be the Doctor, but again he couldn't run from it and the weight of loses eventually got to him when forced to confront the Time Lords once more at the height of their madness in the Time War, as well as his interactions with the Master, the only other surviving Time Lord of the War left in the universe.
And finally 11, on his last life, youthful, energetic and determined to just forget the whole War ever happened, put the whole thing behind him and move on, but who again is worn down in the end by the weight of loss and memory of loss.

“The man who regrets and the man who forgets.”

As the Moment sums up 10, and 11.

And now at this point 11 is being hurled face to face again with the War and that Last Day when he ended it.
And he is also full of the recent knowledge of where he will die and in what circumstances, he is no longer thinking of the War, he is consumed with the thought of Trenzalore and that he will die in a losing battle, die fighting in a war, the least Doctory way he could go. History repeating. Not only is he confronting his past in the form of a Doctor he will not even recognise as such because of his actions in a war, but he is facing a future death that seems no better than the Doctor he denies.

A quick mention here too for the villain of the piece, the Zygons. They first appeared in the 4^th Doctor era and only made one appearance, though it was memorable. They were also the favourite classic Who monster of David Tennant, bringing back a classic monster for an anniversary and making a gesture to one of your lead actors might be reason enough for their inclusion but I am inclined to think that its the Zygon method of operating that swung it. They are shape-shifters, taking on the form of other people, but they have to capture and keep the original in order to refresh the memory-print every so often, they don't just look like you, they access your memories and behaviours learned over a life time to perfectly mimic you and so fit neatly in with the general themes of nostalgia and memory and their effects on the self.

“(The War) Turned me into the man I am now. I'm not even sure who that is any more.”

But the overall theme of the 50^th is what the War, and the Doctors memories of the War make him into, especially in relation to the name he has chosen for himself, Doctor. How does he reconcile the good man with the man who committed genocide?

All those years, burying you in my memory.

Pretending you didn't exist. Keeping you a secret, even from myself.

Pretending you weren't the Doctor, when you were the Doctor more than anybody else.

You were the Doctor on the day it wasn't possible to get it right.

In an odd way Moffat era Who is all about the Doctor relearning what it it to be the Doctor again. The weight of what RTD set up- double genocide could not just be shrugged off and right till the end of Moffats time on the show he deals with the effects of such a monumental event as the Time War on the Doctor, and here's the odd bit, in order to get rid of them.

The 50^th is about coming to terms with it, facing up to what happened, what he took part in and ultimately accepting it.

And what am I?

Have you really forgotten?

Yes. Maybe, yes.

There is a common misperception that the events of the 50^th episode somehow mean the Time War never happened. But all t he vents we see take place on the last day of the War, everything that happened up to that point happened. When 8 regenerated into the War Doctor it was looking like Hurt circa 1970's, the version we see in the 50^th is a hale but aged Time Lord, having fought therefore for at least one thousand years in the War to that point. None of those days are unwritten. Even though the Doctor may come up with a way to save Gallifrey on the last day and not kill all his people, doing so means also accepting all the days of the War preceding that. It means accepting all the pain of memory but also it means the chance to be complete again.

“But for now, for this moment, I am the Doctor again.”

Of course whilst this reconciles one part of the Doctor's past he still faces the greater impending issue of his own final death and the circumstances of it.

Where it is we're going that you don't want to talk about.

I saw Trenzalore, where we're buried. We die in battle among millions.

That's not how it's supposed to be.

That's how the story ends. Nothing we can do about it. Trenzalore is where you're going.

Which will take us into the xmas special and the Fall of 11.

But just to briefly summarise- the 50^th is full of nostalgic memories of course but plotwise it is centred on memory too. The memory of the War and what he believes he did to end it that haunts him and his final acceptance of those memories and of the version of himself that fought in the war as the Doctor. And what is a picture but a memory of an event frozen in time? The Doctor's solution, to use the same Gallifreyian technique for creating art to hold the entire planet in a moment in time preserves it too, tucked away just like a memory, waiting to be recalled.
On top of all the memory stuff we have reminders of the Doctors state of mind, of his brooding on his impending death and its circumstances. 11 has been running, he chose to forget the Time War and its consequences but it caught up with him, when confronted with Kovarians plan to kill him he tried to outrun it but couldn't.

Run.

Tried that. Brought me here.

Confronted with Trenzalore he will finally give up trying to run.

I've been running, faster than I've ever run. And I've been running my whole life. Now, it's time for me to stop.


But that's up next! Not that anyones bothered! }}}

{{And so we come full circle- all the mysteries from the very start of 11's time- what does Silence Must Fall Mean? Who blow up his TARDIS in series 5 and why? What was Dorian's riddle about- Its all still waiting for you. The Fields of Trenzalore. The Fall of Eleven. And the First Question, hidden in plain sight? These questions finally get their answers.

Well Trenzalore is the planet where he is buried, but we arrive before that in the events leading to it. Trenzalore is a small insignificant planet inhabited by a small farming society. It is also got a crack in the universe in its only town's bell tower- the same crack caused by the Doctor's exploding TARDIS way back in series 5. Its a weak point in our universe and someone is trying to get through. They are sending a signal, a question, the first question hidden in plain sight- Doctor Who? And projecting through the crack a truth field, so whoever gives the answer must be telling the truth. On the other side of the crack projecting all this are the Time Lords, trapped in their bubble universe after the events of the 50^th and signalling the Doctor.

All he has to do is give them is real name and they will know it is safe for them to return and come through.

Unfortunately the signal was broadcast right across space and the first to arrive in response to it were the future church, the Papal Mainframe led by Tasha Lem the Mother Superious who shielded the entire planet from everyone. As everyone soon arrived, particularly everyone who had suffered during the Time War.
Now if the Doctor gives his name and the Time Lord return it will be right into the jaws of war, no-one wants them back to start another Time War and are ready to open fire as soon as they do. More than that given half a chance they will simply obliterate the planet before the Doctor can answer. Hence Silence will Fall- the Doctor cannot be allowed to speak his name.
On the other-hand the Doctor, though he does not want to say his name anyway and reignite the Time War cannot leave either as the innocent people of the planet will be obliterated if he does.

So a stalemate results. The Doctor takes up residence on the planet protecting the town from all comers as various attempts are made to infiltrate and destroy the tower whilst the Doctor, alongside the Silence and the Papal Mainframe defend both the town and the crack. For nearly a thousand years in what becomes known as the Siege of Trenzalore.

In the meantime he sends Clara away in the TARDIS, but the TARDIS brings her back right at the end of the Doctors life when Tasha comes to fetch Clara to say goodbye to the Doctor, now an old man, as he goes to meet his fate, to be finally defeated by the Daleks .Only for Clara to beg with the Time Lords through the crack to do something, to interfere and save him and so save themselves in the long run.
The Time Lords close the crack from their side, and give the Doctor a whole new regeneration cycle, sparking his regeneration, the defeat of the Daleks and ending the Siege of Trenzalore.

That's the surface plot anyway. Underneath we still find the now very familiar themes dealing with memory and self.
The first strong suggestion of it comes from Clara's Gran telling the tale of meeting her late husband and it sets the tone for the final third-

“I saw him on a pier, on a rainy day. I'd seen him before lots of times. He seemed so beautiful standing there, I wanted everything to stop. I wanted nothing to change every again, if he could just keep standing there, so beautiful. Long time ago.”

But of course time doesn't stand still, and everything always changes,which is exactly what both Clara and the Doctor are coming to terms with.

Moffat also returns to use of the Dalek robo-slaves and their self reflective horror of having self stripped from memory. As happens to Tasha and her Church when the Daleks finally overcome them.

The Daleks send for reinforcements daily. They are massing for war. Three days ago, they attacked the Mainframe itself.

They attacked here?

How did you stop them?

Stop them? It was slaughter.

Why didn't you call me? I could have helped

I tried. I died in this room, screaming your name....Oh. I died. It's funny the things that slip your mind.

The main bulk of memory related material however comes toward the end where we have an aged Doctor who has been defending Trenzalore for the better part of one thousand years against all comers and now there is no-one left standing but him to defend against the Daleks.

11, now old refers to Barnabas who was a child on the planet when he first arrived, he calls someone else by that name, but its his memory finally failing, Barnanbas lived and died at least eight hundred years ago. The Doctor now lives surrounded by memories from Trenzalore as the generations of children from the town have made him drawings he pins all over his walls.

It sets a pattern here of the moments leading up to the Doctors imminent death being memory associated with melancholy. Like Clara's gran the Doctor evokes someone long gone.

The Doctor has had one thousand years, finally stuck in one place, a lot of time to think and remember and reincorporate the acceptance of the War back into his total self.

It all just disappears, doesn't it? Everything you are, gone in a moment, like breath on a mirror.....But times change, and so must I... Amelia?

Who's Amelia?

The first face this face saw. We all change, when you think about it. We're all different people all through our lives. And that's okay, that's good, you've got to keep moving, so long as you remember all the people that you used to be. I will not forget one line of this. Not one day. I swear. I will always remember when the Doctor was me.

Everything has come full circle for 11- the puzzle set up in the very beginning of Silence Wil Fall is resolved, the plot of the cracks in the universe is resolved, acceptance of his part in the Time War has at least begun in earnest. And now in his final moments he sees once again Amy, the first face he saw as 11. A rare happy memory of the past when he was young and new and running.

But more importantly is the notion of accepting all the different versions of ourselves, not denying any part to ourselves to our selves, no matter how painful. Denying ourselves a piece of our own past Moffat shows us is unhealthy, it has led the Doctor to dark places and troubled mental waters. But here at the last he has come to an understanding through acceptance of his memories, even all those painful ones, as being a necessary part of his whole being, of being the Doctor.
It is fitting 11's last words should relate to memory in this way.

11 regenerates as a different man before he changes physically. He started out running from everything, the memories of the War, from the fact it was his last life, from Kovarian, but at the end he had stopped running, literally staying in one place in one time, learning to accept the totality of his memories and to live with them.

But what sort of Doctor will be born from this?11 departs on a note of accepting his past and his mistakes, but free of the guilt of genocide of his own people yet still guilty of all the acts leading up to the end of the Time War, still full of pain but no longer afraid to face it and accept it and claim it.

So what sort of Doctor does that make?- a crabbit old Scottish one whose got no time for pretence or niceties any more, that sort!



It is possible to come away from this so far with the false impression almost every episode of Moffat era Who is about memory,and this is pretty true on a thematic level. But as I have been highlighting all those themes it may give the impression they are the only themes.

However this is not the case. I separate out here the Pond years from the Clara year with 11. The Ponds were not only the main companions for 11 and Amy and River the two main ciphers for themes of memory and self exploration, they also had themes of their own.

The Pond story is heavily imbued with fairytale, both visually- Amy in her hooded red jumper walking through a wood, or thematically, Kovarian as the wicked witch who steals the Princess and Princes baby and replaces it with a changeling, to narrative, Rory guarding Amy as she sleeps for two thousand years. And each individual episode will have themes of its own depending what it is about which do not relate directly to any other overall themes.

Clara though she slotted nicely into the memory theme as the Impossible Girl served a main purpose with 11 in being the link and introduction to the events of the 50^th. Her basic character traits were laid out- she is a bit of a control freak and compartmentalises her life, not travelling with the Doctor but insisting he picks her up at regular prearranged times and keeping her home life entirely separate from Doctor life. She can be bossy and a little arrogant at times, and by the end of her time with 11 she had, as others before her have, pretty much fallen for the dashing young energetic flirty 11th Doctor. But none of that is ever really gone into in any depth to this point due to her stronger narrative purpose taking up all the time. This combined with the late last minute decision by the BBC Execs to change her from Victorian Clara to modern day gave her an unfortunate but necassry hastily sketched in background.

That will change, as too will how Moffat uses his characters to look at memory and self. For the 12^th Doctor Moffat will explore what it means to be the Doctor, both from the point of view of the effect that can have on someone, and if that's good or bad, and from within the Doctor himself- what makes him tick? What drives him on? What makes the Doctor the Doctor and what makes him good? And coming to understand what it means to be the Doctor is the journey 12 will go on, and a considerable more fleshed out Clara will be his mirror for that journey. }}}}

{{A selection of vids from some of my favourite Who fanvid folks. These all touch on or highlight some of the themes Ive been talking about so far, though some do also contain material form the 12th Doctor, giving a nice hint of the direction things will be going when I cover 12. Watch one or as many as you like they all in their own way highlight different aspects of what has been under discussion and they are all very nicely edited too  }}

{{{{  Quote from Chibnal-

'I love Doctor Who as a big, popular, mainstream, accessible show. So I wanted to make sure that every member of the audience has a relatable character, an access point. Hopefully it means the show can resonate with the broadest possible audience...we've got different generations, different genders."


This seems arse to elbow to me- story and characters first then find the best folk to play those parts. This idea of first thinking, 'oh I need to appeal to black folk and young males so Ill have a young black guy, and I better put an Indian girl in there that covers young females and the Indian demography, oh dear what about older grumpy white Who fans who have been watching forever and might think this sounds like a load of touchy-feely pish?, Right I'll just cast an older white man in there too to cover that. Oh dear now I need to come with stories for them all!' 
NO, no, no! Stupid way to go about it!!!

'We all bring something different to the group, with race, gender."- Mandeep

Well that doesn't sound like load of forced pc crap at all!!   }}}

totally agree Petty. its pandering of the worst kind. Its artistic cowardice. Art should challenge and not be safe. The Doctor is not safe, this all inclusive cozy crap really sucks. the assistants are not 'mates', if Chibnall makes them equals and mates from the start, this is not Dr Who.

{{ I really am trying to be hopeful, I want the first female Doctor to work, but I am getting increasingly worried with all this pc claptrap thats coming out from Chibnal and the cast- whether its the over use of the word 'inclusive' or the rot Chibnal was spilling above.
Who has always had social and political commentary in there, but it was always under the hood- you can watch The Happiness Patrol and not know its a satire of 80's Britain under Thatcher, its a nice extra layer if you spot it, but it works fine as a story on its own if you've no idea- same as Curse of Peladon, which is a commentary on the UK joining or not what was then the Common Market, or more recently Empress of Mars which comments on Brexit, hell RTD is quite open about his aim to include more gay characters in the show, something he did, but the gay part was never the story, it was there in the fact some characters happened to be gay, it wasn't the main deal ever.

My problem here is it feels like we are going to get beaten over the head with the messages. Setting a story around Rosa Parks and civil rights movement for example, its a bit hard to imagine how you do that without it consistently beating you over the head with its social messaging.

If you want to do something about race- its Doctor Who  for gods sake- set it on Planet racist, have some racist aliens and explore the themes through that- you dont just go and slap it on top right out in the open as the main plot- thats not using scifi to reflect society, its using scifi to browbeat an agenda. }}

once you go down the route of whitewashing bits of history, or art, books, poems, or statues that minorities find 'offensive' then our culture is going to stagnate and become feeble. I grew up in the age when comedians, like Bernard Manning, had no boundaries, they could laugh at literally anyone, bit like the great cartoonists of the 18th century, which were quite vicious, but had a more serious message underneath. They were robust, people could take it, and laugh without being offended. Likewise great stories didn't hammer the message, they made you think for yourself, its quite insulting to have diversity spoon fed to you. and if they are really going down the revisiting of Rosa Parks route a) this is a sci-fi show, and b) who is it supposed to cater for, people know all forms of apartheid was bad, and I don't want it hammered every 5 minutes.

{{ Agreed Figg, especially the bit about it being a sci-fi show.

Take RTD (as he is open publicly about having an agenda to increase gay characters, which when he took over stood at 40 years of Who, number of openly gay characters 0 so its not like he didn't have a point).
The main character from his era that carried that message was Captain Jack. But Jack was an ex-time agent who woke up one day to find his employers had stolen a chunk of his memories and who went rogue because of that, became a con-artist selling time-junk as valuable goods and turned up in WW2 disguised as US Army Airman on a hustle, and as a human from the far future when we are spread out everywhere with other species, he is pan-sexual never mind gay.

But everything else is interesting about him ahead of his sexual orientation, its just a part of his character. And the sci-fi is used to both explain his attitude and allows for a contemporary response to that from Rose and simple acceptance of it from the Doctor giving you different reactions to that idea within a Who/scifi context. So it feels natural and not forced in there.
That's how you bring themes and agendas to Who- same with Moffat- hell I've spent hours writing on Moffats main theme of memory and self, but there is not a single episode I could point you to where those are the whole point, purpose and story.

Setting a story around Rosa Parks to discuss racism would be like if RTD, instead of crafting an interesting character who happens to be gay as a means of exploring different reactions to that, would instead just have gone, "ah sod it, lets just set in a contemporary human gay bar and they meet an obviously gay guy in the gay bar called Jack and where everything in the story from setting to narrative to characters is there to reinforce how gay he is."

Its lazy, its no using your characters well if they are there as representatives of  whole groups, and its not using Who as a proper vehicle for exploring those issues and its in danger of coming across to the viewer as telling them how to think. }}

well I suppose RTD was writing as a gay man himself, so he could understand that it shouldn't be the biggest defining characteristic of a person, and in a sci-fi show it isn't really that a big deal, as you said with aliens and people from all times and places, diverging from heterosexual so called norms is a given.

diverging from heterosexual so called norms is a given.- Figg

{{That I suppose was RTD's issue- it should have been but up till then there had never been a single gay character in Who (Ace almost certainly is and the writers thought so, but the BBC wouldn't let them tackle it as an issue save in very oblique ways) so he was more correcting an imbalance than anything else. The main point being whilst he added that to Who as a social agenda, he never beat the viewer over the head with it, he never set stories in a 'gay environment' (like a gay club, or a planet where everyone is gay or something) to highlight the gay issue for example.
Dealing with race in a story about Rosa Parks  is like doing that. Its not subtle and it doesn't sound like a primarily sci-fi idea that tackles social issues by traditional Who means  of metaphor, satire, suggestion, and thematically- it's just slapped on the top layer of the story- its Rosa Parks, its the birth of the civil rights movement, its about 'inclusiveness'

I really hope I'm wrong but there are a lot of warning signs coming up now we have cast and showrunner interviews to go on that they are deliberately going to be highlighting social issues with the sort of subtly you usually only get when you smash someone over the head with a half brick  }}}

Yep I am getting that warning signal too. Stories about race and sexuality are important, but that's another show, and it would tie Who too tightly to Earth and all our shit, Who is different to say Star Trek which always tied the messages back to humanity and Earth, in a kind of a morality tale, I personally think Who is different. If there are morality tales they are more subtle, and ambiguous, Mr Spock is an alien who initially didn't understand human emotions, but the Dr already understands humans, and sometimes he doesn't like us or want to be with us.

{{Taken the BBC about 6 months to finally put up the 3rd part of the Moffat interview but here it is finally




In light of my own ramblings on the topic of Moffat and mental health in Who I found his comment on Rose and 9 interesting, as it denotes the base line of where he sees the Doctor starting from in NuWho-
"Rose is the one who pulls him out of his manic depression and resurrects him as an engaged heroic figure...she is the one who gets him out the trauma ward"  }}}

{{Another excellent documentary on the troubled period of the 6th Doctor this time, from same guy as did the 4th Doctor one I put up.
I found the bit about censorship interesting, and somewhat nostalgic! I remember the 'video nasty' ban wiped up by the press well.
Hard to believe it now but aged about 14ish I had to buy copies of A Clockwork Orange and The Exorcist from a shady guy in a very shady part of the Barras Market in Glasgow. He sold me them out of a holdall full of vhs tapes hidden under his stall, from where he normally sold the likewise illegal at the time porno vids. And I had to make the journey home on train and boat knowing if for some reason the police searched me and found those two films I would be arrested! Mindboggling now }}

Well apparently the cousins skipped Hall H entirely during the Doctor Who stuff! Quite distressing, I must say...