S08.E11: Dark Water

[elle]

This is from  the thread about how Clara and Eleven got out of his time stream.

No, you didn't miss anything. According to Steven Moffat, once the Doctor had found Clara they simply walked out of the time stream, and he thinks that resolution is so blindingly obvious that he can't understand why we'd want to see it on-screen or be puzzled that the next episode started on a reset with no explanation. Never mind that we'd been told, repeatedly, that stepping into the time stream would be fatal. Never mind that there was no exit apparent on-screen. He honestly sees no reason why he needed to resolve the scenario. They were in there and then they were out, and apparently that's all we need to know.

 

Yes, it is awful storytelling, structured around 'cool' moments rather than plausibility or, you know, actual narrative logic. He wanted to end the season on the big reveal of John Hurt. He wanted to open the anniversary special with Clara at Coal Hill School. He had no space in between to achieve the transition, so he decided not to bother with the transition - those twin desires overruled all other considerations, including the integrity of the storyline. Awful writing.

I read this and immediately thought of the question that has been ignored since the Christmas special "Where is Gallifrey".  I now have a horrible feeling that Moffatt is going to hand wave that one away too with a "it is so obvious, you don't need to see it on screen".

 

They don't do a next time preview for two-parters.

 

You know, I feel like an idiot. I stood in the street and watched scenes being filmed with Cybermen in them and I knew it was for the 2-part finale and I still managed to forget and be surprised when they showed up (I don't watch promos). I was glad to see them, though – they made this more of a real Doctor Who episode than it had been up to that point and I finally began to feel invested. I appreciated having the full body horror of Cybermen restored in this episode, as well – it isn't always remembered. And I loved seeing those doors slam shut revealing the logo, the Cyber eyes, which we'd been seeing all through the episode but hadn't made sense of till that moment – which, talk about corporate branding! Missy's idea, no doubt. I don't think the big plot is going to hold together when it all plays out – I can see too many holes and logic gaps already – but I'll reserve judgement on that score till we've seen part 2.
 

I found the location spotting rather distracting, right from the first scene, when Danny got knocked down coming out of the north end of Alexandra Gardens by the National Assembly office building, a stone's throw from my office, but then his memorial was set up at the east side of the park, opposite the main University Building. And then 3W was in the museum, just around the corner, so dead Danny didn't have far to go…. Like I said: distracting.

 

Thanks.  And, it sounds like fun to have been able to see them filming!  I can understand about knowing locations to be distracting while watching a show.   A tv movie was filmed at our state university, I was more interested in picking out the buildings I knew so well than about the plot.

 

 

I do hope that Danny stays dead.  His death (unlike Rory's) had nothing to do with the Doctor and sometimes good people die for stupid, tragic, and completely ordinary reasons.  Clara being in love with him doesn't make him any more or less worthy of a second chance compared to all of the other good people who die in car accidents, etc.

A lesson that was well addressed with Rose and her father.

 

No, his fate was left intentionally open. We never saw if he got sucked in with the others or if he escaped. The Doctor lost consciousness at that point, and it seems more likely he ran out.

I just watched the scene again.  The Master is attacking Rassilon while marching towards him.  We see the The Master is still in an unstable state (alternating shots of the blue skull and John Simms face) though that seemed to be how he generated the energy to push back Rassilon.  He is standing with the Time Lords as they go back into the white void that had been their background.  The very next shot is of Gallifrey "falling" away from Earth.   To me, The Master used up most of his remaining energy to get his revenge on Rassilon.

 

I did not see where the Doctor lost consciousness, he was knocked to the floor, but very awake when he said his next line.

 

Another Moffet mystery not explained - WHO was the Time Lady that Wilf kept seeing and was also present at the meeting of Rassilon/The Doctor/The Master?

[KirkB]

Since Moffat was the one who introduced the snapping fingers to open the doors gimmick (which I always thought was stupid) in the first place it seems unlikely he'd forget about it. The fact the Doctor seemed so concerned about losing the keys when we know full well he has at least one another way to open the doors might have been intended as a hint that something else was going on. On a related but separate note, having a half dozen keys scattered around the INSIDE of the Tardis doesn't make a lot of sense anyway. He can't really be locked in and what good do they do if he is locked OUT?

[cambridgeguy]

 

Another Moffet mystery not explained - WHO was the Time Lady that Wilf kept seeing and was also present at the meeting of Rassilon/The Doctor/The Master?

That's a RTD mystery. 

[Llywela]

Thanks.  And, it sounds like fun to have been able to see them filming!  I can understand about knowing locations to be distracting while watching a show.   A tv movie was filmed at our state university, I was more interested in picking out the buildings I knew so well than about the plot.

 

Another Moffet mystery not explained - WHO was the Time Lady that Wilf kept seeing and was also present at the meeting of Rassilon/The Doctor/The Master?

That was an RTD thing and he has said that he left it deliberately vague so that the audience could make up their own minds who it was - the Doctor's mother/wife/Susan/anyone we want it to be. I thought that was lame at the time, but we've plumbed new depths of lameness since then.

 

I get distracted by location-spotting quite a lot watching Doctor Who (inevitable, since it's filmed here), but it's worse in some episodes than others! The scene I saw with the Cybermen hasn't happened yet - that'll be next week.

Jemma Redgrave

was there, along with the Doctor and Missy. And a bunch of Cybermen, who were headless when I first saw them in the morning but then put their heads on for actual filming later. They spent an entire day on that scene - they were there as I passed on my way to work, about 8am, they were still rehearsing when I passed again at lunchtime, and they were actively filming as I went home for the day (they'd closed the road by then, I watched for a while and then had to take a big detour to get past!). A whole day, for one scene. It made me think about the classic days, when they had 90 minutes to record an entire 25 minute episode. How much has changed!

 

When I went past that lunchtime, Peter Capaldi had a queue of people lining up to have their photos taken with him - he was being lovely about it.

 

Since Moffat was the one who introduced the snapping fingers to open the doors gimmick (which I always thought was stupid) in the first place it seems unlikely he'd forget about it. The fact the Doctor seemed so concerned about losing the keys when we know full well he has at least one another way to open the doors might have been intended as a hint that something else was going on. On a related but separate note, having a half dozen keys scattered around the INSIDE of the Tardis doesn't make a lot of sense anyway. He can't really be locked in and what good do they do if he is locked OUT?

I figured he keeps plenty of spares in case of need - he learned that lesson as early as Marco Polo in 1964, and does keep handing them out to companions these days, without ever getting them back, so I daresay it pays to have a few copies to hand just in case - but stashes them away in hiding places rather than keep them on a hook by the door so they don't fall into the wrong hands, whether that be an enemy or a random school child who wanders aboard.

Edited November 2, 2014 by Llywela

[John Potts]

While I thought the beginning bit with Danny was a bit unnecessary (even if I was thinking "You really should pay attention to crossing the road and not to chatting with your girlfriend, I've seen a PSA about that" - and then he got hit!) I did like Clara's volcano rant. Sure, it was completely unfair and unreasonable, but it felt like the most realistic portrayal of the Danny/Clara relationship we've seen..

 

I don't think the Master/Mistress reveal was especially obvious - I mean, I'd read it here but it wasn't my No.1 contender (there was always the possibility that it was a younger River Song, the Rani or an insane Romana.

 

tankgirl73 Did they never answer the question of what 3w stands for?

 

It stands for "3 words" - I'm not sure they revealed which words it was, though "I still feel" or "Don't burn me!" would be good contenders. Though even for a programme that "Runs on Handwavium" the whole "Corpses continue to feel after death" has got to be one of the most ludicrous ideas they've come up with (to say nothing of offensive to Hindus or anyone else who cremate their dead), unless the whole thing was a trick on the part of Missy. And in any case, I think I'd prefer a quick cremation to be slowly nibbled to death by worms over the years it takes a body to rot, if I'm going to feel it the whole time. Still not sure how much of it was meant to be fake though - if the whole Afterlife idea was simply faked by Missy, then all the Religious/Philosophical objections disappear and we're just left with the fact that it seems like a lot of effort just to mess with the Doctor (though that would be in character for the Master). Though I agree with Llywela - death is becoming very comic book, where any "death" will be undone a few episodes later. As for whether the Master had to become the Mistress just so the two could flirt - I think there are several fanfics that would suggest otherwise!

 

tankgirl73 I was also wondering about the "Last person" thing

 

I think it refers to when Clara piloted the Tardis last time and we met a future(?) version of Danny

[cardigirl]

I liked it.  I am falling in love with Clara as the companion this season, whereas her travel with Eleven left me rather cold.  I was excited to see Impossible Girl on one of the post it notes and have all kinds of theories about what might happen. 

 

I wonder if the phone call we see is the second time through?  Mixed in with the first time through?  First time Danny dies because he was on the phone, but when we see Clara this time with the post it notes, etc, she's trying to rewrite time, and she says "you're the last person I'll ever say this to" because the deal she struck is that Danny will live but Clara will not.

 

Just rambling timey wimey thoughts.  I guess I'm one of the few that hope Danny and Clara survive.  I've enjoyed watching Clara's character grow this season, and I have really enjoy Peter Capaldi as the doctor.  I'm looking forward to part 2 and will be sad that this season is over and we have to wait for a Christmas show and then almost another year til the next series.
 

Edited November 2, 2014 by cardigirl

[ottoDbusdriver]

tankgirl73 Did they never answer the question of what 3w stands for?

 

It stands for "3 words" - I'm not sure they revealed which words it was, though "I still feel" or "Don't burn me!" would be good contenders.

 

The three words were: "Don't cremate me".

[Llywela]

Still not sure how much of it was meant to be fake though - if the whole Afterlife idea was simply faked by Missy, then all the Religious/Philosophical objections disappear and we're just left with the fact that it seems like a lot of effort just to mess with the Doctor (though that would be in character for the Master). Though I agree with Llywela - death is becoming very comic book, where any "death" will be undone a few episodes later.

 

As for whether the Master had to become the Mistress just so the two could flirt - I think there are several fanfics that would suggest otherwise!

I'm going with 'the whole thing was faked by Missy' because a) totally in character to go to such absurdly unnecessary lengths for an end that could have been achieved much more simply, and b) it's all too absurd not to be fake. I can live with a Doctor Who in which Missy/the Master fakes the concept of consciousness after death as part of a convoluted scheme for world domination/to capture the Doctor. I can't live with a Doctor Who that seriously expects me to believe in consciousness after death and the possibility of retrieving the dead from the afterlife. It would make a mockery of the deaths of every other character who has died over the years.

 

And dammit, the whole 'death does not get to happen to me or my loved ones, because we are special and deserve better' entitlement is part of why I stopped watching Supernatural, I don't want it in my Doctor Who as well!

[NutmegsDad]

Really the Master? Sigh. I would have paid good money to see John Simm make out with David Tennant.

 

"Broadchurch: Intruders".

[tankgirl73]

I can live with a Doctor Who in which Missy/the Master fakes the concept of consciousness after death as part of a convoluted scheme for world domination/to capture the Doctor. I can't live with a Doctor Who that seriously expects me to believe in consciousness after death and the possibility of retrieving the dead from the afterlife. It would make a mockery of the deaths of every other character who has died over the years.

 

 

Except that, as I said before, there is precedent for capturing consciousness, with the 'spoonheads' and the Great Intelligence uploading people's minds.  "I don't know where I am" and all that.  Those people's bodies were essentially dead -- but they were able to re-integrate the minds with the bodies (at least it's presumed so, for those who had bodies to return to; and they certainly succeeded for Clara) which was essentially bringing a dead person back to life.

 

And there's also precedent with River Song, when her consciousness is uploaded to the Library.  It could certainly be argued that her consciousness could be downloaded back into another host body of some sort -- in fact that's been a frequent fan theory about Tasha Lem.

 

So there's nothing new about this being in Doctor Who at all.  The trick is just in realizing that we are NOT talking about actually retrieving people from an afterlife.  That was a red herring, that's what we were supposed to think was happening to these dead people; but that was an illusion.  They're all just bits of digitized consciousness existing inside that Timelord-tech floating sphere-thing.  (Literally a nethersphere!)  And that is nothing new at all, it's fully compatible with existing rules of how the Who-niverse works from way back in the original series.  Consciousness can be transferred between bodies, uploaded into databanks, the whole shebang.

[Llywela]

Yes, but all that involves technology - removing and preserving the consciousness artificially. What 3w was first presented as was the idea that the consciousness remains in the body naturally after death, with the dead person aware of everything happening to their body thereafter, and the company supposedly set up to save those poor souls from this fate. And that's the absurd part that was faked by Missy, for whatever reason. The extraction of consciousness, however it is achieved, is artificial.

 

I also don't buy that the Doctor would offer to take Clara to 'hell' or wherever to try to retrieve her dead boyfriend, especially since he didn't know about 3w at the time.

Edited November 2, 2014 by Llywela

[NCChic]

To Clara, the companion I liked in 2013. RIP. I will miss you.

To Clara, the companion I loathe in 2014. I wish you'd get upgraded to a Cyberman. And take Mr. Pink with you. Then you can cyber love each other through eternity.

Now, let me preface this by saying that I've only been invested in Doctor Who since the reboot. And for this entire series, this is only the second time where the companion has had to deal with a new Doctor. I saw Rose as being firm in wanting her "old" doctor back. But by the end of the episode, and through the action of the Doctor in saving Earth, she believed in him and wanted to travel with him again. It was her choice.

Fast forward to Clara, who wants a double life - to have her cake and eat it too. YMMV, but I always think that if you want to be a companion, you need to give it 100% and not when it suits you. The relationship between Doctor and companion does not have to be romantic. I loved Donna's relationship with Ten. They had fun, she got to reign him in (in a way) and saved the Universe. I hated that she had to lose her memories.

I understand that Clara wanted the Doctor to rewrite time - I'd probably have asked for it too if it was someone that I loved. But blackmail? This man is the Doctor - he's very, very clever (or was). Did she expect that only keys would open the TARDIS? I agree with the others about wondering where the snapping of the fingers went. I guess Moffett just doesn't care too much about cannon or that we'd call him on it.

Can we just get this season over with, so that we can find a better suited companion for Twelve?

Edited November 2, 2014 by NCChic

[supposebly]

So, I've been sitting through a season of terrible episodes to see this. This might have worked if I hadn't figured Missy out early on. Or if I had been remotely interested in her.

 

It would have worked if I had any smidgen of sympathy left for Clara (really? Blackmail?) and her boring, useless boyfriend with the stupid name who loses the children in his care in the forest. I have no problem with him being dead. I guess that makes me a bad person.

 

All I can think is: Nine would have been terrifying, Ten would have been outraged, Eleven would have gone very quiet and Twelve, well he got to snog the Master and freak out over the cybermen who don't look very frightening anymore after Eleven's tenure who had one as a pet. And one of them had a funny kind of swagger about him that made me giggle.

 

The Silence looked a lot more sinister in their tanks. I guess it's the chairs. Cybermen like their comfort, don't they?

 

So, overall, as throughout this season. Final verdict: Meh.

[benteen]

I very much enjoyed it.

 

I'll excuse the copout with Clara at the end because it she had done that (in her selfish and self-absorbed way) then I would have wanted the Doctor to throw into the lava next.  Once the Doctor thankfully took command of the situation, she became more tolerable.  Danny's death in the beginning was a surprise but I have to admit I laughed at the manner of his death...Clara telling her she loved him in her own careless way and him getting hit by a car because he was listening to her on the phone.  Kind of sums up the Clara companionship.

 

Capaldi was terrific in this episode and he's been getting better and better every week.  That's what happens when the writing actually focuses on him.

 

The Nethersphere was legitimately creepy and it had a big-time NuWho feel that I think has been absent all season.  The Cybermen in London was cool.

 

I thought Missi might turn out to be someone else but I was fine with the Master reveal and look forward to seeing how it plays out.  Of course the first thing he/she would do is kiss the Doctor to screw with his mind.

 

I'm sure Danny will survive because Moffat doesn't do consequences.

 

Here's hoping the season finale finishes strong!

[patchwork]

Before it was revealed to be all a dream I assumed the TARDIS was putting a protective air filled bubble around its self the same way it does when the doors are opened while in space. Then I figured it doesn't matter it was all in Clara's head anyway. 

 

I know the blackmail was stupid but I can't really blame her for going that route. If I knew someone with a time machine but also knew they had strict rules about messing with timelines I would probably do something similar in an attempt to bring back people I've lost especially if it was soon after their death. Grief screws with your thinking, in my experience anyway.

 

I would rather have John Simm doing a panto version of himself as a female Master than put up with Moffat's Missy=Mistress=Master nonsense. I know forced kisses are so typical of him they're barely worth mentioning but it annoys me each and every time.  I'll be surprised if Danny, and many others, aren't brought back to life by the end of next week. Moffat is a great believer in subverting Nine's "Just this once Rose everybody lives". 

 

As Doctor Who invasion plans go though I'm quiet impressed with this one (despite Moffat dislocating an arm to pat himself on the back for 'Cybermen from cyber space') and as Llywela said it's a very Master-ish in it's convolutedness. 

[Lantern7]

Maybe the three words are "Missy Mistress Master." And the "W" is just an "M" turned upside down.

[elle]

That was an RTD thing and he has said that he left it deliberately vague so that the audience could make up their own minds who it was - the Doctor's mother/wife/Susan/anyone we want it to be. I thought that was lame at the time, but we've plumbed new depths of lameness since then.

 

And a bunch of Cybermen, who were headless when I first saw them in the morning but then put their heads on for actual filming later. 

 

When I went past that lunchtime, Peter Capaldi had a queue of people lining up to have their photos taken with him - he was being lovely about it.

 

Thanks to both cambridgeguy and you for pointing out that was an RTD thing.   Yes, lame!  Can we bring him back anyway?  Maybe we will get the answer and better writing.

 

That must have been funny to see the Cybermen not all suited up.  I will admit when I read that comment I had an image of headless Cybermen, then sanity prevailed and I thought, oh yeah actors.

 

Nice to hear about Peter Capaldi in a good light!

 

 cybermen who don't look very frightening anymore after Eleven's tenure who had one as a pet.

In retrospective, that is all sorts of creepy!  That was the head of some person, or did he pop out the skull before he fixed it?

[tv-talk]

So is Danny really dead or not? 

[wayne67]

The Master has the worst plan ever. Keep human bones and human consciousness and use them in a robot exoskeleton...

 

It'd be a lot simpler if he simply had robots with his consciousness uploaded onto them. That way every single robot would be crazy and have genius level intellect.. and they wouldn't have to come up with a reason why he ignores his regeneration cycles any more. He'd just be like a computer virus, popping up everywhere, leaving behind trojan versions and uploading cookies of activities for more convoluted plans. Or better yet Master Dalek clones ? :P

 

No need to use humans whose emotions blow up the circuitry and no need for an alliance with the Cyber men. Which makes me wonder where does all the Cybermen metal come from anyway ?

 

This show lacks creativity. They're recycling two old villains the Master and the Cybermen and attacking the same target they always attack; Earth. We know the outcome of this as it has been replayed over and over again. How about another world where it's a different villain and ocassionally the Doctor fails to help save the day. After all he didn't help maintain the Pyrovillans or The fish vampires when they were dying out. Though whether the universal reset reset their homeworlds is still unknown.

[tankgirl73]

Aliens (Daleks, Cybermen, the Master, and their ilk) were attacking Earth -- and most often Britain -- for 26 seasons with the original Who.  Eight more seasons of the same in New Who is hardly inexcusable.

 

So is Danny really dead or not?

 

Yes, he really is.  He was hit by a car and sent to the morgue.  What remains to be seen is whether they'll be able to rescue his consciousness from the Nethersphere.  Though what they would do with it, I dunno -- presumably his body is too badly damaged to support consciousness anymore.  (And that's why I think Clara must be pregnant already, whether she's aware or not).

 

I presume that the "delete" option he had at the end wasn't actually going to delete him fro existence (as he assumes) -- but deletes his 'soul' -- his emotions, his humanity -- essentially giving them permission to turn him into a Cyberman.  But at the last moment we see the reflection of the kid he killed, so I would suspect he's not going to 'delete' -- at least not right away.  Or, perhaps, not willingly.  And then he'll be a Cyberman and killing on command (like the good soldier he is -- hey that have to have a purpose for that theme, don't they?  The Doctor hates soldiers because the Cybermen are a perfect example of the perfect soldier, so Danny becomes a perfect soldier Cyberman)... until he sees Clara and finds his humanity again and saves the human race and the Doctor learns that soldiers can be human too and Danny becomes the first in a new race of compassionate Cyber-people (even embracing Cyber-women as full equals)...

Edited November 2, 2014 by tankgirl73

[ketose]

I don't object to Cybermen per se, but the WHOLE SEASON has been servicing this idiotic arc.

 

So, here's a question. Was Clara changed before she was returned to her body in "The Bells of St. John?" I don't know, but I bet that question is a lot more interesting that what Moffat cooks up next week.

[elle]

The Master has the worst plan ever. Keep human bones and human consciousness and use them in a robot exoskeleton...

 

It'd be a lot simpler if he simply had robots with his consciousness uploaded onto them. That way every single robot would be crazy and have genius level intellect.. and they wouldn't have to come up with a reason why he ignores his regeneration cycles any more. He'd just be like a computer virus, popping up everywhere, leaving behind trojan versions and uploading cookies of activities for more convoluted plans. Or better yet Master Dalek clones ? :P

 

That would have been a good plot line and solve the problem of how the Master came back from Gallifrey in his unstable state.  If it had only been his consciousness and not bodily, in any form, he could have transmitted himself back along the transmission that brought everyone to Trenzalore.

[wayne67]

Aliens (Daleks, Cybermen, the Master, and their ilk) were attacking Earth -- and most often Britain -- for 26 seasons with the original Who.  Eight more seasons of the same in New Who is hardly inexcusable.

 

It's not inexcusable that they recycle an old villain and a threat to the human race. However the problem is it's 2014 and we now have season arcs and this season arc has been building up to the Cybermen controled by the Master. It's not particularly exciting and these days we have a billion shows competing for our time and finales are supposed to thrill us and excite us into watching the next season. A rehash of season 2? villain arc. I dont even remember what season the fakeout of Rose Tyler's death was because it all blurs together. As someone upthread points out a season arc with a New villain is RARE. It's cybermen, daleks or the master for about 6 out of 8 seasons.

[Amelia]

I don't object to Cybermen per se, but the WHOLE SEASON has been servicing this idiotic arc.

 

So, here's a question. Was Clara changed before she was returned to her body in "The Bells of St. John?" I don't know, but I bet that question is a lot more interesting that what Moffat cooks up next week.

 

Ooohh I like that idea. If only....

[wayne67]

so Danny becomes a perfect soldier Cyberman)... until he sees Clara and finds his humanity again and saves the human race and the Doctor learns that soldiers can be human too and Danny becomes the first in a new race of compassionate Cyber-people (even embracing Cyber-women as full equals)...

 

I had a fun idea... Since the Master seems to enjoy torturing companions in obscure fashion eg Martha's family. He/She has waited this long to activate the Cyberman plan because he was waiting for a dead companion to show up or at least a companions family member to twist the emotional screws... Accumulating data from previous dead people on his latest activities to find a new weak point.

 

Then once Danny is a cyber man Clara can get her stupid wish, that Danny will have died as part of some overly complicated stupid plan against the Doctor and it won't be an ordinary death and will now get a new life as a tin man. This could pave the way for a cyber man companion or a Clara exit with her being relocated somewhere far away with her robo boyfriend as the price of being the Doctor's friend is high.

Edited November 2, 2014 by wayne67

[mac123x]

I hadn't seen the previews so the Cybermen reveal caught me by surprise.  It's not particularly scary, though, since I've always considered them a rather lame villain.  The only time I've liked them was when they were trading insults with the Daleks in S2.

 

Missy = the Master was the opposite of clever.  Unclever?  Dysclever?  Whatever.  For a moment when Missy said "I was the one you left behind" I hoped it would be a crazy!Romana, but no.  Incidentally, how diid the doctor leave Missy behind? 

 

Danny is dead, and I'm happy.  Now if Clara would only join him.

[Toaster Strudel]

I hope Clara takes an early maternity leave from the Tardis.

[Eozostrodon]

RTD confirmed (word of God, so non-canon technically) that the woman was the Doctor's mother.

 

Except that, as I said before, there is precedent for capturing consciousness, with the 'spoonheads' and the Great Intelligence uploading people's minds.  "I don't know where I am" and all that.  Those people's bodies were essentially dead -- but they were able to re-integrate the minds with the bodies (at least it's presumed so, for those who had bodies to return to; and they certainly succeeded for Clara) which was essentially bringing a dead person back to life.

 

And there's also precedent with River Song, when her consciousness is uploaded to the Library.  It could certainly be argued that her consciousness could be downloaded back into another host body of some sort -- in fact that's been a frequent fan theory about Tasha Lem.

 

So there's nothing new about this being in Doctor Who at all.  The trick is just in realizing that we are NOT talking about actually retrieving people from an afterlife.  That was a red herring, that's what we were supposed to think was happening to these dead people; but that was an illusion.  They're all just bits of digitized consciousness existing inside that Timelord-tech floating sphere-thing.  (Literally a nethersphere!)  And that is nothing new at all, it's fully compatible with existing rules of how the Who-niverse works from way back in the original series.  Consciousness can be transferred between bodies, uploaded into databanks, the whole shebang.

Exactly. None of that stuff was real, just a Master plot to use some kind of technology we've seen before (saving the consciousnesses of the dead as data).

 

I don't think the Doctor ever had any intention of visiting any kind of real afterlife (or really believed that's where they were), it was just another Moff fakeout. I think he was just trying to comfort Clara and probably thought they'd be taken to some other point in the Clara/Danny timeline, perhaps (assuming he's finally put 2+2 together from them meeting their descendent) to visit the child Clara might unknowingly be carrying. He pretty much confirms it when the TARDIS first lands and Clara asks, "Is this where Danny is?" he answers "Almost certainly not, it's where there's a connection with Danny, where your timeline re-intersects with his." If there was even the remotest chance it might be possible to visit the actual afterlife and see your dead loved ones he would have either tried long ago, or made a pact never to try.

[tv-talk]

Romana was far too wonderful to have ever become Missy but at least it would have been less obvious.

 

Is the Master/Mistress in control of our afterlives now? Is Danny in the afterlife we'll all go to, the one where we end up as Cybermen? What the hell are they going for here? I would not be surprised if it's a setup and Danny's death wasnt what it seemed. Either that or Doctor Who has established our afterlives as merely another place the Doctor and Companion can travel to at will.

[Eozostrodon]

Personally I got the impression the data core has probably not been in existence more than a few years, and  that Missy is selective about which consciousnesses she puts in there. I don't think everyone in the world who's died since she set it up, has their consciousness wind up there. But I might be wrong. Next week's episode should be interesting, I hope they expand further on the Nethersphere.

 

 

I did not see where the Doctor lost consciousness, he was knocked to the floor, but very awake when he said his next line.

Maybe. It looked to me like the force of Gallifrey being pushed back into the Time Lock knocked him unconscious when it knocked him down. We see him standing in the background watching as the Master starts zapping Rassilon and that's the last we see of him in that scene, then everything whites out, then there's a scene of Donna's mum watching Gallifrey vanish from the sky while people celebrate, then we go back to the Mansion and the Doctor is lying alone on the floor with his eyes closed moaning and appears (imo) to be slowly coming round from being unconscious. We don't see him get knocked down or anything that happens between the Master starting to zap, and the following scene. So in theory anything could have happened between the moment the Master was zapping and everything started whiting out, and the Time Lock being sealed.

Edited November 3, 2014 by Eozostrodon

[stopeslite]

 

and I can see signs of really strong stories and characters tucked away in there straining to be freed, but they are kept shackled by the demands of seasonal Plot. Everything is in service to that seasonal arc and the characters can't breathe.

That's what drives me so bonkers. The bit about how she was the Impossible Girl who followed him everywhere his entire lifetime? That could have been amazing. The possibilities they could have had, with a Companion who knows The Doctor better than anyone else ever had, than anyone else ever could, who might be the only person (other than The Master) who could see through every manipulation he tries? That would have made for quite a season. But nope, they turned around and made it like nothing ever happened. Just threw it away.

 

 

She went straight to force and extortion, as her first option. That says a lot of very bad things about her.

 

That was one of the few things I agreed with, actually. Even The Doctor said what that meant - that she knew that he wouldn't, that she knew how big and impossible of a request it was, that she knew that there was nothing that could possibly make him do it short of the most dire threat she could come up with. 

[MadMouse]

Using the Master or the Cybermen again isn't the problem, its the whole series has been a rehash of Series 3. Companion lies to loved ones about traveling with the doctor, they end up working for the villain, Master reveal, humanity converted, Cybermen heel turn on Earth. RTD did it better the first time with the 10th Doctor, Martha and Jack. 

[LoneHaranguer]

 

I don't think the Master/Mistress reveal was especially obvious - I mean, I'd read it here but it wasn't my No.1 contender (there was always the possibility that it was a younger River Song, the Rani or an insane Romana.

When Missy told the Doctor "you left me for dead", I immediately thought of Jenny (the Doctor's female clone) who could have gotten angry with him for skipping out, especially if her adventures took a bad turn.

[tankgirl73]

Is the Master/Mistress in control of our afterlives now? Is Danny in the afterlife we'll all go to, the one where we end up as Cybermen? What the hell are they going for here?

 

 

1. No

2. No and no

3. They're going for a fakeout, confusing us into wondering where the hell they're going with this, then quite clearly explaining in the episode (and here in this forum a few times already for those who missed it) that it's not like that at all. 

 

There is no afterlife.  Danny is not in an afterlife.  His consciousness has been uploaded into a Gallifreyan ball in a museum.  In London.  On Earth.  

[ketose]

As a classic Who watcher, rolling pepper pots and lumbering tin men weren't a bunch of badasses. What was badass was the stories of their conquests or the way they trapped our heroes. The very first NuWho Dalek episode was great, because it was damaged and helpless and the Doctor was still scared shitless. Eccleston sold that. Later on, when there were millions of them and the Doctor got all badass and said he would stop them, (even though he didn't) it kind of sucked the danger out of the Daleks. One of the only good Cyberman stories was actually the alternate universe where Rose's father inadvertently created them.

 

The problem is that since Star Trek the Next Generation came after the original DW, the Cybermen and the Daleks are basically the Borg. That's why they are good for 1-2 episodes and not the big bad season-long villain.

[Dust Bunny]

I knew that was Chris Addison as Seb/the intake guy. He played Ollie on "The Thick Of It". I totally recognized his mannerisms. It made me giggle with glee. What a kick that he's on during Capaldi's run. Now I want to watch TToI again.

[Llywela]

I know the blackmail was stupid but I can't really blame her for going that route. If I knew someone with a time machine but also knew they had strict rules about messing with timelines I would probably do something similar in an attempt to bring back people I've lost especially if it was soon after their death. Grief screws with your thinking, in my experience anyway.

Grief does screw with your thinking, it's true. But for most people in that situation, I think the first instinct would be to call the Doctor and beg him to take them back, to change it - like Amy did after Rory's first death, or like Tegan and Nyssa when Adric died. Clara skipped straight past asking and went directly to demanding with menaces, and imo that doesn't say good things about her as a person. She was grief-stricken, sure, but I've grieved and I still knew the difference between right and wrong. How she chose to behave in her grief - cold and calculating - was quite revealing of the darker side of her personality, I feel, and I think that's the message we were supposed to take away, the next stage of her season-long arc. I mean, what she did (or intended to do) was terrible - the show explicitly acknowledged that, Clara herself thought it was unforgiveable. We can understand her actions, but we shouldn't excuse them. If you murder someone in a fit of grief, it's still murder. If you commit blackmail and extortion while grieving, it's still blackmail and extortion. She seemed rational enough to me - rational enough to have thought it through and made a plan, to put on a big act of normality, to have anticipated that he'd say no to a request (as he bloody well should, bringing someone back from the dead is not possible). If she was rational enough to have thought that much through, then she knew what she was doing. Was she desperate? Yes. Does that excuse her actions? No.

 

In retrospective, that is all sorts of creepy!  That was the head of some person, or did he pop out the skull before he fixed it?

In all honesty, it bothered me at the time. The cyberhead was played as a joke - like I said, the show isn't always very good at remembering the body horror of Cybermen, and because of that there is no consistency to how they are presented. Even the rebooted show, which prides itself on being modern and therefore good at things like continuity, has no consistency whatsoever in that regard.

I presume that the "delete" option he had at the end wasn't actually going to delete him fro existence (as he assumes) -- but deletes his 'soul' -- his emotions, his humanity -- essentially giving them permission to turn him into a Cyberman.  But at the last moment we see the reflection of the kid he killed, so I would suspect he's not going to 'delete' -- at least not right away.  Or, perhaps, not willingly.  And then he'll be a Cyberman and killing on command (like the good soldier he is -- hey that have to have a purpose for that theme, don't they?  The Doctor hates soldiers because the Cybermen are a perfect example of the perfect soldier, so Danny becomes a perfect soldier Cyberman)... until he sees Clara and finds his humanity again and saves the human race and the Doctor learns that soldiers can be human too and Danny becomes the first in a new race of compassionate Cyber-people (even embracing Cyber-women as full equals)...

All that sounds depressingly likely to me. I'm not sure why Cybermen would ever want permission before Cyber-ising their victims - they've never cared about permission before - but it's a theory that would tie the clumsy, clunky seasonal themes together and they have to be leading somewhere.

 

That would have been a good plot line and solve the problem of how the Master came back from Gallifrey in his unstable state.  If it had only been his consciousness and not bodily, in any form, he could have transmitted himself back along the transmission that brought everyone to Trenzalore.

So many people are so concerned about how the Master came back, but, you know...he's the Master. He always comes back. He's appeared to be totally defeated, dead and gone, so many times now, but always comes back somehow. In the TV Movie he was green slime and he managed to survive. Of all the questions that exercise me, that one comes fairly low on the list. He's the ultimate cockroach!

 

RTD confirmed (word of God, so non-canon technically) that the woman was the Doctor's mother.

I believe what he said was that they'd originally intended the woman to be the Doctor's mother, but ultimately decided not to confirm it on-screen either way so that it was open for the fans to make up their own minds.

[aliya]

The Cybermen. The slow, dull, stainless steel cybermen. Ha! At the end, when a handful of them were clanking down the stairs while the Doctor shouted "run! run!" I was thinking, "or just walk slightly faster!" Or hell, duck into any building with a revolving door.

Ha!  I was thinking the same thing. First, I find the Cybermen boring, second, yeah, all you had to do was walk a little faster and get out of their way. 

 

Regarding "Don't cremate me," the guy said the dead retained consciousness, right? Does that also mean they can feel pain? So you shouldn't cremate someone because they will feel it? Or is it that their consciousness disappears if they are cremated, but not if they rot for 1000 years underground? I didn't quite get this part.  Having had to have someone cremated, this was a bit too close for comfort. 

[Llywela]

Regarding "Don't cremate me," the guy said the dead retained consciousness, right? Does that also mean they can feel pain? So you shouldn't cremate someone because they will feel it? Or is it that their consciousness disappears if they are cremated, but not if they rot for 1000 years underground? I didn't quite get this part.  Having had to have someone cremated, this was a bit too close for comfort. 

All part of the propaganda - that's the part that's faked. We don't know why the elaborate charade, but it wasn't true. As soon as it was revealed to be a big ploy to acquire bodies for Cybermen, we knew that everything we'd been told about the company was faked. Corpses don't retain consciousness - the consciousness is artificially removed (presumably at the point of death, somehow - I'm extremely sceptical myself, but that's the premise the story is built on) and stored in the giant floaty ball. Danny was told that he'd still feel whatever happened to his body, presumably as a scare tactic to push him into pressing the delete button - for some reason they seem to want the deceased (or possibly just him) to give their consent.

 

How the various dead people/robots retrieved from other episodes (and other time zones and even the other side of the universe) tie into all this remains to be seen - I'm not yet convinced they will, I suspect they were just window dressing designed to build up to this story without much thought for whether or not they actually fit into the plot.

 

Something that confused me - right at the end, with all those Cybermen following the Doctor out into the street. He ran around yelling for people to run and they acted like he was mad - could they not see the Cybermen behind him? I'd have expected a bit more reaction to the massive robots, even if they didn't understand!

Edited November 3, 2014 by Llywela

[HauntedBathroom]

Danny was told that he'd still feel whatever happened to his body, presumably as a scare tactic to push him into pressing the delete button - for some reason they seem to want the deceased (or possibly just him) to give their consent.

In the new series, the emotions of the converted can be used against them, hence the Cybermens head tend to explode if their emotional restrictor thing malfunctions. This is an attemot to get rid of that weakness before the new Cyberman is unleased.

[Llywela]

In the new series, the emotions of the converted can be used against them, hence the Cybermens head tend to explode if their emotional restrictor thing malfunctions. This is an attemot to get rid of that weakness before the new Cyberman is unleased.

Aye, I can see that. I just don't see why consent has to be involved - it's out of character for Cybermen, who would normally simply do it anyway, nice and efficient. The whole point of the Cybermen, right from the start, has been that they stripped away all emotions, believing them to be weaknesses. If they learned that their emotional restrictor thingummy can be overrided, I'd expect them to upgrade it to mitigate the weakness, not ask for the consent of their victims, which is an extremely inefficient way to go about things. I mean, if the delete button is there to remove emotions, they clearly know how to do it, so why not just do it, quick and clean and pragmatic? That's the Cyberman way.

[darkestboy]

Wow, Moffat went there. Missy is the Master. Not sure how I feel about it but I'm keeping an open mind though.

Danny should probably remain dead. The scenes with him and Clara were lacking something.

Cybermen were used effectively in this one as well. Should bode well for the second half.

So all that fanfic between the Doctor and the Master became canon then, right?

Liked Chang, didn't really care for Web though. Shame the former died.

Danny's bad day was a lot darker than expected really. 9/10

[Pattycake2]

Things I liked about this episode:

 

The Doctor saw through Clara's attempt to blackmail him and turned the tables on her

The Doctor was a better friend to Clara than she was to him

"Don't cremate me" was truly creepy

 

Things I didn't like:

 

The whole you're the last person i'll ever say this to while Danny was walking towards the street.   She loves me!  Splat! It was soooo obvious.  And the car just came from nowhere?  It was clearly a busy street.  It's what I call Bonanza Disease.  If you ever fell in love with a Cartwright boy, you were doomed to die by an Indian attack, runaway wagon, or protecting said Cartwright.

 

The Doctor being surprised that Missy was a Time Lord.  Whoops, Time Lady.  Hate that term, too!  He felt the damn two heartbeats for crying out loud.  Hello!

The Doctor knowing that something was not quite kosher with the skeletons, but not being able to quite figure out what was going on. Scan them for crying out loud!

[romantic idiot]

I would love to have Pink stay dead, but it is not happening, unfortunately, since they've already explained that he hasn't died, just been uploaded. Plus the future astronaut Pink. Of course, if they fix him it's going to ruin one of the best stories in Torchwood but so what else is new.

 

I also want him to stay dead since right now it is sort of due to Clara and Danny's stupidity and I really do not like the both of them.

 

 

The three words were: "Don't cremate me".

 

I think so too. BUT a part of me keeps saying that they should be 4 words. so, ugh either way.

[elle]

He's the ultimate cockroach!

And it kissed the Doctor!  Ah!

 

Something that confused me - right at the end, with all those Cybermen following the Doctor out into the street. He ran around yelling for people to run and they acted like he was mad - could they not see the Cybermen behind him? I'd have expected a bit more reaction to the massive robots, even if they didn't understand!

Has it been that long since the "Battle of Canary Wharf" that the people of London do not remember Cybermen?

Edited November 3, 2014 by elle

[ketose]

Has it been that long since the "Battle of Canary Wharf" that the people of London do not remember Cybermen?

Both consequence and memory free.

[random chance]

Things I didn't like:

 

The whole you're the last person i'll ever say this to while Danny was walking towards the street.   She loves me!  Splat! It was soooo obvious.

This particular TV trope is the reason that, in real life, I never say things like "at least things can't get any worse."

[tankgirl73]

I would love to have Pink stay dead, but it is not happening, unfortunately, since they've already explained that he hasn't died, just been uploaded.

 

He is most definitely dead.  His body is dead.  His mind was uploaded out of his body via some as-yet-unknown process.  But that doesn't change the fact that his body was squashed by a car and is sitting in a morgue.  (Unless that sense of cold meaning being in a morgue is part of the con, and they don't really 'feel' their bodies anymore, in which case he's also possibly either buried or cremated already.)  Enough time has passed that the street where he died is covered in flowers and mementos, it's at least several days since he died.  That body is good and dead.

 

Now his *mind* surely appears to be still alive (and it's well established in Who that a consciousness can survive outside of a body) so they may still be able to rescue him in some way.  But they can't just put him back in his body.  His body is useless now.

 

Question:  Of the people we've seen entering the Nethersphere, were there any who had no connection to Clara?  The question has been raised as to how the Master is getting dead people from way in the past and in the future.  Or, perhaps more importantly that how, *why*?  There's oodles of dying in the present.  Why *those* people at those times?  Well perhaps Clara was 'chosen' by Master to be like a conduit source for dying folks near the Doctor, soehow.

[Gentian root]

I wasn't surprised that there was no trailer for next week, since half of the previous trailer wasn't in this week's episode.

But OMG, BBC, that yellow background in some of your bumpers lately?  Really hard on the eyes.

[tv-talk]

Clara skipped straight past asking and went directly to demanding with menaces, and imo that doesn't say good things about her as a person.

 

 

She knowingly doomed both her and the Doctor to death on the lava flow just because he wouldn't obey her...and then SHE SAID SHE'D DO IT AGAIN.

 

Clara is just awful, not much more to her than that really. What they have done with this character is create, hands down, the worst Companion is series history. Yippee!

 

Basically I hope Danny is fully dead and can never return and that Clara decides to join him (while saving all of time, creation, humanity, and all sentient life in the process of course).

 

Danny and Clara...just get rid of them. The show is not going to be good until there is a reset on Companions and storyline.

Edited November 3, 2014 by tv-talk