fandomsecrets | [ SECRET POST #2518 ]

[ SECRET POST #2518 ]

⌈ Secret Post #2518 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

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Notes:

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Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
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I enjoyed it to the core. I got nothing bad to say about it. I laughed, I cried, I cheered.

How about you?

I enjoyed it! As someone who stopped watching Doctor Who after Ten left, I might try watching again. I also now understand why they didn't have all the other doctor's show up. It would not have made a lot of sense.

They sort of did, when they surrounded Gallifrey. It was an awesome TARDIS Heaven! :D

I liked it. I also think (hope) they are setting up for the final series of Doctor Who. I am hoping it will end with The Doctor sacrificing himself to get Gallifrey back.

They were talking about how they hope Dr. Who is still around in years to come during the pre-special special. No plans to end it right now.

I adored it. Loved how they introduced Billie's character - was unexpected and she was a star in the role. My favourite thing about it all was Ten and Eleven's interaction. So funny. So bloody awesome.

I enjoyed it as an episode/basic special. As a 50th Anniversary special, I'm still just a little 'meh' about it. My grievances boil down to the following:

1. Elizabeth I/Zygon plot was almost completely unrelated to the whole Destruction of Gallifrey conflict. I mean, it was nice to finally have that whole Elizabeth I thing explained, but the fact that all those characters/events could've been replaced by any other equally irrelevant adventure was slightly off-putting.

2. I would've loved to have seen actual Rose and not TheMoment!Rose/Bad Wolf, but even that I'm fine with. What I am rather disappointed at is the fact that the only character she interacted with was 8.5 Doctor. I was looking forward to Eleven and Clara interacting with her, since that's part of the whole fun. It's part of why I really like Utopia, Turn Left, and the Death of the Doctor, and why I don't think the Sontaran two-parter and the Doctor's Daughter from Season 4 really lived up to their Donna/Martha potential.

3. The fuck. You don't end season 7 on a cliffhanger with Clara shattering her existence to save the Doctor, and 11 jumping in after her, and the two of them getting stuck in a shadowrealm... and then cut to Clara teaching students. Does she even have a teacher's license? I mean, she likes kids and maybe could have registered as a substitute teacher, but agh. It reminded me of Demon's Run and the Doctor promising to try and find Melody... and then cut to Amy and Rory making crop circles.

4. And I know continuity has never been a strong point in Doctor Who and the End of Time was a mess of it's own, but wasn't it stated that part of the Doctor's reasons for killing both Time Lords and Daleks was that the Time Lords had gone mad with power and were starting to destroy the universe in very much the same way as the Daleks? IDK, a small complaint compared to the others.

5. Is there a reason they went with 8.5 instead of 8? McGann was totally willing to be a part of it, and he even did become a part of it with the mini-episode, so why not use him instead of a random new not!Doctor? Not so much of a complaint since who knows behind the scenes workings of actor availability, but still I wonder.

But other than that, I liked it. 10 and 11 worked really well together. I kind of wish Clara had had a slightly larger role. After she zapped herself back in time, I don't remember if she really had any lines. Yeah...

Edited 2013-11-24 22:40 (UTC)

My two cents about 4)

That was Rassilion and the High Council who made that decision (to destroy ALL of universe), but that plan failed. In Day of the Doctor the general even says so (something along the lines of: to hell with the council, all their plans failed). I don't think we really know what OTHER Time Lords thought about that, the common citizens, if they'd agree with the Council.

5. Is there a reason they went with 8.5 instead of 8?

On the one had, the idea of a lost regeneration where "the Doctor wasn't the Doctor" is kind of interesting.

On the other, I think if it were said that Eight started out all properly Doctor-y but eventually became a warrior because of the Time War and got angry and bitter and did Bad Things and blew everybody up and his subsequent regenerations tried to forget not only that warrior phase, but also that entire regeneration, it would have been a fun allusion to how some fans insisted Eight wasn't canon because they didn't like him/the TV Movie.

Also, I just really like Eight and would have taken more of him in any form. :P

it would have been a fun allusion to how some fans insisted Eight wasn't canon because they didn't like him/the TV Movie

Yeah, I think that's one of my main reasons I'm like "awww, they could've had so much fun with him!" (In addition to Eight being generally awesome.)

I don't know about bringing Rose back. There needs to be a limit on how often you break the narrative rules you use to create a tragedy. Otherwise Rose starts looking more like Toonces the Driving Cat than Rose. Bridging the mirror universes is a very bad thing, except when it isn't, except when it is, except when it isn't except when it is. And aww fuck it, who cares about narrative when you can have schmaltzy fanservice.

I'd say the same is true of the whole plot device of having three, then thirteen doctors show up to save the day. Crossing your own time stream is a bad thing, except when it isn't, except when it is, except when it isn't.

Honestly, I think Doomsday's tragedy was forever handicapped by her reappearance in the 4th season, and her subsequent write-off then was just RTD going "fuck, how do i get rid of her now? there's no logical reason she'd choose to leave him and i want the focus to be on donna."

So I don't really care how many times she comes back. Same with Donna. I mean, yes, narrative vs fanservice and all that, but IDK. What's the point of having a 50th anniversary if not for a bit of fanservice?

I really enjoyed it! It was damn good and emotionally satisfying. I'm looking forward to getting a chance to have a rewatch. I'm really looking forward to where the show will go with Capaldi in the coming years.

I think I'm going to go against the general attitude though and say I didn't like the inclusion of Tom Baker. Not only was it just weird, but when he said something like 'revisiting just the old favourites' it felt rather like a snub to the other past Doctors who didn't get to appear (outside of archive footage). I don't think he added anything to the plot, and would rather have had that minute given to Kate, telling the Doctor what she'd agreed with the Zygons and wrapping that plot thread up.

I've noticed whenever something is left unfinished in an episode, it comes back later in something else. There might be a plan behind that.

Re: WHOVIANS, how was the 50th? DISCUSSION MAY CONTAIN SPOILERS.

(Anonymous) - 2013-11-24 22:55 (UTC) - Expand

I really liked it.

I liked the use of the original intro and the shadow of the policeman going from black and white to color and clearly modern-day.

I quite liked Rose during the two seasons she was on, but I got really tired of her showing up again and again. When I heard Billie Piper was in this, I thought "Oh great, not AGAIN..." So I was very glad when it turned out Rose wasn't actually in this.

I liked the small references to other companions, like the photo board in the Black Archive (would have loved to get a better look at the whole thing) and Kate talking to/about Martha on the phone and name-dropping Jack Harkness.

I liked the extent to which they were able to include all the Doctors, even if what we saw on the screens was recognizable footage from old episodes and nobody but the 8.5, Ten, and Eleven moved a muscle in the group shot at the end. Seeing Nine's eyes start to appear as 8.5 regenerated was neat.

I liked the 3D oil paintings (although I'm still confused as to how the Doctors got into and then back out of the No More one).

I really liked Clara. Loved the whole drive-the-motorcycle-directly-into-the-TARDIS stunt. I also loved Kate and I loved the TARDIS being air-lifted.

What left me wanting:

-The UNIT/Zygons plot having no resolution - I hope they at least give this a mention later.

-Lack of McGann (and Eccleston, too, although I really didn't expect him to come back).

-How we were supposed to get from the end of the last episode to this? I understand that having the 50th anniversary special not begin in medias res is a good idea because otherwise you could never watch it on its own, but it's still confusing. Maybe that will be explained later, too.

Finally, as much as this confuses the Doctor's timeline, I keep thinking about the Master's timeline re: when Gallifrey tried to return in "The End of Time." If Gallifrey was frozen in a pocket universe, did all that stuff with Timothy Dalton get erased from the timeline? If it did, what does that mean for the Master? Did he not become Crazy Evil if no one sent the drum beat back into his head when he was a child?

There's a passing line when they first show the Time Lord command centre that the High Council (Rassilon's plot surrounding the Master) had their plans fail, so I take it that the events of "The End of Time" happened, and the Gallifrey events we see in this happen after the planet is sent back at the end of that.

Re: WHOVIANS, how was the 50th? DISCUSSION MAY CONTAIN SPOILERS.

(Anonymous) - 2013-11-25 06:16 (UTC) - Expand

I loved it. I wasn't really thinking about it as a '50th special' so much as just a multi-Doctor special, and so my expectations were reasonable and were more than satisfied.

my main gripe is that it could have easily have been McGann as the Eighth Doctor instead of making him 8.5, I think that would have added considerably to the ep; but I did like Hurt in the role, and it's always fun when the older-looking one is so much younger. (and finally yay for an acknowledgement that the Doctor is a big fat liar about his age!)

I have only seen about five minutes of it so far, but I am annoyed by the inaccuracy of the Four scarf on the nerdy girl. It's supposed to be garter stitch, not stockinette!

I don't think it was a proper Four scarf? I think it was shorter (not hard), the tan was far too light, and it didn't have fringe. It was just a long scarf in Four-inspired colors.

It actually looked a lot like what I have, which is a 6'ish thin scarf made from the leftover yarn from an authentic Four scarf.

I took it as a Doctor fangirl having a replica that she may have even knitted herself, not getting it quite right because old photos of Four were not close enough to identify the exact stitch and may not have shown the ends.

Disliked it for what it did to the continuity. Liked some of the classic nods, like Coal Hill School and the reference to the UNIT dating controversy.

I thought An Adventure In Space And Time was a much better tribute :D Absolutely beautiful and I LOVE EVERYONE HOLY SHIT.

the reference to the UNIT dating controversy

They did? I think I missed that.

I still need to see An Adventure in Space and Time, though I did just see The Five(ish) Doctors and my reaction to that was a similar "absolutely beautiful and I LOVE EVERYONE HOLY SHITAFSKLOJIAFJL".

Re: WHOVIANS, how was the 50th? DISCUSSION MAY CONTAIN SPOILERS.

ryttu3k - 2013-11-25 03:54 (UTC) - Expand

Great dialogue among the principals. The Bad Wolf/Old Doctor scenes were pretty good, as is usual, the actual plot was a machine gun of WTF.

Like several other people have said, I really don't see why there was a need to make up a whole new Doctor when they could have brought back Paul McGann.

I also think that Billie Piper's role (awesome as she was in it) could have been filled by any other companion and I don't like how often Rose is singled out as special. (Also I think it would have been so cool to bring back, say, Carole Ann Ford. And definitely thematically appropriate for the bits when they were talking about killing all the Gallifreyan children.)

And I don't like that they brought back Tom Baker like that, it felt like they were singling him out like "he's the only good classic Doctor" and I don't see why they couldn't have given the Doctors who look too old now (like 4-7) just a brief cameo as characters other than the Doctor. (Random old men or Zygons or something?)

But I did like a lot of stuff too. The War Doctor was awesome and I loved the end bits with all the Doctors and the brief glimpse we got of Peter Capaldi was very exciting. Also Gallifrey is back! We're gonna get the Time Lords back! Romana and the Master and Susan and the Rani! I'm definitely excited for that.

why they couldn't have given the Doctors who look too old now (like 4-7) just a brief cameo as characters other than the Doctor. (Random old men or Zygons or something?)

They were hiding underneath the sheets in the gallery.

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