Doctor Who

[Thad]

Well, it sounds good, anyway.

But that may because I AM old enough to drink, and have been.

[Sharkey]

Well, that's a high compliment. Kinda. Ish.

Maybe just move that whole thing to some "Here's my crazy idiot idea for a great videogame if I ever got around to it but I never will" topic. I'm sure we must have one of those. That nobody reads. Maybe we'll both be less embarrassed in the morning.

[zaratustra]

That's also pretty much the plot of DROD The Second Sky. The world is ending and the totalitarian empire is the only one with the tools to save everyone: but you have to steal control from them first, otherwise everyone just ends in internment camps instead of being killed.

[beatbandito]

It's also similar in ways to Fable III. Your evil king brother is taxing people out the ass, forcing children to work factories and people in to the armies. After overthrowing him you learn that the kingdom needed those funds / resources / soldiers as their only hope against an army of darkness that will wipe out humanity.

Of course it loses all of the dark lessons when your character is able to prevent the disaster while turning the kingdom into a utopia all just by playing the guitar in a dog suit.

[McDohl]

Sharkey, that is actually a fabulous idea, and I'm sad that it never saw the light of day.

I'm guessing this was back in the Verge days, eh?

[Thad]

You know, "A bunch of redshirts get picked off one by one" is such a common trope already in Doctor Who that I only just started realizing just how much they're using it this season. Like, you could make a case that it happens in one form or another in every episode.

[Smiler]

It happens in a large chunk of episodes, but it seems to just be the general theme of this season as well.

[Kayma]

Years ago, everyone lived! Now, not so much.

[Thad]

Well, quite a lot of the Redshirts are actually surviving and popping up in Paradise. So there's that.

Wouldn't be surprised if that's happened to a few more than the ones we've seen, too; could be that every single one of them shows back up for the finale.

[Bal]

Being confronted with the accusing faces of everyone he's let die, at least recently, would certainly fit with this doctor's arc so far. Like he says in the Orient Express, he didn't know if he could save her, and if it didn't work he'd have just moved on to the next person until he stopped the creature. The implication is that he has a disregard for life, but I think the opposite is true. He'll do whatever it takes to save who he can.

[Thad]

Basically, he's no longer so, so sorry.

[Thad]

Well, there IS something inherently anticlimactic when your big reveal is that you're bringing back the second- and third-most-brought-back villains, yet again.

Didn't expect they'd go so straight-up homoerotic with it, though.

Er, if you'll pardon the expression.

Once again, fantastic character work but not much in the way of coherent storytelling, which is par for the season. I'm okay with it; great work from the three leads once again. And as much as the big reveals were telegraphed (and, in one case, actually shown in last week's previekew), I AM legitimately wondering whether Clara and Danny will be sticking around after next week's episode or not. Nice that, even though nothing in this episode's climax came as much of a surprise, I really don't know what's going to happen next.

[Bal]

At least we finally got to see a male to female regeneration, and the plot is pretty diabolical, though I get the feeling the Cybermen are just there for the "only organic matter" reveal and because there need to be some baddies marching around killing the locals.

[Thad]

Apparently the review copy they sent to the press had the main reveal cut out of the ending, but the press was not told this and some of them just thought the ending was a total incoherent mess.

Not sure why they even fucking bothered, considering the reveal was so damn obvious.

This seems to be becoming a trend with Moffat: spend an extended period of time teasing something and then reveal that yeah it's exactly what you thought it was in the first five minutes. (See also: Everybody immediately asks "Is River the Doctor's wife?" and, three and a half years later, Moffat reveals that the answer is "Uh, yes.")

[Thad]

I think this one felt a lot more like a Davies finale than a Moffat one -- but at least one of the good Davies finales.

You know, the hero has to decide whether to kill the villain, but then somebody else kills him is one of my least favorite tropes, but this is absolutely the only time I've ever thought it worked. "Who's going to save your soul, Doctor?" Alistair, of course. It was always Alistair. He takes the shot so the Doctor doesn't have to. Always.

It was a nice sendoff. So that makes two nice sendoffs he's gotten.

And then the ending really twisted the knife for awhile.

And then motherfucking Santa Claus shows up. Okay, well-played, Moffat. Well-played.

So I guess we can assume Clara will at least show up in the Christmas episode. They might write her out after that, of course, but hopefully we get a goodbye that's better than this one was.

[Bal]

Them lying to each other for the other's benefit over and over again was agonizing but so well done.

[Thad]

So okay, most of the arc stuff's been wrapped up at this point, but a few dangling threads:

Who was behind getting the Doctor on the Orient Express? We know Missy gave Clara the Doctor's number, but she never claimed any credit for the Orient Express.

The Doctor's face: he talked quite a bit about it in Deep Breath but never brought it up again. Moffat's said that he and RTD had discussed a plan for explaining Capaldi's multiple appearances as different characters but that he may or may not ever get around to it.

Similarly, I'm pretty sure that I read an interview where Moffat said he was going to explicitly address the moment when 12 goes back to join his 12 prior incarnations in Day of the Doctor. Again, just because he said that isn't any guarantee that it'll happen, but I'm sure he's got at least SOME kind of vague long-term plan for the Gallifrey arc.

Given the way the last couple of seasons have played with the "don't say anything about last season's big cliffhanger until the finale" episodic pacing, I expect next season to be much the same and that the Gallifrey arc won't be brought up until the finale. Though of course there's plenty of reason to think he might advance it in the Christmas special.

And you know, it's interesting to think about how episodic this season actually WASN'T. Sure, each episode had a self-contained monster-of-the-week story, but there WAS a very important arc throughout the season, and it was Clara and Danny's.

[Lottel]

I'm sure Moffat will get around to it like he did with figuring out who blew up the Tardis and the other few big plot points from season's past.

[Thad]

Well, right, that's why I'm emphasizing that he may never actually get around to this stuff. It's pretty reasonable by now to assume that the big questions may either be completely unresolved or may be totally anticlimactic.

(Another one: Orson Pink. There are a few options here: Danny comes back, Clara turns out to be pregnant, it gets waved off with an offhand line about time being rewritten, or it's never addressed at all. In order of increasing likelihood.)

[Bal]

Or she ends up having to adopt that kid, gives him the surname Pink in honor of Danny, and the resemblance was a coincidence.