paradox of the Trenzalore grave

[Captrek]

From Dark Water:

CLARA: And fix it. Change it. Change what happened. Save him. Bring him back.
(She holds up another key and we all remember what happened in Father's Day.)
DOCTOR: No.
(She throws the key away.)
CLARA: Five left. Every time you say no to me, I will throw another key down there. Do we understand each other?
DOCTOR: Well, I understand you. Let's not get carried away.
CLARA: Time can be rewritten.
DOCTOR: With precision. With great care. And not today. But you know that of course, otherwise you wouldn't be threatening me.
CLARA: Did you just say no?
DOCTOR: If I change the events that brought you here, you will never come here and ask me to change those events. Paradox loop. The timeline disintegrates.

It seems to me the same kind of "paradox loop" exists in TOTD when Clara implores the Time Lords to fix the Doctor's death. The Doctor not dying on Trenzalore means there's no grave on Trenzalore, which means NOTD never happens, which means the GI and Echo Clara never go back into the Doctor's timestream, which means The Snowmen never happens, which means The Doctor never tracks down the Impossible Girl, which means their whole relationship never happens, which means she's not there on Trenzalore to ask the Time Lords to change those events. Paradox loop. The timeline disintegrates.

Has this paradox ever been addressed? Was it some kind of Time Lord magic that Gallifrey could do for the Doctor but the Doctor couldn't do for Danny?

 

[RoJoHen]

Paradoxes are only a problem when the writers decide they're a problem.

I mean, honestly, Matt Smith started convulsing over in pain just being in the presence of his grave. "Which is why I shouldn't be here. The paradox is very bad."

Nothing about him standing there was a paradox.



That said, part of me wonders if the Doctor isn't done with Trenzalore. Maybe he is still destined to go back.

The really weird thing is later in "Time of the Doctor" when the Doctor and Handles are trying to identify the planet. Handles says "Gallifrey" because of the message coming through, and the Doctor says it can't be. Well, of course it can't be Gallifrey. It's obviously Trenzalore. You should know that already because you were literally just there two episodes ago.

 

[matthunter]

We can assume the Time Lords have the collective power to override paradoxes.

But really it depends if the grave still exists now that the Twelfth Doctor does.

I know games aren't canon, but in the LEGO Dimensions level CapalDoc ends up back at the giant TARDIS grave on Trenzalore and says it should be impossible.

The Doctor is only guessing that Trenzalore was meant to be his grave after dying as Eleven, though. Some future Doctor might still see it as fitting to make his last stand there. And would know to fake the damaged TARDIS window and console room.

 

[Romulan_spy]

Couldn't the paradox be resolved if we assume it is the grave of the Doctor still to come in the future? If some future Doctor, say at the end of Capaldi's 12 regenerations, comes back to Trenzalore at a time before the events of The Name of the Doctor and really dies then the Doctor's grave will be there when Smith's Doctor arrives.

 

[RoJoHen]

I know it's just an old saying, but Dorium said Trenzalore is the place "where no one can speak falsely or fail to answer." Well, the Doctor never answered. Maybe that's still coming.

It begs the question...who put the Truth Field there in the first place? Perhaps a future Doctor?

 

[Allyn Gibson]

That said, part of me wonders if the Doctor isn't done with Trenzalore. Maybe he is still destined to go back.

I have thought that all along. The blasted wasteland of Trenzalore in "Name" is nothing like the Christmas globe planet of "Time." "Time" ends with survivors on the planet, but "Name" shows us a planet that appears to be lifeless. It may be that the grave on Trenzalore was always for a post-Smith Doctor, and he will return again at some point in his life, probably not expecting to ever go back there.

The other thing that puzzles me is when the Doctor learned of his apparent fate on Trenzalore. How long has the Doctor known that he would apparently die there? As we see in "Day," the tenth Doctor is aware of the planet's significance in his personal timeline.

 

[RoJoHen]

The other thing that puzzles me is when the Doctor learned of his apparent fate on Trenzalore. How long has the Doctor known that he would apparently die there? As we see in "Day," the tenth Doctor is aware of the planet's significance in his personal timeline.

I don't think 10 knew the significance. I just think he inferred the significance based on his conversations with 11 in that episode.

(paraphrasing)
Smith: "I've seen Trenzalore, where we're buried. A final battle among millions."
Tennent: "That's not what's supposed to happen."
Smith: "That's how the story ends. Nothing we can do about it."

And then...

Tennent: "Trenzalore... (mulls it over). We need a new destination because...I don't wanna go."

I imagine the first time the Doctor ever heard of Trenzalore is when Dorium told him at the end of "The Wedding of River Song."

 

[Professor Zoom]

From Dark Water:

CLARA: And fix it. Change it. Change what happened. Save him. Bring him back.
(She holds up another key and we all remember what happened in Father's Day.)
DOCTOR: No.
(She throws the key away.)
CLARA: Five left. Every time you say no to me, I will throw another key down there. Do we understand each other?
DOCTOR: Well, I understand you. Let's not get carried away.
CLARA: Time can be rewritten.
DOCTOR: With precision. With great care. And not today. But you know that of course, otherwise you wouldn't be threatening me.
CLARA: Did you just say no?
DOCTOR: If I change the events that brought you here, you will never come here and ask me to change those events. Paradox loop. The timeline disintegrates.

It seems to me the same kind of "paradox loop" exists in TOTD when Clara implores the Time Lords to fix the Doctor's death. The Doctor not dying on Trenzalore means there's no grave on Trenzalore, which means NOTD never happens, which means the GI and Echo Clara never go back into the Doctor's timestream, which means The Snowmen never happens, which means The Doctor never tracks down the Impossible Girl, which means their whole relationship never happens, which means she's not there on Trenzalore to ask the Time Lords to change those events. Paradox loop. The timeline disintegrates.

Has this paradox ever been addressed? Was it some kind of Time Lord magic that Gallifrey could do for the Doctor but the Doctor couldn't do for Danny?

Well, you could go with one of a couple of things:

1. The Doctor lies. He's lying to Clara in that scene.
2. There are no rules to time travel in Doctor Who except what is important to the story being told at that time.
3. He isn't done with Trenzelore.

I go with #2.

 

[The Mighty Monkey of Mim]

Has this paradox ever been addressed? Was it some kind of Time Lord magic that Gallifrey could do for the Doctor but the Doctor couldn't do for Danny?

Yes and yes. From "The Time Of The Doctor":

THE DOCTOR: Yes. We saw the future, Clara. This is how it ends.
CLARA: Change it.
THE DOCTOR: [scoffs]
CLARA: Like Tasha said, change the future.
THE DOCTOR: I could have once, when there were Time Lords. Not any more.

As someone above said, the Time Lords as a collective body have powers to manipulate time and mute paradoxes that are far beyond the Doctor's as an individual. In "The Waters Of Mars" he tried to exert that power for himself and was only marginally successful. And recall back in "Father's Day" that the Doctor said his people would have stopped the paradox and its consequences from occurring had they been around:

"...there's nothing I can do to stop them. There used to be laws stopping this kind of thing from happening. My people would have stopped this. But now they're all gone."

He implies that the "laws of time" are more the type of laws devised/imposed/enforced/manipulated by the Time Lords and their loving symbiotic TARDIS consciences than the type that can't be physically broken, though who knows how distinct those two types remain as the the number of Time Lords and amount of available energy increases. (And we do know from The Three Doctors that the exercise of the Time Lords' powers had considerable energy cost attached to it.) Moreover, we actually do see them physically broken on a number of occasions, although we also see that there are often profound repercussions that aren't necessarily predictable and/or can get pretty wacky and dangerous for the universe and/or to individual characters. ("The Wedding Of River Song" comes to mind among many other examples in addition to the aforementioned "Father's Day"; I'm sure we all can think of at least one.)

 

[Emperor-Tiberius]

I have thought that all along. The blasted wasteland of Trenzalore in "Name" is nothing like the Christmas globe planet of "Time." "Time" ends with survivors on the planet, but "Name" shows us a planet that appears to be lifeless. It may be that the grave on Trenzalore was always for a post-Smith Doctor, and he will return again at some point in his life, probably not expecting to ever go back there.

I wish that were the case, but the appearence of the Smith-era TARDIS interior kinda spoils it, at least plausibly. I'd have loved it if for that scene, the TARDIS interior was the white room with the roundels, but then, there wouldn't be an urgency about the fact that this this Doctor's end, and not some future Doctor's.

 

[Gingerbread Demon]

Well couldn't they go back there if they ever decide to kill the show off? Heroic death for the final story and we find out his name?

Because that was the question that can't be answered on Trenzalore. "Doctor Who?" The answer was his name..

 

[Professor Zoom]

Well couldn't they go back there if they ever decide to kill the show off? Heroic death for the final story and we find out his name?

Why on Earth would you permanently kill off your show like that?

 

[The Mighty Monkey of Mim]

I wish that were the case, but the appearence of the Smith-era TARDIS interior kinda spoils it, at least plausibly. I'd have loved it if for that scene, the TARDIS interior was the white room with the roundels, but then, there wouldn't be an urgency about the fact that this this Doctor's end, and not some future Doctor's.

But in the very next episode, we see that the TARDIS assumes the interior most fitting to whichever incarnation is inside, or tries to. Remember how Tennant, Hurt, and Smith all walked in and it glitched through all three of their console rooms before stabilizing on the most recent one?

Of course, there is still the matter of Clara saying she saw only eleven faces in the timestream (plus Hurt just after that), but I suppose that could be a result of the Great Intelligence already having partially rewritten his timeline by the time she entered it, or some limitation effect that meant both of their influences could only affect the past up to the point each entered.

 

[Gingerbread Demon]

Well couldn't they go back there if they ever decide to kill the show off? Heroic death for the final story and we find out his name?

Why on Earth would you permanently kill off your show like that?

Well that's how I'd end it if I were ending Dr Who.

 

[Emperor-Tiberius]

Yeah, but Doctor Who is one of the few shows on the planet that survive easily on tie-in material. Its unlike any other show in how can it survive even a second cancellation.

I could literally see the show go on forever.

 

[Captaindemotion]

Yeah, it might be 'rested' if ratings fall or it loses its way but I don't see them ever coming up with a definitive ending and bringing his story to a close. After all, the 2005 revival showed that the show doesn't need a whole new start-over to bring it back onscreen. No matter how long it's off the air, any new series can just be a continuation of the old one, however long the gap or however distant a memory it is to current viewers.

 

[Gingerbread Demon]

Yeah, it might be 'rested' if ratings fall or it loses its way but I don't see them ever coming up with a definitive ending and bringing his story to a close. After all, the 2005 revival showed that the show doesn't need a whole new start-over to bring it back onscreen. No matter how long it's off the air, any new series can just be a continuation of the old one, however long the gap or however distant a memory it is to current viewers.

Um I know that.

I was just saying how I'd like it to end, you know "what if" situation?

 

[Captaindemotion]

^Fair enough.

 

[The Wormhole]

Yeah, but Doctor Who is one of the few shows on the planet that survive easily on tie-in material. Its unlike any other show in how can it survive even a second cancellation.

Although, Star Trek has already survived two cancellations.

 

[Emperor-Tiberius]

Yeah, but not quite with the same set of characters, did it? I mean, sure, the reboot is Kirk and Spock, but its not the same. Whereas DW has always been about this crazy alien who hops around time and space in a time machine.