"The Woman Who Lived" Grading and Discussion Thread

[arch101]

I thought the ep was just fine. And, since I don't have HBO, I hadn't seen Maisie Williams before and thought she was pretty good, too.
I've liked Capaldi in the role so far but with this ep something really clicked with me and I think he's terrific. I'm digging an older Doc again. I'm also digging that every young woman on the show isn't flirting with him anymore as they did when he was played by younger actors. I had watched Pyramids of Mars on Saturday and this current ep fit with it surprisingly well.

 

[Mr. Adventure]

And why we can't get back to the Doctor being a wanderer though time and space and just helping people without some major plotline?

Hear, hear.

I really do wonder what's going on in Clara's personal life now. How much time has passed since Danny died? How well is she coping? Is it possible that she's actually in a deep depression when she's at home by herself? While I wasn't a fan of the Danny story, it was a big deal for Clara's character. I want to see the consequences.

Danny Pink was a thankless role. I guess he personified the little man that gets run over (literally sometimes) through the Doctor's adventures. We see time and again where characters die fast in the path of the Doctor. Danny Pink took that across an entire season instead of the usual one-and-done's we meet in an adventure.

 

[The Four Doctor]

Speaking of Cromwell, why does no one think to question his "pardon" of Sam Swift, given that he would have had neither the authority nor the inclination to pardon small-scale crooks, and was in any case probably hundreds of miles away fighting royalists in Scotland and the north of England.

Dozens of people see a hole open up in the sky and heavenly forces rain fire down upon the populace at Tyburn, a public place of execution just outside the nation's capital in the period when mass communication was becoming A Thing for the first time. Isn't that exactly the sort of event that would leave records? Especially given that any kind of weird phenomena would be seized on by royalist propagandists as signs that nature had been put out of whack.

 

[The Wormhole]

The 12th Doctor is seen at the freezing of Gallifrey in DOTD. Sooner or later his presence there has to be explained, doesn't it?

What further explanation do you need other than what's provided in the episode? The combined power sources of all the TARDISes is required to pull it off. Yes, that even means the next guy we haven't been introduced to yet.

Except the other Doctors don't summon Twelve. The bigwigs at Time Lord HQ are surprised by his arrival, and as of TOTD Eleven remains unaware of his existence. So it seems he shows up on his own initiative.

We know very little about how all the Doctors were summoned to Gallifrey. In my mind, the Moment calculated it would take the combined power of thirteen TARDISes and so summoned the first thirteen Doctors. Why should Eleven be aware of Twelve? Aside from Eleven, Ten and War none of the Doctors seemed to be communicating with each other. Besides, according to Day of the Doctor, when multiple Doctors meet, after they depart they instantly forget about their successor(s) anyway, so of course Eleven is unaware of Twelve in Time of the Doctor.

Dozens of people see a hole open up in the sky and heavenly forces rain fire down upon the populace at Tyburn, a public place of execution just outside the nation's capital in the period when mass communication was becoming A Thing for the first time. Isn't that exactly the sort of event that would leave records? Especially given that any kind of weird phenomena would be seized on by royalist propagandists as signs that nature had been put out of whack.

A recurring theme throughout Doctor Who is that whenever there's very public alien attacks or incidents, people don't talk about it. Like in The Next Doctor, Jackson Lake comments that everyone will talk for years of the giant robot which stomped through London on Christmas Eve, to which the Doctor just replies "Maybe not."

 

[RoJoHen]

Dozens of people see a hole open up in the sky and heavenly forces rain fire down upon the populace at Tyburn, a public place of execution just outside the nation's capital in the period when mass communication was becoming A Thing for the first time. Isn't that exactly the sort of event that would leave records? Especially given that any kind of weird phenomena would be seized on by royalist propagandists as signs that nature had been put out of whack.

A recurring theme throughout Doctor Who is that whenever there's very public alien attacks or incidents, people don't talk about it. Like in The Next Doctor, Jackson Lake comments that everyone will talk for years of the giant robot which stomped through London on Christmas Eve, to which the Doctor just replies "Maybe not."

Of course, that particular event ended up being explained via Cracks in the Universe.

 

[The Wormhole]

Dozens of people see a hole open up in the sky and heavenly forces rain fire down upon the populace at Tyburn, a public place of execution just outside the nation's capital in the period when mass communication was becoming A Thing for the first time. Isn't that exactly the sort of event that would leave records? Especially given that any kind of weird phenomena would be seized on by royalist propagandists as signs that nature had been put out of whack.

A recurring theme throughout Doctor Who is that whenever there's very public alien attacks or incidents, people don't talk about it. Like in The Next Doctor, Jackson Lake comments that everyone will talk for years of the giant robot which stomped through London on Christmas Eve, to which the Doctor just replies "Maybe not."

Of course, that particular event ended up being explained via Cracks in the Universe.

Not really, the damage done by the cracks was undone by the end of season 5, so those events still happened, they just once again weren't talked about.

Doesn't matter, Doctor Who is replete with tons of other examples. The Seventh Doctor even deliver a monologue on the matter in Remembrance of the Daleks.

 

[Captrek]

What further explanation do you need other than what's provided in the episode? The combined power sources of all the TARDISes is required to pull it off. Yes, that even means the next guy we haven't been introduced to yet.

Except the other Doctors don't summon Twelve. The bigwigs at Time Lord HQ are surprised by his arrival, and as of TOTD Eleven remains unaware of his existence. So it seems he shows up on his own initiative.

We know very little about how all the Doctors were summoned to Gallifrey. In my mind, the Moment calculated it would take the combined power of thirteen TARDISes and so summoned the first thirteen Doctors. Why should Eleven be aware of Twelve? Aside from Eleven, Ten and War none of the Doctors seemed to be communicating with each other. Besides, according to Day of the Doctor, when multiple Doctors meet, after they depart they instantly forget about their successor(s) anyway, so of course Eleven is unaware of Twelve in Time of the Doctor.

At this point we're speculating about things that didn't appear on screen, so I guess there's no right or wrong. But since it was the Doctors, not the Moment, who came up with the idea of freezing Gallifrey, they would presumably know how many of them it takes to carry out their plan and whom they were summoning.

My understanding is that Eleven ends DOTD with a complete memory of the events, and the other Doctors don't remember the events until they "catch up" as Eleven. So Eleven post-DOTD would know if Twelve had been part of the plan.

 

[Psion]

A recurring theme throughout Doctor Who is that whenever there's very public alien attacks or incidents, people don't talk about it. Like in The Next Doctor, Jackson Lake comments that everyone will talk for years of the giant robot which stomped through London on Christmas Eve, to which the Doctor just replies "Maybe not."

Of course, that particular event ended up being explained via Cracks in the Universe.

Not really, the damage done by the cracks was undone by the end of season 5, so those events still happened, they just once again weren't talked about.

Doesn't matter, Doctor Who is replete with tons of other examples. The Seventh Doctor even deliver a monologue on the matter in Remembrance of the Daleks.

Eventually, the Curator figures out a way to weave a low-level perception filter around events that discourages people from paying alien invasions much attention. Sure there were demons in the skies, but it's oh so much more fascinating to speculate about the village harlot's sex life!

And, as we see in the world today, the trend continues.

 

[Doctorwhovian]

The Hell is Gallifrey with it's war tardises. Hell is descending ala End Of Time because Clara opened the "heaven sent" opening from Danny Pink's skull which she thaught was "Heaven sent".

 

[Emperor-Tiberius]

At this point we're speculating about things that didn't appear on screen, so I guess there's no right or wrong. But since it was the Doctors, not the Moment, who came up with the idea of freezing Gallifrey, they would presumably know how many of them it takes to carry out their plan and whom they were summoning.

My understanding is that Eleven ends DOTD with a complete memory of the events, and the other Doctors don't remember the events until they "catch up" as Eleven. So Eleven post-DOTD would know if Twelve had been part of the plan.

Actually, I think he'd be clueless of Twelve's involvement. Maybe even wonder who the hell was he - maybe the Meta-Crisis found a way in? Or maybe he didn't notice him with all that commosion of TARDISes around. So, remembers everything, but Twelve's part in it. Which makes sense.

 

[MacLeod]

More importaly once found the Time War starts all over again, so looking for it is a waste of time.

So we have this storyline set up at the end of the 50th anniversary episode and you're calling it a waste of time? Why set it up then? Why can't we have a coherent plot to come back to every so often?

Moffat has already apologised for restoring Gallifrey. Don't expect the Doctor to find or even look for it ever.

Well at least whilst Moffat is show runner, a new show runner might decide to go look for it.

 

[The Borgified Corpse]

There had to have been more than 13 TARDISes at Gallifrey. After all, there were clearly two different versions of McCoy, one in his traditional green question mark jumper and one in his movie costume.