(Come visit scenic, un-genocided Gallifrey!)
Fuck that noise, man. WHAT?
If you’ve come this far, you either know that the combined force of the Doctors and a slightly immobile, feral Rose Tyler served to un-destroy Gallifrey. In the past. Oh, you still can’t VISIT, or anything, but it’s hanging out there somewhere in the wibbly-wobbliness.
So, right, we can’t use it, but this wellspring of sorrow and gravity and the weight of the responsibility of the Doctor is gone.
It’s nonsense. It’s NONSENSE. When a planet goes, it’s gone.
“Alderaan is FINE, the power of the Force reunited all its bits and now they have universal health care and ponies.”
“Vulcan’s back! The two Spocks touched hands over a picture of Spock’s mom and there was a big CH-CHUNK noise and there it was and everyone’s happy.”
Just…stop.
I’m open to opposing viewpoints, I just think it was a real bush league move.
Tags: anniversary specials, bullshit, doctor who, steven moffatt, television, this is not like bringing spock back from the dead that was poetic and beautiful
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Can we talk about how wrong Elizabeth I was?! Oh, she’d throw away her power for the Doctor? Oh, and she’s so silly! Fuck that, please. Just…why would you change her so much?
Sidenote: I can’t believe they destroyed Vulcan, I love the Vulcans! Whatever, in this version of Star Trek Spock apparently doesn’t get sarcasm, so it’s already a bit disappointing.
Fun fact: I had _completely forgotten_ the presence of Queen Elizabeth 1 as a clown until this very moment, as it made me so angry I forgot about it as it was happening. In that instant. For the whole plot. All of it. God-DAMN that was bad.
Fun trivia! The actress who plays Liz 1 is Just Judy from Love Actually! WORLDS/TOAST COVERAGE COLLIDES.
THAT’S WHO SHE IS. I knew she looked familiar. I guess I could have googled it. But I didn’t.
Seriously, that was so bad. Especially when Ten points out all the flaws with the fact that she’s picnicking with him and agreeing to marry him–and then they just go with it anyway for a cheap joke.
Steven Moffatt is a garbagebeast who got his smelly tentacles all over British television and he needs to GET GOT!!!!!!!!! just one m*n’s opinion.
Read tentacles as “testicles”, and it was the same sentence, basically.
Hate Steven Moffat. Haaaaaaaaaaate.
I’d be willing to see where they’re going with it in terms of “oh, Gallifrey’s not gone after all,” I guess, though it obviously negates some of the show/Doctor’s sadnesses. But what really bothers me is that it (a) radically doesn’t make sense in relation to what happened in The End of Time (was Gallifrey trying to escape from the painting or whatever that they hid it in in this anniversary episode?) and (b) radically ignores the previous reason the Doctor supposedly wiped out Gallifrey in the first place, namely that the Time Lords had become as awful as the Daleks and were on the verge of committing pan-universal genocide. The bits in The End of Time (I think?) where Doctor #10 is describing the effects of the Time War on the universe are among the creepiest of the series for me, and the fact that the Time Lords were monsters now was referenced in the little Night of the Doctor webisode released just before the anniversay special. But in the anniversary special itself, this goes completely unremarked upon, even though this would be the moment when they were readying their doomsday weapon.
Also the Doctor(s) strategy of making Gallifrey vanish while the Daleks are surrounding it and firing away at it so the Daleks all blow each other up just seems like a scaled up version of the trick in Blink where the TARDIS vanishes and the Angels freeze because they’re looking at each other. Feh, I say, FEH.
Yeah, I gave myself a real headache trying to reconcile this chronology of events with The End of Time.
Supposedly The End of Time still happened just before/separately from the stuff going on in the 50th. Time Lord general dude said something about “screw the High Council, their plan went to shit,” (I’m paraphrasing) which I assume was referring to whatever nonsense Rassilon was up to in End of Time. The way I figure it, End of Time was all about the corruption of the Time Lord higher ups and how they pretty much deserved to be locked away forever, and Day of the Doctor was the reminder that, hey, there’s a bunch of kids and like the Time Lord equivalents of postal workers and office drones on Gallifrey too, it’s pretty shitty that the Doctor had to kill all of them too.
And as for the Daleks killing each other via crossfire, this actually retroactively makes me feel a lot better about the bajillions of times they’ve shown up since being supposedly genocided. It always annoyed me that the Time Lords were DEAD FOREVER but there were like millions of Daleks still kicking around.
Also, so the Daleks were firing continuously on the planet for, what? Days? Weeks? And yet the planet persists. But in the 30 seconds it would have taken them to realize an ENTIRE PLANET was gone, they wiped themselves out completely? NOPE.
There was a disassembled geodesic dome inside the burning man shack and I always hated the Bad Wolf premise but, even though the weight is gone, I thought it was one of the better uses of timey-wimey writing. Very cleverly written. Glad we’re not keeping the War Doctor, since I like how the Doctor does not generally shoot things ever.
Every other part suffered severely from Steven Moffat’s attitude towards women generally. I especially loved his depiction of classic doctor who fans (scarf) as asthmatics jealous of their sisters, although, complicatedly, I liked that girl and she made me miss Donna.
If they can make up bullshit reasons to bring back other “gone forever” characters, WHY NOT DONNA?
DONNNAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!!!
The fangirl-stand in’s name was Osgood, though, so she’s clearly some relation to Clara, right? I was trying to remember if Clara ever actually met Osgood (or if it was just the Zygon double). Because if Clara and Osgood are sisters who are somehow one character split in two, it would explain why Clara is sort of boring and two-dimensional.
For me it basically summed up everything I like about the Moffat Who Era and everything really, really hate about it. It’s seriously like he sees a fixed point in time or a paradox and thinks, “hmm how I can make it not a fixed point in time and who really cares about paradoxes?” It was a fun ride, the 50th. But it would have been a better ride if I didn’t know that it meant that poor John Simm suffered those drums in his head and killed himself for the Doctor for no good reason at all.
Maybe at least John Simm made it back to Gallifrey and is also lurking there? One can hope!
Augh. Yes to all this. It takes ALL OF THE EMOTION out of Nine’s entire character — even if this whole “oh John Hurt doesn’t remember he saved them because something something paradoxes” nonsense works out, it’s still made it out like now Nine’s just an uninformed nitwit who’s upset for no reason and then later on he’ll remember when he’s Matt Smith? Oh…kay?
I mean on the grander scale it bothered the crap out of me that the “Doctor Who 50th Anniversary Extravaganza!” really ended up being the “Moffat Era Doctor Who Extravaganza with a few nods to previous things because I feel obligated but mostly Moffat Era LA LA LA MOFFAT FOREVER!” It just felt like there was a real dismissal of anything that hadn’t happened very, very recently in DW canon.
I was actually really glad that Billie Piper wasn’t actually Rose Tyler but just this mental projection of Bad Wolf Girl instead, because if they had brought actual Rose Tyler back YET AGAIN after supposedly locking her away for realsies last time… I don’t even know. This show’s never been THAT good about sticking to its guns (at least in post-2005 reboot times, I’m not sure about earlier stuff), but man.
I mean, I pretty much quit this show after the Angels take Manhattan anyway, but I popped in wondering if maybe this would make me want to come back and… nope. It didn’t.
First, the Angels take Manhattan…then they take Berlin.
I was incredibly disappointed that the things under the blankets were not weeping angels.
Me too! Oh man I almost had a really great heart attack about it… and it turned out to be Zygons. Whomp whomp.
I think they were but the Zygons smashed them to bits…?
The perfect metaphor for how Moffat handles mysteries and paradoxes. Great buildup and no good ending.
My take is: if you look at it from the perspective of “this is a universe with some sort of internal logic” then yeah, it’s definitely nonsense. If you look at it from the perspective of “the writers got bored and want to do something different now” then it makes sense. I must say I’m curious to see Capaldi’s take on the Doctor, now that he’s got the opportunity to go in a somewhat different direction, motivation-wise.
Ugh the whole thing was awful except for the part where Tom Baker wobbled onto the screen and made me cry. I’m vaguely excited that we might get some old school $Random_Artifact of Rassilon and general Gallifreyan nonsense again, but way to negate the last few hundred years of the Doctor’s character development. Oh but the angst was real because BLAH BLAH TIMEY WIMEY he forgot he saved Gallifrey. At least now he’ll get over his The Last of His Kind hang-up.
Fuck it, all I want is someone to play a recorder and maybe do some Venusian aikido while wearing a velvet cape. THE END.
Oh the Tom Baker tears… I cried like a hungry, angry baby.
Good point, I love the Nouns of Rassilion.
I have been storing all my outrage for this very moment.
WAY TO COMPLETELY ERASE EVERYTHING THAT MADE NEW WHO AMAZING, MOFFAT. I know that just screaming at the sky “MOFFAT!” like a sci-fi collective of old men angry at lawns has become a cliche in criticism concerning his seasons, but I honestly can’t view the special as anything other than a means to completely deny everything that Russell T. Davies initially established with the reboot. Someone please support me in my paranoia.
I mean I guess on the upside at least he didn’t have Eleven wake up one day and go “It was all a dream!” and reveal that he’s outside of not-Harrod’s about to deal with some living plastic.
This sounds exactly like the type of storyline trolling Moffat would totally one day indulge in, oh god I want to have a rage-stroke just thinking about it.
The only good thing about this mess is that Christopher Eccleston (Doctor of my heart) didn’t participate. I like to think that, after putting such amazing work into developing the post-genocide, PTSD Doctor, he told Moffat to take a hike.
The idea of Gallifrey coming back, getting to know the Time Lords, etc. is actually quite interesting, and could be a nice way to get away from “Lady Companion is a Puzzle for the Doctor to solve”, but REALLY? The only way to make this happen is by undercutting the rest of New Who’s narrative?
(in case you can’t tell, I have some Feelings about Moffat being a damn menace)
Good point. I was initially super bummed we saw no 9 in the special, because he is MY Doctor and I love him to bits, but ultimately I would’ve been disappointed to see him associated with that shitshow.
Slightly tangentially, who else watched An Adventure in Space and Time? Now that was properly delightful, and also made me cry a lot.
It was wonderful.
It was really touching. But why was Matt Smith there? Why did that happen?
I’m going to be a dissenter and say I LOVED IT, and I loved that Gallifrey was saved, because a) sick of the Last of the Time Lords angst, b) especially sick of it given that the goddamned Daleks never managed to stay genocided, so why should the Time Lords, and c) I agree with John Seavey over on Mightygodking that bringing Gallifrey back means you can proceed to completely ignore Gallifrey because it’s boring.
Also, I usually hate reset button type plots, but I’m okay with this one because I figure it’s not like the Doctor never pressed the button, it’s more like the fate of Gallifrey has been the cat in Schrodinger’s box for hundreds of years. What actually happened to Gallifrey has been in flux since the War Doctor grabbed the Moment: it’s only when 10 and 11 go back and help the War Doctor decide they won’t do it that Gallifrey is really saved. Until then, Gallifrey was both gone for good and just missing at the same time. Is there some science-y or science fiction-y word for this besides paradox? Time loop?
Perfect. These were exactly my thoughts, without my having thought them before.
Schroedinger’s plot redistribution?
I agree with you 100%. I have had a lot of problems with Moffat, but I enjoyed the 50th so much…I saw it 3 times in 3 days and loved it every time!
“B” is a pretty good point that hadn’t occurred to me. I love the Daleks because they are both so evil and so ridiculous, so I’m usually happy to have them around but, “No, seriously, this time we really killed them all, for good.” does lose some impact when you know they’ll just find a way to come back in a few months. And if they can do that with the Daleks, why not with Gallifrey, I guess?
YES YES YES.
I know I’m in the minority here when I say that although I’m not really thrilled with Moffat, neither do I see him as an unholy menace who also hates women. (I also remember that RTD was getting entirely too close to a Jesus-complex for his Doctors, so really, all the writers have their flaws.)
I did love the 50th, unabashedly. I’m excited for the next Doctor to NOT be so emo over being the last of his kind. I’m excited for a Doctor who probably will have less of the sexual tension they loaded 9, 10 & 11 down with. (Fun once or twice; after that it got dull.)
The problem with Moffat (hahahaha, ONE of the problems with Moffat) is that he takes what would be/was a brilliant idea for one episode and makes it into a much bigger thing that doesn’t work. “Just this once, everybody lives!” and that whole two parter IMO, is pure genius. The weeping angels in Blink, genius. But having everybody live always and forever, and having the weeping angels become a catchall villian, and having every companion be a constant magical puzzle of specialness (instead of temporarily becoming Bad Wolf or the DoctorDonna) DOES NOT FUCKING WORK.
I was initially excited to see the Elizabeth I thing get addressed, but that was just offensive, as was Oswin The Scarf Girl.
At the same time, though, the idea that future you could go back and fix the worst thing you’ve ever done in your life is really fucking appealing. I was incredibly emotional watching this episode for that idea alone, and at first blush, loved the thing. But after thinking about it lots and reading a bunch of analysis, all I can say is MOFFAT GO HOME.
Elizabeth I. Ughhhhhhhhhhhhh.
WE COULD HAVE HAD IT ALL. The number of ways those references could have gotten taken care of that were funny and yet not horrifically misogynistic is literally infinite. BUT INSTEAD WE GOT THIS.
I didn’t watch the 50th because I literally cannot make myself care about any of Moffat’s characters, but if it’s anything like what he did with Nefertiti in Dinosaurs on a Spaceship (OH my god that was seriously the dumbest title/premise), I just don’t want to know.
Are we ignoring the fact that half of the Dalek’s shock troops are currently stuck in stasis in the middle of routing Gallifrey’s ground defenses? Good thinking, that.
Has anyone watched or rewatched Coupling lately? I really liked it at the time and there are still some good laughs that hold up, but man does it ever shine a depressing spotlight on Moffat’s fucked up ideas about the gender binary.
I remember watching it a long time ago and thinking it was really funny. Then I watched a couple of episodes recently and I had to turn it off. Sometimes becoming a more aware, enlightened mature feminist person makes watching media really frustrating.
Yeah, it is fun, but only if you’re not paying attention to how awful everyone is.
Yeah, I tried to watch one episode and couldn’t even finish it! it was so awful.
Terrible, horrible, no good, very bad anniversary special.
… beloved childhood text retained on shelf. 😉
Can we also discuss The Five(ish) Doctors Reboot? (If you haven’t seen it, that link goes to the streaming version, and I had no problem watching it on my US-based computer.)
Quel dommage, Davros!
I laughed and clapped my hands gleefully all through it. Mainly due to my neverending delight with Sylvester McCoy (he was my childhood doctor. What classic doctors does everyone else identify with, I’m always curious about that).
I really wish that had been the actual 50th anniversary show. It was perfect.
I LOVED IT AND I DON’T CARE. (Except for the pointless Liz bits.)
I don’t think it takes anything away from 9 or 10. I don’t think something that happened in 2005 can be considered ‘foundational’ for a show that’s been going on since 1963. The Time War still happened. The End of Time still happened. The idea that the Doctor wiped out all the Time Lords and Daleks was retconned almost immediately because there was no way they were going to have Doctor Who with no Daleks.
I only hate Moffat about 45% of the time. I actually like Clara. I fail at Who-fandom.
Yeah, that’s pretty much how I feel too.
Clearly, we’ve outed ourselves as Not Real Fans 😉
Yes, I agree, and I like Clara too. she’s underwritten as are most of Moffat’s female characters, but Jenna Coleman is so adorable and peppy that I can’t help but love her.
I don’t care for Clara, but I honestly think that’s mostly because we haven’t seen her for long enough, yet.
Count me in on the positive side. I found it a lot of fun, if a bit silly.
But I’m a casual viewer only and not emotionally invested. Elizabeth was the only off note for me. Also, I don’t think they completely ignored Classic Who – I liked that Clara was teaching in Coal Hill school, and I understand that there were a bunch of other call backs.
I adored it too – sure, there were stupid bits, and they chose the 50th anniversary to bring back ZYGONS of all things? But I was on the edge of my seat and flipped my shit over Bad Wolf (still the best story arc of the rebooted series, hands down) and all the tiny little in-jokes. And the 10/11 banter. OH THE BANTER. Can we just lock them in a room together for an hour every 6 months or so and let them banter all the live-long day?
I definitely agree that the 10/11 interactions were the very best part, A+, would banter again.
“Timey wimey?”
“I’ve no idea where he picks that up.”
THE BEST.
“I felt a great disturbance in the Force… as if millions of voices suddenly cried out in terror, and then were like, oh, nm, we’re fine.”
A+
I too really, really didn’t like the episode.
BUT Romana is my favorite companion. And if this whole Gallifrey-is-back thing doesn’t end with Romana (and maybe Leela? or the Monk or the Rani?) coming back I will burn down Gallifrey myself.
BUT I’m conflicted because I soooo don’t want Moffat writing her… ugh ugh ugh
I don’t actually watch enough Dr. Who to comment (though I have seen all the Donna and Martha episodes and one doesn’t really need to watch Dr. Who to have strong opinions on it) but I did stumble upon An Adventure in Space and Time. I only caught the second half but I was charmed by it in spite of myself.
My biggest problem with the episode–leaving aside the floofy Elizabeth and the Wups! Gallifrey’s Fine, You Guys, My Bad stuff–is that the conscience and brain of the destroy-everything weapon was Bad Wolf Girl/Feral Rose.
I would’ve much, much rather seen Donna as the projection of the machine’s conscience. Much as I like Rose, Donna became brainier and more introspective than Rose as her character developed. It would’ve been nice to see her acknowledged as the Doctor’s best mate and sounding board.
That said, MOFFAT! MOOOOOFFFFFAAAAAAT! (shakes stick)
Great show.
I wasn’t overly impressed, and I really would have appreciated more Classic stuff (a 50th anniversary special that’s all about a New Who event is just wrong), but I don’t agree that bringing Gallifrey back was the wrong move. Gallifrey was a presence through so much of the series, and when RTD wrote the Doctor’s genocide of the Time Lords and Daleks into the show, he not only wrote something that many felt and still feel was grossly out of character for the Doctor as they’d seen him for decades, he also removed it from the toybox at the writers’ disposal. (Except when he felt like bringing it back in some way that made less sense than Day of the Doctor does.)
I was also really unhappy with how Elizabeth was written, but I don’t think it’s fair to put all the blame for that on Moffat. The script was his and so was the decision to go to Elizabethan England at all, but he was stuck with a bunch of RTD-era references to Elizabeth waiting in a glade to elope with Ten (the Queen of England! Who wouldn’t marry because she was married to her kingdom – going to run away with a strange man!), being singlemindedly obsessed with him many years later, etc.
Also agree with yasaman about the Daleks.
Wow, holy damn, the glade reference is in Eleven. What’s the one I’m thinking of in Ten that first introduced the element? *googles* “End of Time,” clarifying why she hates him in “Shakespeare Code,” IIRC.
So, here’s the theory I heard (and I will admit I need to re-watch these episodes to clarify it): Moffat & Co were in it for the long troll. Waaaay back during 10’s reign (it’s David Tennant, he reigned, I will not change my wording, harumph, etc), during the episodes with the Master where they brought all the other Time Lords back, they mentioned that Gallifrey was just in a time lock. Which would mean they were setting up the whole thing way back then. It’s not unfeasible, either. Davies and Moffat wrote together for a long time, and enjoyed each other’s writing immensely. I’m not exactly a Moffat fan (I have major GRRR feelings when it comes to Amy Pond and what he did to River Song), but I think it’s plausible that the beginnings of this idea were there for a long time.
That said, WTF LIZ I???? WHO ARE YOU AND WHAT HAVE YOU DONE TO ELIZABETH?? UGH. Trivializing one of the greatest monarchs ever…grrrr….
I agree with you 100%. I have had a lot of problems with Moffat, but I enjoyed the 50th so much…I saw it 3 times in 3 days and loved it every time!
Yeah, I tried to watch one episode and couldn't even finish it! it was so awful.
Yes, I agree, and I like Clara too. she's underwritten as are most of Moffat's female characters, but Jenna Coleman is so adorable and peppy that I can't help but love her.
So, I don’t disagree with whatever everyone said about the portrayal of Elizabeth, but I actually kind of enjoyed Joanna Page in the role. I am pretty sure she was inspired by Miranda Richardson as Queenie in Blackadder, so I found it pretty funny. Though of course, Moffat is generally terrible at writing female characters.
So, I don't disagree with whatever everyone said about the portrayal of Elizabeth, but I actually kind of enjoyed Joanna Page in the role. I am pretty sure she was inspired by Miranda Richardson as Queenie in Blackadder, so I found it pretty funny. Though of course, Moffat is generally terrible at writing female characters.
Okay, someone tell me whether or not Gallifrey is now locked in the universe with alterna-Rose and not-Mickey-the-idiot-Rickey and one-heart-Doctor?
Is it? Isn’t it? Might it be but we don’t know? If it is, does it make this whole time-lock Gallifrey 1000x stupider, or only 100x?
No I think they are in a bubble universe (all by themselves – and as someone pointed out quite a few daleks).
I’m so sick of the Doctor swanning in to moral dilemmas, cheating his way out of them with the ~power of his cleverness, and the script acting like that makes him morally superior to the people who were going to have to make the impossible decisions. Knowing more than the other people in the situation doesn’t make you a better person, just in a easier position.
Also, the thing about having the Doctor interact with other Time Lords is that it makes all his superior cleverness seem like even more bullshit. Sure, when he’s dealing with humans it makes sense that he’s smarter and more likely to come up with some timey-wimey solution, but there’s no reason the other Time Lords wouldn’t have thought of a time-lock, time-travel related solution.
Also also, how ridiculous was the whole “spending five minutes shooting an important message into a wall while people are dying all around me” thing.
“Knowing more …. doesn’t make you a better person, just in an easier position” << this is pretty insightful in a broad way, and I’m now keeping it in mind when I talk to hackers who are like LEARN TO CODE FIX EVERYTHING as a response to training people in using new tools. A-hem. Thanks.
Adventure in Space and Time was fantastic, and I enjoyed it more than any actual episode of DW in a long time.
The plot is easily explained by “something something alternate timelines”. Since when are we asking Who to be logical? There have been SO MANY episodes that make no. goddamn. sense. (Can anyone tell me what the hell happened in The Wedding of River Song?)
I like the Gallifrey reset – I’m up for a more swashbuckling, less tortured Doctor and I can see a lot of good stories coming from the search for his homeland. Besides, it opens up more interactions with the Time Lords high council and their dubious morality, which could be interesting. Also, more Master, please.
Basically, I loved the special, am intrigued by the new possibilities in the show, and am immensely looking forward to Twelve’s time on the show. (We’re calling Capaldi Twelve anyway, right? We’re just skipping over the Hurt Doctor?)
We’re calling Capaldi Twelve. I’m still fighting with my boyfriend over that, but dammit, Capaldi’s Twelve!
Oh wow, “The Hurt Doctor”. Now I’m imagining Jeremy Renner in the role. I mean, that obviously couldn’t work but then maybe but actually let me just imagine this a while, OK?