#idk how to express this it’s just like. idk like with rtd coming back to dw and having SO much control and every episode feeling half assed

[lucydacusgirl]

I feel like popculture atm is like overrun with people who are already famous and established and are therefore surrounded by yes men. Can we bring back editing.

[umbrellasareforever]

i get your dw feelings! ive been wondering/accusing myself of nostalgia, or if i just used to watch in a different way, if im too invested now, overscrutinising etc

but i feel you totally about the super clean feeling. i keep comparing ruby to rose bc the actresses were both 19, right? i keep trying to figure out if rose really looked more 'real' or if thats just nostalgia talking. maybe she read the same way to a 26 yo in 2005 as ruby does to me? maybe thats just how fashion goes? i dont know, but it all just feels too Pretty. grime it up

not like this isnt also true to an extent for other eras. i mentally grime up 13 a Lot, and like clara, or 12, or 10, or whoever, theyre all pretty, right? it's tv, and it's not grimy tv, of course theyre all gonna be made pretty! i already missed some of that lived-in-ness with 13s era but it feels even more sterile now

or maybe im just being nitpicky, like you said. ive been thinking about how the more time you spend thinking about something the more complaints youre gonna have, right? ive got more complaints about 13s era than i do........anything else ive ever watched maybe, but thats because ive spent so much time thinking about it because i love it, you know? it's kind of paradoxical

but i also totally feel you about wanting someone new. like every artist has their fixations their obsessions their things they make art about, and that develops also over the course of their life, im not saying rtd has uninteresting ideas when it comes to dw, but i do feel like we've kinda, you know, got the picture now. and i so desperately want to see what doctor who could become with some new artists with their own obsessions and experiences and visions at the helm, you know? i feel a little like ugh we've DONE this, even if we havent done literally exactly this bc rtd dw in 2005 is not the same as 20 years later, but like. some fresh blood you know? we've heard of these guys already, we've seen their visions. get someone new. do something completely bonkers and get a woman to run the show :P

idk, just wanted to say that. i feel you 🤝

Thank you so much for taking the time to say all this!! It feels nice to know I'm not totally alone or crazy!!

It really is hard, especially with RTD being back, to not fear that nostalgia is just taking over the brain and of COURSE we think about this damn show too much!! No doubt about it!

Which honestly does make me wonder how those who don't obsess think about this season so far; ohhh to look at things with fresh eyes...

Every time I think about bringing in fresh blood I think about Jamie Mathieson coming in and writing Mummy on the Orient Express, Flat Line, and Oxygen -- three of my all time favorite episodes of New Who -- and I'm like?? Where'd he go?? Those episodes were so wonderful and felt so fresh and I think about them so often?? Why is he not back??

But I also 10000000% agree that there's literally nothing stopping them from getting someone other than a white man to run the show. I promise you BBC, the world will not end!!

[forest-of-cheem]

my initial reaction to the power of the doctor was… well. bloody loving every single minute of it.

now that i’ve had some time to think it all over…

(under the cut because spoilers!!)

thirteen

this really did feel like such an excellent send-off for her.

she might well have made my favourite regeneration scene of new!who. the way she was so desperate for more time… but in the end, went into the sunrise with peace and happiness, and no regrets except wanting to know what comes next… and the visuals, on the clifftop with light shooting off in all directions…

the AI hologram!! i love that it was responsive rather than just reeling off the standard “if you’re seeing this, then i’m dead” message.

i love how expressive whittaker is. just. her face is doing so much, all the time, and it’s brilliant.

yaz

she’s come so far…

watching her pilot the tardis with her notes!! and even being able to catch ace as she was plummeting from the top of a building!!

i love her literally shoving the master to the ground and taking the tardis with her.

not to mention the way she fooled his ass, and forced him out of the doctor.

she carried the doctor!! yaz really stepped up and said i will be the goddamn hero today!!

i get the sadness over no thasmin kiss, but i guess. to me it makes sense, in a way. it’d be more painful for them to have some intimacy now when 13 is right on the brink of regenerating. and i’m a sucker for a tragic romance.

especially when new!who has only really seen two doctor/companion couples get romantic kisses in its entire run - 11/river, and 10/astrid. (yes, rose kisses tentoo, but he’s part donna, so i would argue it doesn’t entirely count.)

idk. what i’m trying to say is: romantic associations with the doctor rarely end well, for multiple reasons. that we got explicit confirmation of 13 and yaz’s mutual feelings at all is enough for me.

the master

dhawan is the best new!who incarnation of the master and i will die on that hill

inserting himself into all of those paintings was so uncalled for and so unnecessary, and i loved it

ra ra rasputin… artistic poetry. a masterpiece of the screen.

the master wearing 13’s outfit?? i am half-feral. i need more of it.

not trying to be rude, but i genuinely don’t get the people complaining that his plan/motives were too confusing/unclear. like… it was pretty clear to me…

“don’t make me go back to being me” i WILL cry.

playing the recorder when yaz abandons him…

and the way he squealed when the elevator doors closed on the way down to the bunker?? this episode really said here’s all the things you never knew you wanted sacha dhawan to do.

he was delightfully unhinged throughout this entire episode. if rtd doesn’t bring him back, it’ll be a damn crime.

fourteen

look, i love 10. he’s my favourite doctor. but i am… conflicted about his return.

for one thing, i simply refuse to refer to him as 14 when that’s supposed to be ncuti gatwa!!

also, 13 leaves full of optimism and excitement, and then the first trailer for next year sounds all gloomy and severe?? i’m not feeling it.

also, i already feel like those specials simply will not compare to POTD. this was THE anniversary special for me, and it wasn’t even really intended as such. this ep had old doctors and companions alike, and so far the 60th is three episodes of… 10 and donna. and that’s it.

some of my bitterness here may well be the fact that i’m already sick and tired of seeing people all ~hooray the boring mediocre woman is gone it’s time for my favourite MAN doctor, yay, doctor who is saved!!~ like. shut the fuck up already.

everything else

no surprise that dan left, but tbh i feel like that could have been reworked into him leaving at the end of the preceding ep. it feels weird having him only at the very beginning and then near the end.

gonna be honest, before this ep i thought kate stewart was a perfectly decent character, but simply didn’t care much about her. but she was excellent in this episode, and now i definitely want to see more of her!!

the group for past companions is such a fantastic idea and i’m amazed it’s not been done before. everything about that bit was perfect. and it was so cool seeing classic companions! even if i didn’t have any real idea who they were!

this episode is gonna be what makes me watch classic who. i tried several years ago but… i got bored halfway through the second episode. keep meaning to go back, but i never have. now i definitely intend to.

on that note, i thought this was a great introduction to ace and tegan. their bits with the AI hologram were very sweet and have left me really wanting to see their classic stories.

i really thought vinder was gonna be the timeless child daddy, and instead. he was just there. he helped yaz, fair enough, but what was he even there for in the first place?? are he, bel and karvanista investigating alien shenanigans too now??

me, pretending to be shocked when graham arrives, despite having known for months about that set photo circulating of him and dan together…

all in all, this was a top-notch episode for me. my only quibbles are with dan’s early exit, and vinder’s presence feeling a bit random… and tennant’s return that may or may not go down well next year. idk. i have faith in rtd to deliver a fantastic era, but i have my doubts as to whether this is the way to kickstart it.

all else aside, jodie whittaker and mandip gill have made one of my favourite tardis teams, and sacha dhawan has cemented his place as my favourite master. and despite most of my actual predictions for this ep being wrong, i was right about this: it was chaotic, it was heartbreaking, and it was wonderful.

[galiifreyrose]

*banging pots and pans* I’ve watched RTD era at least 18 bajillion times but every re-watch is more fun than the last and I have some THINGS to say about The Library arc. 

There IS Moffat salt in here. But up front, I still LOVE these episodes.

I’m going to start with - and this hurts - that honestly, Moffat’s one-shots in RTD’s era have always tended to be some of my absolute favorites. I knowwww the discourse. I know it. I’ve heard it. I’ve been there. It cannot kill my young teenage love for certain episodes. I love critical thinking :)

There were a few things that just jumped out to me this time watching The Library episodes that... idk. I’d perceived before, but they struck me way differently at this point in my life? At this point in fandom? Sometimes I wonder if I’m just too deep in fanon and my perspective is skewed but I shall speak ANYWAY

1. The lying.

“The Doctor lies” is nothing if not a central concept to Eleven’s era, especially where River is concerned. With Eleven, it feels more natural. He’s more cagey, he’s more hurt. There is a candor to the Doctor that died with Ten and did not carry to Eleven, and that’s an important part of his character. So, what bothers me is seeing Ten act that way. Telling Donna “oh, yeah, I lied” suddenly seemed WAY out of line with the way they’d been acting up until that point. It maybe would have been easier to write off if not for the CONSISTENCY of the lies and half truths that follow throughout the episode. To me, RTD’s era is so full of honesty and truthfulness that the sudden prevalence of lies lies lies just sits wrong with me.

2. Miss Evangelista

This all comes down to the line “I have the two qualities needed to see absolute truth. I am brilliant, and unloved.” Hey Moffat?? What the fuck kind of mindset do you have for the world? Is that truly what you believe is necessary to see the truth in the world? What does that even mean? What does that imply? How cynical! How depressing! Is there not absolute truth in making soup for someone you love? Is there not honesty in a simple life? 

I’ve started typing three different thoughts and deleted each of them because it all comes down to “I hate the way Moffat writes women” plain and simple but GOD!! That line to me is the ANTITHESIS of what Doctor Who is about, to me.

3. The Doctor’s Name

I know there’s speculation to hell and back on THIS particular little doozy, but I’m just formally putting my headcanon on the record. This is me speaking as someone who does not, in any lifetime, ship DoctorxRiver. And I”m going to express this without eloquence I’m sure, but it’s not his actual name, it’s something more like a codeword. Something like a hostage situation where you REALLY need to know you can trust someone, and that you can plant ahead of time, and still carries a fuckton of weight, but... I just can’t bring myself to get on the train of “it’s actually his name.” Now, Tennant’s performance as River obliterates herself is pretty damn convincing for the argument “it MUST be his name, that was a strong reaction” but lalalalalala I’d like to live in my own little world on this one.

Thanks for coming to my ramble.

[beccaland]

What are your opinions on the RTD era's companions' relationship with the Doctor? 'Cos personally, they bother me a little sometimes, and I was curious what your opinion was.

Yeah, they bother me a little too. I’m actually going to share some thoughts about the characters themselves, as well as their respective relationships to the Doctor. Partly, I want to do that because not to do so would be an injustice to the characters. So, here goes.

Rose (and Mickey a bit, because you can’t really separate an analysis of their characters and he’s a companion too):

Rose is a charismatic character, and I think just right for relaunching the series. She’s young and displays many of the flaws of young people, yet in other ways is more mature than other adults, including her own mum–indeed Rose is often seen taking on a role of parenting her parent. While Jackie seems content to live off the dole, Rose has a job. It’s not a particularly good job, but she seems to be given a fair bit of trust and responsibility, probably above what her official position warrants, which suggests that she’s earned the admiration and reliance of her boss–and given her home life, that’s not surprising. Rose is clearly used to having to be more responsible than her peers. She’s vibrant, curious, compassionate, and brave.

She also takes advantage of Mickey’s affection for her, perhaps without realizing it (at least at first). She’s pretty judgy generally, and she’s not above using the Doctor as well. This suggests that despite (perhaps in part because of) being brought up by an emotionally immature parent and having to take on a lot of responsibility before she was really old enough to bear it, Rose is quite selfish.

Now, as to her relationship to the Doctor, meeting him does two things for her: it gives her an apparently easy escape from a life she feels trapped in, and it gives her the opportunity to develop a relationship with someone unlike anyone she’s ever known, who seems to see potential in her far beyond what any other person in her life has ever shown (especially Jackie and Mickey), and who is both willing and able to protect her and to care about what she feels and wants. Am I saying the Doctor started out as more of a parent-substitute than a boyfriend? Yes I am. Is that kind of creepy? I think so. But not necessarily more creepy than him being her boyfriend, given the age gap.

OK, so Rose gives Mickey a kiss and obliquely tells him “thanks for nothing” before swanning off with the Doctor. By the time she comes back, a year has passed for everyone she knows but just one day for her. This causes ENORMOUS problems for Jackie and Mickey in particular, and she does seem genuinely sorry (well, sorry to Jackie–she seems mostly annoyed with Mickey’s anger AT BEING SUSPECTED OF MURDERING HER. BECAUSE SHE RAN OFF WITH AN ALIEN). This gets swiftly brushed aside by alien shenanigans, and Rose swans off again–leaving Mickey apparently in some doubt as to their relationship status. The nature of her relationship to the Doctor is also left ambiguous at this point, but she’s clearly not thinking of him as “substitute for parental acknowledgement and affection” anymore. She flirts like crazy with Jack who flirts like crazy with both her and the Doctor and both she and the Doctor seem vaguely jealous of the other’s attention to Jack. Back to Mickey meeting them in Wales, who apparently STILL DOESN’T KNOW that Rose has basically dumped him, and does she make that clear? No, but the Doctor is acting more and more like a jealous boyfriend (and really doesn’t stop treating Mickey like garbage until the poor guy saves them and stays behind in Pete’s World, thus earning his respect, I guess, and also removing the threat), and none of this is Mickey’s fault. He’s astute enough to see, at least, that the Doctor and Rose’s relationship is destructive to others.

After the Doctor regenerates, they’re 100% in couple mode, with Rose referring to the events of S1E2 as their “first date” and the Doctor happily assenting to this characterization (has Rose actually broken up with Mickey yet? Honestly can’t remember, but I don’t think Mickey knew it if she had). The Doctor and Rose have a deeply codependent relationship. We might attribute this to her dysfunctional relationship with Jackie and the Doctor’s recent PTSD. They latch onto each other like needy puppies, and this isn’t a criticism, because there are really people who fit these profiles, and they are not bad people, and it does make for interesting characters and good storytelling, but it’s by no means a healthy depiction of a relationship.

Consider, for instance, that the Doctor tries to send her away (no doubt he felt he was making a noble sacrifice, but he did this against her clear and repeatedly expressed wishes, and with the complicity of Pete). Rose ignores the Doctor’s clearly expressed wishes and comes back, which, fair enough I guess, but it all ends in tragedy anyway. So what does he do? HE BURNS UP AN ENTIRE SUN just so he can say goodbye. I mean, I’m sure he verified it was not an inhabited solar system, but seriously. In that goodbye chat, he specifically tells her that they cannot get across the barrier between universes because “the whole thing would fracture. Two universes would collapse.”

Does Rose accept the judgment of the person who is unquestionably the foremost person in either universe able to evaluate the risk of such an attempt? No she doesn’t. We learn in series 4 that even before the stars started going out, she was having Torchwood build a DIMENSION CANNON to P U N C H. A. H O L E. IN THE UNIVERSES!!! like presumably as many as it took for her to find the right one. Just so she could get back to him. AFTER HE MADE IT CLEAR THAT IS NOT WHAT HE WANTED. BECAUSE IT WOULD DESTROY THEM. This is portrayed as romantic rather than horrific. Seriously. And then he dumps his problematic clone on her and goes back to his own universe. SO ROMANTIC. Sorry, I try not to be rude about Rose’s relationship with the Doctor. I think it’s actually an interesting dynamic that makes sense in context, but it really bugs me that so many people view it unproblematically, and it bugs me even more that people don’t imagine both Rose and the Doctor growing out of it. Like, I can’t lie: I think that’s wacked and super unhealthy, in much the same way (though to a lesser degree) as the Twilight series and its fans are, except Doctor Who is still better-written and far more interesting.

That said, I’d be willing to read a well-written fix-it fic that depicts them growing out of their unhealthy codependent dynamic while staying together romantically. TBH I’d be more interested if it were Rose and Tentoo because then it would be canon-compliant, but I’m not too picky on that point. I AM picky about it not even remotely disrespecting the relationship the Doctor had with any other companion though. And it would have to have a whole “you were so obsessed with me that you were willing to destroy an unspecified number of universes, INCLUDING THE ONE YOUR FAMILY AND BEST FRIEND WERE IN, just to see me again for a brief period of time before this universe also collapsed WITH US IN IT and honey, that’s actually CREEPY AND GROSS even though I thought it was super sweet at the time, but in my defense the universe was already ending at that point anyway and you don’t have that excuse because in your case it was PREMEDITATED” conversation because otherwise I won’t believe they’ve actually grown as people. Also it’d be nice if it were funny more than angsty (but lbr you can’t write what I’m talking about without a fair amount of angst). So, y'know, if anyone has actually written that fic lmk.

Meanwhile, there’s MARTHA.

OK so I’m on record about how awesome Martha is. This is already getting long so I won’t belabor Martha’s total awesomeness as a character, but even though I got a bit tired of dysfunctional family relationships in New Who, it was novel to see them have any ongoing family relationships at all, and Martha’s was particularly rich, partly there were so many of them for her to interact with, thus revealing lots of different facets of her character. And despite her fractious relationship with them, she remained fiercely loyal, which was an interesting source of tension between her and the Doctor, and one that diverted attention away from the dental-drill painfulness of the unrequited love subplot.

It’s super gross that the writers made her hung up on the Doctor all the way through series 3. Not because it’s ridiculous for an intelligent, perceptive, professional young woman to be hung up on an emotionally unavailable man. No, that really happens to actual human beings (and again, possibly related to serious parental issues, so it’s not even without narrative justification). Handled with any sensitivity at all, it could have made for a lovely level of complexity. What really bugs me, and I’ve also written about this before, is how the Doctor treats her like GARBAGE, and this is barely addressed as a problem that he is responsible for. In the end Martha realises her mistake in sticking around for so long, but her attempts to call out his bad behavior in the past fell on deaf ears. Martha is the rebound girl but he acts like he doesn’t even know he’s doing it. Which, IDK, maybe he really doesn’t know? Like for all his 900+ years the Doctor has little previous actual relationship experience and also he’s super blindingly hung up on his high school-esque sweetheart Rose. And it’s not just in regards to Martha’s romantic feelings that he treats her poorly. He also dismisses her VERY VALID CONCERNS about her own safety and well-being when traveling in the past for the sake of his own whims. And he brushes off legitimate questions about how stuff works. Anyway. This is well-trodden ground. As is the fact that RTD later inexplicably fobs Martha off on MICKEY, the only other black companion in the series up to that point, despite having already paired Martha off with a cute, sweet doctor who seemed like a MUCH better fit, and there literally being no narrative reason for them to be a couple in that scene.

Donna! Well, as we all know, Donna is among the best-developed companions ever.

She didn’t start out that way though. She started off as a Deeply Problematic (read: disgustingly misogynistic) Stereotype who was never meant to be more than a one-off, but CT and DT got along so well that they brought the character back full-time, and so we got a lot of deconstruction, exploration, and development of that first impression. And I’ll forever be happy we did. But even in The Runaway Bride, she had moments of surprising depth and pathos. Deep down, Donna was always better than she seemed. The fact that she was the last person (other than her mother) to realize that fact is part of what makes her so compelling.

Her relationship to the Doctor is also the least problematic, because they’re both on the same page about being platonic bffs. To be fair, part of the reason he does make sure this is clear from the outset is because he has finally realized how he hurt Martha (NOT THAT HE EVER APOLOGIZED TO MARTHA FOR THAT–for a guy for whom “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry” was basically a second catch phrase, Ten actually sucks at apologising to the people close to him). Unlike Martha, the Doctor doesn’t overlook Donna or brush off her concerns. Unlike Rose, he is not codependent with her. Donna calls him on his BS, and he listens. She helps him to face his emotional vulnerability rather than running from/shutting out potentially scary personal relationships (like with River and Jenny). The Doctor helps Donna to see that she really is brilliant and important, and she grows to believe him.

That’s not to say that Donna’s character was handled perfectly. No, indeed. Even after her first story, we’re repeatedly subjected to jokes about her desperate need for and inability to get a man. Even the Doctor, who is otherwise kind to her, takes these jokes for granted and sometimes participates in them. At the end of series 4, we’re shown that the one person in the universe that Mr. Pansexuality Personified, JACK HARKNESS has no interest in flirting with is Donna Noble, the man-hungry middle-aged slightly overweight loud temp from Chiswick. And then, of course, the Doctor denies her agency and takes away her access to the memories of everything she saw, everything she did, everything she discovered about herself while traveling with him. Just so he wouldn’t have to see her die. It was selfish of him. She made her choice and he ignored it to spare HIMSELF pain. But, y'know, at least the Doctor cheated the lottery to make her rich as a wedding present to a very attractive, kind-looking, and clearly adoring man–right before he regenerated. So she did get a happy ending.

[handdrawnfantasma]

thoughts on the last 3 episodes of series 12 of the space hobo show + summary thoughts of the entirety of s12 below the readmore. yes i know u’ve been getting my analysis and Feelings in the tags of my reblog spam for the past 48 hrs but i’m doing this for completionism’s sake and also bc i am putting off watching revolution of the daleks bc i know it is gonna inflict SO much psychic damage on me

so first off villa of diodati was REALLY good. miri i know u were saying that the person who made that one video raved abt this episode in stark contrast to the feelings expressed about the rest of s11 and s12 and if i was going to make a theory as to why i think it’s because out of all the episodes in Thirteen’s era, this is the one that feels most like an episode from either moffat or RTD’s era when you watch it? idk if it’s to do with how it’s shot or if it’s because it doesn’t have the Two Lines No Waiting situation that most other episodes in this era do but it definitely *feels* different to the rest of the era. but again, i stand by what i say that this does not make the other episodes in 13′s era bad, not by a long shot. definitely think this comes down to Preferences In Style Of Storytelling. THAT ASIDE, not only was it a FANTASTIC self-contained horror story, it did REALLY well at setting up the finale, bringing back the mention of the Lone Cyberman from where that plot thread was set up in the B plot of Fugitive of the Judoon, and was also just a REALLY good historical episode. the costumes were lush and the ghost story-esque atmosphere... loved it. also DEFINITELY think it was no coincidence that this episode brought in the Frankenstein theme with Mary Shelley being inspired to write the novel through her encounter with Ashad. like. considering this episode is the prelude to a finale where we find out that *the Doctor* is kind of a Frankenstein’s monster figure............ once again this era continues to give me EVERYTHING with the way it sets up themes and parallels and is constantly comparing and contrasting with every single storyline feeding into its thesis statement in one way or another. this era gives me So Much

and like this is without even going into the acting bc like AGAIN!! idk how people say the acting is bad in this era bc like. really Felt 13′s panic when she realised the cyberman was there and her desperation to keep the fam out of it. very very interesting to me how this era keeps emotional threads from the series that immediately preceded it running without actually explicitly saying that’s what it’s doing. its a very cool way of not making newbies to the series feel like they’re locked out. you don’t need to know WHY 13 is acting that way you just need to see her utter panic. love it. ALSO love how much this episode went more of a ways to completely tearing off the mask 13 has been trying so hard to keep on. the thematic thread running from “i’m fighting time itself and i’m gonna win” in waters of mars to “can’t i just lose for once” in heaven sent to “winning? is that what you think this is about?” in the doctor falls to “sometimes even i can’t win” in villa of diodati. idk where im going with this but i am Many Thoughts Head Full about it. Thirteen giving up the cyberium to Ashad because she lost her bottle at the last minute and didn’t dare call his bluff on his threat to destroy the timestream and cause a huge paradox that would end the world in 1816??? lord. i Felt that

and then!! boy!! ascension of the cybermen! i was SO stressed watching this episode!! at some point i kind of want to go into comparing and contrasting this episode with the doctor falls bc like......... one of the biggest parts of that episode was the idea that the cybermen were invading the farmstead level of the colony ship and that this was a big Thing and that the Doctor had no chance at defending it properly but i did not feel NEARLY so stressed or so invested in that plot thread as i did during ascension of the cybermen when the Fam and the last few scattered humans of the week were having to flee for their lives and hide and escape from an enemy that could do NOTHING but overwhelm them. the Fam choosing to stand by 13 at the end of villa diodati then followed by NONE of their preparations working. “i’ve been so reckless with you” even though 13 was FAR less reckless with the fam than 12 ever was with his companions, and the subsequent way that 13 was SO short and snapping left and right at everyone during the rest of this episode???? amazing. stunning. love this character work. also once again i’m in love so much with the Fam and how often they have to rely on each other and figure their way out of a problem without the Doctor in this era (and how often they manage to DO it!!!!! 13′s era is TRULY the era where companions get to shine on their own two feet and i ADORE it. positively shaped by their TARDIS experience into wiser and better versions of themselves. Graham and Yaz were so, SO good during this episode.) Ryan was ALSO really good, i like how him getting stuck with 13 meant that he’s the one out of the fam that got to see the mask FULLY off for the first time. i can only imagine what was going thru his head when he realised she was building a fucking bomb to throw at the cybermen to allow their escape. i also have SO many thoughts about how Ryan, the one of the Fam who has been shown to be most concerned with the idea of his own home planet coming to harm and him not being there to protect it, is the only one of the Fam who is there standing next to 13 when the boundary opens to reveal Gallifrey on the other side like.............. god. if any of the Fam were going to see that and suddenly Understand Everything it would be Ryan. this is SUCH strong writing

also i love how Ko Sharmus seemed like a huge shout out to Obi Wan Kenobi in the OG star wars trilogy. old man, near the last of his kind, a veteran of a war, living by himself in the space sticks. BIG Obi Wan vibes. also i can only imagine how it felt to be watching this thing live without the context for the Brendan segments that you get in the following episode. imagine watching this tense cyberman action and having it constantly intercut with this random story abt a foundling child in Ireland without knowing the context that this is the Master projecting his human au RPF fanfic of what he found in the Matrix directly into the Doctor’s mind

i’ve got most of my thoughts about the Timeless Children out of my system in my tag rambles so mercifully for all of you i am sparing you me once again going deranged abt thoschei on main but like..... gosh. gosh. that episode was a Lot. i’ve seen some Wild criticisms over it and now that i’ve seen all of s11 and s12 and the episode itself i gotta say i agree with exactly none of them??? the idea that this is some kind of Chosen One narrative? false. absolutely not. tecteun and the time lords got what they wanted out of this kid and then threw them away. the Doctor isn’t the Doctor because they’re the Timeless Child, they’re the Doctor because of the CHOICES they made after meeting Ian and Barbara, like............... this backstory has no bearing on the person they shaped themself into and that’s the POINT. these people really looked at the Master (who like. is a villain. i love them but they are very much a villain and we’re not supposed to agree with them) saying “you always acted like you were SPECIAL and you WERE” and they decided “huh yeah this sounds legit!”. like. idk how to explain to you that that is the Opposite of the point. this isn’t a chosen one narrative it’s a horror story of medical abuse and child exploitation LMAO. uh what other ice cold takes have i seen. OH yeah the idea that this somehow diminishes or disrespects the show’s history somehow like.............. for starters, Bold of you to assume that a show like Doctor Who has ANYTHING resembling canon, for another, this show has been introducing new concepts and shaking up canon throughout its whole history, you could argue that it’s entirely built on change. and tbh, hats off to Chibnall for having the guts to ACTUALLY shake up the show, unlike some showrunners i could think of but will not name. honestly in MANY ways the Timeless Child arc is actually a much better take on aspects of the Cartmel Master Plan and that’s been kicking around since the 80s. i’m not even going to touch the people i’ve seen saying that the plot would have worked better if it was the Master who was the Child. like. you seriously think being the blueprint of Time Lord society wouldn’t have made him utterly INSUFFERABLE?? if the point is that our choices are what makes us (“choosing who we want to be next”) then it makes zero narrative sense for the Master, who DOES put stock into the idea that it’s What You Are that matters and not What You Choose, to be the Child. imagine going through life being this unable to grasp a narrative. i think the only other ice cold take i saw was one that claimed this was a case of “backstory over character” and i’m like........ actually it’s really not because you can SEE how this knowledge completely shakes Thirteen and also, this is the series finale..... we’re obviously not going to see HOW MUCH it’s affected her and her sense of her own identity and how it’s going to shape her going forward until the next series. its only a case of backstory over character if it doesn’t affect the character LMAO... (like, again, i already know that Revolution and Flux revolve around this as their big emotional arc for 13, but just. imagine thinking that this is just never going to be visited again or that this isn’t going to somehow affect the protagonist somehow. i know you’re used to Certain Other Showrunners’ ways of doing things but COME ON)

ANYWAY I’M BORED OF TALKING ABOUT THAT but like. yeah. so much in the Timeless Children really Hit Different. i love how it recontextualises SO much of the show and its history, that’s really fun and it opens up SO many new narrative pathways to be explored. compare and contrast the Name of the Doctor myth arc which had precisely zero payoff lmao. and i really like, again, how it feels so much like every theme and narrative thread laid down by the era so far was leading to this reveal somehow. i like how it makes every time the Doctor has ever wiped someone’s memory SO much harsher in hindsight, i like how it brings in the idea of the Other from the Expanded Universe and divides that concept between Tecteun and the Doctor/the Timeless Child in a way that fits entirely with what we know of the Time Lords as a society, if i think too long about the questions this episode raises about identity and imperialism/colonialism i will actually lose my mind. and like, obviously i was kind of living for all the Master content in this episode and the approximately 10 different layers he was working on at any given time, this was excellent content for me, specifically. love how the big reveal in this episode and the way it’s been brewing for 2 series now feels like a big “okay, and NOW what happens? how does this affect the Doctor’s perception of who she is, truly??” like. sure she breaks herself out of the Matrix by literally giving herself a pep talk of “have you ever let who you’ve been before limit yourself”, and she puts on an excellent brave face for the master with her speech about how he hasn’t broken her and has actually given her a gift of herself, how she contains multitudes and she is SO much more than him, but like................. she’s pretty obviously deeply shaken over what he showed her and what she DOES about what she’s found out and how this is gonna affect this Doctor who realised who she was in her post-regeneration episode with a rallying cry of “we can honour who we’ve been and choose who we want to be next” but who has also been running AWAY from her past for so much of her tenure is....... yeah. god. EXCITING. i mean she’s stuck in space jail now as of the end of this episode so i am sure that is going to have a FANTASTIC effect on her mental state and her ability to deal with finding out part of the truth about herself

i also have about fifty different metas brewing in my head, including one about all the reasons that it makes sense and is more narratively satisfying/interesting that dhawan!master is after missy because i still can’t believe people argue that it’s the other way around, one about how Demons of the Punjab and The Timeless Children share some really similar beats, and one about how the difference between Moffat and Chibnall as showrunners is that Chibs isn’t scared of consequences and follow-through, but this post is already WAY too long so i will end by saying. Series 12 Good