The Bycantium Paradox

'Is Moffat rewriting River's Spoilers? Or is that just part of the Big Plan?'

With River Song's really wibbely wobbely timelne it's really remarkable that there has been, to my knowledge, only one paradox regarding her character up to now. Namely, when she meets the Tenth Doctor in 'Silence of the Library' she appears to think that it was him with whom she was investigating the Crash of Byzantium*. But we know better than that. So why doesn't she ?

Certainly, there are several sensible and even more less sensible explanations for this, however one of the more reasonable reasons go back to the famous 'The Waters of Mars' fixed-point domino-effect, which altered the universe's and the Doctor's timeline.** Obviously, it wasn't the Eleventh Doctor who should have shown up in the 'Delirium Archive', the final resting place of the headless monks. But we also understand that between 'The Waters of Mars' and 'The End of Time' the Doctor wasn't visiting as many museums as he apparently was supposed to. So back then in the Library things (or time) seem to have been more straight froward for River.

But is that the only time she meets him then? Probably. At least up to our *recent* knowledge that's how it appears to be. Surely, the Doctor would have mentioned a certain 'Picnic at Asgards' when telling the Ood what he was all up to before visiting them. Come on, he even told them about having tinkered with the TARDIS' locking circuit. Additionally, the Doctor doesn't seem to have learnt much more about River since his very first encounter.
Moreover, that domino-effect could have also effected River's timeline through what certain events don't take place exactly as they should have. I'm not saying she won't find herself sacrificing her life in the Library. But the Doctor, River and we know that Time can be rewritten... and it wouldn't surprise me if Moffat did take advantage of this, at least a little bit e.g. for sorting a few paradoxes out...

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*In a DWM(#147) interview Moffat says that when filming his Library episode in 2oo8 he knew that it won't be David Tennant's Doctor whom he'll be writing for during his time as executive producer. And Doctor Who has already dealt with bigger last minute changes than dropping one part of a line.

**Although personally 'The Waters of Mars' does not belong to my most favourite episodes, every single future Doctor Who script writer is going to be thankful for Russel T Davies allowing them to take the parts RTD contributed to that serials canon less seriously.

Shattered Dreams...

Sadly, yesterday neither Sherlock nor Doctor Who could stand their ground at the National Television Awards (NTA), which is for the latter one the first time since it has been brought back to life. If you feel like torturing yourself, these YouTube videos show how they are NOT getting the awards. (Best Drama, Best Drama Performance).

And the winning parties forgot to thank Sherlock and Doctor Who being nominated in the same categories, which was the main cause for Waterloo Road (never heard of it) and ... erm who? - David Jason getting any awards in the first place.

Because, the obvious reason for this is that both shows have more or less the same fan-base, and as the two of them were put up against each other in the same categories, fans had to make up their minds what to vote for. And because of the split votes both failed... Well, I wouldn't say failed for Doctor Who is still one of the Beeb's most important series, and Sherlock is on the best way to get there, nevertheless, we are not pleased. I mean, back in 2oo5 the show could scope three awards, and I think since then Doctor Who has improved a lot.

Let's hope next year we'll have learnt something of this, because with Sherlock's new season it's more than just very likely that two of our most favourite serials will be nominated against each other again.

'Doctor Who' goes Shakespeare...

... at least sort of.
Actually, this one will be more about Shakespeare than 'Doctor Who', however, maybe there are still a few fans out there who are interested into this BBC interview with Catherine Tate and David Tennant which is mostly about their new 'Much Ado about Nothing' Shakespeare project. But naturally, there are also several remarks about 'Doctor Who' and other 'stuff' they used to work on together. So it ends up to be at least some sort of interesting also for a few fans of that TV show this blog is mostly dedicated to.

And I really hope someone will come up with the idea of adapting that Shakespeare production for film, just as they did that with Hamlet a few years ago. Don't panic, I'm not going to make a Hamlet review out of this post, but to sum it up, saying it's a great one would be some sort of an understatement, even if a few conservative teachers and professors might disagree with me about that.

Anyway, I'm looking forward to reading the first reviews of that 'Much Ado about Nothing stage production. The two of them seem to be enthusiastic enough to turn it into something well worth seeing.

PS: I just couldn't help noticing David Tennant's familiar 'old trainers - suit' combination...

EDIT: Thanks to DoctorWhoDom we are able to watch the complete version of the interview on YouTube. And credits go to Combom for pointng this out.

Halfway Out of the Dark...

Actually, the key-line was 'Don't make my mistakes.' But you can't have that as a title. Or something between that and 'How did boredom even get invented?' (well, I guess not being in the possession of a TARDIS comes quite handy to do this).

Anyway. These 6o minutes has to prove the biggest Moffat critics that there is a reason for that guy having that job. Come on, just compare what RTD used to give us around this time of year... and he even got away with it.

But first things first, here are a few other reviews by The Guardian, SFX and The Telegraph. And after writing this 'review' (if it's one) someone should check whether Lawrence Miles is all right.

So, comparing 'A Christmas Carol' to any other Christmas episode we had so far, the biggest difference was the plot. This year, it wasn't about the end of the universe, planet earth or London, but about 4oo3 people trapped in a crashing space-ship and Kazran being the only one being able to save them. The problem is, he doesn't feel like it. But the Doctor wouldn't be the Doctor if he didn't try to do something about this, a la good old Charles Dickens. Still, after testing a chimney's general chimney-ness (another unforgettable entrance of the 11th Doctor), being let down by the psychic paper which refuses to refer to the Doctor as a 'mature and responsible adult', almost comparing himself to Mary Poppins, breaking a sonic-screwdriver (again!), rescuing and taming a flying shark, making a match between Kazran and Abigail, proving to be bad with card-tricks, and not to forget about marrying Marilyn Monroe, the Doctor finally manages to save the day. And the outcome is one of Moffat's other 'must-sees'.

Maybe its biggest plus point is that the audience doesn't need to be a Whovian to understand what is going on (*cough* not like last year *cough*) but luckily, Moffat didn't forget about us while writing it. I guess, the Doctor appearing in a fez and a Tom Baker scarf are among other things those bits which are exclusively aimed at us. So are Amy and Rory's 'costumes'... Furthermore, there are a few great one-liners and almost even more lovable situations the Doctor get himself into. I just loved the 'Kazran, it's this or go to your room and design a new kind of screwdriver. Don't make my mistakes.'-bit or his instruction to young Kazran about how to kiss Abigail 'Try and be all nervous and rubbish and a bit shaky... Make it part of the plan!'

My biggest fear was that Moffat's adaptation of Dicken's story might turn out to be some sort of a Christmassy musical, especially after a few teasers saying that Katherine Jenkins, who did a great job BTW, is singing two times within 6o minutes. But really everything was just on spot. I mean even the fact of Kazran not letting Abigail out of her ice-y coffin for Christmas in the beginning makes sense in the end. Or that the machine doesn't react to Kazran as the Doctor changed him too much, or how Kazran finally releases Abigail because of his younger self. Besides, when Kazran decides to do that after all, and she finally comes out of her 'ice-box', that was one of those rare Doctor Who-moments that I had some sort of a tear in my eyes.*

Oh, and before I forget it. Fans seem to be a bit in two minds about the Doctor saving or not saving Abigail. In my humble opinion I think he did save her. Because, although that is not exactly what he says to Amy in the closing scene, he still acts a bit fibishly (and I know that's not a proper word). As if he didn't want to tell her something for being afraid of revealing one of his habits. I mean, saving her wouldn't have been a requirement for saving those 4oo3 people on that space-ship. Additionally, the following 'Halfway out of the dark.' sounds way too optimistic... almost as if it was a reference to Kazran's own life.

EDIT: And yes, I know what official sources say. But think about it. If Kazran lost his love on that day it wouldn't be 'Half way out of the dark' for him and Kazran is the only one to whom the Doctor can refer to. Additionally, Moffat is certainly not keen on spoiling his xmas episode by not giving it a 'proper' ending.
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*The other time was, when Wilf said good bye to the Doctor in Journey's End - 'But every night, Doctor, when it gets dark, and the stars come out, I'll look up on her behalf. I'll look up at the sky, and think of you.' that was the tear-jerker.

A Christmas Carol's Paradoxes

or 'Things would be much easier if script writers were aware of a *small* set of rules' but who cares...

I don't remember another episode dealing with more paradoxes than 'A Christmas Carol'. Starting with the Doctor altering Kazran's time-line to Kazran hugging his younger self in the end - and surprisingly it doesn't mean the end of the world. There aren't any Reapers (we might now from 'Father's Day') and this time it also doesn't lead to the Doctor receiving doomsday-like messages from Oods or any other aliens. So what did we miss?

Although it has to be said that I think it's not us missing something but quite the opposite. Still, I suggest to keep the good old 'fans are going to sort that out somehow'-tradition up and to start with a few 'explanations'.

The most obvious and handy reason why this time the Doctor didn't need to care about the famous 'Laws of Time' was that in the 'Big Bang' two-parter the universe was whipped out and re-installed from Amy's memories. And maybe the Reapers some sort of didn't make it. Or that their non-appearance has something to do with the mysterious 'Silence'.

However, going into further detail, those lovely creatures also didn't appear in 'The Waters of Mars'. And here I have to mention the definition of a paradox, which is something along two points in time which aren't supposed to meet. Right? And fixpoints are certain events which aren't supposed to change, as seen in 'Fires of Pompeii' and 'Waters of Mars'. So, applying this knowledge, obviously Kazran's life was not exactly a fixed point in history. That's why the Doctor had some fun instead of feeling guilty while altering it.

But there is still the question why old Kazran could touch is younger self without any consequences. Well, going back to 'Waters of Mars' we know that by saving Adelaide Brooke the Doctor started off something terrifying which haven't appeared yet. Everything what happened in 'End of Time' was caused by the Master, except for the Ood's magically fast development of the ability of time travel and prophesying. Now, that could have been a result of the Doctor changing Adelaide's time-line. And this whole thing might be a hint to time having some sort of a problem in general which has to be sorted out, maybe by the Reapers. And that issue is keeping them busy for a while, or at least it appears to be a bit more important than the whole Kazran stuff. They seem to be busy saving time as we know it first, to have the time to deal with that nasty young-Kazran-thouching-old-Kazran incident. And it seems that they won't make it out of that important time-saving-job alive. So, to cut it short, whatever happened in 'Waters of Mars' may have made the Reapers cease to exist in general.

Or is it that the Reapers are just really afraid of (flying) sharks?

Just one of Those Coincidences

Good old Disney tries to get more Doctor Who into our every day-lives.
Do you know the opening line of its (Disney's) latest ... erm, masterpiece? 'Tangled'?

It's: 'This is the story of how I died...'

What happened to good old 'Once upon a time'? Old fashioned? Maybe... So 'borrowing' the opening words of the most over-rated Doctor Who finale (I dare to put an optimistic 'ever' after this) seem to be more up to date.

Still, I don't think RTD is going to write them a letter...

It’s called 'A Christmas Carol '- is - 'A Christmas Carol'

In this interview published by The New York Times Steven Moffat talks about a few things we've all been worrying or, if not worrying at least wondering about. Starting with the Doctor mysteriously marrying Marilyn Monroe, or how he managed to write his first Christmas special in mid-April, up to whether Moffat is planning to do a Doctor Who-Sherlock cross-over, or not.

Well, I suppose you read it yourself...

On Reading Moffat's Continuiy Errors

In the very unlikely case that you aren't sure what I'm talking about, there are a few rumours that Moffat's very first Doctor Who Xmas special might have something in common with a story ('Continuity Errors') he once wrote featuring the 7th Doctor and the biggest library of the universe having every single book ever known, at least up to 2668. (So, strictly speaking, the events took place long before Moffat's 'Silence in the Library' 2-parter.)You can give it a read-through here. And believe me, it's worth it.

To sum it up, it's about the Doctor manipulating a librarian's past to get hold of a 'restricted' book. And oddly enough, reading the story now is some sort of a continuity error in its own. From the very beginning you think you know what is going to happen, for example we know that and how the Doctor will answer Gwen's question, without the question actually being part of Andrea's first 'memory-draft'. But we just know these things from Moffat's episodes, from - I don't know how to put it -  it's like reading a deja-vu. It's as if we were knowing the hard facts before them taking place but without being familiar of the details. Or vice versa. And that's what keeps us interested into the story this such.

And it's not entirely impossible that the Doctor might end up doing something different this Christmas, manipulating Mr Scrooge's life... Well, I'm pretty sure that there won't be this 'deja-vu feeling' about it, but I'm afraid, it will be only after having watched 'A Christmas Carol' that we'll know for sure.

Just for the Record...

Today Doctor Who, you know, very likely the best TV serial on this tiny blue planet, is having its 47th anniversary. But as this is the first official Doctor Who Day, there aren't any established 'rituals' yet. So we have the freedom of being creative, and freedom is, as facts prove, one of the biggest enemy of creativity in the first place. But let's ignore that side-mark.

Wish you a happy Doctor Who Day then.

Children In Need - A Christmas Carol

Here is the link.
Don't be disappointed, it is only a trailer and not the opening minutes as I at least was hoping for. But it is nevertheless a very promising one, however, there isn't much to speculate about, at least not yet.

So, what did we get then?

We are already told that 'A Christmas Carol' is not set on earth, for what we can assume that, let's call him Mr Scrooge, is an alien who is not too fond of Christmas, which is, we remember, a very human feast and quite popular on earth but even there not everyone is happily celebrating it. Furthermore, he doesn't seem to agree about the Doctor's 'Time can be rewritten' theory. I guess it is not wrong to suppose that's why the Doctor gives him a visit, and I hope Moffat has a very sensible reason why the Doctor uses the chimney to do so. Oh, this might be just after the scene where we see him standing on the roof looking through a giant window at something that might be Mr Scrooge's home...

Additionally, that blond woman the boy (young Mr Scrooge?) is staring at in the beginning might be dead, or something similar to it, and it's not too hard to guess that somehow he is connected to her past. Just as the girl, the one saying one of the Doctor's most favourite lines. And it wouldn't surprise me if somehow Mr Scrooge were also connected to those spooky white corridors which don't seem to exist for much good.

Besides, Amy and Rory appear to end up in some trouble. I hope they won't need the Doctor's help too much, because we also know in this episode they won't spend a lot of time with him.

So, for the next month the Whoniverse has something to look forward to.

About Moffat's And A Certain Blue Box's Secrets...

This Steven Moffat interview by NYMag just made my day, at least some sort of.

First, ignore its title, I couldn't find a single line referring to Sherlock, or is this just me?

The interview as such starts with Moffat answering a few questions about the Doctor's love-life, and yes, thanks for mentioning him having a grand-daughter. But what about Liz, pardon, Queen Elizabeth I?

Then they are addressing Moffat's soft spot regarding killing main-characters and the famous 'Flesh And Stone' 'continuity error' which, as it has to be added, many suspected as part of the story even back then, because it was actually crying to get some attention. Come on, you let the Doctor wandering around in a tweet jacket he had lost just a few minutes ago AND then you also gave him a different watch, so you really shouldn't have expected us not to notice that you wanteed us to notice something going on.

The final part is about the bad, bad internet. We shouldn't forget about Moffat having a twitter account to which he seems to be at least some sort of devoted*. Oh, and people writing blogs do have a life, dates and relationships and all this kind of stuff, it's only that they also happen to have a hobby. But hold on a second – there is an entire blog dedicated to Matt Smith's hair? Really? That's new to me, but then again I also didn't know that River was polarising Doctor Who fans. Gwynne Watkins might simply not know the right sites.

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* EDIT: at least Moffat shows here that he is also aware of this small paradox...

A Mad Man with a Box...

This is a Matt Smith interview by The Telegraph about how Doctor Who has changed his life, how he has been dealing with its fandom and there is also a paragraph mentioning the old 'How Did Matt Smith End Up As An Actor' story, which might be already familiar to more than just the vast majority of the people who are going to read that article.

A bit of a downer is how Matt Smith refers to the name of his character, or is this just The Telegraph quoting him in a wrong way? It is still, just as for the last 47 years, 'the Doctor' and not 'Doctor Who', latter one is the name of the show. Oh, and is it worth mentioning the whole TARDIS vs Tardis stuff?
Probably not.

However, apart from these points in my humble opinion it manages to be a surprisingly entertaining interview. Matt Smith has certainly the right idea of presenting his role. Thanks for that.

Furthermore, he also talks about why this show is still so immensely popular (yep, it does have 'the best ever TV drama format'). And I hope when saying 'everything is possible' he does not include to forget about a certain set of rules which would really appreciate if someone would actually care about them. That's rather Steven Moffat's job, though.

And finally we have to agree uncompromisingly to the last statement, we’ll never tire of watching the Doctor saving the day again and again, at least not as long as someone screws things up really badly.

You make All Of Space & Time Your Backyard...

... and what do you have? A back yard.

If you haven't come across two extraordinarily nice scenes which haven't made it into the actual episodes (and yes, I AM talking about Doctor Who) then these links might be quite interesting to you:
this one took place between The Eleventh Hour and The Beast Below and this one was intended to be between Flesh and Stone and Vampires in Venice.

They are quite adorable, but if you are actually waiting for your box-set to arrive, don't blame me for serving you surely one of its biggest highlights. So, it's your choice.

Oh, and BTW, there is a tiny chance that you might find the second one quite entertaining. Well, some of it is just stupid, nevertheless, in my humble opinion it's a pity that it's not in the actual episode. Because I think it's quite revealing, come on, the Doctor tells Amy why he likes to have a companion on board of the TARDIS. Additional it's hard not to love the tiny Donna reference 'No, forget mates...' At least it makes more sense to me than Flesh And Stone's actual last minutes.

Every Doctor, Every Me...

That was actually good, or is it only the nostalgia coming through?

It wasn't a surprise that part 2 of The Death of the Doctor (link) was better than part 1 because that's where the actual story took place, just like in last year's The Wedding of Sarah Jane. Basically, it even had the same structure, with the Doctor doing a lot of dashing between two places and running as about a year ago.

Nevertheless, this time it was different, in a brilliant way. For if there is one thing RTD is good at, then it's reuniting companions. Sure, there was a bit of a lot hugging and and all that stuff going on, but I suppose that's just the way people are.

I'm glad that this time RTD even addressed the 'why didn't you come back' question, which is not the easiest one to answer, I guess. But RTD handled it in one of the best ways possible. We some sort of suspected Ten going back to each of his former 'companions' before regenerating, and RTD just told us what we wanted to hear. I think also the line 'I don't look back, because I can't...' didn't take many of us by surprise (although we may want to attach an 'Explanation Needed' sign to it.)

Still, there were at least two things fans won't be too found of. First, how that Memory Wave device could have worked in the first place, because even New-Who fans might know that the Doctor uses to change the TARDIS key here and then. So Jo and Sarah Jane weren't exactly remembering the same key. Additionally, why didn't the Doctor just snap his fingers for opening the TARDIS to save them? We know that he knows that he can do that...

The second thing was RTD's attempt of rewriting the good old regeneration rule. In my humble opinion RTD didn't rewrote any sort of canon, because the Doctor was obviously lying. It isn't the first time that he would do that when confronted with a let's call it rather unpleasant question. He just didn't want them to worry about him too much. Besides, he also didn't told Jo about Gallifrey not existing anymore.*

However, all in all, this turned out to be a surprisingly enjoyable episode. Sure, we have to take in account that The Sarah Jane Adventures isn't only officially made for children. It actually IS made for them.
And RTD, thanks for the Doctor not taking himself too seriously. 'Cos between you and me, if that day ever comes, I think the whole universe might just shiver.' is the perfect amount of drama all of his episodes should have.

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* EDIT: By the way, Russel T Davies himself encourages us in this SFX interview not to take that '5o7 statement' too seriously.

The Wait Is Over...

How do you write a proper introduction to a post about a 26 minutes long episode which's main purpose was to introduce its next part?

So, with The Death of the Doctor (link) we had again a very long intro to about 6 interesting minutes just as last year... and I guess they could have solved this a bit differently. Furthermore, actually I'm not too comfortable about the Doctor insulting his former companions for, well, ageing, despite Jo was not exactly nice to him either. Then again this wasn't the first time Eleven has insulted someone... poor Rory.

Furthermore, this episode might be the reason why children will be afraid of big soft-toys in the future. Loved Jo's reaction to those 'Giant Vouchers', though.

And yes, it's undeniable that RTD delivered us a cliffhanger, the part of which The Sarah Jane Adventures has become quite famous for. But in my humble opinion this wasn't exactly RTD's greatest one, it seemed to be a bit forced to me. Basically he just cut a scene into two parts, and I'm sure he could have done better than that...

Nevertheless, after there hasn't been any Doctor Who-ish episode on for about 6 month I think I've been missing it too much to be critical. So, I'm really looking forward to part two. And I'll keep my fingers crossed for RTD explaining that somewhat *cough* ridiculous *cough* 'very complicated biological swap' properly. Additionally I may not be the only one looking forward to Jo and Sarah Jane firing questions at the Doctor.