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Does Moffat reuse his old ideas too much?
Corwin
Posts: 16,646 Forum Member
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I know It's not just Moffat reusing previous stories/ideas in the show but I had not realised he'd done it to the extent he has.
Blink of course was based on a short story featuring Sally Sparrow.
Elements from The Curse of Fatal Death made it into Series 5.
But his short story "Continuity Errors" (pdf of it here) which I've only just read seems to be a source of a lot of stuff.
The plot of the story features the Doctor
The story is set in the largest Library in the known Universe which covers most of a planet and has copies of every known book.
It even features the diary of a time travelling archeologist.
It also has the line "What to Monsters have Nightmares of? Me" later used in GitFP.
Finally a possible future reuse, the Doctor is described as "a good man, a hero in fact". Sounds rather like the description of the person River Song kills doesn't it?
Blink of course was based on a short story featuring Sally Sparrow.
Elements from The Curse of Fatal Death made it into Series 5.
But his short story "Continuity Errors" (pdf of it here) which I've only just read seems to be a source of a lot of stuff.
The plot of the story features the Doctor
travelling back in time and rewritting the personal history of a particular person in order to get them to do something they refuse to do in the present.
Sound familiar? The story is set in the largest Library in the known Universe which covers most of a planet and has copies of every known book.
It even features the diary of a time travelling archeologist.
It also has the line "What to Monsters have Nightmares of? Me" later used in GitFP.
Finally a possible future reuse, the Doctor is described as "a good man, a hero in fact". Sounds rather like the description of the person River Song kills doesn't it?
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Uh, no, primarily because the sources you list here aren't TV episodes and aren't exactly held up as shining moments that the whole fanbase knows of. An awful lot of the best of New Who has, in some way, been based or influenced by work in other media and the VAST majority of the audience is totally unaware of that work so why not? Besides, good ideas are good ideas, providing the story works it doesn't matter.
No he doesn't.
Oh yes, he does!!!
Sorry, couldn't resist
Haha!
No, continuity errors is the title of a short story by the moff
which is available in pdf
Ahh, now it makes sense now..... Nothing to see here, everyone can move on now lol
Has he written other short stories and if so where could I find them?
This is the orginal Sally Sparrow story if you haven't read it.
As far as I know he hasn't written any other short stories, though I wasn't even aware of Continuity Errors till yesterday.
Quite. Even Douglas Adams wasn't above doing it on occasion.
I don't think Moffy has that many.
Just rewatching Series 5 and Father Octavian describes the man River Song killed "A good man, a hero to many".
IMO she is going to kill an important figure in American history in the U.S.-set 2-parter that opens series 6. A 'hero to many'...
It could be Rory because of the Roman stuff but IIRC no-one remembers that happening.
- "If [such and such] isn't performing the relevant act then how come we can hear it?"
- no, that person is dead, you can hear their voice over the radio for other reasons
- I'm the Doctor, here to be your occasional friend from childhood
And if he continues allowing the Doctor to hop back and forth within the same narrative without consequence then he's going to eliminate even those wafer-thin shards of peril that remain since the sonic screwdriver became capable of absolutely everything.Of course, all complaints are relative.
OMG she assassinates Lincoln?
So it wasn't just me then? I know there's that whole 'fixed point in time' thing, but the distinction is based on the Doctor's intuition (supposedly) and is thus somewhat arbitrary. At the moment 'fixed point' just seems like an excuse for when time travel would be too simple a solution.
Not to fussed about plot element reuse, there've been loads of episodes and so naturally bits are recycled. 'Eleventh Hour' felt like a cross between 'Girl in the Fireplace' and 'Smith and Jones' but had such awesome quotes and scenes that I was still thrilled when I watched it.
Maybe she kills JFK in Dallas November 22nd 1963.
I may just have heard the noise of nail striking head. We shall see.