For me, the use of time travel in a plot, and, essentially "plucking the answer out of thin air" by, for example, going back in time and rescuing yourself, or telling your earlier self how to escape, is not a trick.
It's simply one of the logical, possible consequences if you allow that time travel itself is possible.
All fine and dandy for a one-off story, but if used in a continuing TV series there are problems, as it's always a "get out of jail free" card that could be used to resolve any tricky situation. The question then becomes, if the Doctor was able to use that to escape the Pandorica, why doesn't he just go back and rescue Adric just before the ship crashes into Earth?
It's too powerful a plot device to be used regularly, and yet here we have a show based around a time travelling protagonist and associates.
This effect was used to humorous effect in The Curse of the Fatal Death, CIN Special. Each time the Master had prepared a trap, the Doctor had already been back in time and prepared a counter measure, to which the Master had done the same and prepared a counter counter measure.... and so on.
It's the same problem as the over use of the sonic screwdriver, who's abilities miraculously rise to fit the requirements of this week's plot.
It's the same problem with the transporter in Star Trek. The writers had to keep coming up with explanations as to why the landing party or away team couldn't just beam up out of any danger.
So that's why in DW, history can be re-written, except when the plot demands that it can't. The Doctor can't cross his own timeline, except when he can.
As Terry Pratchett commented about DW it's "makeitupasyougoalongium".
The question then becomes, if the Doctor was able to use that to escape the Pandorica, why doesn't he just go back and rescue Adric just before the ship crashes into Earth?.
Just realised I haven't actually commented on the episode. I voted excellent again. I just thoroughly enjoyed myself from start to finish. The Doctor was likeable, Clara was fun, the monsters were scary and remorseless, the mystery was intriguing and clever and the cliffhanger was brilliant
Somebody commented earlier that the thread was a bit quiet and wondered whether this was indicative of a decline but I think the busy threads are the ones where the episode is confusing or controversial or full of plot holes or things people want to rush on here to vent about.
This one, I though, had very little of that, it was just a really solid and enjoyable bit of Doctor Who so there's not really a huge incentive to want to jump into the thread and post anything!
I thoroughly enjoyed it too. I think some people over-analyse everything rather than just enjoying it for what it is, even if it's hokum a lot of the time. It's fun hokum
It's the same problem with the transporter in Star Trek. The writers had to keep coming up with explanations as to why the landing party or away team couldn't just beam up out of any danger.
And why it seem to curse any crew member with bad luck but Kirk, Spock, McCoy, Scott or Uhuru or Chekhov.
The thing about Capaldi's Doctor, though, is that he spent some 600 years, or whatever it was, stuck in one place in a state of perpetual warfare. That he even remembers anything about Earth or Clara or the social niceties at all is quite a feat!
They made quite a thing about 11 having few accepted 'normal' social skills well before that so you can't really say it's a result of Trenzalore. However all the others seemed fine with humans and it does jar that 12 is portrayed as quite so inept.
They made quite a thing about 11 having few accepted 'normal' social skills well before that so you can't really say it's a result of Trenzalore. However all the others seemed fine with humans and it does jar that 12 is portrayed as quite so inept.
In this episode we were told that the Doctor had deleted the knowledge of Sign language from his memory.
There was meant to be a similar line in The Lodger where we would have been told that he had deleted 20th/21st century social customs from his memory.
The line however was cut so 11 just became more socially awkward than in previous incarnations without any explanation.
good episode, not up to the previous two, the ghosts were very creepy though, a real underwater menace ;-). did not realise it would be a two parter, the ending certainly surprised me
In this episode we were told that the Doctor had deleted the knowledge of Sign language from his memory.
There was meant to be a similar line in The Lodger where we would have been told that he had deleted 20th/21st century social customs from his memory.
The line however was cut so 11 just became more socially awkward than in previous incarnations without any explanation.
That's very interesting, and explains a lot about the Doctor's very bizarre behaviour in that episode which was way out from his previous characters! Thanks.
Not quite sure why he would delete his knowledge of our social customs, or his knowledge of sign language though! Presumably he deleted his ability to lip read too, which I can't believe that he wouldn't have had along with all his other abilities!
For me, the use of time travel in a plot, and, essentially "plucking the answer out of thin air" by, for example, going back in time and rescuing yourself, or telling your earlier self how to escape, is not a trick.
It's simply one of the logical, possible consequences if you allow that time travel itself is possible.
...
So that's why in DW, history can be re-written, except when the plot demands that it can't. The Doctor can't cross his own timeline, except when he can.
As Terry Pratchett commented about DW it's "makeitupasyougoalongium".
Apologies for shortening your post, but I do agree with it all.
I personally think my "head-canon" as it were, considers the only rule of a time travel resolution in Doctor Who to be an in-universe last resort - in other words it's the active direction the writer chose for his/her story to take, but for The Doctor as a character it's the only direction and he is forced to take it...except for cheap tricks (see Smith and Jones) or minor paradoxes (see New Earth).
In Under the Lake, the Doctor could have gone back in time at any point... to see when the ghosts were first present, to see what happened when the crew first arrived, to watch the base being constructed. He could always have done this, but never chooses to. He only does it when all other options, and hopes of a linear resolution are lost.
There's plenty of other examples. The Doctor realises relatively quickly that Kazran Sardick is the kind of man who simply cannot be reasoned with in A Christmas Carol, and the isomorphic controls he has means the Doctor can't opt for a more forceful approach to saving the spacecraft - so he plays the time travel card as a 'last resort'.
The Doctor travels back in time to give the Sonic Screwdriver to Rory in The Big Bang, which gives his past-self the means to get out of the Pandorica and eventually give Rory the Sonic Screwdriver. This is the time travel card played to its absolute limit.
The question then is why doesn't the Doctor just always cut to the chase and use time travel to fix all of his problems? For a 'last resort' it's never let him down before - its track record as a means of success is a perfect one, so why not just employ it all the time. In Father's Day, the Doctor exclaims to Rose that he knows what he's doing whereas she doesn't in regards to altering the past. The whole point of the story is about just how dangerous time travel can be and the consequences it can have.
That doesn't go ignored in the stories where The Doctor uses it heavily, and A Christmas Carol deals with those consequences - The Doctor proclaims how stupid he is for using time travel to change Kazran into a better man, not considering that this then alters the isomorphic controls as well which Kazran now no longer inherited access to. The Doctor's complacency means that Abigail is the only solution, and she (admittedly willingly) begins her last day saving everyone.
The Doctor generally does know what he's doing though, and understands how much leeway you can have in regards to changing the past. He suggests to Martha in The Shakespeare Code that she doesn't need to worry about treading on butterflies, and that if she isn't planning on murderering her ancestors then she should be quite safe to interact with history. In a situation where time and space are breaking down like in The Big Bang, there is far less of a universe left for time travel interaction to reverberate across the whole of existence, and The Doctor can afford to be a bit more superfluous with it.
Above all, The Doctor's lesson on time travel (if there ever was one) seems to be that it should be treated as the means to find a day that needs saving, rather than it to be the means to save the day. It should be used in relative moderation, and as a last resort - even then only when you can guarantee a minimal impact. You might run into William Shakespeare, or Charles Dickens or Queen Elizabeth along the way, or you might check back to see how one thing led to another like how the ghosts appeared in Under the Lake, or how the Racnoss became the centre of the Earth in The Runaway Bride... but you're always meant to be a spectator through time travel that treads softly regardless of what presents itself, not its means of rewriting the universe to suit your own needs.
The thing that always stands out in my head is the exchange from "The Doctor's Wife", where Idris says something about how she always takes The Doctor where he NEEDS to go.
Given the relationship DW and the Tardis are supposed to have, it's plausible that DW simply trusts that the Tardis has taken him to the correct time where his intervention can successfully resolve something.
Off the top of my head, it seems like whenever DW does try to "do a Bill & Ted" it often ends up rather chaotic and maybe that reinforces the idea that the Tardis knows what it's (she's?) doing?
Maybe the times when we see DW jumping around in time are the occasions where he's going "off-mission" and - contrary to what the Tardis might have expected - is making it up as he goes along?
I think part of the explanation is that the Doctor is, after all, a Time Lord with all the knowledge and understanding of the universe, and time in particular, that implies. I think that was most strongly presented in the modern era way back in Rose when 9 was explaining what it was like to be the Doctor.
The Doctor always knows what he can and can't do in a given time and place. So, for instance in The Magician's Apprentice, he knows that leaving the tank behind in medieval times and introducing the locals to contemporary words and phrases will not alter the time line.
Back in the classic era, most of the time the Doctor couldn't properly steer the TARDIS, it would go places apparently at random, which meant that this issue didn't arise. He didn't have enough control to go back in time and fix things (like saving Adric, for example).
But then, as Aslan52 pointed out, in The Doctor's Wife The TARDIS claims she "always took him where he needed to be" rather than where he wanted to go. This begs the question of, for example, why the TARDIS would not allow 6 to go back in time and rescue Adric.
Maybe the TARDIS felt, as many fans do, that Adric simply had to die!
I'm afraid time travel is broken in the DW universe, but no less fun and enjoyable all the same.
But then, as Aslan52 pointed out, in The Doctor's Wife The TARDIS claims she "always took him where he needed to be" rather than where he wanted to go. This begs the question of, for example, why the TARDIS would not allow 6 to go back in time and rescue Adric.
I suppose we're looking for a sort of valid time-travel paradox type answer aren't we?
Of course the main reason was simply that Adric was an annoying little tit who nobody wanted to rescue... ;-)
I suppose we're looking for a sort of valid time-travel paradox type answer aren't we? Of course the main reason was simply that Adric was an annoying little tit who nobody wanted to rescue... ;-)
I got the impression the Doctor wasn't going back to change the past, but to simply find out what happened in the hope it would help him take action in the present to save Clara. I could be wrong because I've only watched it the once, but I didn't get the impression he was off to change the past.
I got the impression the Doctor wasn't going back to change the past, but to simply find out what happened in the hope it would help him take action in the present to save Clara. I could be wrong because I've only watched it the once, but I didn't get the impression he was off to change the past.
I got that impression too, though, like you, I've only watched it once (and I'm spoiler free for part two). He wanted to discover what lay behind the current events.
Possible solutions to the cliff hanger:
1) Becoming a "ghost" (for want of a non-supernatural word for this phenomenon) is reversible (perhaps only for Time Lords).
2) Going into the past somehow (inadvertently) changed something which caused the Doctor to become a "ghost" and now has to be undone.
7/10
A nice paint by numbers episode of Doctor Who. Utterly derivative to the point of self parody at times- as if the fact we had all seen this a thousand times before and all knew it just from the plot summary alone wasn't enough they even threw in dialogue referencing past episodes and then for the truly hard of thinking gave a massive visual callback to one of the episodes it was stealing from (that wasn't even remotely a classic in its own right).
I almost admire it's bravado in brazenly celebrating the fact it wasn't just ripping off established genre greats but also cannibalizing mid-season clunkers with Martha Jones. Never mind that it didn't have one original idea in its entire 45 minutes (and no, tokenistic sign language doesnt count). Nevermind that the humourous quips and pop culture references were 'Dad-joke' levels of lazy and excruciating (sort of the point). Never mind that the 'ensemble cast' (for that read: didn't make a spot on Casualty this season) were utterly non-descript. Never mind that they hire Paul Kaye and then give him nothing to do but aimlessly walk up and down corridors. Never mind that the pacing of the direction in the action sequences was leaden and dull.
I am sure this will all be remedied in part 2 which looks a lot better. And this shows the downside of 2 parters. When they are as front loaded with exposition and all set-up like this one was then they risk the first part being entirely disposable and unmemorable. Of course you have to wait until Part 2 but I reckon this would be a good advert for why feature length specials might be the way forward. After all there are many classic films that would suffer if chopped in half this way.
Not to be too harsh. This was meat and potatoes Doctor Who. The kind of episodes that you need in between the whizz bang showboating of premiers and finales. Just the Doctor and his companion doing very Doctor and companion stuff. And I'm clearly missing something. I've seen Classic and New Who fans declare Part 1 alone as a masterpiece. I read someone say 'best episode in six years- which I find quite frankly astounding. The calls for Whithouse to be show runner seem to have gotten louder since it aired. Which to me is bizarre. I'm excited for the conclusion. But Under the Lake proved only that he can write to order and mimic. It had not an ounce of the creativity or vision or daring or spark of RTD and Moffat...the magic needed to he show runner.
It was like a really good version of one of your favourite songs. Cosy and fun and pleasant. But you've heard it all before many times. Whithouse has 45 minutes to show if he's just made another Waters of Mars style beauty or another Ganger atrocity. Fingers crossed.
Funny that people keep mentioning this latest ep felt so reminiscent of Classic Who, cause I thought that Ganger story (well, parts of it) was the closest thing to old Who we've seen so far.
Funny that people keep mentioning this latest ep felt so reminiscent of Classic Who, cause I thought that Ganger story (well, parts of it) was the closest thing to old Who we've seen so far.
The Impossible Planet
Satan Pit
42
Planet of the Ood
Waters of Mars
Silurian 2 parter
Gangers 2 parter
Cold War
And now add Under the Lake to the list. I'm hoping we see more of Whithouse'own voice as a writer come out in part 2. We saw it in The God Complex brilliantly. Either way he should enjoy these halcyon days. He's getting the sort of praise and free pass he can forget about entirely should he ever get the top job.
I'm also a little surprised by all the enthusiasm for this episode and its writer. It's a fairly good, if unoriginal, story so far, like something concocted by a creative writing class based on what they know of Who.
The plot is clunky and the characters are all paper-thin devices to assist the plot.
The best bit for me was the view of the underwater research station. Whose existence is surprising, given that they could presumably just have drained the lake? It didn't look that massive.
I almost admire it's bravado in brazenly celebrating the fact it wasn't just ripping off established genre greats but also cannibalizing mid-season clunkers with Martha Jones. Never mind that it didn't have one original idea in its entire 45 minutes (and no, tokenistic sign language doesnt count). Nevermind that the humourous quips and pop culture references were 'Dad-joke' levels of lazy and excruciating (sort of the point). Never mind that the 'ensemble cast' (for that read: didn't make a spot on Casualty this season) were utterly non-descript. Never mind that they hire Paul Kaye and then give him nothing to do but aimlessly walk up and down corridors. Never mind that the pacing of the direction in the action sequences was leaden and dull .
See this kind of thinking, that thankfully hasn't been to strong, is just.. urgh. Writers can't include anything that's not 'ordinary' the way the highest percentage of people are like, without people claiming its tokenism, what there are people in the world who are deaf this episode featured people and one happened to be deaf, why is this being singled out and called tokenism, its just bizarre, what's the concern or dislike are people threatened by it somehow or uncomfortable by it.
The only token kind of person in TV/Movie is the demographic to which I'm in, young white straight male in good health with no conditions as your pretty much guaranteed to get that in anything you watch, its a must, that's the visible tangible badge of honour of hey look we have to have this as that's what we want and everything else wants to represent white young males, that what sell, because that's people, right.. and then when content makers do something outside that demographic we have the cheek to moan and say they are just putting that in for the sake of it.. What does that even mean! its beyond stupid.. oh they are having a mixed race cast for something set in London they are just doing that to tick boxes, no they just have people to represent London, the female character is more a focus than the male boo its feminist writing trying to put men down, no the movie/tv program is about a female in the main role y'know like how you have (the majority of) movies with a man in the main role, but no to have a women be a lead its feminists wanting to undermine men and is a token ploy on the makers of said content.
This bothers me and I'm in the group that's so overly catered to, I can't imagine how even more frustrating it must be to be in the groups outside of it who are so under-represented, and then when they are represented (and people want to see themselves represented and to have a reflection of themselves on the screen which isn't to much to ask) they then have people moaning and going ah its tokenism its tokenism.. what!...... the world we live in.
Sorry, I'll get off my soap box now, its just this attitude is so prevalent and its.. urgh.
See this kind of thinking, that thankfully hasn't been to strong, is just.. urgh. Writers can't include anything that's not 'ordinary' the way the highest percentage of people are like, without people claiming its tokenism, what there are people in the world who are deaf this episode featured people and one happened to be deaf, why is this being singled out and called tokenism, its just bizarre, what's the concern or dislike are people threatened by it somehow or uncomfortable by it.
The only token kind of person in TV/Movie is the demographic to which I'm in, young white straight male in good health with no conditions as your pretty much guaranteed to get that in anything you watch, its a must, that's the visible tangible badge of honour of hey look we have to have this as that's what we want and everything else wants to represent white young males, that what sell, because that's people, right.. and then when content makers do something outside that demographic we have the cheek to moan and say they are just putting that in for the sake of it.. What does that even mean! its beyond stupid.. oh they are having a mixed race cast for something set in London they are just doing that to tick boxes, no they just have people to represent London, the female character is more a focus than the male boo its feminist writing trying to put men down, no the movie/tv program is about a female in the main role y'know like how you have (the majority of) movies with a man in the main role, but no to have a women be a lead its feminists wanting to undermine men and is a token ploy on the makers of said content.
This bothers me and I'm in the group that's so overly catered to, I can't imagine how even more frustrating it must be to be in the groups outside of it who are so under-represented, and then when they are represented (and people want to see themselves represented and to have a reflection of themselves on the screen which isn't to much to ask) they then have people moaning and going ah its tokenism its tokenism.. what!...... the world we live in.
Sorry, I'll get off my soap box now, its just this attitude is so prevalent and its.. urgh.
If it really is just a case of 'And? Theres a deaf character? So what?' why has every single review made a big deal of it (even while claiming it's not a big deal) and why have the BBC and associated Twitter accounts made a big deal of it? Why has there been specially made content focussing on this very aspect? Why have some people on Twitter been falling over themselves to say stuff like 'this is why Doctor Who is so important?'. So either we are supposed to notice it or aren't we? If we do are we then making too big a deal out of it? But if we ignore it are we then not recognising the importance of it?
I'm afraid in light of how poorly sketched out the other characters were I suspect it was cynically used as a 'gimmick'. Something to give the episode an angle. Just my view of course. I applaud Whithouse for one thing. It certainly was a good example of eqaulity and showing that we are all the same. The actress was as dull as the rest of the supporting cast and the character just as thinly sketched.
I would be keen to address your other points but I'm afraid your post is rather confusing and lacking in coherence. I think it's something about 'white young males' and what is considered 'ordinary'. Not sure what this has to do with my original post. I think you're probably reaching and making a few assumptions. Quite why you consider impaired hearing to be out of the 'ordinary' is beyond me.
Funny that people keep mentioning this latest ep felt so reminiscent of Classic Who, cause I thought that Ganger story (well, parts of it) was the closest thing to old Who we've seen so far.
I agree, I enjoyed it, it was a pleasant change from the frantic 'got to get this done in 42 minutes' format, harking back to having the equivalent of 3 episodes to tell the story.There was time to find out more about the characters than their names and jobs and there were some wonderful moments involving the Ponds, especially Rory, and Amy and the 'ganger doctor'. I still think an hour is the perfect format for new Who, you can accommodate telling the story and not rushing the ending, as seems to happen so much. I know it isn't going to happen except for specials but the extra few minutes makes a huge difference.
The main reason I dislike the Ganger two parter was that it felt padded out with too much - fairly pointless - running back and forth. I think it would have felt right at about 60-70 minutes, rather than the 84 minutes it actually had over two episodes.
Under the Lake doesn't have that issue for me.
I know that 60 minutes of story is something of a problem for commercial broadcast, but that would have been better served aimed at a 90 minute slot (with commercials) rather than 2x60 minutes slots (with commercials). Surely that's possible on BBC America, rather than being straight-jacketed into 60 minutes (42 minutes + commercials) slots. That kind of duration would have helped as well a lot of the single episode stories that were too rushed.
Comments
It's simply one of the logical, possible consequences if you allow that time travel itself is possible.
All fine and dandy for a one-off story, but if used in a continuing TV series there are problems, as it's always a "get out of jail free" card that could be used to resolve any tricky situation. The question then becomes, if the Doctor was able to use that to escape the Pandorica, why doesn't he just go back and rescue Adric just before the ship crashes into Earth?
It's too powerful a plot device to be used regularly, and yet here we have a show based around a time travelling protagonist and associates.
This effect was used to humorous effect in The Curse of the Fatal Death, CIN Special. Each time the Master had prepared a trap, the Doctor had already been back in time and prepared a counter measure, to which the Master had done the same and prepared a counter counter measure.... and so on.
It's the same problem as the over use of the sonic screwdriver, who's abilities miraculously rise to fit the requirements of this week's plot.
It's the same problem with the transporter in Star Trek. The writers had to keep coming up with explanations as to why the landing party or away team couldn't just beam up out of any danger.
So that's why in DW, history can be re-written, except when the plot demands that it can't. The Doctor can't cross his own timeline, except when he can.
As Terry Pratchett commented about DW it's "makeitupasyougoalongium".
.
Nobody wants that..:o
I thoroughly enjoyed it too. I think some people over-analyse everything rather than just enjoying it for what it is, even if it's hokum a lot of the time. It's fun hokum
And why it seem to curse any crew member with bad luck but Kirk, Spock, McCoy, Scott or Uhuru or Chekhov.
They made quite a thing about 11 having few accepted 'normal' social skills well before that so you can't really say it's a result of Trenzalore. However all the others seemed fine with humans and it does jar that 12 is portrayed as quite so inept.
Oh come on, Chekov suffered a lot!:D
In this episode we were told that the Doctor had deleted the knowledge of Sign language from his memory.
There was meant to be a similar line in The Lodger where we would have been told that he had deleted 20th/21st century social customs from his memory.
The line however was cut so 11 just became more socially awkward than in previous incarnations without any explanation.
Not quite sure why he would delete his knowledge of our social customs, or his knowledge of sign language though! Presumably he deleted his ability to lip read too, which I can't believe that he wouldn't have had along with all his other abilities!
Apologies for shortening your post, but I do agree with it all.
I personally think my "head-canon" as it were, considers the only rule of a time travel resolution in Doctor Who to be an in-universe last resort - in other words it's the active direction the writer chose for his/her story to take, but for The Doctor as a character it's the only direction and he is forced to take it...except for cheap tricks (see Smith and Jones) or minor paradoxes (see New Earth).
In Under the Lake, the Doctor could have gone back in time at any point... to see when the ghosts were first present, to see what happened when the crew first arrived, to watch the base being constructed. He could always have done this, but never chooses to. He only does it when all other options, and hopes of a linear resolution are lost.
There's plenty of other examples. The Doctor realises relatively quickly that Kazran Sardick is the kind of man who simply cannot be reasoned with in A Christmas Carol, and the isomorphic controls he has means the Doctor can't opt for a more forceful approach to saving the spacecraft - so he plays the time travel card as a 'last resort'.
The Doctor travels back in time to give the Sonic Screwdriver to Rory in The Big Bang, which gives his past-self the means to get out of the Pandorica and eventually give Rory the Sonic Screwdriver. This is the time travel card played to its absolute limit.
The question then is why doesn't the Doctor just always cut to the chase and use time travel to fix all of his problems? For a 'last resort' it's never let him down before - its track record as a means of success is a perfect one, so why not just employ it all the time. In Father's Day, the Doctor exclaims to Rose that he knows what he's doing whereas she doesn't in regards to altering the past. The whole point of the story is about just how dangerous time travel can be and the consequences it can have.
That doesn't go ignored in the stories where The Doctor uses it heavily, and A Christmas Carol deals with those consequences - The Doctor proclaims how stupid he is for using time travel to change Kazran into a better man, not considering that this then alters the isomorphic controls as well which Kazran now no longer inherited access to. The Doctor's complacency means that Abigail is the only solution, and she (admittedly willingly) begins her last day saving everyone.
The Doctor generally does know what he's doing though, and understands how much leeway you can have in regards to changing the past. He suggests to Martha in The Shakespeare Code that she doesn't need to worry about treading on butterflies, and that if she isn't planning on murderering her ancestors then she should be quite safe to interact with history. In a situation where time and space are breaking down like in The Big Bang, there is far less of a universe left for time travel interaction to reverberate across the whole of existence, and The Doctor can afford to be a bit more superfluous with it.
Above all, The Doctor's lesson on time travel (if there ever was one) seems to be that it should be treated as the means to find a day that needs saving, rather than it to be the means to save the day. It should be used in relative moderation, and as a last resort - even then only when you can guarantee a minimal impact. You might run into William Shakespeare, or Charles Dickens or Queen Elizabeth along the way, or you might check back to see how one thing led to another like how the ghosts appeared in Under the Lake, or how the Racnoss became the centre of the Earth in The Runaway Bride... but you're always meant to be a spectator through time travel that treads softly regardless of what presents itself, not its means of rewriting the universe to suit your own needs.
Given the relationship DW and the Tardis are supposed to have, it's plausible that DW simply trusts that the Tardis has taken him to the correct time where his intervention can successfully resolve something.
Off the top of my head, it seems like whenever DW does try to "do a Bill & Ted" it often ends up rather chaotic and maybe that reinforces the idea that the Tardis knows what it's (she's?) doing?
Maybe the times when we see DW jumping around in time are the occasions where he's going "off-mission" and - contrary to what the Tardis might have expected - is making it up as he goes along?
I think part of the explanation is that the Doctor is, after all, a Time Lord with all the knowledge and understanding of the universe, and time in particular, that implies. I think that was most strongly presented in the modern era way back in Rose when 9 was explaining what it was like to be the Doctor.
The Doctor always knows what he can and can't do in a given time and place. So, for instance in The Magician's Apprentice, he knows that leaving the tank behind in medieval times and introducing the locals to contemporary words and phrases will not alter the time line.
Back in the classic era, most of the time the Doctor couldn't properly steer the TARDIS, it would go places apparently at random, which meant that this issue didn't arise. He didn't have enough control to go back in time and fix things (like saving Adric, for example).
But then, as Aslan52 pointed out, in The Doctor's Wife The TARDIS claims she "always took him where he needed to be" rather than where he wanted to go. This begs the question of, for example, why the TARDIS would not allow 6 to go back in time and rescue Adric.
Maybe the TARDIS felt, as many fans do, that Adric simply had to die!
I'm afraid time travel is broken in the DW universe, but no less fun and enjoyable all the same.
I suppose we're looking for a sort of valid time-travel paradox type answer aren't we?
Of course the main reason was simply that Adric was an annoying little tit who nobody wanted to rescue... ;-)
Some good gags too, but without descending into silliness.
I got the impression the Doctor wasn't going back to change the past, but to simply find out what happened in the hope it would help him take action in the present to save Clara. I could be wrong because I've only watched it the once, but I didn't get the impression he was off to change the past.
I got that impression too, though, like you, I've only watched it once (and I'm spoiler free for part two). He wanted to discover what lay behind the current events.
Possible solutions to the cliff hanger:
1) Becoming a "ghost" (for want of a non-supernatural word for this phenomenon) is reversible (perhaps only for Time Lords).
2) Going into the past somehow (inadvertently) changed something which caused the Doctor to become a "ghost" and now has to be undone.
A nice paint by numbers episode of Doctor Who. Utterly derivative to the point of self parody at times- as if the fact we had all seen this a thousand times before and all knew it just from the plot summary alone wasn't enough they even threw in dialogue referencing past episodes and then for the truly hard of thinking gave a massive visual callback to one of the episodes it was stealing from (that wasn't even remotely a classic in its own right).
I almost admire it's bravado in brazenly celebrating the fact it wasn't just ripping off established genre greats but also cannibalizing mid-season clunkers with Martha Jones. Never mind that it didn't have one original idea in its entire 45 minutes (and no, tokenistic sign language doesnt count). Nevermind that the humourous quips and pop culture references were 'Dad-joke' levels of lazy and excruciating (sort of the point). Never mind that the 'ensemble cast' (for that read: didn't make a spot on Casualty this season) were utterly non-descript. Never mind that they hire Paul Kaye and then give him nothing to do but aimlessly walk up and down corridors. Never mind that the pacing of the direction in the action sequences was leaden and dull.
I am sure this will all be remedied in part 2 which looks a lot better. And this shows the downside of 2 parters. When they are as front loaded with exposition and all set-up like this one was then they risk the first part being entirely disposable and unmemorable. Of course you have to wait until Part 2 but I reckon this would be a good advert for why feature length specials might be the way forward. After all there are many classic films that would suffer if chopped in half this way.
Not to be too harsh. This was meat and potatoes Doctor Who. The kind of episodes that you need in between the whizz bang showboating of premiers and finales. Just the Doctor and his companion doing very Doctor and companion stuff. And I'm clearly missing something. I've seen Classic and New Who fans declare Part 1 alone as a masterpiece. I read someone say 'best episode in six years- which I find quite frankly astounding. The calls for Whithouse to be show runner seem to have gotten louder since it aired. Which to me is bizarre. I'm excited for the conclusion. But Under the Lake proved only that he can write to order and mimic. It had not an ounce of the creativity or vision or daring or spark of RTD and Moffat...the magic needed to he show runner.
It was like a really good version of one of your favourite songs. Cosy and fun and pleasant. But you've heard it all before many times. Whithouse has 45 minutes to show if he's just made another Waters of Mars style beauty or another Ganger atrocity. Fingers crossed.
The Impossible Planet
Satan Pit
42
Planet of the Ood
Waters of Mars
Silurian 2 parter
Gangers 2 parter
Cold War
And now add Under the Lake to the list. I'm hoping we see more of Whithouse'own voice as a writer come out in part 2. We saw it in The God Complex brilliantly. Either way he should enjoy these halcyon days. He's getting the sort of praise and free pass he can forget about entirely should he ever get the top job.
The plot is clunky and the characters are all paper-thin devices to assist the plot.
The best bit for me was the view of the underwater research station. Whose existence is surprising, given that they could presumably just have drained the lake? It didn't look that massive.
See this kind of thinking, that thankfully hasn't been to strong, is just.. urgh. Writers can't include anything that's not 'ordinary' the way the highest percentage of people are like, without people claiming its tokenism, what
The only token kind of person in TV/Movie is the demographic to which I'm in, young white straight male in good health with no conditions as your pretty much guaranteed to get that in anything you watch, its a must, that's the visible tangible badge of honour of hey look we have to have this as that's what we want and everything else wants to represent white young males, that what sell, because that's people, right.. and then when content makers do something outside that demographic we have the cheek to moan and say they are just putting that in for the sake of it.. What does that even mean! its beyond stupid.. oh they are having a mixed race cast for something set in London they are just doing that to tick boxes, no they just have people to represent London, the female character is more a focus than the male boo its feminist writing trying to put men down, no the movie/tv program is about a female in the main role y'know like how you have (the majority of) movies with a man in the main role, but no to have a women be a lead its feminists wanting to undermine men and is a token ploy on the makers of said content.
This bothers me and I'm in the group that's so overly catered to, I can't imagine how even more frustrating it must be to be in the groups outside of it who are so under-represented, and then when they are represented (and people want to see themselves represented and to have a reflection of themselves on the screen which isn't to much to ask) they then have people moaning and going ah its tokenism its tokenism.. what!...... the world we live in.
Sorry, I'll get off my soap box now, its just this attitude is so prevalent and its.. urgh.
Capaldi has really hit his stride now which augers well for the rest of this season and beyond.
Great to see the Doctor firmly taking centre stage here with Clara very much in the role of companion, which is as it should be IMO.
Chemistry between Capaldi and Coleman FAR better than that seen with Smith, making the episodes far more watchable and enjoyable IMO.
Kudos also for containing more brilliant and quotable lines in one episode than we saw over the the whole Smith tenure.
If it really is just a case of 'And? Theres a deaf character? So what?' why has every single review made a big deal of it (even while claiming it's not a big deal) and why have the BBC and associated Twitter accounts made a big deal of it? Why has there been specially made content focussing on this very aspect? Why have some people on Twitter been falling over themselves to say stuff like 'this is why Doctor Who is so important?'. So either we are supposed to notice it or aren't we? If we do are we then making too big a deal out of it? But if we ignore it are we then not recognising the importance of it?
I'm afraid in light of how poorly sketched out the other characters were I suspect it was cynically used as a 'gimmick'. Something to give the episode an angle. Just my view of course. I applaud Whithouse for one thing. It certainly was a good example of eqaulity and showing that we are all the same. The actress was as dull as the rest of the supporting cast and the character just as thinly sketched.
I would be keen to address your other points but I'm afraid your post is rather confusing and lacking in coherence. I think it's something about 'white young males' and what is considered 'ordinary'. Not sure what this has to do with my original post. I think you're probably reaching and making a few assumptions. Quite why you consider impaired hearing to be out of the 'ordinary' is beyond me.
I agree, I enjoyed it, it was a pleasant change from the frantic 'got to get this done in 42 minutes' format, harking back to having the equivalent of 3 episodes to tell the story.There was time to find out more about the characters than their names and jobs and there were some wonderful moments involving the Ponds, especially Rory, and Amy and the 'ganger doctor'. I still think an hour is the perfect format for new Who, you can accommodate telling the story and not rushing the ending, as seems to happen so much. I know it isn't going to happen except for specials but the extra few minutes makes a huge difference.
Under the Lake doesn't have that issue for me.
I know that 60 minutes of story is something of a problem for commercial broadcast, but that would have been better served aimed at a 90 minute slot (with commercials) rather than 2x60 minutes slots (with commercials). Surely that's possible on BBC America, rather than being straight-jacketed into 60 minutes (42 minutes + commercials) slots. That kind of duration would have helped as well a lot of the single episode stories that were too rushed.