Yes but let's face it, that was always just a ploy around which to tell stories and go to another earth like quarry on another planet. It was never much about time itself and even when it was, it was just a general "Oh you shouldn't/can't mess with time" and the problems if they do, storyline.

They now seemed to have replaced good stories with complex stories and think that they are the same thing. They are not! Complex time stuff just for the sake of it whereas a good old simple well told tail has always served Dr Who well for decades.

Time used to be linier and they just moved back and forth. Now it's a mess and no one knows what is going on.

No, No and NO!!!!!

Doctor Who is a show about time travel and its GREATEST advantage is that it is the ONLY show in which time is not a limitation. Events can be rewritten and consequences can cause cause. All other shows in the world, including sci-fi ones, have linear timeline. And Doctor Who is special in the fact that his timeline is not linear. It is fortune and uniqueness, not a problem. That's why I love DW!

So, if you prefer linear timelines, watch Star Trek or any other sci-fi show, but please stop complaining about 'too much focusing on time' in a show about TIME TRAVEL.

I'd personally like more one-episode timey-wimeys like Blink and Big Bang, because longer timey-wimeys (for example River story) might be too complicated (but it doesn't mean it should be totally excluded - Crack in wall and Impossible girl storylines were perfect!)



Exactly this.

This is exactly what I dislike. Too simple action-oriented stories. DW should be mystery-oriented, imaginative, escapist, dreamy and time-oriented!



Star Trek and DW are DIFFERENT AND SHOULD BE DIFFERENT!
Star Trek is a very good linear sci-fi show.
DW is a show about TIME TRAVEL where meeting future self and rewriting events are possible. That's the beauty of Doctor Who.

Without timey-wimey the only difference between DW and Star Trek would be size of the crew (Don't get me wrong, I like Star Trek too, but they are different and should be different!)

My feelings exactly! Yes it's a show about TIME & SPACE! I love the time-travel aspect, always have.......but not when it is abused and used as lazy way of getting out of trouble!
It's like the Sonic Screwdriver dilemma...don't get me started on that one!!

Yes I would agree. Time stories can only as good as the resolution at the end whether its a reset ( bit of a cop-out) or a new timeline. Whilst the fun is initially trying to make all the pieces fit if you have an unconvincing timey wimey resolution then the whole device becomes disappointing . My case in point is the whole Tesselecta device in Season 6.


I think linear stories can be forgiven for a more straightforward beginning, middle and end because we see events as they happen to / with the characters and there is the chance of decent development of said characters and there is something very rewatchable in that fact.
Blink is probably the best of all the timey wimey stories as it had a well written main character( played very sympathetically) within a good plot and where all the additional time elements put together made sense.

It's easy to forget the fact that most modern Who stories have no time craziness going on. That is, as long as you don't count the places where a companion says, "hang on, the Trilozons can't blow up the Earth in the past, because it still exists in the future".

As for wanting to watch Star Trek in order to avoid complex time paradox plots - The Voyage Home? The City on the Edge of Forever? Trials and Tribble-ations? Yesterday's Enterprise? The Year of Hell? Pretty much all of Enterprise? And that's just off the top of my head (even if I had to use Wikipedia for the titles...)

Brilliant post.

Blink was genius because the concept was new and exciting. Now the timey-wimey stuff is just a big yawn, and an easy way out of trouble if Moff can't think of anything better.

And I'll stop saying timey-wimey when Moff stops saying humany-wumany* and other abominations.

*I shouldn't have posted that phrase, it has made me feel ill.

I have mixed feelings about Timey Wimey.

I agree that the Time Travel premise works better as a frame work for episodic adventuring, but I think using Time Travel as a plot device can be interesting too.

I think accepting that time can change and little inconsistencies shall arise in a 50 year long story is fine, but I don't want writers to actively use that as an excuse to not even try.

I thought the idea of stretching a long ass arc over 4 years and in reverse was a little emotionally constipating in terms of gratification, although the big pay-off on Trenzalore was worth it.

I think the deconstructional elements of the show examining the Doctor and his life-style have lead to some great stories, but I kinda wish they'd stop self-analysing so much, try to leave the subtext unspoken and just get on with some cool adventures.

I think it's fine to be mysterious and secretive, as long as the tease isn't painfully drawn out, and the answers aren't overwhelmingly boring.
And more importantly, the answers/twists should enhance the previous stories, and give new meaning to character actions and events, instead of just making them seem dull in the light of fore-knowledge.

I reckon you need to take Time Travel with a certain amount of salt, since it seems to operate in different ways depending on the circumstance, allowing the writers some narrative leeway, but in some cases, if you really think about it, the whole concept makes no logical sense what-so-ever, so you either have to choose to role with it regardless, or forge some convoluted head-canon to justify the faulty mechanics.

I really liked The Lodger, and Closing Time, because they were fun adventures, that perfectly mixed the larger than life alien elements with the domestic drama of everyday life, and it anoys me when people describe them as 'filler', just because they don't link into the over-arching series plot.

That became more of a list than I was hoping but meh, it gets the points across.

That comment is quite amusing.

Noooooo!! I hated when the 3rd Doctor was stuck on earth all the time!!


Bang on, could not agree more.


Again, totally agree. Timey-wimey is boring-smoring.

Hopefully with an older actor as the Doctor, we will get a rest from all this juvenile 'timey wimey' rubbish at last.

I'd like to see a Doctor with a little more dignity, and scripts that do not use a lame excuse such as 'timey-wimey stuff' to explain what is happening.

There is a difference between "timey-wimey" and "Time Travel". Timey-Wimey is Steven Moffats way of using time travel without getting all bogged down in exposition. It works to a certain degree but loses appeal the more it used. It's like technobabble in Star Trek. No-one questions things like "Inertial Dampeners" as it is a world building tool that easily solves an issue. But when you get to to Voyager and you just get meaningless words thrown at you as a resolution, then it sucks.

So "timey-wimey" is fine when used well and a useless cop-out when not.

Yeah. It's like, the first time it was used in Blink, it was funny, because it was just the Doctor saying "ahhh... #@*% it, time wimey stuff."

But after a while it just begins to cheapen things a bit.

I felt a little similar about that one short where the Doctor looses his memory, and he says "Doctor Who? Oh wait! No one knows. That's the thing."

In passing its fun, but all the little instances like that combined together makes the show feel a little too self-aware.

If you don't want time travel, watch Emmerdale.

Indeed.

I agree that sometimes Moffat has used 'timey-wimey' to get himself out of some pretty deep plot holes and not always successfully. But RTD could be just as lazy and inconsistent albeit in a different way.

This idea that Doctor Who is supposed to only be about the Tardis landing somewhere random, some conflict and the doctor defeating the bad guys is nonsense. And reductive. Its always been more than that even when it has had elements of this.

and even within this thread the definition of 'timey wimey' seems to have gotten muddled. Do people mean they dislike the more complex time travel elements being used as a plot point or do they mean 'timey wimey' as a lazy excuse to resolve a plot. I have a degree of sympathy with the latter but cannot fathom why the former would ever be a problem in a show that's always been about time travel and its implications. RTD chose to ignore this aspect far too much and to his detriment. He instead favored linear plotting with easily recognizable characters and familiar tv drama tropes that gave the show a grounding in real life. Moffat moved away from this. I'm glad he did.

The phrase 'timey wimey' and the concept of it annoys some people? Fine. 'I don't want to go', 'Doctor/Donna', talking blobs of fat, Kylie stunt casting, 'im sorry, I'm so so sorry', whinging matriarchs and back flipping sass machines made and indeed make me want to throw my DVDs out the window.

I also feel this accusation that Moffat resorts to lazy 'timey-wimey' too often is a massive overstatement. Many of his stories haven't. But then it becomes a stick to bash him with. The 'Timey-wimey' agenda wielded by the Moffat bashers who are always terribly obvious and easily spotted.

'Timey-wimey' can be quite an annoying phrase in itself. But for me its Moffat saying that we are watching for the thrill of the story and be damned with getting bogged down in silly pseudo science. Leave that stuff for the people that own Star Trek box sets and actually enjoy Babylon 5. Dull.

Well, I love Babylon 5 and Star Trek (early incarnations, at least - and the two latest movies have brought the fun back there ).

I actually think this thread is now talking about two different "timey-wimeys".

The first is the use of the phrase itself, which I think has become rather over-used. It was fun and amusing at first but the humour has worn thin. It has become the Doctor Who equivalent of Star Trek's infamous "technobabble" and it's been used to "gloss over" some plot weaknesses. Instead of getting a plausible explanation, we get "timey-wimey". Sometimes it's used for brevity - but lack of time to tell the story properly has been a gripe of mine with Doctor Who for a long time now.

The second is the use of time travel itself as a plot device. When this is done well then I'm all for it. I like the bit of mental exercise needed when navigating a plot strewn with potential grandfather paradoxes and the like. I liked its use of the vortex manipulator in The Big Bang to allow the Doctor's escape from the Pandorica, and the little things like getting a drink for little Amelia by stealing it from her earlier, which was what caused her to be thirsty. Or in The Lodger when the Doctor gets Amy to write the note that will (or had) lead him to Craig's flat.

It's less successful drama when used as the ultimate reset button. Or when it's "sometimes you can change things" and "sometimes your can't". This is position Doctor Who has reached with all the guff about time locks and fixed points etc. (which are utterly illogical and make no sense and have no internal consistency at all).

However, it doesn't usually matter because of the fun and charm in most of the stories and main characters (and in particular Matt's version of the Doctor himself).

How long do you have to wait for the Emmerdale bus?

WHO said anything about NOT wanting time-travel?? I never said that in my Opening Post!!
This annoys me. People do NOT READ half of what they are scrolling through whilst watching TV!!
I have merely said that Time-travel is being mis-used lately and OFTEN! It is being used as a 'scapegoat' along with the Sonic Screwdriver!!!
Moffat has definitely used it throughout the last few years - it cannot be denied!! How many times has Matt/Rory/Amy River been involved in Time-Travel?? And at the same time (ish) all their problems solved??? At the flick of a F*****g switch - and everything is reverted back to normal......(yawn!!). The Universe is back on track!
OK - RTD did similar in his 'Last of the Timelords' - and re-wound history....but only by one year!!.
I don't dismiss Time Travel!!! I LOVE IT! But within reason. Not Moffat-style!
I saw a film last night called 'Termination Point' - that was a good time-travel story!!

Hmm.

One reset of the Universe. It did not involve time travel - just an exploding TARDIS. Our heroes remembered afterwards.

One broken fixed point in time. It did not involve time travel - it just showed us enough of the consequences of River not shooting the Doctor for us to understand why she did and for her to understand why she must. Events all lined up as they should, as they always did. Nothing changed.

The two things you seem to be complaining most about are not really time travel.

The other times it has been used I think were successful. Even Journey to the Centre of the TARDIS.

I am. I enjoy seeing the doctor visit various planets and moments in history, but I'm not a fan of the "timey-wimey" bit, even less when it doesn't make sense (something that seems to be happening more and more now...)

Equally, perhaps they have read correctly, and you're not understanding them. It's worth taking a moment to look at both sides at once.

For example, you say you have no problem with time travel being used in plots, but dislike it being mis-used - in other words, you have a dividing line in your head grouping what is acceptable and interesting to you and what is not. Other people may group things differently - what is an 'easy cop-out' for you might just be the natural consequence of time travel mechanics to them, and so they might not see the problem.

For example, The Big Bang - well, we know they're not going to actually leave the universe having been destroyed, are they? There's no cop-out in going into the episode knowing it's about how they manage to get things back to normal. And they do spend the whole episode talking about it, it's not pulled out of a hat.

Same with the Wedding of River Song - it was clearly portrayed right from the start as an alternate timeline, one that we know must be returned to the status quo, there's never any doubt about that. In this case, it was messing with the supposed laws of time that caused the problem, and leaving them well alone fixed it.

It could easily be argued that the Last of the Time Lords' 'missing year' was the cop-out, as it conveniently undid all the plot developments without any prior justification.

Splintering yourself across another person's personal timeline is extremely silly, but it's a whole different class of silly, that stands alone from the basic silliness of just changing timelines.

Well said johnnysaucepn, for one of the most sensible, rational and reasonable posts I've read in ages.
Are you sure you're on the right message board?

that's a fair enough observation but its also fair to say that time travel doesn't need to be a plot device quite as much as it seems to be these days.

OP, I share your view!

Are you sure you're reading the right post??

Post of the week!

So many subtle layers of irony and sarcasm it's brilliant! So brilliant, in fact, it deserves to be on the "My Opinion is very important and deserves it's own thread", err, thread.

Well, it made me laugh anyway.