I don't think Jenny partially regenerated at the end of the episode.

I thought it was the gaseous stuff that started the terraforming process that brought her back to life? She appeared to exhale stuff of the same colour when she resurrected.

Moffat shoehorned in another Doctor because he knew Matt Smith was leaving and it was highly unlikely he'd still be around when it was time for 12 to be replaced. He wanted to break the regen limit and retconning in a past incarnation, that contradicted so much already established lore, was the perfect way to do it. You may disagree, some on here seem to make a hobby of it, but my reasoning does support my conclusion.

I'm personally thankful that it's out of the way. Some people on here were fixated that the Doctor couldn't possibly get more regenerations. As if it's an actual rule of nature or something.

Besides, the idea of a Doctor nearing death was the arc is Series 6 and Series 7b. Yet another "nearing the end" arc would have just been annoying. Particularly when it's virtually impossible to hide the identity of the next Doctor.

Also, the advantages of having John Hurt as an official Doctor far outweigh the one minor disadvantage of a disrupted numbering system. Only fans could name all 13 Doctors anyway.

BIB: I'm not sure if I'm correct, but I'm guessing that your intent there was sarcasm. If that is the case, then you have mistaken my motives when I used "No problem with..." I wasn't in any way setting myself up as any kind of authority and giving you permission. I would never presume to put myself in a position of higher authority or claim some sort of special entitlement. I'm just another poster with opinions, like everyone else here.

I was simply trying to be clear about what we were actually debating. I'm sorry you didn't take it that way. And if I'm wrong about your motives, I apologise for that too.

I quite agree with the other aspects of your post.

I thought that was regeneration energy, personally.

I'm pretty sure fans could name more than 13!

Did someone really say John Hurt was a bad actor as the War Doctor?!

He phoned it in. Maybe better writing might have encouraged him to up his game, who knows.

Such a lazy expression to review someone's acting. I can't imagine it was anywhere near well-paid, which is the usual reason people attribute to what they've identified as a sub-average acting performance.

He was playing a world-weary character. Why must you use your loathing of Moffat to insult anyone remotely connected to him?!

Bit of an exaggeration don't you think? Firstly that I "loathe" him at all, then that I insult anyone remotely connected to him! I assume you've got a list of all these poor people and the insults I directed at them handy?

I'm equally surprised and in disagreement with that. I don't particularly like the idea of the war doctor, and it was blantantly a reaction to the loss of potentially having Eccleston involved, but as for the character itself, John Hurt played him brilliantly.

I'm also surprised at how a thread I set up to talk about elements of partial regeneration has somehow been hijacked to become an argument about the war doctor and Moffat.

To get back to the main question.

Perhaps the DNA from is arm was enough for him to use it to stay the same, that or because the arm was chopped off during his regeneration process perhaps as it was well reserved it had some regeneration left in the hand.

Another thing is that I don't think during the regeneration process The Doctor will be able to look around for a piece of his DNA as he could regenerate anytime anywhere.

The 11th doctor obviously has jealousy issues


Or, just for fun, let's throw another hand grenade into the mix, Moffat said a good friend of his would finally be answering that annoying regeneration limit question during the season 6 build up.
He meant the "607" line in Matt's episode of the Sarah Jane adventures, which had the whole "11th Doctor being the last regeneration" plot line not come up would've been a perfectly acceptable way to answer a line written into 1 episode in the 70s only fanboys cared about.

IMO, the sooner SM decides to leave and someone else takes over as Head Show Runner, we may get better episodes. For one thing, the writing will be up to scratch, and as a result, the cast will be acting better.

Just think back to 2010, and Victory of the Daleks. We had the Paradigm Daleks. Many fans disliked those, and so they haven't been used again since, apart from The Pandorica Opens and Asylum of the Daleks. It wasn't one of Steven Moffat's best ideas, I have to admit.

For me, this series hasn't exactly been a bed of roses where the writing's concerned. The scripts have been somewhat off this year, which is a shame. I don't want DW to be axed. I'd like the show to be around for many more years, but if we continue having the quality that we have been having then, that would put the show on thin ice, if not very thin ice.

It seems rather late in the day to be saying "Welcome to the Forum", but congratulations on your first post.

Perhaps the jar in which the hand was kept served as a life-support system, which kept it in a state of viability (as opposed to stray locks of hair, nail-clippings, or other dead excrementitious material), so the opportunities for repeating the event are strictly limited to similar circumstances.

Your point about the Doctor not necessarily being anywhere near samples of his DNA when regenerating set me thinking: I hadn't realised till now that fewer than half of the regenerations are seen to take place in the Tardis.

Astonishing, isn't it? It's as if there's only one conversation allowed across the whole forum. No matter what door you open, it leads to the same room.

True. But I was thinking that he could at least try by keeping something off that nature in the console room, given that of late he seems to always regenerate there. He may not regenerate there, but he'd be prepared if he did.

Also, thanks for contributing to the intended discussion and getting the thread back on track.

Maybe your right about the hand being preserved, but surely it would be within the doctor's grasp to do the same thing. I'm not saying that hair or nails would definitely be as reliable to use, I'm just saying that their is also nothing to suggest they wouldn't be.

As for your point about the regenerations, as someone who got into the show with new who, even though i've seen the Classic regenerations, every regeneration of what feels like my time with the show (2005+) has been in the TARDIS (even the 10.5 meta crisis one) so that feels like the standard for me. I'd actually like it if the next time wasn't in the TARDIS as it would be something different. Plus it's starting to feel a bit co-incidental and silly how he is always near or already in the TARDIS when it comes time to regenerate and always in the console room when it happens.

Actually, looking at it again, I think I may have miscounted, and the majority of regenerations do take place in the Tardis (even excluding 10.5 and the Master's regeneration). I suppose the warrant for this is what the Doctor says immediately after his first regeneration, "I've been renewed. It's part of the Tardis. Without it, I couldn't survive". However vague the wording, there is evidently something that connects the Tardis and the Doctor's regeneration.

Nonetheless, I agree with you that some variation would be nice.

Thats because the same small group of people keep hi-jacking nearly every thread to shoehorn in some spurious criticism of Moffat and the minute you call them out on it just watch how indignant they get.

Witness the post at 04:13 which doesnt even attempt to address the thread topic and instead somehow manages to go on a bizarre tangent back to the paradigm daleks. I mean for goodness sake theyve all but admitted that was an error. Why are people resurrecting it over half a decade on?

'Coming next on Digital Spy Forums...Is Moffat responsible for Global Warming? Someone attempts to prove he was after these messages...'

It's that damn Timelord transdimensional technology again!

I mean, once it's out of the box, you can be both inside and outside the box at the same time.

Or a throwback to Zork.