I don't get Doctor Who and the fact that Galifrey is no longer in existence. The planet may be destroyed in this current time, but surely with the Doctor being a timelord, why can't he just travel back in time a few years to when it did exist? Problem solved, he would be able to see that wonderful sunset again. It seems rather daft that he is mourning over the loss of his planet when he can quite simply travel back in time to whatever period he likes and be on his home planet again. He has done the same with other planets in the past. Time is no object to him.

Crossing back into established events is strictly forbidden, except for cheap tricks.

Im not a expert but im sure I read that his home planet was wiped from time and space during the time war and because of that it does not exsist in the past anymore.

Am sure someone with better knowledge of Doctor Who will know if i have that right or wrong.

Hi,

I'm no expert but havin seen the way many ppl talk about the doctor going back in time before the war, it seems that people see the war as a single localized event.

Since it's a time war i always assumed, like the previous poster, that it took place out side of our normal timeline or perhaps it took place at the beginning of the time lords origins b4 galifrey was even thought of?

Anyway, thats my thoughts. Feel free to pull them apart.

Not sure if it was ever officially confirmed on the TV show (the books may have done so) but it seems to be the case that Time Lords were not able (or at least not allowed) to travel into the past on Galifrey.

Everytime the Doctor visited Galifrey on the show it was after his previous visit*. So either it was physically impossible for Time Lords to travel into Galifrey's past or it was just Time Lord protocol that you always visited after the last time you were there.

If the former then obviously the Doctor can not go back to a time before his last visit (which was presumably sometime during the War).

If on the otherhand the rule about not travelling to the past on Galifrey was just a Law introduced by the Timelords (to presumably stop anyone messing up their past) then it would in theory be possible for the Doctor to travel back to Galifrey (unless of course it has been totally removed from Space and Time as others have suggested)



*taking this idea further it could be suggested that the Doctor's personal Timeline and that of Galifrey are the same, if the Doctor spent 50 years of his life away from Galifrey then 50 years would also have passed on the planet the next time he visited. A similar thing seemed to be true for his encounters with the Master (every encounter was after the the previous one from both their points of view).

I assume Gallifrey is wiped from the timeline so it has never existed, the Doctor is left as a bit of an anacronism as he comes from a non-existant planet.
It is interesting though that both Jabe and Capt Jack knew of the timelords existance, even if dismissed as legendry.

Possibly because it has been 'pulled' rather than never physically existing there remains race memories of something.

I'm sure there was some theory involving them still existing somehow in people's heads.

G

Given the Doctor's "Back to the Future" explanation to Martha, surely he would have ceased to exist if the planet had never existed?

But also, why didn't the Time Lords just go back to Skaro just before life started to evolve there and nuke it out of the sky?

It's difficult, this 4-dimensional plot stuff!

Have you seen "Genesis Of The Daleks"?

Well it was my understanding that the Tardis protected the doctor in some way from being wiped from existence.

That was the plan, but the doctor couldn't go through with it. He said something along the lines of

"If you saw a small child and someone told you he would grow up to be evil, could you kill that child?"

You're not thinking in the right dimensions. The last time war as he put it removed Gallifrey and the time lords from existence completely from the timestream; in terms of red dwarf, they have a quantum probability of less than zero, because they never had a quantum probability to begin with.

So essentially, it isn't like he can go back and save members of the council for example, because they were never there in the first place - the doctor is essentially a paradox. That is, at least, the way I see it.

Also, if I remember my Dr. Who correctly, the TARDIS shouldn't be functioning if there is now Gallifrey.

Why? The Eye of Harmony, which existed under the Citadel. This is what gave the Timelords the power to travel through Time.

Also, as a previous poster mentioned, it is forbidden to travel into Gallifreys past, as the TARDIS has a failsaft to prevent this.

Although, I'm fairly sure that the Doctor has done this in one of the BBC books.

Again, I think that this is attributed to something of a paradox. The doctor has stated however that the tardis is powered by the energy of the universe. I'm not sure whether that refers to cosmic rays, or the eye of harmony

I think that Rassilon, or those before him, could have thought of such an eventuality and harnessed powers like the ones you mention. Perhaps the Timelords can exist in diaspora and somehow reconvene in the future.

It's that most wonderful of things, a shifting TV format.

Timelords weren't even thought of on 22 Nov 1963, they "evolved" as a plot device to perpetuate things into the Troughton era and beyond. So the possibilities are endless!

I think it would be cool if he did somehow get back and rescue some of the timelords, or even Galifrey. I dont think it would detract from the Doctors character at all, in fact I think it would make him even more interesting. How would he cope with others like himself around, after being alone all these years?

but isn't that what he wants? to not be alone?

Yes, but can you imagine the impact, of not knowing anyone of your species for so long, then suddenly being surrounded by them?
It would either blow your mind with happiness, or crack you up with the realisation you are no longer yourself unique. People there to criticise you, put rules in place, spoil your fun. Perhaps no more cavorting around with human companions?
I dont think I am getting my point over very well!
Sometimes what you want is not always what you need....

Not only that, but there are limits to the kind of rules the doctor will break. My current thinking is one of a circular pattern; I was discussing something like this with a friend a couple of nights ago, and he mentioned that current Gallifreyan civilisation was built upon the ruins of the previous one; two timelords were known as Rassilon and Omega, and the third was an unknown (but suspected to be the doctor). It's plausible, if you go by that thinking that the last great time war leaves the ruins of Gallifrey, and the doctor and another two timelords help him rebuild.

You should remember that the master doesn't see himself as evil, so if there is a "greater good", there is no reason why he wouldn't collaborate witht he doctor. To rebuild Gallifreyan society, for example.

Certainly have - but there they just tried to stop the Daleks being invented by Davros. I meant go back further and stop life evolving on the planet.

Regarding the "could you kill the child" argument above... no I couldn't kill the child, but if you find a way of stopping him from being conceived then that'd have the same effect.

I always get the idea that the Time WAr was the climax of a series of checkmates whereby the Time Lords and the Daleks (now equally matched in their time travel abilities) just kept undoing whatever the other did, so this rules that out too.

G

Its a sci-fi show for goodness sake, the writers could easily bring back Galifrey and the rest of the timelords if they wanted to, they could easily think of a way round it. Look how Buffy suddenly gained a sister!

I definitely think Galifrey and the rest of the Time Lords should be brought back it makes little sense to get rid of the possibilities they have.

Wasn't the doctor banished from Galifrey at one stage?

I think the reasoning is that given this was a "Time" war Galifrey and the Daleks were removed from time. They no longer exist in time, any time.

I think there's a bit of exposition in Dalek as to how that went down and how that lone Dalek survived, is there not?

Of course, we know now that there were some Daleks hiding outside time, in the void.

If I recall correctly the 2006 annual says that no one knows how the war ended, and alludes to a relic on some far off planet that depicts the war with one survivor.

I imagine the Doctor must also have been out of time when he "pushed the button".

Or survived al la Dalek...

I'm sure someone must have a more detailed answer.



Not as such. He seems to have run off with a, definitely stolen, TARDIS at an unknown point before the series began, settling in Totter's Lane in the junkyard.

When his people caught up with his 2nd incarnation they banished him to earth, disabling his TARDIS, and forced a regeneration on him - this is how the 3rd Doctor's adventures start.

Interestingly, he was later made President of the High Council and was quite welcome on Galifrey.
Last edited by Pingu's Dad : 20-04-2007 at 19:49

He fibbed his way out of the position, by making Flavia President in effect until he returned - and she said something like - "Refusing the mantle of President is intolerable..."

I'm not sure what happened after that, never saw Trial of a Timelord.

Wasn't the presidency given to him at the end of 5 Doctors? PD runs into the Tardis and Tegan (or Turlough) said something like "o you're running away?"

"Why not? After all, it's how it all began" he replies with a grin.

Very fitting way to celebrate 25 years.