The Day of the Doctore Review Thread (Spoilers?)

Assuming the Master doesn't pop up somewhere else first, of course for a laugh if/when the Doctor makes it back to Gallifrey and dematerialises his TARDIS in the panoptigon when he steps out they say "Welcome Lord President", too which I'm sure the Dcotor would reply with something like "O no not again."

 

From what I remember, probably a couple of years out of date, when the BBC One Channel Controller was asking for new drama submissions a couple of years ago, they said that the budget was £800,000-£1,200,000 per hour.

 

I was converting from pounds and ballparking the budget, knowing that Doctor Who is in the top budgeting tier. Eccleston's series, eight years ago, was budgeted at roughly one million dollars an episode.

Here's a quote from Ben Stephenson earlier in the year:

By the math, the average across the BBC is less than a million dollars per hour.

If the BBC funded it alone, the budget for "Day" would have been under two million dollars. If they got a cofunding partner (like they did for "The Five Doctors" thirty years ago), Moffat would have had more money to work with. Except for BBC America's involvement in Gatiss' film, I haven't heard about any cofunding deals in the anniversary events.

 

I suspect each companion is subjected to the memory erasing device after their visit to UNIT. So the visit need not be in her future for her to not remember it.

 

So it appears it's taken $10m in the cinema in 3 days.
http://www.theguardian.com/media/2013/nov/27/doctor-who-50th-day-doctor-box-office-hit

 

True, but it seems more likely the pictures on the board are there for foreshadowing than to imply previous visits and nothing else. Since multiple Claras exist across time, that might be one of the other Claras, one who is hanging with Capaldi's Doctor?

 

Perhaps. I just took it at face value (admittedly unwise with Doctor Who ).

 

If it was another show runner, that might be the end of it, just a mystery. Moffat, though, loves the paradoxes of time travel. If this was RTD, I wouldn't think much of the pictures and hand mystery.

 

Exactly, no way, no how are you going to have the hero kill kids on a family show. Once I saw them, I knew Gallifrey had to be saved. And, really, I think Moffat has a great point about that.

Mr Awe

 

Honestly, I find the whole thing takes away from the threat the Time Lords posed. I'm sure the Doctor always knew there were innocent people on Gallifrey that didn't deserve to die and that contributed to the guilt he's felt. The fact that he, the man who abhors violence death went ahead and committed genocide against two races, one of them his own emphasises just how bad the Time War had gotten and how much of a threat the Daleks and even the Time Lords posed. Just how desperate he was to end things that the man who always tries to find another way couldn't and ended up slaughtering innocents. Yes, we can say that's a most un-Doctor-like thing to do, and even the Doctor would agree, as evidenced by the fact the Hurt incarnation was "stripped of his knighthood" if you will and not considered a true Doctor. But the Time War had gotten so bad there really was no way out. Even the Time Lady Rassilon vaporised in The End of Time agreed that mutual genocide against the Time Lords and the Daleks was the only way out.

But now all that is negated and the Doctor simply only thought he committed the atrocity that has haunted him all this time.

 

On top of all that, I wonder if his inaction in Genesis of the Daleks, also weighed heavily on him when considering and after, WarDoctor used the Moment. If he had taken that action, The Time Lords may not have ever gone off the rails, and the Genocide of his race mightn't have ever been needed

 

The episode shows how avoiding war can be difficult but worth it. It was obviously an easier solution in the practical sense to just destroy both sides to end the war. However, easier doesn't mean better. In the end, the Doctor found a better solution using his creativity and ingenuity. That is thoroughly a Doctor Who theme and perfect for the anniversary special.

Also, the Time Lords were never before shown to be such a huge threat until the new series. They were typically idle, boring, and passive. So, the atrocities never really fit that. Going back to a less war like race really doesn't detract from anything at all!

Mr Awe

 

Well, not entirely. Sometimes they were portrayed as corrupt as well, notably in "The Trial of a Time Lord." In the Doctor's words from "The Ultimate Foe," the concluding story of that arc:

So the potential was there, but presumably it took the unending horrors of the Time War to hone that potential and bring out the worst in them.

 

It would have been cool to see some random people regenerating in the background during the battle in Arcadia would make it feel more like Gallifrey than some other random planet the Daleks were attacking.

 

It was generally the more subtle, politically ruthless type of thing rather than blatant military ruthlessness. Good point though, the underpinnings were there. They were a race with that potential.

Mr Awe

 

Yep, their MO was passiveness and non-intervention. Very different than the active militarism. They wouldn't go out of their way to screw over a race, but they'd certainly look the other way if someone else was doing it.

I forget, was it Underworld that showed how they became that way, an intervention with benign motivations that went horribly wrong.

Mr Awe

 

Loved it! Even better in 3D in the cinema!

 

I liked it too. It made the special bigger/more movie like.


The part with the doctor dangling from the TARDIS in the background as "DOCTOR WHO" pops up made think of a zany british comedy(nothing in particular)

 

when "MATT SMITH" popped up you mean the Doctor Who title was the 1963 version

I loved the I Am The Doctor theme during that sequence. I want the soundtrack. now!