If the Daleks then why not the Time Lords?

Discussion in 'Doctor Who' started by Gotham Central, Oct 2, 2012.

  1. The Wormhole

    The Wormhole Fleet Admiral Admiral

    Joined:
    Jul 23, 2001
    Location:
    The Wormhole
    The Writer's Tale makes it quite clear that RTD doesn't care for the Time Lords and implies Moffat doesn't either.

    The perfect quote which sums up everything about who and what the Time Lords are.

    Not just uber-fans, RTD described it as such in his Time War essay written in 2005.
     
  2. G2309

    G2309 Captain Captain

    Joined:
    Feb 28, 2009
    From what I understand their complacency made them weaker and less likely to survive. Which is why they were desperate enough to resurect the master to help in the war.
    Even when the timelords do appear in the end of time te don't get much screen time which shows how much Russel T Davis cared for them.
     
  3. The Wormhole

    The Wormhole Fleet Admiral Admiral

    Joined:
    Jul 23, 2001
    Location:
    The Wormhole
    RTD was very relunctant to include the Time Lords in The End of Time. Even when he finally decided to use them, he found them difficult to write for and had a hard time just trying to figure out how they would talk.
     
  4. Timby

    Timby o yea just like that Administrator

    Joined:
    May 28, 2001
    They're definitely more interesting in their absence, but all of the Doctor's whining about being the last of them, and missing his people and all that ... it really fell flat for me, because it was as though the Doctor had completely forgotten that his people were raging assholes.

    As for the Daleks, I'm just glad that they're finally un-fucked and are re-established as Being Out There, Doing Bad Things, so now new stories don't have to go through the hoops of the Daleks showing up, someone crying "oh, no, some Daleks survived the Time War, what will we doooooooo" as a result of another ship falling through time or hiding behind the moon or behind the sofa or what have you, which means the stories don't have to waste time with some increasingly masturbatory explanation of why these Daleks survived.
     
  5. TemporalFlux

    TemporalFlux Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

    Joined:
    Sep 13, 2002
    Location:
    The End of Time
    The Time Lords set up an escape plan through The Master; but another of their race, The Doctor, stopped it. The Daleks could have set up their own escape plan; would there be a Dalek of good conscience to stand up and stop it?
     
  6. The Wormhole

    The Wormhole Fleet Admiral Admiral

    Joined:
    Jul 23, 2001
    Location:
    The Wormhole
    Surviving the genocide of his entire species probably left the Doctor with some guilt issues, especially since he's the one who caused it. As a coping mechanism, he chose to remember the Time Lords by noble ideals they claimed to believe in as opposed to remembering them as the galactic douchebags they really were.
     
  7. Holdfast

    Holdfast Fleet Admiral Admiral

    Joined:
    Feb 19, 2000
    Location:
    17 Cherry Tree Lane
    The Time Lords are really one of the few alien races the Doctor can be genuinely intellectually intimidated by; that's why I'd like to see them back again. Most races are basically either children or curiosities to him, with the possible exception of the Daleks and maybe one or two others. He may care for many of them, but there's always a power imbalance in the relationship. Time Lords, whether adversaries or allies, have to be taken more seriously by him.

    Not just someone to teach, impress, protect, awe or defeat, but a person to talk to in a way only adult equals can. That's the dynamic I'd like to see if the Time Lords ever returned. The whole power/corruption/"jerks" angle discussed upthread is a mirror I'd love to see the Doctor be forced to emotionally & intellectually hold up to himself in a meaningful & literate way.
     
  8. DWF

    DWF Admiral Admiral

    Joined:
    May 19, 2001
    Location:
    Columbus, Ohio
    He remembers the planet fondly but I've not heard him talk about the Time Lords that way.
     
  9. Mr Light

    Mr Light Admiral Admiral

    Joined:
    Dec 7, 1999
    Location:
    Pennsylvania
    Doesn't he say in The End of Time that he chooses to remember them fondly, but by the end they were totally warped?
     
  10. The Wormhole

    The Wormhole Fleet Admiral Admiral

    Joined:
    Jul 23, 2001
    Location:
    The Wormhole
    Indeed, from The End of Time:
    Wilf: "But Doctor, I've heard you talk about your people and how great they were."
    Doctor: "That's how I choose to remember them, as the Time Lords of old. But then they went to war, and it changed them."

    I alos like this quote from The Sound of Drums. Although technically about Gallifrey, it can also be applied to the Time Lords and their society:
    Jack: "All the legends I've heard about Gallifrey made it sound so perfect."
    Doctor: "Perfect to look at, maybe. And it was..."
     
  11. Starkers

    Starkers Admiral Admiral

    Joined:
    Apr 22, 2001
    Location:
    Behind Enemy Lines
    Yeah, it'd be nice to have a situation like the War Games again, the Doctor is actually scared of his own people.
     
  12. The Wormhole

    The Wormhole Fleet Admiral Admiral

    Joined:
    Jul 23, 2001
    Location:
    The Wormhole
    We kinda saw that in The End of Time. After all, if the Doctor wasn't scared of the Time Lords, why then did he grab a gun upon learning they were returning?
     
  13. MacLeod

    MacLeod Admiral Admiral

    Joined:
    Mar 8, 2001
    Location:
    Great Britain
    No doubt the Doctor learned of the President's plan to destroy the universe, which was the point at which he decided to use 'the moment' to end the war.
     
  14. Sindatur

    Sindatur The Gray Owl Wizard Admiral

    Joined:
    Jan 2, 2011
    Location:
    Sacramento, CA
    Yea, obviously we wouldn't want them appearing every week, but, I can't think of any classic interaction with the Time Lords/Gallifrey that I dislike. I'd enjoy seeing him on Gallifrey or having the Time Lords pulling his strings once in a while
     
  15. Haggis and tatties

    Haggis and tatties Vice Admiral Admiral

    Joined:
    Dec 27, 2002
    Location:
    Glasgow
    Yeap...love the timelords, love them harrasing the doctor now and again when they want something.......i would love some day to see them come back and just like the present doctor, step back out of the spotlight and back to their roots of custodians of time and space again.
     
  16. JoeZhang

    JoeZhang Vice Admiral Admiral

    Joined:
    Jan 9, 2008
    Except for their first appearance (where the Doctor and the War Chief shit themselves at the idea of the Timelords appearing), I find the Time Lords desperately dull.

    Every time they appear, it's like a super-powered council committee fill with old people waiting for a prostate exam.
     
  17. Romulan_spy

    Romulan_spy Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

    Joined:
    Sep 8, 2000
    Location:
    Terre Haute, IN. USA
    If they want to bring back the Time Lords, here is how they could do it. Explain that a handful of Time Lords escaped just before the end. They went back in time and using genetic engineering, over time, cloned an entire new civilization of Time Lords that have been hiding from the universe all this time. After growing in strength, they decide it is time to reassert themselves as the master civilization in the universe. Since they are clones, the show could portray some similarities with the Time Lords from the old Who while introducing some new elements as well. They would not have to behave exactly like the Time Lords of old.
     
  18. The Mirrorball Man

    The Mirrorball Man Vice Admiral Admiral

    Joined:
    Dec 18, 1999
    Location:
    Switzerland
    That's what DC did with the Guardians and it didn't make them more interesting.
     
  19. Sci

    Sci Fleet Admiral Admiral

    Joined:
    Mar 2, 2002
    Location:
    Montgomery County, State of Maryland
    There's nothing cool about an Omniscient Council of Vagueness.
     
  20. paudemge

    paudemge Captain Captain

    Joined:
    Nov 11, 2004
    The Daleks won the time war.