The Impossible Girl: Who IS Clara Oswin Oswald?!?

[Gov Kodos]

Gov Kodos wrote:

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For what it's worth her name, Oswin, means God's friend and Oswald, God's power. What of Vastra's comment that perhaps the universe does make bargains?

http://www.thinkbabynames.com/meaning/1/Oswin

http://www.thinkbabynames.com/meaning/1/Oswald

Going a little further, Clara can mean bright. Of interesting note, the Benu or Bennu Bird's name in Egyptian mythology means bright or shining. The Benu Bird resurects itself after death, like the phoenix and our Clara seemingly. Also, in the Book of the dead the Benu Bird describes itself thus, “I am the Bennu bird, the Heart-Soul of Ra, the Guide of the Gods to the Tuat.” The Heart-Soul of Ra might be a fanciful way to look at Clara's other names described earlier, Oswin Oswald.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benu
http://www.egyptianmyths.net/phoenix.htm

So, could Clara's story be some kind of Phoenix, or inspired by the legends of such?

[Christopher]

Gov Kodos wrote:

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For what it's worth her name, Oswin, means God's friend and Oswald, God's power. What of Vastra's comment that perhaps the universe does make bargains?

Heck, I did the name-etymology thing back in post #3 of this thread. The meaning of "Oswald" I found was "divine ruler," and I put forth the admittedly unlikely notion that "Clara Oswald," "bright divine ruler," could tie into "White Guardian" somehow.

ToddCam wrote:

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You are wrong. I have no desire to see Clara as a Time Lady. I want to see a return of Susan and Romana.

The motivation is irrelevant; the methodology is the problem. You just don't start with a conclusion and fudge the reasoning and evidence to fit it. That's not a way to assess realistic likelihoods, just a way to rationalize whatever notion you're trying to rationalize. It doesn't make it any less unlikely that Clara is some kind of Gallifreyan, or that the very, very un-regeneration-like thing she's doing is merely a variant on regeneration.

I also think Time Lords somehow all being inaccessible is stupid, given the premise of the time-traveler known as the Doctor. If the Doctor visited Earth right after the events of "The Dalek Invasion of Earth" would Susan somehow be dead? It's stupid.

Not entirely, because it's been established that the Time War altered history extensively -- that the two sides kept going back in time and altering events to turn defeats into victories and so on, waging the same battles over and over. And though RTD left it ambiguous, Moffat established right off the bat that the history of the Doctor Who universe is mutable, and that major events from the RTD era like the Cyber King's rampage and the Dalek theft of Earth could be completely wiped from the timeline.

So since it was a Time War, it's entirely possible (under the very flexible temporal physics and logic of the Who-verse) that it was waged throughout history, that the Time Lords weren't just killed at a certain point in their timeline, but were effectively erased from ever having existed at all.

But Clara herself? I can make rhetorical points (badly argued or not) without believing them to be the case.

And I can state what terrible ideas I think they are.

I do understand probabilities, and as you quoted, I said I have serious doubts. I think it's almost certain she isn't a Time Lady.

Then why argue with me when I said she probably wasn't?! Why waste so many posts on it? Just to be annoying?

So more Time Lords is unimaginative? Because there have been TWO of them as companions in 50 years?

It's not about companions specifically. Nor is it about Time Lords specifically. Such a narrow definition excludes River Song and Jenny, two of the main characters that have been implausibly proposed as Clara's true identity.

And it's not about who's a companion and who isn't, it's about how to interpret the mystery of what Clara is and what she's doing. Seeing a character lead multiple lives in separate eras and jumping to the conclusion that she's a regenerating Gallifreyan, ignoring all the ways that doesn't fit the evidence, is what's unimaginative. It's retreating into the trite and familiar rather than opening one's mind to novelty.

[Gov Kodos]

Christopher wrote:

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Heck, I did the name-etymology thing back in post #3 of this thread. The meaning of "Oswald" I found was "divine ruler," and I put forth the admittedly unlikely notion that "Clara Oswald," "bright divine ruler," could tie into "White Guardian" somehow.

Maybe, I'd like that better than she's a Time Lord, though I would rather something other than Guardian's, too. I'd wondered, with Egyptian Goddess's in Oblisks, and Nefertiti, if Moffat might have gotten some inspiration from Egyptian Myth rather than recycle a past character or concept?

[ToddCam]

Christopher wrote:

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The motivation is irrelevant; the methodology is the problem.

You can't just say it's irrelevant when I was responding to your declaration that I had a "desired" conclusion. I was refuting the "desired" part.

Not entirely, because it's been established that the Time War altered history extensively -- that the two sides kept going back in time and altering events to turn defeats into victories and so on, waging the same battles over and over. And though RTD left it ambiguous, Moffat established right off the bat that the history of the Doctor Who universe is mutable, and that major events from the RTD era like the Cyber King's rampage and the Dalek theft of Earth could be completely wiped from the timeline.

So since it was a Time War, it's entirely possible (under the very flexible temporal physics and logic of the Who-verse) that it was waged throughout history, that the Time Lords weren't just killed at a certain point in their timeline, but were effectively erased from ever having existed at all.

A good point, but also terribly annoying. I guess Doctor Who is a show whose fans apparently demand less internal consistency than say, Star Trek, but as a fan I find the "throw out what's inconvenient" thing to be pretty lazy. And yes, I am well aware of all the contradictions in Trek. It may be impossible to keep a consistent universe, but at least there is (apparently) an effort. If the events of past episodes are now null, there should be due consideration for how these things played out, and even why this change would have taken place. If Earth was never stolen, does that mean Mickey and Martha never met? What change did the Eleventh Doctor make so that these things didn't come to pass? That's just the way I like my speculative fiction, I guess.

The Time Lords being wiped from existence doesn't really hold up to scrutiny. Many, many aliens have claimed to have heard of them in the modern Who. Jo specifically references them in "Death of the Doctor." And if the Doctor's race is gone, is the Doctor somebody who just came into existence at some point, sans history, and at what point? We know that various people still had memories of him (Sarah Jane, Jo), others' lives were affected (as mentioned by Sarah Jane in regards to Ian, Barbara, Ben, Polly, Tegan, Ace), and there are records of him, like with UNIT, strongly implying the First through Eighth's adventures did take place.

Then why argue with me when I said she probably wasn't?! Why waste so many posts on it? Just to be annoying?

Initially I was responding to your passive-aggressive statement, which I found annoying. Then I was arguing against your premise that I was supposed to have some pure rhetorical reasoning. Finally, you made other points, and I was discussing them (like the nature of something being unimaginative).

[intrinsical]

Christopher wrote:

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Not entirely, because it's been established that the Time War altered history extensively -- that the two sides kept going back in time and altering events to turn defeats into victories and so on, waging the same battles over and over. And though RTD left it ambiguous, Moffat established right off the bat that the history of the Doctor Who universe is mutable, and that major events from the RTD era like the Cyber King's rampage and the Dalek theft of Earth could be completely wiped from the timeline.

So since it was a Time War, it's entirely possible (under the very flexible temporal physics and logic of the Who-verse) that it was waged throughout history, that the Time Lords weren't just killed at a certain point in their timeline, but were effectively erased from ever having existed at all.

Where do you get the idea that the Timelords have been permanently erased from time? It has been clearly in End of Time that on the last day of the Time War, Daleks launched an all out attack on Galifrey. The Doctor used something called The Moment to create a Time Lock around Galifrey, trapping all Daleks and Timelords within. They're just trapped inside the Time Lock. A few Daleks have escaped from the Time Lock, so has The Master. Rassilon almost succeeded in releasing all the Timelords. Who knows, maybe a few other Timelords have also escaped.

To say Timelords have been "erased from ever having existed at all" is just wrong.

[Photoman15]

Hold on a sec. I just thought of something. Moffett doesn't do "throw away lines". Somebody brought Strax back to life after AGMGTW, as per the Doctor.
That's all.....

[Christopher]

ToddCam wrote:

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You can't just say it's irrelevant when I was responding to your declaration that I had a "desired" conclusion. I was refuting the "desired" part.

Taking it too literally. Again, your motivations have nothing to do with my objection. I'm not concerned with what you want or what you feel. I don't even know who you are. This isn't personal at all. I'm only talking about the methodology of the argument. The point is that you started with the conclusion and selectively interpreted or finessed the data to justify it. Which is effectively meaningless, because it can be used to "prove" any piece of nonsense.

A good point, but also terribly annoying. I guess Doctor Who is a show whose fans apparently demand less internal consistency than say, Star Trek, but as a fan I find the "throw out what's inconvenient" thing to be pretty lazy.

Oh, I've seen Doctor Who fans demand all sorts of things, but what fans demand from a show often has little to do with what the show itself contains. Doctor Who's strengths have never included consistency or internal logic. For nearly half a century, it's always been a make-it-up-as-you-go kind of affair. After all, they didn't have reruns or home video in the early years of the show. And since the show was aimed at children, nobody expected the viewers of a current serial to remember the events of a serial from five or ten years earlier. Not to mention that the producers kept changing, and new producers can't be expected to remember or choose to honor what their predecessors did.

So DW continuity has always been extremely loose and inconsistent. The recent stuff about time being overwritten is just a rationalization for what's always been part of the show.

And you know what? That's not lazy, not for this kind of storytelling. Doctor Who is a tall tale. It's a fantasy about a wizard with a magic box. It's a bedtime story for children, and it's got the bizarre, contradictory, stream-of-consciousness logic of a child's narrative, and that's perfectly appropriate in this context. If you choose to sit down and let someone tell you a ridiculous tall tale, then you have to expect that they'll change the story and contradict themselves and throw logic out the window whenever it suits them. That's the whole point of a tall tale.

intrinsical wrote:

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Where do you get the idea that the Timelords have been permanently erased from time?

That's not what I meant. What I meant was that, given the flexible temporal logic of the Who-verse, it doesn't work to assume that the Time Lords were alive prior to a certain calendar date and killed off after that date. And given that we've now been explicitly told that events we've seen in past serials can be erased from history, we can't assume that if the Doctor went back to where he left Susan, say, she'd still be there.

What I'm really saying, more fundamentally, is that Doctor Who chronology has never been that linear or sensible. Events always happen in relation to story chronology, even where time travellers are concerned. True, Moffat has done a lot of playing around with time travellers meeting each other in backward order, but the original show never bothered with that. Whenever two Time Lords met anew, it was always after their previous encounter from both of their points of view, no matter where they were in objective time. Whenever the Doctor returned to Gallifrey, no matter where he was in objective time, it was always after his previous visit. Whenever he encountered the Daleks or the Cybermen, no matter when he was in history, it was always after their previous encounter (and the Cybermen's design kept evolving forward even as the stories jumped all through the timeline). And once he'd left a companion behind, or even lost them to death, he never went back to visit them again. The show never cared to delve into the chronological conundrums of it; time travel was just a plot device for getting the Doctor and his friends into trouble, and the only order of events that mattered was story order.

The whole "All the Time Lords are dead now" idea is just the same kind of storytelling. No, it doesn't add up in linear terms, but it's not trying to, any more than the original show ever tried to make sense of the temporal logic of the Doctor's encounters with the Master or the Daleks or whoever. Trying to make coherent sense of it is like trying to explain the physics of how a cloud can provide structural support for a giant's castle or the biochemistry of how a goose can lay golden eggs (although Isaac Asimov took a stab at that once). It's misunderstanding the type of narrative that Doctor Who is.

[ToddCam]

Christopher wrote:

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Taking it too literally. Again, your motivations have nothing to do with my objection. I'm not concerned with what you want or what you feel. I don't even know who you are. This isn't personal at all. I'm only talking about the methodology of the argument. The point is that you started with the conclusion and selectively interpreted or finessed the data to justify it. Which is effectively meaningless, because it can be used to "prove" any piece of nonsense.

That's fair.

[Sindatur]

It seems many believe something happened to all Time Lords everywhere when it happened on Gallifrey. I've never understood that interpretation. I believe it only happened on Gallifrey, and anyone who wasn't on Gallifrey, wasn't Time Locked, Erased, whatever. So, If Romana was still in E-Space, she would be unaffected (Other than what happened to her Home Planet). If the Doctor went to the time and place where he dumped Susan off, she'd still be there (If she didn't run home to Gallifrey to participate in the Time War). This is why I think a Retooled Rani could be a very good possibility to be used as a villain in NuWho, because I think she would've stayed far away from Gallifrey and the Time War, unlike The Master, who could easily be lured back with the promise of more Regenerations, since he goes through lives like underwear and socks.

I do hope at some point thy bring Gallifrey and The Time Lords back. I don't wanna see them every week, or even every Series, but, I always enjoyed the few times they appeared in the Classic Series messing about with the Doctor's life and manipulatng him. I enjoy the Time Lord back stabbing Politics (The Gallifrey Adventures Audios with Romana II and Leela are awesome fo this, S5 coming out in February, I believe)

Regading Oswin The Dalek as a Companion - I too was thinking throughout Asylum of the Daleks how cool it would be to have Dalek Oswin as a Companion (Shades of Shalka Doctor with his Android The Master as a Companion)

[Christopher]

Sindatur wrote:

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It seems many believe something happened to all Time Lords everywhere when it happened on Gallifrey. I've never understood that interpretation. I believe it only happened on Gallifrey, and anyone who wasn't on Gallifrey, wasn't Time Locked, Erased, whatever. So, If Romana was still in E-Space, she would be unaffected (Other than what happened to her Home Planet). If the Doctor went to the time and place where he dumped Susan off, she'd still be there (If she didn't run home to Gallifrey to participate in the Time War).

The only thing to understand is that it works in whatever way the story requires. If the story requires all the Time Lords to be dead, then they're all dead, temporal logic be damned. At most, their past is "time-locked" so the Doctor can't go back and rescue them, or the Laws of Time forbid him from crossing their past time streams and altering their destinies. But if the story demands that a given Time Lord or Lady managed to survive, then a justification for that survival will be made up, no matter how bizarre or inconsistent it is.

[Sindatur]

Christopher wrote:

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The only thing to understand is that it works in whatever way the story requires. If the story requires all the Time Lords to be dead, then they're all dead, temporal logic be damned. At most, their past is "time-locked" so the Doctor can't go back and rescue them, or the Laws of Time forbid him from crossing their past time streams and altering their destinies. But if the story demands that a given Time Lord or Lady managed to survive, then a justification for that survival will be made up, no matter how bizarre or inconsistent it is.

I'm not seeing that, personally. I'm seeing them simply ignoring the possibility there were Time Lord off Planet, like The Rani or Susan or possibly The Monk or Romana. All we have to go on is "They're all dead" or "They're all gone" and they're obviously not dead, since they did escape from the Time Lock once, and "They're", I believe, refers to those that were on Gallifrey. Never once, has there been any indication there was any effect whatsoever outside of the Planet Gallifrey, that I cn recall seeing on the show.

Yes, the story writer will do what he wants, but, I've seen nothing on screen that implies an effect on any that were off planet.

[The Mirrorball Man]

Sindatur wrote:

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Yes, the story writer will do what he wants, but, I've seen nothing on screen that implies an effect on any that were off planet.

When he calls himself "the Last of the Time Lords", I never got the impression that what he really meant was "the Last of the Time Lords except for all those other Time Lords who live away from Gallifrey and that I could visit at any time if I felt like it".

[Christopher]

Sindatur wrote:

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Yes, the story writer will do what he wants, but, I've seen nothing on screen that implies an effect on any that were off planet.

On the contrary, there's plenty of onscreen evidence that the Time War raged far beyond Gallifrey. We were told this from the very start of the new series -- "Rose" established that the Nestene Consciousness had lost its homeworld in the Time War, and "The Unquiet Dead" established that the Gelth had been rendered incorporeal by it. A "webisode" of Sarah Jane's Alien Files, an online tie-in to The Sarah Jane Adventures, reveals that the species to which Eve from "The Mad Woman in the Attic" belonged was also wiped out in the Time War. Though most non-time-sensitive species knew the war only as a myth (except for the Sontarans, who were aware of the war but barred from participating as they desired), it was devastating to time-sensitives across the universe.

http://tardis.wikia.com/wiki/Last_Great_Time_War

I envision something like a hotter version of Enterprise's Temporal Cold War (or like the open temporal war alluded to in "Storm Front") -- time travellers moving throughout history, jockeying for advantage, changing history to make things better for themselves and worse for the enemy, while trying to prevent the enemy from doing the same. It would've been mostly invisible to non-time-sensitives because they wouldn't be aware their history had been changed, but time-sensitives would've been aware of the chaos going on, and would've been drawn into the conflict in their own defense, or become pawns or cannon fodder for the main combatants. Any Time Lords off Gallifrey would've noticed as history changed around them, and activists like Susan and Romana would've surely gotten involved and tried to help. So it's unlikely that they weren't involved. They were probably fighting by the Doctor's side, and he saw them die. After all, if he'd thought they might've escaped, he surely would've gone looking for them. He was certain his people were all gone; he wouldn't have just assumed that, not if there was any chance they could've sat it out safely.

[Sindatur]

Christopher wrote:

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On the contrary, there's plenty of onscreen evidence that the Time War raged far beyond Gallifrey. We were told this from the very start of the new series -- "Rose" established that the Nestene Consciousness had lost its homeworld in the Time War, and "The Unquiet Dead" established that the Gelth had been rendered incorporeal by it. A "webisode" of Sarah Jane's Alien Files, an online tie-in to The Sarah Jane Adventures, reveals that the species to which Eve from "The Mad Woman in the Attic" belonged was also wiped out in the Time War. Though most non-time-sensitive species knew the war only as a myth (except for the Sontarans, who were aware of the war but barred from participating as they desired), it was devastating to time-sensitives across the universe.

http://tardis.wikia.com/wiki/Last_Great_Time_War

None of that says a thing about Time Lords who were off planet being plucked out of time? I do agree Romana (if able) and Susan (and I'm sure many others) would've rushed home to join the fight, though

[Christopher]

I never said "plucked out of time." What I meant, and evidently didn't convey clearly enough, was that the war was waged non-linearly, that it explicitly involved going back and rewriting past events to undo defeats, so we can't assume that just because we saw a given Time Lord alive at a given point in history, that means that event is still part of the post-Time-War history.

Remember "Genesis of the Daleks?" The Time Lords sending the Doctor back into Skaro's past with instructions to prevent the Daleks from ever being created in the first place? That episode is retroactively regarded as the opening salvo of the Great Time War, and similar tactics were probably used routinely by both sides once the war was in full gear. So yes, it does seem likely that many of the combatants were not merely killed, but erased entirely. That's only to be expected when you're talking about a time war.