Near the end of the episode, all the past Doctors from One to Nine arrive at Gallifrey to help save the planet. But one thing I'm curious about is who exactly sent them? Was it the Eleventh Doctor, or the Moment? And why exactly did they all need to be present anyway? Surely Eleven could have used the calculations that the TARDIS had been running since his first incarnation, or am I missing something?
In Universe explanation: They needed the power of multiple Tardises Real world explanation: It was the 50th Anniversary episode!
I have no problem with Hurt, Tennant and Smith's Doctors realizing they needed more computational power to create a planetary-wide stasis field. So they went back and convinced past doctors to do the computation and to show up. I know some are worried about past doctors knowing the future and the consequences of it. But I feel it shouldn't be too hard for the 3 doctors to convince the past 8 doctors that what they are doing is absolutely critical to Gallifrey's survival and to do it with the TARDIS on autopilot and sensors completely turned off so they don't know exactly what's happening or when it happened. Capaldi's doctor shows up because he already knows he's needed.
I had a different read on it, based on the fanwanky trailer. Matt Smith says that there's something the Doctor has been running from "all my lives." He can't be speaking of "The Moment," because he's only been running from that for three lives. What if he's always known, even if only in a subconscious way, that he'll be there when Gallifrey falls? That he's been running all of his lives from his future, not his past? And, of course, Capaldi's there because he needs to be there. Perhaps the calculation doesn't even finish until Capaldi's life.
The Tardis took them all there. Sexy doesn't always take the Doctor where he wants to go, but always where he needs to go.
More to the point, I'd say there's at least some indication that The Moment is indeed the Doctor's TARDIS from the far-future. The Moment's dialogue about confusing the past and the future felt very reminiscent of Idris in The Doctor's Wife.
"And for my next trick..." I like to think that the Ninth did, based on that. Just an assumption of mine.
The similarity could be due to the fact that they are both sentient Time Lord tech, not that they are the same sentient Time Lord tech.
I believe Bad Wolf was indeed a melding of Rose and The TARDIS, and I believe The Moment's Sentience was indeed a Bad Wolf incarnation. So, yea, Bad Wolf, The Moment, The TARDIS, all the same thing, IMHO.
That's kind of creepy! I like it. But The Moment said something like she took the form from the Doctor's past ... or was it his future? She can never really be sure. Rose Tyler. No, that's not right. Bad Wolf. So this implies she was mimicking Bad Wolf. But I much prefer the notion the Bad Wolf, the TARDIS, and The Moment are all aspects of the same presence.
Particularly when you tie that with Idris/TARDIS's statement that she stole The Doctor, rather than the other way around. This particular old TARDIS had a plan for the universe and she needed someone to act it out. The Doctor was that someone.
The memory problem is not really a problem. All the classic Doctors would forget what happened same as Hurt's and Tennant's Doctor. Either the three of them recruited them themselves or they got picked up by The Moment. I'd like to think it was Eleven who went around and recruited his earlier incarnation, so so I can play sort of a minisode in my mind where he travels further and further in his timeline with an increasingly large fleet of TARDISes until they all swoop in on Gallifrey.
It seems like there are only really two options: Either the Eleventh or Tenth Doctor contacted them all (psychically?), or it was the Moment.
^ I still like my Tardis idea. After all, they made a big deal about how the three sonic screwdrivers were essentially the same earlier in the episode. And 'The Eleventh Hour' established that the screwdrivers come from the Tardis console. Its the same Tardis all through time, too.
^ That is a lovely idea, HoHoHod0, but it makes more sense that to think the early Doctors were brought there. The Tardis for the First and Second Doctors had faulty navigational circuitry, so they couldn't have steered to Gallifrey without help.
Sorry ... what? I'm just sitting here at my desk saying, "HoHoHod0" over and over to myself and chuckling over it. Complete distraction!