Fan Theory: Can we discuss fan theories?

[Nightowl1701]

In my my mind, the Watcher in Logopolis is like K'Enpo in Planet of Spiders: His future self. However, unlike that situation, the Doctor's Watcher is just like the Doctor himself: Chaos personified. K'Enpo, being the future self of the Hermit, is just his present self, a literal prototype of composure, knowledge and wisdom. He knows and understands how regeneration works, in a way the Doctor never has or ever wants to. He's in harmony with his future projection and allows it to take his place, making for a seamless transition. Whereas the Doctor is rarely ever in good company when he meets even his past incarnations by mistake or otherwise. He's in complete disharmony with his future, and none more so than the Fourth Doctor, who might've gone on forever where it not for Almost Five knocking on his door.

In short, the Watcher is Five, who should've arrived by now, IMO. Its the Time Lords version of the Grim Reaper - only, he's not Death, he's the Regeneration.

Hence why Four regenerates from a fall his future selves could walk away from - the fall didn't fatally wound him. Didn't even hurt him that much. Having defeated the Master after getting his eviction notice from the Watcher, he was simply ready to go, and knew the fall would be a pretext his companions wouldn't even question.

 

[BritishSeaPower]

^ Oh, I like that a lot.

 

[Emperor-Tiberius]

Of course, Six then kills/defeats the Valeyard in Brink of Death, thereby definitively destroying any future Watcher from coming to existence. Thus why, since he became Seven, we've never seen a Watcher again. Even the FIfth got to have seen his Watcher, thanks to Paul Cornell and Big Finish.

 

[Gingerbread Demon]

@Nightowl1701 I like that idea too.

 

[Gingerbread Demon]

Did Romana waste 4 regenerations finding the perfect body?

 

[Mr Soak]

Doubt it. Given the regenration lasts longer than the pyrotechnics (see The Christmas Invasion and the Doctor's hand), it is likely that the multiple bodies was all in the one regeneration. It' would only be at the end of the regneration process that the body would "lock".

 

[Nightowl1701]

Did Romana waste 4 regenerations finding the perfect body?

There's three ways you could look at that:

1) Romana was still in mid-regeneration - her body hadn't 'set' yet. She was much better at the process than the Doctor.
2) Romana had settled on her new body (Astra), but the Doctor was being a jerk about it. So she projected Watchers of other potential selves into the console room while she remained in the back, needling the Doctor until he was finally ready to accept the Astra face. (C'mon, even she couldn't change clothes that fast.)
3) According to the Short Trips story The Lying Old Witch in the Wardrobe... the 'Companion' riding shotgun with Four throughout Destiny of the Daleks wasn't really Romana at all. (I'll let you look that particular story up.)

 

[Gingerbread Demon]

There's three ways you could look at that:

1) Romana was still in mid-regeneration - her body hadn't 'set' yet. She was much better at the process than the Doctor.
2) Romana had settled on her new body (Astra), but the Doctor was being a jerk about it. So she projected Watchers of other potential selves into the console room while she remained in the back, needling the Doctor until he was finally ready to accept the Astra face. (C'mon, even she couldn't change clothes that fast.)
3) According to the Short Trips story The Lying Old Witch in the Wardrobe... the 'Companion' riding shotgun with Four throughout Destiny of the Daleks wasn't really Romana at all. (I'll let you look that particular story up.)

Oh.......... OK so that companion was her watcher. It all makes sense now.

 

[BritishSeaPower]

Interesting that "Lying Old Witch..." names the TARDIS projection Iraj, close to Idris.

 

[matthunter]

I kinda like the idea that regeneration is either something the Doctor never quite paid attention to at school or is an artificial process that the Time Lords improved, hence why younger "newbloods" like Romana can control it better. The series of course has nods to either with the Master and Mels being able to control the process to some degree ("young and strong", "focusing on the waist size") and at other times implying it's random ("good luck" to the General, unless that's an admission that it doesn't always work at all).

 

[Gingerbread Demon]

Well hey at least with regeneration they get a body and it doesn't malfunction and they become a blob of genetic goo.

 

[diankra]

Submit any of your own....... Feel free.

I've always since the 4th Doctor had this fan theory in my head that what we see in a Timelor/lady is not the actual being. They're not human, they come from an alien world, and their physical body may be a disguise for their actual form.

That was suggested by the Daleks in Masterplan.

 

[Gingerbread Demon]

That was suggested by the Daleks in Masterplan.

Really? What was the suggestion made?

 

[SpocksOddSocks]

Really? What was the suggestion made?

I'd like to know this too. Why am I imagining someone explaining that Timelords are rather like their technology and bigger on the inside?

 

[Gingerbread Demon]

I'd like to know this too. Why am I imagining someone explaining that Timelords are rather like their technology and bigger on the inside?

They're all obsese on a planetary scale.

 

[diankra]

Really? What was the suggestion made?

Something like "He only appears human..."

 

[matthunter]

Something like "He only appears human..."

Well, that doesn't really imply that he's actually a star jellyfish or something even more esoteric. It means he's NOT human, but you can't outwardly tell. All it implies is that Time Lords share a body type with us (or more accurately us with them, since they evolved first).

 

[diankra]

Well, that doesn't really imply that he's actually a star jellyfish or something even more esoteric. It means he's NOT human, but you can't outwardly tell. All it implies is that Time Lords share a body type with us (or more accurately us with them, since they evolved first).

Checked and it's in episode eight:
"He looked like an Earth creature."
"That's only a disguise. The Daleks know of him."

 

[Qonundrum]

Did Romana waste 4 regenerations finding the perfect body?

"The Mark of the Rani" hints at time lords being able to change appearances more readily, though the Doctor is "stuck with what he's got" according to the Rani, who was clearly having fun mocking him. But her dialogue opens up more possible reasons as to why he can't control appearance change (yet Romana could), had one heart in his (presumably, canon has been inconsistent - what a shock) first incarnation, etc. "The Christmas Invasion" tells that within a neat and tidy 24 hour cycle until it shuts down (instead of a slow leveling down), post-regeneration, bits that are lopped off can grow back - also hinting at changes to one's looks being possible. In other words, Romana didn't waste four regeneration cycles. Later eras, dating back to 1985, were finding ways to "de-jokify" it.

Amazing what a scene written as a joke (disdain lampooning of the show?) in 1979 has grown into something almost plausible within the confines of the show's universe.

 

[BritishSeaPower]

There are fans who still bend over backwards to try and justify the rather dumb "Women Can't Be Captains" line from Turnabout Intruder in Star Trek (including more than a few using it as "evidence" against Discovery) that I can't be surprised about the Romana conundrum.

Something about the Doctor being half-human and having less control...