The idea is that the ship blows up because they're dead (also it's a clumsy echo of Earthshock: Adric stays and dies, Turlough runs and survives).
Yes. But if they had just blown up the ship when they still were alive, they certainly would have ended up dead! It was completely implausible that there was no other way to end their life than the Doctor sacrificing himself. It would have made more sense had it been about curing them.
Maybe if timelash had been a better story, some-one might have been interesting in writing a story for the 3rd Doctor's adventure there (say as an MA novel if not a BF Companion Chronicle or Short Trip).
They're continually regenerating. Drop them into a Sun and they regenerate as fast as they die. At least, that's the idea.
Didn't say it made sense... but if you continually regenerate you'd repair as fast as the damage was done.
I liked it otherwise, but Valeyard was just a bad idea. Doctor will become evil in the future? Just no. Also, how is Valeyard's plan even supposed to make sense? If he manages to get the Doctor killed now, then certainly that is a paradox as Valeyard is the future Doctor!
He, err, wanted to destroy the unvierse with a really neat paradox? Maybe? Who knows? Okay, admittedly that didn't really make that much sense, but I still dig the idea of a future evil Doctor or just any future Doctor, really. I mean, we only ever get multi-Doctor stories with the current Doctor and past incarnations, so meeting a (potential) future incarnation already made me really excited
He's a possible future Doctor gone dark. Nothing wrong with that. Or, his own Watcher gone evil. Again, nothing wrong with that.
That’s not what he is at all, the dialogue states it...he’s basically a temporal construct the Time Lords made to prosecute the Doctor. They nabbed him as a distillation in mid regeneration (between your twelfth and final regeneration...every dark thought the Doctor ever had basically) and the payment for success would be his very existence, taking over the Doctor basically. The Time Lords are going through a very shady phase here...hence the Doctor being on Trial in basically Guantanamo. His previous trial was on Gallifrey proper, and he’s technically Lord High President of Gallifrey since the Five Doctors. He still has that role in this and his next regeneration, despite what is said here. He references it in Remembrance.
Continually regenerating. That and the ship being tasked with keeping them alive are the key here....the ship is good enough to steal from Time Lords with. It’s not going to let being sling into a sun bothers it...and the source of all time lord power is a collapsed star. Regelation, even in a dying star would basically mean they would burn for eternity.
But if the Doctor permanently dies as the sixth Doctor, then there won't be a point between his twelfth and final regeneration!
Of course there will, just it will be the Valeyard. That’s how evil he has the potential to be, a recursive loop of Dark Doctor. It’s also the Time Lords..they can do what they like with time, more or less, it’s sort of the point of how corrupt they have become. It’s also quite apparent that the Valeyard knows he’s being lied to (I.e as you say, it does t sound super likely as something even the Time Lords would consider a good idea.) and is quite happy to have a different plan involving the Matrix, because again, he’s that evil. He’s the Master turned up to eleven. The Master isn’t evil after all, he doesn’t generally destroy for the sake of it, it’s all about power...The Valeyard May be a different question entirely. Hence The Master doing his second good guy job in just a few years. That’s why really, honestly, the Valeyard really doesn’t have to ever show up again. He’s just a boogeyman made real by the Time Lords tinkering.
I maintain the idea that he's a Watcher gone wrong. After the Doctor defeats him with his own regeneration as a cost, the Doctor no longer has Watchers to warn him that his time is to come. Just a pet theory.
I suggest whoever saw Trial of a Time Lord by now on Twitch, that they head and buy The Last Adventure set of audio stories at Big Finish, and see how that story ended up changing the Doctor... into the Seventh.
I dropped out of the marathon as I have the remainder of the classic series on DVD and devoting like six hours of my day to Doctor Who was a bit... straining over time, but I plan to rewatch the rest in some weeks or months and I'll definitely listen to that audio drama inbetween!