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"Hell Bent" Grade and discussion thread

Grading

  • Be a Doctor

    Votes: 58 43.9%
  • Gallifrey Stands

    Votes: 37 28.0%
  • A Hybrid

    Votes: 19 14.4%
  • Gallifrey falls

    Votes: 10 7.6%
  • Sent it to the end of time

    Votes: 8 6.1%

  • Total voters
    132
The BBC announced a spin off and everyone complained.

I really don't see that being intended to set up a spin-off in any sense - it was simply that Clara can have adventures forever - just out of sight...

I meant The Class. People lost their shit about it rather than be pleased there was a spin off coming.

Without even normal, mortal Clara, The Class wouldn't seem to have anything to do with Doctor Who (aside from being in the same universe).
 
Well, I thought this was the best Doctor Who series finale I've ever seen. I think Peter just became my favorite Doctor. Taking last weeks together with this plus the set up from the Raven, it's incredible. I voted 5 stars both weeks after 3 for the Raven, but even that is retroactively a bit better now.

I don't really see what's the problem about the Time Lords being back and no one wanting them around. The Doctor has never liked his own people, so why would he now? Plus they arr A holes, and Rassilon is 100% a dick.

New on BBC 17 Clara and Me! But it's nice that Clara, is dead, but not, kind of like the Trenzalore grave paradox discussion thread, Clara does die there, but she's got all of time and space to keep having adventures in before it happens. Why anyone is complaining about this is beyond my understanding. Is Me the companion or is Clara? Maybe it's more of an equal partnership.

BTW, some people keep saying the Doctor doesn't remember, but he does remember the 4 1/2 billion years, he's said so, and he said it in a not lying manner in his dialogue. Even though the Doctor's corporal form, his body, is maybe only 2000 years old but all of the non corporal stuff, his mind, is over 4 billion years old now. No I'm not going to explain it, if you want explanations for everything Doctor Who is not the show for you.

I also like having a show where not every stupid prophecy is true. On the 13th hour of the 13th day of the 13th month, you will find true happiness in a tortoise shell. So it was a legend. How many legendary prophecies have come true?
 
The BBC announced a spin off and everyone complained.

I really don't see that being intended to set up a spin-off in any sense - it was simply that Clara can have adventures forever - just out of sight...

A bit like Lady Christina de Souza with her flying double-decker.

12. The new sonic screwdriver may be coming out a bit late to be this year's must-have Christmas gift, since we only see it for about six seconds and the next episode will be broadcast on Christmas Day which obviously is too late.
Notably, this new model cannot be River Song's gift as it bears no resemblance to the one seen in Silence in the Library, which was Tennant's with some extra bits attached.
 
The one thing this does remind me is that SM keeps introducing concepts that he by the time he gets around to dealing with, he's bored of and he disposes of with a line - The Silent and now the return of Gallifrey.

So if he sets something up as important, its a good chance that by the time he finale rolls around, it's largely irrelevant.
 
Okay so wait, why did the doctor or clara have to erase their memory? Because he's realised he'll go too far, break too many rules to save her? But I don't get why saving her is that big a deal. There don't seem to be any major consequences. I guess there's the matter of his ordeal in the confession dial but, from his perspective, he was only in there a few days.

So yeah this was another moffat finale where I have to sit and think to myself, what exactly just happened? It's not so much stuff isn't explained as, it's explained in an unsatisfying manner with quick bits of dialogue.

re: Gallifrey, it's a bit disappointing to see laser rifles and Gunships. The time lords aren't something out of star trek or stargate, they should be millennia ahead of that. I'm not sure it's even a good idea to show them on screen, as it would be hard to show the appropriate sort of godlike weirdness of such an advanced civillisation.
 
The one thing this does remind me is that SM keeps introducing concepts that he by the time he gets around to dealing with, he's bored of and he disposes of with a line - The Silent and now the return of Gallifrey.

So if he sets something up as important, its a good chance that by the time he finale rolls around, it's largely irrelevant.

That is increasingly appearing to be his main legacy.
We need a name for this effect, which I'm not sure if TV Tropes currently lists (it's not quite the same as "Aborted Arc") whereby the end of a story doesn't quite match the beginning because the emphasis has changed along the way, or the writers have changed their minds/lost their notes/forgotten what they were thinking.

"The Borg Queen's Holiday" perhaps (in reference to that odd scene in Unimatrix Zero where she makes a comment towards Harry Kim that never gets picked up later).
 
re: Gallifrey, it's a bit disappointing to see laser rifles and Gunships. The time lords aren't something out of star trek or stargate, they should be millennia ahead of that. I'm not sure it's even a good idea to show them on screen, as it would be hard to show the appropriate sort of godlike weirdness of such an advanced civillisation.

They did just fiinish fighting a war and really they've always had stasers on the old show, so gunships are a step up. Really they aren't used to fighting wars so they've really needed over the years is a small peace keeping force in the capital.
 
Nitpick question: when the two Tardises pass each other in space, wouldn't the Doctor's Tardis have alerted him to another Tardis in close proximity?
 
Well, she is the one who voluntarily split herself into infinite parts just to protect him, with no expectations of her own survival. She is the one who persuaded him not to give up and find a way to not destroy his own planet. She is the one who persuaded the Time Lords to give him more regenerations when he thought he was out of them. She is the one who told him that being afraid was okay when he was a scared little kid. She is the one who stuck by him through what was probably one of the more traumatic regenerations he ever had, given the whole 'new cycle' thing. She is the one who pushed him to greater extremes of action than most.

You may complain about Moffat loading too much 'special snowflake' stuff onto one character, but you can't possibly claim that this came out of nowhere. Given all of the above, it only makes sense that the Doctor would have more of a connection to this one woman than some of the others who just happened to be along for the ride without really contributing anything but who he just kept around to have someone he could impress.
.

Put like that really does demonstrate the Mary Sue nature of Clara, the girl who can be anything the plot requires as long as it's exceptional.
 
The one thing this does remind me is that SM keeps introducing concepts that he by the time he gets around to dealing with, he's bored of and he disposes of with a line - The Silent and now the return of Gallifrey.

So if he sets something up as important, its a good chance that by the time he finale rolls around, it's largely irrelevant.

That is increasingly appearing to be his main legacy.
We need a name for this effect, which I'm not sure if TV Tropes currently lists (it's not quite the same as "Aborted Arc") whereby the end of a story doesn't quite match the beginning because the emphasis has changed along the way, or the writers have changed their minds/lost their notes/forgotten what they were thinking.

"The Borg Queen's Holiday" perhaps (in reference to that odd scene in Unimatrix Zero where she makes a comment towards Harry Kim that never gets picked up later).

"Super Trigger-Finger Worf" referencing Worf's destruction of a starship in "The Chase" which is described as being really odd at the time but never followed up upon. That scene still bothers me even though I've not seen it for over twenty years. :lol:
 
Overall, I really enjoyed this episode...up until the end. Maybe I'm missing something, but WHY did they have to use the neural block at all? Clara decides she wants to keep her memories; the Doctor agrees that she's right and he's gone too far.

Why, then, would they decide to play memory roulette with the thing? There's no reason why either of them would have needed to have their memories wiped, unless the reason is "to make the Doctor less sad," which is pretty poor motivation.

Everything leading up to that, though, I thought was awesome.
 
First impressions, that was a bit of a mess, yet a highly enjoyable one and actually the more I think about it the more I might be thinking it's messy because it didn't got anywhere I expected it to, so be interesting to see what a second viewing does. 4/5 for me, but that may go up, and its a very strong 4/5 :p

Re the Diner spinning off Tardis like, anyone else feel this was a homage to the final episode of Sapphire and Steel?

Probably Maisie Williams best performance as Me, and its quite amusing in the end that she goes off with Clara given that in The Girl Who Died Clara said to the doctor "Fight you for her"

Loved the regeneration, especially the fact that she made it clear that'd been her only male body ;) Would have been nice if Dalton could have been paid/persuaded to do it but that was always unlikely. If only they could have got Roger Moore ;)

The fakeout with waitress Clara took me in hook line and sinker.

Two things I have a bit of a problem with. Firstly the Doctor wasn't in the Confession Dial for 2 billion years from his perspective because he only recalled the few days he was there in his final version (and again, he's no less the Doctor than the first one to step out of the teleporter) Secondly after looking for Clara he meets a mysterious girl who vanishes to a Tardis noise and then when he looks round his Tardis is there with a picture of her on it! If nothing else he at least knows what Clara looked like now!

Anyway the reversal of Journey's End was very welcome, and much as saving Clara taints the impact of Face the Raven I like this end for Clara a lot more than her dying (and it's a much better end than Donna got)

Gotta love that original console room though!
 
Why, then, would they decide to play memory roulette with the thing? There's no reason why either of them would have needed to have their memories wiped, unless the reason is "to make the Doctor less sad," which is pretty poor motivation.

My impression is that the Doctor was simply unable to cope and accept Clara's death. That's why he takes the gun, shoots the General, and steals another Tardis to take Clara away. He is adamant that he will undo her death despite the risks to Time itself and the fact that Clara repeats again that she is ok with dying. The Doctor won't hear it. He even takes her to the end of the universe hoping it will break her free from being frozen in time. He would always try something to save her and would never stop. Erasing the Doctor's memories of who Clara is, was the only way to ensure that he would stop trying to save her. There is also the possibility that it relates to the Doctor and Clara being the Hybrid. One of them had to lose their memories in order to stop them from traveling together. In other words, the Hybrid had to be split up. Let's not forget that Claracould not "walk away" either. She had a chance last season to stop traveling with the Doctor and settle down with Danny and she could not do it. Traveling with the Doctor was like a drug to her. She was addicted to it and it got her killed. So really, both of them had a problem of not being able to give up on the other which is why a drastic method like a memory wipe was ultimately necessary.
 
The fakeout with waitress Clara took me in hook line and sinker.

Me too, for sure. The whole time I assumed she was another Splinter Clara. Jenna's face towards the end, when it becomes clear she's the real Clara...oh man. Seriously, that girl can act.
 
Why, then, would they decide to play memory roulette with the thing? There's no reason why either of them would have needed to have their memories wiped, unless the reason is "to make the Doctor less sad," which is pretty poor motivation.

My impression is that the Doctor was simply unable to cope and accept Clara's death. That's why he takes the gun, shoots the General, and steals another Tardis to take Clara away. He is adamant that he will undo her death despite the risks to Time itself and the fact that Clara repeats again that she is ok with dying. The Doctor won't hear it. He even takes her to the end of the universe hoping it will break her free from being frozen in time. He would always try something to save her and would never stop. Erasing the Doctor's memories of who Clara is, was the only way to ensure that he would stop trying to save her. There is also the possibility that it relates to the Doctor and Clara being the Hybrid. One of them had to lose their memories in order to stop them from traveling together. In other words, the Hybrid had to be split up. Let's not forget that Claracould not "walk away" either. She had a chance last season to stop traveling with the Doctor and settle down with Danny and she could not do it. Traveling with the Doctor was like a drug to her. She was addicted to it and it got her killed. So really, both of them had a problem of not being able to give up on the other which is why a drastic method like a memory wipe was ultimately necessary.
Yeah, the more I think about it, the more that makes sense. In the moment, though, I was just kept thinking, "Or you could just NOT use that thing."

It bums me out.
 
And, I totally called it in one of the other threads -- the retro TARDIS was Clara's TARDIS! Well, along with Ashildr.
Mr Awe

And there is nothing to say that one of the future incarnations of the Doctor doesn't looks like Ashildr.. Me indeed. (or Clara for that matter).

All part of keeping casting options open I suppose.

I really don't see that being intended to set up a spin-off in any sense - it was simply that Clara can have adventures forever - just out of sight...

So now she really is the Impossible Girl.

Now, I might have just made a nonsentient clone and shoved it into the Raven's (Black Guardian's?) path--or placed Clara into that stasis chamber as the bird struck-- a send up of the Raven we saw in Game Of Thrones, no doubt, even if it acted more like a Hound from Tindalos.

I just loved that original TARDIS set. I never wanted them to leave that room. I'm glad they spent quite a bit of time in there because they obviously spent a lot of time building it. I hope we see it again at some future point.

That was probably left over from this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/An_Adventure_in_Space_and_Time

7. Rassilon was played by Donald Sumpter, whom I recognised as Lord Ashdown from Coalition. It was rather hard to get this out of my head.

He was also Erasmus Darkening in The Sarah Jane Adventures.
Let me guess--he leaves Galifrey, becomes this character--then winds up frozen in stone in The Five Doctors.

Loved the wraiths. Man, Steven must have had some really messed up dreams as a child.
 
The finale was pretty damned good ! I'm rather fond of the idea of the two of them out there in a Tardis having fun.

There's a whole 'lost cast' of adventurers loose in the Whoverse now - Clara and Ashildr, Jenny the Doc's 'daughter', Capt. Jack, River, Martha and Mickey, Rose and 10A...
 
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