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Merlin?

EJA said:
This has been mentioned before, but we know from Battlefield that at least one future incarnation of the Doctor will become known as Merlin in a parallel continuum. But there's one thing about this scenario that doesn't sit well with me: In the Arthurian myths, it's Merlin who disguises Uther, Arthur's father, as Igraine's husband, the Duke of Cornwall, so Uther can sleep with Igraine and sire Arthur. Would the Doctor really aid a man in exercising his lust, helping him deceive a married woman into having sex with him? I have difficulty seeing the Doctor willingly engineering such a scenario, which has its roots in violence and petty lust.
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The Myths and Legends of the Doctor have always been distorted. There's no reason why the Doctor can't be Merlin, without having actually participated in enabling the seedier things, such as the "rape".

The Doctor may have simply been involved in something, totally unrelated, that eventually led to Uther being able to use the disguise
 
captcalhoun said:
^i don't know that i worry about EJA's mental health, but i do feel that he takes Who far too seriously and worries about continuity far more than any sane fan does.
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Personally speaking, I worry about continuity continuously. But I don't take Who seriously at all. Not sure where that places me on the scale of things...
 
While I too have my own personal continuities for various shows, comics, etc...they're way too complicated to talk about on a message board and I don't really obsess about minutia that I can't reconcile into them. I dunno. I don't mean to attack EJA's beliefs or interests or sound harsh in my responses to his posts but I just get frustrated reading about the same stuff over and over again and not ever coming to a conclusion about it. It's weird lol.
 
Sindatur said:
EJA said:
This has been mentioned before, but we know from Battlefield that at least one future incarnation of the Doctor will become known as Merlin in a parallel continuum. But there's one thing about this scenario that doesn't sit well with me: In the Arthurian myths, it's Merlin who disguises Uther, Arthur's father, as Igraine's husband, the Duke of Cornwall, so Uther can sleep with Igraine and sire Arthur. Would the Doctor really aid a man in exercising his lust, helping him deceive a married woman into having sex with him? I have difficulty seeing the Doctor willingly engineering such a scenario, which has its roots in violence and petty lust.
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The Myths and Legends of the Doctor have always been distorted. There's no reason why the Doctor can't be Merlin, without having actually participated in enabling the seedier things, such as the "rape".

The Doctor may have simply been involved in something, totally unrelated, that eventually led to Uther being able to use the disguise
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I'm curious; are there any variations on the Arthurian myth that omit Merlin's aiding of Uther to deceive Igraine? In all the stories I know of, Merlin is involved with Uther prior to Arthur's birth.

The only way I can really imagine the Doctor helping Uther is if Uther and Igraine were already lovers, and Igraine's husband was an abusive bastard, then he might be moved enough to help them. That's how I'd depict it, anyway. Then again, by this stage the Doctor would fully realise that Arthur HAS to be born, so he might well do it anyway.

Yes, I was intrigued by River's reference to wizards and the Doctor in "The Pandorica Opens." Intentional? Who knows, but somehow I doubt it.
 
Why do you doubt it? It fit with the entire "fairy tale" theme of the series. Maybe it wasn't a direct reference to Merlin but it implied and nothing Moffat does is "just for the heck of it". As I said before The Doctor would realize that Arthur's birth was a fixed point in time and despite his own misgivings about Uther's character would make sure that Arthur was born no matter what.
 
^Yes, probably this. I reckon the Doctor wouldn't hide his true opinion of Uther though. Sort of like how Merlin does in the film Excalibur.
 
Yeah I could see a conversation between the Doctor Merlin and Uther where the Doctor tells him he can't stand him or whatnot and Uther replies he doesn't give a damn what he thinks about him, he's his counselor and will serve him! LOL
 
in the BBC show 'Merlin', Merlin doesn't even meet Arthur and Uther until Arthur's already in his teens.

and Merlin's his contemporary.

and Ygraine's Arthur's mom and Uther's wife. It was Morgana's mom Uther cheated with.
 
Yeah there are always going to be different depictions of the myth...that's why I find it so interesting and why it's one of my favorites.
 
I actually now have a theory that as of the new series, as far as the rest of the universe is concerned, the events depicted in Battlefield never took place at all. You see, the Time War rewrote history so that it's never been possible to visit other realities. It's not a question of "when" or "where" in time and space you are; the only exceptions are what we see in Rise of the Cybermen/The Age of Steel, Doomsday, and The Stolen Earth/Journey's End. If you were to visit Winifred Bamberra now, you'd most likely find that she'd never met Ancelyn or Mordred, and there never was a battle on the shores of Lake Vortigern, and Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart never fought the Devourer of Worlds. This means that the Doctor is no longer destined to travel to Arthur's dimension and become known as Merlin. The Time War has made things a lot more uncertain.
 
If the Doctor that we know does do that, I'm sure the circumstances will be different. ie, he's helping two people in love come together by disguising Uther so he can slip past the guards, not to fool Igraine.
 
I actually now have a theory that as of the new series, as far as the rest of the universe is concerned, the events depicted in Battlefield never took place at all.
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No I've just checked and it's still there on youtube.
 
Battlefield is actually quite an interesting story, in light of developments in the new series. The story clearly shows that the Doctor's future has already happened, he just hasn't experienced those events in his personal timeline yet, as of his seventh incarnation. With this in mind, it can be said that the Time War was also already happening then, and had already concluded, but as with the Merlin affair, the Doctor himself had not yet experienced it, and so was unaware of it. Logically, any effects the War had on the cosmos would be felt by everyone everywhere and everywhen, being that it occured across the whole timeline.
 
JoeZhang said:
The story clearly shows that the Doctor's future has already happened,
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No it doesn't.
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Erm, excuse me, but....the fact that Ancelyn, Morgaine, and all the other people from Arthur's dimension recognise the Doctor, despite him not having met any of them before? The note that his future self leaves for his past self warning him that Morgaine has just seized control of a nuclear missile? It's like in the new series, with River Song already having known the Doctor for years when they first meet in Silence in the Library.
 
Erm, excuse me, but....the fact that Ancelyn, Morgaine, and all the other people from Arthur's dimension recognise the Doctor, despite him not having met any of them before?
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Right and what are the two explanations that the Doctor offers for that?
 
It's nothing like River Song. See this line of thinking is exactly what I'm talking about. It really is pointless engaging in these discussions with you EJA. You have your own continuity obviously. All well and good. That doesn't mean that it's the right continuity. It also doesn't mean that nothing is rendered invalid from the past.
 
captcalhoun said:
an alternate Doctor and/or a future Doctor.
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I know of at least one fanfic story of the Merlin Doctor that is both a future Doctor and an alternative Doctor -- Erin Noteboom's "A Man at Intervals." If I'm remembering the story correctly (it's been a fair few years since I last read it), Merlin is an alternate eighth Doctor whose timeline unhappened.

In Peter David's "One Fateful Knight" in Short Trips: The Quality of Leadership, the Merlin Doctor is the eighth Doctor, straight up, no alternate.

I'm sure there's a fanfic somewhere that posits that Merlin's Merlin is a future (though amnesiac) Doctor, which would mean, I suppose, that Katie McGrath grows up to be Jean Marsh.

The Merlin in Steve Parkhouse's Doctor Who comics is clearly not the Doctor. This Merlin is a colleague of Rassilon.
 
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