Moffat reveals who Tom was playing in Day of the Doctor!
- Thread starter Starkers
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I do like the idea of it being The Moment, which is something I'd never considered. Anyway a nice interview I thought.
Ugh. All this does is muddy the waters. There's not a coherent story present, if the identity of one of your characters is, like, in a state of quantum flux. Is it the Moment? The Doctor himself? Who knows? Not the author....
I enjoyed seeing Tom Baker immensely, I was very moved by it actually, but there's no story here.
I enjoyed seeing Tom Baker immensely, I was very moved by it actually, but there's no story here.
But I think the important point to take away is that it's open to interpretation and that was more or less what Moffat was going for. I don't want a definitive answer, and while I like the idea of The Curator being The Moment and I see why that would work for some people, I prefer he was a far future incarnation of The Doctor. The whole scene is both vague enough and not that vital that it doesn't matter what The Answer is.
What’s your preferred explanation?
I do think of it as, in the distant, distant future, long after Jodie and long after we’re all dead, the Doctor settles down and chooses a different incarnation per day to revisit. I like that idea.
WTF? This statement by Moffat confounds me. It makes me feel like that Toff has no clue how regeneration works, and his explanation for why making the Doctor Jodie Whittaker for pure shock value, it reinforces why I am glad he is gone, and can sod off by a lake somwhere and eat chips to add to his already ample frame. The moment? Seriously...most writers have a clearly defined reason for including characters and know what they are for. J.R.R. Tolkien had a definitive role for Frodo Baggins and company meeting Tom Bombadil in the Old Forest. Moffat would have said, well it Could be a dream, reality, or magic..yea, that's called lazy writing and conviction, or a choose your own adventure book conclusion after the adventure already happened!!. Is he well? Need meds? Disjointed in his responses. His idea of time Lord regeneration is Rubbish!
I do think of it as, in the distant, distant future, long after Jodie and long after we’re all dead, the Doctor settles down and chooses a different incarnation per day to revisit. I like that idea.
WTF? This statement by Moffat confounds me. It makes me feel like that Toff has no clue how regeneration works, and his explanation for why making the Doctor Jodie Whittaker for pure shock value, it reinforces why I am glad he is gone, and can sod off by a lake somwhere and eat chips to add to his already ample frame. The moment? Seriously...most writers have a clearly defined reason for including characters and know what they are for. J.R.R. Tolkien had a definitive role for Frodo Baggins and company meeting Tom Bombadil in the Old Forest. Moffat would have said, well it Could be a dream, reality, or magic..yea, that's called lazy writing and conviction, or a choose your own adventure book conclusion after the adventure already happened!!. Is he well? Need meds? Disjointed in his responses. His idea of time Lord regeneration is Rubbish!
That was a great interview. Regarding the Curator, Tom being the Moment was only his original idea but he changed it. He states that his preferred interpretation is:
"I do think of it as, in the distant, distant future, long after Jodie and long after we’re all dead, the Doctor settles down and chooses a different incarnation per day to revisit. I like that idea."
Personally, that's my preferred take as well. Perhaps hundreds or thousands of regenerations after Capaldi.
"I do think of it as, in the distant, distant future, long after Jodie and long after we’re all dead, the Doctor settles down and chooses a different incarnation per day to revisit. I like that idea."
Personally, that's my preferred take as well. Perhaps hundreds or thousands of regenerations after Capaldi.
This is fiction. Regeneration can work whatever way the writers decide it should work. Heck, the whole reason it was invented in the first place was that they needed to recast their lead actor and just decided on a whim to give his people a new ability. And "how it works" was something they developed quite gradually. Initially, it was "part of the TARDIS" and was just called "renewal." The second time, it was just called "changing your appearance." It wasn't until the third time that it was named "regeneration" and established to be something a Time Lord's own body did rather than something done to it by Time Lord technology. It was a couple of years later that it was first established as being limited to 12 regenerations. Then came variations like Romana's "trying on outfits" regeneration, the first hint that Time Lords could control what they changed into, and the Watcher, the first indication that Time Lords could have forebodings of their own impending regeneration.
The new series has also introduced numerous new ideas about "how regeneration works" over the years, starting with the idea of regeneration energy, and the frankly absurd change that regeneration happens standing up even though it's supposed to be something that happens on the brink of death. Then there are other additions, like the idea that the body is still mutable shortly after regeneration and can regrow a severed hand, or that regeneration energy can be transferred between bodies, or that a regeneration can be aborted before the body transforms, or that regeneration allows for sex changes, or that a Time Lord subconsciously or consciously chooses their next appearance, or that a Time Lord could resist regeneration. "How it works" has been subject to constant flux over the past 50 years, just like everything else in Doctor Who. As Moffat pointed out, this is a franchise defined by change and reinvention, so hostility to change makes no sense from a Doctor Who fan.
And how is that different than Russell T Davies and the Timelady in The End of Time? She is whoever you want her to be. Tom is whoever you want him to be. I agree with Moffat that it is a future Doctor, since that is more or less what is supported by the text.
I try not to worry about who the Curator is, since it was so obviously a moment that stepped clear through the fourth wall. It's like that bit at the end of An Adventure in Space and Time when "William Hartnell" looks up and sees Matt Smith smiling back at him. That's not something that we're supposed to believe "actually" happened in the story, it's just the performers coming out on stage to take a bow, as it were. The Curator's role isn't to be part of the story, it's to be an excuse for Tom Baker to come out and take his last bow to the audience. (Well, second-last now, thanks to Shada.) So what he "really" is in the story doesn't matter.
Although as in-story excuses go, I like the suggestion that it was really the Moment playing another role. That raises fewer difficult questions than the idea of a far-future Doctor "revisiting" old faces.
Although as in-story excuses go, I like the suggestion that it was really the Moment playing another role. That raises fewer difficult questions than the idea of a far-future Doctor "revisiting" old faces.
I don't recall ever commenting on Claire Bloom's character on the board, so what's the word "and" doing at the start of your question there? It reads like you're trying to catch me in some sort of contradiction....
There was a guy here a few years back who posited just such a theory. Here are a few of his posts on the matter:
This particular poster was ridiculed in the threads he posted this theory since according to those who ridiculed him "the Curator is so obviously a future Doctor, no other interpretation makes sense."
The timelady in the End of Time obviously was the Doctor herself.
So, The Doctor in the future can regenerate day after day and you're cool with that then? okay.. sure.. accept any new idea because it's "change".. change isn't always good, and new ideas don't always become accepted.. that too is the essence of being a Doctor Who fan, or just simply a normal rational human being.. Not everything has to be liked or accepted for you to be a fan.. Fans who judge other fans who like or dislike something about the show all share a common thread.. they watch Doctor Who.. You're rehash of yes, the new ideas on Regeneration are quite detailed and concise. I applaud that. However, your last statement impies that being a fan is accepting all and any change without reservation.. and that is simply not how the world or many fans think. Evidence is proven by their many divisions over story, content, and yes gender changes.. so while I applaud your attempt to uphold Moffat's convoluted thinking, I as a fan, and as a long time fan, think the idea of daily regeneration as stupid and dumb..
But hey that's my opinion, if you think the ole Doc can regenerate daily into older bodies, sure go ahead and have that.. It makes no difference to me. I ain't here to change anyone's opinions. I just, like the rest of us, like to voice my opinion in a forum of common interest, but not necessarily amongst like minded individuals, cause frankly group think is boring, cowardly, not brave, and spineless..
And for the record, the regeneration of Romana I into Romana II, that too was a sore subject for me.. The whole Bodies in flux aspect was just too silly..
Well, obviously they're not actually going to do that, because that's not how series television works. You're taking it too seriously. Moffat specifically suggested it would be sometime in the far future "after we're all dead." In other words, he has no plan for it to actually happen and no expectation that it ever will. He's just playing with ideas in order to handwave an excuse for getting Tom Baker to return for the anniversary. Like I said, that scene was basically on our side of the fourth wall. It wasn't meant to be taken literally, nor was it ever meant to be followed up on in any future story. It was meant to be a purely self-indulgent moment where the show and the audience stopped pretending that this was real and remembered that it was a TV show performed by actors, and we were taking a moment to celebrate one of the most beloved of those actors. This is meant to be fun, after all.
And as Moffat said, the Curator might just as well have been the Moment taking on a different face. If the "future Doctor" explanation bothers you, just go with the Moment, so to speak. Problem solved.
And since he's actually leaving, we know it's not like when he said the quest to restore Gallifrey could be a plot thread that stretched to the show's hundredth anniversary after "Day of the Doctor," when it actually ended up stretching all the way to the next episode. Or a couple seasons, depending on how you count it.
Is there another instance of the fourth wall violation in nuWho and Classic? I wanna say yes, but can't think of a specific scene. Tho I know both Pertwee and Baker had some.. The fifth doctor special had the Hartnell stand in rolling his eyes at the camera..very funny.
I thought Heaven sent and Hell Bent showed Gallifrey was returned. It was moved along with the entire solar system to the extreme end of time, near the end of the universe. Same place, just towards the end of time. Karn is located in the same solar system.
"The Feast of Steven," the Christmas episode inserted in the middle of "The Daleks' Masterplan," ended with Hartnell turning to the camera and wishing the audience a happy Christmas.
Then there's the bit in "Remembrance of the Daleks," set on November 22, 1963, where Ace is watching a TV where the announcer says "Coming up, the new science fiction series, Doc--" and then is cut off.
And heck, a ton of stuff Moffat does leans against the fourth wall with its self-referential aspects, like the bit where Missy insists the Doctor's real name is Doctor Who.
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