Doctor Who S34E11: "Dark Water" *Spoilers*

[Bedlam]

Does he still have the power to steal bodies. He stole Tremas body with the remaining power from the keeper of traken. He must steal bodies via another method.

Well there was the snake thingy from the TV Movie.

I'm not sure how the twin hearts works with the body stealing thing, unless another one grows once he's in charge, I'm not sure if it was ever made clear is the Tremas master had two hearts.

[mr friendly guy]

Yeah you're right. I had forgotten about that horrible, horrible movie.

[Parallax]

Yeah you're right. I had forgotten about that horrible, horrible movie.

I have to assume that Missy hasn't stolen a new body and has just regenerated, unless new evidence comes to light.

As for the 1996 movie, it still had three things going for it: McGann's performance, a fantastic TARDIS interior, a great take on the theme music.
Sadly, the rest of the film was horrible drek.

[DaveJB]

Or the Master stole the body of the woman who found that ring in the episode where Ten cremated the Simms Master. The Master has stolen a body before, why wouldn't he do it again?

That woman already had her life force absorbed (and IIRC, crumbled into dust) during the Master's botched resurrection in The End of Time. That said, there were a few Time Ladies among the high council, so the Master could easily have taken one of their bodies. And there'd be a horrible irony in if it the one whose body he stole was the woman who RTD strongly implied was supposed to be the Doctor's mother.

As for where he got body-snatching powers from, he already had all manner of bizarre superpowers in that story, although it'd beg the question as to why he didn't just take the Tenth Doctor's body.

[Crazedwraith]

Why is everyone assuming Body snatching and things? Why can't it just be simms master expired after being sucked back to gallifrey, regenerated into Missy and Escaped?

This seems to be overcomplicating things.

[DaveJB]

We've already seen the Master snatch bodies twice, whereas in all 51 years of the show's history there's never been any firm indication that Time Lords can change sex during regeneration. Admittedly there's not been anything to say they can't do that either, but the former explanation is the one that has precedent within the show.

[Crazedwraith]

We've already seen the Master snatch bodies twice, whereas in all 51 years of the show's history there's never been any firm indication that Time Lords can change sex during regeneration. Admittedly there's not been anything to say they can't do that either, but the former explanation is the one that has precedent within the show.

It's been explicitly stated that they can at least once, how is that not a firm indication?

[DaveJB]

It's only been stated, not observed. And from the fact that the Eleventh Doctor said that he could regenerate 100+ times in an episode of The Sarah Jane Adventures, but actually turned out to have no regenerations left at all, I think we should be wary about taking what he says at face value.

That said, knowing Moffat I wouldn't be surprised if both the "stole a female body" and "spontaneously changed sex during regeneration" theories turn out to be wrong.

[Enigma]

The Doctor could very well still have his final battle and death on Trenzalore. The TARDIS definitely ends up there.

<snip>

Not necessarily. Did you noticed on the dying TARDIS the crack in one of the windows? And noticed what appeared on the TARDIS after the Doctor violently landed on Trenzalore?

He was to die there and then but didn't happen. Neither did he die defending the townsfolk of Christmas. Now since the TARDIS does not have the same damage as the dying one, we can speculate that he isn't going to die there.

[SpottedKitty]

Admittedly there's not been anything to say they can't do that either, but the former explanation is the one that has precedent within the show.

It's been explicitly stated that they can at least once, how is that not a firm indication?

Agreed; remember the time a freshly-regenerated Doctor checked his hair and squeaked "Argh, I'm a woman!" — it sounded more like a "Whups, it's happened to me this time" rather than a "This cannot be!".

[Havok]

Not necessarily on Trenzalore. I guessing that sometime after Day of the Doctor the TL managed to free themselves from stasis or at least managed to start performing actions even if not at full capability. Otherwise how would they be able to give the Doctor a new set of regenerations?

The "stasis" that they put Gallefrey in isn't exactly like the paintings. They are in a pocket universe, however, if they were in complete stasis they wouldn't have been able to do anything so we have to assume that time passes there, but perhaps at a very slow rate or at a normal rate from them. The Doctor doesn't really know. The reason I think that time goes very slowly for them is like as I said before, they needed to know it was safe to come back, so the idea that they are still defenseless from the Time War damage would seem to hold.

But to your point, the TARDIS definitely ends up on Trenzalore, and in fact given that the remains of the Doctor are actually shown there, the glowy thing Clara jumps into, it's pretty much a given that it is his final resting place, even if he doesn't necessarily die there.

The Master could have escaped any time between the end of Day of the Doctor and the start of The Time of the Doctor. He presumably has one advantage, in the sense he just had to get himself back to the universe, whereas the Time Lords had to get an entire planet back.

Well, the only way back to the universe is through one of the cracks that were made by the TARDIS exploding and destroying our universe. Given that both The End of Time and The Day of the Doctor happened during the final desperate days of the Time War, that would actually give the Master the entire run of 11 to escape through one of the cracks in the universe, unless we are to think that Gallifrey ONLY had access to the one crack, meaning that they lead to different universes, which would make more sense as Inmate Zero and the prison guard that came looking for him, clearly weren't from Gallifrey.

If that is the case, the Master could only have escaped through the crack in Christmas on Trenzalore, and as we know that as soon as the crack appeared it had several different races monitoring and protecting it, along with the Time Lords watching it on the other end sending out the signal, it seems very unlikely he would have escaped unnoticed. However, given that Missy is dressed in the same Victorian era garb that we saw on Christmas, that could very well be the case. I could even see the Master convincing Rasillion and the rest of the Time Lords, the idiots that they seem to be, that if they sent him through he would check to see if it's safe. And then of course, bail on them, which would also explain why they insisted on the Doctor saying his name.

However, as I have stated, it's not an issue of being able to get through. They already figured that out. They just need a trustworthy source to tell them they aren't going to get nuked coming through the crack, or as we know form the first episode that the rest of the universe isn't still pissed at them for causing all the damage they did.

[Havok]

It's also possible that the Master may not actually have been on Gallifrey when it was put into stasis. He/she may have gotten off the planet before that happened, and then escaped from the Time Lock by some other means (as Davros and Dalek Caan already did).

As I said in my previous response, the time frame of Gallifrey returning to the Time Lock from Earth's orbit with the Master on it and the transfer into stasis is the same day. Now, it is possible the Master escaped on the same day, but it seems pretty unlikely given how pissed Rassilion probably was with him.

[Havok]

The Doctor could very well still have his final battle and death on Trenzalore. The TARDIS definitely ends up there.

<snip>

Not necessarily. Did you noticed on the dying TARDIS the crack in one of the windows? And noticed what appeared on the TARDIS after the Doctor violently landed on Trenzalore?

He was to die there and then but didn't happen. Neither did he die defending the townsfolk of Christmas. Now since the TARDIS does not have the same damage as the dying one, we can speculate that he isn't going to die there.

Like I said, the TARDIS is there with the remains of the Doctor inside, which is what Clara jumps into after the Great Intelligence does. He most certainly ends up there, otherwise, Clara couldn't jump into him to get split into a million Clara's to save ALL the Doctors. Whether he actually dies there is the only aspect up for debate.

[Havok]

Admittedly there's not been anything to say they can't do that either, but the former explanation is the one that has precedent within the show.

It's been explicitly stated that they can at least once, how is that not a firm indication?

Agreed; remember the time a freshly-regenerated Doctor checked his hair and squeaked "Argh, I'm a woman!" — it sounded more like a "Whups, it's happened to me this time" rather than a "This cannot be!".

Didn't the Doctor say that The Corsair had regenerated as a woman once as well. I think it's a fact that it can happen at this point.

[TimothyC]

Didn't the Doctor say that The Corsair had regenerated as a woman once as well. I think it's a fact that it can happen at this point.

Both the Fourth and the Eleventh made references to both male and female Corsairs.

[Crazedwraith]

It's been explicitly stated that they can at least once, how is that not a firm indication?

Agreed; remember the time a freshly-regenerated Doctor checked his hair and squeaked "Argh, I'm a woman!" — it sounded more like a "Whups, it's happened to me this time" rather than a "This cannot be!".

Didn't the Doctor say that The Corsair had regenerated as a woman once as well. I think it's a fact that it can happen at this point.

That was the explicit statement I was referring to yes. But apparently its not enough for DaveJB because the Doctor has been known to lie on occasion.

In the Night of The Doctor as well one of the options the Sisterhood Of Kahn gave the Eighth Doctor when inducing a regeneration was male or female. So there's another source. Though they had much more control of regeneration than the Time Lords apparently.

[jwl]

Why is everyone assuming Body snatching and things? Why can't it just be simms master expired after being sucked back to gallifrey, regenerated into Missy and Escaped?

This seems to be overcomplicating things.

Well for one thing, it would be more fitting to the master's character if he didn't regenerate naturally. When he first appeared, he was already on his last regeneration. Then he got mutated, then he stole a body, then he stole a body again, then he somehow got out of being out of being eaten by the tardis (maybe by stealing another body?), then he got exterminated by the daleks and resurrected by the time lords, then he actually regenerated naturally, then he refused to regenerate and died, then was resurrected with superpowers and a very limited lifespan. Not regenerating seems more of a trend than regenerating with the master.

[Crazedwraith]

That's just bollocks. Last we saw the Master he was in a time lord body and being sent back to Gallifrey. He regenerated. He was resurrected by the time lords with a complete set and has died once on screen since then. There is no logical or narrative purpose to be had in him randomly body snatching a time lord.

For it to have any impact storywise it would have to be someone we 'know' like romana or the Doctor's mother or some bollocks like that and the show would have to devote time to explaining why we should give a shit about this because those characters have no be shown in NuWho. o no, there's no point in it being body snatching.

[DaveJB]

That was the explicit statement I was referring to yes. But apparently its not enough for DaveJB because the Doctor has been known to lie on occasion.

That's not what I said; I pointed out that we've actually seen the Master steal both Tremas and Bruce the ambulance driver's body before, whereas the show has been far more vague about the possibility of Time Lords changing sexes during regenerations before. Although the whole discussion's really irrelevant now, since in tonight's episode...
Spoiler

The Doctor didn't act as if it was in any way strange for the Master to have changed sex during his/her regeneration in tonight's episode, indicating that it doesn't require anything special, or at least nothing that the Master wouldn't have to hand on Gallifrey.

[DaveJB]

Ghetto edit: Actually, it seems like the problem here may be less-than-complete research on my part. Turns out the first mention of the Corsair was in "Shada," which I've never watched and was incomplete, but is nonetheless considered canon. And the dialogue in that story is far more explicit about Time Lords changing sexes during their regenerations so yeah, that really overrides the much vaguer stuff the Eleventh Doctor said.

[Crazedwraith]

I checked a transcript of the Doctor's Wife:

DOCTOR: The mark of the Corsair. Fantastic bloke. He had that snake as a tattoo in every regeneration. Didn't feel like himself unless he had the tattoo. Or herself, a couple of times. Ooo, she was a bad girl.

That doesn't really seem vague to me.

[DaveJB]

Conceded. Clearly I just didn't remember the line very well.

[Crazedwraith]

No worries. I'd remembered it differently from that as well.

[Eternal_Freedom]

There is also mention in the TV movie that Time Lords can change species when they die/regenerate, so changing gender shouldn't be too difficult. Yes, it's from the movie, but I'm fairly certain at least one of Romana's possible new bodies wasn't human either.

[Havok]

Conceded. Clearly I just didn't remember the line very well.

No worries. I'd remembered it differently from that as well.

I fucking didn't! CONCESSION: ACCEPTED! *smug*


This place is going soft.