Sunday, November 10, 2013

The Moment is Coming - Or . . . . .

 . . . . . or “Day of the Doctor – Trailers 1 and 2”
or Three Doctors – Three TARDISes – A Kabillion Daleks and at Least One Zygon

Finally! Final-flipping-ly!! It's here at last!!! Hallelujah!!! The long awaited trailer – or trailers – to “The Day of the Doctor” have finally arrived and are chock full of cool stuff!

The first, which was “leaked” to the Internet on Friday was very cool, the second, released on the BBC's website was even better, chock full of Whovian goodness! I'll be covering aspects of both here.

I, like the vast majority of you, have been cursing Steven Moffatt and the rest of the Who Crew since the San Diego Comic-Con where they showed a trailer to those in attendance. Cursing Moffatt, Smith, Coleman, Gatiss and everyone even remotely associated with the show, but I have to hand it to those in attendance, no one posted it on the Internet and that was actually cool.

Anyway – on to the Trailer – I'll be covering Trailer 2 here since it gives us the most information and I'll be covering it in my usual style, starting with . . . .

WHAT I LOVED
What's not to love?? It's the trailer for the 50th anniversary episode of the show we all love.

WHAT I LIKED
BAD WOLF!!!!!
Billie Piper  is back and, I posit, visible to only John Hurt's version of The Doctor in her Bad Wolf persona. If you remember back to “The Parting Of Ways”, Rose had spread the Bad Wolf warning associated with only the Daleks throughout all time and space and what better time than the Time War itself for the Bad Wolf warning to show up, and we all know she hates the Daleks, so eggs Hurt's Doctor on to use “The Moment”, which it was established was in the possession of The Doctor by The High Council of the Time Lords in “The End of Time”.



THE MOMENT
As I said above, it was established that The Doctor possessed “The Moment” and it's been assumed that it was what he used to end the Time War. It's been assumed that The Moment trapped both the Daleks and the Time Lords in a time loop, but is that what really happened? The 9th Doctor tells about how he saw them all burn, but did they?? Did he really commit double genocide?  When he had the chance to have killed off the Daleks forever in his 4th incarnation (“Genesis of the Daleks”) and didn't?  I know that regenerations mess with the Time Lord brain, but The Doctor usually stops at genocide, unless .. . . . . .”The Moment” goes even further than Rose did in destroying the Dalek fleet in “The Parting of Ways”. Guess we'll have to wait for that.

The Moment we've all been waiting for?

THREE DOCTORS
I've had many faces, many lives, I don't admit to all of them. There's one I've tried very hard to forget.”

In a bit of a shout out to the 10th season's “The Three Doctors” which featured Doctors 1, 2 and 3, we again have the drawing of 3 versions of The Doctor together. Drawn by the Bad Wolf persona to once again battle an immense Dalek fleet?? Or something more sinister?

Our Heroes???
Since "The Three Doctors" we've had "The Five Doctors" which was an official 20th anniversary episode (shown in the US on November 22, 1983 before it was shown in the UK on November 23) and "The Two Doctors" which featured Doctors 2 (Patrick Troughton) and 6 (Colin Baker) in 1985.

THREE TARDISes
Very cool sightings of 10's TRADIS being back in action and Hurt's (seemingly with some of the organic elements of 10's – which kind of begs the question – what was 9 doing to the poor thing to make it so “lived in” looking?? Unless Hurt's Doctor did a redesign on it after the Time War. . . . . . . . .  You can also see that the Time Rotor is pretty much the same as 10's - aside from the white light as opposed to the bluish/green.






























A TALE OF TWO KATES
In this picture, we seem to have 2 Doctors and 2 Kate Stewarts – hmmmmmmm – what's up what that??  I get the feeling that we're seeing a split screen that shows the Doctors with Kate Stewart in two different time frames.  Just a feeling.


TWO SONICS
Boys will be boys, comparing their respective sonic screwdrivers . . . . . . . . 


. . . . AND A ZYGON!
For some reason I have had the feeling that ever since it was announced that the Zygons would be baking a comeback to the show after a mere 38 year absence that they really wouldn't be playing that much of a role in the actual story here. Like we would see Doctors 10 or 11 vanquishing them in the beginning of the show and then heading off into the meat of the story, and the trailer, at least for me, has done nothing to change that feeling. We just see a snarling Zygon breaking some glass. I guess, in the end the Zygon could be the entire cause of the Time War, but I'm not laying any bets on that.



NO CYBERMEN???
It's been long rumored that the Cybermen would be making some sort of an appearance here, but not even a flash of silver to be seen.


A KABILLION DALEKS
Once again, The Doctor takes on the might if the Dalek fleet (they do have a nasty habit of constantly showing up).




FINAL SPECULATION
Much has been made since John Hurt was brought on to play a mysterious incarnation of The Doctor that has never been seen, nor has he ever, before the end of "The Name of the Doctor" even been mentioned.

The Doctor himself, in his 9th, 10th and 11th incarnations have all told of how the killed off the Time Lords and then thus guy comes along, an incarnation of the Doctor who acted, we assume, during the Time War, not in the name of The Doctor and his is the one that all subsequent regenerations of The Doctor strive to forget.  By this do they mean that he was acting as a mere pawn to the Bad Wolf warning, acting for it instead of for the good of the Universe?  And if he wanted to forget that act, why does he goi around constantly telling people he did it.  I get the guilt, I get that he wants to, but can never actually forget what he did, but he seems to be trying to forget one whole regeneration's worth of his life.

On top of all of that, the speculation as to which Doctor John Hurt is actually playing, with his seeming to wear 9's leather coat with aspects of 8's Victorian era look and who knows what else, has been all over the place.  Is he some weird incarnation between 8 and 9 - Doctor 8.5?  Is he the Valeyard of old, a future version of himself?  The 13th Regeneration?

Here's my thought.  John Hurt is playing the 8th Doctor and here's why.  Since the 1996 movie an the 2005 return to TV, Paul McGann's 8th Doctor has been the longest tenured of all of the Doctors, having appeared in numerous audio, comic and literary venues.  Why Moffatt decided toi go with Hurt as opposed to bringing back McGann, which I think would have been cool, is beyond me, except for maybe 2 reasons.  He really wanted to age the 8th Doctor and you grab John Hurt for your TV show when you can. 


That and I have read something in going through various websites regarding The Moment and the information I found led me to believe that Hurt is the 8th.  I don;t want to explain any more since I guess it could be considered spoilery, so I won't go there

AND IN THE END
I think like pretty much all Whovians around the world, this one episode has been the most anticipated ever and will either raise the bar for future episodes or could possibly fail miserably.  I don't think there is really any in between here.  A less than totally magnificent episode will seem like such a letdown because of all of the anticipation.  This is one chance for the Who Crew to really shine and I hope that they do.  I'll be glued to my television at 2:50pm my time on November 23 (since there was not getting near any of the theaters here to get tickets) aong with millions of others around the world.

Geronimo!!!!!!!!!!!