promethia_tenk | Moff Who, Clara, the Silence, predictions (with diagrams!)

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It makes ALL THE SENSE IN THE WORLD. I don't know how (*pokes Clara*), but I'm sure she'll be at the centre of everything. (Not sure that she's a Pond though. I'm still more inclined to think Gallifreyan in some way.)

Eggs. It'll be to do with eggs, I just can't see it clearly.

Edited 2013-01-29 21:14 (UTC)

It makes ALL THE SENSE IN THE WORLD. I don't know how (*pokes Clara*), but I'm sure she'll be at the centre of everything.
\o/ It's all building to something, and Moff goes bigger by going deeper.

(Not sure that she's a Pond though. I'm still more inclined to think Gallifreyan in some way.)
But if she's not a Pond, she's not in the center of everything! Hence the lumpy diagrams in the middle. If she's not a Pond everything starts to string out. If she is a Pond, you get all these lovely, looping, reiterative fertility symbols: the (exploding) TARDIS, the cot, the pools . . . all these cradles of life that successive generations all come out of. Ah well, sooner or later one of us will be right. But this is me, going on record.

Eggs. It'll be to do with eggs, I just can't see it clearly.
I think it's to do with the exploding TARDIS and the whole unmaking/remaking the universe. Which River was in the middle of. Hmmm, on repete loop for 2000 years.

If she is a Pond, you get all these lovely, looping, reiterative fertility symbols: the (exploding) TARDIS, the cot, the pools . . . all these cradles of life that successive generations all come out of. Ah well, sooner or later one of us will be right.
I can see the logic of it. I just can't see how. Unless she's Amy and Rory's granddaughter. But Anthony would have to have been a VERY young dad for her to have been born in 1963.

Sorry, going to bed. Tired.

I mean I think she's River's daughter. Pretend this is the Amy/River/Clara icon I want.

Don't worry. I know you'll fight me on this : P

I mean I think she's River's daughter.
You know, I think I got that. But was trying to think of other possibilities...

. . . this conversation has lost me somewhere. *scratches head*

If she is a Pond, I don't see much point in looking beyond the obvious.

Anyways: Jekyll in Space!

Let's say Jekyll in space and leave it at that.

(Sooooo tired. I can't even. zzzzzzzzzz)

Oh! Oh, I love this. Diagrams! Arrows! Magical rainbow love beams! <3 <3 <3

=DDD

I love Moff Who, and how reliably things end in magical love beams.

*torn* Personally, I'm not big on the idea of Clara being another Pond woman - I feel that the lost-child!dynamic has been used up with the River storyline… Then again, we could say the same of the whole "who are you?" thing, and Clara will be a mystery anyhow. Your diagrams are really nice, I like the way you had it all thought out, made it seem a lot clearer… And I would LOVE it if Clara tied up the loose ends, my god. To be honest, I might sound cynical, but I was thinking Moffat will just be leaving plotholes behind - so if in the end, Clara brings it all together, I'll be delighted!
Very nice seeing your thoughts about this anyway =)

Moff is big on going over the same ideas again and again, but he never does them in exactly the same way. He's always building on top of what he did before, revising, circling back around. And he's constantly changing things in ways that don't just alter the immediate situation but everything that came before. Immediately after season six I would have been with you and said that I never want to go back there again, but . . .

It's not all tied up yet, and when Moff goes back to things (I think) he usually makes them better. *crosses fingers* That's my gut feeling on it anyway.

(Thank you again, by the way, for all the gorgeous fic comments. I'm a grinning mess over here. Shall try to reply to all of them properly sooner or later.)

Moff is big on going over the same ideas again and again, but he never does them in exactly the same way. He's always building on top of what he did before, revising, circling back around. And he's constantly changing things in ways that don't just alter the immediate situation but everything that came before.
That's a beautiful way of putting it!
I guess I'm quite critical of Moffat on a couple of points, including his plotlines, so I can't entirely agree with you. But I'll be beyond delighted if the show proves you right and is up to those high-class standards ;)

Immediately after season six I would have been with you and said that I never want to go back there again, but . . .
Because it was too fresh on your mind or because you downright disliked it?

(Thank you again, by the way, for all the gorgeous fic comments. I'm a grinning mess over here. Shall try to reply to all of them properly sooner or later.)
-beams- yay! I like turning people into grinning messes exceedingly. You're welcome, take your time, and the comments will probably keep coming ;) ("Probably" because they WILL, but might be slow, lol.)

Moff for me is one of those writers where you realize you've been holding your breath for your whole life. So it's always going to be like, there is Moffat . . . and then there is the entire rest of television. No matter how good the rest of that television may be, it's not Moffat.

Which is not to say I can't hear criticisms. I've actually spent acres of time reading them. I particularly like picking apart the whole Moffat/Rusty divide. And Moff does have a few writing habits that do rub me the wrong way, but overall . . . nope, there's nothing like Moff tv *grin*

Season six, though . . . ooof. I've got quite a few tantrums scattered around if you wanted to find them. I'm not proud, but it was a rough season. At this distance from it all, I like the *idea* of season six (and I think most of the individual episodes are excellent--many of them favorites), but I do think Moff tried to do too much in too little time and neglected handling the fallout. He basically put us through the emotional wringer and then left us with scraps to try to piece together. Weirdly, I feel much better about all of it coming off the first half of season seven, for reasons I haven't quite managed to grasp. But I think somehow he put in just the right, tiny bits of resolution I needed to be able to accept it all? So, yeah, season six: not a favorite. But, I have to ask myself, just what was it that he needed to get to so badly that he had to rush that? I do have an enormous amount of faith in his ability to get the big picture right, no matter how uncomfortable I may be with it as it unfolds.

Yeah, I see what you mean about Moffat! He has something special indeed, no matter his flaws ;) I like comparing Moffat and RTD too, they're so different and really quite complementary…
Ah, I understand now. Indeed, although the episodes themselves were really great, the way the arc was handled was… questionable. I don't feel the same way, in fact, because I didn't blame the lack of resolution for some parts on series six itself, but blamed Moffat for always handling emotion well as a general rule. I feel that there are many, many emotional loose ends he just left us to pick up on, as you said. I didn't think there was much resolution in series seven though, so I'd be curious to know what you saw in that… With the exception of Manhattan, perhaps.
To be honest, I'm torn between wanting to share your faith, and trying to start with little expectations so I can only be pleasantly surprised… ;) But I definitely can't wait for the episodes, though I have no idea how the big arcs will be handled.
(Sorry for the very late answer btw, lol. I didn't die ^_^)

I am now kind of convinced that whatever is going on with Clara, it has something to do with her mum. There are too many references to her… In Asylum of the Daleks for sure—her birthday, and the soufflé thing. In Snowmen—I need to have another look now, because I'm suddenly wondering if it's her father or her mother that is referred to, but I'm pretty sure we hear about one of them very briefly, maybe when she leaves her house to join the kids she's taking care of? And I stumbled upon spoiler lines from the next ep recently, stuff that was heard while it was being filmed—Clara had a line that mentioned her mother being dead. Three episodes, three times her mother appeared? Can't be random!
/sharing randomly

Wasn't the Doctor already erasing himself from history before Clara came along? Or was he just keeping a low profile...

There wasn't any mention of him actually erasing himself, just that he was playing dead. And then for the way he was so pleased and surprised by what Oswin had managed, I kinda feel like he wasn't just impressed with what she'd done, but got inspired by it and decided to follow up.

I'm making an inference there, but I don't think it's a big one.

Edited 2013-01-29 22:18 (UTC)

Ahh ok.

I don't know how I feel about Clara being the center of everything because I feel like the Pond's story should be done... but the upside down triquettra you've got in the last diagram is very pleasing...

Well, it is done for Amy and Rory. But insofar as they were a part of the larger overarching story, I don't think it can be done. They're too woven into too much ongoing stuff.

but the upside down triquettra you've got in the last diagram is very pleasing...
I thought about you while I was doing that.

Awwwee<3

Crosses fingers for magical rainbow love beams!

They may not actually be rainbow. I may be overreaching there.

Hmm, ~~TARDIS blue~~monochromatic love beams would be totally fine too!

As long as there are love beams, really, I think we'll all make due ; )

I'm not sure she's a Pond, but the diagrams are convincing about her general place in the narrative: little bubbles of plot and character enter the scene, seemingly from the sidelines, and then your view rotates and they turn out to have been central all along. Clara's going to be one of those.

I think the Ponds are also still in play, even if they've officially exited, because they're caught up in too many still-running plot threads. Other things we still don't know include: why the TARDIS blew up on Amy and Rory's wedding day, and what's behind that proto-TARDIS in the Lodger and the s6 opener. (Clara has an impeccable sense of time...) There's one other detail I keep coming back to: Amy Pond's house doesn't just have too many rooms, it has too many stories. Literally. It's a two-story house from the outside, and yet on the upper-floor landing there is a very prominent staircase. That just so happens to be identical to the one in the Lodger. It's way too prominent to be a continuity error, especially in a scene that draws attention to the extra room nobody notices. There's an extra story folded into Amy's house that isn't there on the outside.

Edited 2013-01-29 22:12 (UTC)

I'm not sure she's a Pond, but the diagrams are convincing about her general place in the narrative: little bubbles of plot and character enter the scene, seemingly from the sidelines, and then your view rotates and they turn out to have been central all along.
Oooo, that's a good way to put it.

I think the Ponds are also still in play, even if they've officially exited, because they're caught up in too many still-running plot threads.
Earlier I thought there might be a cleaner break between Pond era and Clara era? But I feel like all the plot threads are just continuing, twisting on.

Other things we still don't know include: why the TARDIS blew up on Amy and Rory's wedding day, and what's behind that proto-TARDIS in the Lodger and the s6 opener.
I think this is going to be absolutely key. There's still so much we don't know about whatever is pulling the strings here and why.

There's one other detail I keep coming back to: Amy Pond's house doesn't just have too many rooms, it has too many stories.
That I'm mostly inclined to believe is a red herring/production coincidence? Mind you, if it isn't that would be brilliant. But I'll believe people who say that plenty of British houses have that stair runner strip and that Amy's phantom staircase is probably just a staircase up to an attic.
ETA: Just remembered how ladders and stairways are now more of a ~thing than they were back in season five. Maybe there is something there.

Edited 2013-01-29 23:31 (UTC)

I was on the fence about it being a production coincidence, but as soon as my brain reframed it from "too many floors" to "too many stories" I teetered and windmilled and fell off my fence with a resounding crash onto the side of "deliberate." The cute parallel between Amy's house having two stories, with a bit on top for the attic, and Amy's run having two seasons with a bit on top for s7, is probably coincidence, but the idea that the Silence have planted another story in there and you don't even see it until, once again, your viewpoint rotates to take it in from another dimension... oh, that's so deeply tempting. And the fact that so many Pond-related plot threads haven't been tied off yet means there almost has to be another story lurking in there.

Also, from a super-Doylist production standpoint, the House With Too Many Rooms is so emphasized in Eleventh Hour that I can't imagine them choosing to include that staircase on the interior set and going "eh, it probably leads to the attic." Let alone leaving a light on at the top when there's literally nobody home except little Amelia. And Moff's production team is generally pretty good at... well, at least dressing the sets so it doesn't look like they're recycling them, and a staircase is pretty easy to dress to make it look distinct. Even if the runner strip is common, the fact that they chose to reuse it could very well be significant, especially with the Lodger proto-TARDIS still a dangling plot thread.

Or Moffat could be fucking with us. Always a possibility.

I love your diagrams and your thinky thoughts.

Can't wait to see what's in store for the Doctor, Clara, and River when the new episodes start back up again.

Thank you <3

Very excited that you're up to date with Doctor Whoooooo!

This makes a lot of sense. :)

I saw this back when you first wrote it, and really got a kick out of the circles and lines and rainbow rays of love, but I wasn't sure I agreed with all of it. At the time, I wasn't sure whether I wanted Clara to be part of the Pond saga (not because I don't like her, never that; just that - hmmmm scratch that. See comment below), but people are pointing out so many things that are thematically consistent and could also be consistent plotwise ... it could happen.

As to what I said above, I think I stopped myself in the middle of falling for the "does everything have to route back to ______? Why can't [writer A/B/C/Moffat] do something new?" fallacy. And I caught myself. After reading this: "Moff is big on going over the same ideas again and again, but he never does them in exactly the same way. He's always building on top of what he did before, revising, circling back around. And he's constantly changing things in ways that don't just alter the immediate situation but everything that came before." from

flowsoffire, a great huge honking light went on in my head (or a huge honking bell rang, not sure which), as to why the "he always recycles stuff and that's bad!!!" complaint always bothered me.

Bless you both: why on earth should any writer be invalidated for returning to archetypes, messages, imagery that speaks to her, as long as she does so well? And Moffat always does it well, finding something new to see in the old imagery, or finding a new way to use it.

And yes, I'm finally going through a whole bunch of peoples' commentary and meta now. After way too long and after the second half of the season has started.

Oh, I miss my Ponds. I have yet to work through that.

I'm glad to hear this ended up resonating for you!

I realize my main argument is a hard sell and, honestly, I am going to try not to sell it too hard to avoid making an annoyance of myself. But I do feel very strongly that Clara is going to be absolutely central to events going far, far back, that the continuity is going to remain heavy, that there will be no strong break between the Pond era and the Clara one, and that Moffat is going to continue to repeat himself as much as ever (and that all of this is a good thing).

I saw someone compare Moffat to Bach once, and I think the insight is spot-on. You don't go complaining that Bach just keeps repeating the same notes over and over again. If it bores you, fine, that's perfectly legitimate, but to say that he shouldn't be doing it at all is to miss the point altogether.

And yes, I'm finally going through a whole bunch of peoples' commentary and meta now. After way too long and after the second half of the season has started.
I am so far behind on reading and responding to meta it is shameful. Hopefully I will rectify that at some point :-\

Oh, I miss my Ponds. I have yet to work through that.
Well, maybe the show will do something about that : )

I saw someone compare Moffat to Bach once, and I think the insight is spot-on. You don't go complaining that Bach just keeps repeating the same notes over and over again. If it bores you, fine, that's perfectly legitimate, but to say that he shouldn't be doing it at all is to miss the point altogether.

OOooo. I like this!

Well, maybe the show will do something about that : )

That'd be oh, so excellent!

Moff Who, Clara, the Silence, predictions (with diagrams!)

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