Rate And Discuss 3.13: Last Of The Time Lords

[Martin Penny]

Here's a thing. My Dad just suggested it was the Masters wife who has picked up the ring - they could have planned it all along in order to get him out of it. It would explain why she suddenly shoots him - he's planned to put himself into the ring (as per the fobwatch) and be collected later...
Si.

That's a rather good theory actually!
When I saw the hand pick up the ring I immediately thought it was Mrs Saxon, but it hadn't really occurred to me that they could have planned it all.

[Captain Tancredi]

I think the word I'm looking for is "uneven". Some moments of incredibly devious cleverness, some very emotive stuff, a surprisingly bleak first half for RTD...and some slack writing in between to make everything hang together. And Gollum.

But overall not a bad ending to the three-part storyline- I'm just not sure that as an episode it made the best of some of its ideas. As was pointed out in Confidential, there's some really quite deep character stuff going on which didn't quite come out on first viewing.

[Jim]

How great was Martha's final scene. In complete contrast to the (obviously fantastic) weepy departure of Rose - Martha has sussed it and walks away from the Doctor, with some regret - but hanging on to her own integrity and desires. Its the Doctor at this point who looks weary - realising once again he will mis out.

[Kinggodzillak]

To find out what happened? That's the big intrigue with stories that suddenly take you forward into the future isn't it?

Si.

In theory, yes...but I was wary of another narrative copout, that's what we've been given for the last two series finales. I was prepared to be surprised here, but that caption just shot it all down. We've got a time machine, and we've got a big big big problem that can't be resolved without time travel. 1+1 = reset.

Guess I've seen too much Voyager...

[The Secretive Bus]

I must have missed the series having that specific agenda!

New Who series 1 was all about that - remember people going on about the 9th Doctor never doing anything? The Doctor spent his time trying to get people to fight for themselves: Dickens, Mickey, Rose, Nancy, that woman in "The Long Game" I can't remember the name of...

Maybe it wasn't as much a staple of old Who (though I remember several Tom Baker stories where he mutters "We must help them to help themselves...") but new Who is quite often about people looking into themselves and finding inner strength to help themselves and each other.

[Andrew Curnow]

See, I didn't interprete the Doctors statement of forgiveness as a religious parallel, because it's true to the personal relationship the Doctor has ALWAYS had with the Master. It reminded me of "The Time Monster" when the Doctor is conned into pleading for the Master's life, basically because he forgives him. Here, it's given an extra twist in that the Master resents the Doctors compassion so much that he'd (apparently!) rather die than accept it. But I saw all that as a continuation of their relationship, and nothing to do with any religious symbolism.

That's just what I thought, Si - the Master 'hates' the Doctor forgiving him, and yet as we know, he always does. That's not a religious issue surely?

Bus is right about season 1, there were a lot of cases where the day was saved by somebody else being inspired by the Doctor, rather than the Doctor himself - but since TCI onwards that hasn't really been the style of the series at all.

Again, I just really enjoyed it, it was suitably epic for a modern-day season finale, but still in many ways very Who-y. Assuming she's gone permanently, we'll miss Freema I think... and I wonder who the new girl will be. Assuming there is one? But I digress...

[Steven Ford]

Just where is RTD going with this Doctor. You could not imagine any previous Doctor being written as a near to God character. This series is starting to effect my belief badly.

Maybe you never saw Death Comes to Time. :0

[Jim]

"Assuming she's gone permanently, we'll miss Freema I think... and I wonder who the new girl will be."

freemaagyeman.com has a link to a RTD commentary where he states we will here "exciting, brilliant" news about Martha on monday!

[Martin Penny]

Going back to the hand picking up the ring for a moment, I thought it was quite badly handled, the way the scene was edited made it into another 'flashback' moment, as though the Doctor had seen it happen.

It would have been more effective to have it happen just after the Doctor had the left the funeral pyre.

[P-Bal]

I suspect it's not the first badly handled ring on the set of Doctor Who.

[Si Hunt]

we will here "exciting, brilliant" news about Martha on monday!

Get her a spin-off!!

And a catastrophically MASSIVE hat.

Si.

[Larry]

i've given it a 7/10 but to be honest i'me not over all sure what to make of it It certainly is not in the same epicness of the series 1 & 2 finales and after last weeks episode and the trailers on first viewing I feel slightly dissapointed.

There were some good moments but I did not like the Doctor, being turned into a Lord of the Rings, Gollum, type human nor did I like the resoloution of The Doctor being brought back by the power of thought.

Another problem I had was that there was no explaination as to how the humans who reached Utopia, ended up with just their heads in the pods.

[Si Hunt]

Can I just say that the production team's weird decision to keep the status of the last story being a three parter really made me think poorly of "Utopia". In hindsight it was an intriguing opening episode of a brilliant three-parter, but at the time, because I thought it was self-contained right until the last seconds, I was left feeling it was really insubstantial.

It's also really hard to see what they thought they'd gain from not revealing this awesome spoiler - ooh, imagine if we'd known that the last three episodes contained one story and not two. Devastating!

Si.

[Si Hunt]

Also we suspect the curly haired kid that ended up in the Toclafane that Martha captured might have been the Blue Peter Competition Winner!

Si.

[Jason Thompson]

I'm not sure what I made of it all to be honest. Random thoughts:

Captain Jack is the Face Of Boe? What a pointless piece of retcon that is.

The resest button ending. I personally don't care for that as a plot device, and the fact that it was so obvious that it was going to happen right from the end of last week's episode didn't help. One thing though: they reset it to just after the world sees the US President assassinated, apparently by the machinations of Britain's Prime minister. Wouldn't that be a bit hard to explain and leave humanity in a rather precarious position? But apparently no-one thinks there'll be a problem and everyone's happily going about their daily lives.

The coda leading into the Christmas special was a pointless retread, not as good, and not required. Last year we had an incredibly emotional scene of Rose's farewell, and the sudden jolt into 'look, we're carrying on with new adventures' was almost a required event. This time it was unnecessary. Martha's departure was not nearly so emotional, and left us with the distinct impression we'll be seeing her again, so we could have ended with her seeing the TARDIS off, knowing that there will be more adventures on the way.

Overall I liked it, but it didn't do much for me, and I preferred the previous two season finales.

[P-Bal]

It's not explicit that Jack is the La visage de Boe, it was merely a throwaway line which you could either smile at as a joke, or leap on and assess in line with established continuity and spurt fan wee over the walls.

The finale lacked OBERMAN.

[Jon Masters]

4 / 10 - all 4 points going to John Simms as the Master. Too tired to say much more, too polite to say much about what I thought.

One point - (without watching back) I seem to remember the US president being assassinated after the spheres appear, so the Doctor is talking out of his proverbial.

Still, my suggestion that the plot details might be handled in 5 minutes so we could have a Jones reconciliation and a Martha-loves-you speech were horribly accurate.

[WhiteCrow]

I thought the Face of Boe / Jack was kind of good, but not as good as it should have been, as of course Rose met Boe before she'd looked into the time vortex.

The idea for the Toclafaine were brilliant. A race who lived to the end of time almost, who survived through keeping only their head alive. So much possibility. But uterly wasted. Having them behave just as children, killing because they found it fun lost them the kind of empathy their plight deserved. They could have been an interesting race, explored as the cybermen were, but again just wasted really.

It'll be interesting to see what they do with the Titanic - although I think it's been done to death a bit, even the Time Tunnel is "been there done that".

[Larry]

any one else reckon The Master, will return as a burnt up emaciated bloke with two huge bulging ping pong ball eyes.

[WhiteCrow]

any one else reckon The Master, will return as a burnt up emaciated bloke with two huge bulging ping pong ball eyes.

Surely they've done enough statues this year.

[Si Hunt]

I can't believe the Axons were mentioned TWICE!

Si.

[Larry]

I can't believe the Axons were mentioned TWICE!

Si.

hope that's not a hint for next series returning villain/alien.


on another forum i'm on an interesting theory has been raised that Lucy Saxon, could or is really The Rani - after all it was a woman who picked up the ring.

[Larry]

as for Jack being the Face of Boe, how in the hell did his head get so big surely it's not all down to ego.

[Martin Penny]

In the commentary for the episode, RTD says that the ring scene was there in case a future production teams wants to bring The Master back. So I'm guessing we won't be seeing the Master again for a while

[Darren]

1 out of 10


That was the worst episode of New Who I have seen. I am almost speechless, infact. Where was the excitement, suspense or terror? I was on the edge of my seat during Doomsday and Parting of the Ways. But Last of the Time Lords- this is what the series has led up to?

The notion that the Doctor could be traumatised to that degree without regenerating or dying outright is ludicrous.
John Simm's Master was annoying as ever, which is a shame as the entire episode was almost dedicated to showing him prancing around the Valiant. The premise that the Toclafane were the last of the humans sent to Utopia was shoehorned in in 2 minutes through flashbacks of Utopia and discarded
The Doctor ressurected and made "super powerful" by a planet of humans chanting "Doctor" ws nauseating and pathetic. Oh, but it was a very handy and lazy plot device.
The Paradox Machine. Last week the Doctor told Jack to touch nothing, but now, what the hell, they have to finish the episode so just shoot it indiscriminately. Handily this made everything that had gone before irrelevent and pointless because time rewound and none of it happened.

Finally, the Titannic has crashed literally into the TARDIS, eh? The TARDIS that nothing can penetrate, and that includes The Hordes of Ghengis Khan? Hhhmmmm.

Awful in every way.