Hide (TV story)

Hide was the ninth regular episode of the seventh series of Doctor Who produced by BBC Wales. It was the first time Clara Oswald directly communicated with the Doctor's TARDIS and confronted it about not liking her.

Synopsis
Clara and the Doctor arrive at the haunted Caliburn House, set alone on a desolate moor. Within its walls, a ghost-hunting professor and a gifted empathic psychic are searching for the Witch of the Well. Her apparition appears throughout the history of the building, but is she really a ghost? And what is chasing her?

Plot
"Caliburn House. Night four. November 25th, 1974. 11:04 pm."

Professor Alec Palmer and his assistant Emma Grayling are attempting to contact an apparition haunting Caliburn House. Emma is a psychic, and uses her gifts to gain the attention of the 'ghost'. They are interrupted by knocking at the front door, and open it to find the Doctor and Clara. The Doctor tells Alec that he is looking for a ghost and Clara claims that they are 'Ghostbusters'.

The Doctor claims to be from "the Ministry", and knows who Alec and Emma are. Photographs taken by the professor show the same figure in the same pose throughout the history of Caliburn House. The Doctor and Clara search the house, as a strange creature stalks them through it. Loud knocking is heard, which is said to be associated with the 'Witch of the Well'.

The Doctor takes a series of photographs of the 'ghost' throughout Earth's timeline. Clara believes that she is nothing more than a ghost to the Doctor, because as a time traveller he has been to a time when she is long dead. He tells her she is "the only mystery worth solving". The Doctor uses his photographs to explain that the 'ghost' is in fact a time traveller called Hila, who is trapped in a pocket universe and being chased by an unknown creature.

The Doctor uses a crystal from Metebelis III to enhance Emma's thoughts and use them to create a portal, a reality 'well'. He goes to rescue Hila, who escapes, but is trapped in the pocket universe with the monster. Clara returns to the TARDIS, and after a brief argument with the voice interface, manages to break into the pocket universe and rescue the Doctor from the creature.

In conversation with Emma, the Doctor reveals that he brought Clara to Caliburn house in order to see Emma, not the ghost. He asks what she senses about Clara, but Emma reports nothing unusual about her. As the Doctor and Clara are preparing to leave, the Doctor inadvertently reveals that Hila is Emma and Alec's future descendant. Alec and Emma are in love, and the Doctor advises them to "hold hands, and don't let go". Then the Doctor realises that the creature in the pocket universe has been trying to return to another creature in the house. He then states that every lonely monster needs a companion, and explains to Clara that the two creatures have been separated through time and space and certain events, and are yearning to be with one another. He describes this as not a "Ghost story" but a "Love story". He then returns to the pocket universe, where he reconciles with the monster to bring it back in the exact same manner as before.

Cast

 * The Doctor - Matt Smith
 * Clara Oswald - Jenna-Louise Coleman
 * Major Alec Palmer - Dougray Scott
 * Emma Grayling - Jessica Raine
 * Hila Tacorien - Kemi-Bo Jacobs
 * The Crooked Man - Aidan Cook

The Doctor

 * When the Doctor introduces himself, Alec asks him, "Doctor what?," to which the Doctor responds, "If you like."
 * The Doctor says he loves carrier pigeons.
 * Emma tells Clara not to trust the Doctor, saying that "he has a sliver of ice in his heart".

Individuals

 * Alec is a ghost-hunter, as well as a "member of the Baker Street Irregulars [who] specialised in espionage, sabotage and reconnaissance behind enemy lines, a talented water colourist [and a] professor of psychology."
 * Emma is an empathic psychic and assistant to Alec.

Popular culture from the real world

 * Clara introduces herself and the Doctor as "Ghostbusters."

Foods and beverages

 * The Doctor drinks milk.
 * Emma and Clara both have a glass of whiskey which they don't like, and so drink tea instead. Furthermore, Clara calls whiskey the "11th most disgusting drink ever invented."
 * The Doctor requests some Kendal Mint Cakes to go with his Tacorien rescue.

Places

 * Alec owns Caliburn House, which was built sometime before 1474.
 * The "Cumbrian agenda" of series 7b continues in this episode with not only the positive reference to Kendal Mint Cakes, but also the negative one to Carlisle being the "opposite of bliss".

The TARDIS

 * Clara calls the TARDIS a "grumpy old cow."
 * The TARDIS uses her voice visual interface to talk with Clara, using a hologram of Clara herself, because the interface is programmed to "select the image of a person you esteem." Unlike the last time the Doctor used a similar interface, (TV: Let's Kill Hitler) the TARDIS projects the interface outside of the ship and, for the first time on screen, addresses a companion in this manner.
 * The TARDIS unlocks herself in order to allow Clara to enter, even though she doesn't yet have a key. She's done this before. (TV: The Doctor's Wife)
 * Clara says that they need a place to keep her umbrella, the Doctors states that he has or had a place at one point. The First, Second, Fourth, Fifth and Seventh Doctors all had umbrella racks in their control rooms, and the Fifth, Ninth, Tenth's control rooms, as well as the Eleventh's first one, had hat stands.

Technology

 * The Doctor obsesses over toggle switches and an ACR 99821.
 * A subset of the Eye of Harmony is used to open a gateway to the pocket dimension.

Story notes

 * Working titles for the episode were Phantom of the Hex and The Hider in the House.

Ratings

 * The overnight ratings were at 5 million live viewers.

Filming locations

 * Gethin Woods (forest in pocket universe)
 * Margam Castle (also used in The Sontaran Stratagem/The Poison Sky as Rattigan Academy)

Production errors

 * Several wires are seen running from the TARDIS to the equipment which opens the wormhole to the pocket universe, but when Clara returns, they are all missing.
 * While the Doctor is wandering the pocket universe for the first time, he removes his bow tie. The bow tie then appears and disappears between close and wide shots.

Continuity

 * The Doctor is able to utilise a "subset of the Eye of Harmony" to enter a pocket universe by running cables from the TARDIS. (TV: The Deadly Assassin, Doctor Who)
 * The TARDIS's cloister bell chimes. (TV: Logopolis, Castrovalva, Resurrection of the Daleks, Doctor Who, et al.)
 * The Doctor references fixed points in time. (TV: The Fires of Pompeii, The Waters of Mars, The Wedding of River Song)
 * Clara introduces herself and the Doctor as "Ghostbusters," referencing the film, as had previously the Tenth Doctor and Rose Tyler. (TV: Army of Ghosts)
 * The Doctor uses his Psychic paper. (TV: The Empty Child, New Earth, Partners in Crime, The Vampires of Venice, et al.)
 * The Doctor once again pretends to be from Health and Safety. (TV: Partners in Crime)
 * Clara references the Eleventh Doctor's big chin, as had previously Oswin Oswald. (TV: Asylum of the Daleks)
 * The Doctor uses a blue crystal from Metebelis III. (TV: The Green Death, Planet of the Spiders, AUDIO: Worldwide Web)
 * Emma speaks to the ghost, telling it to "speak to me," in the same vein as Gwyneth holding a séance and saying "speak to us." (TV: The Unquiet Dead)
 * The Doctor enters a pocket universe. (TV: The Celestial Toymaker, The Mind Robber, Full Circle, The Doctor's Wife, et al.)
 * The Doctor uses what appears to be the same reddish-orange space suit he used on Krop Tor (TV: The Impossible Planet) and Mars (The Waters of Mars).
 * The Seventh Doctor also visited a mysterious stately home due to his companion at the time, Ace. (TV: Ghost Light)
 * The Eighth Doctor previously encountered another being referred to by humans as "the Witch from the Well." (AUDIO: The Witch from the Well)
 * The Doctor jumps and clings on to the outside of the TARDIS, as had Captain Jack Harkness previously. (TV: Utopia)
 * Clara has difficulty coming to terms with seeing a long-dead Earth, as Rose Tyler did in TV: The End of the World.
 * Sarah Jane Smith once visited a haunted house very similar to this. (TV: ''The Eternity Trap)
 * The Fourth Doctor previously encountered a time traveler from the future, whose journey had gone wrong. (TV: The Talons of Weng-Chiang)
 * The Doctor previously drew a symbol on the floor with chalk to solve a problem from another pocket universe. (TV: Battlefield)
 * Both the Doctor and the TARDIS state that the pocket universe would drain the energy from the TARDIS; this had previously happened in a parallel universe. (TV: Rise of the Cybermen/The Age of Steel)
 * After a heated discussion with the TARDIS, Clara is let in by her without a key, to follow the Doctor into a pocket dimension against his orders. This exact sequence of events was previously also done by Charlotte Pollard in AUDIO: Zagreus. Like Clara does in this story, Charlotte also called the TARDIS a "cow" in AUDIO: The Next Life.
 * The TARDIS interface was previously seen in TV: Let's Kill Hitler. Back then, it also showed companions.
 * Clara mentions the TARDIS not liking her. (TV: The Rings of Akhaten).
 * Asking for Kendal Mint Cake was not the first time the Doctor has asked for baked confectionery amongst a list of items needed to find someone. (TV: The Impossible Astronaut)
 * When jumping into the pocket universe for the first time, the Doctor says, "Geronimo". (TV: The End of Time, et. al.)
 * Clara answers a question of the Doctor's by saying, "That's the chap." This is the same answer that the Fourth Doctor gave when Adric asked if Earth is the planet with all the oceans. (TV:Logopolis)
 * The Doctor refers to the Vortex with verbiage similar to his "wibbly-wobbly, timey-wimey" description of Time. (TV: Blink)
 * Like Clara, Wilfred Mott also wondered if the Doctor viewed Humans as insignificant. In both cases, he asserted that he did not. (TV: The End of Time)

Home video releases
to be added