Howling:John Hurt is the Valeyard theory

So this is my 0,02$

When the Tenth doctor started regenerating at the end of ‘The Stolen Earth’ and subsequently diverted it to his ‘handy hand’. He explained it with: “I stopped it from going all the way and siphoned off the rest”. I think this means that he used a part of his regeneration energy to heal himself and then he put the rest (so the entire regeneration process that didn’t happen) into the hand thereby using an entire regeneration and essentially becoming the 11th doctor in the process. This could be confirmed by the fact that the remaining energy goes on to generate an entire new body from the hand and then rearranging Donna’s brain into that of a Time Lord. This would stand for both the physical and the mental parts of the regeneration.

This would make Matt Smith the 12th doctor which would contradict the doctor saying in ‘The Lodger’ that he is the 11th. However he is gesturing to his face at the time which could be seen as him saying that it’s his 11th face. This works out with the theory that Tennant is both the 10th and 11th doctor because he hasn’t changed his face. It could also be him saying that he is the eleventh regeneration cause he never says that he is the 11th doctor just the 11th.

Now the Master has said in Prose that the Valeyard would appear between the doctor’s ‘twelfth and final regeneration’ (I’ll come back to this) although we shouldn’t take this as automatically true, but what if we do? That would mean that somewhere after the twelfth doctor the valeyard would appear. If Matt Smith is the 12th that would mean that from now on the possibility of the valeyard returning is present. Also the Valeyard had a storyline where he manipulated the former versions of the doctor into changing his life which greatly resembles the plot of ‘The Name of the Doctor’ in which John Hurt first appears.

My guess is that Hurt is the Valeyard because the Valeyard can be said to go against the name of the doctor because of his egotism. The doctor being someone who would throw his own life away to help others. Also he has been described by the master as the amalgamation of the doctor’s dark side which would explain the dark setting where Clara finds Hurt.

End of theory

About the regeneration thing ‘between the twelfth and final regeneration’. How is this possible if the Time Lords have only twelve regenerations. I think this means that the doctor has absorbed at least a part of river’s regenerations thereby giving him an even more extended lifetime. Or it could be otherwise interpreted so that the Valeyard shows up on another time after the doctor’s 12 regenerations. The master saying this might mean we get to see more of him in the future *fingers crossed*. Any thoughts on this would be great --145.53.128.150talk to me 21:56, June 13, 2013 (UTC)


 * I haven't read the whole theory, but I thought the Master said in The Trial of a Time Lord (TV) that the Valeyard was from "between the Doctor's 12th and 13th lives", not regeneration events, meaning he appeared during the process of 12 regenerating into 13 (however that would happen). Just sayin'. —BioniclesaurKing4t2 - "Hello, I'm the Doctor. Basically, . . . run." 01:35, June 14, 2013 (UTC)


 * Yup, between the "twelfth and final incarnation." See The Ultimate Foe ( and ). Andbeonetraveler ☎  01:46, June 14, 2013 (UTC)


 * Sorry, I read the Valeyard page and it said regenerations. What i think is still interesting is the fact that the master says final incarnation which leaves at least a little bit of wiggle room for the doctor possibly having extra regenerations.--Drakonim ☎  02:18, June 14, 2013 (UTC)

Another problem with "Hurt is Valeyard" is that Hurt seemed as if he was forced to be the one to take the fall for making a tough decision, though one he felt was needed and perhaps justified, a feeling which might have been part of the reason he lost the name "Doctor" (either by the others deciding or even by his own decision). By contrast, the Valeyard sounds more like a pure outright "bad guy", trying to sentence the Doctor for any crime he could. I just don't see them as having the same stories, which, as you know, "we all are in the end". And as for Journey's End 10 actually being 11, he may have "spent" the regeneration energy, but would he had to have actually "used" it on himself for it to count as one of his regenerations? Another potential loophole to exploit? —BioniclesaurKing4t2 - "Hello, I'm the Doctor. Basically, . . . run." 04:52, June 14, 2013 (UTC)

I was just making a post which said some of the same things. I dont think Hurt is the Valeyard. His interchange with the Doctor at the end of "Name.." was hardly what one would expect. The Doctor seemed to acknowledge that he had no alternatives, and didn't dispute that he was only motivated by a pursuit of peace and sanity. It is only at the use of the word "name" that the Doctor blanches.

Now perhaps it was not a real dialogue because they were not real to one another, and the Doctor saw no point in really taking him on because he did not think Hurt coould really hear him, or perhaps because Hurt in the timestream is only really a shado of Hurt. But it still doesn't sound to me like what the Doctor would say to the Valeyard.

I have said on other threads that I suspect Hurt is really the person with whom Porridge sympathizes,the person who pushed the button to end the CyberWar, at a very great cost of life. (Nightmare in Silver) Compare that action to the 9th Doctor, who had prepared a weapon which would have destroyed all the remaining Daleks, but he would not use it because it would also kill millions on Earth. First, do no harm, is the ancient code of the physician. If River is correct and we get our word "Doctor" from him, perhaps we also get the physician's moral code as well. If 9 had set off the device to defeat the Daleks, he would have broken the promise too.Phil Stone ☎  05:26, June 14, 2013 (UTC

I allways suspected Porridge meant himself with the poor guy who had to push the button what with him being the emperor. It's true that the dialogue at the end of "The Name.." doesn't fit with the Valeyard but they can allways write it in such a way that it does fit but it's not likely that's true. However with your theory of Hurt being the guy who pushed the button it would have to be the Doctor. This is because he says:'He is me' when Clara asks who Hurt is. I know that the Doctor lies but it doesn't really make sense. Also Clara says she saw all his 11 faces which is once again a reference to the face. She then goes on to say he's the 11th Doctor but that can be explained by nobody except the Doctor knowing how many regeneration energy he still has left.--Drakonim ☎  15:18, June 14, 2013 (UTC)

And on the subject of "faces", perhaps it is that Hurt isn't a true "face" of the Doctor because he never really existed: he's just a visual manifestation of the state of mind of the Doctor when whatever decision that it was was made, and the effects of that decision were so great as to "break off" that state of mind as a semi-separate entity, at least in the mental plane. He may only show up in the 50th as a mental "haunting" for one or both 10 and 11 (and perhaps also Clara) that only they can see or speak to. —BioniclesaurKing4t2 - "Hello, I'm the Doctor. Basically, . . . run." 15:43, June 14, 2013 (UTC)

I found something new while watching 'The end of time' pt. 2. At the beginning in the Time Lord meeting one of the Partisans says that in the heart of the time war:"millions die every second, Lost in bloodlust and insanity". This is an exact opposite of the 'peace and sanity' Hurt mentions. Even the lost part could give an explanation for the lack of choice that he mentions. This would mean that Hurt is born from the Time War. I don't know exactly if by heart of the war she means another location or an earlier timeframe so this could mean that Hurt could be a mental manifestation of one of the Time War doctors. I think the most likely one would be the 8th cause we don't know what happened later in his life. I'm not disregarding the rest of my theory but I'm now highly doubting Hurt being the Valeyard. --Drakonim ☎  05:35, June 15, 2013 (UTC)

Drakonim- I did not mean that he was not (in some sense) the Doctor. As 11 says, only I am here. But rather that the actions which warrant Hurt's having broken the promise are those to which Porridge refers, not the crimes of The Valeyard. I understand that Porridge may be understood as saying it is a great burden to be in charge, and he feels it himself. And given that he in effect detonates the bomb that destroys the planet, it could be a bit of forshadowing. But the ending seems to undercut that interpretation, because when Porridge blows up the planet, later than policy would seem to dictate, he and his friends are saved by the waiting Imperial craft, with no trepidation on his part at all. Apparently, only the Cybermen were killed.

As I recall in "Name..." one of the things Vastra does is look at the sky to see if systems the Doctor has saved were returning. This parallel to the hole in the sky seems significant, at keast as a contrast between the Doctor and whoever it was who ended the Cyberwar. And if that was the Hurt doctor, the contrast is even more to the point.

I keep being reminded of Amy's conversation with River after Amy leaves Kovarian to tender mercies of The Silence. River says it was an alternate timeline that was erased. It never happened so it should not concern her. Amy is emphatic that she knows she did it, and that makes it real. It seems to me the same is/will be true of the Hurt Doctor. That even if his act is/was/will be undone, that the Doctor will consider it real because he knows he did it. So Hurt as he exists even now might be a sort of ghost who persists not as a proper part of his timeline that Clara might have accessed, but as a part of the Doctor who he himself will not let go of, and so Clara only sees him when she is with the Doctor. "Good men dont need rules. Today is not the day to find out why I have so many." Perhaps we are finally going to learn why he has so many.Phil Stone ☎  05:54, June 15, 2013 (UTC)


 * I like the idea but the only problem I have with it is that I think the timeline has an objective view on erased or subverted timelines. Like with your example of Amy, if we went into Amy's timeline would we see the other timelines she has experienced over her life (The girl who waited, The wedding of River Song)? I can get behind the idea that the Doctor could have those same reservations that Amy has about actions in aborted timelines but I don't think they show up in his own personal timeline.

Also what you're saying about Porridge and the detonating is on a smaller scale which would probably give a little leeway on the rules as long as the planet that the Cybermen are on is destroyed. Also I think it was Vastra checking to see if their plan had worked because they sent the 'normal' human Clara after the GI which wouldn't automatically mean that she would/could fix everything. I like the 'Good men don't need rules' part because we haven't really heard anything about that anymore and it would fit with the Doctor's greatest secret.

Also on my previous post my guess on the 8th also comes from the fact that he possessed the Moment to end the time war which would line up with the Bloodlust/Peace and Insanity/Sanity. We allready know that the Doctor came out of the Time War a changed man (no pun intended) and the survivor's guilt we have seen in his recent incarnations could be an explanation for the darker atmosphere surrounding John Hurt.

Hurt could also be an incarnation inbetween the 8th and 9th that used the Moment and therefore went against the Name of the Doctor and isn't named Doctor for that reason (not really convincing myself with this one but i like to look at all the angles).--Drakonim ☎  08:36, June 15, 2013 (UTC)

Drakonim: When the post-war incarnations (9, 10 & 11) have spoken of ending the Time War & destroying the Time Lords, they've all expressed regret & "survivor guilt" but they've all also shown that they still think it was right -- terrible, yes, but right. In The End of Time, what we learned of the Time Lords' intentions supported that. In The Fires of Pompeii, the Doctor said, "It's Pompeii or the world." At the end of the Time War, the choice was "Gallifrey or the universe". The Doctor used the Moment & saved the universe from his own people. It was terrible but it was right.

What the Eleventh Doctor said of the Hurt incarnation was, in effect, that he'd done something understandable & well-intentioned but wrong. That doesn't fit his attitude to ending the Time War. It also, because seemingly genuinely well-intentioned, doesn't fit what we know of the Valeyard. The Valeyard was most certainly not well-intentioned. The Valeyard didn't do evil while meaning to do good. The Valeyard did evil while meaning to do evil. --2.96.27.7talk to me 19:48, June 15, 2013 (UTC)

I understand what you mean by an "objective view" to be what history would say if it were objective. A "subjective view" would include those pieces which fall out of history, but which people who travel in time might remember, as Amy remembers not helping Kovarian. The Doctor refers to it as "scar tissue" of his travels through time. I believe it was when 5 was fighting Omega, he said that in many ways a man is the sum of his memories, a Time lord even more so.

The thing is, this is not a timeline in a museum or history book. This is what remains in the Doctor's tomb after his death. It seems to me that this personal timeline could just as easily be the "subjective view" rather than the "objective view."

I would also agree that TIme Locking the Time War is not how he broke the promise. In "The End of Time" 10 is willing to not only risk his life, but take up arms to keep the lock from being broken. Those things just dont jive, even if you understand the Time Lock, as some people do, as the destruction of the Time Lords and the Daleks, because if it were so, why would 10 fight to maintain that?

Unless the idea is that the Hurt Doctor really is no different from any other Doctor, except for the situations he has been in, and the choices he had to make. And any other Doctor would have done the same thing. And every Doctor will decry Hurt's actions as breaking the promise, but none will allow it to be overturned? So we see 10 refusing the revolver from Wilf in "End...", consistent with "...the man who would never..." from "The Doctor's Daughter." Then he accepts it, once he knows what is at stake. I can see this as a way of going forward, following "The God Complex," where the Doctor is supposed to be taken off his pedestal. But I dont really accept it.Phil Stone ☎  04:18, June 16, 2013 (UTC)

Phil Stone: "I believe it was when 5 was fighting Omega, he said that in many ways a man is the sum of his memories, a Time lord even more so." The quote's right but but not the story; it was early in The Five Doctors. (Your point still stands, though.)

My impression, from what very little we got in The Name of the Doctor, was that whatever the Hurt Doctor did wasn't like other things the Doctor's done & that Eleven (at least) thinks he was wrong to do it. By that, I don't mean that it turned out badly -- it probably but not certainly did turn out badly -- but that he ought to have known in advance that it was the wrong thing to do. Obviously, without knowing what he did & the circumstances in which he did it, this can only be an impression & I've no details I can point to to say, "this is why he ought to have known that it was wrong."

To take admittedly hypothetical examples: The action, in both cases, was intended to alleviate suffering (a good intention).
 * Suppose a human gave a painless lethal injection to a patient suffering from an agonising & inevitably fatal illness. Many people would believe that right or, at least, justifiable.
 * Now suppose a similar situation with one difference, that the injection was given when the person who gave it knew the diagnostic tests had not yet been completed, so that there was still a real possibility that the parient might not have been suffering from that illness but from a more treatable one.

From the information I've given in the second example, you can't know whether the patient was or was not inevitably going to die in agony. But you can know that the person who gave the injection "jumped the gun" & was in a position to have known that he/she was doing so. He/she knew at the time that the diagnosis was uncertain.

I'm not trying to say that I think the Hurt Doctor was in that particular situation. I'm only outlining a situation in which someone took drastic, irrevocable action without waiting to find out if it was really necessary. That doesn't depend on hindsight -- on knowing the actual results of the tests. It depends only on the knowledge that they'd not yet been completed. What's wrong is having acted without first taking the available measures to establish that the action was necessary. --89.242.74.48talk to me 05:20, June 16, 2013 (UTC)

What you are saying makes sense. Except for the fact that the Doctor is always saying he was stupid for not realizing something, and his mistake costs something to someone. He readily admits misunderstanding things in the God Complex, for example. He leads the clerics to their doom by not realizing that all the monuments surrounding them are short one head. Granted he usually doesn't preface a decision with, "We could wait a bit and be sure, and there is no reason not to, but let's not anyway." What usually happens is that there is no time to discover the crucial detail which will be uncovered before the end of the story. Circumstances force his hand. But that seems to be what Hurt is saying as well. Would 11 be so accepting of Hurt's explanation if his fault was carelessness? And while one would not want a careless physician, would one really characterize a careless physician as one who broke his promise? Is that really how one would put it?Phil Stone ☎  06:21, June 16, 2013 (UTC)

Take a look at the situation in The Beast Below, where Amy saved the Doctor from making a mistake by killing the last of the Star Whales. He'd not fully considered that killing it might not be necessary. In that situation, the mistake would have been understandable & well-intentioned -- but still unworthy of the name "Doctor", as he said at the time.

Anyway, I wasn't trying to say the Hurt Doctor was in that situation or even a very similar one. I don't know what situation the Hurt Doctor was in. All I have to go on is what was shown in The Name...: that the Eleventh Doctor accepted that whatever the Hurt Doctor did really was done "in the name of peace and sanity" but that the Eleventh Doctor also thought it was a violation of the promise represented by the the name "Doctor". None of us yet knows the actual situation.

As you say, normally, when the Doctor acts with too little information, it's because the circumstances don't allow time to discover more. In the kind of situation I had in mind, the time would be available -- available but not taken. There's a big difference between 1. not (in the circumstances) being able to find out more & 2. being able to to find out more but not doing it.

Also, how blameworthy carelessness is depends on the situation. If the action taken will (as far as you know) have minor & easily reversible consequences, that's one thing. If the action taken will (as far as you know) have drastic & irreversible consequences, that's quite another matter. In that kind of situation, the obligation to take care is far greater.

We'll not really be doing anything but guessing until we actually know what the Hurt Doctor did. Once we know that, we may well find ourselves discussing whether or not it really was as bad as Eleven obviously thinks it was. (I was 89 earlier.) --2.101.50.121talk to me 15:51, June 16, 2013 (UTC)


 * I agree with you, @BioniclesaurKing4t2! You're on the right track.


 * Clara said she saw ELEVEN incarnations of the Doctor but she didn't see Hurt. If he was a past incarnation, she would have seen him and she'd have said TWELVE. If Tennant had been #10 & #11, she would only have seen TEN incarnations. This also means that Tenant's Doctor went through 2 regenerations within a year's time which just doesn't make sense with the way the show is designed. And Hurt couldn't be a future Doctor because, hey, the future hasn't happened yet! The only characters who can be in The Doctor's timestream at that moment in time were people from his past...the future is still in flux. So, Hurt can't be future incarnation either.


 * In fact, The Doctor (and Moffat) doesn't know what the next incarnation will look like (because the part isn't cast) so, practically, the next incarnation could not make an appearance in the timestream Clara visited because no one knows who he/she is yet. BUT despite not ever seeing Doctors #1-10 before, Clara was still able to identify them all as incarnations of the Eleventh Doctor. So, not only is the future indeterminate but if there had been future incarnations of the Doctor in the timestream, Clara would have been able to recognize them because she was able to identify the previous ten incarnations. So, that means that the timestream--as it existed when the Doctor and Clara walked into it--does not contain future events or characters in The Doctor's timeline. Badwolff ☎  19:37, June 16, 2013 (UTC)


 * She may have seen pictures of them in various places, such as in The History of the Time War or elsewhere in the library. Andbeonetraveler ☎  20:09, June 16, 2013 (UTC)


 * Well, she just opened the book and flipped a page so I don't think so. But, I'll admit that we have no idea whether she wandered back to the library to read through the book. My gut feeling is that there is not enough trust between The Doctor and Clara yet that he allows her to spend hours or days wandering around the TARDIS but we don't know what we don't see. Badwolff ☎  20:16, June 16, 2013 (UTC)

Then again, looking at Hurt as a state of mind instead of a body, guilt can easily turn to anger and then rage, so it could be wrapped around and construed that Hurt is the pre-Valeyard. Maybe he becomes (but isn't yet, necessarily) the part of the Doctor that splits off between 12 and 13. He may have recurring appearances in the following Series or few, always showing up as a ghost-like apparition that only the Doctor can see, but then a change occurs, and a new actor plays him after inward depression and regret turn to outward aggression, and when 12 regenerates, he "jumps out" and becomes the Valeyard, either antagonizing 13 for a time or not, before getting defeated but escaping, when he tries taking revenge on 6, but, as we saw, is foiled. He may or may not go back to antagonize 13 after that (I don't know any non-Trial of a Time Lord Valeyard stories, if there are any). —BioniclesaurKing4t2 - "Hello, I'm the Doctor. Basically, . . . run." 23:22, June 16, 2013 (UTC)


 * Another possibility not discussed much if at all is that mental-state-only Hurt may somehow be an extension of the "Time Lord Victorious" state of mind from The Waters of Mars. Not sure how, but it's the "how" as much as the "what" in Moffat's stories that surprise (and confuse) us the most. —BioniclesaurKing4t2 - "Hello, I'm the Doctor. Basically, . . . run." 01:10, June 17, 2013 (UTC)


 * BioniclesaurKing4t2, "I don't know any non-Trial of a Time Lord Valeyard stories": According to The Valeyard's infobox, there are a few prose stories but that's all. The only one I've actually read is Matrix, which is the subject of another current discussion here. --2.96.27.208talk to me 03:22, June 17, 2013 (UTC)

When I first saw the back of John Hurt in the story my first thought was the Valeyard I then start thinking, as Clara mentioned that she didn't see that one, that he was part of the Doctor an aspect of his own guilt.

The Valeyard is an amalgamation of the darker sides of the Doctors nature between the 12th and final incarnation the way the Master says you don't improve with age as to suggest this is how the next Doctor or the last Doctor will look. Yet he is not the future Doctor as if he was to kill his past self would cancel him out. He was brought in being by the high council as a possible future Doctor he wants to be a separate entity and take over the Doctors remaining lives and become the 6th Doctor which was played out in the audio story “He Jests at Scars”. He is in sense the Doctors Mr. Hyde a part of him

On starting the discussion about the Matrix Novel there was another point in it. When the Valeyard reveals himself and says he has been corrupting all of the Doctors lives he also states to the 7th that he been close to being evil destroying Skaro, destroying the Cyberfleet and being close to killing Mordred that could be implied that the evil side is responsible for some of the bad that the Doctor has done or nearly done which part of him made him destroying Gallifrey, Killing the Racnoss, becoming "Time Lord Victorious".

John Hurt’s Doctor Panics the Doctor he is afraid of him and that he didn’t do it in his Name not the Name of the Doctor it is stated that what he did was in the name peace and sanity, which the Doctor does not accept which must have been something bad..A-Smk ☎  21:24, July 2, 2013 (UTC)

1)The whole Valyard being between x & y regenerations is based on a statement made decades ago, as well as several regenerations and a Time War ago. At a time when the BBC was doing all it could to kill the series, suggesting this evil character was well into the Doctor's future (in fact almost as far as possible) was no doubt considered a safe move. But I see no particular reason for Moffet or the BBC to hold to this timeline, any more than they are stuck with the original limit to the number of regenerations. Time can be rewritten. The events of the Time War itself, its effect upon the Doctor, or even the actions of the Hurt Doctor, might change things such that the Valyard never comes to be.

2) I risk repeating myself, but again consider the 9th Doctor rigging a device to destroy the Daleks, but not using it because it would also kill many of the people of Earth. (Or more recently,"In 900 hundred years of traveling in time and space I never met anyone who was unimportant.") Compare that to the person who destroyed the Tiberian Spiral Galaxy, and a billion trillion lives, to end the CyberWar. We dont have to assume ignorance, or carelessness, or even just a lack of patience to understand a difference between these choices. We can understand them as simply being different moral choices, guided by distinctly different ethics. This strikes me as being precisely the sort of difference to which the Doctor is refering when he talks about the Hurt Doctor as not acting in accord with his promise/Name. Its not about facts or details, but what one does about them. Phil Stone  ☎  03:53, July 5, 2013 (UTC)