Forum:Is in-character linking narration canonical?

categpry:discussions without clear resolution

So yanno how BBC Video used to release incomplete serials with linking narration to cover the lost episodes? Sometimes, that used an actor who wasn't in character providing the narration, as with Tom Baker on Shada. But The Crusade release has William Russell fully in character as Ian Chesterton. They even give him a lower third which reads, "Ian Chesterton". So is that a valid image of Ian? And if so, doesn't it counter the Death of the Doctor notion that Ian never aged? And to the extent that there are other in-character linking narrations, do we take them seriously? 21:43:52 Thu 18 Aug 2011


 * It's something outside of the original broadcast.
 * Should we include/count the linking narration done for the missing soundtracks?
 * I don't think it does count as it's deliberately framed as narration, I'd add a however this though, if a story comes along and (somehow) manages to frame it into a story then maybe it could be counted. But as it stands there doesn't seem to be enough information for this to be a valid image. --Tangerineduel / talk 16:29, August 21, 2011 (UTC)
 * Just sticking to The Crusade for a minute, the thing is, that's a very different reconstruction to either Baker on Shada or Ford on Reign of Terror or Anneke Wills giving linking narration for Power of the Daleks on CD. Unlike these other cases, it's done as a scene with the character of Ian, not with the actor.  It is Ian looking back on his life and remembering the story of how he got knighted by King Richard.  It's released by the BBC, the tape's producers took the time to create a properly dressed and realistic set, and there's proper multiple-shot editing.  It's in every sense a licensed narrative, and it does connect to the broader canon by confirming things that happened in other media.  For instance, he references PROSE: The Witch Hunters, which was, at the time The Crusade VHS was released in 1999, the very latest story involving Ian.  It just seems like there was a genuine effort to make the piece fit into continuity. 04:11:34 Mon 22 Aug 2011


 * Okay.
 * How do we classify this? Is it still DW? Prefix wise I mean, and is there anything else that fits into this category?
 * Are the in-universe DVD documentaries in a similar field?
 * As it does tie in with The Witch Hunters and obviously The Crusade, then I would be leaning toward it being canon.
 * But I am concerned about what other stuff is lurking out there that might also fall into this category. Or might fall just outside of this category but may be included within it because it's close. --Tangerineduel / talk 13:54, August 22, 2011 (UTC)


 * Well, I think it's a special case so it kinda deserves special rules. I only have two examples that spring readily to mind.  One is this Crusade thing.  The other is the Fourth Doctor version of The Power of the Daleks.  I think I'd be okay with references to them both being the company that produced the thing they were on.  So for instance BBC Video: The Crusade.  The problem here is, of course, that these little segments have no name.  The only distinguishing characteristic is really the medium/company of release. 22:43:14 Mon 22 Aug 2011

If BBC Wales says it's valid, then it's canon. That's a lot clearer than vague references to CURSE OF THE FATAL DEATH as a dream. Boblipton 22:44, August 22, 2011 (UTC)
 * Well, BBC Wales makes virtually no pronouncements on what they think of as a "valid" story. And the issue here is that there's an official BBC-made in-character "snippet" which directly challenges the BBC Wales-made episode of TV on the issue of the 21st century nature of Ian Chesterton. Sarah Jane tells us that Ian is unaged from his 1963/5 appearance, whereas this in-character linking narration shows us a man with white hair claiming to be Sir Ian Chesterton.  And don't even get me started  on the minefield that is the Fourth Doctor narration of The Power of the Daleks.  Thing is though we do need to at least consider how to deal with these oddities. 02:47:05 Tue 23 Aug 2011

I was under the impression that Ian's lack of aging is a rumor and may refer to his zest for life. According to his entry in this wiki:

''According to a rumour Sarah Jane Smith shared with Clyde and Rani, Barbara and Ian had become professors at Cambridge by at least the 2010s and had not aged since the 1960s. (SJA: Death of the Doctor)''

That doesn't sound definitive to me, since we neither see it on SJA or have her say she saw it. Boblipton 02:53, August 23, 2011 (UTC)

Which, come to think of it, gives us a side-stepping out: this is the current Ian's take on what he remembers. Watcha think? Boblipton 02:56, August 23, 2011 (UTC)


 * The precise wording of the quote is:


 * "This couple in Cambridge, both professors; Ian and Barbara Chesterton. Rumour has it they've never aged. Not since the 60s."


 * That was sort of my concern, the other stuff like Power of the Daleks which has Tom Baker remembering something as the Fourth Doctor and that was only the cassette version.


 * Boblipton's idea of a sidestep is…nice, but involves some mental hoop-jumping to make work.


 * The quote can be interpreted in any number of ways, but at its purest the statement is, Ian and Babs are professors, that bit is presented as fact, everything after the word "Rumour" is just that and we take it as a rumour until we see anything countering it or hear a definitive statement made by someone.


 * So, as far as the SJA info goes, it's still rumour until proven otherwise. --Tangerineduel / talk 13:56, August 23, 2011 (UTC)


 * Yeah, given that the SJA mention was a rumor, even if it was implied to be true within the show, it's not that much of a conflict. Ausir(talk) 14:38, August 23, 2011 (UTC)


 * Well, this isn't just about the SJA thing. But if we rule The Crusade VHS linking narration as valid, then here's what I think happens.  I think it means that we can definitively say that Sarah Jane was simply wrong.  Her rumour is definitively disproved, which is slightly more than saing "according to a rumour Sarah Jane heard . . ."  The linking narration allows us to be a bit more declarative in our language:
 * "Sarah Jane once told Rani and Clyde that she'd heard a rumour that Ian and Barbara hadn't aged since the 1960s. (TV: Death of the Doctor) However, Sarah Jane's information was unreliable, as Ian Chesterton certainly appeared elederly when he once made a video long after leaving the TARDIS in which he related the story of how he had been knighted by Richard the Lionheart. (BBC Video: The Crusade)
 * As has been pointed out by Ausir, the issue of SJS' rumour isn't that hard to dispense with. It's the other things that are in this narrative which would bring something new to the character of Ian.  For instance, the fact that the older Ian bought a suit of armour so as to remind him of being knighted, means that it wasn't a swiftly-forgotten incident, like Rose's was.  The fact that he refers to the space in the video as his house allows us to say that Ian was extremely comfortable later in life.  It's a truly posh house he's got.  The surroundings allow us to say with certainty that he didn't go crazy or end up in squalor.  This isn't a case like Dodo whose post-TARDIS life is tragic, by at least one account. He is the very picture of a successful elderly gent, which obviously adds something to his biography.   As a matter of fact, aside from Sarah, Jo and the Brig, this is the only companion for whom we have video evidence of anything close to retirement age.  Finally, the character knows he's being filmed in this segment. The character clearly understands there's an audience down the other end of the camera, and even talks directly to them — well, us.  Yet he's incredibly naturalistic going through the variety of camera set-ups and the like.  Most people aren't so at ease when they know they're being filmed.  This implies that he's made videos in the past.


 * So it's not just the one aspect of refuting SJA. There is a bit more than that here.


 * Now, the broader implication here, I think, is that if you let in this one, you have to let in the Fourth Doctor retelling of the Second Doctor story, Power of the Daleks. I wanna say there's another one like this out there, too — maybe a Sixth Doctor linking of something First Doctor? — and those would be considerably more complicated to deal with than "Sir Ian Reminisces", for lack of a better title.  19:20:50 Wed 24 Aug 2011


 * As we're pondering narration, what about the narration at the start of The Deadly Assassin and Doctor Who (1996)?


 * Your assumptions do sort of lead on from what's established in-universe, in The Face of the Enemy it is said that Ian had an easier time getting work when they returned to Earth, easier than Babs, so they weren't poverty stricken in the 70s.


 * Ian and Babs must have been a little mad to name their son John Alydon Ganatus Chesterton…just saying. Maybe he's living off Chess' royalties.


 * Did Colin Baker narrate anything in a style approaching Tom Baker's?
 * If we allow Ian's and the Fourth Doctor narration we'll need to be clear why those narrations are "valid" but not the third person narration of all the others. --Tangerineduel / talk 15:32, August 26, 2011 (UTC)


 * Before their son was a rockstar, he was an aspiring rockstar. Which means he stopped taking money from his stuffy old man once he got a girlfriend to pay for everything (which, on the salary of a stewardess who seems to get fired a lot, couldn't have been easy).


 * Anyway, I think there are two separate questions here. The question with Ian isn't whether it's meant to be in-universe, because it clearly is, but whether linking narration on a videotape is part of the canon. The question with Tom Baker isn't whether it's from a canonical source, because you can't get much more canonical than a broadcast episode, but whether it's in-universe. (Is it Tom Baker, or the 4th Doctor? If the latter, who exactly is he talking to, unless he's breaking the fourth wall, like the 1st Doctor's Christmas message?) There's an even bigger version of that problem in The End of Time. (How would Rassilon know about the 'pagan rite to banish the cold and the dark' practiced by the humans of the west of the north, etc.? And who could he be talking to? And yet, isn't that what establishes that the episode starts off shortly before Christmas?) And then there's the linking narration in the videotape of Shada, which (if I remember it right) has both problems at once. --173.228.85.35 03:36, August 27, 2011 (UTC)