Howling:The Twelfth Doctor in Day of the Doctor

While the brief appearance of Peter Capaldi in The Day of the Doctor was certainly a "wow" moment, it did leave me a bit puzzled. From a storytelling point of view, there's no real need for his Doctor to be there. He already knows from what the Curator said that Gallifrey survived and his very existence is due to the Time Lords granting his predecessor a new set of regenerations. So why is he there? Here's my theory: I think he's come from a point in his life where the Time Lords have not yet returned. In other words, he's still searching for Gallifrey. He decides that the only way he'll ever find it is if he returns to the moment he saved the planet. Maybe he figures by doing so he might find some sort of clue as to its location, something that the Eleventh Doctor overlooked (since he was the only Doctor that remembered the events of Day). Incidentally, the fact that no further Doctors appear suggests that Capaldi will ultimately succeed in bringing Gallifrey back. I don't know if they'll address it in a future episode but it might be fun to revisit that scene from Capaldi's perspective. What do you all think? Slughorn42 ☎  03:48, January 26, 2014 (UTC)

Bringing Gallifrey back isn't the problem. Eleven could have done it in The Time of the Doctor. The problem, as that episode established, is bringing Gallifrey back without re-igniting the Time War.

However, it does very much look to me as if that problem has been set up as the background to Capaldi's tenure. It might not be the story arc so much as the context within which the story arc takes place. If nothing else, the Daleks & quite a few other races will be certain (rightly or wrongly) that the Doctor is trying to bring the Time Lords back, with or without Gallifrey. That's going to provide a complicating factor applicable to a very wide variety of possible situations.

Moffat being Moffat, though, I'd not be too surprised if we've to wait until the next regeneration episode for it to be resolved. --89.243.204.160talk to me 15:33, January 26, 2014 (UTC)

I understand that he could've brought it back in Time of the Doctor. The question is how can he bring it back now that the cracks have been closed permanently. Slughorn42 ☎  16:21, January 26, 2014 (UTC)

Well, we thought before that the cracks had been closed permanently & were wrong. However, even if they really have been & bringing Gallifrey back would be a problem in itself, that's merely a technical challenge. The point still stands that doing so without re-igniting the Time War is the really difficult part & the Time Lords' enemies are going to be permanently suspicious that the Doctor is trying to bring them back. That's also where the main story material is.

Like you, I think Moffat does intend Gallifrey to return eventually. He likes complicated, l-o-n-g stories, so I'm not going to try guessing at the how or when. At least, I'm not going to try guessing just yet. Maybe once I've seen a bit of Series 8... --89.243.200.139talk to me 22:47, January 26, 2014 (UTC)

In a way it's a shame the Eighth Doctor Adventures ended without showing the restoration of Gallifrey. If they hadn't, we might have some idea of how he could bring it back. Slughorn42 ☎  00:45, January 27, 2014 (UTC)

If they had shown it, Moffat would almost certainly want to do it another way, just to be different. Mind you, I've spotted quite a few ideas taken from novels, audios &c but given new twists, both in the RTD era & in the current one, so it'd be worth looking again at these sources to see if there are ideas, not originally related to Gallifrey, that could be adapted to the purpose. It might also be worth looking for things Moffat would be likely to want to contradict -- like the "modified de-mat gun" idea of the Moment (from a comic, I believe, & totally stuffed by The Day of the Doctor) -- or to reinterpret, or even things he'd find appealing enough to want to confirm.

Another source Moffat definitely uses is long-ago TV stories: Captain Avery, in The Curse of the Black Spot, was mentioned in The Smugglers (First Doctor). The box with a map of the London Underground, in The Snowmen, referred to The Web of Fear (Second Doctor), the story that introduced Lethbridge-Stewart. And, of course, the Great Intelligence was originally from The Abominable Snowmen (also Second Doctor) & reappeared (though that's not the right word, as it was never seen) in The Web of Fear & the spinoff video Downtime. I wonder if there are any ideas, neglected for decades, that he might revive as a means of getting Gallifrey back.

Come to think of it, Kate (Lethbridge-)Stewart originated in Downtime & Moffat obviously likes her & wants to make more of her. (I approve.) --89.241.218.165talk to me 09:46, January 27, 2014 (UTC)

I haven't listened to any of the audios from the Gallifrey series but I understand that at one point the main characters are shifted into an alternative universe version of Gallifrey and have to find their way back. Maybe something similar to that could be used but I'd prefer to be surprised. Slughorn42 ☎  15:31, January 27, 2014 (UTC)