Board Thread:The Panopticon/@comment-188432-20130129081336/@comment-188432-20130131184920

Josiah Rowe wrote: The thing is that based on in-universe, diegetic information only, we can combine only Victorian Clara and Oswin from the Alaska. It's obvious to us as viewers that modern-day Clara is a third iteration of "the same woman", but we can't say that based on in-universe evidence yet. In-universe, all that we know is that modern Clara looks like the other two and walked past Victorian Clara's grave. We can justify a merger of Victorian Clara and Alaska because the Doctor says they're "the same woman", but adding in modern Clara is our supposition. Yes, it's strongly implied by the narrative, but in-universe the Doctor doesn't even know that modern Clara exists yet. So how can we justify merging her stub into an omnibus article? I know i said I would stay out of this discussion for a bit, but I'm gonna weigh in here because I've not yet specifically opined on the "third Clara".

I strongly feel that we do have diegetic information that Modern is the same as Victorian and Dalek Clara. This is what happens in The Snowmen, after the bit I've already quoted:


 * DOCTOR: Something's going on. Something impossible.  Something ...  Right you two stay here.  Stay right here. Don't move an inch.
 * VASTRA: Are you coming back?
 * DOCTOR: Shouldn't think so
 * VASTRA: But where are you going?
 * DOCTOR: To find her. To find Clara.

He doesn't say, "I'm going to find someone who is like" the woman they've just buried. He says he is going "to find Clara".

Lest there be any doubt whom he means, we then get:


 * JENNY: But Clara's dead. What's he talking about? Finding her?
 * VASTRA: I don't know. But perhaps the universe makes bargains after all.

Vastra there is referencing the bargain he wanted to make earlier whereby he would get Clara — not some copy of Clara — back.

We then cut to modern Clara, and everything about that shot is designed to let you, the viewer, know that this is the same woman, including the line, "I don't believe in ghosts.".

And then there's the episode's final shot.


 * DOCTOR (looking at a picture of the Victorian Clara on the scanner) Clara. Oswin. Oswald. Watch me run.

It is not speculation whatsoever to say that he believes that the Clara he had already met is somehow still alive. And there is no reasonable doubt from the visual language of the piece that the "modern day Clara" is the one with whom he is going to rendezvous. What would be the point of showing her if not?

It couldn't be using any clearer filmc language. Shot of Modern Clara over Victorian Clara's grave. "Don't believe in ghosts." Shot of Doctor in Tardis, looking at Victorian Clara. "Clara. Oswin. Oswald.  Watch me run."

If we put modern Clara on her own page, we'd be ignoring filmic conventions and using only part of the episode as a valid source.

We are supposed to be writing articles from our audience perspective. As the second principle of T:IU states:
 * "Write from the perspective of a neutral observer who has access to all known facts about your topic. You, the writer of the article, are omniscient, even though the subject of your article is not."

So it doesn't matter that he's not met modern Clara yet. From the evidence we have right now, there is no other reading of that scene but that there are multiple Claras who are all the same woman — because that's what the Doctor quite emphatically believes. Since we have no other in-universe source to knowledgeably contradict him at present, his beliefs about the situation predominate.

As long as the article stresses in the lead that it is the Doctor's belief that Oswald is a person that somehow is the same woman across time and despite death, I think we're fine.