Board Thread:Inclusion debates/@comment-188432-20130514042227/@comment-188432-20130527170924

70.36.140.206 wrote: I think the episode answered most of the other points. The prequel probably takes place inside the Doctor's timeline, so it's perfectly reasonable for us to see props the Doctor couldn't possibly possess. Except that the set looks nothing like the set of "the Doctor's timeline" in the episode. There's nothing remotely like the setting of this scene in the whole of the episode. Indeed, the way the timeline works in terms of Clara's interaction with the Doctor is that she always sees the incarnation in motion. There's none of this "I'm gonna talk to a frozen Eleven" business.

But, hey, let's give you that it's Clara walking around the Doctor's timeline. Where's the Doctor walking, then? At no point is The Name of the Doctor about the Doctor walking around Clara's timeline! …is there really anything worth debating? Yes. I'm worried about the precedent this sets. In the creation and maintenance of policy, you have to take a step back and examine how this one individual thing compares with other things that are similar.

And if we let these two things in, we'll have to let in a lot more.

I'm sorry, but I think that the Prime Computer ads are not "obviously parodic". Except for the one tiny bit of business about getting married, they're spot-on Graham Williams-era Four and Romana. And you certainly can't say that the character spots that have occurred before just about ever series of modern Doctor Who are parodic. Where are Amy and the Eleventh Doctor travelling in their very first ad? It looks to me that they are spinning around, unprotected, in the time vortex. If we took that as a valid narrative, it would change the way the time vortex article is written. Who is Donna talking to when she says, "And just like that — poof! — we'll be gone"? Who are the characters in the original ''she said, he said" ad — Martha and Ten — talking to?

And on and on. The prequel to Name of the Doctor is "Clarence and the Whisper Men". SS, HS is not a prequel. It's not a part of the narrative. It's an advertisement done in a narrative style. There's a big difference, and we as a community would be wiser to let this one go than to establish a precedent by which other narrative ads can come in.