#but i still think two finding a way to undermine the daleks' traps for jamie would add an interesting context to their arc in this serial

[galacticlamps]

your posts about how /obviously a trap/ Waterfield's plan is made me think hey, what if he did that on purpose, not knowing how truly stuck Two would be without the TARDIS and hoping he might just walk away? and now your tags about Two potentially building warnings into the traps for Jamie and Kemel have me like. what if Evil is just one big nest of 'I'm being forced to do something to you but I'm trying so hard to subvert that as best I can but you don't realise it and think the worst of me'

ooh that's interesting! & definitely not something I thought of before! with Waterfield I was just looking at it from the perspective of him being under-prepared and unenthusiastic about playing the role of a schemer, and turning to tropes from fiction to craft his trap because that's easier than coming up with something totally original, especially under pressure

but this explanation would honestly make a lot of sense (I mean, in the novel, he literally does choose to let Ben & Polly walk away, and I can't imagine the Daleks presented it to him as 'hey, do what you want about these people, it's cool'). Plus, judging by some of the things he says in episodes 2 & 4, Waterfield really hated what he was doing in the '60s, and didn't even feel totally satisfied with it all being justified by the fact that they had his daughter - so, yeah, I definitely think it's possible he was kinda hoping his own plan would fail before dragging anyone else down with it.

On the Doctor's end I'm, like, fighting with myself - because I don't want to just read things into the script solely because I'd like to see them, of course, but also, Episode 4's camera script is particularly messy compared to the others, so I'm a little bit hesitant to base anything off of it alone.

But then on the other hand, what if the only reason that explanation never occurred to me before looking at the script is just because the episode’s missing? Plenty of surviving serials from the era make a point of linking up cuts between a plots & b plots with shots that juxtapose the two directly - you can even find some evidence for that style in this serial in the surviving episode 2, when we get a crossfade from the portrait to Victoria, or before that, when we cut from a live close up of the Doctor's face to the photograph Waterfield's about to use as bait for his trap - and the antique shop sequence is full of brief shots of Waterfield that have no dialogue, including some of him checking the device he has that shows him when doors have been opened, and can lock/unlock them remotely, to let Two, Jamie, and Perry in to find Kennedy’s body. I feel like if that episode had been a recon, those moments would probably have read as more of a general “Waterfield’s carrying out his plan simultaneously” and less of a direct cause-and-effect - so maybe if we still had the visuals, in real moving time to the soundtrack, that linkage in Episode 4 would've also been an obvious conclusion? And the fact that they scripted that line for Jamie & also that it got cut (possibly because it wasn't getting the point across clearly enough?) is a pretty compelling idea...

But also, even if there were no basis for it at all in anything 'canon' I would still argue it's not a bad interpretation of what's going on in the serial - that whole 'yes I'll be the one to do it, not because I want to, but maybe because I can do it more mercifully than anyone else' thing fits with both the Doctor & Waterfield's reluctance to work with the Daleks, even after they both know that Jamie & Victoria, and their respective homes are all at stake. And it's a serial already full of mind control and manipulation and henchmen/subordinates with varying degrees of commitment to their superiors, and competing loyalties among people who perceive themselves to be on the same side - all in all I think that'd fit right in, whether the writers were trying to imply it in that one scene or not

#sorry if this is a non answer #i think im still trying to convince myself one way or another without being majorly biased #but of course i am! #because if the doctor really did have some ability to protect jamie then i think his not mentioning it later when they argue is significant #almost an admission by omission - proof that he knows how serious what he did was & that trying to make the experiment safer #was literally the very least he could do #idk i just feel like that'd be a nice touch #bc we dont really see the doctor apologize #and i get that in the moment it's more important for him to explain to jamie the whole reasoning behind the experiment #(rather than just saying sorry i hurt you) #but i feel like if he's done more to help him than he admits to in that scene #then in a way it's saying he knows that doesn't absolve him? and that jamie's right to be angry #but he needs to understand what the experiment was all about & where they stand now that the doctor's not being forced to lie to him #and that's why he focuses on explaining all about the human factor instead of actually apologizing #idk this story will never feel like it has closure for the two of them without imagining an additional scene or two #but i still think two finding a way to undermine the daleks' traps for jamie would add an interesting context to their arc in this serial #so yeah i'd definitely like to read it that way