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handdrawnfantasma · 2 years

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honestly the more i think about it the more i am OBSESSED with how what the Master was doing in TPOTD feels like the natural endpoint to his arc. like, it is far and away not the ONLY way things could have gone for him but it’s like one of those tragedies where the line you trace from A to B seems like an inevitable result of the character’s choices you know? the line from 12 trying to get Missy to be more like him -> Missy getting sabotaged by her own past self and seemingly abandoned by the Dr -> dh!master discovering the truth of TTC in the matrix and coming to the conclusion that the Doctor has always been better than him, more special than him, that they’ve never actually been equals and never had a chance to be -> trying hard to level the playing field by dragging her down to his level, pushing her to the point where she would kill both of them (and what’s left of their shared childhood ie the planet with all those memories on) by her own hand (“Become death, become me”) -> this plan doesn’t WORK and so of course the only thing left is to go the other way and to very literally become the Doctor instead, steal their body and identity and completely wipe them from existence. the line from trying to emulate 12′s idea of goodness on a surface level while pointing out that actually 12′s idea of good isn’t absolute -> whatever he was up to in Spyfall dialling the performative evil up to 11 to try and regain his identity as the Dr’s counterweight -> a little piece of you is in me, all that i am is somehow because of you and believe me when i say i cannot BEAR that -> an army of cybermasters born from you but led by me -> become death become me -> i’m going to force you to regenerate into me now I am the Doctor -> i have erased you, don’t make me go back to being me

this post barely even counts as meta really, i’m just turning him over and over in my mind, but i guess i just love how it’s so very easy to see how he got there?? he just couldn’t let this idea go that the Doctor is better than him because of what they are, when actually anyone who’s spent like 10 minutes with the Doctor could have told them that what makes the Doctor the Doctor is what they choose to do and who they choose to be. it’s the attempt. you know? which is why Yaz succeeds where he fails. i don’t really know where i was going with this so i’m going to stop before this becomes unwieldy but gosh i am MANY thoughts head fit to BURSTING

#honestly i could have a lot to say abt how 13 and dh!master's arcs are like light mirror vs dark mirror regarding the theme of identity #but i would want to actually organise my thoughts into something more coherent first HAHA #needless to say they're the same they're the exact opposite they're two sides of the same coin they have their backs against--#each other and neither of them is willing to turn round you see what i'm driving at right #this post is a Mess! i would apologise but you all just have to deal with it i'm afraid #fel livebagels the space hobo show #dw spoilers

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handdrawnfantasma · 2 years

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OKAY it’s almost 1am and i’ve been yelling at kite on discord for long enough, time to commit my thoughts on 13′s final episode to my tumblog. spoilers under the readmore, obvs

okay so first things first let’s get this out of the way: i genuinely LOVED it. like is it in my “these episodes really Hit Different” tier or my “shiny gold star” tier, no, but it is SOLIDLY in my “loved it” tier. i just. it was so much FUN! it was so JOYFUL! i’m so happy that 13 got to go out on this kind of note and i’m so glad that her regen episode was just. a FUN ride.

like tbh nothing about this episode went as i expected it to go but i am actually okay with that! i could definitely think of a few ways that this final special could have been linked in more with like, the wider overarching themes or narrative threads of the era, but the more i think about it the more i am okay with the fact that while a handful of the themes were carried through, there wasn’t really a huge link back to like, say, the Timeless Child storyline. and really, there shouldn’t need to be! for me, i guess the main narrative thread of this era was wrapped up with Flux and with 13 coming to terms with what she’d learned about her past and what she still didn’t know, and choosing not to open the fobwatch and instead keep it safe and hidden because she came to the realisation that what Ryan said to her in s12 was right the whole time - whoever she was before, she HAS an identity right now and obsessing over the past rather than living in the present was destroying her and her loved ones. so like, for me the specials function mostly as an emotional coda for 13 and Yaz, and i was surprised to find i didn’t NEED any big links back. tbh i think the main thematic link Chibs was trying to make with this episode was his first-episode thesis statement of “honour who you’ve been and choose who you want to be next” and the themes of hope and connection so like, those were very much present

that being said, Chibs ABSOLUTELY managed to pull a great fake-out on me with that episode opener. like. the entire set-up with the child in the pod on the train and THEN the reveal that it was an eldritch glowy energy creature that instinctively takes a form that makes people want to protect it (A CHILD????) had me sitting there for the first 30-45 minutes of the special FULLY expecting this to take a turn where that turned into some sort of reveal of the Doctor’s original species or something. like i was there FULLY ready for glowy eldritch trueform Dr. in hindsight i’m glad that this is not where this went bc i think that would have done a disservice to some of the things the Timeless Child storyline was trying to accomplish, but i was FULLY ready to be on board and clowning with it. (i may still clown with it, purely bc its such an interesting concept to me as something to explore in fanworks, LMAO)

still so funny to me that Dan noped out in the first 15 minutes of the episode. man had THEE closest near-death experience and was sensibly like “nope i am not pushing my luck i am Outtie!!” honestly? ICONIC, love this for him. love that he still cites his TARDIS experience as something that has given him the strength to live his life on Earth as well. that said, STILL funny that he missed almost the entire adventure, absolute KING move. we stan

i hecking loved ALL the past Doctor cameos we got, holy shit! i wasn’t expecting any of them at all but the circumstances in which they showed up were ABSOLUTELY my jam??? the idea of vestiges of the Dr’s old personalities kicking about inside their thinkpan?? EXQUISITE. Eight refusing to manifest in robes bc he doesn’t do robes, the man the myth the LEGEND. i loved One being like “oh dang i guess this version of us is VERY strong-willed, just won’t die hm” like YES SHE IS!! YES SHE IS!! i also loved that Five and Seven got to have moments of closure with their old companions via 13′s adaptive AI hologram, those moments were so genuinely sweet and touching and i adored them. honestly i just. im so pleased for the 80s doctors and Eight, also. like, remember when it was the 50th anniversary and the only real look-in they got was a short clip of 8 regenerating into the War Dr and the Five-ish Doctors Reboot, which was a labour of love and comedy film mostly written by the three 80s doctors making light of the fact that they weren't going to be in the 50th?? and then it comes to this special and chibs is like. i am gonna write ALL of you into it. like, Six didn't need to be there!!! unlike Five and Seven, his companions did not feature (with the exception of Mel’s brief cameo in the Companion Support Group at the end)!! but he's there helping to bolster his future self and help her hold on to their existence anyway

i ammmm MANY thoughts head full about the conclusion of the spydoc storyline, like, the more i think about it the more absolutely JUICY things there are to find in here. like. lord. right until the end they were just perfect on the nose foils for each other. the Master becoming so unhappy and so sick and incapable of being himself and presumably still so bitter and depressed about being in the Doctor’s shadow and (he assumes) not having ever been her equal that he hatches a plot to steal the Doctor’s body and identity and completely erase her??? to become her in literally every way and then wreck her reputation??? VS Thirteen who has come to terms with what she does and doesn’t know about herself, and has come to the conclusion that actually she has LOVED being herself!!! the Master being so unable to let either one of them live that even while dying as a result of his own actions backfiring on him once again, crawls after Thirteen JUST to ensure that if he can’t be the Doctor, neither can she. VS Thirteen who wanted more time but gracefully accepts that she has to pass the torch of being the Doctor onto the next them and faces her death with a smile. i just. THEM. THEY. the Master being SO bitter vs the Doctor having seemingly let go of most of her bitterness towards him! (”WHAT a mind!” she says of his plan to LITERALLY STEAL HER BODY AND ERASE HER FROM EXISTENCE! “we used to be friends, once” she says sadly after these aforementioned plans have fallen apart.) i just. GOD. if you two had actually taken a moment to have an ACTUAL PROPER CONVERSATION at ANY POINT during these incarnations of yours y’all could probably have genuinely actually gotten along, but nooooooooooooooooooooooo

anyway this episode also fed me EXCEEDINGLY with regards to my ongoing doctor who theory of mirrors. like. LORD. the Yaz-Dhawan!Master-13 hall of mirrors in this episode was EXQUISITE. can’t believe that in the episode where we had the Master trying to literally, physically take the Doctor’s place in the universe and failing, we had Yaz spiritually embodying what it is to be the Doctor RIGHT at the moment when it seemed like the Doctor was gone forever. like. Yaz was so magnificent during this episode and i’m so PLEASED about this conclusion to her Doctorification plotline. she piloted the TARDIS on her OWN!! using the notes she made HERSELF during those 10 long months separated from 13 trying to get that other TARDIS to move!!! she made a plan with Vinder and saved Ace from crashing into the ground and moved people to where they needed to be and she SAVED the Doctor just by being herself. no destiny, no weird timey wimey bullshit, no special powers. just Yasmin Khan and her faith in herself and her faith in and love for the Doctor. the Master was really there trying to break Yaz’s faith in 13 and she was no-selling him every time. QUEEN.

also she got to bridal-carry an unconscious, injured 13 into the TARDIS and like honestly? stunning, beautiful, powerful, showstopping, incredible

very important point for me: 13 is 4 for 4 with getting companions back home, safe, ready to live the rest of their lives, being wiser and better people for their experiences travelling with her. like sorry but she is WINNING

also like. im still so emotional about 13′s ending. it was just so POSITIVE. the gratitude for having met and loved the people she did and experienced what she did with them?? “my hearts are full of love for you all”. also god. she LOVED being herself!!! the Doctor had an incarnation that LOVED being themself despite what she went through during all that!! i love this so much for her. i love that she got one last quiet moment with Yaz and got to see Yaz safe at home. i love that she got to tell her TARDIS to look after the next one. i love that she CHOSE the way she would meet her own end and she wanted to do it while seeing one last sunrise as herself. i just. she was at peace with herself and with the idea of leaving even if she WANTED more time as herself and tbh this is all i wanted for her from this episode. tbh i’m even only slightly Annoyed at having had to watch her turn into DT again instead of Ncuti and i FULLY expected to be frothingly angry and bitter about it, but the rest of the episode and the lead-up to the regen itself was just so JOYFUL that i am much less mad than expected

tl;dr will absolutely be bothering my parents again this week to steal their iPlayer access and watch this special again, and now i am FREE to write reams of Sunless AU fanfic with wild abandon

#fel livebagels the space hobo show #it's all positivity under here fam!! haters to the left

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handdrawnfantasma · 2 years

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i’m the best at what i do and what i do is come up with increasingly more and more niche ideas for AUs that are of interest to a narrow demographic of me and me alone

#this post brought 2 u by thinkin abt mawdryn undead in the context of 'actually the doctor is functionally immortal' TTC revelations #and then doing the maths and realising that if five had actually had to go thru with sacrificing those 8 regenerations to save nyssa n tegan #that would bring us to thirteen... i want to see THAT canon divergence #thirteen nyssa tegan and turlough in one TARDIS would be an incredible combination anyway #and like. a thirteen born out of a five that fully thought he was gonna go thru The Final Death for nyssa n tegan would most likely be #v different to the 13 we know for a million reasons. but like. can you IMAGINE #the drama!! the mystery!! the 'i'm definitely supposed to be Super Dead and i have No idea why i'm not' of it all!!#GOSH and actually tegan nyssa and turlough would be SUCH a thematically interesting bunch of companions to do a--#timeless child themed storyline with...#fortunately for everyone bringing this concept to fruition would require far too much consumption of the DWEU on my part #and as it stands i still haven't gotten through the majority of classic who. so we are all safe from this particular tyranny of my brain #fel livebagels the space hobo show #(as always these days: not really but streamlining is important u kno)

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handdrawnfantasma · 2 years

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misc ‘mnnnr/hmmmm’-ing abt space hobo show news under the cut

otoh part of me wants to be jazzed abt the news of 10 and donna comin back for the 60th anniversary of dw next year bc they were my fave rtd tardis team and i am always gonna love ‘em

but like otoh a much larger part of me is just pullin big ol :/ :/ :/ :/ faces over this bc like... crossing my fingers AND my toes here and hoping that ncuti gatwa gets, like, a decent amount of episodes next year before the 60th airs bc if his debut is a multi-doc episode that also features rtd trying to ride the coattails of his decade-plus-old successes i’m gonna be Pressed. like what utterly undeserving and disrespectful circumstances those would be for ur first outing as the doctor being basically made to compete with the fan favourite nuwho dr lmf. also like honestly they could have announced this like........ next year??? you know????? closer to the actual special?????? honestly the more i think abt this the more peeved i am lmf. REALLY REALLY REALLY hope we get a season or at least half of a season of 14 before this like............ gatwa deserves better for his first outing than bein forcibly overshadowed by rtd (and dt lbr) wanking over his glory days. hopefully this is NOT what is gonna happen but like, u kno, One Fear

(this is a lie i currently have Two Fears re: this show and that is the fear that 13′s regen ep won’t stick the landing for the era. the sole thing holding back this second fear is knowing that Mandip Gill has said in an interview that she was satisfied with Yaz’s ending LMF and also. current showrunner's way of wrapping up arcs vis a vis predecessors has left me more cautiously hopeful)

(but in any case another reason for all my :/ :/ :/ :/ is also bc as much as i will always hold abiding affection in my heart for 10 and donna. gotta say. really do not jive with the subset of dw fans who run their mouths abt how they could only look forward to dw again if rtd/dt/etc were involved. im just vividly remembering that one article in what might have been the fckin guardian (i can’t remember) where it was like ‘how to make dw good again’ and ‘bring david tennant back’ was on the list. and now these people are going to be INSUFFERABLE bc they're gonna feel like they have been vindicated for all the nonsense they have been putting out for years. like even more insufferable than they already are considerin these are usually also the people who refuse to stop banging on with the ice cold takes and bad faith reads re: 13′s era)

(OHHHH WAIT I GOT IT I HIT ON WHY I’M ANNOYED its for the same reason live action disney remakes annoy me. feels like tryna capitalise on the nostalgia factor to draw ppl back rather than letting the new doc shine on their own merits. like yes yes the long-running show continuity is part of the charm and also multi-doc episodes are the thing you Do for an anniversary special and i get that they gotta generate the dreaded Hype by announcin it early but like. c’mon pls pls pls pls pls dont do this for 14′s debut ep)

the moral of this story is basically i need to just avoid all news abt this show and also go back to avoiding most of the fans of this show,, also

#stuck this under a cut bc i dont want to harsh anyone's buzz who is excited #tbh i was just gonna leave this in my drafts but im annoyed abt it even after sleeping on it #so o well #fel livebagels the space hobo show #(i mean not rly but it keeps my rambling abt it streamlined)

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handdrawnfantasma · 4 months

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spoiler-free space hobo show post: the first 10 mins were extremely awkward (a combination of the celebrity-as-themselves-cameo + the dialogue coming off Odd for some reason + really shoving the Christmas thing down our throats in a way that felt Annoying to me) but it gradually picked up after that and i ended up thoroughly enjoying it as i was watching it. felt like a sort of mini-homage to both the moff and chibs eras with the combo of the fairytale vibe + framing + the entire Thing that happened when the [SPOILER] appeared in Ruby's flat and also the heaping helping of TTC stuff. also "I'M LEARNING THE VOCABULARY OF ROPE!!!!" is my new fave dw line

anyway overall i liked it and would watch again

#i am now patiently waiting for some kind soul to compile all the TTC threads in this ep into something i can reblog LMAO #also: someone got menaced by a christmas tree again unbelievable #anyway i am still [points at eyes points at Arr Tee Dee] abt the upcoming series but for now. Acceptable Tribute #also 15 is GREAT but like we all knew that already #fel livebagels the space hobo show

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handdrawnfantasma · 1 year

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the thing about wondering if i should watch s10 again after its been over 12 months since my first watchthru of it is that i know watching it knowing all the beats is just gonna BUG me

it’s like, on the one hand there is much to love in s10 (Bill’s entire existence and her dynamic with the space gandalf grandpa, the tragedy enjoyer’s feast of watching the terrible old people struggling against the narrative, the breathtakingly literal self-sabotage at the end (will there ever be a better or more literal metaphor for self-sabotage in television?? doubtful), some genuine BANGERS in the episode lineup, 10x1 and 10x4 are some of my Faves and 10x10 is just Thoroughly Enjoyable for me)

but on the other hand there is so much that after over a year to reflect on it would IRK me seeing it again (the pacing is a Mess, the terrible old people struggling against the narrative ends up taking away a lot of the focus from Bill and means she doesn’t really have much of an arc, and honestly i could say a lot about what happens to her in the 2-part finale now i’ve had a long time to chew on it but tbh other people have said it more eloquently than me first. like just bc i am Content that she got a happy ending with her space oil gf does not mean i am not Irate abt the other stuff u kno)

it just gives me the “i like it but in a way that means i want to scribble all over it with red pen and then hand it back for you to do a second draft and achieve the best marks in your coursework” feeling, you know

#yes this is about #fel livebagels the space hobo show #i'm hoping this won't show up in any tags bc the only name i've used is generic af LMAO #but yeah like tbh even on my first watchthru i remember being like.#having seen ppl make such a Big Thing of the V***t Arc and then seeing it play out like. 'that's it?'#the moffin man once again out here with some Stellar concepts that could have been better in the execution

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handdrawnfantasma · 2 years

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no context doctor who spoilers: the master achieves lyctorhood

#i haven't been able to get this out of my head since i made that post yesterday LMAO.#dw spoilers #tpotd spoilers #fel livebagels the space hobo show #i'm going to end up writing that AU in a goofy way despite the fact i said i wouldn't just so i can get it out of my head LMAO

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handdrawnfantasma · 2 years

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the final results are in! 13 era best era. why are you booing me i’m right

#fel livebagels the space hobo show

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handdrawnfantasma · 2 years

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back when i was knee-deep in avoiding my end-of-year-coursework stress in late spring this year i did a rewatch of flux and made notes on my thoughts on all the episodes. now i’ve reached that point again in my pre-tpotd rewatch i figure i may as well clean up and post the ones that never made it out of my drafts so here we go, the flux rewatch and associated Thoughts(tm) continue now in once, upon time edition

i still love Bel SOOOOOO much holy shit. every time she is on screen i am SO invested in her. honestly i think her leitmotif is one of the best bits of music segun akinola has composed during his run on this show?? i love her determination i love how much she Cares i love how she admits that she’s trying to make sense of a world that no longer makes sense. LOVE IS THE ONLY MISSION. IDIOT.

i also love how bel’s part of the story is like. so necessary for again, showing us what the post-flux universe looks like. and it DOES show us what the actual universe looks like, bc she is here on this journey looking for Vinder than spans multiple planets/parts of space. which like, correct me if i’m wrong but i don’t think any other “the universe is ending” plotline in new who has ever actually shown us that as extensively?? we’re often TOLD it’s affecting things but we only ever see it from an Earth perspective or companion perspective. here we’re getting someone who’s not from Earth and who is on an epic odyssey of her own and who doesn’t know the doctor or companions and honestly i really love it. ALSO everything about the way the post-flux universe works is so Sunless like. day randomly switching to night?? maps don’t make sense anymore?? the destruction bel flies through on her way to try and find vinder and how it seemingly defies so many laws of physics and is all the more unsettling for it?? the damage to space and now time gradually eroding what’s left of the universe?? it’s all SO Sunless, thank u creative team of this era for catering to MY interests, specifically, i feel so pandered to

also like, it’s Interesting how Bel mentions that there’s a rumour spreading about the mouri being compromised, bc like........ the mouri being on a planet that is supposedly not meant to even exist makes u wonder how something like that spreads. is it bc the flow of time is already so damaged that it’s actually making it POSSIBLE for that rumour to spread bc time is no longer as linear as it should be (plus the flux having destroyed so much of the universe already making space wibbly as well as much smaller???). or is it just that the person she says she heard this rumour from in a bar had connections to all of this Deep Lore?? much to think about. from a doylist perspective Bel being able to do a monologuey-voiceover about this was probably to aid with narrative flow and make sure that the mouri being compromised = the universe getting even more broken connection was firmly established in our heads, but STILL, i could world-build so much fanfiction from this if i so chose

i’ve talked about this recently in one of my tag rambles on someone else’s post but like........ the daleks and cybermen squabbling over the scraps of the post-flux universe trying to be the rulers of what’s left rather than like. doing anything to help the situation. once again chibs is not subtle with the ongoing theme of imperialist regimes and empires taking advantage of catastrophes for their own gain and like tbh. he uses these old-sci-fi-style allegories really well to aid his point. Bel is Right when she tells the last cyberman she downs that any victory they gained would be hollow and pointless. they want to rule over the universe for the glory of being able to say they rule over the universe, even if that universe is empty. ideology ENTIRELY divorced from reality

okay all that side, turning my attention now to all the temple of atropos stuff......... at the time i made this post i just typed “many thoughts head full re: the nature of the mouri and atropos and the anchoring of the thread” and tbh that is still true. the mouri were “assigned” by persons about whom “information is unavailable” to hold Time together and control it into a linear form but other than that they are still VERY mysterious. (i kind of love this btw, i FIRMLY believe that anything to do with ordering such a fundamental part of the universe as we know it in a fictional setting SHOULD stay shrouded in mystery and defy understanding). but that just opens up so many questions, like - are the mouri like eternals? do they even exist in the same dimension as our main characters, or as temporal beings are they almost entirely removed from it? were they always creatures whose nature was related to time, with the ability to control time and withstand it being channelled through them, and was this ability co-opted by whoever it was that “assigned” them to their posts in the temple of atropos, or are we looking at something even more sinister than that??? do the mouri have a culture?? i have SO many questions and will enjoy generating potential answers to these questions for y e a r s

anyway i still love how the timeline stuff and the chaos of time running mad was handled in this episode. like it was chaotic but honestly it SHOULD have been. and i also loved how everyone’s experience of being pulled through their own timestream was so different?? this was really cool. like the difference between Dan’s chaotic jumping around his timestream from moment to moment mid-conversation vs Vinder’s very linear experience of key moments from his backstory vs 13 being continually pulled back into the same lost memory vs Yaz experiencing moments that she doesn’t even recognise. some actually really enjoyable timey wimey bullshit

like with dan - the seamless change between time and place while he’s still talking, all of these shifts in space and time happening during one single conversation with Di?? so unsettling, love this. the fact that Di herself seems to at one point also move forward in time and become aware of her true place in the timestream rather than continue playing her scripted role in whatever conversation Dan is remembering was also VERY neat, like, i wonder if that was because the Passenger form with her inside is nearby in the physical space outside of the timestorm that the flux gang are trapped inside?? also!! i love that this is the first time that Dan meets Joseph Williamson and it’s while the dude is wielding a very un-1820s-like laser gun. quality DW buffonery

then with vinder, i thought it was actually a REALLY good storytelling device to use his being trapped in the timestorm to give us his backstory exposition and how he came to be on the outpost that we first met him in in 13x01. i actually really loved that while his timey wimey bs was much more linear and he was seemingly much more buried in playing out the events as they happened to him, there was the Off part of Yaz repeatedly showing up replacing figures in his backstory and probs contributing to those short moments where he became Aware of the fact that he was reliving things he already lived. and his backstory itself is so interesting, it’s probably one of my favourite parts of this episode because it’s drawn so clearly and with such confidence - the ace pilot bg, the complicity with the Grand Serpent’s political machinations (stopping the recording and hearing the deal he makes to have the family of his political opponent meet nasty accidents), and then subsequently deciding to do the right thing and expose it once it’s happened... i’ve seen people draw comparisons between both Vinder and Kate Stewart and also Vinder and the Doctor and honestly, it’s absolutely valid on all counts, he’s absolutely here as another example of someone who was complicit in a corrupt system but then decided to turn away from it because of the strength of their convictions regardless of the cost to themselves. his complicated feelings about home! he swore loyalty to his constitution, not to a single person, but unfortunately that constitution turns out to mean next to nothing when other people would rather see him exiled for trying to uphold that integrity. also: everything with the grand serpent is still so sunless lol

yaz - back in april i wrote how it was interesting how yaz’s timestream is showing her stuff from her FUTURE, but now with the TPOTD trailer out and the 2 planets (2 Earths???) firing at each other, i’m wondering if there isn’t another explanation to this. an alternate timeline leaking through the cracks in the broken time??? back when i first watched this ep i thought it was just the scene with Sonya but on a rewatch the way that Yaz was talking it’s clear that the scene in the police car is also something she hasn’t lived through yet either?? either way, still hoping that this is Proof/foreshadowing that yaz is going to survive and choose to leave the TARDIS on her own terms (tbh, i am like 85% sure that this is what is going to happen tonight. don’t fuck this up for me Chibs). but in any case: also interesting how the angel chooses to stalk Yaz when 13 is its real target. i guess there’s an argument to be made that Yaz experiencing these disruptions in her timestream featuring events that she hasn’t experienced is only down to the presence of the angel within it, so all my speculation above could be totally baseless, but oh well! fun possibilities to rotate in my mind all around. also also interesting how 13 is the most Present when she drops in on Yaz’s timestream as opposed to when she drops in as a floating hologram-esque thing for Vinder and Dan. VERY obvious who 13′s priority is lmaoooo

anyway moving on to 13 and good lord there is SO MUCH JUICY STUFF HERE. i love how john bishop replicates karvanista’s mannerisms so well?? like if you’re looking for it or Know then its very clear from the start that Dan is Dan-As-Karvanista. i’m like 67% certain that Yaz is Yaz-As-Gat based on the mannerisms and that Vinder is Vinder-As-Lee based on mannerisms + the fact that when the Doctor was experiencing “temporal hazing” he’s the one that the other two send to talk to her so like...... please give me all the Fugitive Doctor’s Division team content?? i’m SO INTERESTED in this!! the “temporal hazing” injections are sus af. like they’re clearly enough of a routine thing that it opens up the awful possibility that this is just another tool in Division’s toolbox for controlling the Doctor, perhaps via making sure that any memories they don’t want bleeding through are suppressed?? this combined with the tidbit that this mission on Atropos was supposed to be the Fugitive Doctor’s last job for Division and that it was sold to her as such when we already know from 12x05 that Division had NEGATIVE interest in letting her go and she eventually just took matters into her own hands, removed her own identity and hid herself on Earth as a human, including burying her TARDIS next to a lighthouse, all in the name of escaping Division, like......... can we say Big Yikes!!

interesting tidbit dropped here that Passenger forms are banished from this dimension but of course that doesn’t stop Division from using them. also very funny how Swarm thinks he’s hot shit and ~danced around the universe~ with the Dr but everything about the Drs attitude in this flashback suggests that she does not Care. like this is just routine for her, she is So Bored. he raises some interesting points tho. “it’s a complicated moral high ground you occupy”. “working for Division must be so compromising”. also Confirmed that “erasure of identity” and “isolation prison terms for the infinite duration of the universe” are common tactics in the Division playbook. its interesting that 13 in the memory, as the Fugitive!Doctor, still frames the mission as being for the sake of the universe like. i have so many questions about this. is this a classic dr coping mechanism, is this how Division frames things to her to make what they send her to do more palatable to her/her more biddable, like... What

anyway that scene right after time is fixed and the mouri are put back where 13 is absolutely beside herself from being denied the end of the memory she was just living through is so painful to watch. honestly i’m really sympathetic to her here but the bit 5 mins later where she again says something Concerning, Actually that Yaz RIGHTLY asks her about only for her to snap ‘does everything have to be a discussion?’ i am less so. stop being a dick!! (this is my emotional reaction obvs, as a writer i am LIVING for this moment bc i feel like with this being the halfway point of Flux, this is like... the summit of Flux’s throughline of 13′s grief+obsession with finding the truth about herself+inability/unwillingness to talk to anyone about what she’s feeling/doing poisoning all her interpersonal relationships, it’s honestly very very good)

i STILL love Dan again bringing the fight me energy and also the “him and the dr are the same kind of idiot” energy. extremely funny to me that Dan was ready to do the Exact Same thing for Di that 13 just did for Yaz and 13, king hypocrite, holds him back with a “do as you’re told, you don’t know what you’re dealing with, i do”. like on the one hand she’s RIGHT, Dan trying to get Di out of the Passenger would do nothing but put him in danger as well, but it’s still hysterically funny. they are LITERALLY the same kind of idiot.

i think i actually rambled in the tags already about my excitement and fascination over the fact that Vinder knows what a TARDIS is but i am going to leave in my statement about it anyway!! it’s just so INTERESTING. LIKE. WAS HIS HOME A GALLIFREYAN CLIENT STATE or what. involved in the Time War?? some other thing??? i have so many questions!!!!

Vinder’s hologram message for Bel, as well as being extremely sweet, is just......... extremely nice foreshadowing and parallel for the hologram message that 13 leaves for yaz in 2 episodes time. chibs was REALLY not being subtle wrt setting up thasmin as a thing by making this very intentional and obvious parallel with the established romantic couple who spend this serial Yearning and fighting to get back to each other here

ALSO LIKE........Vinder’s home planet being destroyed?? like it makes sense bc of the nature of the Flux but i can’t help feeling like this is some kind of callback to some s12 stuff here for sure. Vinder is clearly someone who cares about his home despite the complicated position he must occupy with regards to it now, and considering him and Bel have a shared history with it, it must be a wrench to see it that way!! (cross-reference 13′s own complicated loss of Gallifrey, i guess). 13 gives Vinder a direct line to her and the TARDIS thus again proving one of my fave things abt 13 which is that She Cares. like even when she’s hurting and being an asshole she cares so much that it spills out of her lmf. like also cross-reference with how when the angel has the TARDIS she IMMEDIATELY puts herself between yaz+dan and the threat like. im okay i am fine and normal about this

#fel livebagels the space hobo show

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handdrawnfantasma · 2 years

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oh no time for my space hobo opinions again but like, last gifset reminded me that really on reflection the big thing that Irks me abt s9′s overarching plot is the entire Hybrid thread of it. like the real heart of s9 is Clara’s classic greek tragedy icarusian fall and all the stuff that foreshadows that is /chef’s kiss. and like i get that the point of the Hybrid stuff was probably either to act as a red herring for ppl who were still expecting like, a core mystery arc with a buzzword like most of the previous nu-dw series, or as a way of drawing attention to the unifying link btwn several s9 themes, or else to underline the extent of the delicious 12Clara codependency, but like............. as a way of trying to do all (or any) of these things it kind of fell lackluster to me. like the 12Clara stuff and Clara’s entire exit arc is compelling enough to stand on its own imho so it didn’t need to be shored up by/welded together with something else that really ultimately doesn’t have anything to do with it but hey ho

#its redeeming feature comes in hindsight in the ways u can fit it into stuff that came AFTER s9 #12clara in the end did not in fact do the stuff in that prophecy. but i sure know someone who DID #(yes i'm a 'the master is the hybrid' truther and what of it)#(some headcanons simply Make Sense. also it's darkly funny imagining the funny hat and big collars council getting themselves all twisted up #focusing on the wrong renegade)#fel livebagels the space hobo show

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handdrawnfantasma · 2 years

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i’m back on my ‘doing literally everything i can to procrastinate working on the last few bits of my college course’ bs and so it’s finally time for me to unleash more of my flux thoughts(tm) on this bagel. war of the military empire sci-fi metaphor potatohead aliens under the cut

- i’m reiterating stuff i’ve said before in tags here but the best part of this episode for me, personally, is still 13′s delightful lack of filter. like. before legend of the sea devils aired this episode probably would be the one i would come back to when thinking to myself ‘who is thirteen when she does not care about making herself palatable for her friends’ bc she really is just doing whatever she is feeling in the moment with 0 apology. unabashedly admiring and complimentary of Mary Seacole, absolutely no qualms about ripping into General Acceptable Target and his glory-seeking queen-and-country-is-on-my-side willingness to send all of the soldiers under his command into a senseless slaughter against an opposing army they do not have a hope in hell of defeating through strength of arms. dancing around the question of who she is via deflecting - ‘I’m Mary Seacole’s assistant’ when really she is very gently steering Mary Seacole into helping her solve this Sontaran problem lmf. taunting both of the Sontarans that she interacts with this episode and very obviously enjoying it. willing to unapologetically pull dirty tricks like freeing a captured Sontaran soldier to carry a message to his commander that will a) let her arrange a parley but also b) let her find out more info about what the Sontarans are up to via tailing him back to his camp, all the while knowing *full well* that militaristic Sontaran culture means they would see his capture as warranting a death sentence (and the moral complexity of that decision is so interesting to examine! it’s a dirty trick BUT it’s a dirty trick done with the aim of preventing the deaths of thousands more so like... something something sometimes all the choices are bad but you still have to choose something something).

- this WAS all gonna be one paragraph with the last point but i realised that halfway through it became less about 13 being unfiltered and more about 13 handling herself when dropped in a literal warzone lmao. when her attempt at a parley is busted, waiting until the soldier escorting her away gets them both far enough away from the carnage of the battlefield before knocking him out; her attempt to save all of these men’s lives might have gone wrong but at least she can still definitely save the life of this one person. gets actively stuck in off-screen helping Mary Seacole tend to the wounded from the massacre. her strategy for getting rid of the Sontarans is to force a retreat by cutting off their food supply and she is absolutely FURIOUS when General Acceptable Target, having already caused the slaughter of his own people thanks to his own pride and unwillingness to consider any strategy aside from ‘fight them head-on’, undoes all of her hours of work by blowing up the Sontarans once they have already disengaged and are retreating. tbh i kind of love the contrast with this episode and some previous nuwho eps in that, this episode very convincingly showed us the Doctor being a war veteran in how she handled the situation with two blink-and-you-miss-it nods to her own experience (’i’ve fought sontarans before’ + ‘soldiers pay the price for their commanders’ mistakes’ - the second one i’m reaching for honestly but there’s something about the line delivery that hits as More than just a platitude u kno) vs other eps in the past that belaboured the point with a Lot of talking around the subject.

- there’s something here as well with how 13 trying everything she can to avoid senseless bloodshed in the crimea is contrasted against Dan and the other handful of humans we see fighting to get rid of the sontarans in 21st century liverpool. in the case of General Acceptable Target and his warmongering glory-seeking ways he is clearly in the Wrong, but Dan and the others we see are very much framed as being in the right with their use of direct force against the invading Sontaran army occupying Liverpool. like YMMV on this but i do like how this era as a whole seems to come down on “the situation matters” when it comes to the use of violence. like you can make links back to 12x09/12x10 with 13′s cobbling together a bomb while she and Ryan are fleeing the approaching Cyberfleet as “a final fallback option to get us out alive”, Ryan’s being unsure about using weapons during the Cybermen’s attack on the Boundary and being told by Ko Sharmus that “you can be a pacifist tomorrow, but today you have to survive”. the idea that glorifying violence is not okay, violence as a means to subjugate others is not okay, violence for the sake/thrill of it is not okay (all these things are represented by the Sontarans and the British General in this ep but like, cross-reference the Cybermen and Daleks here as well), but there are some situations (defence of self, defence of others, defence of home) where actually Refusing to resort to violence is going to be the worse option. i’ve had this thought mulling in my head for a few weeks now and idk if i’m reaching with this connection but there’s a certain LOTR quote that just... plays the same note for me. the Faramir one about how ‘war must be while we defend our lives against a destroyer who would devour all, but i do not love the sword for its sharpness, the arrow for its swiftness, the warrior for his glory, i love only that which they defend’. idk The Vibes Are Similar

- while i’m here making links both inside this era’s narrative and to things outside of it: the Sontarans planning to expand their empire to include Earth via taking advantage of the flux and manipulating time so that they have always been here since Earth’s beginnings, thus retroactively making it so that Earth has always been a Sontaran holding: VERY Time Lord of them. this is EXTREMELY DWEU-esque ‘the Time Lords anchoring the thread of time so that the linear nature of time’s progression best serves Gallifrey’ and ‘Rassilon altering the histories/DNA of other species so that they come out looking more Gallifreyan’ flavoured. considering that Flux actively engages with the concept of Time being caged and controlled into linearity in the B-plot of this episode before more fully laying it out in the next one, with Division playing a huge part in that no less........ there’s no way that this was not done intentionally lmao. highlighting Gallifrey’s imperialism via drawing parallels with the classic DW sci-fi metaphor villains continues to be something i enjoy very much abt this era.

- Dan and 13 continue to be on a WAVELENGTH. i’m honestly a bit shocked at myself bc i completely missed this aspect of their dynamic on my first watch of Flux but on a 2nd watch it’s so obvious lmao!! it’s even blatently highlighted by the way their two plotlines reflect each other (13 trying futilely to avert bloodshed while kicking the Sontarans out of history in the Crimea vs Dan going up against the occupying Sontarans in Liverpool) and then converge in the middle with both of them infiltrating a Sontaran ship and then talking across time to each other, complete with literally saying the exact same things at the exact same time. everyone who said that 13 only kept Dan around at the end of Flux bc of Yaz or that Dan and 13 don’t like each other need to go back and watch s13 again tbh bc like....... these two idiots actually clicked very quickly. like. 13 invites Dan to come with her at the end of this episode and he’s just like ‘sure!’. if 13 didn’t like Dan she would NOT have extended this invitation and if Dan didn’t like 13 he would not have come with, that is not the kind of characters they are lmao. (especially late-canon 13. by this point if she didn’t like Dan, he would Know About It lmaooooo).

- Dan’s parents are fun and cute and i loved their interactions with both Dan AND with each other. there was such genuine and realistic ‘grown-up child who no longer lives with their parents interacting with their parents’ energy in that conversation in the car. Dan’s eyeroll at his parents’ bickering like ‘pls give me Strength’ is exceedingly relatable 10/10. (also, ‘you said they’d be off after the weekend’//‘i never did’//‘he does this to annoy me’ is absolutely something i could see my own parents doing so like, again, Relatable Content). also in my Halloween Apocalypse ramblings i remember wondering if Dan was keeping his living situation from his parents or if they knew about it and are just in a similar situation and i’m coming down on the latter purely bc of their car in this episode. that is an OLD car they are driving so clearly this is a family used to making everything they buy stretch as far as it will go bc they don’t have the luxury of not making things last.

- “i hope i never see you again” // “feeling’s mutual” dan and karvanista kismesis is real

- okay clowning aside tho. very funny to me how karvanista’s ‘ram one sontaran timeship through the rest of them to cause a massive temporal blast that will retcon them out of existence’ plan is. very Doctor-shaped. in hindsight it’s amazing that we didn’t see “Karvanista and the Doctor were in the same squad in Division” coming from a mile off. also Dan “i worked it out all by myself, until Scooby-Doo here tried to take all the credit” Lewis VERY doctor-y of you, once again they are the Same kind of idiot

- properly not clowning now but like. i do like how another minor thread is back here in this episode re: Karvanista/the Lupari’s involvement in getting rid of the Sontarans, ie the idea/theme of taking responsibility. i don’t think this one was intentional but i DO like how it being present (and explicitly acknowledged via Karvanista saying ‘this is partially our fault. the Sontaran attack force snuck through in the second before we sealed the shield. it's our responsibility’) allows for drawing a link back to 13 trying to take responsibility for the cyberium/cybermasters situation at the end of 12x08 bc she thinks she caused it via giving up the cyberium bc she didn’t want to risk the Earth/the existence of the fam, only for Ko Sharmus to turn around 2 episodes later and say ‘actually this is MY mess and my responsibility bc i’m the one who sent it back in time in the first place and i obviously didn’t send it back far enough’. the space for examination here of that entire concept of responsibility - where does the blame/fault/responsibility lie, how far back up the chain of cause and effect and decisions do you have to go, can any one person and their actions truly be said to hold The Responsibility for any one series of events. i’m probably barking up a wrong tree here tbh but still, it won’t leave my brain so i’m leaving it here

- the B-plot in the Temple of Atropos has some really nice moments...... Joseph Williamson turning up again is just nice for me, personally, but i do love ‘all is porous, all is broken’ acting as immediate foreshadowing for the mechanism that exists to hold back Time being broken, as well as the universe itself being a Wreck bc of the Flux. the idea of unbound Time as an inherently destructive force, Time as a sentient being, Time as evil (but this information being given to us by repair drones of the Temple of Atropos itself, and considering who was responsible for binding Time in the first place.......... i would say Unreliable Exposition much but the situation becomes more complex than that when you think about it bc of the paradox that to beings who have evolved and flourished under the linear time allowed by Time’s binding and can not exist in any other way, unbound Time being allowed to move in any which way it chooses WOULD be inherently destructive and evil! something something time and death go hand in hand and are thus fundamentally opposed to life something something the timeless child’s seemingly infinite lifespan/source of regenerative energy making them a natural antithesis to this force something something one of these things is endemic to this universe whereas the other one seemingly came from outside of it something something ancient Gallifrey bending both of these disparate beings to its own designs and actively pitting them against each other to boot something something, i need to stop now before my clown makeup becomes permanent but anyway Flux is still sooooooooo DWEU and also soooooooo Sunless Skies

- everything about Vinder and Yaz’s interactions together is so lovely. Vinder thinks Yaz is great from literally the moment she walks in the room and you know what, he’s RIGHT. Swarm threatening Yaz is soooooo anxiety-inducing and i have such a love-hate relationship with this episode’s cliffhanger and how it plays into the classic villain playbook of ‘villain threatens hero via holding their love interest hostage’ lmfao. though like honestly idk how people saw that happen and STILL didn’t twig that 13 and Yaz were hurtling towards confirmed canon love story bc H O N E S T L Y

- “I’m Azure, this is Swarm” // “Translations, but they’ll do”. TRANSLATIONS OF WHAT??? OF WHAT??????? i continue to love the Ravagers and how eldritch and alien they are but they will have me yelling WHO AND WHAT ARE YOU?????? for the rest of my life

#fel livebagels the space hobo show #this got very long and also a mess but i went to the effort of typing it all out so onto the blog it goes

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