The Dr Who thread

SimonB · Post by **SimonB** » Tue May 29, 2007 7:06 pm 0

My only problem is the carelessness with the watch. If my spirit was trapped in it I would have made Martha promise to guard it like a hawk before sticking the funny hat on rather than letting her let me leave it lying about.

Bog · Post by **Bog** » Tue May 29, 2007 8:50 pm 0

SimonB wrote:My only problem is the carelessness with the watch. If my spirit was trapped in it I would have made Martha promise to guard it like a hawk before sticking the funny hat on rather than letting her let me leave it lying about.

Yur, but that would've been a short ep.

Governmentyard · Post by **Governmentyard** » Tue May 29, 2007 8:52 pm 0

Martha being a knobcheese and losing the watch I can buy, but the Doctor not being bright enough to leave it with her in the first place - that's a leap of faith too far for an audience member of average intelligence or above.

F-ZeroOne · Post by **F-ZeroOne** » Tue May 29, 2007 9:41 pm 0

juice wrote:
F-ZeroOne wrote:"Whatever happens, we have got the Maxim gun and they have not"...

I don't have any problems with a school teaching its pupils weapons training - these boys were supposed to be the future Officers of the Realm, after all - but I'd be a little bit suprised to find that they might have machine guns; which in those days before true war-standard mass production were well-crafted, expensive bits of kit (they were fairly rare even in the British Army at the time). Also, they use a lot of ammo, and bullets aren't free either...
True dat - while it seemed a bit incongruous, it was a public school for kids who would almost certainly end up in the armed forces and would be expected to do their bit for king and country. The times, they have a-changed...

Also, according to Wikipedia, the British armed forces had introduced the Vickers machine gun in 1912: it's conceivable that some now-obsolete Maxims could find their way down to a school, rather than to a lower-priority military unit. Unlikely, but possible.

I'd have expected Lee Enfields, personally - though it could be argued that as officers-to-be, they'd be kept away from all such nasty commoner weapons and be given nice revolvers and a riding whip, instead

Yeas, Lee-Enfields - or probably, more likely, older-pattern rifles - would perhaps have been a bit more realistic (and the emphasis in the British Army at the time was on rapid rifle fire; as a friend of mine remarked, at thirty bolt-action operated rounds a minute it meant we went to war with the most dangerous gathering of poets the World has ever known...

)

Mind you, if I start nit-picking this sort of thing in Doctor Who, I'll have to mention that you wouldn't have found Me109s escorting bombers at night in 1941 either...

Edit: ah, looking at earlier posts it seems the book does have a valid point. Carry on, chaps...

Darkflame · Post by **Darkflame** » Tue May 29, 2007 10:40 pm 0

Reverend Goatboy wrote:Martha being a knobcheese and losing the watch I can buy, but the Doctor not being bright enough to leave it with her in the first place - that's a leap of faith too far for an audience member of average intelligence or above.

umm..err...hmm...
The Doctor didnt give it to her to protect her!

Yup, thats a good explanation.
Case closed.
Move on

XOR · Post by **XOR** » Tue May 29, 2007 10:55 pm 0

Darkflame wrote:
Reverend Goatboy wrote:Martha being a knobcheese and losing the watch I can buy, but the Doctor not being bright enough to leave it with her in the first place - that's a leap of faith too far for an audience member of average intelligence or above.
umm..err...hmm...
The Doctor didnt give it to her to protect her!

Yup, thats a good explanation.
Case closed.
Move on

I was away in the caravan on Saturday, but managed to see bits of it on my handheld tv (2" by 1.5" screen or something like that) when I wasn't being pushed out the way by my daughters, so I probably missed something major...but I thought the Doctor told Martha that if the watch was opened, it would return him to his former Time Lord self...but wasn't that really expecting too much for a pocket-watch never to be opened by anyone who was around and was curious enough (including the human Doc), or would it only work if it was opened by Martha?

Darkflame · Post by **Darkflame** » Wed May 30, 2007 12:12 am 0

Well, the kid opened it briefly.

Length of exposure Id guess.
Still, it dosnt seem too secure.

seibu · Post by **seibu** » Wed May 30, 2007 11:19 am 0

Reverend Goatboy wrote:Martha being a knobcheese and losing the watch I can buy, but the Doctor not being bright enough to leave it with her in the first place - that's a leap of faith too far for an audience member of average intelligence or above.

Well, it's a tricky situation. A pocket watch is an expensive and valuable thing for a maid to have. If Martha had been discovered with it, the watch would almost certainly have been confiscated. So it makes a lot more sense for Smith to have it. The fact that as a human he can't possibly know its true significance is unavoidable. It's risky - but the doctor makes it clear the whole plan is a last resort.

HGFB · Post by **HGFB** » Wed May 30, 2007 11:23 am 0

The Doctor also said there was a perception filter to there to stop him noticing the watch too much so the chances of him opening it himself were probably quite small.

Stevo · Post by **Stevo** » Wed May 30, 2007 11:32 am 0

Darkflame wrote:Well, the kid opened it briefly.

Length of exposure Id guess.
Still, it dosnt seem too secure.

The kid is now the Doctor*

*may not be true but we will see soon enough

Governmentyard · Post by **Governmentyard** » Wed May 30, 2007 11:53 am 0

seibu wrote:
Reverend Goatboy wrote:Martha being a knobcheese and losing the watch I can buy, but the Doctor not being bright enough to leave it with her in the first place - that's a leap of faith too far for an audience member of average intelligence or above.
Well, it's a tricky situation. A pocket watch is an expensive and valuable thing for a maid to have. If Martha had been discovered with it, the watch would almost certainly have been confiscated. So it makes a lot more sense for Smith to have it. The fact that as a human he can't possibly know its true significance is unavoidable. It's risky - but the doctor makes it clear the whole plan is a last resort.

Engrave 'Martha' on it so people know it is hers? If you can stick a 'percfeption filter' on it you can engrave the bloody thing, surely?

Or she could keep it in her pants, along with my face.

Baggypants · Post by **Baggypants** » Wed May 30, 2007 12:06 pm 0

Stevo wrote:
The kid is now the Doctor*

*may not be true but we will see soon enough

the kid is the new Captain Jack? until Jack re-appears?

Governmentyard · Post by **Governmentyard** » Wed May 30, 2007 12:10 pm 0

So for one episode then?

HGFB · Post by **HGFB** » Wed May 30, 2007 12:36 pm 0

Jack isn't back until episode 11.

Baggypants · Post by **Baggypants** » Wed May 30, 2007 12:42 pm 0

It worked for that imbecile with the flip-to head with Ecclestone