Fixing the Series 8 Arc
A lot of the "arc scenes" in Series 8 don't actually make any sense once you've seen the finale.
I'm really tired of us getting fed arc elements that then end up not actually meaning anything, other than to be a carrot to "lure" us to watch the finale. So I came up with some ideas that I think would make those elements actually tie into the finale better. And maybe, on rewatch, even make them more fun.
These are just my ideas. And my belief that just a little bit of story editing would go a long way:
1.) Why did Missy pull in the Half-Faced man? He's not human, he's a robot. He's got no soul and no human body to convert. So why him?
A. The Half-Faced man wakes up and adjusts his hat and sees the woman. She comes up to him, tells him congratulations, he's reached the Promised Land, and she hopes her boyfriend wasn't too hard on him. Then asks him if he jumped, or if he was pushed. "He's such a naughty boy. I'm sorry if he caused you any trouble." She sits down at a garden table beside him and pulls out a recording sphere which she clicks on and puts between them. "But I do like to keep an eye on him." She leans forward avidly, almost pathologically avidly, very stalkerish. "So tell me everything."
2.) Why did Missy download a miniaturized soldier from the future who had been turned into protein gloop? Not only was she in the wrong time period, but she also had no body left to "Cyberconvert."
A. This scene would play out basically the same way it did in the episode, but the implication now, would be that Missy is also pumping her for information on the Doctor. "Would you like some tea? Little splosh? Lovely."
3.) Why were robots repairing a space ship to go to the "Promised Land" when it wasn't even a place, it was a computer program? And they were robots, therefore having no souls, minds, or bodies to convert, so how did they fit in? And how did they know about the Promised Land in the first place?
A. My answer would take a bit more tinkering with the episode as a whole. Make the robots Cybermen. Of course, the Doctor freaks out because Cybermen are in Robin Hood's England. He assumes the Sheriff and "Robin" are actually Cyber-controlled and brainwashed locals (only to reveal that the Sheriff is actually half Cyberman like Tobias Vaughn.) (Which would make it even more radical that they were using gold to repair their ship, and why they need humans to deal with it. And make it even more symbolic when the Sheriff is stopped by dropping him into a vat of it.) They could explain it by, "The original substance is not available here, gold is the nearest equivalent for repairs." And that they had promised the Sheriff he could keep the gold that was left over. Greed is always a good motivator.
But, and here's the main thing, when the Doctor reads that the Cybermen are heading for "The Promised Land" have it also revealed that their mission is to retrieve the treasure that had been stolen from them. (Which ends up being that Missy had stolen their Cyberconversion technology, and they intended to get it back. So, later, on rewatch, it would be realized that by stopping these Cybermen the Doctor had actually, accidentally, helped protect Missy and her plot.)
4.) The policeman in Caretaker would happen the same way, since he's in the right time zone, place, species, and it makes sense he could be converted to a Cyberman. Missy looking at him and walking away is mysterious enough, and could, again, imply she was thinking about what she'd learned from the others, and her plans.
5.) Flatline - the mention of "Clara. My Clara. I have chosen well," can be explained later with a line in Death in Heaven when Missy is taunting the Doctor about Clara while the plane is crashing:
MISSY: Oh, and now it begins. Doctor, I do believe you're on call. Miss Oswald expects. Who else but the girl who's got your number? Whoops!
DOCTOR: It was you!
(He remembers answering the phone in The Bells of St John.)
CLARA [memory]: Ah, hello.
DOCTOR 11 [memory]: Where did you get this number?
CLARA [memory]: The woman in the shop wrote it down. It's a helpline, isn't it?
MISSY: (Cockney) Computer helpline, love. That's the one. Best helpline in the universe.
DOCTOR: You put us together.
MISSY: I kept you together.
(Back to Deep Breath.)
CLARA [memory]: Who put that advert in the paper?
DOCTOR [memory]: Who gave you my number?
CLARA [memory]: The woman. The woman in the shop.
DOCTOR [memory]: Then there's a woman out there who's very keen that we stay together.
DOCTOR: Why?
Instead of:"Cos she's perfect, innit? The control freak and the man who should never be controlled. You'd go to hell if she asked. And she would. The phone's ringing, Doctor. Can you hear that? Now that is the sound of your chain being yanked. Heel, Doctor! (as Clara) Help me, Doctor. Help me. Help me, Doctor."
No need to imply it needed to be a "control freak" or that there was anything special about Clara, anyone would have done. That Missy was just looking for "a" Companion for him, instead Missy could say:
MISSY: "Because she was a very demanding customer, and so persistent. I thought you deserved it. And you always did like a pretty face. And you'll do anything for your Companions, won't you? Even go to hell if they ask."
Then add: (because it never was clarified why it had to be specifically Clara, or how she ties into Missy's plan, since Missy didn't know Clara would fall in love with Danny or that Danny would die and end up in the Nethersphere.)
DOCTOR: Buy why Clara? How does she fit into your plans?
MISSY: (shrugs) No reason. Anyone would do. (Looks up evilly, implying.) Everyone has loved ones. Relatives. Boyfriends...
Which would make it even more sinister that when the Doctor answers the phone, and it's Clara begging him to tell her how to turn on her boyfriend's emotion inhibitor, because he hurts...
(I'm hoping people would get the implication here that Danny's accident was no accident. And that whatever person Missy had sent to the Doctor as a Companion would have ended up with some relative or loved one killed, and that that traffic accident wasn't such an accident.)
So, Missy's having "chosen Clara well" is more about the fact that Clara had worked out well for her, rather than any specially inherent attribute of Clara's.
6.) The references to the little girl thinking "Miss" had told her to go find the Doctor work fine as they are. Missy's a Time Lord too, and more than capable of putting a suggestion into a young head. (And it was to Missy's benefit that the Doctor and Clara stay together. So this is another example of her putting them together and keeping them together.) Also the "that was unexpected, I love surprises," thing sort of works, because Missy would have been stuck there in the forested present day London at W3 too. So it was to her benefit that the Earth wasn't destroyed. Sending the kid to the Doctor may have been Missy's way of making sure things were taken care of. Since this sort of thing is rather the Doctor's specialty. But I don't think any of that had to be said, since it wasn't immediately obvious, or necessary for the stories to work.
7.) Dark Water/Death in Heaven would have played out basically the same then, other than that one conversation in the plane I changed above. Although, I think I would have added a muttered, "He doesn't need any more friends," when Missy ground poor dead Osgood's glasses under her shoe. Just to make her killing of Osgood just a bit less arbitrary, and tie it more into the "I need my friend back!" reveal later.
Anyway, those are my ideas. I think then, when going back and rewatching the previous stories of the season, it would be a little more fun, since the arc references would make a bit more sense.
1.) Missy had recruited Clara as the Doctor's Companion, because she needed a Companion who was from the present day where her 3W was situated, and who had relatives or loved ones Missy could kill to get the Companion to demand the Doctor stop it from happening, in order to lure him to 3W. (Yeah, it still doesn't make sense that the Doctor would believe in an afterlife, but I guess we can blame it on the Tardis telepathic circuits for piloting them there. Danny's brain patterns were in the gallifreyan computer in the building. So she wasn't "wrong." It just happened to be a Gallifreyan version of the Afterllife. Like the Panatropic net on Gallifrey.)
2.) The Half-Faced Man and Dalek dissolved soldier were pulled in so Missy could pump them for information on the Doctor's whereabouts and doings.
3.) The robots going to the promised land, where actual Cybermen, who were going there to retrieve the Cybertechnology the Master had stolen from them. But were stopped by a golden arrow. (Sorry, but that would have made that arrow ending much more fun for me. Just dink a Cybership with a golden arrow and the whole thing explodes. Brilliant. In a totally fanboyish "Cybermen are allergic to gold" sort of way. :D) [Which I think Gatiss would have appreciated.]
4.) Then the rest of the stories, and the arc in general, makes a bit more sense:
Abstract:
Missy/The Master stole Cyberconversion technology and planted a convenient present day Companion on the Doctor so that she could create a Cyber Army to give the Doctor as a present to lure him back into being friends with her. [Yeah, it's lame, I know, but the Master always was sort of nuts that way.] Missy/The Master then kills the Companion's boyfriend in a car accident so the Companion will beg the Doctor to fix it, which leads him to the Master at St. Paul's cathedral and The Master puts her plan into action to convert all of mankind.
She's thwarted by the "love" of the Companion's boyfriend, and her usual inability to believe that the Doctor isn't just like her. (Pretty par for the course for the Master who's been trying to drag the Doctor into his schemes for centuries.)
I don't even find it all that unusual that the Master would have a plan to give the Doctor an army, only to also try to kill him beforehand. By this point, I think trying (and failing) to kill the Doctor is probably a knee-jerk reaction for the Master. She probably knows or expects he won't die, so this is just a bit like playing for them, she even watches what he'll do from the Nethersphere, not particularly surprised, just sort of resignedly annoyed when the Doctor "wins that round" again.
Anyway, those are my suggestions, editing ideas, and general "How can I make this arc work" thoughts.
What do you think?
Visits Total
I'm really tired of us getting fed arc elements that then end up not actually meaning anything, other than to be a carrot to "lure" us to watch the finale. So I came up with some ideas that I think would make those elements actually tie into the finale better. And maybe, on rewatch, even make them more fun.
These are just my ideas. And my belief that just a little bit of story editing would go a long way:
1.) Why did Missy pull in the Half-Faced man? He's not human, he's a robot. He's got no soul and no human body to convert. So why him?
A. The Half-Faced man wakes up and adjusts his hat and sees the woman. She comes up to him, tells him congratulations, he's reached the Promised Land, and she hopes her boyfriend wasn't too hard on him. Then asks him if he jumped, or if he was pushed. "He's such a naughty boy. I'm sorry if he caused you any trouble." She sits down at a garden table beside him and pulls out a recording sphere which she clicks on and puts between them. "But I do like to keep an eye on him." She leans forward avidly, almost pathologically avidly, very stalkerish. "So tell me everything."
2.) Why did Missy download a miniaturized soldier from the future who had been turned into protein gloop? Not only was she in the wrong time period, but she also had no body left to "Cyberconvert."
A. This scene would play out basically the same way it did in the episode, but the implication now, would be that Missy is also pumping her for information on the Doctor. "Would you like some tea? Little splosh? Lovely."
3.) Why were robots repairing a space ship to go to the "Promised Land" when it wasn't even a place, it was a computer program? And they were robots, therefore having no souls, minds, or bodies to convert, so how did they fit in? And how did they know about the Promised Land in the first place?
A. My answer would take a bit more tinkering with the episode as a whole. Make the robots Cybermen. Of course, the Doctor freaks out because Cybermen are in Robin Hood's England. He assumes the Sheriff and "Robin" are actually Cyber-controlled and brainwashed locals (only to reveal that the Sheriff is actually half Cyberman like Tobias Vaughn.) (Which would make it even more radical that they were using gold to repair their ship, and why they need humans to deal with it. And make it even more symbolic when the Sheriff is stopped by dropping him into a vat of it.) They could explain it by, "The original substance is not available here, gold is the nearest equivalent for repairs." And that they had promised the Sheriff he could keep the gold that was left over. Greed is always a good motivator.
But, and here's the main thing, when the Doctor reads that the Cybermen are heading for "The Promised Land" have it also revealed that their mission is to retrieve the treasure that had been stolen from them. (Which ends up being that Missy had stolen their Cyberconversion technology, and they intended to get it back. So, later, on rewatch, it would be realized that by stopping these Cybermen the Doctor had actually, accidentally, helped protect Missy and her plot.)
4.) The policeman in Caretaker would happen the same way, since he's in the right time zone, place, species, and it makes sense he could be converted to a Cyberman. Missy looking at him and walking away is mysterious enough, and could, again, imply she was thinking about what she'd learned from the others, and her plans.
5.) Flatline - the mention of "Clara. My Clara. I have chosen well," can be explained later with a line in Death in Heaven when Missy is taunting the Doctor about Clara while the plane is crashing:
MISSY: Oh, and now it begins. Doctor, I do believe you're on call. Miss Oswald expects. Who else but the girl who's got your number? Whoops!
DOCTOR: It was you!
(He remembers answering the phone in The Bells of St John.)
CLARA [memory]: Ah, hello.
DOCTOR 11 [memory]: Where did you get this number?
CLARA [memory]: The woman in the shop wrote it down. It's a helpline, isn't it?
MISSY: (Cockney) Computer helpline, love. That's the one. Best helpline in the universe.
DOCTOR: You put us together.
MISSY: I kept you together.
(Back to Deep Breath.)
CLARA [memory]: Who put that advert in the paper?
DOCTOR [memory]: Who gave you my number?
CLARA [memory]: The woman. The woman in the shop.
DOCTOR [memory]: Then there's a woman out there who's very keen that we stay together.
DOCTOR: Why?
Instead of:"Cos she's perfect, innit? The control freak and the man who should never be controlled. You'd go to hell if she asked. And she would. The phone's ringing, Doctor. Can you hear that? Now that is the sound of your chain being yanked. Heel, Doctor! (as Clara) Help me, Doctor. Help me. Help me, Doctor."
No need to imply it needed to be a "control freak" or that there was anything special about Clara, anyone would have done. That Missy was just looking for "a" Companion for him, instead Missy could say:
MISSY: "Because she was a very demanding customer, and so persistent. I thought you deserved it. And you always did like a pretty face. And you'll do anything for your Companions, won't you? Even go to hell if they ask."
Then add: (because it never was clarified why it had to be specifically Clara, or how she ties into Missy's plan, since Missy didn't know Clara would fall in love with Danny or that Danny would die and end up in the Nethersphere.)
DOCTOR: Buy why Clara? How does she fit into your plans?
MISSY: (shrugs) No reason. Anyone would do. (Looks up evilly, implying.) Everyone has loved ones. Relatives. Boyfriends...
Which would make it even more sinister that when the Doctor answers the phone, and it's Clara begging him to tell her how to turn on her boyfriend's emotion inhibitor, because he hurts...
(I'm hoping people would get the implication here that Danny's accident was no accident. And that whatever person Missy had sent to the Doctor as a Companion would have ended up with some relative or loved one killed, and that that traffic accident wasn't such an accident.)
So, Missy's having "chosen Clara well" is more about the fact that Clara had worked out well for her, rather than any specially inherent attribute of Clara's.
6.) The references to the little girl thinking "Miss" had told her to go find the Doctor work fine as they are. Missy's a Time Lord too, and more than capable of putting a suggestion into a young head. (And it was to Missy's benefit that the Doctor and Clara stay together. So this is another example of her putting them together and keeping them together.) Also the "that was unexpected, I love surprises," thing sort of works, because Missy would have been stuck there in the forested present day London at W3 too. So it was to her benefit that the Earth wasn't destroyed. Sending the kid to the Doctor may have been Missy's way of making sure things were taken care of. Since this sort of thing is rather the Doctor's specialty. But I don't think any of that had to be said, since it wasn't immediately obvious, or necessary for the stories to work.
7.) Dark Water/Death in Heaven would have played out basically the same then, other than that one conversation in the plane I changed above. Although, I think I would have added a muttered, "He doesn't need any more friends," when Missy ground poor dead Osgood's glasses under her shoe. Just to make her killing of Osgood just a bit less arbitrary, and tie it more into the "I need my friend back!" reveal later.
Anyway, those are my ideas. I think then, when going back and rewatching the previous stories of the season, it would be a little more fun, since the arc references would make a bit more sense.
1.) Missy had recruited Clara as the Doctor's Companion, because she needed a Companion who was from the present day where her 3W was situated, and who had relatives or loved ones Missy could kill to get the Companion to demand the Doctor stop it from happening, in order to lure him to 3W. (Yeah, it still doesn't make sense that the Doctor would believe in an afterlife, but I guess we can blame it on the Tardis telepathic circuits for piloting them there. Danny's brain patterns were in the gallifreyan computer in the building. So she wasn't "wrong." It just happened to be a Gallifreyan version of the Afterllife. Like the Panatropic net on Gallifrey.)
2.) The Half-Faced Man and Dalek dissolved soldier were pulled in so Missy could pump them for information on the Doctor's whereabouts and doings.
3.) The robots going to the promised land, where actual Cybermen, who were going there to retrieve the Cybertechnology the Master had stolen from them. But were stopped by a golden arrow. (Sorry, but that would have made that arrow ending much more fun for me. Just dink a Cybership with a golden arrow and the whole thing explodes. Brilliant. In a totally fanboyish "Cybermen are allergic to gold" sort of way. :D) [Which I think Gatiss would have appreciated.]
4.) Then the rest of the stories, and the arc in general, makes a bit more sense:
Abstract:
Missy/The Master stole Cyberconversion technology and planted a convenient present day Companion on the Doctor so that she could create a Cyber Army to give the Doctor as a present to lure him back into being friends with her. [Yeah, it's lame, I know, but the Master always was sort of nuts that way.] Missy/The Master then kills the Companion's boyfriend in a car accident so the Companion will beg the Doctor to fix it, which leads him to the Master at St. Paul's cathedral and The Master puts her plan into action to convert all of mankind.
She's thwarted by the "love" of the Companion's boyfriend, and her usual inability to believe that the Doctor isn't just like her. (Pretty par for the course for the Master who's been trying to drag the Doctor into his schemes for centuries.)
I don't even find it all that unusual that the Master would have a plan to give the Doctor an army, only to also try to kill him beforehand. By this point, I think trying (and failing) to kill the Doctor is probably a knee-jerk reaction for the Master. She probably knows or expects he won't die, so this is just a bit like playing for them, she even watches what he'll do from the Nethersphere, not particularly surprised, just sort of resignedly annoyed when the Doctor "wins that round" again.
Anyway, those are my suggestions, editing ideas, and general "How can I make this arc work" thoughts.
What do you think?
Visits Total