Okay.

[royalmarriage]

Obligatory The Stolen Earth musings and Journey's End speculation. To keep me busy until Saturday.

• Harriet Jones, former Prime Minister, appeared to be exterminated. But the Daleks say "Exterminate" and fire and her quarter of the "outerspace Facebook" disappears. Suggesting that they haven't actually killed her, just destroyed her equipment. Maybe she still lives, working with the Daleks.
  
  
• Or maybe it's not Harriet Jones at all? The "fanfare" of the subwave network opening up sounded suspiciously like the Archangel Network "sound of drums" rhythm, and she appeared to be using psychic paper when presenting her credentials. Could she be (as some have suggested) the Master in disguise?
  
  
• Whether she is or not, could Simm!Master be back? There have apparently been vague rumours that he's been recording scenes for the final episode.
  
  
• Rose said that the Darkness is coming, and Caan apparently described the Doctor as "the Dark Lord". One wonderful theory is that in fact they're both referring to the Black Guardian. Can't quite see it myself, but who knows?
  
  
• Totally left field, but what relevance does Camden hold? Only in Wilf's scene in Voyage of the Damned there's an ad for "Carols at Camden" and Rose appears to be in Camden during her early scenes in The Stolen Earth. For that matter, I clocked an ad promoting an event for "Friday 25th July". Dunno what that does for Lance's aHistory, but I think that's this year. (It might be an old poster.)
  
  
• I don't necessarily want to get into the more crackpot theories about Donna, but it's obvious that she's pretty darned important and is almost certainly going to be involved in the plot of the next episode in a pretty pivotal way.
  
  
• Similarly, there've been a few briefly lingering shots on the hand in the jar. Relevant to future developments in some way?
  
  
• Okay, can't go much longer without mentioning it - the regeneration. Is it or isn't? Will he or won't he? On the "a regeneration definitely will happen" we have the pretty indisputable evidence that a regeneration started at the end of The Stolen Earth, and unless the start of Journey's End is the most appalling copout in history, the Doctor is going to change his form. Countering that, David Tennant has been seen shooting scenes for this year's Christmas special (the title of which would be a serious giveaway, according to RTD in the latest Doctor Who Magazine Bad Wolf Magazine). But given RTD's desire to pull off a stunt like regenerating the Doctor without anyone knowing about it in advance, it's just possible that he might have gone to great lengths to do so (and huge kudos to him if he has managed it). David Morrissey was apparently seen alongside Tennant working on scenes for the special, playing a doctor - possibly the Doctor? It's possible that Tennant could be appearing as a "past Doctor", a la Troughton in The Two Doctors. And sure, he's gone on record as saying that he's appearing in the specials throughout 2009, and there've been reports that he's negotiating pay for the 2010 series, but he could have just been saying that to put folks off the scent. Alternatively, the specials might not be part of the continuing narrative post-Journey's End, but are instead stories that slot into the existing continuity somewhere? Alternatively, something might cause the regeneration to not occur - perhaps the hand in the jar, perhaps the "Osterhagen Key" - or a la Jenny in The Doctor's Daughter, the tenth Doctor could regenerate, but into someone who still looks like David Tennant - yes, it's a bit of a cop out, but there's a precedent.
  
  (Gotta be honest, I love David Tennant and would like him to continue playing the Doctor for at least a few years to come...but not if that totally kills the drama of the end of The Stolen Earth!)
  
  
• And I've got to mention this - it's sweet that the design team thought of the Doctor shooting Davros's hand off in Revelation of the Daleks and so gave him metallic robotic talons, but *ahem* - when last seen in Remembrance of the Dalek Davros was a head and a hand and not much else...so where does this resurrected Davros fit into the old series' continuity? I know, just call me a pedantic fanboy and have done wi'it.
  
  

So, my thoughts and random shpiel. I think the only way I'm going to get through the next five days is to watch The Stolen Earth on a regular basis...

David.

Comments

[zoefruitcake.livejournal.com]

I noticed the poster for the 25th July as well...

[missratbat.livejournal.com]

I just saw the posters, but noted the location most of all - I thought it was their way of saying, 'Look, Camden! Camden's not in Cardiff! So this must be London! Right? Right?'

Between the realities of the prop/costume and the lack of specific description, it's hard to say what Davros was supposed to be in Remembrance. So I guess that gave them wriggle room to update his 'classic' look. Including having the stinky old so change his shirt for the first time in several centuries... :)