Getting in the TARDIS will ruin your life...

Ok so the last episode of Doctor Who really drove home for me how dangerous getting involved with The Doctor is. I can’t tell if they are going for this intentionally or not. It would be a bit like me picking up a bunch of toddlers in my crazy cool car and driving up to Detroit to tangle with some street gangs, and hey if one or two get shot its not my fault right?

I think the reason it is really standout with Amy is that he visited her first as a young child, River Song had a whole bit about how he sweeps into your life.

How can you not see it from the angle that Amy and Rory had a ton of trauma in their life because of The Doctor? From being trapped in the Pandorica to spending millenia as a plastic guard.

The Doctor knows very well what happens when a human baby is conceived in the time vortex, yet he still let Amy and Rory spend their honeymoon in a TARDIS in flight.
Which of course leads to a bunch of insanity for both of them.

Hell even when they try to break off the relationship he forces his way back into their lives. Then when something finally happens and he can’t contact you he sits around depressed until he finds someone new to occupy his time.

Funny thing is you never got this sense in classic who for whatever reason, even when the companion is basically a hunter gatherer with probably even less sense of what they are getting into. I blame some aspect of Smith’s acting for projecting a kind of fatherly role.

I don’t think the Doctor knew what would happen with the TARDIS on Rory and Amy’s honeymoon. I doubt there had been any children conceived in a TARDIS prior to River Song.

As far as the Doctor being dangerous, Davies set that up in the very first episode of the new series. Moffat reinforced this in “The Girl in the Fireplace,” and I doubt he has changed his mind about it.

I think it would be a good thing if more of the new series companions went off happily into the sunset, but that isn’t actually all that dramatic. The problem is, the companions have become intensely emotionally attached to the Doctor. In the old series, it never felt like that. Any real deep emotion was strictly subtext.

And from Amy’s point of view, they were happy in their “past” life. Maybe Amy was putting a brave face on it, but I don’t think we’re meant to believe they were miserable.

Yeah, I don’t think there’s any reason to believe that the Doctor ever gave a moment’s thought to what would happen if someone conceived on the TARDIS. I mean, unless you believe that’s why he gave them the bunk beds, but I don’t think so.

Every first companion episode contains some variation of the “Is it always this dangerous?” “Yes.” exchange, and most of them have plenty of opportunity to see exactly how dangerous it is a bunch of times, and choose to stay anyway.

I’d also prefer that more of the Companions live happily ever after in their own place and time, but I’m not mad at the Doctor for that not happening. Informed consent and all.

So what happens when a human baby is conceived in the time vortex? I Binged it, but this was the first link Bing list. And none of the others seemed helpful.

You get some kind of proto-timelord baby that can regenerate. Not so bad on its own I guess, but it certainly complicated the companion’s lives.

There was some dialogue in Demon’s Run that seemed to indicate The Doctor was aware this could happen.

I don’t have time to read this thread.

On point xkcd: xkcd: Children's Fantasy

That brings up an interesting question (at least interesting to me, and my sense of amateur geneticist, ok, Sims 2/3 player…)

It seems that the ability of a Galifreyan to regenerate is based on whether they have traveled in time or not, if regeneration is an effect/side effect of temporal travel or exposure to the Time Vortex, would a Galifreyan who never travelled in time be able to regenerate, or would they simply be a humanoid life form with two hearts?

Lets say that there was a community of Space-Amish on Galifrey, a community that does not use temporal technology, and has never been exposed to the Temporal Vortex, would they have the ability to regenerate?

What if genetics from a Galifreyan who HAD been exposed to the vortex, and had the ability to regenerate was introduce into The Space-Amish community, would regeneration be a trait that was passed down genetically, would it be a hereditary trait, and if so, would it be dominant or recessive?

Oh, I think this was known for a long time but just not spotlighted.

It’s probably fan retconning it, but there are hints that this happened with the fourth doctor in him leaving everyone and going off and then coming back. (Face of Evil specifically shows this having happened at least once.) Given what we have seen with Amy and Rory, I can see this having been the modus operandi for Sarah Jane back in the day. And they did talk about it with Sarah Jane’s return about how he has affected people. I think it could be the same for Ian and Barbara as well. Too bad they didn’t do follow ups as they have done now.

Tegan was probably the only spotlight to this in old Who and it was the flip side of Amy. Tegan was sick of seeing the death and destruction and it had stopped being fun for her. Maybe they need someone like that again?

I will grant that Smith’s Doctor seems to be naive or happy to downplay a physical relationship as if it doesn’t occur to him. That makes sense and so I get that he was taken off guard by River’s conception. I think he got them bunk beds because “bunk beds are cool” and didn’t think of the physical side.

If anything, I like how this has been contrasted. The Doctor is able to be a pacifist precisely because he’s powerful in some way. He can get the bad guy to stop and listen to him where other people would just be shot. But his companions can’t and have to use violence.

edg

Good questions!

It’s not canon but there was a book called the Gallifreyan Chronicles that came out before even the TV movie. In it, it “explained” that Time Lords came about because of an injection they get of organic nanobots (nanoids?) that are what allow for the regeneration cycle. They go so far as to try and explain that after doing this so many times, the nanobots can’t do it anymore, so that’s why Time Lords are limited in the number of times they can regenerate in old Who.

The implication, though, is that the “average” Gallifreyan still has the normal two heart biology, as they were genetically modified over the millennia, and still lives a long time on the home world, even without regeneration.

My take on River’s conception is that Rassilon discovered time travel and maybe that it helped regeneration by being exposed to the time vortex but then you had so many time traveling and regenerating more often because of the dangers that no one questioned that it helped. Or maybe Gallifreyans can only regenerate a couple of times compared to Time Lords. Just a few thoughts on it.

I’m more curious about what they are going to do with regeneration after Smith. Are they going to keep the continuity of old Who and say twelve is it? Are they going to give him more and explain it? Or are they just going to say that was never a limit and keep going? Are they going to have the Valeyard in some way? That would be interesting!

(And awesome on the Sims reference! Generations, I assume? I don’t play it but my wife does.)

edg

Not to derail the thread, but my current Sims setup is mostly TS3 with a smattering of TS2 when I get bored with 3

2 has better genetics, with dominant and recessive traits, 3 has better personality archetypes and psychological traits

I run the base game and Late Night, so basically, I set up a town, introduce a vampire, disable the slayer and helsing, and see how long it takes for the entire town to succumb to vampirism

Organic nanobots?:rolleyes::smack: so regeneration is caused by Mitichlorians?!? :smack:

The old series made occasional hints that life in the Tardis was not all fun and games. When it came time for Tegan to leave, she practically ran out the doors, saying “It isn’t fun anymore.” That’s the balance Doctor Who always has to maintain: enough sense of danger to make it suspenseful, but not so full of peril that it ceases to become a family-appropriate program.

I kind of wished that the writers would get away from that a bit now as they’ve essentially done something like this to all of the NuWho companions in one way or another (Donna being the worst of the lot, an opinion shared by many of us around here). Being the Doctor’s companion is dangerous, point taken. I haven’t seen any of this series yet, so I don’t know the fate of Amy and Rory, but I would like to see some companions go back to their lives or settle on some nice planet and live the rest of their lives content and happy.

There was a thread awhile back that stated that becoming involved with any TV hero will either kill you or ruin your life.

I don’t think it’s a problem, because it seems to be a ‘Time Lord Rule’, rather than a ‘law of nature’. In the 4th Doctor episode The Keeper of Traken, The Master was in his 13th and final incarnation when took over the body of Consul Tremas in order to extend his life (and allow the producers to replace actor Roger Delgado, who had died, with Anthony Ainley). Later, in The Five Doctors, the Council of Time Lords awarded The Master was awarded a pardon and a ‘new set of regenerations’ as recompense for assisting The Doctor, so there is precedent for ignoring the ‘12 regenerations rule’.

Since there are currently no other Time Lords around to enforce the restriction, there’s no reason The Doctor can’t keep coming back indefinitely.

Yes, but they had a ton of pleasure as well. I’ve always assumed that the Doctor and companion(s) have lots of wonderful, non-dangerous journeys that we’re never shown because they’re not dramatic.

Amy and Rory talked about trying to give up the life, but they couldn’t because it was so much fun.

There is a throwaway line in The Sarah Jane Adventures in which The Doctor tells someone he can regenerate more or less infinitely.

I don’t think either of the Winchester brothers has had a long-term girlfriend…

…unless he gets hit with Zectronic Energy…
And ends up with etheric beam locators

Why?

I’ll explain later…