**Spoilers** Series 9, Episode 12 - "Hell Bent"

Penn

ixoy wrote: »

It *is* completely out of character which is why I thought it was perfect. The Doctor just never does that - he's the smartest guy in the room, he encourages brain over brawn. But he has committed acts of violence for others - this was just much more personal. I honestly didn't think he would shoot but the episode made a good deal of the fact that he did.

Plus, even breaking his own rules, he wouldn't have shot someone who couldn't regenerate. That's why he asked the General how many regeneration he'd had.

TICKLE_ME_ELMO

So I just watched it and I'm a bit emotional. I had just about emotionally recovered from Face The Raven and then they do that! Strangely though I was hoping Clara would stay dead and then when the Doctor started talking about wiping her memories I was hoping she wouldn't let him. Nice twist having him forget instead.

I did feel that Clara's death in Face The Raven was a bit... anticlimactic? It made sense but it still felt a bit rushed. They did a great job wrapping it up properly here. Technically it's left open for reappearances but I doubt that'll happen, unless Jenna Coleman's post Who career doesn't take off. I could see her popping up whenever Capaldi decides to leave. They could tie her returning to the point of her death with him regenerating... maybe. If they wanted. Would be a nice way to wrap his time up, whenever that happens.

So, one more time because this is definitely the last time it'll be relevant..... I've LOVED Capaldi and Coleman together. Some episodes have been dodgy but the Doctor/Clara relationship has always worked for me. I've genuinely considered myself a fan of Doctor Who over the past 2 series and I'm pretty sad that things have to change but that is the nature of Doctor Who, I suppose.

EDIT: I do kind of wish they'd ended it with Clara walking through the door back into the TARDIS though. They were very clear about her having to face her death eventually but the ending was a bit soft. They should have just had her tell the Doctor she had to go because she had an appointment she couldn't get out of and then have her say the thing about memories becoming songs and BAM! She's dead.

mach1982

Interesting theory below about Clara and her TARDIS

http://www.radiotimes.com/news/2015-12-05/doctor-who-introduces-a-brand-new-second-tardis


TL:DR The Doctor TARDIS is Clara's TARDIS, it this version before she dies that suggest the 1st doctor take it .

Could explain why the Tardis "Dislikes her " as they are old friends and the TARDIS is messing with her.

Sonics2k

Fantastic episode. Capaldi is just incredible in the role at times.

I do wish they'd just let Clara be gone and done instead of that somewhat confusing ending, but overall a great episode.

TICKLE_ME_ELMO

Sonics2k wrote: »

Fantastic episode. Capaldi is just incredible in the role at times.

I do wish they'd just let Clara be gone and done instead of that somewhat confusing ending, but overall a great episode.

It was a bit like Moffat didn't want to commit either way, or thought he was being clever by having a happy/sad ending. I thought it was very well done right up until Clara walked back into the Tardis. It kind of muddied an otherwise brilliant story/ending.

Busi_Girl08

I loved the episode, but as someone else said (either here or on Gallifrey Base), Clara's death scene last week just didn't have the impact that it should have had. Moffat's become the Boy Who Cried Death.

Amy died - kind of, she just went away and lived and then died.
Rory - Died, came back, died, came back, died, but not really, then had the same fate as Amy.
Doctor - Faked his death.
River - Died, but got to live in a computer matrix. Then came back as a ghost who the Doctor ended up mauling the face off to the confusion of everyone. Now is coming back for Christmas (yes, I know it's in the future, but finality be damned).
Clara - Died, then came back frozen in the middle of her last heartbeat to go off on billions of years of adventures with Me, Myself and Ashildr.
Missy - Allegedly killed by CyberDanny, actually just transmatted out. Allegedly killed by Dalek gunfire, just transmatted out, ditto Clara.

Moffat reeeeeally seems to have an issue with death.

I think it would have been more refreshing to have just a straight main character death, a la Adric.

Wibbs

Danny died. So the only main type character who actually pegs it(after being in "heaven" for a time) of course buggered up the continuity as him and Clara were supposed to leave descendants. Timey wimey.

TICKLE_ME_ELMO

Busi_Girl08 wrote: »

Moffat reeeeeally seems to have an issue with death.

I think it would have been more refreshing to have just a straight main character death, a la Adric.

Exactly. Her death was earned and made sense and added together with 99% of this episode was a pretty great ending for the character.

Even thinking back to The Woman Who Lived episode and Me said something to the Doctor about being there for the people he leaves behind. Her accompanying Clara back to Gallifrey to face her death would have been a pretty decent way to wrap her up too.

What we're left with is two characters who can potentially pop up again but are highly unlikely to because of the actresses playing them being busy elsewhere.

A clean cut death would have been much better. And I say that as a fan of the character.

Mr Bloat

I enjoyed it. It wasn't what I expected but it was a really good episode. The Christmas episode looks shocking from the trailers but I can't stand River so maybe I'm biased.

Hands up whose kids jumped off the couch in the final scenes of Hell Bent shouting "Oh My God, a new sonic! It's awesome! I want it! I need to change my Santa letter!" My lad replayed the scene where it was ejected from the console about a million times.

I guess a fair few "grown-ups" had the same reaction... I know I did

TICKLE_ME_ELMO

Have to say I was interested in seeing where they went with The Doctor and his new companion off the back of how his relationship with Clara was, co dependent, a bit destructive, ended badly etc. but I've just realised he's completely forgotten her now so it won't impact any new companion relationship at all. Might have been a bit too dark for the show. ... we'll never know.

NyOmnishambles

Just watching it again

Jaysus that scene in the Cloisters where Clara finds out he was in the Confession Dial for around 4.5 Billion years and The Doctor says he had to do it because he had a duty of care is heartbreaking

I am still a bit iffy on bringing Clara back for it but it is no harm for her to have a happy-ish ending really and it should set things up nicely for a clean-ish start next season

Christmas Ep looks cack though, hopefully not

OU812

OK, Can someone correct me if I'm wrong here...

Clara is still alive, is now immortal (she's actually dead, but her death is a fixed point in time & once she avoids that she lives), she's now gone off into the universe (in which she's fractured into a million times) with another immortal, a warrior, Knows all about the doctor, but he knows nothing about her & she's got her own Tardis which appears to be the first doctor's tardis, so can we assume a future show will have her travelling to that version's timeline & "handing him the keys" or is she going to join/run Torchwood now?

The_Valeyard

Saw a theory today.....

There is only ONE tardis.

Remember when Clara met the first Doctor (The Name Of The Doctors), she suggested which Tardis to take, one that had a broken chameleon circuit but be much more fun.

So the Tardis already knew the Doctor and the universe. So the Doctor begins his journey and Clara is returned to the point of her death with help from the Timelords on Galifrey.

corkie

An Even Better Look at Doctor Who's New Sonic Screwdriver

Maybe the End of the Glasses?

TICKLE_ME_ELMO

Have to say I was surprised we didn't see Missy involved in the finale. I thought she might have had something to do with luring the Doctor to Trap Street and all of that business.
Makes you wonder why they brought her back at all in those first 2 episodes other than to tell us she was still alive, which could have been done at some point in the future and with more impact.

TICKLE_ME_ELMO

NyOmnishambles wrote: »

Just watching it again

Jaysus that scene in the Cloisters where Clara finds out he was in the Confession Dial for around 4.5 Billion years and The Doctor says he had to do it because he had a duty of care is heartbreaking.

I do remember thinking during Face The Raven that it was sad but that the actors didn't seem as sad about it all as I was. I guess this episode explained it. Capaldi and Coleman both seemed totes emosh at times which makes more sense assuming the episodes were filmed in order and some of theses scenes were their last scenes together.

TICKLE_ME_ELMO

Wait.... hang on.

Maybe this is a dumb question but if Clara was wiped from The Doctor's memory how was he able to tell waitress Clara the whole story of what happened on Gallifrey?

Penn

TICKLE_ME_ELMO wrote: »

Wait.... hang on.

Maybe this is a dumb question but if Clara was wiped from The Doctor's memory how was he able to tell waitress Clara the whole story of what happened on Gallifrey?

Clara is wiped from his memory but as he said himself, he can piece together bits from the absence of Clara. So he's telling her the story of what happened, but he's not actually telling her exactly what Clara said or did, only we the audience are seeing that. He's piecing the rest together from what he does remember and what he presumes happened.

Like when it first cuts back to them in the diner and it's revealed he's saying it was a local gangster instead of Rassilon etc. He's telling her a different version of what the audience is seeing, which is what really happened.

jimbob_jones

One thing has been puzzling me since the finale aired, knowing that we saw Clara die at the end of Face The Raven, can we assume eventually she gets tired of travelling with Me/Ashildur and eventually accepts her fate ?

I know that she can have as many adventures in the meantime, which will probably be spin off books, graphic novels, audio books etc... before she meets her end

OU812

jimbob_jones wrote: »

One thing has been puzzling me since the finale aired, knowing that we saw Clara die at the end of Face The Raven, can we assume eventually she gets tired of travelling with Me/Ashildur and eventually accepts her fate ?

I know that she can have as many adventures in the meantime, which will probably be spin off books, graphic novels, audio books etc... before she meets her end

What I read into it, was that her death is fixed in time (& space) and once she avoids that time, she'll live (technically she's already dead, therefore immortal). With the Tardis she can go forwards & backwards in time & avoid that one point eternally if she wants.

Ideally she could reboot torchwood as I doubt Barrowman would return to it at this point.

Penn

jimbob_jones wrote: »

One thing has been puzzling me since the finale aired, knowing that we saw Clara die at the end of Face The Raven, can we assume eventually she gets tired of travelling with Me/Ashildur and eventually accepts her fate ?

I know that she can have as many adventures in the meantime, which will probably be spin off books, graphic novels, audio books etc... before she meets her end

She'll probably have a few adventures with Ashildr, but ultimately one of two things will happen. Either the effects of her not dying will begin to cause problems and she'll return to 'face the raven' and accept her death, or the Time Lords will track her down (the Doctor even said that her memories of him meant the Time Lords could find her, that was why he wanted to erase her memories of him) and they'll bring her back.

I really can't see Clara ever coming back. It's pointless as The Doctor doesn't remember her, so all of their relationship from the Doctor's perspective is gone.

jasonb

I could see Clara coming back at least once more. The poignancy of her memories and feelings for the Doctor not being reciprocated could be used, like they were in the scene in the Diner.

I love the theory that Clara's Tardis ends up being the Doctor's one, but shouldn't his Tardis have looked like a Diner for the last 50 years of TV episodes then?

I thought the episode was very good, but I would have preferred either Clara dying in Face The Raven, or trotting off with Me in Hell Bent. Both together, as some said, is just Moffat crying death, and it takes away from the impact of her death in Face The Raven...

J.

Wibbs

jasonb wrote: »

I thought the episode was very good, but I would have preferred either Clara dying in Face The Raven, or trotting off with Me in Hell Bent. Both together, as some said, is just Moffat crying death, and it takes away from the impact of her death in Face The Raven...

J.

Yea, for me it was just a (much more elegant) way of playing to the fans but similar to Tennant's Doc sprouting a human twin for Rose.

TICKLE_ME_ELMO

jasonb wrote: »

I could see Clara coming back at least once more. The poignancy of her memories and feelings for the Doctor not being reciprocated could be used, like they were in the scene in the Diner.

I can't see Coleman coming back to Who in the future unless it was a one off, like Amy appeared briefly in Matt Smith's last episode. They could have The Doctor on one of his adventures discover there's a major issue in the space time wibbly wobbly and it's being caused by Clara not returning to the point of her death. Tie that in somehow to The Doctor regenerating and his memories of her coming back right at the end. Queue tears and both facing theit deaths together and THE END.

Sonics2k

From the moment we saw Clara on the screen again I could tell she would be saved somehow. It did seem like Moffat just didn't want to kill her off in case Jenna wants to return to the show someday.

The start of the episode was fantastic, the Doctor finally back on Gallifrey gave me goosebumps and the whole scene with the soldiers joining him was fantastic.
It annoys me that they didn't do more with him being back on Gallifrey instead of changing the apparent plot of the episode over to Clara when they could have done so much with him becoming the new Lord President and so on.

I get why they brought Clara back, but it kinda ruins her death scene which was brilliantly done and probably one of the saddest deaths or loss of a companion ever. She dies doing something truly noble, but now she's just sodded off with Me and that's it.

Penn

jasonb wrote: »

I love the theory that Clara's Tardis ends up being the Doctor's one, but shouldn't his Tardis have looked like a Diner for the last 50 years of TV episodes then?

Yeah I don't believe that theory. When Clara jumped into The Doctor's timestream, she was spread throughout the Doctor's timeline. But the 12th Doctor didn't exist at that point, and shouldn't have. That timestream that Clara jumped into was only up to the death of the Eleventh Doctor, because that's when the Doctor was supposed to die.

When the TimeLords gave the Doctor more regenerations, Clara (as the Impossible Girl) wasn't spread throughout the Doctor's future, as it wasn't supposed to exist.

So Clara couldn't have gotten the Tardis while with the 12th Doctor (and then given it to the 1st Doctor), because her future with the 12th Doctor wasn't part of the timestream she jumped into.

It's a f*cking difficult thing to explain, but basically she couldn't have given it to the 1st Doctor because there was never supposed to be a 12th Doctor for her to get the Tardis with in the first place. Her telling the First Doctor to take a certain Tardis was just her role as the Impossible Girl making sure he took the right one which would help him.

jasonb

It worries me slightly that I know exactly what you're saying Penn. However, if Moffat wants it to be, then wibbly wobbly timey wimey...

J.

TICKLE_ME_ELMO

Sonics2k wrote: »

I get why they brought Clara back, but it kinda ruins her death scene which was brilliantly done and probably one of the saddest deaths or loss of a companion ever. She dies doing something truly noble, but now she's just sodded off with Me and that's it.

Yeah and it kind of ruins the whole point around her death, that despite being more like The Doctor than anyone he's traveled with before the one most important difference remained, she was breakable. Now it turns out she's kind of not.... or at least a lot more bendable than breakable. Even in Hell Bent when he's talking to Me at the end of the universe she says it's no one's fault Clara died except Clara's. She fell where she stood etc. etc.

Then all of that is undone by Clara and Me flying off in a Tardis. I might just rewatch it and hit stop after Clara leaves the diner and pretend the last bit never happened.

Busi_Girl08

Mr Bloat wrote: »

Hands up whose kids jumped off the couch in the final scenes of Hell Bent shouting "Oh My God, a new sonic! It's awesome! I want it! I need to change my Santa letter!" My lad replayed the scene where it was ejected from the console about a million times.

I guess a fair few "grown-ups" had the same reaction... I know I did

My reaction was more along the lines of "Oh thank feck, they're getting rid of those stupid sunglasses!!"

TICKLE_ME_ELMO

Busi_Girl08 wrote: »

My reaction was more along the lines of "Oh thank feck, they're getting rid of those stupid sunglasses!!"

Does Clara have the sunglasses on her Tardis?