Dr. Who (father's day question)

dragon · Post by **dragon** » 2008-05-26 04:03pm

just seen the father's day episode where Rsoe saves her father and those creatures show to sterilize time. Do they fully explain these things considering as often as time gets changed. Especially if you consider that if these things were to clean up the mess then all they are doing is making a bigger mess. Considering we have seen the future when humanity is a vast empire so if they cleaned the past then the whole of creation kind of just got changed as well.

Plus the doctor made a comment about their were laws against that sort of thing and that the time lords enforced it, but how considering these thing were able to cut him off from the tardis?

DaveJB · Post by **DaveJB** » 2008-05-26 04:45pm

I think that what really kicked off all the shit was the fact that Rose prevented her father's death in front of a previous version of the Doctor and Rose. The Doctor's plan was for something like this to happen:

1) Pete gets knocked down by car in front of Doctor I and Rose I.
2) Rose I runs away in tears, followed by Doctor I. He agrees to take her back in time again, thus they become Doctor II and Rose II.
3) Rose II and Doctor II wait around the corner from Rose I and Doctor I, with the intention that Rose II will comfort the dying Pete after Rose I has left.
4) Rose II suddenly decides to prevent her father's death altogether, running past Rose I and Doctor I. Unfortunately, this means that Doctor I never has any reason to take Rose I back in time, therefore they never become Doctor II and Rose II, therefore Rose II is never able to save Pete... whoops, major time paradox, and the reapers show up to eat everyone and everything.

Essentially, there was an unresolvable paradox on Earth, and the universe's "immune reaction" (as the Doctor put it) was to take out the entire human race and thus prevent the paradox from getting worse. Sucks for all those generations of humans that will never come to be, but the universe will still get along fine without the human race.

The story never elaborated on how the Time Lords would stop it, but based what we've seen before, I'd imagine they can detect these paradoxes, seal it off before the Reapers can show up, and send in someone to correct the paradox.

Zixinus · Post by **Zixinus** » 2008-05-26 05:07pm

Essentially, there was an unresolvable paradox on Earth, and the universe's "immune reaction" (as the Doctor put it) was to take out the entire human race and thus prevent the paradox from getting worse.

Why the entire human race? Why not just those that are connected to the paradox, like Rose and company? Or why not just the town? Wiping out whole humanity is just seems so... overkill.

Sucks for all those generations of humans that will never come to be, but the universe will still get along fine without the human race.

But it would! After all, from what I have seen about the Whoverse, Humanity will become one of the most powerful civilizations known, spanning several galaxies and wanking off so furiously that almost every other race bows before their grace!

[/sarcasm]

Post by **NecronLord** » 2008-05-26 05:50pm

It's worth noting that for all the shiny of the various human empires; a hundred thousand years from now, the Sontarans are still far, far, far ahead of humans technologically.

DaveJB · Post by **DaveJB** » 2008-05-26 05:51pm

Zixinus wrote:Why the entire human race? Why not just those that are connected to the paradox, like Rose and company? Or why not just the town? Wiping out whole humanity is just seems so... overkill.

See, this is why we need Target novelizations for NuWho! The explanation in the episode was just "Paradox = Big, flying dragon things appear and eat everyone on the planet." It could be either that they eat everything on the planet to be absolutely certain... or they might actually just have been supposed to eat Rose & co., but ate the whole human race out of sheer gluttony.

Stark · Post by **Stark** » 2008-05-26 06:03pm

Zixinus wrote:Why the entire human race? Why not just those that are connected to the paradox, like Rose and company? Or why not just the town? Wiping out whole humanity is just seems so... overkill.

While I'm the first to figure he was exaggerating given his terrible emotional state, you have no idea how the 'paradox' or 'wound' works. The description does not suggest the reapers were 'nice' and 'just take the broken bit' kinda guys - they were attracted by the damage, and then just fucked shit up like animals. It's like saying chaos demons summoned by a little cult taking over the world is 'overkill'.

As to the OP, the episode pretty clearly explains this, so I'll just repeat it. There were two versions of them there, making it especially vulnerable. Rose crossed her own timeline AND her own history to change something, something a Time Lord would never do due to their special temporal awareness, creating a disaster that a Time Lord couldn't fix without equipment. The Doctor was confident he could easily repair the situation with use of the TARDIS, and he was *surprised* that the TARDIS interior had been removed, clearly showing that despite their argument, the Doctor had not expected any actual danger at that point. All of this was clearly explained in the episode.

To be honest, I figured that the Doctor's desperation at the loss of the Time Lords moderation was honest - never in his life had he had to deal with the true consequences of paradoxes, as the Time Lords would always 'clean up'.

Teleros · Post by **Teleros** » 2008-05-27 05:50pm

Zixinus wrote:Why the entire human race? Why not just those that are connected to the paradox, like Rose and company? Or why not just the town? Wiping out whole humanity is just seems so... overkill.

Depends on how you look at it. If you think of the reapers as a sort of immune response generated by the universe then what happens to the other six billion people on Earth is neither here nor there as far as the universe at large is concerned. To take the immune response a step further, it could even be seen as an overactive immune system - just like with allergies etc.

Also, although I admit it's been a while since I watched it, I don't recall the reapers being particularly intelligent (or seeming to be) either: whilst you or I might be able to do something more efficient to fix the paradox (eg just kill those involved), the reapers might simply not work that way.

Stark · Post by **Stark** » 2008-05-27 05:55pm

Even if you use the Doctor's language, antibodies aren't intelligent. They were clearly empowered and attracted by paradoxes (as seen when Rose allows one into the church), so the simplest explanation is that they just came due to the paradox and then went nuts (and everyone on Earth would be affected by the paradox anyway, if only to a lesser extent). It's not like they're the Cosmic Censor or anything, they're clearly a predatory life form of some sort.

Post by **NecronLord** » 2008-05-27 06:49pm

Yeah, I only ever got the impression that they were animalistic; scrabbling away at the stone, for instance, and served to clense an area of paradox - the more time twists in knots, the more powerful they are, and the older the things they can devour.