Take a hike - In honor of yesterday being “National Take a Hike Day”, I thought I’d post some screen captures from the beautifully filmed Doctor Who episode, IN THE FOREST OF THE NIGHT. Jenna and Peter looked right at home wandering through the woods.
I present the following with little by way of commentary or preamble. For now it’s exclusive to Tumblr but it may be reposted to AO3 (perhaps expanded, perhaps not) in the future. What I will say is it’s one attempt at addressing a certain creative decision on the show. It is set sometime between Return of Doctor Mysterio and The Pilot, during his 70-plus-year time at a university in Bristol….
BOX 114, a short story by The Saddleman
The Doctor, now in his Twelfth life, was celebrating the fiftieth anniversary of his tenure at St. Luke’s University in Bristol. The fact he hadn’t seemed to age at all during this time didn’t seem to bother his students or fellow staff. After all, nearly every university graduate knows at least one prof who seemed to defy the laws of time, right?
As was traditional at St. Luke’s for someone marking such a milestone, the Doctor arrived at his office to find his desk overloaded with small boxes. Each of them contained a note card written by a different student or faculty member.
After quietly cursing (in High Gallifreyan, of course), the Doctor resigned himself to sitting down and reading the well-wishes. Every. Single. One. After all, they put in the effort and this being a university, there might well be a test after.
By the time he’d reached Box 113, he feared he was about to keel over from an overdose of gratitude.
As such, he approached Box 114 in the hope that maybe, just maybe, it would be different. Someone writing, “Brilliant instructor, shame about the eyebrows,” or “A real Scot would know Arthur’s Seat isn’t a chair put aside in a local pub for some guy named Arthur,” or “Give a barber a job today.”
His wish sort of came true, as Box 114 did indeed break the pattern of its 113 predecessors. For one thing, it had two cards in it, not one. One card was flat, the other was folded neatly in half.
The unfolded card gave the Doctor a strong sense of deja vu. He had seen that handwriting before, he could swear he did.
“My clever boy. Save the other card until you need it. It’s very important. In fact, you could almost say it’s Timeless. Love, your Impossible Girl. P.S. Have I told you before that forgetting me is actually quite offensive?”
The Doctor frowned. Again came that sense of deja vu. Forget? Forget who? he thought. Or have I forgotten who I was supposed to forget?I hate when that happens.
The Doctor slowly unfolded the second card, which had three words printed in bold felt marker and underlined three times:
THE MASTER LIES.
The Doctor started at the card. “The Master,” it read. Not “Missy,” so, unless the “Impossible Girl” had failed to read the memo, likely this wasn’t referring to the current incarnation of his oldest friend and enemy who currently resided in exile in his TARDIS. A future Master, then? A past Master? Someone else entirely?
There was a knock on the office door and a young man leaned in, reminding the Doctor he was almost late to his next lecture.
To be determined, the Doctor thought. Time will tell, it always does.
Shrugging, he refolded the note and put it into his trouser pocket before snatching up his lecture notes and, with long strides, heading off to his next class.
Express-ly Forbidden to Forget - This week is the 7th anniversary of my favorite Doctor Who episode of all time, Mummy on the Orient Express which first aired on October 11, 2014. The thrilling adventure, the costumes, the off-the-scale sexual chemistry between Peter Capaldi and Jenna Coleman all helped to make this episode totally unforgettable. I guess it was the same for the Twelfth Doctor because not even the memory wipe from Hell Bent could erase the Doctor’s thoughts of traveling with Clara…
“I know that her name was Clara. I know we traveled together. I know that there was an Ice Warrior on a submarine and a mummy on the Orient Express. I know we sat together in the cloisters and she told me something VERY important, but I have no idea what she said…or what she looked like…or how she talked…or laughed. There’s nothing there. Just nothing.”
I still find it funny how the three things the Doctor remembers most about traveling with Clara are the romantic settings. His (the Eleventh Doctor’s) date to Las Vegas being thwarted by an Ice Warrior in “Cold War”, sitting in the cloisters where Clara told him she loved him and, here, the sexiest Doctor Who episode ever recorded.
It’s been seven years and I know I won’t forget them!
A Horse is a Horse (of course…of course)…or is it?- Here are a couple of pics of the Doctor and his “carer”, Clara (or, in this case Queen Vic) riding “fake” horses while filming for TV. I think Peter and Jenna always look perfect together even when they’re apart. Hahaha.
I’m still waiting and hoping that they’ll get back in the saddle again and find a new project to work together on.
Four reasons why this will always be my favourite Whouffaldi image…
1. First and foremost: the BBC created this for use as their main marketing image for S9. The BBC promotions people thoroughly and completely embraced Whouffaldi in 2015, and the cover of my S9 blu-ray (among many other things) will memorialize that fact forever.
2. Hand holding! And the spot where their hands are joined has a huge glow that nicely highlights that fact. (Interestingly enough, this is the only main image for any series that features the Doctor and companion holding hands, at least in NuWho.)
3. Matchy-matchy outfits! Twelve’s trousers and Clara’s dress have matching checkered patterns (even though they never actually wore those outfits at the same time - he’s wearing his outfit from The Magician’s Apprentice/The Witch’s Familiar, she’s wearing her outfit from Under the Lake/Before the Flood).
4. Clara’s heart eyes are off the scale, I mean get a hold of yourself, woman!
I will just be forever delighted by how hard the BBC went on Whouffaldi for Series 9.
Best picture ever. I love it so much. It has been my Windows 10 desktop wallpaper for 6 years!!!
Deja view - Some pictures from an old Peter Capaldi photo shoot came across my desktop this morning (a post by @lady-stefania-of-chaol-ghleann) showing Peter posing with old Doctor Who Magazines. The one with Peter staring at a Dalek made me re-imagine the photo with Twelve reading about Clara and wondering why the Dalek looked so familiar. Is it Oswin Oswald from ‘Asylum of the Daleks’ or could it be Clara Oswald, the Magician’s Apprentice? I guess Twelve will never really know for sure. Hahaha.
It’s been more than 18 months since I last uploaded a new story to Archive of Our Own, and I’m happy to announce The Saddleman is back with a new light-Whouffaldi short story, “Doctor Who and the Clockwork Squirrel.” A sequel, prequel and sidequel to “Under the Lake” and “Before the Flood.” Very much a tongue-in-cheek tale that I hope you enjoy. (This is also the 75th story I’ve posted to AO3 since roughly this same time in 2016!)
“The Doctor has created the universe’s first and only clockwork squirrel (honest, he checked). When it goes missing under mysterious circumstances, he calls upon his “other companion” to help.”
