Doctor Who History-Day of the Doctor

The “War Doctor” is about to trigger the Moment-which will destroy Gallifrey and the Dalek fleet surrounding it-in a farmhouse on the planet (possibly his old house). However, the Moment is sentient-with a conscience-and an interface, which manifests itself as his future companion-Rose Tyler. It wants to have him take a look at what his future will be if he pushes the button.

Meanwhile, the current Twelfth Doctor, Clara, and UNIT, are investigating strange things at the British National Gallery art Museum. There’s been statues broken, and paintings that are now missing certain elements-and apparently broken out from the outside. To make things even more unusual, there’s a painting of Gallifrey in the Time War at the Museum-the Fall of Arcadia.

Meanwhile, at another point in the Doctor’s past, the Tenth Doctor is in Elizabethan times-with Queen Elizabeth. He decides to propose to her, hoping to uncover that she’s really a Zygon, a race of alien shape-shifters last encountered by the Fourth Doctor. However, she is the real Elizabeth-and soon the Doctor and Elizabeth find themselves pursued by the real Zygons-one of which was masquerading as her horse.

At this point, the Moment opens time portals that allow the Three Doctors to suddenly converge.

The Tenth and the Eleventh seem to get along well at least at first, but then the War Doctor-an incarnation they disavowed-joins them. They are also surrounded by Elizabeth’s men, and taken to the tower.

In the Tower of London, the Doctors converse, and discover that there’s a Zygon plot-that they’re basically imprisoning themselves in the paintings, to emerge in the future and take over UNIT’s Black Archive by impersonating them, where they keep a lot of the Alien stuff. Clara finds this out the hard way, but thankfully she’s able to use a time vortex manipulator to go to the past and rescue the three Doctors, saving them from having to make a completed calculation to modify their sonic screwdrivers to escape from the Tower (although the  cell door, as it turns out, was unlocked anyway).

Marrying Elizabeth before he goes (which will ultimately lead to consequences in the past for him), the Doctors think of a plan to stop the Zygons. They ask a UNIT man to move the Fall of Arcadia painting into the Black Archive. Using the Zygon’s technology, they then meld with the painting and emerge from it as the Zygons face off with the UNIT people they are impersonating.

Kate-the leader of UNIT is about to set off a nuke to eliminate London if the Zygon’s don’t yield-she’d rather die than be invaded. However, the Doctors temporarily muddle the memories of both UNIT and the Zygons, confusing them as to which is real and who is the Zygon duplicate-and then goad them into trying to develop a peace treaty.

The War Doctor is impressed by his future selves’s ingenuity, and feels that he is now ready to do what must be done-end the Time War to save the many. But he doesn’t have to do it alone-as the Tenth and Eleventh, perhaps thinking they’ve misjudged their past self-stand with him.

But Clara doesn’t want them to go through with it. She thinks of the title “Doctor”-the Man who makes people better-and that this a destructive act totally uncharacteristic of that. There must be another way.

There is.

There’s three of them. Three TARDISes. If they can do things right, if they can calculate a solution using their combined brainpower-they can save Gallifrey by moving it into another dimension, safe from the Daleks, while the Daleks will eliminate themselves in the crossfire. The Doctor didn’t destroy his planet in the past after all-he saved it.

The TARDIses surround Gallifrey-and not just them-the Doctor’s invited all this lives to this party to help complete the moving of the planet.  Gallifrey stands.

There’s even an unexpected one-a Thirteenth Doctor-with some rather prominent eyebrows. More on him later, though…

After Gallifrey is safely transported to an unknown dimension, and the Dalek fleet destroys itself, the Doctors then return to the Gallifrey. Now, the War Doctor can confidently call himself the Doctor. His future incarnations-the Ninth, Tenth, and the first half of the Eleventh’s life will still live with the guilt of thinking they actually destroyed it, as the Doctors often do not retain memories as their timelines cross. They’re unsure where Gallifrey is, or how safe it is, but at least they tried and didn’t intentionally destroy it like they thought they did.

His purpose fufilled, the War Doctor regenerates into his “ninth” self, the Doctor we met at the beginning of the new series:

 

 

After the Doctors say their farewells, and the Eleventh is alone in the Gallery while Clara heads out for a bit; The Doctor wanders if one day he’ll retire, and maybe become a curator. A booming voice echoes from the Gallery: “You know, I really think you might…”

The man is the Gallery’s curator, but to the Eleventh Doctor, he bears an uncanny resemblance to an older version of his Fourth incarnation. He reveals that the painting’s title is Gallifrey Falls No More, that the Doctor will perhaps eventually find and return to his home planet-and also strongly hints that he is the Doctor, who has somehow re-regenerated into an ‘old favorite’ and retired to becoming a curator.

As he reenters the TARDIS-free of the guilt of the Time War and his unresolved past=and now, with new hope for the future-the Doctor dreams of returning with all his incarnations.

Clara sometimes asks me if I dream. Of course I dream, I tell her. Everybody dreams. But what do you dream about, she’ll ask. The same thing everybody dreams about, I tell her. I dream about where I’m going. She always laughs at that. But you’re not going anywhere, you’re just wandering about.

 That’s not true. Not any more. I have a new destination. My journey is the same as yours, the same as anyone’s. It’s taken me so many years, so many lifetimes, but at last I know where I’m going.
 Where I’ve always been going. Home, the long way round.

Metal Gear Profiles: Revolver Ocelot Part one

Ocelot is perhaps one of the most important characters in the Metal Gear canon apart from the Snakes-he appears in all the main console Metal Gear titles (He doesn’t appear in the handheld story Peace Walker, although he is indirectly mentioned). He’s a character with complex motivations, sort of a triple agent. As Ocelot is a long story, I’m going to divide this one up into at least two posts.

Ocelot is actually the son of the Boss, Adamaska-the woman who trained Snake/Big Boss-and the Sorrow, one of her comrades in the Cobra unit. He was actually born during the Allied Invasion of Normandy. Raised in part by the Philosophers-the secret society the Boss was sort of involved with as well-he eventually started to work for the NSA and CIA, but was actually a double agent also working with the KGB. Somewhat flamboyant-, he names himself Ocelot, gives off an Ocelot’s “meow” before fighting, and becomes a major in the GRU, and plays both sides.

In Metal Gear Solid III: Snake Eater,Ocelot first encounters Snake during the Virtuous mission, when Snake is trying to rescue the scientist Sokolov. Here, they begin a rivalry, as he’s actually humiliated by Snake when his gun is jammed.  Snake suggests he uses a revolver instead. He helps Volgin steal back Sokolov and the Shagohod, although he’s not too pleased when Volgin uses a small nuke on his own people (This in turn causes the downfall of his mother).

After Virtuous mission fails, and Snake Eater begins, Ocelot once again confronts Snake but is ordered to aid him covertly. They do have a rematch, with Ocelot now sporting dual revolvers. Also Ocelot starts using his catchphrase- “You’re pretty good”-based on what Big Boss told him about his skills.

When Snake is captured however, Ocelot-now “Revolver Ocelot”-accidentally grazes him badly in the eye, causing irreversible damage and forcing him to wear an eyepatch for the rest of his life.

After Volgin’s defeat, Ocelot chases Snake and boards the WIG plane he’s using to escape, with the two having one final duel before telling each other their real names.

After Snake becomes Big Boss, Ocelot calls both the KGB and the CIA, and also thinks they might be interested in something else that he’s acquired the blueprints for-the walking bipedal tank, the unproduced alternative to the Shagohod-Metal Gear.

Along with Big Boss, Major Zero, Eva, Para-Medic and SIGINT, Ocelot joins the Patriots, while continuing to serve as a GRU Major. Although he does not leave the organization with Big Boss, he is not pleased with their plans. He also becomes a skilled interrogator, earning the nickname Shalashaska (slang for Prison/gulag, AKA Sharashka).

In Metal Gear Solid V: Ground Zeroes and The Phantom Pain,When Big Boss in injured and catatonic following the trap set by Cipher’s treacherous right hand-man Skull Face-which also destroys Big Boss’s MSF force-Ocelot keeps a watch over his friend (and also under orders from Zero), and over the medic who serves as Big Boss’s decoy-Venom Snake. Ocelot assists both Big Boss and Venom when they escape from the hospital in Cyprus, and also keeps up with the deception, in part by using self-hypnosis.

Along with Miller and Venom, they build a new Mercenary force, Diamond Dogs. Ocelot serves as more of the voice of reason of the trio, since Miller has now become more irrational and revenge-driven since the fall of MSF. Ocelot helps train D-Dog, Venom’s wolf companion.

He also stands up for Quiet, the former XOF mercenary who has supernatural abilities.

However, along with Miller, he’s very critical of the scientist Huey Emmerich, who worked for MSF and helped design the first Metal Gear, known as ZEKE, but who probably betrayed MSF in the first place. Along with Miller, they gather increasing evidence about Huey’s crimes, as well as any information he has on XOF (As he helped XOF design the Metal Gear ST-84 Sehalanthropus.).

It’s also here that Ocelot first meets Eli-the future Liquid Snake-who would shape both their fates in the coming decades. Eli later escapes Diamond Dogs with the Metal Gear, but he and Ocelot will meet again.

At the end of the game, Venom’s memories of being the medic resurface, as do Ocelot’s. Ocelot pledges to support Big Boss in his formation of Outer Heaven, but Miller is not too pleased about everything. Vowing to help train Big Boss’s other son David, to take down his father, Ocelot agrees he’ll side with Eli-and might have to kill Miller one day….

Doctor Who History-The Forgotten Doctor

When Doctor Who returned in 2005, Christopher Eccleston was introduced as the Ninth Doctor. However, it remained unclear what happened to the Eighth Doctor, played by Paul Mcgann in the 1995 TV movie. It was still in continuity, but no regeneration from Mcgann to Eccleston was shown. It was only hinted that, perhaps, it had something to do with the Time War in which the Doctor fought in.

However, for the 2013 anniversary, the answers finally arrived.

We flashback to the life of the Eighth Doctor, older and slightly more haggard than he appeared in the TV movie.The Time War is raging across space and time, threatening all existence. Time Lords and Daleks alike have gone to desperate measures to win. The Eighth Doctor however, just wants to stay out of it.

 

A ship is crashing. The Doctor tries to help the young woman piloting the ship, Cass, by bringing her on board the TARDIS.

However, she soon discovers that he’s a time lord when he reveals the TARDIS is bigger on the inside. Disgusted as the species, she’d rather die than become his companion. The Doctor is unable to stop the ship crashing-and he’s on-board it too.

The ship crashes on the planet Karn, last seen in “The Brain of Morbius”, where the Doctor fought an undead Time Lord and was helped by the Sisterhood, a sort of breakaway sect of time ladies with an alchemy-based science.

They’re able to revive the Doctor, but Cass is dead. The Doctor has only a matter of time before he ‘dies’ again-and the Sisterhood have potions that can induce a regeneration. The Sisterhood urge him to give up being a “Doctor”, and become a Warrior. Disappointed that he failed to save Cass, and fearing he has no alternative, the Doctor takes the potion to induce a regeneration-to become the warrior the universe now needs.

 

“Physician, heal thyself.”

The Doctor’s regeneration results in a man who has resolved to become a warrior. This “War Doctor” then fights in the Time War against the Daleks.

 

Years pass from the Doctor’s POV. However, the Time Lords, even with the help of the War Doctor, are losing-badly. Gallifrey’s cities are under attack by the Daleks, and the fleet surrounds the planet.

 

Seeing no end in sight, the Doctor figures there is only one solution-the destruction of Gallifrey which will destroy both the Dalek’s fleet and Gallifrey itself, bringing the war to an end, although at great cost. He declares “No More”….

and then steals an object from Gallifrey’s weapon archives-the Moment, the “Galaxy eater” which, once activated, will consume Gallifrey. This is the moment that will haunt the Doctor forever.

However, perhaps there is hope for redemption in the Doctor’s future-and his past, as we’ll find out in the next installment which will deal in full with the rest of the 50th anniversary special, “Day of the Doctor.”

 

Doctor Who History-Doctor Who?

A prisoner on Death Row in Victorian London reveals that the Doctor has a secret-one that will be revealed at his grave on Trenzalore. The Paternoster gang-who psychically contact River (or at least, her post-death library copy) and Clara, via a psychic conference call-reveal.However, the gang apart from River and Clara are soon captured by the Great Intelligence and his latest henchmen-the Whispermen-and taken to Trenzalore itself.

The Doctor relucantly travels to Trenzalore to rescue them, but it’s clar that what’s happened her has happened already-there are graveyards, and a giant TARDIS, presumabely the Doctor’s own headstone-presumably containing the Doctor’s remains.

And this tomb-which the Great Intelligence wants to enter-can only be opened with the Doctor’s name-his greatest secret. Of course he doesn’t want to say it-it is pretty much the point of the title-but River says it for him, opening the doors.

Inside is not quite a body, but a Timestream-the sum of the Doctor’s timeline, represented as a form of energy-and the Great Intelligence enters it-messing everything up, killing or thwarting the Doctor at various points during his lives, causing all the good thing’s he’s done to start to come undone. It causes the Eleventh Doctor considerable agony, as his whole life/lives are unraveling.

However, there’s one thing that can be done. Clara enters the Time stream to save the Doctor-and she does so, on many occasions. The previous Claras he encountered before were actually splinters of her that had been born to help the Doctor, created by the original Clara.

She helps the first Doctor select a TARDIS when he escapes Gallifrey for the first time.

She helps out the Third while he’s driving Bessie. She even has something to do with a strange cliffhanger on Iceworld (With an Ace-style look to boot!)

And of course as Oswin and the Snowmen Clara, she helps the current incarnation.

However, even though he’s been saved, the Doctor realizes that this could be fatal to Clara. He jumps into his own timestream, rescuing her. However, before he leaves, they both spot an unusual, bearded man. The Doctor reveals that this is also him, but also not him-an incarnation he’s been trying very, very hard to forget, that broke the promise of being the Doctor and saving people…his ‘secret’ is not his name, but his own ashamed past.

The Doctor Who Fought in the Time War-the Doctor’s darkest hour.

That’s John Hurt of “Alien” “Harry Potter” “Elephant Man” and “Indiana Jones” fame among others, as the War Doctor.

Doctor Who History-A Nightmare in Silver

The Doctor and Clara take the Wards to the World of Wonder, a theme park on a different planet in the future. However, it seems largely abandoned, and for good reason-it’s occupied by the military. There also happens to be a deactivated Cybermen that can play chess, but it’s actually manipulated by another person-the small man Porridge.

 

 

However, the Cybermen aren’t entirely dormant-in fact, the World of Wonders sits atop a Cybermen tomb, and cybermites-small versions of the Cybermat-are loose.

The Doctor is even partially converted, and begins a mental battle with another persona-the Cyberplanner (or “Mr. Clever”) while Clara and the military group find themselves under siege from the Cybermen army.

 

The Cybermen have also upgraded once again, with a new design allowing them to fly, remove key body parts to use as weapons, and super-speed. They also appear far more sleeker than their predecessors.

 

The Doctor tries to confound the Cyberplanner with a game of chess, hoping to outsmart his ‘other half’. He manages to do so, and this causes a strain on the Cybermen’s hive-mind, halting them. However, the military attempts to destroy the planet with a device, but Porridge-in fact, a galactic Emperor-is able to transport the survivors to safety while the Cybermen and the planet are destroyed. The Doctor also manages to reset the partial conversion of the survivors as well.

But even though he’s once again defeated one of his oldest, greatest enemies once again, one of the Doctor’s greatest struggles is about to begin.

 

 

Doctor Who History-A Journey through Time and Space

An accident-caused by a group of space salvagers attempting to steal the TARDIS-causes the TARDIS to malfunction, trapping Clara inside, and leaving the Doctor with the scavengers. The Doctor re-enters with the scavengers, while Clara wonders through the many corridors of the giant vessel-full of libraries, strange mini-worlds, and swimming pools.

 

However, eventually they get stuck in a time-loop, and are pursued by horrifying monsters, who are actually messed-up versions of themselves from a possible future.

However, the Doctor is able to fix things by making sure the inciddent never happens in the first place-by talking to himself from a few hours before via a time rift.

Next, it’s back to Victorian times where the Doctor once again finds himself with the Paternoster gang-Vastra, Jenny, and Strax. This time, they’re investigating a Utopian secret society which is in fact, using the venom from an alien leech monster to preserve people and then awaken them after an apocalypse. The Doctor himself falls victim to the poison during the investigation, but doesn’t entirely freeze up due to his alien nature.

The society is led by Miss Gillyflower, played by famed British actress (and former Bond girl) Diana Rigg. She has the alien leech as a sort of symbiote with her, and wants to use it to both trigger an apocalypse, and preserve those she deems to be worthy.

The Doctor is able to stop her plans, with the help of Clara and the gang. Meanwhile, Clara, returning to the future, has taken up a job as a babysitter, much like the Snowmen version of Clara. However, due to old photos of her surfacing from her various adventures in the past with the Doctor, her wards have found out, and now ask to be taken on a trip with the Doctor.

 

 

Mobile Suit Gundam-The “Star” Gundams-Universal Century Part II-The 90’s.

With the 90’s, the Gundam series was sort of shifting, with the Universal Century series starting to get sidelined on TV in favor of alternate universes. However, it still managed to crank out some movies and Original Animated Videos(OAV), which contributed to the lore, and of course featured their own Gundams.

First up was the Gundam F91, from the movie of the same name. Much smaller than it’s predecessor, this unit featured new beam technology, including a beam shield and rifles which had variable beam speeds.

Gundam 0083, an OAV”Interquel” which detailed how the Titans rose in Z Gundam,  has two main ‘hero’ Gundams. The first is the GP01 Zephyrantes, which while in it’s initial configuration is mainly a souped-up version of the original Gundam, but when modified on the moon, it’s given a series of heavy boosters which make it incredibly fast, and becomes a “Full Vernian” Gundam. It’s used against Anavel Gato’s stolen Gundam GP-02A Physalis, although both are destroyed. It’s replaced by:

The Gundam GP-03 Dendorium. This Gundam might not look like much on it’s own, but it gets hooked up to a massive Mobile Armor full of several weapons, making it incredibly formidable.

Back on TV, the final UC Gundam TV series for quite some time was Victory Gundam. This Gundam suit was, like the ZZ, a sort of gestalt unit formed from smaller craft. It also utilized a new maneuvering system, the “wings of Light”. It was eventually replaced by the V2 Gundam which upgraded it’s basics systems and armor.

The OAV Gundam: The 08th Ms team returns to the One Year War which started it all, and reveals a new mass production model of the Gundam, known as the Gundam Ground type. It basically has a blockier appearance than it’s counterparts, and it’s weapons have been moved into different places-the vulcan guns, traditionally on the head, are now in the chest, and the beam saber handles are stored in the legs instead of one the back, which now sports a heavy backpack for equipment.

After being heavily damaged,one of these units was rebuilt and customized into the Gundam EZ8, with more durable armor, higher energy output and the V-fin present on other Gundams replaced by a rabbit ear attenae.

Doctor Who History-Cold as Ice (Warriors)

1983, during the Cold War. A Russian sub has unearthed something in the artic-unfortunately that something is an Ice Warrior-the Martian race who have served as both enemy and ally to the Doctor in the past. It starts to rampage across the ship.

However, the Doctor and Clara arrive, although they intended to go to Las Vegas.

He attempts to barter a peace between the Warrior-Shaldak-but the Warrior is not interested in peace, as he’s been encased for 5000 years and has lost his family and his species has resettled elsewhere in the galaxy. They manage to hold the Warrior prisoner, but he manages to escape, giving us our first look at what the creatures look like outside their armor-kind of reptilian.

Sheldak plans to set off the nukes on the sub, creating a nuclear war for revenge against humanity. Thankfully however, his people arrive to take him home, and he deactives the missiles.

Next up, the Doctor and Clara visit a “haunted” house where a psychic and a researcher are trying to contact a ‘ghost’.

The Doctor soon figures out that this isn’t quite a ghost, but something else entirely-a time traveller, moving at an incredibly slow speed, trapped in another dimension.

The Doctor then starts a rescue operation of sorts, by hooking the psychic to one of those blue Metebellis III crystals that caused him a lot of trouble at the end of his third life.

The Doctor is able to rescue Hila (who is actually a future descendant of the researcher and psychic, who have feelings for each other), although he himself gets stuck for a bit, and pursued by an unusual looking creature. After getting out of the dimension with help from Clara and the TARDIS, the Doctor figures out the creature was kind of just looking for it’s mate, which was in the house, and reunites the monsters.

Doctor Who History-Clara 3.0

The Doctor is in a monostary, trying to figure out the mystery of Clara Oswald-a Woman who met him at the Dalek asylum and in the Victorian era-and died both times (and her original incarnation, Oswin, was turned into a Dalek-something particularly difficult to reverse since Daleks are basically mutant squids in battle tanks)-when he receives a phone call on the TARDIS’s exterior phone-from Clara.

Strangely, Clara-who doesn’t know the Doctor (yet) is simply looking for some help with her Wi-fi, and was given the Doctor’s phone number by a mysterious Woman in a shop (Whose identity will remain a secret, until the Doctor’s next incarnation).

The Doctor and Clara soon discover something sinister is afoot other than just bad connections-people are being ‘uploaded’ into a network of some kind using the Wifi, by sinister spoonheaded robots known as server.

This is being controlled by the sinister Miss Kizlet, from the British building known as the Shard.

After Clara is suddenly uploaded, the Doctor then uses her motorcycle to race up the Shard, and confront Kizlet to release the people trapped in the network…

…..having hacked a Spoonhead and creating a duplicate of himself which then uploads Kizlet into the nework herself, not allowing her to escape unless everybody else is saved.

After it’s all over, Kizlet reports her failure to her superior: The Great Intelligence, who was behind the plan. He wipes her memory as a UNIT team storms in.

The Doctor offers Clara companionship,  which she initially refuses, but she ends up travelling with him. First stop: The Rings of Akhaten, orbiting a planet.

We learn a bit of Clara’s backstory, that she was born due to wayward leaf blowing in the wind resulting in the meeting of her parents, and that her mother died a few years back. However, there’s nothing unusual about her story that accounts for the Doctor having encountered the alternate versions of her.

At first, the Rings seem to be a fairly nice alien marketplace.

But there’s something sinister going on here-turns out the people there only survive by singing and sacrificing to a giant entity-Akhentan itself, that feeds on emotions.

But Akhentan hasn’t reckoned with the Doctor-who gives him an epic speech, and offers his memory and emotions while giving said speech:

Can you hear them? All these people who’ve lived in terror of you and your judgement? All these people whose ancestors devoted themselves, sacrificed themselves, to you. Can you hear them singing? Oh, you like to thing you’re a god. But you’re not a god. You’re just a parasite eaten out with jealousy and envy and longing for the lives of others. You feed on them. On the memory of love and loss and birth and death and joy and sorrow. So, come on, then. Take mine. Take my memories. But I hope you’ve got a big appetite, because I have lived a long life and I have seen a few things.

 I walked away from the last Great Time War. I marked the passing of the Time Lords. I saw the birth of the universe and I watched as time ran out, moment by moment, until nothing remained. No time. No space. Just me. I walked in universes where the laws of physics were devised by the mind of a mad man. I’ve watched universes freeze and creations burn. I’ve seen things you wouldn’t believe. I have lost things you will never understand. And I know things. Secrets that must never be told. Knowledge that must never be spoken. Knowledge that will make parasite gods blaze. So come on, then. Take it! Take it all, baby! Have it! You have it all!

However, it’s not enough to overload the creature. Clara however, takes the leaf that resulted in the matchmaking of her parents, which overloads and destroys the creature, saving the people from their service to an angry planet parasite god monster.

Clara however, is somewhat disturbed by the Doctor’s interest in her, especially when he states she reminds him of somebody who died. However, Clara doesn’t know yet, that the ‘someone who died’ is, in fact-her.

Doctor Who History-The Impossible Girl vs. The Abominable Snowmen

The Ponds, sent back in time by the Weeping Angels, will never see the Doctor again. Upset with losing another group of companions, the depressed Doctor has decided to hang out with the TARDIS parked in the clouds in Victorian London. He’s also re-aligned the ‘theme’ of the TARDIS console room, to something resembling that used with earlier incarnations, with a more hexagonal console and “roundels” on the wall. His wardrobe is also altered, adopting a more Victorian look.

Meanwhile, his contemporary friends Vastra, Strax, and Jenny try to coax him out of his funk, to no avail, and sort of function as a way to keep him out of trouble. But trouble of course, is always finding the Doctor instead.

Strange, living snowmen monsters have started to prowl the streets, and Clara-a bartender who also moonlights as a babysitter (or governess)-has noticed, especially since one of her wards has had nightmares about a former babysitter/Governess returning. Clara also has an incredible resemblance to Oswin from the Dalek asylum.

Things lead back to Dr. Simeon, leader of the Great Intelligence institute, which has giant snowglobe of sentient, psychic snow. Temporarily breaking out of his depression, the Doctor agrees to investigate the mystery, first as “Sherlock Holmes”.

Simeon is played by Richard E. Grant, a noted British actor who played an alternate version of the Ninth Doctor in “Scream of the Shalka” as well as the skit “Curse of Fatal Death”. The Snowglobe/Great Intelligence is voiced by Ian Mckellan, famous for the X-men and Lord of the Rings films among others.

Turns out he’s using the frozen body of the former governess to help control the snowmen. Pursued by the creatures-the snowmen and the governess-the Doctor manages to escape to the TARDIS, and impressed by Clara’s knowledge, offers her companionship. Unfortunately, the governness mortally wounds Clara by pulling her off the cloud.

The Doctor attempts to take on the Simeon and the Snowglobe by erasing Simeon’s memories and thus breaking the psychic connection. Although this proves unsuccessful, the grief felt by Clara’s loss manages to override it and destroy the snow creatures. The snowglobe’s intelligence seems to be defeated, but in fact it will pester the Doctor in his earlier, second life-and later in this one-as the “Great Intelligence”, controller of the robot yeti and Whispermen.

At Clara’s funeral, the Doctor puts the pieces together and suddenly realizes that Clara-who is now dead-was identical to Oswin-despite being in the future, dead, and a Dalek-and in the present, a third Clara exists. Intriqued by this new mystery, he has a new purpose and reason to travel. He’s going to find her.