tencrush | Who Speculations...

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Who Speculations...

As is my wont after just one Who episode, I have many theories which I shall now expand upon...

As I theorised earlier, I think Amy's line "you've had all summer" is a red herring, supposed to con us into believing it's been a few months at most in The Doctor's timeline. I think the new coat is a giveaway that it hasn't, in fact, been a few months in the Doctor's timeline, it's been 200 years that he's been looking for Melody and he is now the age he is when he gets shot in The Impossible Astronaut.

Future River tells Amy and Rory in A Good Man Goes to War that the Doctor will find Melody and take care of her. As of this epiode, he hasn't found baby Melody at all, she's been kidnapped, brainwashed and grown up without seeing Amy and Rory again until lateish childhood. There two facts don't gel. Now when time was rewritten in The Big Bang, in Amy and Rory's timeline the events of Series 5 never actually happened (although they regained their memories of them, they never took place, or Rory would be plastic), but I think it is safe to assume that in the Doctor's timeline, they did happen. The Doctor is a Time Lord, after all, and it would seem that time is rewritten around him all the time. All these things actually do happen from the Doctor's perspective, are subsequently perhaps undone and unhappened, but have still happened to him. Everyone has been harping on about River's regenerations as being the only Time Lordy thing that she's got going on, but I doubt that that's the case. My theory is that River's past can be rewritten even though it's already happened to her. River is a Time Lord in that respect as well, things can unhappen or change around her. Every single thing that we have seen happen to Melody/River are things that have happened to her, even though the timeline in which they happened may well be rewritten at a later date, she will have experienced these things, even if they didn't take place. The Doctor and River are two Time Lords whose pasts and futures are intertwined through seemingly paradoxical events that are both cause and effect, both their histories and their futures are subject to change as time is rewritten around them. Which is why River needs a bloody book to keep track, the Doctor's got a massive alien brain, but River's is, in all likelihood, human.

Taking it as read that the above probably makes no sense whatsoever, my prediction for the end of the series is that, whatever happens, River will turn out to be the wife the Doctor never actually had. They will be married in a timeline they both experience, but a timeline that is subsequently rewritten when the Doctor eventually does rescue the baby and return her to Amy and Rory. Given that the previous point didn't make much in the way of sense, this point now makes even less sense, but still. Most of this theory is based around my possibly misplaced faith in Moffat agreeing with me that "she turns out okay in the end" is not an adequate resolution to a "young mother and father have their newborn stolen from them" storyline. It just isn't. No way.

The Doctor's wearing a tux in Let's Kill Hitler because he popped off to marry River in the future. That sounds like a rather flippant prediction, but watch this space, that's definitely the truth, I'd stake something or other on it, I won't specify what because it could be utter bollocks.

ETA: Actually, reading all this back, a much simpler and Moffaty explanation for everything comes to me and it's this: The Doctor has been fruitlessly looking for baby Melody for 200 years. He's been unsuccessful because he's not the one who is supposed to return Melody to her parents. I think the final reveal will be that River herself will be te one to return the baby to Amy and Rory, thus rewriting her own history and undoing her marriage to the Doctor and her murder of the Doctor in one fell swoop, because the River that marries the Doctor is the River that murders the Doctor and in order to stop herself doing the latter, she has to also undo the former. Yeah, that's my theory and I'm sticking to it.

Now my brain hurts and I must lie down.

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Given that River gave Amy the book at the end of last series to remind her of the Doctor, I like the whole time is re-written around them theory.

The fact that River is AT their wedding is also a fact that was never really adequately explained and I feel might tie in to a later episode, possibly the one about River's wedding. I think Moffat is writing the most convoluted cause/effect paradox/inevitability time travel storyline he can come up with just because he likes playing with time. There's that small matter of River now being the catalyst for getting Amy and Rory together romantically, which may subsequently not happen if Mels is erased from the timeline she was suddenly slotted into (and I DO believe we are SUPPOSED to be seeing Mels as being REALLY PASTEDED ON when it comes to Amy and Rory's story), but this may well prove that Amy and Rory getting together is an inevitable fact regardless of Mels' interference. SO MANY THINGS, MOFFAT. Damn you.

They will be married in a timeline they both experience, but a timeline that is subsequently rewritten when the Doctor eventually does rescue the baby and return her to Amy and Rory.

No moar Rivar? D: D: D:

The Doctor's wearing a tux in Let's Kill Hitler because he popped off to marry River in the future.

I think that too, but idk if he had long enough.

How long do you need to say "yeah, sure"?

I don't think it implies there'll be no moar River as we know her, I think it implies that the River we know from later on is a mixture of all the things that have happened to her, even the things that have subsequently unhappened, like her marrying the Doctor.

Having said that, I think Moffat is overestimating how much the average viewer, apart from maybe the staunchest of Doctor/River shippers like yourself, is interested in the intricacies of the Doctor/River timeline and relationship. I already think it's getting way too much airtime as it is, and it doesn't feel like it's over by a long shot. What I'm saying is I quite LIKE Doctor/River and it's boring me already that the rest of this series is going to be ALL ABOUT THEM AND HOW IT WORKS. I don't actually care that much and wish Moff would get it over with. Even Amy and Rory are turning into bit players in the River Show.

She's not, strictly speaking, AT their wedding. She left the journal and walked past. I don't see that at odds with "I don't do weddings."

I don't think that's at odds with I don't do weddings, I think it's simply not really adequately explained why she's there from a timey-wimey standpoint, if eveyone's been restored to where they were when we started.

Oh yah, I forgot that we already seen later River earlier. Timey-wimey, etc.

OMFG WHAT IF AMY FINDS OUT THAT THE DOCTOR SAW RIVER DIE?

I think if he gets them married off he could scale back a lot on River and then it wouldn't have to be about her. I thought this year was supposed to be about Rory? Did the Moff just lie to us about that?

I'm pretty sure Rory's big moment was in a Good Man Goes To War, though there still might be something going on there, what with River saying she killed a good man ages ago and maybe that IS Rory after all. I don't know. I just kind of want the whole timey wimey Amy-Rory-Melody-River-Doctor thing to just wrap itself up already, I feel like it's starting to collapse under its own intricate weight.

re: ETA, I WILL TOTES CREYS IF THEY DONT MARRY. But thinking about it it does seem V UNLIKELY that anyone including the Moff would want to put the Doctor off-limits like that. I think they might marry and then have it undone later? Just cos if they don't it'd feel like a cheat and we'd need to see a bit of matrimonial bliss to make the time-divorce more upsetting.

I think they'll marry and it will be undone pretty much immediately, but because they're both Time Lords, it won't really be undone for them because they'll still remember it happening, you know? So they'll be married and not married at the same time. I can't really see them having any matrimonial bliss, I think their entire relationship is a sequence of meetings and adventures.

I'm with you. I just watched it again this morning. Last year I had lots of theories about River but now I'm just tired of speculating and want the resolution (and I do like her a lot). I hope the resolution is tidy and satisfying, but who knows if it will be?

The fact that River apparently killed the Doctor (or someone) and was jailed for it yet the Doctor isn't upset about it (so maybe it didn't happen?) makes me *headtilt*

*has a cry*

He seems to be assuming he's the person he killed. Maybe it's Eleventy's deathwish there, or maybe he just thinks "well if ANYONE can get out of certain death, it's me."

These theories do make sense. Especially the latter, especially during the last episode and the Impossible Astronaut.

Yeah, me too, I love River but Moffat's heaping so much convoluted history on her that I'm afraid she's never going to live up to the hype. The fact of the matter is that we've invested three seasons now into speculating about what the deal is with River and the Doctor, and the more time we put in, the bigger the payoff has to be to make it worthwhile. I'm starting to fear that she's suddenly tipped the scales the other way by still being as much of a mystery in this episode as she was in the last and the payoff is now going to be a letdown no matter how epic it is.

Yes. YES!

Finding out she is Melody Pond was a pretty decent reveal. I think it should have ended there. But they have to tie up why she ends up in prison, and I'm afraid it'll all be anticlimactic. I'm trying to trust!

Your Rory-punching-Hitler gif did fire me up for the episode, though! :)

Rory repeatedly punching Nazis in the face would have been an episode I was perfectly happy with, to be honest, but that's probably because I'm still angry we never saw him punching the Doctor again for not telling him Amy was a ganger. Which he totally did.

MY brain hurts, but i always like your theories!

(the fact that river actually turned out to be amy's daughter makes my threesome icon somewhat disturbing...)

(the fact that river actually turned out to be amy's daughter makes my threesome icon somewhat disturbing...)

Don't you mean 'foursome'...you do have the TARDIS in there as well ;-)

Rory has been through the wringer, along with Amy. If he doesn't get the most brilliant ending ever, I will be irate.

That theory is just complicated and brain-hurty enough to be true.

MOFFAT STOP MAKING ME FEEL DUMB EVERY WEEK

Honestly, I don't think Eleven has, at all, been looking for Melody.

That's also a distinct possibility that's occured to me, but I got the impression from the answerphone prequel that he fruitlessly had. Though maybe he hasn't because he knows it's pointless?

Finally got to watch it! Very good...and entertaining! Fancy that.

All right, I'm confused...is that supposed to be the Time Agency?

I kind of assumed it was something to do with the Time Agency, yeah. Maybe they later went more sensible and became the Time Agency? Or they're a rogue spinoff? Who knows.

I was hoping it would be leading up to a Time Agency reveal at some point (maybe season 7?). 'Cause really, do we need another time player in this wonderful mess? And there was the whole wrist strap thing...that idea could definitely use some tweaking. LOL

Fruitlessly been searching? All it showed us was Amy being really worried about her baby and Eleven guilting. There was nothing anywhere that showed he was searching.

Changing her childhood would automatically make River not River, she would grow up to be Melody. Mels wouldn't have existed either, though she could have a similar personality... The Doctor loves River the way she is. She won't become the person she is if he changes what made her that way. And he knows that regardless of how hard it was on her River herself doesn't want it changed, because she likes the person she now is.

I think, when it comes to River, he has been very much trying not to break her dying wish of not changing any aspect of her life. And hey, if it wasn't for him, she wouldn't have even been born XD

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