Doctor Who headcanon #2

Time Lord regeneration is both the secret to the continuing success of Doctor Who, and one of the great mysteries of Doctor Who mythos. It’s easy to forget that the Doctor isn’t human, but each time the Doctor regenerates, losing his old face and persona and gaining new, we are reminded of the alienness of the Doctor and his kind, the Time Lords, as represented by the wonder of regeneration. Time Lords are creatures of time — they “walk in eternity”, as the Fourth Doctor so enigmatically put it. The essence of time is change, and regeneration reflects this aspect of time. You think you know the Doctor, but there goes and regenerates, and suddenly he’s no longer the man you know. When you appreciate that the Doctor has done this twelve times in a lifespan of over 2000 years, you realise how really alien and inhuman the Doctor, and his species, is.

Much ambiguity surrounds the concept of regeneration in Doctor Who lore. It has never really been made clear what actually happens when a Time Lord regenerates. True to form, we fans have tried our best to nail down the precise mechanics of regeneration, but, ultimately, until more explicit evidence is provided, it is a question open to interpretation.

Which is where headcanon comes in. Some time ago I read a contributor’s piece on Doctor Who TV which speculated that regeneration involves the total “death” of the Time Lord in body and mind, wherein the consciousness of the Time Lord’s former incarnation is disintegrated alongside the physical body and is replicated in the new body. In this way, each incarnation of a Time Lord has a separate consciousness. I’m not satisfied with this explanation, as I don’t really like the idea that the only relation that any given incarnation of the Doctor has with his previous incarnations is that they are made up of the same atoms and share memories. This theory almost denies that the Doctor is the same person as his previous selves. Are a man’s memories all that makes him who he is?

I prefer to think that regeneration is an organic process that is supposed to rapidly “renew” the Time Lord’s body, rather than dissolving the old body and constructing an entirely new body. The change happens at a cellular level: the cells remake themselves to rejuvenate the whole body. This process is imperfect, though, and the regeneration process will result in a physical change of appearance — a side-effect of regeneration. The regenerative process also has the effect of frazzling the brain, resulting in an altered personality, but, ultimately, continuity of consciousness. In this way, aspects of personality due to “nature” (i.e. preferences, persona) change, but not those due to “nurture” (i.e. values and principles, memories, things that are learned or due to experience).

This interpretation can also be distinguished from theories that see regeneration as involving a “body-swap” wherein an existing body is simply changed into another body (while consciousness and memories are retained). I don’t see regeneration as exchanging one body for a completely different one, but as a complete and drastic renewal of the same body. I think it is the disposition towards seeing regeneration as a simple “body-swap” that leads many to embrace the possibility of a female Doctor: the argument is that there is no reason the Doctor could not regenerate and find that he has ended up with a female body. In contrast, the way I prefer to see regeneration — as a renewal of the existing body rather than changing one body for another — means the idea of a female Doctor is more problematic, as it is hard to see how a male body could renew itself into something other than a male body. The objection could be raised, “But how is it any different from a young man (Eleven) regenerating into an old man (Twelve)?” Ignoring the fact that Eleven had physically aged to an extent that made him physically older than Twelve when his regeneration process began, I’d suggest that such changes as physical age, height, complexion, hair colour, facial structure, weight, etc, are essentially superficial changes of outward appearance. In contrast, a change from man to woman, involves a fundamental chromosomal shift, which begs the question: if one chromosome can slip, why not two? Why do not Time Lords routinely regenerate into non-humanoid forms?

I suppose the way one looks at the mechanics of regeneration also depends on what explanation for the origins of regeneration one accepts. To my knowledge, two different explanations for Time Lords’ ability to regenerate have been offered in the show. The traditional explanation, developed in the expanded media, was that regeneration is an artificial aspect of Time Lords’ physiology inserted by Rassilon during his shaping of Time Lord civilisation. The more recent explanation propounded in the revived series is that Time Lords evolved the ability to regenerate naturally, per A Good Man Goes to War:

DOCTOR: “But she’s human. She’s Amy and Rory’s daughter.”
VASTRA: “You’ve told me about your people. They became what they did through prolonged exposure to the time vortex. The Untempered Schism.”
DOCTOR: “Over billions of years. It didn’t just happen.”

This explanation posits that Time Lords evolved the ability to regenerate due to billions’ of years exposure to the time vortex. A similar process, River Song’s conception in the TARDIS, brought about the ability to regenerate in her.

These two explanations are plainly in clear contradiction with each other: either Rassilon did artificially insert regeneration into the Time Lord genome, or he didn’t; either regeneration is a result of natural evolution, or it isn’t. Such a contradiction can be resolved by resorting to Rule 3 of my headcanon rules: “Any blatant contradictions between onscreen explanations can be resolved by preferring the most recent explanation.” Rule 9 also comes into play: “Only the television show is explicitly canon; the audio stories, novels and comics are canon if you want them to be, but are not necessarily so.” Since the traditional explanation was only propounded in the expanded media, its canonicity must be subordinated to the later onscreen explanation. Another related piece of Time Lord backstory developed in the expanded media but retconned in the revived series was the idea that Time Lords are “born” fully grown through an artificial process of being “loomed” into existence from DNA strands — The Sound of Drums and Listen have showed Time Lords as children (the Master and the Doctor respectively), as did The Day of the Doctor, which made mention of “2.47 billion” children who died on Gallifrey (and indeed showed some Gallifreyan children).

So I prefer the “evolutionary” explanation for regeneration rather than the “artificial” explanation. It occurs to me that, if one accepts the evolutionary explanation, one would be more disposed to seeing regeneration as a restorative process (as I do) rather than as a process involving a total reconstitution of the body, or a body-swap. Conflicting views of the implications of regeneration, can be, if not resolved, but at least better understood, when the different interpretations of the mechanics and origins of regeneration are understood.

Day of the Doctor Review

[This blog was originally written in December 2013 on a former blog of mine.]

I woke up especially at a quarter-to-six on the day of the worldwide premiere of The Day of the Doctor, bleary-eyed, cursing the BBC for making me get up at such an ungodly hour of the morning, yet excited in anticipation, especially so in the knowledge that “Whovians” all around the world were, at that very moment, waiting alongside me in identical eager anticipation. I had the good fortune to be converted to Whovianism in good time for the Fiftieth Anniversary, such that I could fully appreciate the plotline, the implications for the Doctor Who saga, and what a “gift” for the fans the anniversary special really was.

And what a show. Building on the mysterious events of the Time War, and the Doctor’s infamous role in ending it, it is revealed that it was not the Eighth Doctor (Paul McGann), as previously assumed, who participated in the Time War and (according to legend) killed all the Time Lords and Daleks to end the war, but a self-designed “warrior” incarnation of the Doctor, the War Doctor (John Hurt).

The twist at the end of the eighty-minute special reveals that, in fact, the Doctor had never actually killed all the Time Lords. With the help of the Tenth (David Tennant) and Eleventh (Matt Smith) Doctors, the War Doctor discovered he didn’t have to kill his entire race after all – utilising the resources of all thirteen Doctors (including the next Doctor, Peter Capaldi), the Doctor(s) engage in a bit of Time Lord trickery to freeze Gallifrey at the Fall of Arcadia in a moment in time, contained in a piece of Time Lord art, a stasis cube. The Daleks were left to destroy themselves in crossfire, and Gallifrey was presumably saved, to be released from its frozen state at some point in the future. The War Doctor and the Tenth Doctor, as well as all the previous incarnations of the Doctor recruited to help with the salvation of Gallifrey, would not remember saving Gallifrey as the events were outside each of their time streams, and as such the Doctor would not remember that he didn’t actually kill all the Time Lords.

It was a great feature: I loved the engaging plotline, the clever plot twist, the coalescence of three incarnations of the Doctor, the return of Billie Piper and Tom Baker, and all the little nods to the last fifty years of Doctor Who. But I can’t help regretting the little bout of revisionism that the writers engaged in, in creating this feature. The writers are entitled to revise and retcon to their heart’s content, of course, but I am of the persuasion that what the writers have done in this special, while making for an excellent feature in itself, was ill-advised and not good for the programme as a whole.

Firstly, I’m unhappy with the rewriting of Doctor Who canon. The Doctor’s alleged role in ending the Time War, as morally questionable as it was, was supposed to be a pivotal, defining moment in his story. The Doctor’s supposed decision to kill all the Time Lords and Daleks alike, taken in the depths of the most terrible, devastating war in the history of the universe, was supposed to be inescapable: the one instance when the Doctor couldn’t just fly in and save the day crying “allons-y!” or “Geronimo!” or whatever. It was a decision taken “on a day when it was not possible to be the Doctor”, as the Eleventh Doctor said. It made the Doctor what he is today. In any case, it was an important event in the Doctor’s past. It made him interesting, and added to the mystery of the character. But the writers saw fit to say that the event never happened. They were within their right to do so, of course, but I don’t think it was a good decision. The Doctor’s act was a pivotal moment in the Doctor’s ancient storyline, perhaps the most important moment of all. By rewriting it and making it into yet another instance among many in which the Doctor simply conjures up some clever alien jiggery-pokery to save the day, I feel the writers have taken away some of the depth and mystique from the Doctor’s story, his character, and from the show itself. What is the message that Steven Moffat intended to convey with this revisionism: that the Doctor will always save the day? The superhero will always be there for you? There is a right solution – a right answer – to every problem? How shallow.

Secondly, I quite resent how the writers have manipulated the actual canonical storyline of the events of the end of the Time War to allow for their revision in The Day of the Doctor of the Doctor’s actions. The writers seem to have been making out (e.g. by the recurring “No More” meme, and the parallel events involving UNIT and the Zygons) that the Doctor’s decision was a classic Hiroshima dilemma: do I use this bomb and kill many innocent people if it means shortening the war and saving many more? In actual fact, this is a distortion of the story. The Doctor’s decision was not analogous to Hiroshima: the Doctor used the Galaxy-Eater (or the Moment) to kill all the Time Lords and the Daleks and thus end the Time War because the Time Lords had decided to end the war themselves in a much more sinister way, by undertaking the “Ultimate Sanction” – the destruction of the entire universe, all of time and space, and everything inside it (except the Time Lords themselves, who would continue to exist as a kind of disembodied consciousness). It was not a simple choice of taking many innocent lives to end the war, or letting the war carry on indefinitely to potentially claim many more: it was a choice between one’s own race, or the very existence of the entire universe. I imagine if the Doctor had the choice (in the actual scenario, not the rewritten one), he would make the same decision again without hesitation. So, yes, what the Doctor(s) did to save Gallifrey in The Day of the Doctor was perfectly applicable to both situations, but why did the Doctor need to revisit this event in his saga anyway? It was only made possible through a sleight-of-hand rewriting of the Doctor’s history, and the convenient invention of another heretofore-unseen spacey gimmick that allowed the Doctor to save the day without getting his hands dirty. The events of the Time War – at least this particular event – really should have been left alone.

Finally, I regret what this changed history means for the character of the Doctor himself. The Day of the Doctor was the first time we were informed that the Doctor actually regretted his decision to use the Galaxy-Eater and that he would have changed his decision if he had the choice. Of course, the Doctor’s regret is only possible in the context of the changed storyline: in the context of the original storyline, I don’t think there is any doubt that the Doctor would have chosen to sacrifice his own people again rather than let them destroy the entire universe (e.g. his actions in The Fires of Pompeii, and the way he condemned the Time Lords “back to hell” again in The End of Time). Rather, what we’ve seen from the Doctor regarding his decision at the Fall of Arcadia before The Day of the Doctor was not regret, but sorrow. Terrible, debilitating, unbearable, all-consuming sorrow (like here). This sorrow has been a constant fixture in the post-war incarnations of the Doctor; behind the grit of the Ninth Doctor, the joviality of the Tenth Doctor, and the frivolity of the Eleventh Doctor lies intolerable pain, weariness and suffering. The Doctor tries hard to repress his great remorse and guilt about the fate of his people, but it is always simmering just below the surface; it’s almost as if the Doctor’s outward display of supreme self-confidence and jocularity is, in part, over-compensation for the pain he feels underneath – a burden which he carries with him everywhere he goes. This seems especially true of the Eleventh Doctor, who is prone to sudden, frightening outbursts of intense emotion and lapses into dark solemnity, in stark contrast with his usually quirky, frivolous nature; it’s in these compelling moments that we feel like the mask has slipped, and we’re seeing the Doctor as he really is. This darkness and pain, and how it manifests itself, is part of what made the new Doctor such an interesting character, rooted in the Doctor’s dark past. But now that it turns out that the Doctor actually never did that terrible deed, that he actually saved his people and single-handedly ended the Time War, what has he to be sorrowful, guilty or anguished about? Rather, he has an enormous deal of which to be proud. Good for him, right? The Doctor is free to bestride time and space, carrying an unbearable burden no more, once again just a happy-go-lucky spaceman with a time machine and a stylish haircut. Like the Eleventh Doctor without the intensity and darkness simmering beneath the surface. How shallow.

As I said, in and of itself, The Day of the Doctor was a brilliant feature. The fiftieth anniversary special probably merited a feature length film of two hours’ duration, at least, but I’m making no complaints in that department. Maybe the BBC were unwilling to fork out for such an endeavour. But, as part of a continuing plotline, I don’t like what the writers have done. I feel the writers have devalued the significance of the Time War, and especially the Doctor’s role in ending it, in the 1,200-year-long-and-counting story of the Doctor. I often resent the snobbishness of Classic Who devotees who insist that the new series is so shallow, but, in The Day of the Doctor, I’m starting to see their point. It’s rare of me to criticise the great Steven Moffat, but I think, in this case, he has made a poor, opportunistic and ill-considered authorial decision. But that’s just my opinion.

On a female Doctor and sex-change regeneration

The regeneration of the Master into Missy has brought to the fore debate over the prospect of a female Doctor. The debate among the fandom about whether the Doctor should one day regenerate into a female form onscreen has been as vociferous as any debate about UNIT dating, whether Susan named the TARDIS, or whether or not Adric was an annoying tit. It was first established that sex changes for Time Lords were possible when the Eleventh Doctor remarked in The Doctor’s Wife that another Time Lord, the Corsair, had regenerated into a woman “a couple of times”. Subsequently, in The Night of the Doctor, the Sisterhood of Karn divulged to the Eighth Doctor that, with their “elevated” Time Lord science, they could bring about a controlled regeneration, even to change him into a female. Now that a major male Time Lord character has been shown onscreen to have regenerated into a woman, the prospect of a female Doctor has become more real than ever.

Personally, while I thought the Master’s sex change was very successful, and while I’m not completely closed to the idea of a female Doctor, I do have significant reservations. For one, I think portraying the Doctor as a female would be incongruous with the essential nature of the character. The Doctor, to me, is an intrinsically male character — not overtly or stereotypically male in that he’s some kind of chest-beating ape, but still very much a masculine character. Paul Verhoeven explains it well. He’s a father figure to the universe, a defensive and loving dad. It’s clear he sees himself in a very paternal way — he feels he has an obligation to look after the universe, to protect his charges from bullies and meanies of all sorts, to step in and give a helping hand, as a father should. He loves and is loved by the universe as a fatherly protector.

As well as this, there’s my personal subjective preference for the Doctor to remain a male character. I’ve come to love this character, the Doctor, independent of any of his individual incarnations. When I think of the Doctor, no individual incarnation springs immediately to mind, but I think of a number of essential traits that make this overarching character, this person, who he is: heroic, principled, selfless, eccentric, lonely, mysterious — and a man. I very much get the feeling that, throughout his various incarnations, despite looking and feeling different after each regeneration, the Doctor remains the same person, and it’s very important to me, for my investment in the character, that the Doctor always feels like the same person. To an extent, at least, I’d feel that the Doctor had become a different person if the Doctor were to become a woman. After thirteen or however many incarnations as a man, I think I’d feel that I couldn’t recognise a female Doctor as the character I knew and loved; that a female actor is likely to depart in a fundamental way from how the character has been portrayed in the past would only exacerbate this feeling. Think of it as if a loved one or a very old and dear friend suddenly decided to get a sex change. After the operation and after that person has assumed their new identity, I think most people would feel that, although that person bears a resemblance to the person they used to be in many ways, it would be as though the person one knew and loved had essentially gone, or at least changed to the point of unfamiliarity. That’s because sex is not just biological happenstance — the sex organs you happen to possess — it is a fundamental part of what makes a person who they are.

All that said, I said I’m not completely closed to the idea. Although I have my reservations, I’m willing to be open-minded, and consider any proposal for a female Doctor on its merits. If a female were to be cast as the Doctor, I’d certainly watch with an open (even interested) mind and be willing to embrace the change. I could very well be wrong: a female Doctor might not be as incongruous as I expect, and I might identify with her as recognisably the character I love. At the same time, I think my reservations are legitimate, and I can’t help but be sceptical and respectfully opposed to the idea. However, I think it may, at least, be worth road-testing the concept of a female Doctor in a one-off episode in which the Doctor inadvertently turns into a female for the duration of the episode. The way the Doctor, as a female, relates to his/her dumbfounded companions would be worth watching, although I think the idea might have worked better with Matt Smith’s Doctor (with the Ponds) than with Peter Capaldi’s: I can imagine Twelve turning into worse-than-everybody’s-aunt, played by Judi Dench or Maggie Smith.

Sex-change regeneration

There’s also the more academic matter of in what circumstances Time Lords can regenerate into the opposite sex. Personally, I’d rather that it not be established canonically that regeneration is completely random with regards to sex, and that Time Lords are equally likely to regenerate into the opposite sex as remain the same. That is, I don’t want it to be established that Time Lords, as one participant in such a debate amusingly put it, are a race of bisexual gender-fluid sequential hermaphrodites. That’s not because I’m a bigot, it just blatantly contradicts all history of portrayal of Time Lords on the programme, and would seem like a liberty taken with the canon for narrow political reasons, as a way of championing transsexualism.

The evidence is that one Time Lord, the Master, has regenerated into a woman after more than one regeneration cycle of being a man. All the other Time Lords we’ve seen have always regenerated into the same sex, with one offscreen exception (the Corsair). This doesn’t exactly suggest that regeneration is completely random with regard to sex. Furthermore, it hasn’t even been established that the Master’s latest female incarnation was the result of regeneration; given that the Master has a history of stealing bodies, and that his last body in The End of Time was basically an imperfectly reanimated corpse in a state of irreversible decay, it can’t be discounted, without further clarification, that Missy’s body was also stolen in the same way he stole the body of Tremas on Traken.

So sex-change regeneration is possible, but, until it is established otherwise, it can be assumed it is anomalous or unusual, rather than the norm. Personally I entertain three theories (which are not mutually exclusive) as to the circumstances in which Time Lords can regenerate into the opposite sex. The first is that same-sex regeneration is the norm, and that opposite-sex regeneration is a very rare, freak occurrence. The second is that, when Time Lords can control their regeneration (as Romana and the Master, and even the Doctor, it is implied, have been shown to be capable of doing), they can, if they have a sufficient degree of control, choose to regenerate into the opposite sex. As to why the Doctor’s regenerations have always (thus far) been random, I expect he either doesn’t know how (perhaps he snoozed through that class in the Academy), or doesn’t care enough, to control his regeneration. My third theory is that there needs to be an external influence on the regeneration to bring about a sex change, such as the potions the Sisterhood of Karn offered to the Eighth Doctor to control his regeneration. The three theories are not mutually exclusive, but the point is that sex-change regeneration at least seems to be unusual, and that some explanation is needed.

Susan should be the next companion

Susan Foreman, the Doctor’s granddaughter, was left by the First Doctor on Earth in the 22nd Century at the close of The Dalek Invasion of Earth, Susan having fallen in love with David Campbell, a London freedom fighter, during that serial. It was the Doctor’s first goodbye, and his goodbye to the only member of his family to travel with him. I think she should be brought back as the Doctor’s companion for series 9.

Just bear with me, here…

A brilliant idea came to me while I was laying awake at midnight pondering Doctor Who (as, I’m slightly ashamed to say, I do), a “master plan” for series 9. I suspect that the “searching-for-Gallifrey” plot will be explored to some extent in series 9 — to what extent, it’s hard to predict. However, what I would propose is for the searching-for-Gallifrey plot to constitute a strong story arc encompassing the whole of series 9, and ending in its resolution in the finale, in which the Doctor finally arrives at Gallifrey (but has some conflict to overcome there — a tyrant to overthrow? The threat of a renewed Time War? A terrible decision to make?). Such an arc would be similar to the Key to Time arc — the Doctor’s search for Gallifrey would take him all over the universe, all over time and space (I haven’t fleshed out the details). For one series, the Doctor would finally have a destination, a purpose to his travels.

Which is where the Doctor’s granddaughter comes in. Assuming, and it looks probable, that Clara Oswald doesn’t return in series 9, there would be a vacancy open on the TARDIS for the position of the Doctor’s best friend. Susan should take that role. If the Doctor is looking to find and restore the home planet of the Time Lords, surely a Time Lord is most appropriate to accompany and aid him in such an endeavour? He can’t conscript a human girl for what could potentially be a long, arduous and dangerous quest. He couldn’t burden a human with that. He either needs to go it alone, or team up with the only other Time Lord left in the universe. Besides, a “going-home” quest is inherently a family affair. It is only appropriate that the Doctor seeks the company and help of another Gallifreyan for an objective in which both have a deeply personal interest. More appropriate, still, that that other Gallifreyan is the Doctor’s own kith and kin. Susan would have as much an interest in finding her lost home again as the Doctor.

How could this turn of affairs be brought about? The Doctor could, upon resolving to find Gallifrey, decide to seek out his long-lost granddaughter to ask her to join him. The Doctor links up with the TARDIS telepathic interface, asking the TARDIS to take him to Susan.* The TARDIS materialises in 23rd Century London. The Doctor is eventually confronted with a familiar female figure. She peers at him unsurely, and poses a tentative question, “Grandfather?” She looks different: she has regenerated, and is older than when the Doctor saw her last, but he recognises her instantly as his Susan. “You came back,” she coos tearily, and they embrace. She explains that, although she and David lived a long and happy life together, David had died long ago, and that she has been living out a lonely existence on Earth ever since without contact with her family or the Time Lords. The Doctor explains the resolution he’s made to find Gallifrey. He asks Susan if she wants him to take her with him, take her back home. She agrees, admitting that there is nothing left for her on Earth.

The reason it should be Susan who accompanies the Doctor on his quest to find Gallifrey, rather than some other Time Lady (such as Romana), is the potential for character development for both the Doctor and Susan. The Twelfth Doctor has been presented in series 8 as being less dependable, less “user-friendly”, less attuned to his “human” side (so to speak); darker, meaner, morally ambiguous. That’s what 900 years’ spent on Trenzalore watching people he knew and loved continually die around him, while he, only, remained, did to him — it made him, in the most painful way possible, come to the realisation that he, the Last of the Time Lords, was “nobody’s boyfriend”. Here, now, is a chance for the Twelfth Doctor’s character to mellow. In being reunited with his granddaughter, the Doctor finally has someone to care for and someone whom he is finally allowed to love with all his being. Not just anyone, though, someone like him, a Time Lord who supposedly knows what it’s like to have buried loved ones and to be alone. Susan’s experience on Earth parallels the Doctor’s experience on Trenzalore. To have each other would be the best possible thing for them.

Moreover, returning Susan could present a further opportunity to develop Susan’s character. Susan was the archetypal Classic Who “cardboard cut-out” companion whose job was to look pretty, scream, ask questions and get rescued a lot. Carole Ann Ford herself apparently resented her character’s being portrayed in this way. “New Susan”, Susan 2.0, Susan 2000 (or whatever) will have aged and matured, have become self-reliant (perhaps a cause for tension with a paternalistic grandfather?), and will have generally have changed during her time on Earth, as well as having undergone personality change due to her regeneration, in any case. Here’s the opportunity to reimagine Susan as a modern companion, a strong and capable female lead character, dear but at the same time invaluable to her grandfather.

Other opportunities presented by the return of Susan could include delving deeper into the Doctor’s past and his other family. Could we meet, or at least be told about, the Doctor’s children, siblings, or, pray, his (first) wife? Could the writers pick up where Andrew Cartmel et al. left off in 1989?** The opportunity is there, if the writers are man enough to take it. A further opportunity for Doctor Who, in this idea in general, is to move the programme away from its very Earth-centric preoccupation, to get the Doctor out into the universe and move towards more hard science fiction. In this way, Susan would be the first non-human companion of the revived series.

I know there are reams of potential continuity problems with this idea. For example, I’ve completely ignored all of Susan’s history in the extended media (having consumed none of it). I’m relying on the production team’s ability to retcon at whim to avoid these tricky questions. The extended media is, after all, secondary to the television series, and not necessarily canon. If the extended media is to be taken as canon, I’m sure there is still nevertheless a way to somehow reunite Susan (wherever she is) with the Doctor. That said, the biggest problem with my master plan is the question of what happened to Susan in the Time War. The “Last of the Time Lords” mythology would seem to suggest Susan is not in the universe — she either perished in the Time War or was trapped along with all the other Time Lords in Gallifrey’s pocket universe. It is true enough that the Doctor seems to have made no effort to locate Susan after the Time War, which would imply she really is lost or dead. If that is so, I truly am stumped. Having said that, Susan’s fate is never explicitly stated. There may be a way yet for the Doctor to be with Susan. If nothing else, the Doctor could always discover that Susan had a son or daughter with David he never knew about, whom she left on Earth to protect from the Time War…

#bringbacksusan

* Alternatively, the Doctor could simply set the co-ordinates to 22nd or 23rd Century Earth. Dark Water seems to suggest that the TARDIS’ telepathic link, when employed to take a person to another with whom one’s timeline is “intertwined”, takes one to that person’s destination with respect to one’s own point in one’s relative timeline. So, if 2000-year old Doctor linked up to the telepathic interface and asked the TARDIS to take him to Susan, he may well meet up with 1800-year old Susan, or worse, Susan’s grave.

** Whether the writers adopt the Lungbarrow interpretation of the Doctor’s and Susan’s respective origins or retcon it is up to them.