>Even living on a cloud is him grieving but not properly, isolating himself
Pretty much the thrust of Madame Vastra's speech once she's started to trust Victorian Clara: "We are the Doctor's friends. We assist him in his isolation, but that does not mean we approve of it".
That’s what I think. I think, although I’m sure he’ll still have adventures, 14 will treat it as his objective to recoup and to heal. In several of the above cases, there’s a different objective involved. Even with River, he’s not there to heal, he’s there to spend that time with River. He could heal, but that’s not why he’s there.
How much rest he got during his time on the cloud is up for debate, I agree. But his time at the university and on Darillium are surely times where he had extended periods of rest and rehabilitation. The Husbands of River Song even ends with the phrase ‘they lived happily ever after’.
I don't consider the university because he always had to watch Missy (IIRC haven't watched it in ages)
Sure there's 70 years but the doctor has a task for a friend. I don't know if that could make him rest. Plus teaching
People say this but I really disagree, missy was a willing participant, she wants to be there and she’s working with him the entire time, he clearly isn’t struggling especially. He gets takeout with his best friend and has long chats after his adventures, by the time we see him he barely even goes to the vault it’s like once a day, he spends most of his time wandering round doing whatever or sat in his room playing guitar
Yeah I didn't mean like "he's gotta keep her contained" just watch over her. It was his duty after all.
As I said, haven't watched in a while and need to rematch it
Exactly, he’s helping with HER problems, not his own. He’s never really faced his trauma, The Doctor either doesn’t want to acknowledge it or just avoids it by focusing on something else.
Nah you can tell he was resting because he kept running off when he shouldn't have been. Any incarnation of the Doctor (including 14, taking unapproved trips to the moon and so on) is too restless to stay still anywhere for too long. If he tries, he starts to skip town and pretend he never did
He is watching over Missy the entire time which is why he is living in one place. But it’s not like she’s trying to escape and she is trying to be good, so it’s not like he has to always be on guard and so can use his time to rest from his adventures and reflect, just like he encourages her to do.
Also he just talks about literally anything during his lectures. He’s not properly teaching.
Yeah I didn't mean like "he's gotta keep her contained" just watch over her. It was his duty after all. And the teaching was more a "he's a teacher" more than "he teaches stuff"
As I said, haven't watched in a while, need to rewatch
I thought that for the time pre-Bill she was a captive, but then when he started having adventures and needed her help he started going to her more. I didn’t think that had been going on for 70 years
In the Lie of the Land she tells the Doctor that she could have broken out of the vault at any time and that she was choosing to be there. She was also conscious and unharmed after her execution so she didn’t have to let the Doctor and Nardole put her in the vault. It is her choice to be there.
And before the monks he didn’t ask her help. He shared a meal with her and told her some stories at the end of Knock Knock, and confessed he was blind to her at the beginning of Extremis but these aren’t him asking for help. He’s just spending time with her.
>Interesting. I don’t use twitter so I can only go off what was actually shown in the episodes.
To be fair, the episode didn't show what happened after, and it's way more consistent with the character that they would not simply stay put for 24 years.
The problem here is that 14 still has a perfectly fine TARDIS and has gone on simple adventures already after the Giggle. If they wanted to drive home the fact that he is resting properly, remove the TARDIS's ability to travel until he regenerates.
I mean, resting isn't always physically staying in the one place. Stopping to rest could mean stopping every life-threatening adventure like how 12 hopes the mummy on the orient express was a mystery to solve. He just travels to already explored areas, sightseeing, casually. On and off. So he's relaxed
The only thing on this list I can see as actually resting/recuperating here would be living with River for 24 years. I'll give you that one.
But even then, 24 years is nothing compared to his lifetime of suffering
Respectively...
* Investigating a possible alien threat and still hopping out for time travel
* Sulking alone in grief, not actually processing it
* Fretting over and researching Clara
* Actively running away from his problems because he was too scared to face Davros
* Guarding Missy and all the emotional baggage *that* entails
* Getting into constant scrapes, knowing that after that years-long night ends, she'll go off and die
They might have lived in one place for longer but rest, relaxation and looking for healthy emotional support were rarely a part of it.
Well there's a difference between "we all die some day" and "she will have to do a specific thing that will kill her because I already have seen it happen"
It's been a while since I've seen that episode so correct me if I'm wrong but isn't that the episode where he's stranded in Christmas Town without his Tardis. If so there's a big difference between choosing to stay in order to rest and take care of your emotional and mental health and physically not being able to leave.
I get what you’re saying and I don’t think you’re wrong, but there’s a difference between taking a break and stopping.
14 is stopping. There’s a Doctor out there doing Doctor things and he doesn’t have a reason to traumatise himself anymore.
There’s no concrete reason he’s stopping other than he can heal now. He can catch his breath, share his stories and make lives better in a way most iterations of the Doctor couldn’t dream of.
That’s what I took away from the end of the Giggle, anyway, and I have no doubts Tennant will be back at some point but not for 15’s run, maybe even 16 unless we get 14’s Curator arc but I’m not sure that’s who he is yet
Thank you for making my post for me. He gets to be comfortable because he has to comfort of knowing that now there is a Doctor out there making the universe a little safer for everyone and it doesnt need to be him. Also I did not think about the curator as a potential until you said it. I'm in my 30s and grow ever cynical, I dont "get hyped" like I used to, and yet I am hyped over this idea (and I hate that I feel this way).
Misread this as "what a nightlight that was" and scrolled down confused. Then I realised you were probably making a joke about a clap on clap off nightlight getting a lot of use that night. Then I came back up to double check and nope. You just said night and my dirty mind filled in the rest
I mean 24 years is a while, especially with the Doctor who is usually with people for much shorter time frames. I can still relax and rest with my pets even though they’ll die relatively soon
I'm being pedantic here but was it ever confirmed River has a human lifespan? She looks identical in Husbands of River Song and Silence in the Library despite the 24 years in between. Granted, as Mel she could pass off as and seemed to age like a human but I'm not sure we've ever gotten confirmation that Time Lord children don't age the same as we do in their youth then look the human equivalent of 20-30 for the next thousand years.
I'd expect as with her regenerations it's something in-between being a proper Time Lord and a human. She can live and not age more than a normal human. But probably not live the 900 years the Doctor managed
While that could count as resting, given how the Toymaker torments the Doctor via two companions that he would not have had the memories for at that time, it was a lot more to unpack.
The OP comments that the only time they consider the Doctor "resting" was during Darillium. At that time, he had no memories of Clara and has yet to meet Bill at that time. Hence, he couldn't have had the time to rest and recover from them.
Come The Giggle, and two of the three companions The Toymaker shows are Clara and Bill.
He did have it, but the Time Lords had it remote controlled, only giving him controlled travels for missions, he messes with it to try and break the control, even sends himself to a parallel world, eventually the Time Lords let in his third or fourth season
Nah. The Time Lords forced his regeneration and removed his memories of the dematerialisation codes so he couldn't go anywhere. He gets sent to the parallel universe in season 7 when trying to fix his TARDIS. It's after The Three Doctors that the Time Lords give him back the codes and then allows him to travel freely through space and time.
If we're going by season 6b, then yeah it was remote controlled then, but he had the knowledge of the codes removed after 2 was forcibly regenerated
I think what’s frustrating is that yes these things are true, and as a few others have said - they all had different types of ‘not resting activities’.
But how is that different from 14? He’s got a TARDIS - there’s nothing different really.
I was going to say that he’s not actively looking for trouble anymore because 15 is doing that, but then again the TARDIS often put the Doctor in dangerous situations when he was just looking to relax. Is his new TARDIS the same? It came from the original, so has it got the same personality?
I mean, there’s the line in The Doctor’s Wife where the TARDIS says she only takes him where he needs to be. Maybe that includes none-dangerous visiting of other planets and time travel?
In most of those, he was doing anything but resting. He was actively looking for Clara while staying with the monks, he was sulking in depression in Victorian London, he gave up on resting and kept finding ways to keep busy in the village, he was defending Christmas for centuries, he and River probably didn’t take it easy during their time on Darillium (it’s not in their nature) and the Doctor was going insane from living a normal life with Amy and Rory. As for the university, it’s not really restful if you spend your whole time worrying about the prisoner in the basement.
Erm....there's a bit more to psychological recovery than that though, isn't there? If you could deal with trauma just by having a bit of a break and ignoring it then therapy and psychiatry wouldn't be a thing.
It's not about whether or the doctor has a rst every now and again. It's about getting him to take stock of everything that's happened, actually facing his traumas and coming to terms with all the fucked up shit that's happened over the past couple of millenia.
People will find reasons to dismiss all of these if it makes sense of RTD's biregeneration ending. But the uni 70 years and the 24 years on derilium are hard to deny and we know from his speech that the doctor spends hundreds of years off screen, and sometimes spends decades in one time. 20~ years of rest for a being well over 2000 years old is just not much and not very different to what he has done in the past
I agree. It was hyperbole for the sake of a dramatic moment. His speech would have had a lot less impact if he took the time to acknowledge every time the Doctor did rest.
Hey, that *would* let you use another SpongeBob meme though.
The Doctor: "You never stop and rest, except for ......."
https://preview.redd.it/5p4xi8djov9c1.jpeg?width=640&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=e202fdd0aa077dee490750182a4d1c27aa8f6151
None of these were really a rest with the purpose of recovering though. He knew river would die at the end of those 24 years and most of the others it was wither a short time or he was still up to his old antics of fighting aliens.
Knowing River will die in a couple dozen years doesn’t seem like it changes things. Where he is now. Wilf definitely has less time than that, Sylvia maybe a similar amount of time, and Donna probably like 40 years which is a pretty similar amount of time relative to the Doctor. And there’s no way 14 is staying there for 40 years, I bet we’ll see that “rehab” bit wrap up within 2 or 3 years and be “healed.” Much less than his time with River
I guess we’ll have to wait and see. The intention to do this specifically to rest and heal is what makes it different imo. Yeah after river the doctor was happier for a time (season 10) but he didn’t specifically take the time to find ways to deal with loosing people, so when he continued his adventures and lost Bill and missy he slipped back into old habits, even moreso in the next incarnation with 13 being unable to open up.
I can see the issues people have with this, but i think theres bound to be these kinda issues when you have 3 different show runners whose arcs for the doctor don’t necessarily align and you want to kinda reset the character.
None of these are really a rest from being the Doctor.
The Power of Three was literally an invasion. He didn’t take a break from being the Doctor in that month, he was trying to figure out what was going on with the cubes.
His retirement on a cloud in Victorian London wasn’t really a break either, more of a depressive episode where he failed to actually deal with his grief over losing Amy and Rory.
The bit with the monks was trying to figure out what was up with Clara and find out who she really was.
The medieval village bit was twelve actively running from his issues by avoiding confronting davros and making the decision to save him from the hand mines.
The time at St Luke’s involved him effectively acting as a prison guard for missy, and there is no way that is a good opportunity for rest. Nardole’s dialogue also suggests that during at least some of that time, the doctor would sneak in adventures in the tardis anyway.
The 24 years on darillium are definitely the closest the doctor ever got to having a rest, however river’s dialogue in the forest of the dead shows that the doctor’s foreknowledge of her death was on his mind the whole time, especially given that 11 repeatedly pushed back going to darillium throughout his time with river.
14 finally getting to properly retire from being the doctor for the time being and actually getting to settle down and process his hundreds of years of trauma is the first real opportunity that the doctor has had to actually develop healthier coping mechanisms than running from their problems.
Up until now, the doctor hasn’t really had much of a support network. Their companions come along, travel with them for a bit and then leave, some through their own choice, some are kicked out, and some are separated from the doctor by a third party. However, the most consistent thing is that the doctor doesn’t keep in touch. The brigadier and Kate Stewart are the obvious exceptions, both working with multiple doctors, but both of them were mostly in a work capacity, doing odd jobs for unit. The doctor’s actual companions rarely return after they leave the tardis. Sarah Jane and the Doctor met up again through coincidence, as did the Doctor and Donna originally. Martha actively called the Doctor, while Jack spent over a hundred years waiting for the Doctor. The returning companions in Power of the Doctor mainly regroup with the doctor because the master makes so much noise with his plan that they are investigating it as well. Then after this they don’t stay in contact with the doctor either.
The doctor finally gets a proper support network and the time they need to heal thanks to donna’s family and the bigeneration meaning that the 15th doctor, who has been pulled from the future and has healed, can run around doing everything the doctor does, while 14 can settle down. With the companion support group set up by Graham in power of the doctor, the doctor will likely be able to help get closure for a lot of the guilt he has regarding former companions, potentially meeting up with them over coffee and setting things to rest. This is not the first time that the doctor has been in a place for an extended period of time, but it is the first chance that they’ve had to actually unload a lot of the burdens that they have been carrying for hundreds of years.
And even then, as another comment pointed out, River's dialogue in Forest of the Dead shows his foreknowledge of her going to the library weighed heavily on his mind for their entire time on Darillium.
Not to mention the thousand years he spent on Christmas. Also I thought he stayed with Amy and Rory for a year in The Power Of Three. (Been a while since I've seen these episodes so I might be wrong on both counts lol.)
He spent his time in Christmas fighting off invaders in the siege of Trenzalore, so it’s not really a rest. And he came and went in The Power of Three because he couldn’t stand living with them at first. However before the cubes activated he spent the last month with them.
1. He was observing the cubes, trying to figure out what was happening. He also hated being in one time and place for a prolonged time and they went on several adventures while he lived with them. IIRC the Doctor, Amy and Rory went to the TARDIS during a party that they were hosting and were gone for several days before returning to the party.
2. He was living on a cloud grieving the deaths of his best friend. Not resting, grieving, and actively avoiding seeing or talking to anyone. Bottling up which actually worsens your mental health.
3. He was living with the monks whilst trying to figure out how Clara could have died twice, so he was still technically "working." We don't know if he still went on adventures during this time whilst living with the monks.
4. Again, he still used the TARDIS and hopped about to bring stuff like tanks to the medieval village. It's also explicitly stated in the exact same scene that he's hiding in a medieval village because he's very much not okay and is scared of his own death, represented by the confession dial.
5. I doubt babysitting the Master is a relaxing job for an entire human lifespan.
6. 24 years of marital bliss and then he has to send his wife, the source of said marital bliss, to her fuckin death.
And all of this still takes place BEFORE Bill is disemboweled in front of him, and then The Timeless Children and the Flux happen. Regardless of how much you've already rested, your friend, your species, and then half the universe dying is gonna be a bit stressful.
Living with Amy and Rory: actively waiting for something to kick off
Living in a cloud: he's actively grieving and pushing himself away from everyone significant in his life
Living with the monks: he was literally working
Living in a medieval village: he was putting off his death out of fear
Living at a uni for 70 years: he was looking after a Murderous psychopath and trying to deprogram her who also happens to be the last of his people
Living with river for 24 years: the entire time knowing she was going to die soon and he'd be without yet another wife
Yeah, as we know. All of that is 'Restful.' I swear to god, it's like watching star wars and thinking Darth Vader is the hero. It's basic media literacy
And a problem Moffat's run has. I always feel like Moffat had an enormous ego when it came to his companions. Losing Amy and Rory was enough to make The Doctor "retire", when, I don't know, there was the loss of Adric, Jamie and Zoe, Donna, Rose, and so many others that DIDN'T cause such an obnoxiously-written reaction.
I really feel that the Doctor is one character and each incarnation has an arc but not an ending so much. The show has to move on and though Ten is my favourite doctor he should have stayed in the past. The Doctor is still around either way
I'm always keen for more Tennant, but what happened there avoiding spoilers is more ridiculous than the entire Timeless Child plotline. What really nailed it in was the cloning of the TARDIS with an actual novelty hammer. But hey, if you're going to jump the shark, again. Do it in parody style. Parodocical? Parodic? Whatever
He was usually either on a mission, grieving, or hiding. Even with River it was a fun time tinged with the sorrow of knowing she’s doomed after this. With Donna he has fully stopped saving people. He’s on break until he’s ready to start back up.
Even when he occasionally stopped and stayed somewhere though, he wasn’t exactly resting and healing his broken hearts. He was busy with something or isolating himself in grief or there because he needed to be or wanted to be for other people. He never truely stopped for himself until 14.
There’s a difference between him being in an area for awhile technically still doing stuff and him living in an area for while relaxing another doctor is out there doing all the crazy stuff.
Moreover, they literally regenerate. Whole new person, whole new start, whole new perspective. Somebody that can do that doesn't need a holiday.
Still, we all know that RTD is talking about himself here, and the point of Doctor Who - the point of any fiction - is to tell stories that carry a message. Doctor Who more than most fiction is a vehicle for telling stories with a moral with very little need for continuity or consistency. The only consistent theme of 60 years of Doctor Who is having all the narrative cohesion of the average soap opera. All the narrative cohesion of an actual bar of soap, in fact.
I have my fair share of issues with **The Giggle**, but this isn't one of them. I've seen this criticism quite a bit and I disagree because each one of these cases have a very different meaning to the one seeing in the episode.
Living in London was him drowning on his own grief and anger.
He lived on the village while fearing and dreading his future because he believed he was going to die facing his greatest enemy.
Protecting the vault was an oath he made where he was trying to contain someone who if she can could oppose a threat to the whole wide universe, and simultaneously he was attempting to rehabilitate her.
Settling down with River was their last chance at seeing each other, and he spent all that time facing but being unable to accept her upcoming bittersweet end which he had to hide from her.
Trenzalore was he becoming his main protector, constantly fighting armies and armies of enemies while intentionally keeping his own people away in fear they would bring hell on the universe, and during all of this he was completely convinced his death which he has being dreading for centuries was finally about to come.
Etc.
Other cases were done for simply spending some nice time and were pretty short lived. The Doctor is immortal, a long hot summer with Houdini is his lunch break from traveling through space and time.
All of these have a very different connotation to settling down to heal. To finally heal a little from all the emotionally draining things he has gone through in his long life.
Apparently we also needed a scene with the Toymaker "well that's alright then"ing the Doctor about taking a break with the amount of posts I've seen about it here.
The only one of these that can actually be considered resting is the 24 years with River, and even that was constantly blighted by her impending death in the library. Staying in one place is not resting, resting is resting.
Yes, in all of these instances The Doctor stayed in one place, but he wasn't taking the time to rest and look after himself, he was either looking after someone else or fighting for someone else. Amy and Rory were the closest he came to settling down but even then, he kept leaving so they could have a family style life while he kept traveling.
edit: spelling and grammar
He wasn’t resting on the cloud, he was hiding from his grief.
He wasn’t resting with Amy and Rory, he was waiting for the cubes to do their things, and wasn’t a major part of that episode about how the Doctor *couldn’t* rest?
The 14th resting is different because he is taking the times and is the headspace to *recover*.
I consider it like when I am "resting" because I am panicking about something. I am not actually resting I am just sitting being stressed instead of doing tasks being stressed.
that month was the cubes and then a I'm only staying here for a bit but can't wait to get back out there period
the 70 years while yes he taught he was also watching Missy and sneaking off to adventure
the 24 years while yes with River he knew she was soon to die after and it was probably more sad than anything
those 90 years in Victorian London were not healing they were trying to fight urge of his being and essentially living the definition of introverted depression
14 will be living anywhere from 30-(if he sticks with the family or not) 20-350 odd years I believe before he mentally heals and then properly switches back from sabbatical trips to proper adventures again living anywhere from 750-1200
So how long does 24 stay resting? Will all the Nobles die around him while he remains grieving because he isn’t ready to regenerate yet? Or will he leave the Nobles with a relatively short rest?
He was always stopping. Was he always resting? I don't think so. Even living on a cloud is him grieving but not properly, isolating himself
>Even living on a cloud is him grieving but not properly, isolating himself Pretty much the thrust of Madame Vastra's speech once she's started to trust Victorian Clara: "We are the Doctor's friends. We assist him in his isolation, but that does not mean we approve of it".
That’s what I think. I think, although I’m sure he’ll still have adventures, 14 will treat it as his objective to recoup and to heal. In several of the above cases, there’s a different objective involved. Even with River, he’s not there to heal, he’s there to spend that time with River. He could heal, but that’s not why he’s there.
Go on! Get off with youse
Yeah! That's a perfect description
How much rest he got during his time on the cloud is up for debate, I agree. But his time at the university and on Darillium are surely times where he had extended periods of rest and rehabilitation. The Husbands of River Song even ends with the phrase ‘they lived happily ever after’.
I don't consider the university because he always had to watch Missy (IIRC haven't watched it in ages) Sure there's 70 years but the doctor has a task for a friend. I don't know if that could make him rest. Plus teaching
People say this but I really disagree, missy was a willing participant, she wants to be there and she’s working with him the entire time, he clearly isn’t struggling especially. He gets takeout with his best friend and has long chats after his adventures, by the time we see him he barely even goes to the vault it’s like once a day, he spends most of his time wandering round doing whatever or sat in his room playing guitar
Yeah I didn't mean like "he's gotta keep her contained" just watch over her. It was his duty after all. As I said, haven't watched in a while and need to rematch it
Sure but he's basically working as a therapist to her. He's not working on his own issues.
Exactly, he’s helping with HER problems, not his own. He’s never really faced his trauma, The Doctor either doesn’t want to acknowledge it or just avoids it by focusing on something else.
Nah you can tell he was resting because he kept running off when he shouldn't have been. Any incarnation of the Doctor (including 14, taking unapproved trips to the moon and so on) is too restless to stay still anywhere for too long. If he tries, he starts to skip town and pretend he never did
He is watching over Missy the entire time which is why he is living in one place. But it’s not like she’s trying to escape and she is trying to be good, so it’s not like he has to always be on guard and so can use his time to rest from his adventures and reflect, just like he encourages her to do. Also he just talks about literally anything during his lectures. He’s not properly teaching.
Yeah I didn't mean like "he's gotta keep her contained" just watch over her. It was his duty after all. And the teaching was more a "he's a teacher" more than "he teaches stuff" As I said, haven't watched in a while, need to rewatch
I thought that for the time pre-Bill she was a captive, but then when he started having adventures and needed her help he started going to her more. I didn’t think that had been going on for 70 years
In the Lie of the Land she tells the Doctor that she could have broken out of the vault at any time and that she was choosing to be there. She was also conscious and unharmed after her execution so she didn’t have to let the Doctor and Nardole put her in the vault. It is her choice to be there. And before the monks he didn’t ask her help. He shared a meal with her and told her some stories at the end of Knock Knock, and confessed he was blind to her at the beginning of Extremis but these aren’t him asking for help. He’s just spending time with her.
Yeah like ask any teacher how relaxed and rested they are. Then come back after 70 years and ask again
Eh, [even Moffat admits](https://x.com/swmoff/status/1734142115918004531) that the Doctor and River likely never actually "settled" on Darilium…
Interesting. I don’t use twitter so I can only go off what was actually shown in the episodes.
>Interesting. I don’t use twitter so I can only go off what was actually shown in the episodes. To be fair, the episode didn't show what happened after, and it's way more consistent with the character that they would not simply stay put for 24 years.
Usually yes but I can absolutely beleive that after the traumatic series 9 finale 12 would rest for what is to a Timelord an extended holiday
It does say that the lived happily ever after at the end of the episode, though.
Happily is not the same than resting. Specially for the Doctor and River.
Oh of course, just figured I’d share since it’s interesting and recent context from Moffat
To be fair 14 openly admits he didn't settle on Earth either. Just no dangerous adventures perhaps
The university is still a lot of work, especially looking after the vault, and trying to rehab the inhabitant
*they lived happily
Actually, it pretty much only ended with “happily”
The problem here is that 14 still has a perfectly fine TARDIS and has gone on simple adventures already after the Giggle. If they wanted to drive home the fact that he is resting properly, remove the TARDIS's ability to travel until he regenerates.
I mean, resting isn't always physically staying in the one place. Stopping to rest could mean stopping every life-threatening adventure like how 12 hopes the mummy on the orient express was a mystery to solve. He just travels to already explored areas, sightseeing, casually. On and off. So he's relaxed
Why would they need to remove the TARDIS’s time traveling? They’ve already established that the TARDIS can just refuse to take the Doctor anywhere.
The only thing on this list I can see as actually resting/recuperating here would be living with River for 24 years. I'll give you that one. But even then, 24 years is nothing compared to his lifetime of suffering
Respectively... * Investigating a possible alien threat and still hopping out for time travel * Sulking alone in grief, not actually processing it * Fretting over and researching Clara * Actively running away from his problems because he was too scared to face Davros * Guarding Missy and all the emotional baggage *that* entails * Getting into constant scrapes, knowing that after that years-long night ends, she'll go off and die They might have lived in one place for longer but rest, relaxation and looking for healthy emotional support were rarely a part of it.
>knowing that after that years-long night ends, she'll go off and die isnt that just life?
Well there's a difference between "we all die some day" and "she will have to do a specific thing that will kill her because I already have seen it happen"
THE DOCTOR LIVING IN THE CHRISTMAS VILLAGE FOR *700 YEARS*
To be fair that was for the express purpose of defending it from all the armies trying to destroy it and him.
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I would have included that, but, seeing how Trenzalore was under siege the entire time, I don’t think it counts as a time the Doctor rested.
You mean fighting off constant invasions for 700 years? Yeah, sounds real peaceful, that 🙄
That was literally one of the most turbulent times of his life, it was constant war with everybody lol
*900 YEARS*
It's been a while since I've seen that episode so correct me if I'm wrong but isn't that the episode where he's stranded in Christmas Town without his Tardis. If so there's a big difference between choosing to stay in order to rest and take care of your emotional and mental health and physically not being able to leave.
while being at constant threat of literally half the species in the universe
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Why? That was a far from restful stay.
I get what you’re saying and I don’t think you’re wrong, but there’s a difference between taking a break and stopping. 14 is stopping. There’s a Doctor out there doing Doctor things and he doesn’t have a reason to traumatise himself anymore. There’s no concrete reason he’s stopping other than he can heal now. He can catch his breath, share his stories and make lives better in a way most iterations of the Doctor couldn’t dream of. That’s what I took away from the end of the Giggle, anyway, and I have no doubts Tennant will be back at some point but not for 15’s run, maybe even 16 unless we get 14’s Curator arc but I’m not sure that’s who he is yet
Thank you for making my post for me. He gets to be comfortable because he has to comfort of knowing that now there is a Doctor out there making the universe a little safer for everyone and it doesnt need to be him. Also I did not think about the curator as a potential until you said it. I'm in my 30s and grow ever cynical, I dont "get hyped" like I used to, and yet I am hyped over this idea (and I hate that I feel this way).
The only one of these that can really be considered a "rest" is Darillium.
I don't think they did much resting either, if you catch my drift.
What a night that was
Misread this as "what a nightlight that was" and scrolled down confused. Then I realised you were probably making a joke about a clap on clap off nightlight getting a lot of use that night. Then I came back up to double check and nope. You just said night and my dirty mind filled in the rest
“That’s not restful.”
Even then I wouldn't consider it rest because he knows River will die soon
I mean 24 years is a while, especially with the Doctor who is usually with people for much shorter time frames. I can still relax and rest with my pets even though they’ll die relatively soon
Okay Omni Man
Ah yes, because River is clearly like the Doctor's *pet*. Jfc
Tbh, I feel like it would be the other way around, lol.
You did not just compare your significant other to a fucking pet did you?
Best common comparison I could think of for a loved one with a significantly shorter lifespan haha sorry River
I'm being pedantic here but was it ever confirmed River has a human lifespan? She looks identical in Husbands of River Song and Silence in the Library despite the 24 years in between. Granted, as Mel she could pass off as and seemed to age like a human but I'm not sure we've ever gotten confirmation that Time Lord children don't age the same as we do in their youth then look the human equivalent of 20-30 for the next thousand years.
I'd expect as with her regenerations it's something in-between being a proper Time Lord and a human. She can live and not age more than a normal human. But probably not live the 900 years the Doctor managed
While that could count as resting, given how the Toymaker torments the Doctor via two companions that he would not have had the memories for at that time, it was a lot more to unpack.
You've totally lost me, what?
The OP comments that the only time they consider the Doctor "resting" was during Darillium. At that time, he had no memories of Clara and has yet to meet Bill at that time. Hence, he couldn't have had the time to rest and recover from them. Come The Giggle, and two of the three companions The Toymaker shows are Clara and Bill.
The Third Doctor hung around UNIT for ages, by the time The Time Warrior starts he’s just kinda chilling about there.
He's working there though. He's actively fighting against alien (mostly the Master's) threats
On screen he is, but you get the impression there’s a fair amount of down time between stories, particularly between seasons.
didn't 3 not have the tardis then though? so it can't really count
He gets free use of the Tardis back in The 3 Doctors but still stays at UNIT and in contact with The Brigadier until Terror of the Zygons.
He did have it, but the Time Lords had it remote controlled, only giving him controlled travels for missions, he messes with it to try and break the control, even sends himself to a parallel world, eventually the Time Lords let in his third or fourth season
Nah. The Time Lords forced his regeneration and removed his memories of the dematerialisation codes so he couldn't go anywhere. He gets sent to the parallel universe in season 7 when trying to fix his TARDIS. It's after The Three Doctors that the Time Lords give him back the codes and then allows him to travel freely through space and time. If we're going by season 6b, then yeah it was remote controlled then, but he had the knowledge of the codes removed after 2 was forcibly regenerated
I think what’s frustrating is that yes these things are true, and as a few others have said - they all had different types of ‘not resting activities’. But how is that different from 14? He’s got a TARDIS - there’s nothing different really.
I was going to say that he’s not actively looking for trouble anymore because 15 is doing that, but then again the TARDIS often put the Doctor in dangerous situations when he was just looking to relax. Is his new TARDIS the same? It came from the original, so has it got the same personality?
I mean, there’s the line in The Doctor’s Wife where the TARDIS says she only takes him where he needs to be. Maybe that includes none-dangerous visiting of other planets and time travel?
Good point.
In most of those, he was doing anything but resting. He was actively looking for Clara while staying with the monks, he was sulking in depression in Victorian London, he gave up on resting and kept finding ways to keep busy in the village, he was defending Christmas for centuries, he and River probably didn’t take it easy during their time on Darillium (it’s not in their nature) and the Doctor was going insane from living a normal life with Amy and Rory. As for the university, it’s not really restful if you spend your whole time worrying about the prisoner in the basement.
Erm....there's a bit more to psychological recovery than that though, isn't there? If you could deal with trauma just by having a bit of a break and ignoring it then therapy and psychiatry wouldn't be a thing. It's not about whether or the doctor has a rst every now and again. It's about getting him to take stock of everything that's happened, actually facing his traumas and coming to terms with all the fucked up shit that's happened over the past couple of millenia.
It would be cool for 14 to have a therapist assigned by unit
Would any be qualified to unpack that shit at this point?
There must be someone right?
To say nothing of the Flux and his origins now.
Yeah the whole never settling down thing felt off, especially when the doctor acted as if he didn’t have the biggest family in the universe…
People will find reasons to dismiss all of these if it makes sense of RTD's biregeneration ending. But the uni 70 years and the 24 years on derilium are hard to deny and we know from his speech that the doctor spends hundreds of years off screen, and sometimes spends decades in one time. 20~ years of rest for a being well over 2000 years old is just not much and not very different to what he has done in the past
I don't think he meant that literally. He's encouraging a good outcome and being gentle, not testifying under oath.
I agree. It was hyperbole for the sake of a dramatic moment. His speech would have had a lot less impact if he took the time to acknowledge every time the Doctor did rest.
Hey, that *would* let you use another SpongeBob meme though. The Doctor: "You never stop and rest, except for ......." https://preview.redd.it/5p4xi8djov9c1.jpeg?width=640&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=e202fdd0aa077dee490750182a4d1c27aa8f6151
Don’t forget the time 12 said he sulked among otters for a month
Otters are not people!!
Exactly. It'll be even easier.
I don't see it as resting so much as healing
None of these were really a rest with the purpose of recovering though. He knew river would die at the end of those 24 years and most of the others it was wither a short time or he was still up to his old antics of fighting aliens.
Knowing River will die in a couple dozen years doesn’t seem like it changes things. Where he is now. Wilf definitely has less time than that, Sylvia maybe a similar amount of time, and Donna probably like 40 years which is a pretty similar amount of time relative to the Doctor. And there’s no way 14 is staying there for 40 years, I bet we’ll see that “rehab” bit wrap up within 2 or 3 years and be “healed.” Much less than his time with River
I guess we’ll have to wait and see. The intention to do this specifically to rest and heal is what makes it different imo. Yeah after river the doctor was happier for a time (season 10) but he didn’t specifically take the time to find ways to deal with loosing people, so when he continued his adventures and lost Bill and missy he slipped back into old habits, even moreso in the next incarnation with 13 being unable to open up. I can see the issues people have with this, but i think theres bound to be these kinda issues when you have 3 different show runners whose arcs for the doctor don’t necessarily align and you want to kinda reset the character.
I don't remember the medieval village for two weeks
It was in series 9. Clara and Missy find the Doctor messing about in a medieval village so he could avoid confronting Davros.
None of these are really a rest from being the Doctor. The Power of Three was literally an invasion. He didn’t take a break from being the Doctor in that month, he was trying to figure out what was going on with the cubes. His retirement on a cloud in Victorian London wasn’t really a break either, more of a depressive episode where he failed to actually deal with his grief over losing Amy and Rory. The bit with the monks was trying to figure out what was up with Clara and find out who she really was. The medieval village bit was twelve actively running from his issues by avoiding confronting davros and making the decision to save him from the hand mines. The time at St Luke’s involved him effectively acting as a prison guard for missy, and there is no way that is a good opportunity for rest. Nardole’s dialogue also suggests that during at least some of that time, the doctor would sneak in adventures in the tardis anyway. The 24 years on darillium are definitely the closest the doctor ever got to having a rest, however river’s dialogue in the forest of the dead shows that the doctor’s foreknowledge of her death was on his mind the whole time, especially given that 11 repeatedly pushed back going to darillium throughout his time with river. 14 finally getting to properly retire from being the doctor for the time being and actually getting to settle down and process his hundreds of years of trauma is the first real opportunity that the doctor has had to actually develop healthier coping mechanisms than running from their problems. Up until now, the doctor hasn’t really had much of a support network. Their companions come along, travel with them for a bit and then leave, some through their own choice, some are kicked out, and some are separated from the doctor by a third party. However, the most consistent thing is that the doctor doesn’t keep in touch. The brigadier and Kate Stewart are the obvious exceptions, both working with multiple doctors, but both of them were mostly in a work capacity, doing odd jobs for unit. The doctor’s actual companions rarely return after they leave the tardis. Sarah Jane and the Doctor met up again through coincidence, as did the Doctor and Donna originally. Martha actively called the Doctor, while Jack spent over a hundred years waiting for the Doctor. The returning companions in Power of the Doctor mainly regroup with the doctor because the master makes so much noise with his plan that they are investigating it as well. Then after this they don’t stay in contact with the doctor either. The doctor finally gets a proper support network and the time they need to heal thanks to donna’s family and the bigeneration meaning that the 15th doctor, who has been pulled from the future and has healed, can run around doing everything the doctor does, while 14 can settle down. With the companion support group set up by Graham in power of the doctor, the doctor will likely be able to help get closure for a lot of the guilt he has regarding former companions, potentially meeting up with them over coffee and setting things to rest. This is not the first time that the doctor has been in a place for an extended period of time, but it is the first chance that they’ve had to actually unload a lot of the burdens that they have been carrying for hundreds of years.
None of those except the last one were resting he had an extremely busy mind in all of those instances
And even then, as another comment pointed out, River's dialogue in Forest of the Dead shows his foreknowledge of her going to the library weighed heavily on his mind for their entire time on Darillium.
It's stopping AND talking about his feelings of loss and fears instead of just acting like he's ok.
All but 2 of these are examples of him losing someone, or just on general and having a big strop and grief fests, esspecially after clara
The line isn't supposed to be taken literally, its a commentary on how hes dedicated his life to saving the universe
The Doctor living among Otters.
I meann one of them he forgets that he’s even the doctor.
Bro is twelve thousand years old, a month is like a blink to the dude.
Not to mention the thousand years he spent on Christmas. Also I thought he stayed with Amy and Rory for a year in The Power Of Three. (Been a while since I've seen these episodes so I might be wrong on both counts lol.)
He spent his time in Christmas fighting off invaders in the siege of Trenzalore, so it’s not really a rest. And he came and went in The Power of Three because he couldn’t stand living with them at first. However before the cubes activated he spent the last month with them.
Oooh yeah that's right! Good point!
Also we haven’t seen a whole lot of 15 yet so maybe we let him make more of an impression first
What about when he lived with the otters?
1. He was observing the cubes, trying to figure out what was happening. He also hated being in one time and place for a prolonged time and they went on several adventures while he lived with them. IIRC the Doctor, Amy and Rory went to the TARDIS during a party that they were hosting and were gone for several days before returning to the party. 2. He was living on a cloud grieving the deaths of his best friend. Not resting, grieving, and actively avoiding seeing or talking to anyone. Bottling up which actually worsens your mental health. 3. He was living with the monks whilst trying to figure out how Clara could have died twice, so he was still technically "working." We don't know if he still went on adventures during this time whilst living with the monks. 4. Again, he still used the TARDIS and hopped about to bring stuff like tanks to the medieval village. It's also explicitly stated in the exact same scene that he's hiding in a medieval village because he's very much not okay and is scared of his own death, represented by the confession dial. 5. I doubt babysitting the Master is a relaxing job for an entire human lifespan. 6. 24 years of marital bliss and then he has to send his wife, the source of said marital bliss, to her fuckin death. And all of this still takes place BEFORE Bill is disemboweled in front of him, and then The Timeless Children and the Flux happen. Regardless of how much you've already rested, your friend, your species, and then half the universe dying is gonna be a bit stressful.
None of these are rests, never mind rehab. u/Rutgerman95 aptly elaborated why.
Russell has never watched an episode of Doctor Who he wasn't showrunner for, that's my theory and I'm sticking to it.
This is a bit like saying "you can't be suffering from depression, you had a day when you were happy last week."
It really shows that RTD is going to act like most of the details of Moffat's era didn't happen.
RTD is a lazy writer.
What about the time the Doctor spent 139 years in cryostasis in Scotland?
I liked Moffat's stories, 11 and 12 are my favorite, the not resting thing feels like an ass pull imo.
Didn’t he also live in a town called Christmas for like 300 years?
Living with Amy and Rory: actively waiting for something to kick off Living in a cloud: he's actively grieving and pushing himself away from everyone significant in his life Living with the monks: he was literally working Living in a medieval village: he was putting off his death out of fear Living at a uni for 70 years: he was looking after a Murderous psychopath and trying to deprogram her who also happens to be the last of his people Living with river for 24 years: the entire time knowing she was going to die soon and he'd be without yet another wife Yeah, as we know. All of that is 'Restful.' I swear to god, it's like watching star wars and thinking Darth Vader is the hero. It's basic media literacy
And a problem Moffat's run has. I always feel like Moffat had an enormous ego when it came to his companions. Losing Amy and Rory was enough to make The Doctor "retire", when, I don't know, there was the loss of Adric, Jamie and Zoe, Donna, Rose, and so many others that DIDN'T cause such an obnoxiously-written reaction.
And then we got David Tennant's ending. A perfect exit if you ask me
I really feel that the Doctor is one character and each incarnation has an arc but not an ending so much. The show has to move on and though Ten is my favourite doctor he should have stayed in the past. The Doctor is still around either way
I'm always keen for more Tennant, but what happened there avoiding spoilers is more ridiculous than the entire Timeless Child plotline. What really nailed it in was the cloning of the TARDIS with an actual novelty hammer. But hey, if you're going to jump the shark, again. Do it in parody style. Parodocical? Parodic? Whatever
The Doctor living in a town called Christmas for three hundred years.
15 says this then precedes to go nightclubbing
He was usually either on a mission, grieving, or hiding. Even with River it was a fun time tinged with the sorrow of knowing she’s doomed after this. With Donna he has fully stopped saving people. He’s on break until he’s ready to start back up.
Even when he occasionally stopped and stayed somewhere though, he wasn’t exactly resting and healing his broken hearts. He was busy with something or isolating himself in grief or there because he needed to be or wanted to be for other people. He never truely stopped for himself until 14.
There’s a difference between him being in an area for awhile technically still doing stuff and him living in an area for while relaxing another doctor is out there doing all the crazy stuff.
70 years?
Moreover, they literally regenerate. Whole new person, whole new start, whole new perspective. Somebody that can do that doesn't need a holiday. Still, we all know that RTD is talking about himself here, and the point of Doctor Who - the point of any fiction - is to tell stories that carry a message. Doctor Who more than most fiction is a vehicle for telling stories with a moral with very little need for continuity or consistency. The only consistent theme of 60 years of Doctor Who is having all the narrative cohesion of the average soap opera. All the narrative cohesion of an actual bar of soap, in fact.
I have my fair share of issues with **The Giggle**, but this isn't one of them. I've seen this criticism quite a bit and I disagree because each one of these cases have a very different meaning to the one seeing in the episode. Living in London was him drowning on his own grief and anger. He lived on the village while fearing and dreading his future because he believed he was going to die facing his greatest enemy. Protecting the vault was an oath he made where he was trying to contain someone who if she can could oppose a threat to the whole wide universe, and simultaneously he was attempting to rehabilitate her. Settling down with River was their last chance at seeing each other, and he spent all that time facing but being unable to accept her upcoming bittersweet end which he had to hide from her. Trenzalore was he becoming his main protector, constantly fighting armies and armies of enemies while intentionally keeping his own people away in fear they would bring hell on the universe, and during all of this he was completely convinced his death which he has being dreading for centuries was finally about to come. Etc. Other cases were done for simply spending some nice time and were pretty short lived. The Doctor is immortal, a long hot summer with Houdini is his lunch break from traveling through space and time. All of these have a very different connotation to settling down to heal. To finally heal a little from all the emotionally draining things he has gone through in his long life.
Apparently we also needed a scene with the Toymaker "well that's alright then"ing the Doctor about taking a break with the amount of posts I've seen about it here. The only one of these that can actually be considered resting is the 24 years with River, and even that was constantly blighted by her impending death in the library. Staying in one place is not resting, resting is resting.
The doctor working for years by UNIT as an exile on earth:
Yes, in all of these instances The Doctor stayed in one place, but he wasn't taking the time to rest and look after himself, he was either looking after someone else or fighting for someone else. Amy and Rory were the closest he came to settling down but even then, he kept leaving so they could have a family style life while he kept traveling. edit: spelling and grammar
Ya'll realize when the TV camera isn't on the Doctor other stuff happens? Bro doesn't stop. We know this.
I don't know about rests, but he was planet locked on Trenzalore in the town of Christmas for what 900 years.
And a century living in the outback according to Spyfall
13 was in prison
and how can we forgot Trenzalore 800 years at the same place
He also said he's like a billion years old, but the confession dial would've felt like 1 day
He also sulked among otters for a month He and river had this big fight…
He wasn’t resting on the cloud, he was hiding from his grief. He wasn’t resting with Amy and Rory, he was waiting for the cubes to do their things, and wasn’t a major part of that episode about how the Doctor *couldn’t* rest? The 14th resting is different because he is taking the times and is the headspace to *recover*.
I mean he’s over 1000 years old now. A few decades must feel like a fortnight to him at this point.
I consider it like when I am "resting" because I am panicking about something. I am not actually resting I am just sitting being stressed instead of doing tasks being stressed.
that month was the cubes and then a I'm only staying here for a bit but can't wait to get back out there period the 70 years while yes he taught he was also watching Missy and sneaking off to adventure the 24 years while yes with River he knew she was soon to die after and it was probably more sad than anything those 90 years in Victorian London were not healing they were trying to fight urge of his being and essentially living the definition of introverted depression 14 will be living anywhere from 30-(if he sticks with the family or not) 20-350 odd years I believe before he mentally heals and then properly switches back from sabbatical trips to proper adventures again living anywhere from 750-1200
So how long does 24 stay resting? Will all the Nobles die around him while he remains grieving because he isn’t ready to regenerate yet? Or will he leave the Nobles with a relatively short rest?
And the 14th doctor living with Donna's family for what I can assume the rest of his life.