YMMV / Doctor Who 2013 CS "The Time of the Doctor"

• Alternate Character Interpretation: Did the Time Lords give the Doctor a brand new regeneration cycle out of gratitude for his actions in "The Day of the Doctor", because they empathized with Clara's words, or because they simply needed the Doctor alive since he's the only one who can help them return? Since there's more than one of them, it could be all of the above.
• Ass Pull:
  • Averted in the case of the Time Lords granting the Doctor a new set of regenerations. Although the show was accused of this by some, the concept of regeneration cycles being renewed had been introduced 30 years earlier in "The Five Doctors" and had been mentioned as recently as 2007's "The Sound of Drums" as having been granted to the Master.
  • Some fans have accused Steven Moffat of doing this by having the Tenth Doctor's partial regeneration in Series 4 count against his total, so that the special could end by dealing with the twelve-regeneration limit. However, the question of whether it counted had been a matter of debate among fans since 2008, so it didn't come out of nowhere; Moffat just decided to take a side.
• Broken Base:
  • Whether the Doctor slapping Clara's butt (when introduced as her "boyfriend" to her family) is playful and cute, sexist and not appropriate for a family show or just the Doctor having No Social Skills.
  • While fans don't mind the War Doctor being added as a numbered Doctor, some don't like adding the Tenth Doctor's partial regeneration, saying that Steven Moffat added it just for angst. It caused continuity errors with several earlier episodes involving regeneration energy which would have played out differently if the Eleventh Doctor had been planned to be on his last regeneration from the start. However it has been argued that the Doctor might not have worked out that the partial regeneration counted until sometime during his exile on Trenzalore; a deleted reference to him losing a leg (maintained in a spin-off novel and made evident only by the Doctor limping in a few scenes) might have made this more clear.
• Captain Obvious Reveal: After months of speculation as to how the Doctor could regenerate past his final limit, it's revealed the Doctor receives a new batch of regenerations as a gift from the Time Lords. It's been implied since the 1980s that this was possible, but usually in stories involving the Master (suggesting one had to play dirty to extend their limit).
• It's Short, So It Sucks!: Despite being an Extra-Long Episode at 60 minutes, the fact that it's still considerably shorter than every previous regeneration story in both the Classic and Revival Series made the whole thing feel a bit rushed to some. That said, others consider this to be the finale of a loose trilogy that began with "The Name of the Doctor" and continued with "The Day of the Doctor", so it could be said the Doctor's regeneration comes at the end of a three-part story.
• Like You Would Really Do It: After eight years of fans believing Gallifrey and the Time Lords to be gone for good, few believed that they were going to be brought back in full during the space of just two (albeit feature-length) episodes. That said, they did make their eventual full return comparatively quickly, just not this quickly.
• Memetic Mutation:
  • After Eleven had a vision of Amy in his final moments, with the explanation that she was "the first face this face saw", fans have speculated about the implications regarding other Doctors' regenerations. In particular, the Eighth Doctor, because the first face he saw was Pete, the hospital worker played by Will Sasso who fainted upon seeing Eight walking out of the morgue. This would create some hilarious◊ Mood Whiplash for his regeneration in "Night of the Doctor".
  • Sneeze hard enough and you'll turn into Peter Capaldi.
  • "Kidneys!"
• Tear Dryer: The Eleventh Doctor's tear-jerking final monologue is followed by Twelve rambling about his kidneys and seemingly not knowing where he is.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: Fans have been dying for the ultimate staring contest; Weeping Angels vs. the Silence, but no; the Weeping Angels got kicked down to a few seconds' appearance.
  • Also, in the Daleks' losing their memories of the Doctor in their previous appearance. It could have made for a fascinating story where the Doctor encounters and fights the Daleks without their knowing who he is...but nope, Status Quo Is God and the Daleks just get their memories of him back from Tasha Lem.

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