If you could write a Doctor Who episode...

I've had an idea for an episode where The Doctor travels to Tudor England,although before that he arrives at the tower of London and meets the beheaded ghost of Anne Boleyn."It's the witching hour!" would be first thing The Doctor shouts as he realizes he's arrived at the wrong time and specter of Anne Boleyn comes into view.

I want to see an episode in Rajput India. Simply because I don't think one has been done.

I had a lot of inspiration for my definitive end story tonight. Unfortunately, by the time I was ready to write it down, it was way way way too late to actually do writing. So here's some notes.

Last spring, on the afternoon before the evening I watched The Name of the Doctor, I was thinking about things like how there was an anniversary coming up and the Daleks were so ingrained in the show that they keep coming back even when you think they've been totally eradicated, and how maybe they really were totally eradicated, but the Whoniverse will spontaneously generate Daleks to fill a vacuum, and maybe that could be a good one-off anniversary story, about how the Daleks always being there is a constant of the universe, and the Doctor being there to counter them is a constant too.

So, let me reiterate, hours before I had any idea what happened in Name of the Doctor, I hatched a plot bunny about the Daleks rewriting the fabric of the universe so they become a constant, and the Doctor being unable to delete them, but writing himself into the fabric of the universe as a check on their plans throughout eternity. He at least believes that doing so will end his life. Maybe it does, maybe it doesn't, but I like its potential as a definitive end.

Anyway, now that story probably can't be published for at least a decade, because it's pretty much the Great Intelligence and Clara at the Doctor's Timestream.

However! I keep thinking more about it and fleshing out things. The fabric of the universe quickly became the Web of Time, or at least a Sufficiently Advanced terminal allowing editing of it (I need to research how the Web has been portrayed). I can throw in a bit about how the Web of Time is the reason why sometimes when Time gets that broken, time travelers end up "where they belong". The Doctor might write himself into it using his biodata, which would be rather logical, but not as dramatic as stepping or jumping into a big glowy thing. This would be prose though.

A lot of dominoes fell tonight. I was going to just post a rough outline because of the late hour, but it became a lot less rough and a lot less outline as I wrote, and suddenly the hour was a lot later.

Uh, yeah. It's probably a great big pile of emotional fanwank, but I can share a link to anyone interested.

It would be set somewhere on Earth that was neither Europe nor North America post-1500s

This is never going to happen, but I'd love to see an episode where the TARDIS translation circuit breaks down on a faraway planet (or somewhere and -time interesting on the Earth) and neither the Doctor nor the companion speak the local language. Hijinks ensue, of course, and due to several misunderstandings the heroes end up either in prison, a zoo, or some local branch of UNIT or Torchwood who try their best to interrogate them about foreign countries/planets, but they can't understand a word of it. The Doctor would from time to time completely forget that he needs to speak English in order that the companion understands him, so he would spontaneously change between different languages (but never Gallifreyan, since speaking it brings too many painful memories - this is explained at the end of the episode). And of course the companion would get annoyed of this and great banter would fly around. ...I think this would be a story with Ten and Donna :D

Also, I'd quite like to see the Doctor onboard Wasaskeppet on its (quite short) maiden voyage and the real reason *coughalienscough* to why it sank. I'd love to see a story with the Doctor crash-landing in Karelia and meeting Elias Lönnrot who's out to collect the stories and songs which eventually form the Kalevala. Perhaps the Sampo was some alien device?

edited 17th Jan '14 3:45:06 PM by Huilisti

I could see something like that happen, Star Trek did an episode similar to that with Darmok, it would be really cool to see Doctor Who do that.

1) The Doctor and companion find themselves stuck in an alternate universe where their adventures are merely the events of a TV show called Doctor Who, and have to deal with a monster of the week which phases between an actor in a cheesy rubber suit and a legitimate threat. Plenty of meta-humor and gentle mocking of the show to be had here, and seeing the Doctor and companion team up with their real life actors and writers would be awesome.

2) The Doctor and companion are in the TARDIS when the time vortex inside completely dies, stranding them in WWI France. They find very bizarre anachronisms, such as military generals including Hannibal, Napoleon, and Winston Churchill, cavalry units riding FREAKING DINOSAURS, and laser weapons used casually in battle. Time has become severely damaged and completely destabilized around this point in history.

After some snooping around, it turns out that the Master has teamed up with a new race of alien enemies to build a device which will completely destroy time as we know it. I came up with some cool ideas for this one, like a Meta-Crisis for the Master, and the companion getting stuck in a different time stream than the Doctor, and becoming a badass soldier in the war, and getting pissed at the Doctor for leaving, though it's only been about five minutes for the Doctor.

3) The Doctor getting amnesia due to technobabble, and the companion being forced to save both of their lives using everything they picked up from traveling with the Doctor.

4) Something really mind-screwy centering around the psychic paper going haywire.

5) a story in Imperial China where the monster is a shapeshifting dragon.

6) Every Doctor versus every Master.

Thank you for bumping this thread, this is fun.

I don't have concrete plot ideas but more like, general guidelines I'd wish to see the writers would apply...

In general, I'd like to see more episodes where the Doctor travels to the past historical significant event, and whatever adventure happens, it's serious enough to be plausible timetravel/alien incident in *our* past history the UNIT and other authorities could keep hidden from the general public (The Empty Child/Doctor Dances, Human Nature/The Family of Blood, maybe also Girl in the Fireplace) instead of "just silly" (far too many). And if it is more of "silly adventure of fun" (because occasionally we like those, too), it's not about some particularly famous episode in history, and/or it's something that the most people present would not notice. Low key is the key.

And if the Doctor meets historical famous people, I'd like to have it a non-direct reference instead of the "the Doctor has a fun adventure with Shakespeare / Queen Elizabeth". (For example, it's mentioned that Arthur Conan Doyle is inspired by the Victorian Sleuth Trio, but it's not a plot point we dwell on. Or it's left to us to figure out the sweet aristocrat girl would become the certain famous person when she grows up.)

Now, some undeveloped plot points to give an idea what I'd like to see. I'm not a great writer, so maybe nothing like this exactly, but sort of like this (instead of that terrible Shakespeare episode).

We visit Venice, again. No vampires, please. Atmospheric episode. So, at least better vampires. It will involve the magnificently convoluted election for the Doge of Venice. Maybe the Doctor and the Monk(/the Master/someone) are trying to out-time-travel each other to set their preferred boy as the first boy on the St. Mark's square the youngest councilman sees in the morning (by tradition, the first boy the councilman sees is the one to draw the critical lot). The Monk tries to set up a disguised evil thing as the first "boy" the councilman sees. (Extra fun: it's a Dalek.) The Doctor is trying to outsmart the Monk with some random Venetian boy who has no idea what is happening.

The Doctor goes fishing in Florida in the 1950s. For some reason or another, the Tardis isn't available. (Maybe the magically timetravel resistant fish ate it.) After a glorious battle against the nature and the fish, the Doctor seemingly fails to catch the fish. In the end, he finally ends up on random beach, finds his way to a nearby bar where he retells the story — how he lost something precious, something that allows his life to be an adventure — to a drunk in the bar. He wakes up next morning crestfallen on the beach, and oh, the Tardis is back there, waiting. (The fish was playful and finally spat out the Tardis. Or maybe Tardis was the playful one and thought the Doctor needed a lesson. Who knows.)

In China. Ming dynasty. A regular sightseeing adventure with the companion went wrong, and the Tardis (and the Doctor in it) are now trapped in a ...timetravel trap... thing. Timey-wimey, woo. Luckily, the companion got out, and yes, they have a thing that allows holographic communication with the Doctor! Maybe the sonic. The companion can't release the Doctor alone, they must get help from the nearby city, and not just any help, it needs to be something elaborate. The hilarity ensues. For added hilarity, add the Master/Missy who (by of course) loves to play the role of scary sorcerer (and who wants the Tardis because it's the only Tardis in the neighborhood.) Maybe the companion is hiding as a servant in the household of the Missy the Evil Sorcerer.

I'd also love a good science fiction story (preferably with paradoxes in time and space!), but those are more difficult to come up with on the spot.

And oh yes, a proper Lovecraftian monster would be nice. Something so out of universe that even Doctor is genuinely scared. Maybe skip the man Lovecraft himself.

edited 21st May '17 12:53:34 PM by maus42