Talk:Time War (Doctor Who)

This article was nominated for deletion on 31 July 2024. The result of the discussion was no consensus.

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Primary vs 2ndary Sources

I have long thought that this preference ( or insistence) on "reliable" 2ndary Sources (by the WickedPedia) is completely inapplicable articles on current TV programs. Persons see the programs and report what they see. Citing some magazine that discusses the program doesn't improve the article over what people saw. The programs are immediately available on DVD or YouTube. IMHO, the WickedPedia should abandon this rule relative to articles on current TV shows. (EnochBethany (talk) 20:36, 27 October 2013 (UTC))[reply]

Overhaul

I overhauled the entire article (save the spin-off sections) as to give a unified presentation of the subject. This is what a reader would be looking for, not a chronological collection of statements about the Time War in the sequence they were first revealed. This is in keeping with similar articles, e.g. The Doctor (Doctor Who) does not beging with the information provided by the First Doctor in the first episode, adding more and more in a chronological sequence either (and one can clearly see that in that first episodes, the Doctor - though already a time travelling alien - was not a Time Lord from Gallifrey with the ability to regenerate, with the Tardis one of many, which he had stolen etc.)

Of course, I have retained the various episodes in which details were revealed in footnotes. Str1977 ^(talk) 10:32, 9 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]

But can you really say what Doctor Who was NOT? Unless there is a reliable 2ndary source saying he was NOT something, how are you going to "prove" what he was not? Did not his very name (WHO?) imply that there was much unknown about him? So, they started with the germ of a character and slowly developed it to utter absurdity (not that it is unentertaining absurdity). (EnochBethany (talk) 20:41, 27 October 2013 (UTC))[reply]

History immutable?

The article currently states

Whereas earlier episodes implied that history was either immutable ... or capable of being 
changed only by very powerful beings< ref >Pyramids of Mars (1975); Remembrance of the Daleks 
(1988)< / ref >

I don't know about the second (though stories like "Genesis of the Daleks" would also be relevant for the issue), but the first is unsupported. It used to be referenced by the The Aztecs, a 1964 serial. However, the episode does not actually state this but rather the opposite. In the story line, Barbara tries to change history by making the Aztecs quit human sacrifice in an effort to ultimately ensure their survival. The First Doctor vehemently tries to persuade her otherwise, not because history is immutable but because he considers it wrong to do so, given the unforeseeable consequences. That Barbara fails in her attempts is quite different from statements that no change could be achieved. Also, that her actions actually change a single man (the Aztec high priest) though not the entire people, seems quite in keeping with the "some things are fixed, others can be changed" reasoning provided by the Tenth Doctor.

However, the whole discussion makes me wonder whether this "changing history is so much easier after the Time War" is actually accurate? (Glossing over the fact that the differences are most probably just writers not being able to make up their minds and stick with it.)

Str1977 ^(talk) 10:32, 9 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]

You have to remember that if someone reassembles the Key to Time, anything is possible. All the person has to do is command the Key to Time. So, best to just take this all as a big comedy. The whole series seems to have become a grand exercise in an ultimate Byzantine absurdity. (EnochBethany (talk) 07:49, 30 January 2013 (UTC))[reply]

Infobox redux

I just realised that there was a discussion way back in 2007 (mediaeval time on the Wikipedia scale!) to suppress the infobox as inappropriate for a fictional event, and that someone put it back a little later. I would suggest removing it once again as it's pure in-universe stuff. Mezigue (talk) 10:04, 16 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Ages ago - unless you have a TARDIS :-) I agree with your suggestion that it should be removed. MarnetteD|Talk 12:43, 16 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Sourcing

Virtually all of the refs are WP:SECONDARY. MarnetteD|Talk 21:12, 27 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]