He was also created specifically to fight the war. And fought it until he died of old age, which The Doctor as the character as we know it would not really have done, whether 8 or 9.

There's precedence for this in canon - Romana regenerated to look like Princess Astra; she actually went through different forms like trying on clothes before settling on one. So perhaps, with a certain level of control, or if you're regenerating by choice, you can choose?

I think maybe they can explain it away as the circumstances of his regeneration according to The Night of the Doctor sort of made The War Doctor an in-between regeneration. There's precedent for this in The Valeyard. So I don't think they'll necessarily re-number them. The War Doctor didn't get to be called The…

Hm, I'm new to Disqus, but I was under the impression that the "downvote" function was for people who are rude/trolling/etc. and not just because you don't agree with what someone wrote? So now we're just going to "downvote" people for having an opinion we don't agree with. Ah, the Internet.

I dunno, he already existed in a world where he could go home - and did, in several stories. And who knows how difficult it will be to find, and what the consequences of doing so are - according to the Night of the Doctor, the Time Lords are universally hated now. I don't think it would end the show.

Even Davies seemed to realize this - the "Time Lord Victorious" thing and "I'm the last of my kind, fear me, I can do what I want" got old enough even to him that it led to his death, basically. I never thought going into the new series that the Time Lords would stay gone forever. And he can still be "the lonely…

That always bugged me. What point was it for the Doctor to have wiped out his own people if the enemy he was also wiping out to stop the war just came back, and in massive force, every season?

And again, there's the personal cost that The War Doctor fought in that war long enough to grow old and die of old age. And he still hid his people outside of the universe. Etc. I think there is some personal cost involved.

Couldn't agree more. It goes all the way back to the Fourth Doctor being unable to commit genocide against the Daleks. "Have I the right?" Which, interestingly, could be seen to be the first shots fired in the Time War.

And the Time Lords are unquestionably different now. The Time War went on long enough for John Hurt to become old enough to die of old age. Obviously they got Rassilon back somehow and went bug-fucking crazy. Now they're just removed from the universe, frozen. So it's still different enough, I think.

I honestly always thought RTD would bring Gallifrey back - he certainly brought the Daleks back enough - and I could imagine him having done so in some way. I was surprised he didn't. I never had the idea that the Doctor would remain the only Time Lord forever. And in this universe, still, he is The Last Time Lord.…

RTD also "destroyed" the Daleks and brought them back. The show has been on 50 years, I don't think I ever had the conception that the Time Lords would just never return. RTD found a million ways out of the "time lock" himself, so I actually think this holds up pretty well. After all, Gallifrey is just a few runs…

I disagree, humbly. I think his Doctor, at that point in his timestream, still had done the awful thing. And, even if he wasn't just living with a false memory, he wouldn't know whether he had destroyed his planet or hidden it. The ONLY person who has that piece of information is 11, after everyone else was gone. …

They don't necessarily undo his arc. Because at that point in his timeline, he had done the terrible thing. Hell, even if, say, the 10th Doctor wasn't going to forget this adventure once he left, even he didn't know if they had just hidden Gallifrey or actually destroyed it. That information was only given to 11,…

Wow, sorry about the insane formatting there. I did not do that intentionally. I haven't logged in using Disqus before, and for some reason it really formatted that weirdly.

A few things: