More of my videos are hitting the algorithm, which means more comments, which means more hate comments about the current run of the show, and I have no interest in letting that toxic echo chamber spread to these comments, so I've set the comments to require approval. If you've just come here to comment that the Timeless Children story doesn't fit the canon lore, even though I've demonstrated the contrary in this video, don't bother. As the Doctor said: "If you're going to deny it, don't waste my time. Just shut up."

I’ve always like the idea that the Doctor tried to live each life to his fullest, as is shown by the melt down 10 started to have, but the Master just threw them away like candy and was on 13 by the time the Doctor was on 4.

never realised how funny 11's regeneration is if you cut out the crack. Just looks like he regenerated out of spite for the Daleks talking about regeneration cycles

The idea of The Timeless Child is not a bad one whatsoever. It would explain how The Time Lords came to be, and how they are able to grant The Master and The Doctor an extra cycle of 12 regenerations, because they decide what limits are put in place and can clearly change these at will. The ONLY problem I have is that the Doctor SHOULD NOT be the timeless child. It completely takes away so much of the weight of past iterations, past death experiences, past pains etc.

I love the idea of Missy being post Spy Master and knowing about the doctor being timeless child, but only giving one little hint to Clara. It seems in character for her to just mess with them like that but in a way only she understands.

In the end, I prefer the Doctor to be just a renegade Time Lord with secrets of history their society never wants the universe to learn or else it will unravel the very fabric of reality. So we don't know who they are or every reason why they ran, to the point their mind can't and won't remember it because they rather move forward and help the universe their way. Still, the show has always liked to dance around this topic a lot

Don't get me wrong I know that none of this stuff is actually hints of the "Timeless Child", they were just hints at the mystery of "The Doctor" but it is an interesting and well thought out bit of research. Good spot on the fact that "Shobogan" was not first mentioned during the Masters speech in the Matrix. I did not catch that before.

"I'm much too old to be a Pioneer, although I was once, among my own people" - The Fist Doctor, The Daleks

While I do think the Timeless Children story works generally, I do think that William Hartnell not being the first "Doctor" is kinda meanspirited, even unintentionally. It is a big trend nowadays to delete what came before when people get their hands on the property.

This kinda made me accept the timeless children SLIGHTLY more The origin of gallfirey makes sense but I juts dislike how, the child is the Doctor and not the master..i mean it would make more sense The Masters histroy is so wonky he literally comes back for no reason

I adore the idea of the Doctor getting occasional flashes, just moments, where they say something that implies they are older or more important than even they know. Like the memories are just out of reach. Hell, Seven may have known outright, but lost the knowledge across the several bouts of amnesia he would experience in his Eighth incarnation.

These aren’t subtle hints, it’s just re-contextualising good writing. “Such a lonely childhood” gives us so much about the Doctor’s background and how this can be later reflected upon by their choices and motivations

I favor the idea that just like "John Smith" dreamed of being the Doctor, the Doctor still has vestigial, confused memories that accidentally come out. And Seven remembered the most clearly.

What I want to know now is how powerful is the Doctor's Daughter, Jenny. She was never given a limited batch of regenerations. She's the same species that the Doctor is and has the capacity for infinite regenerations.

This video convinced me that the Master's account of the Timeless Child does actually fit in the continuity

The Timeless Child is two ideas in one - one I like, one I don't The Doctor's Past life - I really like this. The Doctor having a past life they don't know about is particularly exciting, and it further adds to "Doctor Who?" We no longer know all their faces, where they're from, even their species. But their core identity, their development from Babby Hartnell to now, remains totally intact. The Doctor is the first Time Lord - unnecessary, but easily ignored.

Despite the Timeless Child arc having a divisive outcome, this is one helpful compilation.

I really like that Jodie Whitaker's "flashback blast" into the Matrix at the end included "The Brain of Morbius." I missed that. That's really cool. It's such a weird and oddly dark moment in "Morbius," and it's fitting in that moment.

It does feel a lot like the Timeless Child comes from the Cartmel Masterplan, which was an aborted story arc that was being written during the Seventh Doctor's run. It's maybe what Chibnall hooked into when writing the more recent arc; the examples from the Seventh Doctor here are from that plan.

I do like the idea of The Timeless Child, it explains a lot and gives the time lords both a logical backstory and adds a darkness to them they that lied and exploited a child this entire time. I just feel like it would have worked better had it been the Master instead of the Doctor. If it was the master it would explain so much of their torment, would explain how they were able to defy the regeneration limits and keep on living as a corpse or ooze or a snake, and I think it would justify his anger towards gallifrey more and why he nuked it. I still wouldn’t mind the Doctor having some higher gallifreyan importance in their backstory as perhaps one of the most important time lords in gallifreys past with some mysterious important role, but I think the timeless child itself would have been better being either the master or a new time lord we hadn’t yet met

Been watching a lot of the 7th Doctor (and just recently the Silver Nemesis), and they were eventually going to reveal that the Doctor was the reincarnation of this ancient Time Lord figure who lived at the same time as Omega and Rassilion and was very important. Then it got cancelled. But I think this might have been a callback to that. The look on David Tenant's face, though, during his scenes--like he forgot some of his memories. Like he didn't know that happened. And the fact the 1st Doctor ran away from Gallifrey with his granddaughter--the Doctor was always running. Because they knew something was wrong.

I tried looking this up to understand what was going on in The Wild Blue Yonder. This is clearer than the wiki article I read, thank you 60 years of backstory is a lot to go through

I honestly like this crazy secret. The doctor is immortal being, used by a people ensure they would forget all of their lives. I love that the faces in morbius are actually doctors before the “first” and makes you wonder when will the doctor become the valeyard, curator and others. I love the timeless child story.

I love that the Doctor is more than a Time Lord with a whole new story to pursue.

When watching classic Who as a kid, I always felt the Time Lords had this big secret they were keeping, and was always left disappointed that it would never get explored. Even though it gained a mixed reaction, I respect Chibnall for trying to give people like me that eventual payoff. As soon as I saw the faces from Brain of Morbius flash through The Doctor's mind, I knew he was going for a very specific kind of fanservice, and even if it wasn't for everyone, I enjoyed every second.

I don't personally approve of conflating Chiball's Timeless Child concept with the Cartmel Master Plan, but I do concede they're largely compatible besides the Doctor clearly retaining some knowledge of being The Other but not the Child and the iffy choice to mark regeneration as the event/discovery sparking the creation of Time Lord society as opposed to being something engineered after time travel technology/the Anchoring of the Thread.

The Timeless Child is an interesting plot development for the show to take, and I like aspects of it. The Time Lords have always been kinda fake, so establishing that the whole regeneration thing isn’t even theirs is a pretty cool idea… however: the episode realises this concept in a pretty mundane way, the Master just sorta explains all the new lore to the Doctor, who is then outraged that they lied, despite always thinking the Time Lords were bad people? I don’t see what this really adds to the show, other than now we can bait future series finales with reveals about all the new mystery boxes. I’m interested to see how the show plays this going forward, I don’t think it ruins the Doctor necessarily, but it plays into the new series thing they keep doing where the Doctor is like, the most important person ever, an idea I’m not a massive fan of. We’ll see what happens next I guess. I’m just glad there are people who enjoyed this episode out there. I’m sure never watching it again.

This is simply fantastic. Thank you for putting all together the old tie-ins!

Imagine living for so long you start to lose the memories of who you were at a point

I remember seeing The Brain of Morbius as a little Whovian and I remember very well how many excited conversations there were with school friends about it's implications. But a regeneration does have a way of muddying the waters of continuity and we all moved on with the fifth. But it's stayed with me all this time. So to me, as a child of old Who, TTC arc is a gateway to so many possibilities, and what with it being in RTD's hands again, well I've had my love of the Doctor reinvigorated. And this video has helped a great deal. Thanks for sharing.

Never realised that part of Hell Bent revealed he once was a little girl... wow. That's made series 12 look a bit better now. Then again it can be easily said that the Doctor was messing about and knew exactly what Clara was thinking because knowing Missy/the Master they would have used that joke before and the Doctor knows it

I think the idea that regeneration a is a product of the time vortex is a contradiction with the timeless child reveal, which would mean it was retconned to be basically a lie by the timelords to cover their crimes.

I'd be genuinely surprised if the Master wasn't revealed as also being a timeless child, it would simply explain too well how he survived too much stuff

It's amazing how the Timeless Child links into a bunch of old things. Seventh Doctor apparently was able to access some of the memories of the Timeless Child.

i really like the idea of the timeless child, having the doctor lose their sense of identity right after capaldis solidly accepted it is a really cool concept. but i think the execution has been lackluster, although the arc isnt complete yet so its too early to make a full judgement call. i just hope Russel does something interesting with it instead of retconning it or ignoring it.

Even if it has been hinted at throughout the years, I still feel like it's a stupid idea. Personally I feel like it solves only a few questions and opens up a million more, and not the fun, speculative kind. If they wanted to add a timeless child, I feel it could've been anyone else. The Master, Rassilon, even The Rani! Making it The Doctor feels disingenuous to the feel of the show, making them not just a space hobo, but "THE MOST IMPORTANT CREATURE IN ALL OF TIME!!!!" It could've worked well. Really well. But it's so clear that they had no plan going into the series other than setting up plot threads to figure out later on. (Chibnell literally said in an interview that he had no plans for where it would go!) And then there's that little chat in Revolution of the Daleks, Ryan telling The Doctor that "things have to change because they have to so we should just deal with it" A scene that feels so patronizing and frankly INSULTING to the fans who have stuck by this series for close to 60 years. God I feel sorry for RTD, having to follow up with an explanation for this. But hey, maybe it's just me. Maybe I'm just out of touch and this is actually a "new beginning" for the series. Fine. But in my eyes, this just seems like a rushed, overly-complicated fanfiction trying to answer the question that should never be answered.

I honestly thought that The Timelords giving The Doctor a new set of regenerations was just a thing they decided to do. but they actually have done/offered it before with The Master. I feel way less upset about them breaking their own rules now.

I mean the show is so long you could pull clips to justify anything. I don't think the timeless child was planned since before Chibnall. Before him the show was always purposefully vague and for a good reason. The speculation is always better than the answer.

This is really thorough and really makes the storyline fit so well. I love it. Thank you for sharing this.

As a English bloke whos watched Who for aslong as I can remember born in 76 💯💯💯❤️❤️💪💪💪💪💪💪💪💪💪💪

excellent compilation! Really well done here, it shows the thought that went into the timeless child arc, which I feel truly adds depth to the show. [ I hope the doctor will look into that fob watch . . . ]

the stuff written for old who was supposed to be teasing that the doctor was actually a reincarnation of one of the founders of the time lords called "the other" who threw themself into the regeneration pools. but the storyline was never finished so most of the clips were ignored. Chibnall tried to continue that plot thread but for some reason didnt do the same storyline hence the strange lore jumble that is the timeless child

"She found something... *impossible* ." Moffat's use of that word is now seared into my memory that that must be a throwback to him. Good stuff.

I loved this video, thank you for compiling all of that together!

I feel like that Morbius clip is the strongest piece of evidence of the timeless child for classic who. Although I feel like it was legitimately hinted at with Missy and Clara

Tom Baker was the fourth incarnation of Doctor Who. And he was the model from which all other Doctors after him were fashioned from. So have a jelly baby.

I was never that fond of the concept of the Timeless Child but damn this is a good watch!. Well done. Really enjoyable video.

Great video. I may have mixed feelings on the Timeless Child arc but I am a sucker for some lore.

Fantastic! Nice to see these all compiled together 😀

One of the biggest clues to The Timeless Children is that the Doctor's name is the universe's most important secret. Like, if he was just some random Time Lord, then why is his name so important when the other Time Lord's names aren't important? It wouldn't make sense, unless he isn't just some random Time Lord, but the one that started the Time Lords.

Speculation (in response to a lot of the comment threads here): The child, who becomes the Doctor... is a future incarnation of the Master, thrust back to that exact point in time and space in that exact form. Nobody understands either of them like each other - because they ARE each other.

I am _not_ upset about there being a secret origin for regeneration. In fact, I think it's funny that the Time Lords essentially appropriated regeneration from another species. I'm just a bit iffy about the Doctor being involved in this origin. The Doctor doesn't care for Time Lord society, they don't deserve that burden.

while i dont think the timeless child is as bad as the hybrid revalation being the reason the doctor ran away originally, i really think the actual timeless child episode doesnt do the reveal any favours by having like 3 episodes happening at once, like a cyberman x master where cybermen invade gallifrey story, the companions fighting cybermen alone, and then timeless child. I feel like this makes the reveal not have enough time to show the doctors feelings and real impacts and then the next episode and then season is just the doctor learning over and over again who they are. Sacha Dhawans master honestly makes it up for me tho, i absolutely adore his performance. Like hes so desperate for the doctors attention and rage at him because he knows that his biggests fears were true and that hes less important and isnt better than her. it makes the scene where he makes her kneel in spyfall so much more interesting like hes grasping at anything to feel better than the doctor.

So does this retcon the previously established lore that Rassilon and Omega invented regeneration and time travel? And that Gallifery was a matriarchy? Because we have seen the women that used to rule Gallifrey (before they were banished) help The Doctor regenerate into the war doctor. Also I could be wrong but I thought that the 12 regeneration limit was artificially imposed by Rassilon because he was/is a bit egomaniacal and thought he was the only one worthy of true immortality. If the Doctor is the timeless child why did Rassilon and the Timelords have to grant him more regenerations if The Doctor is the original source of the power to regenerate?

Perhaps the master is also a timeless child... Maybe both the doctor and the master came through that portal together... Yin and Yang

Beautiful picture and content edits. Sound mixes are difficult but really make an edit come alive. Excellent back story support ! Re watching her seasons - again - I can now see the very high quality of everything. Quite how I missed this before I don't know.

Thank you for putting the work into this. It's neat to consider.

I like this video. It's been yrs since I've watched the old school doctor who before the 9th. When he said his age I thought to myself I swore he was older. This video cleared it up for me. I don't have a problem with the timeless child. I just wish we got more

thank you verry much now everything sounds clear to me 💙

I am so glad these videos popped up in my recommended section. Huge trip of nostalgia :)

This is so beautiful!! I love this show and its rich history... Here's to another 60 years.

Thank you for taking the clue of the Missy's speach to Clara !! I never see it when people put the timeless children on fire without regardless to the clue of the other seasons and incarnations of the Doctor. Big ty

Tbh it was kinda scary seeing the doctor except his end at first no plan to cheat no way of getting out he was fully ready to die until he got a new chance and made it so he could have another go

I'm just a casual new who fan and I loved how you put what used to be discontinuity plotholes together into a clear and cogent explanation of how/why Timeless Child actually built on the existing show lore.

This primer was nicely thought of for those that never did the old series.

Ive been with this show since Troughton/Pertwee, a HUGE fan and I thank you for the time taken in putting this explanation together. The revelation of the Timeless Child was a little clunky when realised in the show but this video, trawling the canon to find the continuity definitely sheds a great deal of light. It doesn't make complete sense but heck, this is scifi... and RTD is back with a gay, black performer as our next Doctor. Very excited to see where it goes. And thank you

I like to think that the Doctor has no true origin story: As time is constantly being reset, details about the universe are adjusted all across space and time. The Doctor was a normal Gallifreyan child. And they were The Other. Then they were the Timeless Child. They were all of them. Sometimes they're thousands of years old, sometimes only recently broke 2 millennia It also explains how humans can never remember if aliens are real: the story keeps changing :)

i just take the timelords giving Matt Smith regeneration energy as making him extra explosive to destroy the daleks

I find it hysterical that now we know the Doctor has (afaik) unlimited regenerations, at Trensalore the Time Lords probably weren't giving the Doctor more regenerations, they likely just shot him discretely and if anybody asked "hey, wasn't that the fire button?" they'd just shrug and say it mustn't have been because he regenerated, didn't he?

Oh my word. I have watched the show from Day One. My father worked on the show, then I worked on the show.Then I tried to put the colour back on lost episodes. Then I watched the new show with my kids. Never have I seen the structure of the Dr's life more clearly. Yes - it really does all fit. Bravo !

100% not on purpose but its fun to think about it

I love the idea that missy is post spy master purely cause it means the masters final (please just let them die) incarnation finally got to be the doctors friend again

The usage of the word hint in the title very much is not the word i'd use. I'd def more so consider it "timeless children connections". Hint implies it was all planned out from the very beginning which is not the case considering how many different writes and people have contributed to the lore and the show.

I like that you've put this all together, but most of it is referring to other accounts of the Doctor's origin not the Timeless Child. Lots of stuff I didn't even consider though.

You missed a scene in the beginning of World Enough & Time where 12 mentions that he isn't sure that he was male back during his childhood.

Thank you for this video. I'm looking forward to more videos.

My guess is that the ppl who kidnapped amy spliced the timelord genetics into rivers embryo so she got regeneration, hence being harder to kill and more equipt to kill the doctor

A whole deeper depth to "know thyself".

Personally I just love how much the Timeless Child arc adds so much more Mystery to The Doctor. But to be honest, ever since the revelation in the Doctor Who movie back in 1996 where 8th says he's half human, on his mother's side and people became outraged by it. I don't know what people want from this show if not just a bit of mystery behind The Doctor but I liked this twist and I really hope it is revisited at some point. Especially since the Fobwatch is still deep within The TARDIS containing The Doctor's Timeless Child genetics and memories.

I remember watching this and thinking "OMG! They finally got the Morbius regenerations into canon!"

It's really cool that you found all the ties that justify the episode, but I still think it could have been executed better. Preferably, I'd have the Doctor be Tec-te-un. Have it so that they experimented on themselves, so that keeps the Timeless child backstory, but doesn't discount a much more fascinating origin for the Doctor; the idea that they are ultimately responsible for the Gallifreyans' pretentiousness and war mongering over control of time. That's my opinion tho

I don't know if I would include Smith's regeneration as something that fits with the Timeless Child reveal, since the Doctor is clearly dying in that scene (regenerates the moment that he gets "given a new regeneration cycle"). It doesn't directly contradict the Timeless Child reveal or anything, since you can rationalize it and come up with excuses, but it's not a great example of continuity in my opinion.

Part of me believes that the reason The Timeless Child arc wasn't received well was cause Chibnall wrote it. I loved the concept of it and believe that it perfectly fits in with everything else, but feel as though it should have been implemented with much better stories. Here's an analogy for this. If I gave the same joke to 2 kids (The Popular Kid and The Weird Kid), people would laugh harder when The Popular kid said the joke, cause he knows how to deliver his jokes unlike the Weird kid whose delivery will be bland. In this analogy Chibnall is the Weird Kid, eventhough he's the one who actually made the joke in the first place. Just my worthless 2 cents on this matter.

Why include the Eleventh Doctor's regeneration and the regeneration limit? They directly contradict the Timeless Child.

Jenna Coleman is such a beautiful, angelic goddess 😍😍😍

Thanks for this video. It’s sad, I liked the idea of the Timeless Child as a big overarching concept that could bring something fresh to DW, I just feel its a shame that Chibnall didn’t really do the whole thing justice. I’m curious to see where RTD takes things now. Tell you what though, if he brings back Omega, I shall personally seek the man out and give him a great big hug!!!

Another good hint is from Human Nature & Family of Blood with all the voices coming from the doctor's watch including several female ones. At at times a bunch of overlapping ones. Likely from past regenerations since they mingled with his own. And would say to keep them hidden and safe.

So well edited. Look at all these references’. Decades of the show and they have ALWAYS suggested that the doctor is more than a time lord. That we’ve never known the “first” doctor.

Very well put together! 👍

Honestly I'm all for it because of the potential storylines it'll unlock, and if the rumors of a big overhaul on the behind the scenes parts are to be believed, I think the future of Doctor Who has the potential to be bright. Anywho thanks for these videos^^

I did not like The Timeless Child arc when it hit, but it does seem that it has been pretty strongly hinted at since at least Matt Smith's tenure, and it's clear that there was a long running implication that the Doctor lived more lives before the First Doctor took the TARDIS. Honestly I think my biggest issue with it at this point is that it still leaves a lot of unanswered questions (especially for a storyline that is kind of portrayed as containing "answers" to old plot holes), but obviously unanswered questions can be expanded upon in the future. I think the only detail that still bothers me is the "being from another universe" bit. Mostly because I just personally don't like the idea, but also because the story could have been executed without the Doctor being from another universe- there's no real change in stakes between the timeless child coming through a portal to another universe vs. just being some anomaly from our own. At least, as it stands, it removes a lot of the Doctor's identity of being a time lord- though I guess there's no reason they couldn't also just be a time lord equivalent from their parallel universe. Honestly though, I just kind of hope they don't retcon it. It does work, even if it isn't personally my favorite. RTD coming in to retcon it would be extremely cheap- and if they really believe the current audience hates it so much, they should just leave it alone for a while until some new writer wants to take it up again a few Doctors from now. Also, either way, thanks for this video- it does a lot to cement that the Timeless Child story wasn't just something that sprang up out of nowhere.

finally, someone found a way to connect the timeless child to the timeline

Originally during the 7th doctors era they were going to reveal he was a member of the trinity of founders of time Lords, I don't like him being the source of regeneration so if they had to make a twist where there was more to his past then we thought I'd prefer the original where he's important but not the only one.

You could do one of these with the Doctor not liking endings. That's come up a fair bit. First Doctor painfully leaving Susan, not wanting to part with Ian and Barbara; Second Doctor I'm not sure; Third Doctor avoiding Jo's departure; Fourth not actually saying goodbye to Sarah; Fifth's trauma at Adric's ending; Sixth doesn't have much unfortunately; Seventh and Mel mostly; Eighth and Ninth not sure; Tenth has plenty; Eleventh has plenty; Twelfth has plenty; Thirteenth has them too, like her difficulty confronting the concept of a terminal illness with Graham, or her comment about wanting to time travel to have more time with Ryan and Graham, or just in Legend of the Sea Devils where she wishes she could travel with Yaz forever.

interesting how the doctors past has always been so ambiguous but when it becomes canon that there is still so much we don't know about the doctor, people complain imo the timeless children brought some ambiguity back to the character, moffat clarified and solved a lot for us - the doctor's name especially covered with the name/time of the doctor and also picked up in 12s final speech, it gives us some clarity as we can now apply these strange statements about the 3rd doctors age and the 7th doctor but still create a mystery out of it, not one with immediate intention to solve

This is brilliant. I got so many tears and goosebumps watching this! Well done!

I don’t exactly have any issues whatsoever with this concept. We can clearly see the concept is on point with the classic and new series.

That line from the Master will never not be epic: “Renamed themselves with characteristic pomposity the Time Lords.” ❤❤❤❤❤

The series has been hinting that there's 'something more' deep into the classic run. It's all good and the show will continue to develop.

The Timeless Child aka Cartmel Masterplan 2.0