B00DPX9ST8 EBOK (316 page)

[
1379
] Dating
The Day of the Troll
(BBC
DW
audiobook #5) - The blurb says it’s the “far future”, and the story clearly follows on from the ionization effort against the glaciers in
The Ice Warriors
. It’s been long enough since that story that the glaciers have been defeated, and Britain has been uninhabited for ten years.

[
1380
] According to the back cover copy for
FP: In the Year of the Cat
. This is not what we see in
The Invisible Enemy
or
The Ice Warriors
, although both do feature artificial intelligences.

[
1381
]
FP: In the Year of the Cat
. This is intended as the background of Mr. Sin from
The Talons of Weng-Chiang
, who is here referenced as “the Pig” automaton. For that reason, the Pig and his fellows originate from “three thousand years” after 1762.

[
1382
] “Agent Provocateur”. Captain Jack and River Song, natives of this time, both use sonic technology.
The Hollow Men
specifies one of Magnus Greel’s atrocities (mentioned by the Doctor in
The Talons of Weng-Chiang
) as being “the sonic massacres in fifty-first century Brisbane”.

[
1383
]
The Talons of Weng-Chiang
. This happened “about the year five thousand” according to the Doctor; “the fifty-first” century according to Greel. The Doctor says he was with the Filipino army during their final advance. Note that World War Six is
averted
at this time, not fought, as some sources state.

Y5K

There are three television stories which establish versions of the state of Earth around the year 5000 which seem difficult to reconcile -
The Ice Warriors
,
The Talons of Weng-Chiang
and
The Invisible Enemy
. It’s notable that those last two have the Doctor and Leela involved in events of the year 5000 in near-consecutive stories (only
Horror of Fang Rock
is between them) without any link being made.

From the details given in the stories, there’s a way to reconcile them -
The Invisible Enemy
happens first, in “the year 5000” itself. It’s a time where Earth has highly advanced technology and a rather sterile, computer-dependent society.
The Ice Warriors
depicts exactly the same sort of society.
The Ice Warriors
also suggests that the Ice Age has been around for a century of wintery weather - but goes on to claim that it’s only recently reached a crisis point, with glaciers threatening the imminent destruction of major cities. At the time of
The Invisible Enemy
, it’s clearly not a pressing problem (no-one mentions the issue, and Marius is planning to return to Earth). But it might be a factor (or
the
factor) in the “breakout” - a mass emigration to other planets would ease population pressures on Earth.

After this, when the slowly-advancing ice starts encroaching on the temperate areas (in both hemispheres), the crisis seen in
The Ice Warriors
occurs. (This happens in an unknown year, but possibly later on in the year 5000 itself.) There is mass migration to the equator, and we see some people in that story have rejected the computer-controlled society for a more atavistic lifestyle. It’s easy to imagine such a rigidly-controlled society collapsing very quickly if the computers started failing (or arguing with each other) - it might even happen in days. Society would be split in two - those heading off into space (the scientists), and the ones staying behind (the more atavistic).

An unregulated society with little scientific progress... is exactly what
The Talons of Weng-Chiang
tells us the world is like in Greel’s time, “about the year 5000” and “the fifty-first century”. Greel’s a scientist - but clearly one who’d thrive better on the barbaric, individualistic Earth than on a regulated, sterile space station. Environmental collapse and warfare made the Earth a very hostile environment, as seen in
Emotional Chemistry
(towards the beginning of the process) and “The Keep” (ten years on).

Meanwhile,
The Empty Child/The Doctor Dances
tells us that humanity has spread across the galaxy. The
Girl in the Fireplace
shows us that, like the society seen
in The Ice Warriors
, people of this time clearly like reminders of the past along with their high-technology. And - as in the earlier story - when the technology fails, humanity doesn’t last long.

[
1384
]
The Hollow Men,
in the “fifty-first century”.

[
1385
]
The Shadow of Weng-Chiang

[
1386
] Dating
Emotional Chemistry
(EDA #66) - The date is given in the blurb, and is clearly tied in with
The Talons of Weng-Chiang
. It’s left unclear as to whether the retasking Kinzhal proposes for his paratroopers (presuming it actually happens) leads to the founding of the Time Agents;
Talons
suggests that the Time Agency was active before this, otherwise Greel wouldn’t worry about “Time Agents” following him. (Unless, perhaps, he’d previously encountered some from another era.) The psionic weapon surfaces in
Eater of Wasps
.

[
1387
] Dating “The Keep” (
DWM
#248-249) - It’s “the fifty-first century”, and the age of Magnus Greel. It’s confirmed that the problem with the sun leads to the “solar flares” in “Wormwood”.

[
1388
] “Fire and Brimstone”

[
1389
]
Borrowed Time
. The historical alteration is presumably undone when Blythe’s scheme is nullified.

[
1390
] Dating
Benny: The Vampire Curse
: “Predating the Predators” (Benny collection #12c) - The year is given.

[
1391
]
Borrowed Time

[
1392
] “The Time Machination”

[
1393
] “One hundred years” before
Silence in the Library
/
Forest of the Dead
.

[
1394
] Dating
Borrowed Time
(NSA #49) - The year is given (p26).

[
1395
] The end of the century prior to
The Time of Angels
.

[
1396
] It’s established in
TW: Captain Jack Harkness
that he adopted a false identity.

[
1397
]
The Doctor Dances
first established that Jack is from the fifty-first century; the Boshane Peninsula is referenced in
Last of the Time Lords
and
TW: Adam.

[
1398
] According to Jack in
TW: Fragments.

[
1399
] Dating
TW: Adam
(
TW
2.5) - No year is given, and the placement here is roughly derived from a) actor Jack Montgomery being 15 when he played Jack in
Adam
, and b) John Hart’s comment that Jack - presumably as an adult - was “Rear of the Year, 5094”. There’s no way of specifying how much time passed for Jack in-between the two - so in placing
Adam
, ten years have very arbitrarily been allocated.

[
1400
]
TW: Miracle Day

[
1401
]
TW: Captain Jack Harkness.
The identity of his captors hasn’t been revealed.

[
1402
]
Last of the Time Lords, TW: Adam
. The clear implication is that immortal Jack will eventually transform into the Face of Boe, who was first seen in
The End of the World
. Those wishing to overlook this possibility often suggest that it could have just as easily been a punning nickname that Jack acquired because there was already a famous Face of Boe in his native era. Or, of course, both could be true.

There is no Boeshane Peninsula on present day Earth. That said, it’s a safe bet that some place names on Earth will change in the next three thousand years, particularly if various floods, ice ages, solar flares and other incidents create new geographical features. There’s never been any explicit confirmation that Jack grew up on Earth rather than another planet colonised by humans. Wherever the Boeshane Peninsula is, the people there speak with American accents.

[
1403
]
TW: Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang
,
TW: Exit Wounds
.

[
1404
]
Eater of Wasps.
The trio hails from “three thousand years” after 1932, but it’s after
Emotional Chemistry
, so Kala is rounding up. They are presumably working for the same Agency as Captain Jack.

[
1405
]
The Empty Child/The Doctor Dances
. The latter states Jack is from the fifty-first century.

[
1406
]
TW: Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang

[
1407
] The backstory to
TW: Fragments
,
TW: Exit Wounds.

[
1408
] Apparently around twenty years before
A Good Man Goes to War
.

[
1409
] Dating River Song is a Complicated Business

The Doctor refers to River Song’s native time - in other words, when she attends university and is later confined to Stormcage - as “the fifty-first century” on two occasions (in
Silence in the Library
and
The Time of the Angels
). However, the two instances when we’re given specific dates regarding River’s home era (
Let’s Kill Hitler
, 5123;
The Pandorica Opens
, 5145) occur in stories that chronologically take place before the Doctor’s remarks, and happen in the fifty-
second
century. This contradiction would perhaps be more irritating, were it not so emblematic of River’s history being even more complicated than it first appears.

The shorthand where River and the Doctor are concerned is that they meet in reverse order... the Doctor first meets River (from his point of view) when she dies (in
Silence in the Library
/
Forest of the Dead
), and she looks “younger” each subsequent time they meet up (with a line in
Let’s Kill Hitler
explaining that she plays with her appearance). River broadly confirms in
The Impossible Astronaut
that she and the Doctor meet in reverse order (“It’s all back to front. My past is his future. We’re travelling in opposite directions. Every time we meet, I know him more and he knows me less.”), and the ending of
Day of the Moon
depends upon it. In that story, the Doctor kisses River for what to him is the “first time”, and River becomes alarmed that for her, this means it’ll be the final time.

The idea that River and the Doctor always meet in
exactly
reverse order starts to crumble once it’s considered that if that were true, why do they compare diaries to determine where they are in each others’ lifetimes? An exact reverse order would mean that River, at least, would always
know
the order of their meet-ups without having to ask. Perhaps she’s just playing along, but this risks the Doctor hearing spoilers about the future. It becomes all the harder to rationalise in instances such as her asking in
Silence of the Library
if the Doctor has experienced the crash of the
Byzantium
(
The Time of Angels
), when exact reverse order would dictate that of course he hasn’t. In fact, there are so many exceptions to the “reverse order rule” (the most glaring being that the Doctor, Amy and Rory are present when the Alex Kingston incarnation of River is “born” in
Let’s Kill Hitler
, and again encounter her older self after that point), a more accurate way of putting it would be, “River and the Doctor encounter each other in reverse order... except for all the occasions that they don’t.”