Theory:Doctor Who television discontinuity and plot holes/Rise of the Cybermen

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This page is for discussing the ways in which Rise of the Cybermen doesn't fit well with other DWU narratives. You can also talk about the plot holes that render its own, internal narrative confusing.

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• Rose informs the Doctor that Mickey's parents are gone and that his grandmother raised him, but had stated earlier in Rose that she would have to tell his mother about his death.

She said his mother could not cope and left. She never said whether Mickey was in contact with her or not, so she may have meant she might have to visit Mickey's mother to tell her.

Rose was gone a whole year with the Doctor. His mother could have died in that time.

Mickey may have been in contact as an adult since his grandmother's death.

• When Rose decides to go look for her father, she defends by saying "You said 24 hours!" The Doctor hadn't told that to her as he and Mickey had just seen her.

The Doctor had told her. When he and Mickey find her, the Doctor says "24 hours".

• The Doctor and Rose don't have earpods when they are posing as the catering staff, wouldn't they get noticed?

It might be expected that servants wouldn't wear them at work. Much like blue-tooth devices it would be considered rude.

Lucy, the other servant was wearing ear pods.

Similar to how people from the past do not comment on their attire, people from the present may not.

Since they are servants, they may not be thought to be rich enough so no-one would say anything, and no-one would take notice of them.

• The Doctor says in Inferno that taking the alternate Brigadier, Liz Shaw, Dr. Williams, Mr. Sutton, etc. to his universe would cause a cosmic catastrophe, yet Mickey and Ricky are able to coexist without incident.

We do not know if the Inferno universe and the Pete's World universe work to the same rules. Also, the Doctor could have been mistaken as he was much younger then.

The presence of the TARDIS on Pete's World or the lack of the Time Lords might have also influenced things.

• After the Cybermen delete the president, why do they start deleting everyone else, even though they don't know if the people they are deleting want a 'free' upgrade?

Everybody started running, so the Cybermen assumed they were refusing.

They only visibly kill one person after the president, and we didn't see what he was doing before the Cyberman killed him - he might have refused. Also, they might have been "inferior", like they judged the Doctor to be outside at the end of the episode.

You must have been watching a censored version. Five more people were killed on screen. And still more as heard by buzzing and screaming sounds. Also the mention of being "inferior" seemed more of a general statement about humans. The reason The Doctor was denied upgrade is because he was classified as a "rogue element".

It seems anyone who tried to run (i.e. everyone) was classified as rogue elements.

• This episode firmly establishes a discontinuity in Rose's age. A number of previous episodes had implied Rose was born in 1985 or 1986. Rose states that she would be 26 in 2012 (Dalek). In the same and other stories, Rose's age is given as 19. We can deduce that Rose first started travelling with The Doctor in 2005 from Aliens of London. In order to be 19 when Rose started travelling, she would have to be born in late 1985 to early 1986. However, in this story, The Doctor says Rose was 6 months old when her father died (which was November 1987) (TV:Father's Day).