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{{Infobox Individual | {{Infobox Individual | ||
| | |image = The Veil.jpg | ||
|species = Clockwork robot{{!}}Clockwork construct | |||
|species | |job = | ||
|job | |affiliation = Rassilon | ||
|affiliation | |origin = [[Twelfth Doctor]]'s [[confession dial]] | ||
|origin | |first = Heaven Sent (TV story) | ||
|first | |appearances = {{il|[[TV]]: ''[[2016 BBC Christmas ident]]''|[[PROSE]]: ''[[The Veil (short story)|The Veil]]''|[[WC]]: ''[[The Zygon Isolation (webcast)|The Zygon Isolation]]''}} | ||
|first | |actor = Jami Reid-Quarrell | ||
|only | |clip = The Hybrid Confession - Heaven Sent - Doctor Who - BBC | ||
| | }}{{you may|Veil (species)|Veil World|n1=the species|n2=their home planet}} | ||
|actor | '''The Veil''' was a [[clockwork robot|clockwork construct]] within the castle inside the [[Twelfth Doctor]]'s [[confession dial]], capable of taking a form out of the Doctor's nightmares, it was tasked with interrogating him for information about [[the Hybrid]], killing him over and over as he failed to answer. Its touch was burning and, in the long run, lethal. However, the being had no ill will towards the Doctor, even trying to help him escape the prison. | ||
}} | |||
The Veil pursued the Doctor at exactly the same, slow pace, never relenting. Monitors located throughout the castle showed its viewpoint, letting the Doctor know where it was at any given time. The Doctor [[deduce]]d that it was designed to force him to confess his deepest secrets. Whenever he did so, the Veil would freeze and the castle would reconfigure itself, bringing him closer to [[Room 12]] and the way out. Having grown fond of the Doctor over the course of his imprisonment, it considered itself his [[companion]]. | |||
== Biography == | |||
=== Arriving in the Confession Dial === | |||
After being made warden of the Confession Dial ([[PROSE]]: {{cs|The Veil (short story)}}) by the [[Time Lord]]s, ([[TV]]: {{cs|Hell Bent (TV story)}}) the Veil was briefed about [[the Doctor]]. What it heard was mostly "bad things", but it hoped they were unfounded and it would be able to get along with the Doctor, although it knew its role was to force the Doctor to confess what he knew about [[the Hybrid]] against its will. The Veil did not know what the Hybrid was or why its masters wanted to learn more about it, and hoped it wouldn't take long to get the answers it needed out of its prisoner. ([[PROSE]]: {{cs|The Veil (short story)}}) | |||
=== Interrogating the Doctor for the first time === | |||
After the [[Twelfth Doctor]] was teleported into the Confessional Dial, the Veil followed him around for "a bit" and took the form of his own worst nightmare, ([[PROSE]]: {{cs|The Veil (short story)}}) an old woman who died when the Doctor was "[[the Doctor's early life|a very little boy]]"; her body had been covered in white veils, but it was a hot summer day and the corpse attracted [[fly|flies]], a ghoulish sight which gave the Doctor nightmares for years. Chasing the Doctor around the castle, the Veil got the Doctor to confess that he was scared of dying, that he had left [[Gallifrey]] because he was scared, and that he knew what [[the Hybrid]] was. ([[TV]]: {{cs|Heaven Sent (TV story)}}) | |||
Within Room 12, the Doctor found a wall of solid [[azbantium]] marked with the word "Home". He realised the ultimate secret his captors wished him to confess: the true identity of [[the Hybrid]] prophesied to conquer [[Gallifrey]]. Unwilling to give up such valuable knowledge, the Doctor began to punch the wall, allowing the Veil to catch up to him. ([[TV]]: {{cs|Heaven Sent (TV story)}}, [[PROSE]]: {{cs|The Veil (short story)}}) Not wishing to let the Doctor injure himself beyond a point where he could answer its questions, the Veil tried to pull him away, and realised that its touch was fatal to Gallifreyans after it fatally injured the Doctor. A dismayed Veil was sent back to its original position in the Castle, ([[PROSE]]: {{cs|The Veil (short story)}}) while the Doctor, in the day and a half it would take him to die, hauled himself back into the [[teleport]] room and wired himself into the controls, burning up his current body to bring an identical copy of himself into the castle. | |||
The Doctor left himself a single clue, the word "[[Bird]]" written in the [[sand]], to remind himself of a story about the meaning of infinity. This allowed each version of the Doctor to realise what he needed to do. ([[TV]]: {{cs|Heaven Sent (TV story)}}) Not yet understanding the Doctor's ploy, the Veil wrote in its log that it would simply have to start over. ([[PROSE]]: {{cs|The Veil (short story)}}) | |||
=== Loops upon loops === | |||
[[File:Veil attacks Doctor.jpg|thumb|left|The Veil fatally injures the Doctor in one of the loops. ([[TV]]: ''[[Heaven Sent (TV story)|Heaven Sent]]'')]] | |||
On the second day of his imprisonment, the Veil witnessed the revived, reset Doctor going through much the same things as the day before, though now with the information left to him by his burned past self. The Veil "took offence" when the Doctor began hypothesising that the Castle reset automatically: in truth, the [[closed energy loop]] was maintained manually by the Veil itself, who also prepared the Doctor's food. | |||
The loop kept repeating before a helpless Veil who found itself killing the Doctor over and over for no real purpose. By the seventh loop, he had stopped keeping a log of the happenings in the Castle, since they were always the same. The only, inexplicable bit of variety came on the 83rd day of the 235th year, where, to the Doctor and the Veil's confusion, a [[pigeon]] had somehow made its way into the Confession Dial and chirped in the rafters ([[PROSE]]: {{cs|The Veil (short story)}}) upon the Doctor's question "are there birds here?". ([[TV]]: {{cs|Heaven Sent (TV story)}}) The pigeon was never spotted or heard from again and left the Veil endlessly confused. ([[PROSE]]: {{cs|The Veil (short story)}}) | |||
=== Trying to help the Doctor === | |||
By the twelfth day of the [[7000 (number)|7000th]] year of the Doctor's imprisonment, the Veil, driven to near-maddening levels of boredom by the endlessly repeating loop, had decided the best course of action it could take was to try to help the Doctor escape faster, thereby freeing not only him, but also the Veil itself. It realised that the Doctor's scheme could be improved if he took the [[spade (Heaven Sent)|spade]] from Room 12 with him to the "last square" and used it to hit the wall, instead of punching it bare-knuckled: unbeknownst to the Doctor, the spade, being made of an amalgam of [[duralinium]] and [[dwarf star alloy]], was strong enough to chip [[azbantium]]. | |||
On the next loop, the Veil thus put the spade in a conspicuous position and left markings prompting the Doctor to use the spade. However, the Doctor spotted the Veil watching him, and, growing suspicious, chose to ignore the spade when he left the garden, ([[PROSE]]: {{cs|The Veil (short story)}}) as he had done before. ([[TV]]: {{cs|Heaven Sent (TV story)}}) | |||
The Veil made more and more blatant attempts to get the Doctor to use the shovel on every loop until the seventh day of Year [[200435 (number)|200,435]], when it finally decided it was no use to try and change the Doctor's mind and gave up. ([[PROSE]]: {{cs|The Veil (short story)}}) Things continued as before ([[TV]]: {{cs|Heaven Sent (TV story)}}) for over four billion years' worth of loops. ([[TV]]: {{cs|Hell Bent (TV story)}}) | |||
=== Death === | |||
[[File:Remains of the Veil.jpg|thumb|The remains of the Veil. ([[TV]]: ''[[Heaven Sent (TV story)|Heaven Sent]]'')]] | |||
On the 42nd day of Year [[4500000003 (number)|4,500,000,003]] of the Doctor's imprisonment, the Veil noticed that the Doctor was just one punch away from breaking through the wall and escaping. It wrote in its log that, having grown quite fond of the Doctor by now, it hoped that the Doctor would take it with him when he escaped, even fancying itself the Doctor's [[companion]]. ([[PROSE]]: {{cs|The Veil (short story)}}) | |||
When, on the next loop, the Doctor finally got through the wall and stepped out into [[Gallifrey]], the Veil tried to step behind him, but as soon as Gallifrey's sunlight hit it, it crumpled to the floor into a pile of disconnected cogs and gears. ([[TV]]: {{cs|Heaven Sent (TV story)}}) | |||
=== Legacy === | |||
[[File:Heaven Sent (N-Space).jpg|left|thumb|The thumbnail for ''[[Heaven Sent (in-universe)|Heaven Sent]]'', featuring the Veil. ([[WC]]: ''[[The Zygon Isolation (webcast)|The Zygon Isolation]]'')]] | |||
The Veil appeared to be featured in ''[[Heaven Sent (in-universe)|Heaven Sent]]'', an [[episode]] of ''[[Doctor Who (in-universe)|Doctor Who]]'' [[Doctor Who Series 9|series 9]], depicted in a very similar way ([[WC]]: {{cs|The Zygon Isolation (webcast)}}) to their actual appearance and history. ([[TV]]: {{cs|Heaven Sent (TV story)}}) | |||
== Behind the scenes == | |||
=== Information from invalid sources === | |||
Another source agreed that the Veil was featured in an episode of ''Doctor Who''. [[Child 1 (2016 BBC Christmas ident)|A child]] once watched the episode and snuggled up to [[Mother (2016 BBC Christmas ident)|their mother]] for comfort. ([[TV]]: {{cs|2016 BBC Christmas ident}}) | |||
=== Genesis === | |||
[[File:The_Veil_Concept_Art.jpg|thumb|Early concept art of the Veil as revealed by [[Rachel Talalay]] in [[2020 (releases)|2020]].]] | |||
During the ''[[Doctor Who: Lockdown!]]'' watch-along of ''Heaven Sent'' in [[2020 (releases)|2020]], director [[Rachel Talalay]] revealed that [[Steven Moffat]]'s original script compared the Veil's appearance to that of a [[beekeeping|beekeeper]],<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://twitter.com/rtalalay/status/1250139312747880449 |title= Rachel Talalay on Twitter|accessdate=14 April 2020}}</ref> and also released an early concept of the Veil's appearance<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://twitter.com/rtalalay/status/1250139310910775297 |title= Rachel Talalay on Twitter|accessdate=14 April 2020}}</ref> as well as stills from many cut shots of the Veil's point of view on various other parts of the Doctor's prison-castle than could be squeezed into the runtime of the finished episode.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://twitter.com/rtalalay/status/1250145817916104710 |title= Rachel Talalay on Twitter|accessdate=14 April 2020}}</ref> | |||
=== Name === | |||
The Veil was never named on screen, only in the credits of ''[[Heaven Sent (TV story)|Heaven Sent]]'', where it was credited simply as "Veil". In the ''[[Doctor Who Extra]]'' clip ''[[Behind the Veil (DWE episode)|Behind the Veil]]'', actor [[Peter Capaldi]] and director [[Rachel Talalay]] both refer to the creature as "the Veil". The creature's bio on the BBC [[Doctor Who website|''Doctor Who'' website]] consistently refers to it as "the Veil",<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/profiles/2DC2pLW7p5xy0RChntnGNkQ/the-veil |title=The Veil |date of source= |website name=BBC One - Doctor Who, Series 9 |accessdate=29 November 2015}}</ref> and the name was eventually used in a narrative source in [[The Veil (short story)|the short story of the same name]] in [[DWM 521]]. | |||
== Footnotes == | |||
{{reflist}} | |||
{{TitleSort}} | |||
[[Category:Gallifreyan technology]] | |||
[[Category:Individual clockwork robots]] | |||
[[Category:Murderers]] | |||
[[Category:The Doctor's confession dial]] | |||
Latest revision as of 14:10, 15 May 2024
- You may be looking for the species or their home planet.
The Veil was a clockwork construct within the castle inside the Twelfth Doctor's confession dial, capable of taking a form out of the Doctor's nightmares, it was tasked with interrogating him for information about the Hybrid, killing him over and over as he failed to answer. Its touch was burning and, in the long run, lethal. However, the being had no ill will towards the Doctor, even trying to help him escape the prison.
The Veil pursued the Doctor at exactly the same, slow pace, never relenting. Monitors located throughout the castle showed its viewpoint, letting the Doctor know where it was at any given time. The Doctor deduced that it was designed to force him to confess his deepest secrets. Whenever he did so, the Veil would freeze and the castle would reconfigure itself, bringing him closer to Room 12 and the way out. Having grown fond of the Doctor over the course of his imprisonment, it considered itself his companion.
Biography[[edit] | [edit source]]
Arriving in the Confession Dial[[edit] | [edit source]]
After being made warden of the Confession Dial (PROSE: The Veil [+]Loading...["The Veil (short story)"]) by the Time Lords, (TV: Hell Bent [+]Loading...["Hell Bent (TV story)"]) the Veil was briefed about the Doctor. What it heard was mostly "bad things", but it hoped they were unfounded and it would be able to get along with the Doctor, although it knew its role was to force the Doctor to confess what he knew about the Hybrid against its will. The Veil did not know what the Hybrid was or why its masters wanted to learn more about it, and hoped it wouldn't take long to get the answers it needed out of its prisoner. (PROSE: The Veil [+]Loading...["The Veil (short story)"])
Interrogating the Doctor for the first time[[edit] | [edit source]]
After the Twelfth Doctor was teleported into the Confessional Dial, the Veil followed him around for "a bit" and took the form of his own worst nightmare, (PROSE: The Veil [+]Loading...["The Veil (short story)"]) an old woman who died when the Doctor was "a very little boy"; her body had been covered in white veils, but it was a hot summer day and the corpse attracted flies, a ghoulish sight which gave the Doctor nightmares for years. Chasing the Doctor around the castle, the Veil got the Doctor to confess that he was scared of dying, that he had left Gallifrey because he was scared, and that he knew what the Hybrid was. (TV: Heaven Sent [+]Loading...["Heaven Sent (TV story)"])
Within Room 12, the Doctor found a wall of solid azbantium marked with the word "Home". He realised the ultimate secret his captors wished him to confess: the true identity of the Hybrid prophesied to conquer Gallifrey. Unwilling to give up such valuable knowledge, the Doctor began to punch the wall, allowing the Veil to catch up to him. (TV: Heaven Sent [+]Loading...["Heaven Sent (TV story)"], PROSE: The Veil [+]Loading...["The Veil (short story)"]) Not wishing to let the Doctor injure himself beyond a point where he could answer its questions, the Veil tried to pull him away, and realised that its touch was fatal to Gallifreyans after it fatally injured the Doctor. A dismayed Veil was sent back to its original position in the Castle, (PROSE: The Veil [+]Loading...["The Veil (short story)"]) while the Doctor, in the day and a half it would take him to die, hauled himself back into the teleport room and wired himself into the controls, burning up his current body to bring an identical copy of himself into the castle.
The Doctor left himself a single clue, the word "Bird" written in the sand, to remind himself of a story about the meaning of infinity. This allowed each version of the Doctor to realise what he needed to do. (TV: Heaven Sent [+]Loading...["Heaven Sent (TV story)"]) Not yet understanding the Doctor's ploy, the Veil wrote in its log that it would simply have to start over. (PROSE: The Veil [+]Loading...["The Veil (short story)"])
Loops upon loops[[edit] | [edit source]]
On the second day of his imprisonment, the Veil witnessed the revived, reset Doctor going through much the same things as the day before, though now with the information left to him by his burned past self. The Veil "took offence" when the Doctor began hypothesising that the Castle reset automatically: in truth, the closed energy loop was maintained manually by the Veil itself, who also prepared the Doctor's food.
The loop kept repeating before a helpless Veil who found itself killing the Doctor over and over for no real purpose. By the seventh loop, he had stopped keeping a log of the happenings in the Castle, since they were always the same. The only, inexplicable bit of variety came on the 83rd day of the 235th year, where, to the Doctor and the Veil's confusion, a pigeon had somehow made its way into the Confession Dial and chirped in the rafters (PROSE: The Veil [+]Loading...["The Veil (short story)"]) upon the Doctor's question "are there birds here?". (TV: Heaven Sent [+]Loading...["Heaven Sent (TV story)"]) The pigeon was never spotted or heard from again and left the Veil endlessly confused. (PROSE: The Veil [+]Loading...["The Veil (short story)"])
Trying to help the Doctor[[edit] | [edit source]]
By the twelfth day of the 7000th year of the Doctor's imprisonment, the Veil, driven to near-maddening levels of boredom by the endlessly repeating loop, had decided the best course of action it could take was to try to help the Doctor escape faster, thereby freeing not only him, but also the Veil itself. It realised that the Doctor's scheme could be improved if he took the spade from Room 12 with him to the "last square" and used it to hit the wall, instead of punching it bare-knuckled: unbeknownst to the Doctor, the spade, being made of an amalgam of duralinium and dwarf star alloy, was strong enough to chip azbantium.
On the next loop, the Veil thus put the spade in a conspicuous position and left markings prompting the Doctor to use the spade. However, the Doctor spotted the Veil watching him, and, growing suspicious, chose to ignore the spade when he left the garden, (PROSE: The Veil [+]Loading...["The Veil (short story)"]) as he had done before. (TV: Heaven Sent [+]Loading...["Heaven Sent (TV story)"])
The Veil made more and more blatant attempts to get the Doctor to use the shovel on every loop until the seventh day of Year 200,435, when it finally decided it was no use to try and change the Doctor's mind and gave up. (PROSE: The Veil [+]Loading...["The Veil (short story)"]) Things continued as before (TV: Heaven Sent [+]Loading...["Heaven Sent (TV story)"]) for over four billion years' worth of loops. (TV: Hell Bent [+]Loading...["Hell Bent (TV story)"])
Death[[edit] | [edit source]]
On the 42nd day of Year 4,500,000,003 of the Doctor's imprisonment, the Veil noticed that the Doctor was just one punch away from breaking through the wall and escaping. It wrote in its log that, having grown quite fond of the Doctor by now, it hoped that the Doctor would take it with him when he escaped, even fancying itself the Doctor's companion. (PROSE: The Veil [+]Loading...["The Veil (short story)"])
When, on the next loop, the Doctor finally got through the wall and stepped out into Gallifrey, the Veil tried to step behind him, but as soon as Gallifrey's sunlight hit it, it crumpled to the floor into a pile of disconnected cogs and gears. (TV: Heaven Sent [+]Loading...["Heaven Sent (TV story)"])
Legacy[[edit] | [edit source]]
.jpg)
The Veil appeared to be featured in Heaven Sent, an episode of Doctor Who series 9, depicted in a very similar way (WC: The Zygon Isolation [+]Loading...["The Zygon Isolation (webcast)"]) to their actual appearance and history. (TV: Heaven Sent [+]Loading...["Heaven Sent (TV story)"])
Behind the scenes[[edit] | [edit source]]
Information from invalid sources[[edit] | [edit source]]
Another source agreed that the Veil was featured in an episode of Doctor Who. A child once watched the episode and snuggled up to their mother for comfort. (TV: 2016 BBC Christmas ident [+]Loading...["2016 BBC Christmas ident"])
Genesis[[edit] | [edit source]]
During the Doctor Who: Lockdown! watch-along of Heaven Sent in 2020, director Rachel Talalay revealed that Steven Moffat's original script compared the Veil's appearance to that of a beekeeper,[1] and also released an early concept of the Veil's appearance[2] as well as stills from many cut shots of the Veil's point of view on various other parts of the Doctor's prison-castle than could be squeezed into the runtime of the finished episode.[3]
Name[[edit] | [edit source]]
The Veil was never named on screen, only in the credits of Heaven Sent, where it was credited simply as "Veil". In the Doctor Who Extra clip Behind the Veil, actor Peter Capaldi and director Rachel Talalay both refer to the creature as "the Veil". The creature's bio on the BBC Doctor Who website consistently refers to it as "the Veil",[4] and the name was eventually used in a narrative source in the short story of the same name in DWM 521.
Footnotes[[edit] | [edit source]]
- ↑ Rachel Talalay on Twitter. Retrieved on 14 April 2020.
- ↑ Rachel Talalay on Twitter. Retrieved on 14 April 2020.
- ↑ Rachel Talalay on Twitter. Retrieved on 14 April 2020.
- ↑ The Veil. BBC One - Doctor Who, Series 9. Retrieved on 29 November 2015.
