Howling:5 Things to look for in Series 5

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The Howling → 5 Things to look for in Series 5
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Over the course of the Series (5), Matt Smith and Steven Moffat have repeatedly said to look out for 5 things. I think I may have 3, The 3 I have is:

1) An Eye Ball - An Eye Ball that has stood out has been seen in the Eleventh Hour:

  • Amy and The Doctor's close up of their eyes when they look around in the corner of their eye.
  • The Atraxi's obvious Eye Ball.

- Victory of the Daleks:

  • The New Daleks Eye Stalk has a more realistic eye ball in its socket.

2) Red Telephone - A Red Telephone that has stood out has been seen in the Eleventh Hour:

  • A Red Telephone box located on the green of Leadworth

- The Beast Below:

  • A Red Telephone box seen in the back ground of the london market in Starship UK

- Victory of the Daleks:

  • There are many Telephones in the cabinet room and the one in the middle that stands out is the only red one which repeatedly rings thoughout the whole episode.

3) The Cracks - A Crack has been seen in all 3 episodes.

So could these be 3 of the 5 and if so what are the others?? Anyone else seen any other clues related to this topic only??? -- Michael Downey 20:54, April 17, 2010 (UTC).

Any Ideas?? -- Michael Downey 09:08, April 18, 2010 (UTC).

Here are some things people have posted in other threads (progressively less visual and more abstract):

  • The number "0" is of course all over The Eleventh Hour, and it also features prominently in The Beast Below (floor 0, etc.). I haven't watched Victory of the Daleks too carefully yet (having too much fun just watching the story, the first time through), but I didn't see any 0s--in fact, they avoided using a 0 for their big dramatic bomb-explosion countdown by using the color wheel.
  • The idea of a countdown--11s all over Eleventh Hour, Liz 10 in Beast Below. Again, I may have missed it, but I didn't see any prominent 9s in VotD.
  • "Silence" was pretty obvious in Eleventh Hour, and was mentioned in Beast Below, but again, I didn't notice it in VotD.
  • Time/history is somehow messed up. Rory's badge in Eleventh Hour, Amy's age being 2 years off visually vs. auditorily in the voting booth in Beast Below, and the blatant callout at the end of VotD all tie into this.

As for the phone--a red phone is not the same thing as a red phonebox. Especially in a show that's all about a phonebox. So, I don't know if that really counts. --99.37.227.199 09:19, April 18, 2010 (UTC)

Watching it again: No notable 0s. There is a countdown besides the color wheel thing, but it's from 30 rels, and we never hear 9. No silence. And the red phone is not the only one that rings; three phones ring, two are answered, and the only one that's used in the foreground, where we can hear what they're saying, is the green one. Having a red phone as the second most visible of 5 phones is not the same thing as prominently showing identical red phoneboxes in back-to-back episodes.

As for the eye--they do definitely zoom in on a closeup of the new-paradigm Dalek's eyestalk on first reveal, and they keep showing it. Not to mention that there are a lot more Dalek's-eye-view scenes than in most stories. So, you could be onto something there.

Two more things:

  • Packing suitcases. I'll have to rewatch Beast Below, but Amelia in the first episode and Bracewell in the third both pack a suitcase as soon as the Doctor disappears from view.
  • "There's something I've/we've forgotten"--that identical line appears in every episode. And it's called out pretty explicitly in the end of this one, and tied into the overarching story arc. Amy wants to know why he's worried, when it'll take the Daleks some time to rebuild their numbers, and he answers, "It's not that, there's something else. There's something we've forgotten. Or, rather, you have. You didn't know them, Amy. You'd never seen them before, and you should have done. You should." And then the TARDIS disappears, and the crack appears behind it. Can't get more blatant than that. --99.37.227.199 01:50, April 19, 2010 (UTC)

And one more: The Doctor is always late. He's making excuses for the TARDIS ("Type 40 TARDIS, still running her in"), and in the past he's often failed to be the most precise of temporal navigators, but it's strange that he's always late--never early, or in the wrong page--and that everyone calls him on it. --99.37.227.199 01:59, April 19,

2010 (UTC)

In response to above, well spotted with the packing suitcases, I spotted that too but nothing similar in TBB and I can't think of any meaning behind it other than simply taking stuff with you when you go somewhere else.
Also, if the Doctor was a month late in response to Churchill's phone call, why didn't Churchill ring again in the meantime ?
I've suggested elsewhere maybe the memory wipe in the voting booth accounts for Amy not remembering the Daleks.
Finally in response, admitedly not a blatant use of 9, but there were 9 Daleks in the episode, 6 new and 3 obliterated. Don't know if it ties in, but Amy's dream episode is 5 years later, and the Doctor is stranded for 4 days in the supposed Lodger episode.
And a new suggestion, towards the episodes ends the Doctor reappears from elsewhere to where Amy and others are having "tied up loose ends" but these are not specified. Any thoughts ? 86.26.137.154 04:37, April 19, 2010 (UTC)

There are only 5 new Daleks, but if you count Bracewell... you look desperate :P Cannon881 07:40, April 19, 2010 (UTC)

(No I was just tired and miscounted 1 of the oldies at 1 side on 1 of the stills, many thanks for putting me straight 86.26.137.154 09:23, April 25, 2010 (UTC))


There is the 20 minutes thing has been mentioned in all 3 episodes.

1. TEH: Easy to spot, 20 minutes to the end of the world.

2. TBB: Doctor says that amy's memory has been erased by roughly 20 minutes. Just after he enters the voting room and uses his screwdriver to examine the memory modification device ( looks like a light bulb)

3. VOTD: In the scene when doctor and amy talk to bracewell for the last time telling him they are just gonna pop into the tardis for this urgent thing and be right back. He says it might talk them , 10 minutes, then 15, then 20 and then half an hour.

Also 20 minutes is said by the doctor in all 3 episodes. Udbhav3000 12:52, April 20, 2010 (UTC)

Update: 20 minutes is also mentioned in Planet of the Dead, The doctor says that it will take 20 minutes for the swarm to reach the bus. (after the probe is eaten). Might be just a coincidence, but I am gonna look for it in the water of mars and end of time. as well. Udbhav3000 19:52, April 20, 2010 (UTC)

Another thing: Star Wars references--from the "Help me Obi-Wan, you're my only hope"-ish line to the scene in front of the giant space window right out of ESB to the Spitfires attacking the new and improved Death Star^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^HDalek Saucer after the Doctor (without even any Ewok help) takes down the shielding, each episode so far evokes the next Star Wars movie. (Which means, of course, that Jar-Jar will be with the Weeping Angels, right?) Anyway, I don't know if this is at all significant, or just a stylistic choice by Moffat and his directors, but it's hard to miss. --99.50.120.236 08:07, April 21, 2010 (UTC)


Concerning the countdown theory.

-11 is mentioned a lot of times in the Eleventh Hour

-10, a character in Beast Below is called Liz Ten

-9 When the soldier is surveying the rooftops during the evening in Victory of The Daleks, there are nine blimps in the sky, though this number decreases as the episode progresses.


Good catch, anonymous user (you should sign your posts with the 4 tildes or by clicking the Signature button in the edit bar thingy). Now I have to watch it again. After I watch the 4th episode again to look for 8s.... --99.50.120.236 05:36, April 25, 2010 (UTC)

OK, after rewatching episode 4:

  • No crack (except in the scenes from next time). Presumably this means that each of the 5 things only have to appear once in each story, not once in each individual episode, because this obviously has to be one of the 5. Which means that the failure of anything else to appear doesn't prove anything.
  • That also means that the countdown wouldn't run out in time for the finale: 11 in #1, 10 in #2, 9 in #3, 8 in #4/#5, 7 in #6, 6 in #7, 5 in #8/#9, 4 in #10, 3 in #11, 2 in #12/#13. Does that mean the countdown leads to the Christmas special? Or the adventure games (which we've been told count as #14-#17 in the series)?
  • One sort of "countdown" is the "10 little Indians" ways the clerics are picked off one by one. And there's no 8 involved. At the end, the clerics are "down to 4 men", and the wide shots clearly establish 7 people (the 4 clerics, including the Bishop, plus the Doctor, Amy, and River). Since 3 have died, this means we started with 7 clerics, and 10 total people. (Interestingly, you never see more than 5 clerics in any shot, and only 5 of them are named on screen--which would mean 8 total people if it were significant, but it can't be, because there are clearly 2 other clerics who just never get named but are still alive at the end. I'm guessing they're the "Pedro" and "Philip" that someone added to the cast list.)
  • The 4-second loop is also a sort of countdown, but it even more obviously fails to include an 8. (There's not even an "8" digit anywhere in the time shown in the corner.)
  • Eyes, definitely--the eyes are not the windows of the soul they are the doors, Amy's eyes, etc.
  • The closest thing to "There's something I've/we've forgotten" is "There's something wrong, I don't know what it is"/"Yeah, there's something wrong, don't know what it is yet either, working on it." Is that close enough?
  • There are all kinds of references to history being wrong--the museum is wrong about a bunch of things, there's something wrong with the book about the Angels, and of couse the River Song spoilers thing--but, unlike the first three episodes, this is all expected stuff, people being wrong about history, not something more meaningful.
  • No telephone box or telephone, red or otherwise.
  • No silence. (People being told to shut up is about as close as it gets.)
  • No 20 minutes. (I think "2 minutes" is mentioned at least twice, and so is "5 minutes" but neither is the same thing.)
  • No Star Wars.
  • No 0s.
  • No being late. --99.50.120.236 07:53, April 25, 2010 (UTC)
Good work!
The crack is OK, as in previous series the arc references were only ever mentioned in either part 1 OR part 2 of the 2 part stories not in both. So, we'll just have to see what else crops up next week.
There was a mention of '20', the Bishop states he has 20 clerics under his command, but so what?
What about missing the statues not having 2 heads, although not dialogued as such it is still an example of something being missed or ignored or overlooked initially.
86.26.137.154 09:23, April 25, 2010 (UTC)
Found an 8 in The Time of Angels: Father Octavian (oct as in octopus, meaning 8) -- Dragonfree 09:43, April 25, 2010 (UTC)
Well done, you just beat me to it, just realised same thing while typing another post 86.26.137.154
There is a crack on the TV with the recording of the angel which only started to appear when the angel starts moving: http://img532.imageshack.us/img532/2195/screencrack.jpg
it can be seen on most close-ups of the screen; it's clearer on the right hand side of the screen. However on this screen cap on the left hand side the crack is barely visable but it's there if you watch the scene through again. 195.93.21.7 10:09, April 25, 2010 (UTC) Andrewken
It isn't in the pattern of the cracks, though... -- Dragonfree 10:19, April 25, 2010 (UTC)
For "the crack is OK", as I said, the fact that it wasn't present this week but is in scenes from next week is fine, but that also implies that the absence of any other story-arc-thingy this week doesn't mean anything.
The "20" thing was supposed to be about having 20 minutes to do something in each episode, so, yeah, 20 Clerics doesn't seem to mean anything.
Missing the two heads is exactly what the "There's something wrong, I don't know what it is" that I mentioned. There's also the somewhat similar line "What's wrong with this book?" (or something like that--I didn't write that one down). But the previous episodes had identical wording (except for the substitution of "we" for "I"), and this one doesn't.
The "Octavian" is a great catch. No idea how I missed that--I was so busy trying to think of how it could possibly be a sacred name for a Christian group that I didn't even think of the meaning.... --Falcotron 10:30, April 25, 2010 (UTC)

Okay the crack is definately one i'm sure of that. (ive read somewhere that the moffster said that the crack is definatly one of the 5 things and we'd have to figure out the rest.

The second i believe is something to do with 0 (i've only seen the first 2 episodes being in Australia) but prisoner 0 in the first episode and floor zero/ the boy getting a zero in TBB.

Now im not sure if this is right or even close but there have been rumours of possibly the Rani returning and on the starship UK, i'm not sure if anyone else noticed this but one of the letters that was flickering( and quite closely zoomed in on) was a capital R and possibly we might be given the a, n and i throughout the series.

I think the fourth might be a distruption in time. The doctor was 12 years late than 2 in TEH than in the 3rd episode i know the doctor arrives a month late however he is quite often last for when hes planning but not usually when hes going to see someone on personal invitation.

Have no idea about the other one unfortunately. But i looked at the picture above and great work noticing the crack however i doubt it is one of the ones we are supposed to be looking for if u search the wiki for either the crack or the cracks u will see that every single crack is exactly the same shape and this ones totally different.

Also i believe that the doctor saying hes forgotten something is more of a hint for us to look not one of the 5 we need to look for or possibly something to do with the doctors memory. In TEH he forgot to give the man his phone back or thank him or anything and in TBB he forgot to say goodbye and stuff but i think he did expalin that.

Any opinions

A lot of this stuff is covered above. I know this is a long thread, but it's worth reading what others have found and/or suggested. For one thing, it'll give you ideas of what to watch out for when you watch Victory of the Daleks whenever it reaches Oz, and having more eyes searching for 0s, etc. can't hurt.
Also, you should sign your forum posts with four tildes (or just click the Signature button, which does the same thing).
Anyway, as for your ideas:
  • Cracks: everyone agrees here.
  • Rani: There are always rumors of the Rani returning, and I don't think they're any more likely this season than in the past. But you could be on to something with the spelling thing. Now I have to go back and watch all 4 episodes again. (Darn! :))
  • 0: Dealt with above. Nobody's (yet) found any significant 0s in Victory of the Daleks or Time of the Angels.
  • Disruption in time/being late: These have been raised as separate issues, rather than the same, and found in all of the first three episodes. Nobody's (yet) found anything relevant in Angels, but that's OK, because it's the first of a two-parter (at least RTD's arc hints came once per story, not once per episode).
  • Forgetting: I think in TBB (yeah, have to watch it again...) he didn't forget to say goodbye, he explicitly chose not to say goodbye. But "There's something I've forgotten", "There's something I've forgotten", "There's something we've forgotten" in the first 3 episodes seems pretty significant. (I don't think "There's something wrong, I don't know what it is" is close enough, but again, two-parter.) --Falcotron 11:55, April 25, 2010 (UTC)

I think your with him choosing not to say goodbye something about gives a better story. Its now obvious that forgetting something is either one of the five or has something to do with the arc i'm just trying to think what it is. I might have to watch the end of time again i think it might have something to do with that otherwise it originates from TEH cuz thats when he first started mentioning it and because he says we aswell as I.


Just thought of something. A silent menace will follow the doctor and amy through their travels right and he has forgotten something. Possibly has something to do with Rory's phone he transmitted the 0 virus for the atraxi to find but never gave rory his phone back as he rushed straight of to the TARDIS and hasnt seen Rory since maybe a silent menace could be tracing the phone. BTW thaks for the tip on signing.Doctor Sivart 13:07, April 25, 2010 (UTC)