Theory:Doctor Who television discontinuity and plot holes/The Beast Below

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This page is for discussing the ways in which The Beast Below 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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• At the begining of the Beast Below, when Timmy (the boy who scored zero) entered the lift the Smiler had a happy face in two shots. in the next shot of the Smiler, it had a sad face, butwhen the head turns, it turns form a happy face, to a sad face, and then of course a angry face. If this delibrate? Or a simple mistake?

It is deliberate. It is meant to be strange and they all do that.

How is it deliberate?

• There was only one star whale which saved Starship UK, so what happened to the other starships?

As Liz's recorded message refers to other nations leaving before the Whale arrived, it seems the UK was the only one unable to leave on its own.

• Why is the Doctor surprised that the ship is moving even though there are no engines running? It's a spaceship. The law of inertia means it only needs engines to accelerate or steer.

I think it's because of the speed that the starship is moving. I don't know my physics... but I guess it couldn't slow down while in space since there isn't any friction? Now I'm thinking that the big issue is gravity--how would the ship be able to produce a gravity field without an engine? Or any other life support system.

You guys are missing the point. Without engines, how could it take off? That's what the Doc didn't get.

No, no, you're missing the point. According to Newton's first law, a spaceship does not need it's engines on to move, just to accelerate. They could turn off the engines once they accelerated to a certain speed. Perhaps the doctor noticed that they were accelerating without engines, as this could be felt on deck or observed on the TARDIS. The fact that Liz 10 would notice the acceleration is more surprising, as they are presumably accelerating very slowly, as there are no visible effects of acceleration. (Have you ever felt yourself get pushed back into your seat when you accelerate in your car?) There are most likely signs of acceleration, but one would have to be extremely observant. The glass of water would also be a good medium through which to observe acceleration. But Liz 10, who we can assume lived on board for a very, very, long time (if not her whole life) would probably assume any acceleration to be regular, and not know a world where acceleration is not present.

Perhaps the acceleration was why they had 'gravity'.

Perhaps it is travelling faster than the speed of light, which is outside of current physics and might require a continuously running engine.

• In the pre-titles sequence the boy who scored zero is not allowed to use the lift-like systems. He does disobeying the law and thus he is sent below to feed the beast. It is established that the Beast never eats children so he survives. It is stated that anyone who disobeys the law is sent below to feed the beast e.g. the Doctor and Amy. But why would the Starship UK have laws stating that zeros couldn't use the lifts. Additionally why would disobeying such a meagre law be punishable by such a severe way. To sum up, why is the police state so concerned over one child getting a zero?

Not everyone was aware that it never ate the children, and Starship UK was a morphed world with a twisted government. That is why they did things in such strange ways, they knew little to not better until the Doctor arrived.

He's a "person of limited value" - they're on a starship, "back to basics", and have decided that he would take too many resources to support, and instead try to use him to feed the beast.

• Why does the UK need a starship to survive? They didn't seem to have any particular destination planned, and they had been going for 300 years without arriving at a planet or anything, so why not just build a Space Station U.K.?

They needed a Starship to survive the solar flares roasting the Earth. As for why they didn't set up on another planet; that implies that space was availiable. Other races may not have had the space or resources to put up an entire planet's/countries' population, and they may have lacked the resources or were unable to find a suitable planet for colonisation. As for why they didn't just have a Space Station, Starship U.K is one, more or less. Why have a static and vurnerable spaceship when you've got a suitable means of propulsion?