Theory:Doctor Who television discontinuity and plot holes/The Curse of Fenric

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This page is for discussing the ways in which The Curse of Fenric 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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• Audrey has a Super Ted.

According to the DVD commentary, this was in fact a a knitted toy with a similar colour scheme

• Commander Millington's moustache - Royal Navy officers were required to have either a full beard and moustache or else to be clean shaven.

Millington might very well have adopted this non-regulation look as part of his dubious psychological warfare tactics, emulating Hitler's appearance as his office emulates the Nazi cipher room. Bearing in mind the dictatorial authority he wields over everyone at the base but Judson (who is so lax about regulations that he even overlooks the Doctor's blatant forgery of War Office documents), it is not hard to imagine him getting away with this small infringement.

• The English captain is surprisingly ready to join forces with the Russians he was trying to execute only a few hours ago.

He has just witnessed his commander in conference with a reanimated corpse and a giant mutant sea-vampire, plotting to bring about Ragnarok. This is bound to shake up anyone's priorities in unpredictable ways.

Worth mentioning, however, that the Russians were on the British side of the Second World War, as is made clear by Ace. The captain may think his commander's a nutcase (he is hesitant to carry out his orders earlier).

• The Russians speak nothing but English after the first sequence, even to the point of death.

This isn't really an error, but somewhat standard televisual "grammar". Many other films and television series — like The Hunt for Red October, have characters speaking in their native tongue at one point in the narrative, who then switch over to English for the majority of the story. Just because the audience hears English shouldn't be confused with what the soldiers were actually speaking. Doctor Who often has non-English-speaking characters using English, even when that use of English can't easily be explained as a function of the translation circuit or other translation devices. It's not necessarily an error for an English-language television programme to have its characters speaking in English.

Except that early in the story, the Russian leader tells his troops to use "English only from now on" so that the subtitles can stop.

The principle still broadly applies. It's just easier and more convenient for everyone if the Russian characters actually speak English throughout the story, since the writers don't want to have to learn Russian to make sure they're writing out dialogue correctly, it will save on translators having to write subtitles and the audience, for the most part, doesn't want to be constantly taken out of the story to check the subtitles so they can follow what the characters are saying. Sorin telling his men to speak in English from now on basically just the writers telling the audience "We know you probably don't want to be reading subtitled translations all story, here you go, now don't worry about it and let's just get on with things."

• How do the Russians expect to get away with the huge Ultima machine in their little dinghy?

As is made clear in the script, the Russians aren't planning to steal the entire Ultima machine, just its core, i.e. the small sliding-out section with the rotors and poison canister inside. The rest of the mechanism can be duplicated by technicians in the USSR.

• In what version of chess is the black and white pawns joining forces a legitimate move?

The game has been set in a way whereupon a draw is almost a guaranteed result, unless one player makes a suicidal move. By "joining forces", it means that white will make the suicidal move as long as black returns the compliment at some point, meaning the game can reach a conclusion.

Alternatively, does it need to be legitimate? One could take the "Red Dwarf" view that it is precisely the ability of humans (and Time Lords) to cheat that gives them the edge over more powerful but literal-minded beings. Though evil (at least by the standards of non-eldritch horrors) Fenric seems to have the standard "Who" defect of lack of imagination / lateral thinking, forcing him into a Movellan-esque impasse when he cannot out-think his opponent ... until he has been informed that his opponent has been extremely flexible with the standard rules.