Doctor Who Series 10: 7 Big Questions We're Asking After 'The Lie Of The Land'
4. Where Have The Time Lords Gone This Time?
Many fans have quite rightly pointed out the similarities between The Lie of the Land and the series three finale, when the Earth was under the influence of another deceptively benign force in the shape of the Master and the Archangel Network. There was even a nod to the title of the Russell T Davies episode when the Doctor introduces Missy to Bill as “the other Last of the Time Lords.”
But with the re-emergence of Gallifrey, last seen in Hell Bent, the meta-joke has caused a fair bit of head scratching. The fate of the Time Lords was reversed after the Doctor’s incarnations combined forces to rewrite time and protect Gallifrey in a pocket universe (The Day of the Doctor). The Doctor set upon a new mission: to find home the long way around.
The Time Lords came knocking, through the crack in the wall (The Time of the Doctor) and granted the Doctor a new set of regenerations before the fracture in time and space sealed. In an off-screen adventure, somehow the Time Lords escape from the pocket universe and move Gallifrey to the end of the universe. But when the Doctor finally got to walk on Gallifreyan sand again (Hell Bent), he felt betrayed and angered by his people, having spent billions of years trapped inside the Confession Dial.
As far as we know then, the Master and the Doctor are no longer the last of the Time Lords. It would be ridiculous to suggest the Doctor’s line is a continuity error, so either he is lying to keep their existence hidden from Missy, or he is so ashamed of what he found that he is in denial and has written them out of his head-canon, just as he did the War Doctor.