#rtd when i catch you
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Doctor Who: s04e13, "Journey's End"
[voice of rtd] hey what if your best friend in the whole entire universe absorbed a fractured piece of your consciousness to save you (and whole of reality) from total destruction? and what if she was human—too desperately, brilliantly, tragically human—and the searing, deadly heat of all that knowledge was too much for her mind to bear? and what if the only way to pull her back from the edge of annihilation involved wiping all memory of you from her mind? and what if she could never be allowed to remember you? but as long as she was out there, somewhere, alive, then that was enough. then that had to be enough, because what other choice is there? and what if the story ends as it always does, as it always has— with you, in an empty spaceship, alone, at the edge of the universe?
...
would that be fucked up or WHAT? hahaha
#rtd when i catch you#doctor who#dw#dw spoilers#doctor who spoilers#thank god for the children in need specials#doctordonna#tentoo#tenth doctor#the tenth doctor#donna noble#journey's end#dw angst#doctorwhogifs#doctor who gifs#doctor who angst#my gifs#my writing#david tennant#catherine tate#flash warning#flashing gif#flashing cw#tw flashing#gifs#flashing lights
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I try to not make everything about Human Nature/Family of Blood but then Donna Noble said “Sometimes I have dreams about impossible things.” And suddenly it’s all about it again…
#when I catch you rtd rtd when i catch you…#doctor who#dr who#donna noble#fourteenth doctor#david tennant#catherine tate
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Doctor Who was bad :(
#Ncuti Gatwa slayed so hard in an episode that could have been designed in a lab to make it impossible for him to slay#RTD when I catch you.
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Doctor Who report!! We are all caught up with NuWho and in time to watch the new season when it comes out!! mission accomplished, It took us around 6 months total and we loved every minute of it 🥰
Now that we have watched all eras I can share our tastes and opinions nobody asked for under the cut 😌
We can confidently say RTD's era is our favourite and for Doctors 10 (and 14) followed by 12, but honestly there isn't a single Doctor (or Master!) that we didn't love.
We've also started rewatching the first four seasons now with more context and there is just something so special about them. They almost feel like a different show from all the later ones. The silliness and the way the story doesn't take itself seriously at all until all of a sudden it does and then the pain hits you twice as hard because of it. How with just with a line or deed and it's implications the Doctor can be so unbelievably inspiring. The way the narrative seems to place you in the role of a companion trying to catch up with the Doctor and figure him out yet never quite managing to do so creates this distance but also admiration and reverence in you too and you can't help but adore him flaws and all. It has just the right amount of room for every side character and relationship to develop and feel human and the right amount of exposition to keep the pace quick and don't hold your hand. The glimpses behind the doctor's cheerful childish façade into an unsettling calculating alienness and immeasurable trauma but also a weary wisdom. The complete selflessness to the point of martyrdom. The reckless irresponsible acts of devotion from both the companions and the Doctor. The near apotheosis of the companions the closer they get to him. The contagious feeling of awe and wonder and hope for life. The way it's so unabashedly centered around love of every kind 😭 ARGHH I don't know man there is nothing like it!! Ultimate comfort show for us, just.. healing really. There is so much more I can say and gush about but I'd be here typing all day so I'll draw more about it instead!! We would also like to get started on classic Who soon! and try to get our hands on the audio episodes and comic books and all the extra stuff as well 😊
We also watched more David Tennant works since the last report!
Blackpool was hilarious, infuriating and horny, the singing was a choice but overall so fun!! The Escape Artist was great, very sad and tense, would have loved for it to be longer, these miniseries are always so good but so short!! Mad to be Normal is so underrated? we enjoyed it a lot!! RD Laing's portrayal was so compelling, it's beautifully shot and the 60's setting is really immersive and well done. Einstein and Eddington was also really good, incredibly accurate historical setting!! the costuming was fantastic, one of the best I've seen!! These last two films are biographical and sort of no plot just vibes so maybe this is why they are not everyone's cup of tea but we enjoyed them very much. David just never misses, I'm sure we can watch anything with him in it and we will love it no matter what lmao what a guy 😭
Anyway that's all for now! I hope you are all doing well, spring/autumn is almost here! best bits of the year 😊
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seen some people being like oh lots of people just haven’t liked anything since the tenth doctor and too many people are too nostalgic for when rtd was around and nothing else will ever satisfy those people and as someone with a strong preference for rtd and the 9th/10th doctors…
did y’all not see what the show was doing to women w amy and river song and clara
did you not
did you
did you miss that
did you glance over the downright awful vibes
because i stopped watching a little bit of the way into 12 cause it was just too much!! and i have returned now because the return of david tennant and rtd meant, to me, that the show would be comfortable again. and it is. and i will be watching the fifteenth doctor, but i frankly don’t think i’ll be catching up or reviewing my notes on matt smith tbh
i just think those comments are weird because a lot of them imply that people only prefer earlier seasons of new who for nostalgic reasons, which totally overlooks the weird attitude toward women that stephen moffat brought to the show.
#you’re welcome for this mini essay#doctor who#fourteenth doctor#tenth doctor#dw#fifteenth doctor#rtd#david tennant
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Rose Tyler Character Analysis
Ah so Rose Tyler.
Rose " you like my gun?" Tyler who arguably, is one of the most important characters of the RTD era. A character so influential, that the narrative takes the time to mourn her absence and was single handedly responsible for bringing the series back from the dead.
She's so controversial. You either really love her or hate her, and I think that in itself is a testament to how well she is written. Because she left an impact, and that's not an easy thing to do in a series that has been around for so long
With that in mind though, I find that she is also the character that most people tend to misinterpret a lot. Often framing her in a bad light, rather than with the nuance required to understand her.
That being said I'm about to analyze the shit out of her character as well as some of her main relationships so if you love her, great I do too! Let's be friends! And if you don't, that's a shame but hopefully the way I interpret her journey will help you better understand why others do:)
I must stress that this is my interpretation but feel free to let me know if you saw a scene differently than me! Love reading alternate interpretations, me
Rose Marion Tyler is introduced to us in the first season of Nuwho as an ordinary girl. She has a job, a boyfriend, and a mother but from the way we are introduced to these facets of her life, we get the impression that she isn't necessarily someone that seeks to have anything more. She fits right in with said life and from an outside perspective, one can even argue that she seems content with it.
However it's in the moment where we see her come face to face with the impossible, that we really see who she is as a person.
When confronted with a group of living mannequins that slowly creep towards her , alone I must add, her reaction is one that is quite strange. Here she is, looking to fulfill a task in a completely dodgy and empty area below her workplace and when she sees something odd, she doesn't show fear. She doesn't scream, no on the contrary, she begins to try to rationalize what is happening in a manner that makes sense to her. Never one to assume danger, even when it is painfully obvious that there might be something strange happening.
That is when she meets the Doctor. A man unfamiliar and strange that saves her life right before she too succumbs to the threat. Thus, treating us to our first glimpse into the dynamic between our two leads.
She is visibly put off. Perhaps a little afraid but she asserts that the incident was nothing more than a prank. Something harmless and silly, even though it is quite obvious to us that that is not the case. It's this manner of viewing the incident that catches his attention however.
"Very clever, nice trick. Who are they then, students? Is this a student thing or what?"
"Why would they be students?"
"I don't know!"
"Well you said it, why students?"
"Cause to get that many people dressed up and being silly, they got to be students"
I find this interaction so interesting because it says a lot about her perspective. She doesn't assume the mob meant any harm. In fact, she goes out of her way to make up an even more incredulous scenario to justify their innocence, even when it is obvious that that is not the case.
It shows nativity, but there's an underlying level of optimism there as well.
It is here where she finds out that Wilson is dead, and we see her react with concern. But notice, she doesn't assume he had anything to do with it.
Rather it's his tone that rubs her the wrong way, and she confronts the Doctor. Chastising him about joking about something so awful and even when he interrupts, she doesn't stop her pursuit for an explanation.
She is on the move right behind him, asking more questions that only seem to have more confusing answers. Following in spite of how absolutely bat shit his explanations are.
In this brief interaction, we see some of the most crucial aspects of her character. Her bravery, curiosity, and stubborn nature that allow her to remain by his side, long enough that he has to physically stop her and tell her to go home.
It is this blatant show of her character that prompts him to ask for her name.
Because here she is, confronted with the impossible yet she doesn't just stand to the side in shock. No, instead she chooses to engage with the Doctor. Trying to find a reason for what is happening, or in other words, a solution even if it's at the expense of her own well-being.
It's when we see her recovering at home, that the initial veil of an ordinary and perfect life is uncovered. Jackie is too busy on the phone to really offer any emotional support to her daughter. Gossiping on the phone about the incident, and in the minute a break presents itself, she uses that time to criticize her for not taking advantage of the situation.
I must stress that this interaction isn't included to say that Jackie is a horrible mother, quite the opposite, but she is human. RTD goes to show you that no one is perfect. That even the most well intended individual is flawed, and that everyone has their strengths and weaknesses. This is important to keep in mind when analyzing the relationships between the characters.
Even though Jackie doesn't show her support through words, she still takes the time to give her tea as she is sitting. She is doing the best she can under the circumstances in which she's in. She's conscious that their financial situation isn't ideal, and so by telling her that she should have asked for compensation, this is not to show that she is greedy, but rather it's her way of showing that she cares. That at the very least, her daughter can secure herself some money for experiencing the traumatic incident.
It shows that she's a realist, someone who views the world through a cynical lens and prioritizes survival above all else.
Similarly we meet Mickey, and he is a bit more emotional to an exaggerated degree. Showing physically that he cares with a hug and going out of his way to fuss and dote over her, but this overblown affection seems to make her uncomfortable. As if to show that she doesn't like being the center of attention, and that they are making her feel helpless at the expense of their concern.
Understanding her need for a distraction, he offers to take her to the pub but it's not long before she catches on to his true intentions. Granted he does appear to be genuine in his goal, but it's not an activity she would enjoy and so she tells him to just go alone.
Now similar to the previous point I made about the characters being flawed, that applies here too. The relationship she has with Mickey is not perfect. Mickey is trying to play the role of a perfect boyfriend. He is showering her in love and support, but we quickly see that his motivations are not completely selfless. That really that overblown affection he is showing at the moment, is an act. We see this happen again later when he tries to put on this front that he's her protector in front of Clive, but she shuts that down too. Not because she doesn't love him or appreciate the concern, but because it's not him, and this front he puts on sometimes results in him ignoring what she actually needs.
He assumes he knows what's best for her without taking into account that she might not agree. It's only when he shows that playful nature we saw earlier in the intro that Rose seems responsive to him. As if to show that it's when he's acting like himself, that she appreciates his company. Because what she needs at the moment is not for them to dictate what she should do, she just needs them to respect her decision to move on.
When he leaves, we finally see that the comfort she derives from him is really from the friendly banter they have. At the core of their relationship, is a friendship.
I find that way too many people tend to assume that everything Mickey does comes from a place of ill intent, and that is just not true. He's a person, and he too has his own motivations and emotions that may not always align with those around him. That doesn't make him a bad partner, just a flawed one.
When she wakes up, we see that yet again, she is subjected to more fussing from her mother but it is in this interaction that something interesting about Jackie is revealed.
Jackie claims that her prior job at the mall was giving her "airs and graces" and this is something she tends to bring up later too, when she feels herself becoming more distant from her daughter.
This is a reflection of Jackie's own insecurities, not Rose's actual attitude.
Whenever she sees Rose find a piece of the world to call her own, she tends to put it down. Not because she hates seeing her succeed, but because she fears that once she finds something better she'll leave her behind. That she will have to experience loss once more, at the expense of her daughter rather than her husband all that long ago.
Now this is an assumption that on her part, I'd argue, is a bit unfair given that Rose doesn't ever really show to resent where she comes from. (in Tooth and Claw, she is even named "Dame Rose of the Powell Estate". Which shows that she is not really one to shy away from her background) Nor does she believe herself to be better than anyone, but Jackie uses it often because she knows it elicits a reaction out of her. She's grown so used to having her around, that now she can't fathom living without her and resorts to hurting her as a means of keeping her close.
It's an attachment to her daughter that at times, can prove to be stunting to Rose's development but ties back to the long lasting grief she feels at losing Pete. Again this is not an intentional thing she does, but it is a flaw that exists and shows up when they butt heads.
(I stress this point because I've noticed that this Era of Doctor who in particular has many instances where characters declare something, only for it to be a false conclusion. It's vital that one considers not only the words, but the actions of said characters. To read into their words, rather than to take it a face value. I will be doing a lot of that here, case in point)
Rose often has to put up boundaries with Jackie. Not because she doesn't love her, but because the extent of her love and attachment can be overbearing to the point that it interferes with her life. They have survived so long by functioning as a unit, but now it's time for Rose to prioritize her own feelings and that in turn scares Jackie.
I must stress that Rose is still so young, only 19. For her to have the maturity to know how to handle her mother as well as handle the household (we see her fussing over the cat flap, demonstrating that she is constantly aware of the circumstances they live in) shows that she had to grow up fast. Being constantly aware of adult concepts such as finances and the death of a parent from a young age, tends to do that to a kid.
Now skip ahead to when nine stumbles upon her home, and she manhandles him inside lol. She takes control of the situation, offers him a cup of tea and asks him to accompany her to the police station so that they can both handle the situation.
I must stress, once again, that she has no reason to assume he's a good person. For all she knows, he could have purposefully caused the explosion to kill them all. But no, she assumes that he was just a victim like herself and aims to bring closure to the incident.
Rose is someone that assumes the best in people. We see this time and time again with how she interacts with those around her. When she is talking about the body that was found, she assumes it's Wilson and talks about how sorry she is that it happened to him and that he was a nice bloke (even though her face tells the opposite lol).
She is kind. It's in her nature to care for and care about others. It's because of this that she is able to get through to the Doctor when he tries to leave again.
So she insists that he tell her what's going on, and continues to pursue him while making conversation. At one point he asks if she believes him and she admits that she doesn't, but nonetheless she continues listening.
A kind act she then does for Clive, which suggests that the reason why she stays is because she recognizes that everyone wants to be heard. That to be acknowledged, means to finally feel validated. Something that seems to be absent from her life, given how often both Mickey and Jackie tend to dominate conversations regarding her decisions.
She gives him the space to joke around, to add levity to the discussion but the moment he confesses that he is alone she stops it.
Because she is concerned now. He, a complete stranger yet she offers him the patience to go at his own pace. All while, she is firm in her pursuit for an answer but not at the expense of upsetting him.
This is why they work.
She has the emotional intelligence that he lacks. She challenges him by offering a perspective that completely goes against his own. And when he's being insensitive or too focused on the big picture of things, she is able to put him in his place. Reel him back in and set him straight again.
(I did a more in depth analysis on the 9th doctor here if you're interested!)
It isn't until after she leaves Clive that we see her actually start to reconsider the direction that her life is going in. Because now more than ever, she realizes just how narrow her perception of the world really is. How insignificant her life is, in the grand scope of the universe.
She reminisces, talking about how she could go back to school now that she has the extra time to spend. Another decision, mind, that was done on behalf of someone else and she is starting to regret.
She asks for Mickey's opinion but him not actually being him, isn't able to give his input and changes the subject.
"I'm sorry, was I talking about me for a second?"
Her offense is something that stands out to me, however.
Based on prior interactions, one can come to the conclusion that Rose is not as open as she appears to be at first glance. When Mickey attempted to appease her by offering her the space to talk about the explosion, she shut him down and later on refused to include him in her meeting with Clive. She even went as far as to lie about her prior involvement with the Doctor to her mother. Which in turn suggests that it's not often that she has aspects of her life that are solely hers and so, when she finds something, she keeps it to herself.
This could be due to a number of reasons, but I suspect it is because of the company she keeps around.
Her mother criticizes her job and asks her to change it, and Mickey dissuades her decision to go looking for Clive. She keeps things close to her chest because she's aware that the people in her life won't often support them.
Then the Doctor interrupts, and Mickey is revealed to be a clone. Panic arises but her being the selfless person she is, presses the fire alarm as a means of ensuring that more people won't get hurt. This also shows one of her biggest strengths as a character, she is incredibly clever. Even though she dropped out of school at a young age, she has a knack for finding solutions with very little resources. She's sharp and has a level headed approach that makes her perfect for a crisis.
It also shows that she has a habit of putting others before herself, because before Mickey even attacked, she was already standing next to the button.
Her compassion, bravery, and quick thinking are what ultimately drive her to save the Doctor's life. Because I'm spite of being in trouble himself, he pleads that she save herself at the price of his own life. Proving to her, that he is not responsible for the death follows him. And in turn she realizes that the life she is living is truly stunting her, because it's her putting faith into her own capabilities that allows her to save him.
That she, just like the Doctor, is capable of doing something beyond what she thought was out of her reach.
That she is free to live a life not constrained by the ordinary.
Now I'll skip ahead to the big decision; the one that seals her fate as his companion and a decision I often see people misunderstand. The decision to stay with the Doctor is not one that comes easily. Her initial rejection of his request is one that displays her hesitance.
Note that it is not because she doesn't want to, that much is evident from the way she's gazing longingly at the Tardis. But because Mickey's pleading is getting to her. He is latching onto her, metaphorically and literally; not taking the time to consider how she might feel about the opportunity.
He does not trust that she knows what's best, which is made evident in the way he often doubts her.
Up until now Rose has been someone that puts everyone above herself when it comes to making decisions. She has to consider their feelings, to the point that she feels the need to hide things from them.
Her mother.
Mickey.
And now she's going to let them snub out that little spark she just discovered she has.
It's because of this that she thanks Mickey before she leaves. Because it's his helplessness that helps her realize how fit for a life of thrills she is. While he was cowering, she in turn was thriving in the danger.
Him doing nothing but clinging to her, made her realize that she is capable of doing so much more than what she could do at his side. That she has the potential to save many lives and make a difference in the world.
So she leaves.
She is not angry at him when she does, quite the opposite, it's him being true to himself in a crisis that puts things into perspective.
The next episode makes her confront the reality of the path she has chosen.
He takes her to the end of the world and she realizes that her role is not to stop the inevitable. The Doctor is not someone that is responsible for preventing bad things from occurring, no, he is a witness to them just like she is.
This confession comes with the loaded realization that not every adventure will end happily. That death is not something that can be avoided and that the Doctor is not a hero. This shows her naivety, and through this adventure, she begins to lose some of it.
She freaks out at seeing the "relics" of the human race. All things she is familiar with, yet, it comes with the startling realization that everyone is dead.
That she is the last of her kind alive.
So she runs.
In spite of it all being such a shock to her, however, she still has the ability to reach out to someone. Finding comfort in talking to an alien by the name of Rufalo, and asking for her name and background. Extending kindness to someone that she doesn't have to, because it in turn brings her happiness. It shows she is someone that cares for others, regardless of what they look like. That at her core, she is kind and considerate.
One of my favorite scenes that perfectly demonstrates this point is an underrated scene where she talks to a plant. She previously observed that one of the aliens that initially greeted her is a tree descendant that gifts her a piece of her grandfather, and she addresses it shyly.
"Hello, my name's Rose, that's a sort of plant. We might be related..I'm talking to a twig."
It's played for laughs but it demonstrates that her ability to want to understand others comes from a place of wanting to relate to them. She talks to the tree with respect and views it as an equal before realizing that it's just that, a twig.
When the Doctor finds her and begins to appease her by making jokes at the expense of the aliens, she once again surprises him with her reaction.
She gets offended.
All on behalf of the deep south aliens that cannot defend themselves in the current moment from his scrutiny, because she is able to humanize them. To see them as people, in spite of the obvious differences they may have.
This suggests that Rose's first instinct when out of her element, is to try to understand and sympathize.
That way of being, is what causes her to turn her questions on him.
Why he is so quick to judge others.
Why he is able to maintain that sense of levity as he sees the world burn.
And why he seems so touchy about his background.
Something that I wish to add, because we have an instance of this happening in this episode, is that her need to understand others might be rooted in the perception others seem to have of her. People tend to diminish her value because of how she looks. In this episode, Jabe, the tree lady presumes that Rose is the doctor's concubine or even a prostitute. This is why she gets offended and tells them both off.
(This happens a lot more than I realized on my first watch, and a lot of people write it off as her being jealous when that's not the case. That isn’t to say that she doesn’t display some jealousy at times, but it genuinely does not occur as often as people claim it does)
This is also why Cassandra gets under her skin so much. Because she presumes that Rose is inferior and looks down on others but that alone is not enough to justify her being killed. She makes that clear when she pleads for the Doctor to save her.
We also get some insight on why her dad's death left such an impact on her. It's brief but while watching the earth melt away, she says this:
"it's gone, we're too busy saving ourselves no one saw it go. All those years, all that history and nobody was even looking."
Even though she didn't know him personally, the fact that he died alone is something that deeply troubles her. To anyone else he was just a man, yet to her and her mother he was a father, someone that was meant to be a part of her life. He should have had someone there, just like how the earth deserved to be remembered in its final moments by those who personally lived in it. To die without anyone you care for acknowledging your importance must be haunting.
The reason why she stays with the Doctor is for the same reason why the tragedy of her father's death deeply affected her, she doesn't want him to be alone. Loneliness can be so terrible. Had it not been for the Doctor being with her, she would have felt overwhelmed by the weight of the world's end. It's having him there that made the pain bearable. She understands this, and so, she takes it upon herself to be the person he has to look his way. To be the hand he has to hold when everything becomes too much.
But the question remains, to what extents is she willing to go to ensure that he will be okay?
Gradually we see Rose become more confident in her ability to command and reason. She no longer hesitates to step in and offer her perspective, all while she continues to extend her kindness to others. This at times, clashes with the Doctor's own priorities but nonetheless his exposure to her has an effect.
It is in the episode Dalek however, where that kindness takes on a new form, a merciful killing. Up until now Rose has been the one to tell the Doctor to give the perpetrators a second chance. To see the good in others even when it's difficult.
But now this creature that has killed many, is changing. It's growing aware, disturbed, and it's all because of her. She stops the doctor from killing it, but now the creature wants to die. It does not want to become like her. It does not want to become so human that it becomes aware of all it's done and how lonely it is.
For the first time, she is made to confront that her kindness might have just condemned someone to a more miserable end. That humanity is not something that every creature strives for, and that at times the kind decision comes with a price.
So she does what it asks, and orders it to die. Saving the Doctor from sullying his hands with more blood but at the price of her own becoming unclean. Are these the depths to which she would go to ensure the Doctor's wellbeing?
The next two episodes explore what happens when Rose underestimates her ability to make mistakes.
She's become more confident, taking along Adam to their next adventure because she believes she has a good judge of character. Plus he’s kind of pretty, so that’s a plus for her lol
She wants to be the impressive one now and share that wonder for the universe with someone else. To see what it looks like from the perspective of a new pair of eyes, because to her it has all become kind of normal.
The price of understanding the Doctor more, is that it comes at the price of her humanity. She will no longer be able to sustain her naivety towards how cruel the world can be. It will become harder to judge when she is viewing things in a rational human way, or through the eyes of someone that has grown desensitized to the chaos.
In retrospect, I don't think it's a coincidence she is wearing red here. She has now witnessed a death at her hands, and she is trying to regain control. To remember what it's like to view the world through the eyes of someone normal like Adam.
With time, she will grow to be a stranger amongst other humans. She will have a harder time relating to others because her understanding of the world far surpasses there’s.
Oh but Adam is not like her. Because she assumes everyone is well intentioned, she fails to realize that he might hold ulterior motives. When he fails her, she realizes that she is also capable of making a bad call. That the Doctor is holding her to a standard and if she makes a mistake like Adam, she too can be left behind.
Father's day is where we finally see her make a misstep and it's one hell of a problem. Her initial goal was to be there for her father and comfort him in his final moments, but she realizes quickly that seeing it is far more disturbing than she had initially anticipated.
He's her father. Seeing him die once is bad enough, but twice? All while fully aware that she can easily prevent it? It's a temptation that is far too great to pass up. But quickly she realizes her mistake and she can't think rationally, she is far too emotional to reason with.
"but he's alive,"
"my entire planet died, my whole family. Do you think it never occurred to me to go back and save them?"
"but it's not like I've changed history, not much. I mean he's never gonna be a world leader. He's not gonna start world war 3 or anything"
"Rose there's a man alive in the world who wasn't alive before. An ordinary man. That's the most important thing in creation."
She overestimated what she understood about travelling in time. She realizes this, but her pride will not let her stand down. She wrongly uses his loneliness as a means of keeping him there, knowing that he would never actually leave her but alas he does. In doing so, granting her a once in a lifetime chance to get to know her father personally.
With this opportunity comes the realization that her father was not the man her mother told her about.
Not successful nor heroic, but flawed like any other man.
She finds out that he and Jackie had a strained relationship, nothing like the perfect relationship her mother described. That he had had an affair and that they were not on the best terms when he died. Really, her mother was protecting her from the reality of the situation. All for the sake of giving her a father figure that would not disappoint her, even in death.
But on the flip side, she is also able to know the best parts of him. Now she has a reference of who he was at his best as well. She is able to have him recognize her as his daughter and when he realizes the extent of her mistake, he takes on the responsibility to right her wrong. So that his blood is not on her hands, and so that she will remember him as the proper father he would have been after he’s gone.
Note that he does this for her, not because she wouldn't have eventually asked it of him, but because he doesn't want the guilt of his second death to be on her.
She apologizes of course, to the Doctor but not before he does the same. It is in this moment, that she realizes how much she means to him and in turn, how much he means to her.
When viewing this scene, once should keep in mind that the episode draws many parallels between the Doctor and her father. At one point, it states that she considers the Doctor to be the most important man in her life. so when her father comes along, in misplaced anger she asserts that the Doctor did not want her father to live because it would threaten his importance to her.
The reason why I draw attention to this detail is because I believe this is the episode where she realizes she loves the Doctor romantically.
When her father touches her face as he recognises her as his daughter, she nestles into it like a little kid seeking comfort from a parent. Now that she knows what it feels like to have a proper father, she has a better understanding of what that kind of love feels like.
So when the Doctor does the same thing, she stares deeply into his eyes as if just realizing what he means to her. Her reaction to him is almost shy and stiff, very unlike her usual temperament.
I think this is the moment she realizes her feelings for the Doctor are not that of her trying to fill a void her father left, but of a different origin entirely. The reason I say this is because these two scenes, mirror each other down to the camera angle. With both shots, focusing on her reaction to the touch.
I don’t think it is a coincidence that earlier in the episode, she gets mad when her father assumes the Doctor is her boyfriend. She even expresses confusion on why people think they’re together, which wouldn’t really make much sense if she had felt romantic attraction to him prior to this moment.
This isn't to say that she purposefully projected such an image onto the Doctor, not at all. But I think it's this experience that finally gives a name to what she was feeling for him all along. Something that started off as platonic but eventually morphed into romantic love.
(I can’t believe that I just claimed Rose might have daddy issues but here it is. On the bright side though, this goes to prove that the Doctor fell for her first so do as you wish with that assertion lol)
Then Jack appears and finally, their attraction for one another becomes obvious to everyone but one another lol. This is where the whole dancing scene happens and I think you all know what they meant lol I don't have to make an in depth analysis about it.
(But how curious that she suddenly starts being more blatant with her flirting, after Father’s Day? Just sayinnng)
I must stress now, because this will become critical later on, that Rose is naturally very flirty and touchy. She's like that with most people it seems, but she never really means anything by it. When Jack appears, she finds him attractive but when he starts getting too close she begins to feel uncomfortable.
She even stops his advances at one point. She likes being liked, even plays into it, but she never acts on her attraction. It's a flaw of hers in the same way the 10th doctor likes being chased by beautiful women, but she's never unfaithful.
Okay so I'm going to say something really radical here, but Boomtown is when Rose and Mickey breakup. For good. Personally, I am not of the belief that they were together in season 2.
The reason why I say this is because the moment Mickey and Rose are left alone, all she can do is recount stories about the Doctor and how great their adventures are. It is here where we see what was pointed out to us previously: that she would eventually outgrow the outlook of those around her. She is no longer the Rose he knew, or fell for. She has grown more confident, happier, and can no longer relate to him.
In other words, she has outgrown him.
It’s here where Mickey tells her that he is seeing someone else.
Rose does become a little jealous here, making a comment about the girl's weight, but she quickly realizes it's not appropriate and takes it back. Instead, commenting that she's a nice girl.
Now remember how I mentioned that at the core of their romantic relationship was a friendship, we see that here more than ever.
When he suggests they find a hotel, she reminds him that he has someone and then questions why he is even with Trisha if she’s not the girl he usually goes for. (They grew up together, so it makes sense why she would know what his type is). This doesn't seem as if she's asking because she's jealous but because she's confused on why he's settling for someone.
She is concerned for his wellbeing.
To which he admits he is and that he can't move on because he is still in love with her. When he asks if he wants him to wait for her, she can't answer. Not because she is unsure of her answer, but because she knows what it is. Her heart is no longer his.
Her running at the sound of trouble and refusing to answer is the answer. It will never be him. She cannot promise him something that just isn't what she feels anymore. Him yelling that “of course it will always be the Doctor”, is him confirming it. That what they had, has ended.
This is the moment they break up. Her seeking him out afterwards is not her trying to mend the romantic relationship they had, but the friendship.
But it is too late.
When she returns after the Slitheen crisis ends, he is no longer there. He will not wait for her anymore and when asked about his whereabouts, she concedes that he will not join them when they leave because he deserves better.
This is her acknowledging that she did wrong in having him wait. She cries because it ended in such a heartbreaking way, but not because it is no more.
She realizes she hurt him, and this guilt follow her into season 2.
The reason why I am so confident on this is because they’re never really all that affectionate after this. Yes they hold hands and hug, but that’s something she did with the Doctor long before they were together. They never share a kiss, and the only one that ever refers to their relationship as something more, is the Doctor.
(Who I must add, has his own motivations for doing so. Mainly out of jealousy, and because it creates a barrier between the Doctor and Rose's relationship. I swear, you can't trust these people lol)
That's why her attachment to him never really presents itself as an issue later. Weeell not until the Doctor inserts him as a means of putting a wedge between the two of them. But I am getting ahead of myself here.
Skipping to the final episode, Rose is tricked into leaving the Doctor and she is left to confront what life without him is like.
This is the girl who, at the thought of her father dying alone, almost broke the universe to grant him some companionship in his final moments.
He is dying out there, somewhere she can't reach.
And in the meantime, she waits helplessly as the man she loves is trapped in the future, unable to do anything but mourn him.
For the first time, we are confronted with a version of Rose that is devoid of any hope. A sight so unfamiliar to both Mickey and Jackie, that they don’t know what to do or say to make it better.
That does not stop them from trying, however.
It's here that Jackie is able to admit that she admires him for doing what he did. This confession is a big deal because it highlights the beginning of a major change in perspective for her.
The reason why Jackie and the Doctor’s relationship is so strained to begin with, is because she feared that he would be the catalyst to Rose’s eventual departure. She projected her insecurities onto him, often portraying him as the type to endanger her daughter on purpose and the reason why her life was such chaos. Yet, in this moment she concedes that she was wrong, that the Doctor is more noble than she had initially given him credit for.
He's not selfish like she initially presumed, but selfless; choosing to prioritize her safety, over his own loneliness.
When Rose questions what she is expected to do now, Mickey is offended. He cannot understand the extent of her feelings, so he resorts to the defensive. Claiming that she must a sense of superiority if she thinks she is not capable of assuming a normal life like anyone else. But just as was shown before, both him and Jackie are very flawed people. They have their agendas and so they impose what they think is best onto her, without considering their own biases.
Because they care, they assume rather than listen ... but she's no longer the same Rose.
She is different.
No longer naive and no longer fit to live a life that doesn't have him in it. Not solely out of love, but because she felt she was at her best there.
"it was a better life, I don't mean all the traveling and... Seeing aliens and spaceships and things, that don't matter. The Doctor showed me a better way of living your life."
She criticizes Mickey for assuming the worst of her in that moment, as he has seen first hand the change she went through. That's why they broke up after all, because that change made her harder to hold onto.
With that change however, is the realization that living a normal life would mean to throw away all the growth she went through.
To abandon her new sense of purpose, and lose that part of herself that refused to give up. The side of her that held onto hope, in spite of all odds being against her.
And finally, to give up would mean to lose the Doctor: the man that believed in her and never stopped.
When she says there's nothing left for her there, on earth, she means it. She would rather die than live a life without him in it.
She's an emotional wreck at the thought of losing him but other than it just being a statement said in the heat of the moment, I find that she might also have a point.
Sure it's harsh, I won't deny it but really other than her mother, what is there to keep her there?
Everyone, even ordinary people, leave home eventually. That is just reality. Her mother is there, yes, but one day she will die. Rose will be all that’s left, because not even Mickey will measure up to the Doctor and it is unfair to expect him to fill his place.
She will be expected to live a life where not even one person understands her and in the process, forget the part of herself that she grew to love.
What they're asking of her is to give up on the part of the world that she has made her own. To hide the spark that made her into who she is, because that's how much the experience has become a part of her identity as a person.
It's selfish, but doesn't that apply to everyone? Who's happiness has not come at the expense of other people? By asking her to give up her life with the Doctor, are they not doing the same to her?
The reason why knowing that she met her father seemingly changes Jackie's mind is because the revelation is a confirmation that Rose has grown up. Her distress is not out of a naive love that Rose holds towards the Doctor, no, she is aware of the implications of what she is saying.
The reason why Jackie never told her the truth about her father is because at the time, she was a little girl who could not understand that her dad was not a perfect man. She meant to protect her innocence, even if it came at the expense of the truth.
But she realizes then, that she is not that little girl anymore. That before her stands a young woman, who no longer needs her protection. One who has accomplished impossible feats on her own merit, and grew not because of her, but in spite of her.
So when Rose tells her that she has found her place in the world, she means it.
Not to mention, the Doctor was able to give her a sense of comfort that not even she could give her. Granting her a sense of closure and thus cementing just how incredible of a life she is leaving behind.
Jackie’s own fear of abandonment, is not enough to blind her to how important of a task this is to Rose.
This is why they help her in spite of it potentially meaning her death. Because to ask her to leave it all behind without trying, would be the equivalent of killing her. The version of herself that was forged from the experiences aboard the Tardis.
Season 2 is effectively what occurs when the reality of falling for a man indebted to the universe, starts to settle in.
His regeneration makes her confront the fact that he is unlike any human man. That the rules that define human relationships, will not apply to their own. With that in mind, she seemingly loses her footing amidst the chaotic revelation.
She struggles to take control of the alien invasion, not because she doesn't know how, but because everything she knew to be true has changed. The foundation of all she stood for, has been broken and she has no idea what her place in all of it is.
When she realizes that he is still him, her acceptance comes with the acknowledgment that their circumstances have changed. That she will have to accept those alien aspects of himself, and redefine her prior assertions of what a life with him would mean in the long run. Because now more than ever, the love between the two of them is stronger than ever. But neither is willing to sacrifice the greater good for it.
Something I need people to understand is that the reason why their relationship doesn't become anything more than a friendship, until Tentoo, is because both are aware that his duty is something he can't abandon. It's a conscious decision on both their parts, not just on Tens.
We see this time and time again when Ten is made to confront the possibility of her death. She is not immune to the misfortune of the world and she knows this. But just because she's aware of this, doesn't mean that she lets it stunt the enjoyment of her life.
This is where their perspectives drastically differ. On one hand you have ten who recognizes that he is not human. The world is cruel and to give in to his love for her would mean losing her eventually. This is why after he is confronted with Sarah Jane, he can't bring himself to describe why she is different.
Why she is his exception.
So he brings along Mickey to act as a buffer. This is why Rose seemingly disagrees with his idea to bring him along. Her and Mickey are just friends. He still has feelings for Rose, she knows, and to involve him is to give him the impression that he still has a chance. Again, it's not out of jealousy. If it were, she wouldn’t have been so keen on bringing along Sarah Jane Smith after this adventure or Mickey in season 1.
At the price of his comfort, he cruelly doesn’t consider Mickey’s perspective.
She makes this clear later on when he asks why he was tempted to explore Pete’s world.
“Mickey’s mum just couldn’t cope. His dad hung around for a while, but then just sort of wandered off.He was brought up by his gran. She was such a great woman. God, she used to slap him! But then she died. She tripped and fell down the stairs. It’s about five years ago now. I was still in school.”
“I never knew”
“Well, you never asked.”
“You never said.”
It is his inability, ironically, to not think beyond his best interests that has a tendency to hurt those around him.
The funny thing is, the episode where she is supposed to act jealous and petty is actually the episode where we explore why Rose is such a great match for the Doctor. Because even though Madame de Pompadour belittles her importance to the Doctor and seems to be the main focus of his affectons, Rose still does what she can to save her.
This is who she is.
Yes, she can be emotional at times but when it really matters, she can put those feelings aside to do what is right. This is something that we see develop in her since season 1. It shows that she is aware of the duty the Doctor has to protect time itself, and it's here that we see her take an active part in it herself.
When Mickey taunts her out of jealousy of their relationship, asserting that the Doctor's intentions are not as pure as she thinks they are, she is quick to defend him. Because she understands that he is not someone that intentionally hurts others. No, he is flawed and his duties are too important to be held to a human standard.
That isn't to say that she is immune to falling victim to the same dark assumptions.
(We see this plainly in the prior episode too, where Mickey's taunts begin to get to her and she assumes the Doctor doesn't value his companions)
It hurts her. You can see that, in the way that she stares longingly into the distance. Coming to terms with the implication of having been left behind, and her role in his life. She will never be his priority. Not when he is the only one left, to ensure that the world won’t plummet in the absence of his own people.
It is this reasoning that allows her to look beyond herself and reach out to him when he is grieving the loss of Reinette. To ask him if he’s alright, even if its at the cost of her own feelings.
“I’m always alright.”
It is here that she realizes how much he is holding back. How much the constant death is weighing over him. And so, she gives him the space he needs in the meantime. Displaying that strength she has, at the cost of seeing the Doctor at his weakest.
I think this is why in the next episode, when they are trapped in an alternate universe, Ten is seemingly afraid that he might lose her. I mean, to an extent that seems almost overblown but, it makes sense if one infers it's because of how he acted in the prior episode.
Not only because he seemingly put a wedge between the two of them, but also because more than ever she is aware that his duty is to the universe and not to her. He realizes the extent to which he has taken her love and loyalty for granted.
How more than ever she is aware that whatever is between the two of them, will never be.
(Personally I see this as his punishment for being so careless in his actions in the prior episodes. Till this day, I still can't watch that episode without feeling so bad for Rose)
His fear is a reflection of his own insecurity: that alien side of him that is incapable of understanding why Rose would choose him above all else.
Rose is not one that would ever hold it against him, however. For the sake of blaming himself, he underestimates the depths of her awareness to the situation they're both in.
She loves him unconditionally. She doesn't expect him to drop his duty. No, more than ever she is aware of the toll it takes on him, from a second hand perspective.
This is why in Doomsday when Jackie criticizes her for becoming too alien, and for not settling down, she stresses that she will never have a normal life because the Doctor never will. It was never the traveling that made her stay, it was him. The thought of him facing the world alone, to revert back into a miserable version of himself because he has no one to ground him, is a reality she can't live with.
(not to mention, her becoming too desensitized to the life she lives is a problem that can be traced back to season 1 as well. Showing that this is very much a real thing that can happen if she doesn't maintain something that grounds her to the human world)
So she takes it upon herself to be there for him when he hasn't asked. This is incredibly selfless and consistent to her character since season 1.
So when she seeks out Pete, she's not really doing it with the intention of staying. She's curious to see who her father is in a universe where he seemingly lives. Because to her, he is her father regardless of whether or not the body he is in is the original. This universe's versions of the people in her life does not make them any less valid simply because they're slightly different, at the core of them is the people she loves.
In every universe is a version of the person she loves that when prompted, will save her. This is seen in how it's seemingly these two versions of her parents that do something to help her even at their own expense. With this Pete, being the one to save her before she gets sucked into the void and this Jackie, being the one to save them both from an immediate conversion
(Hint hint, this is the attitude that prompts her to accept Tentoo and it's also a big part of her journey in the Rose Tyler dimension cannon audios.)
This is also the episode where her friendship with Mickey essentially ends for the time being. Seeing how much the Doctor and Rose have grown to love one another gives him the courage to leave. To find that part of the world that is his, even if it means putting a pause on his friendship with Rose. It hurts her to see him go, goes to show you how close they are, but Rose understands that this is something he has to do. That he, just like she did with the Doctor, has to put himself first.
This is why in their final moments together they don't kiss. It parallels her first departure, but without the affirmation that they're going to continue their romantic relationship.
In the kiss they do share earlier, it is one sided. Initiated by Mickey and one that Rose doesn't seem responsive to, doesn't even close her eyes. It comes unnaturally to the two of them, as if to show how their relationship has changed.
Rose does not share the same outlook that the Doctor does. It's because of this, that their perspectives have a tendency to clash when they're in danger.
She doesn’t let the moments they have together be weighed down by the knowledge that their time together is limited. No, it is that knowledge that helps her be more outright with her affections towards him. Carrying the strength and hope they both need to continue finding the joy in living in the present.
We see this presented explicitly, when they realize they're stuck on Krop Tor.
"Can you build another Tardis?
"They were grown, not built. And with my whole planet gone, we're kind of stuck."
"Well it could be worse. This lot said they'd give us a lift."
"Then what?"
"I don't know. Find a planet. Get a job. You live a life same as the rest of the universe.
The Doctor can't handle the thought of Rose dying. You see this, in the manner that he is so quick to give up hope once he has accepted their potential doom.
It goes to show that the strength and peppy attitude he has, is nothing more than a mask. That deep inside, he is afraid and struggling to hold it back.
This is where we seemingly see how he really is, how he really feels.
How hesitant he is at accepting that there's a way out.
How quickly he reverts back to cynicism when he isn't reminded that there's still something to fight for.
Rose understands this.
It's because of this, that she resorts to humor. Telling him about the potential outcomes of their current situation, that won't end in death. That even as they wait for their inevitable end, they can still enjoy their final moments together.
It's in that moment, where they're both vulnerable that she admits she sees herself sharing a life with him. Something that seemingly stuns him back to the present, and causes him to put his walls up.
This must be terrifying to him.
To have someone understand him so well, that he is caught off guard by how quickly she is able to bypass any prior barriers.
"I promised Jackie I would always take you back home"
"Everyone leaves home in the end"
"Not to end up stuck here."
"Yeah but stuck with you, that's not so bad."
"Yeah?"
"Yes"
It's her ability to not take his reluctance to voice his feelings personally, that causes him to smile. Because it's the moment he realizes that she sees him for who he is, and understands.
It's her capability to see what he means to say that prompts her to kiss his helmet right before he goes. It is what gives them the strength to watch one another as he drops below the surface with Ida.
In other words, it is what gives her the confidence to reaffirm what he means to her even if he can't express it back.
"Oh she knows"
That is why he doesn't see the need to voice how much he loves her right before he drops to the unknown. In a leap of faith, he realizes that really the only belief he really holds is in Rose Tyler. That he will have another opportunity to voice his feelings, away from imminent death.
Rose also devotes all her belief in him, and willingly shoots at the glass in an attempt to survive for his sake.
Beyond all reason, it's this complete devotion to one another that causes them to overcome the challenges that stand in their way. It is what motivates them to assume that the other is alive, even when the odds are against them.
It's this faith, that gives them the strength to continue living once they're separated…only to then reunite in season 4.
(Where another parallel can be found, in how they both seemingly always end up running towards one another. They both hold on to the one person they know will never fail them.)
"Love and Monsters" demonstrates the extent of Jackie's loneliness. She is a single mother who fills the void her husband left with casual relationships. Her daughter is the only real constant part of her life and the fact that she was "left behind" by her Pete is what causes her to harden and see the world very critically.
It explains why she had such a hard time understanding Rose and her manner of thinking, because it goes against what she craves: security.
This is why she struggled to let her go, but now the Doctor is essentially her family too, and so her loyalty extends to him too. The Tylers are exceptionally loyal, they love unashamedly and they lend a hand to anyone who needs it: Mickey and the Doctor. They may clash often, but that loyalty is what allows them to hold on to one another in spite of their flaws as people.
They're the ultimate ride or dies.
Jackie and Rose are very alike in this way, this is why they often fight. Their love for the people in their lives is so intense, that they have trouble separating that love from their decisions. It is what gives them the strength to stay by the side of their loved ones, even if it means sacrificing their own needs.
But something that I think people overblow is the reason why Jackie tells her that she's becoming someone unlike herself.
The reason why Rose's life was able to be relatively stable, unlike some companions who came after her, is because she makes an effort to maintain both her human life and her life in the stars. They're intricately intertwined, much like how Donna is also able to maintain her foundation in spite of the memory loss.
The Doctor really isn't her whole life if you think about it. She is not being forced to stay by his side and she does take the time to spend time with family outside of their adventure.
She chooses to concentrate on their relationship but she has the choice to divide time for others as well.
There is another aspect of her, that I feel like too many people might misunderstand.
She doesn't think of herself as the Doctor's replacement. Her role by his side does not conflate her self importance, she is more than aware that ultimately she is not him. That she, is not granted the same liberties that he has to put her life on the line.
She knows she is not the Doctor. And she, is comfortable with embracing her role as his companion. She wishes to share his responsibility, not take it over.
This is why she is able to maintain this human aspect of herself for so long. She's still compassionate and understanding, because the tough call is not on her hands most of the time. If it was, she would have gradually lost that part of herself in season 1. But nonetheless it becomes a possible outcome if she's not careful, just like her mother warned.
When she is clinging for her life in Doomsday, something I don't see enough people point out is how truly selfless Rose was at this moment to let go of her hold, for the good of humanity. She reaches for the lever, knowing that there is a good chance she will die, this is why she takes the time to look at him while she desperately holds on.
She wants the last person she sees to be the man she loves; to find the courage to do what is right at the cost of her own life. It was not done out of recklessness.
This is why they are perfect for one another. Because they both understand that they are not the center of the universe, that ultimately, the duty they now share comes first.
This is explored further in the Dimension Cannon audios, that gives context to the development she goes through that leads to her reappearance in season 4.
Her reasons for using the dimension cannon are more complex than they appear at first glance. Her sole reason for finding him is not only because of the love she feels for him, but because she also has to put a stop to the mass destruction of every universe.
I see way too many people use her reasoning for coming back as evidence that she has this weird obsession with the Doctor, and that's just not true.
She seeks him out because she has to.
If she gets to stay with him afterwards, that's just a plus.
(from here on out, I will give out some direct spoilers on said audios to provide more context to the development we see in show. Skip to after the 2nd row of asterisks if you don’t wish to be spoiled)
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It is in the realm of the audios, that Rose is entrusted to travel to parallel worlds without the prior knowledge of knowing where she will end up. Every universe is doomed, and she has to find allies in the parallel versions of the people she loves to pick up on details required to find her original world.
There is no such thing as a parallel Doctor. So she must figure out a way to get back to him and warn him, without his help.
Now I must stress, these audios get dark really fast.
They do not hold back on showing just how awful this duty is, and how it comes at the expense of her humanity and moral code.
At times, she has to manipulate these parallel versions of her friends and family into helping her. To use them, up until she is forced to leave and in doing so, condemning them to a long and painful death.
Over and over again.
Imagine what that does to a person?
To see the people you love, realize that you can't save them. To leave them behind, while hearing them plead for their lives to be saved.
She takes this duty on, under the pretense that her familiarity with the Doctor makes her the most ideal candidate for the job. She embarks on her first trip, thinking that this might be the closest thing she has to being on another adventure and that in the process, she could save some worlds in his absence.
But it's in fulfilling the role as the universe's protector that she realizes just what she signed up for. She becomes the Doctor's replacement, in the same way Jack Harkness takes on Torchwood and partakes in the duty to protect the earth.
Yet what makes her different from those two, is that she is mortal. She doesn't have the tools they have at her disposal nor the wisdom that they have gained over the span of their extended lives.
No, she can die.
She cannot save anyone.
And there truly is nothing to guarantee that she will succeed.
We see her struggle to maintain her distance, to not promise a way out to the people she encounters because there is none. She is no hero, she is their angel of death.
In an act of defiance to the death that will follow her, on her first trip, she saves an alternate version of Clive and takes him under her wing. Only to come to the realization that one life is not enough to make up for all the millions that died under her watch.
It is because of this that she opts to not embark on said missions alone anymore. Instead, she takes her own Pete, Jackie, and Clive only to find that they too struggle to maintain their distance. If not for them, then who will ground her?
It's in one of these solo missions, that she crumbles under the weight of the responsibility that she adopted.
In a twist of fate, she is imprisoned inside a red phone box. Trapped inside with no means of escaping, and no real guarantee that she will find a means of leaving before the world goes to shit.
It is in this moment, where she is left to wallow in her situation, that we see her break down. She admits this to her mother, who can hear her through the intercom.
"I can't"
"Rose you're scaring me, just get out. Find a way"
"I'm locked inside a police box."
"What? A Tardis?"
"No Mum, a real one. A red one, all musty on the inside."
"Well you gotta get out."
“I know.”
I'll skip ahead, but I felt this was necessary to include to show how dire the situation is.
"I'm sorry.”
“Rose?”
“It’s the same mom. Same doors, same noise, same light through the windows-I think they’re a bit smaller. If I half close my eyes, i’m there..but it’s not, i’m not. I’m not him. I’m not a time lord. No psychic paper. No sonic, No centuries of knowledge. Only one heart..”
“Sweetheart, I know it hurts but you gotta get it together.”
“How?”
“I don’t know, pick a lock or something?”
“How did he do it?”
“Sheer cheek, most of the time”
“He lit up every room he was in, they always listen to him! He walked through hell like it was a walk in the park.”
Because now she realizes how important it was for him to remain strong, to smile in the face of danger. Before it was easy to assume that she understood everything there was about how he looked at the world. The size of the burden, and what it meant to share it.
But now she’s in his shoes and the truth is starting to settle in. Jackie says this in response, as a means of putting things into perspective for Rose.
“If the universe needs the Doctor, then the universe needs Rose Tyler to find the Doctor. I’m so proud of you but you need to stay alive. One heart. One life, you got that?”
Rose never sought to replace him, we see that here in the manner that she can't handle being in his shoes. She is starting to develop that very same cynicism that he once had and is beginning to feel a sense of inferiority.
This is why she needs someone with her, much like how the Doctor needs a companion. This is a duty that he has to share with someone, not alone.
Jackie believes in her strength, because she knows that she has it in her to prevail. Rose and the Doctor are not the same, but nonetheless she is now the closest thing he has to an equal. And she has to learn to handle this new responsibility through her own means, not by what the Doctor believes is right.
(This is as far as I will share because there's still one audio left in the series and it has yet to come out, so I will hold on to my final conclusions until then. In the meantime though, I urge you all to check them out. They are absolutely worth it!)
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But with this in mind, the hardened version of Rose we see in season 4 makes more sense. It's why the thought of having an alternate Donna die doesn't really dissuade her into using her, and why she is so unlike the Rose Tyler we knew.
She has matured.
This is reflected in her clothing: the overly practical nature of her outfit and her leather jacket. It purposefully parallels the outfit her first Doctor wore at his lowest point. The version of himself that was overwhelmed by the responsibility he held to uphold what his people once did.
I believe it's this new understanding of his perspective that stops her from putting a name to the nature of their relationship to Donna. She assumes they're together, but Rose neither agrees nor denies her assumption.
Because she can't make that decision on his behalf, not when he has so much at stake.
It is this new attitude that also seemingly makes her more distant. Less forgiving towards the Dalek threat and less inclined for a peaceful confrontation because she understands that sacrifices must be made for the greater good. It's why she serves as his support system throughout all the chaos, she knows now how overwhelming it is.
Yet that part of her that seeks to comfort those she loves is still there. We see this in the way that when the Doctor is struck, she does not waste time wallowing in all that she has done to get to him. No, she puts aside her feelings and tells him how much she missed him. Tells him she's been busy, as a means of not burdening him with all that she has done to get to him.
(Just as an additional tidbit, I don't know why people use these small bouts of jealousy she briefly displays in the first half of this two parter to justify why they believe Rose wouldn't get along with other companions. She canonically does lol She even compliments Martha and is seen to be on good terms with both Donna and Sarah Jane? Her initial jealousy stemmed from disappointment in being left out. It's not enough to warrant the impression that she is a jealous person all the time.)
With all this in mind, it also offers an additional reason as to why she ultimately ends up choosing Tentoo.
Her final decision is not done on a whim, no, it's her being exposed to the constant dread of a life in his shoes, that puts things into perspective.
She cannot continue chasing after him.
When she is returned to that beach, she comes to the realization that the Doctor is going to decide what is best for her, again.
In the time they have spent apart, he hasn't changed his outlook on his prior decision. He is still firm in his belief that she is better off living without him (the timelord version), so much so that he does not ask for her input.
It's because of this that she decides to not back down. To not let him think that he can get away with deciding on her behalf because she's not the same woman she was all those years ago.
Given that it's her life, it is she who needs to make the final call.
Notice that what she asks, when deciding what path to choose, is for clarification on what he meant to say on their initial separation.
The reason why this is important is because the man she knew, would never say it out loud. Only the one capable of changing and giving into that love, would ever do such a thing.
And that version of him is Tentoo.
He is human, but most importantly, his duty to the universe is the same as her own. Indirect. The original Time lord self can continue handling things in his absence so he's got nothing stopping him from enjoying a life by her side. One that can either be mundane or filled with adventure, but it will be spent with one another.
The choice was obvious.
(Notice that this is not the first time she is asked to make this choice. The first time being with Mickey, where she seemingly chooses the life of thrills over her relationship with him, over love. Now that she knows what both paths entail, this time she prioritizes love and chooses Tentoo.
With the growth she underwent throughout her seasons, she realizes that it's not the adventure she wants, it's the Doctor. This is her, finally making the decision that fits this version of herself that understands that love is what she needs)
But it's with this in mind that she questions what the fate of the time lord Doctor would be if she stays. That is why she says "it's still not right, the Doctor is still you."
Because she personally knows what his role entails. She was barely able to handle it on her own with the help of her family, who is to say that he won't crash and burn when he is alone?
The Doctor is not only his name, but his promise to strive for the greater good. In other words, the role he plays for the universe. She doesn't mean that they're not the same man. No, she means to point out that the price of her happiness will come at his expense.
That the time lord version, no matter what she chooses, will forever be tied to the responsibility of handling the universe.
"And I am him"
With this, Ten assures her that he too, in a way, will get his happy ending. Because by choosing Tentoo, he guarantees that this version of himself, his tenth incarnation, will not suffer the same fate that he will. A new man will not walk away in his shoes, no, this version of himself will spend the rest of his life loving the woman that he was made to love. To have the one adventure he can never have.
It does not come without pain of course. That is why he can’t bare to see the two together, and turns his back on them. Realizing then and there, that there is no longer a place in the life she will live from here on out.
When she kisses Tentoo, it is both a way of imparting that final sense of gratitude to the time lord version of himself (who allowed for this to happen), and it is also to signify the beginning of a new life she will spend with Tentoo.
Tentoo is the Doctor, he harbors those same desires that the time lord version of himself has. He is human, which grants him the freedom to choose what path he wants and that path is none other than hers.
It would make absolutely no sense to have her resent him or even believe he isn't the Doctor.
This is the girl who was able to love multiple versions of her father and mother. That through her solo adventures was reminded that at the core of individuals, are traits that remain regardless of their circumstances.
Why would she not love him too?
A detail I love is that when she hears the Tardis dematerialize, her first instinct is to stop and see it go.
She is not running to stop him, that much is obvious, because she stops long before she even reaches it.
No, she just stands there and looks at it.
Just like she would have done had she had the chance to see the earth go on her first trip. This is her goodbye, her affirming that he will be remembered and his importance in her life.
That is why Tentoo joins her, silently taking her hand as if to assure her that he is still there.That he understands that this, is her way of saying goodbye to his other self. But don’t fret, it won’t be long before they too will have their own adventures amongst the stars.
That being said, God forbid he finds out that Jackie joined her on her dimension cannon adventures, he would freak lmao
#10th doctor#doctor x rose#rtd era#tenrose#character analysis#ninth doctor#doctor who#rambles#tentoo x rose#doctorrose#ninerose#rose tyler#rose tyler and the dimension cannon#rose tyler analysis#timepetals#retrospective#long reads
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tenrose u will always be famous
rewatching rtd-dw now after pushing it away for so long is so nice because i am seeing it with new eyes in a way. i see so many things now that i didn’t as a teenager. i think i understood the basics of why ten and rose’s arc worked so well, but not the deeper narrative technicalites of it.
what i loved about ten is that his era really is about the beauty of what it is to be human, to be ordinary. i think davies’ choosing to destroy gallifrey was an incredible choice, it gave the show a new start in every way and it was a restart for the doctor - within and without the show. under the cut bc this got long.
first of, it’s absolutely PIVOTAL to meet him to understand the tenth doctor, if you skip nine you will never understand ten. ten is who he is directly because of who he was as nine.
nine had lost everything, he was alone, he was angry and in pain. he had a warmth to him, always, but he was closed off. he meets rose and she becomes the first person he has. he has no one til then, he was alone.
and rose is so fucking ORDINARY. and it’s beautiful. she’s funny, she loves life, she has a big smile. she has a family she loves and is devoted to. she’s so, so, so beautifully human. she’s selfish, she’s emotional and unfair. and it’s beautiful because she’s imperfect.
nine doesn’t do families, he doesn’t do humanity. but as the first season go on we slowly see him letting that stuff in bit by bit until we get to “street corner. two in the morning. i’ve never had a life like that.” we see him start to open up to hope and love, in it’s many forms. when rose is dying he kisses her to save her. he literally does this knowing it will kill him. he dies to save her, because he loves her. because he has grown to love and forgive HIMSELF. “you were fantastic, absolutely fantastic. and you know what? so was i.” his last words as nine are him professing his love to rose and to himself.
when he’s born again as ten, he is born out of these two things. loving rose, loving humanity. you can immediately see the shift in him when he regenerates. he has a big smile, he’s HAPPY, he has hope. he willingly spends christmas at the dinner table with rose and her family.
this is the catch: to understand the tenth doctor’s ending and to understand tentoo, you have to understand that ten was born actively wanting to be human. and you have to understand that what makes rose who she is is that she is human.
first episode that really got me on this rewatch was school reunion. when rose asks if he’s gonna leave her behind. the CONVICTION that he says, “no, not to you.” is so jarring. the way dt and billie played this scene is phenomenal. rose can’t fully grasp how he’s going to have to watch her die someday and the doctor can’t deny that living on alone is a curse.
when you move farther into the season and as their relationship become more intense you see that as loyal as the doctor is to rose, she is just as loyal to him. but there is an inherent issue with this. he is not human. she CANNOT be as loyal to him as he is to her. she cannot stay with him forever. she will die. sure, they could’ve made her immortal or whatever - but that would defeat the beauty of who and what she is, and what the doctor loves about her.
and i think rose loves being human. i actually worried i had read their relationship wrong, maybe she SHOULD have gotten to be immortal and travel forever but i still think that she doesn’t need that. she doesn’t even want that. it’s the moment in the impossible planet for me, how much the idea of being stranded on a planet with the doctor EXCITES HER. how she lights up thinking about having to get jobs and a mortgage and house with him. you can literally feel her heart racing watching it. and you can feel in that moment, he wants it too. he doesn’t think he can ever have it, but you see he wants it.
i audibly gasped when jackie asked rose if she would ever settle down and rose says “the doctor never will so i can’t. i’ll just keep traveling.” because it’s so obvious that while she loves to travel it’s not even about that anymore. it’s about him. about loving him, wanting to be there for him. and while this is so beautiful: it’s unhealthy and unfair. to her AND the doctor. deep down, they are hurting each other because of the impossibility of their relationship.
now, we all know what happens here. they get torn apart. almost as if the universe didn’t want them to be together. as if... it were almost a kindness. but even then he says, “here you are. living a life day after day. the one adventure i can never have.” with the most longing i could ever fathom.
but even in their long separation, they are always so deeply tied. you almost feel rose’s presence the MOST during her absence. he miss her so much, and you can see him hanging onto the hope and humanity she gave to him because they are so deeply entwined together. but he does it. and while i have issues with the episode, seeing ten become john smith in human nature is so.. there is just so much to unpack about it.
first of all the way he chooses to do this in the first place. second off, the way he cannot stop dreaming of rose despite essentially becoming a different man. the way him being human and rose are tied, once again. ok literally who CARES about joan. joan is a stand in for rose.
“that's all i want to be. john smith, with his life... and his job... and his love.”
DEEP DOWN, THIS IS HOW THE TENTH DOCTOR FEELS. HE FEELS IT SO DEEPLY THAT HE CANNOT LOCK IT AWAY. AND IT DIDN’T OCCUR TO HIM TO FALL IN LOVE BECAUSE HE LOVES ROSE SO MUCH.
this all culminates to the fact that they would both bend reality to be together. she would cross dimensions and he would stop himself from regenerating for her. and in doing so, during this act of love, he accidentally creates another version of himself. he literally SPLITS IN TWO FOR HER. this is what i think i was always trying to articulate but couldn’t when i was ohtentoo.
tentoo isn’t a clone, because implying so negates the impact of what the doctor did. he did not clone himself in a lab. it was not synthetic. he poured his own energy into his own body (part) and split into two people so one of them could be with her but who are both GENUINELY him.
and this is bittersweet. because on one hand: what we all celebrate! the tenth doctor gets to be human like he always wanted to be. the tenth doctor gets to be with the woman he loves. the tenth doctor will never regenerate. he is like he said in his first episode: a LUCKY man.
yet... ten is also the doctor. they’re both him, so ten is essentially living in two timelines after rose and tentoo kiss. there is one branched off and closed ending where they kiss and live happily ever after. and this is REAL and true to their relationship AND IT MAKES COMPLETE SENSE. he loves rose so much that he found a way to be with her forever. instead of changing her into something that would destroy what he loves about her, he becomes like her because he always WAS like her.
rose asking them to say “i love you.” is such a moment of... it’s powerful because it’s her finally understanding that as true as it may be that he loves her, the doctor would never be with her like she needs in real time because he wouldn’t be able to bear watching her die if he gave himself to her fully.
she knows what he was going to say, but she needs to hear it. they could travel forever but they’d never be TOGETHER. tentoo is a doctor who is free of that burden so of course he says it and of course she kisses him. her choosing a part-human doctor is her choosing the truest and freest version of ten that there is. her choosing tentoo is her choosing herself too. that’s why it’s important to respect that decision.
but there is this other timeline where the universe remains cruel, where he loses her again and loses her knowing that somewhere else he does have her. and i think that as much pain as he is in, knowing that he and rose are happy somewhere does keep him going in a way- but it also drives him to madness. he NEEDS her, more than ever after losing martha and donna too. he is the loneliest he has ever been, the most broken he has ever been, but he still doesn’t want to change. he wants to hold on because changing means losing his last ties to rose.
in the end, ten was so human that he saw regenerating as dying. that’s why the ending to his arc and the way eleven feels like a different show manages to work. the way that i have always seen it is when ten regenerates that version of him genuinely does die in a sense. when he becomes eleven, he’s so detached of all the loses he has just experienced because ten is dead. sure, he remembers! but does he FEEL it as much? no, i truly do not think so. i think that ten continues to live on as tentoo, so ten literally is actively now a separate doctor who got to have a separate life.
he got to spend his life with rose. he got to have a life day to day. he got to have that adventure. he got to be human. and rose didn’t have to change or become anything else than the beautiful and messy human that he fell in love with for that to happen. she did stay with him forever, he just changed his forever for her.
#dw#doctor x rose#ten x rose#tentoo x rose#this got long my bad....#and ignore any typos i'm high on a jalapeno edible (bad)#**
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Greetings dear Whovians,
Perhaps, it’s time to explain what’s going on with this blog, why it was abandoned and what lies ahead.
Doctor Who as a show ended for me with Peter Capaldi. Period. I tried to give a chance to Jodie Whittaker’s doctor, but even her first episode was a struggle: I could not see the Doctor in her, there was absolutely no chemistry with companions and I couldn’t care less of what’s going on on a screen.
At that point I made a tough decision that I should say goodbye to my favourite show, otherwise it would be ruined and I would grow to hate something that was seared onto my heart.
Looking back and reading comments how the writing went downhill - this perhaps was the best decision as I still have any good memories about the show (even though Capaldi deserved a better writing, especially in his last season).
All these years I avoided spoilers (and Tumblr) and I have no clue what have actually happened in the series - only the fact that it was horrible and they re-wrote things that shouldn’t be touched.
With the news of RTD coming back I was very hesitant to start watching again considering the gap of 3 seasons which I have no intention to close and catch up. But all the trailers looked very intruiging with a definite vibe of ‘good old days’, so I decided to give it a try.
To be completely open with you - not sure how I feel about The Star Beast episode. Despite amazing chemistry between David and Catherine (who didn’t age a day!), excellent references to previous story lines and heartwarming moments, I feel like all this woke agenda was a bit too much and maybe even unnecessary. This is not kind of show when you need to push on a viewer and write a plot twist around it. Don't get me wrong, but overall it looked like a very poor writing just to squeeze to the episode and not the important message.
Speaking of continuity of doctowhoblog.
I started this blog over 12 years ago when I was still at University, then I started my job and things got complicated. I reached the point when I had a very little free time on my hands and wanted to spend it wisely. Tumblr became a time consuming blackhole with no reward in return, so at some point the weight of value of my time overcome the need to be here.
Would I make gifs again? Frankly speaking I do not remember HOW anymore…turned out it’s not like riding a bicycle.
In addition, a lot of things on Tumblr as a platform changed: the last time I made gifs it was 500px with 2mb limit. Now rules have changed and I have no clue what is the standard and where to begin.
Blog Theme is broken, I know. A lot of things needs fixing, starting from post ‘blocks’, as it appears there’s now not only photo and photoset, but also panorama - what the hell is {block:Panorama} Tumblr?! Links are broken and everything is a mess.
Please bare with me, I will try to fix it if my head will not explode of all these new additions and features.
I wouldn’t jump into conclusion that I am back (yet), but there’s some hope that I would appear on this website from time to time (would the show not go downhill again and continue be promising).
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I just watched The Giggle, the last of the Doctor Who 60th anniversary specials.
I wish they had spent more time on the concept of humanity losing the ability to change their minds.
Bi-generation seems… unnecessary? Like, from what I can tell, the point seems to be so that 14 can have an extended sabbatical so that 15 can be less weighed down by all of his emotional baggage. So, if 15 has all of 14’s memories from the time he’s going to spend with the Nobles, what happens to 14 when he’s done? Does he just disappear from wherever he is and appear inside himself as 15 at the moment of the bi-generation? Also, what happens to the extra TARDIS at that point? It all seems unnecessary. Skip the bi-generation business (maybe having 15 show up from the Doctor’s personal future if you want the Doctor to be the one to tell himself to go on hiatus) and just have a scene at either the end of the episode or the beginning of the Christmas special where 14 is really old in the 30th century or so, and have his body die of old age so he can regenerate into 15.
Also the game of catch made for an anticlimactic climax. The Toymaker seems like the kind of villain who is tailor-made to be defeated by outsmarting, but clearly RTD couldn’t think of a clever way for the Doctor to win a game, so instead he opted for a montage of three people throwing and catching a ball.
#doctor who#the giggle#bi-generation#doctor who 60th anniversary#fourteenth doctor#fifteenth doctor#celestial toymaker#the toymaker
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💖💙💜 owen harper bisexuality masterpost 💖💙💜
i've had this in my drafts for a minute but i figured i'd finish it up and post it today for bisexual visibility day :D
it hasn't cropped up recently, but i've seen a lot of people who've questioned owen's bisexuality over the years and i thought i'd compile all the 'evidence' (although it completely baffles me that we got a show with five canonical bisexual characters and people want to write two of them off as straight / "heterflexible" ?? there shouldn't have to be 'proof' of owen being bi, RTD said torchwood is about five bisexuals fighting aliens in cardiff which means they're all bi, full stop. also, bisexuals should never have to 'prove' they're bi, and in regards to fictional characters, i'm sick of people nit-picking who 'deserves' to be counted as rep and refusing to 'claim' certain characters if they're morally grey or if the fandom simply doesn't Like them as much-)
but i digress.
so without further ado, here's everything i've found that supports owen's status as a bicon :-)
explicit canon instances
➤➤ obviously, we have to start with his gay kiss in the first episode of the show. there's a lot to be said about that kiss, i'm not gonna get into all that here, but i've seen a lot of people say it's not proof of owen being attracted to men, and i wholeheartedly disagree. you can literally catch him smiling very happily after the kiss (and one of owen's few genuine smiles of the series, too). i don't think a straight man (or even a "heteroflexible" man) would beam at another guy who's just informed him that he wants to fuck him. a fair amount of people have also said they interpreted owen calling the taxi as him intending to get away from the couple, but i don't understand how they're getting that impression, because that smile makes it seem very much apparent to me that running away is the last thing he wants to do.
it's also, notably, the first time we see bisexuality IN the bisexual show, which i don't think should be discounted. like, we see owen do something gay before jack does, for fuck's sake. is it a good first impression of how torchwood portrays bisexuality? no. is setting owen up as a more sex-driven, opportunistic bisexual nicely contrasted against ianto & tosh's more romance-oriented brand of demisexual bi/pansexuality? in my opinion, yes. i love that the torchwood bisexuals all practice their bisexuality in different ways. that's very special to me. 'cause it's realistic! real bisexuals all experience bisexuality differently! obviously it'd be a different story if he was the only bi rep, because lord knows we've seen enough of that already, but torchwood makes an effort to show us five different brands of bisexuality, and five different bi stories that largely only exist in the subtext, that aren't the focus of the show, and it's fantastic. it's all i could ever want out of bi rep, honestly, even if it is a bit dated now.
➤➤ the other explicit moment in the show: asking tosh and ianto for an end-of-the-world threesome in sleeper (s2ep2). i've actually never seen owen bi-deniers (fhdskjf it's a conspiracy) even mention this scene. owen literally asks ianto if they can have sex with each other to his face, and he's dead serious when he asks it. that's... i mean you can't mistake that as anything else. like fhdsjkf??
➤➤ next we jump to some of the, i suppose, extended universe content. whether the books are canon or not is debated, but the novel 'another life' features owen playing an online simulation game, and it makes a point to depict owen flirting with someone with a male avatar + wondering to himself if the guy would be down for cyber-sex. [someone posted part of that scene here. for context, owen's also got a VR headset on during that bit.]
➤➤ another instance is on the website, which some also don't regard as canon, but, i mean, i don't know who worked on the things we see on that site, but obviously they got their information from somewhere. they probably consulted with the writers on the show, or at the very least got notes on what things to touch on. anyway, there's a portion of the site where you can find a 'background check' on owen, and it's just a collection of messages from some ex-lovers of his. one of them is a man.
again, some people disregard the canon validity of the website, but the way i see it, the information on this site was released while the show was airing for fans to look at and to gain further insight on the characters. one of the things they felt a need to tell us about owen, important enough to be featured in his background (wayyy before the katie plot was developed), was that he wasn't just interested in women. personally, i regard that as canon. you can find this here. and even if you wanna say fragments jossed this background, it doesn't joss his, like... identity.
next we have things said by russell t. davies himself + by burn gorman (owen's actor)
➤➤ again, RTD (who's torchwood's creator, but i'm assuming everyone reading this knows that) explicitly described torchwood as "a bunch of bisexuals living under cardiff and fighting aliens". that's not ambiguous. [i don't have a direct source for this quote, it was apparently said on the dvd extras.]
burn's comments on owen's sexuality include...
➤➤ (when asked who owen fancies) "Owen's pretty cocky, he'll try it on with whoever comes along." [x] and yes, this is vague, but vagueness is often interpreted as proof of bisexuality. (for example, in the pacific rim dvd features, newt's bio stating he was interested in "whoever will take him" was widely interpreted by the fandom as him being bi.)
➤➤ (in regards to owen's "let's all have sex" line) "I don't think he [...] thinks about the implications, or whether it's with a man or a woman." [x]
(ok i have to admit, although i absolutely adore burn, i'm not super fond of the way his 2006-08 self would talk about how torchwood handled sexuality*. however! he kind of hit the nail on the head in saying that, even if it's in the context of owen wanting end-of-the-world sex, because my take on how owen sees his own sexuality has always essentially boiled down to thinking he'd be like, "well, why wouldn't men also be an option?" (well, with sexual attraction anyway; i think owen's relationship with romantic attraction is far more complex.) i think he resembles jack in that way; anyone's a prospective sexual partner, if they're attractive and interesting and he decides he wants them, and he's also impulsive as hell, so he doesn't think too hard about gender in the moment if he decides he's into someone. there's not really any hang-ups.)
➤➤ and ofc...
(out of context this could look like he's just jokingly calling owen an alien-fucker, although owen makes his thoughts on alien-fucking pretty clear in countrycide lol, but it was said in the context of owen/andy as a ship [x].)
*if you're wondering what i'm referring to, it's a comment here [x] about how the torchwood team's bisexuality is a result of being in a pressure cooker environment and having a 'wartime mentality', and they just kind of 'take what they can get'. the implication that bisexuality is out of desperation/accessibility rather than attraction is pretty damn icky, BUT i love him lots and he generally seems to be pretty woke these days (+ otherwise has always seemed to grasp why torchwood's rep was so unique and groundbreaking and important) so i'll go ahead and hope that was just, y'know, simple 'being a straight guy in 2008' ignorance. fifteen years is a long time and i have faith his opinions have evolved by now, esp considering he used the word 'pansexual' at a 2016 con [x]. (actually, ok, you caught me, that last bit wasn't super relevant and i didn't need to bring it up, but i just wanted to gush about him doing it because how often do you hear that word out of celebs, especially older and presumably straight ones. and in 2016, too. kinda slay of him, ngl)
aaand finally, some random, non-explicit little things that i think support him being a bisexy king (several of these are goofy and half-serious)
➤➤ in episode 2, they make a point to cut to owen smiling after jack's line about "you people and your quaint little labels". one might argue he's smiling at gwen & carys on the screen, but cutting to him immediately after jack says it very much implies he's reacting to jack's words, and i think it's particularly poignant after, again, we saw him kiss a man the episode prior. (which, another thing - owen's literal introduction features him kissing a man, like that's gotta count for something. if the literal third thing i ever see a male character do ever is kiss a guy, that means something.)
➤➤ and of course, in the same episode, we get "period military is not the dress code of a straight man" .... owen's the only one of them with working gaydar. also what a fruity thing to say
➤➤ speaking of fruity things to say, in s2e10 when they're all watching the old film, owen goes "look at the state of them 💅" and he says it SO cunty for no reason it always kills me fhsdkjfd
➤➤ combat.
➤➤ no, really.
➤➤ bonus: in the combat commentary, it's mentioned that when RTD saw the above scene between mark & owen, he said it was "the gayest thing he'd ever seen".
➤➤ in the three monkeys, a big finish audio featuring owen & andy, owen flirts with andy repeatedly. even if he just does it to be annoying, it's still pretty damn gay. also the pet names... (he calls him sweetheart, sunshine, and tiger. it's half-mocking, sure, especially because it's owen, but there's also a domesticity to it.)
➤➤ and then there's the hope's "you're alive again and you want crisps?!" "be glad that's all i'm asking for" (owen was like 'i will not use this as an excuse to try to sleep w andy i will not use this as an excuse to try to sleep w andy i will not use th') these are the only two audios i've heard with this duo, i'm sure there's more examples in the other two. i know gooseberry literally has owen sabotaging andy's relationship with his gf and that is... woohoohoo.... i'll update this once i get through those.
➤➤ …. this is my personal opinion but i lowkey think he kinda wants john hart a bit when they all first meet him in kkbb hdskjfds. gwen & tosh both seem very charmed by him and they're meant to, it's supposed to be like 'oh, look at jack's ex waltzing in and charming the pants off everyone (ha), and only ianto and jack see through him' - owen isn't given a flirty line of dialogue or even a close-up shot of him eyeing john like the girls get, but if you watch him closely he certainly looks… intrigued by him. i think owen's more of a bi disaster than he lets on.
➤➤ in episode 10, diane notes that owen has "beauty products" in his bathroom. obviously this shouldn't be indicative of sexuality, but how many Straight Men in 2006 were moisturizing lmao. hell, how many do nowadays 😭
➤➤ gwen & owen's dynamic settles into a lovely little friendship in s2 and owen lowkey gives gbf vibes <3 them making fun of the movie in s2e10 together + the cheek-kissing at the end of s2e9… bi besties!!
➤➤ the peace sign he throws up in meat when he meets rhys fdsjk i don't even believe in some of the silly internet jokes abt bi culture but c'mon
➤➤ have you seen his taste in women. diane is soo butch and gwen's a total tomboy in s1. that's bi culture babey!!!! i too like girls when they're boys
➤➤ i already talked about it but the aforementioned scene where he asks tosh and ianto for a threesome... he asks them, like, immediately after they team up and bully him for not comprehending that there's "no phones. phones all broken. anyone there? no, 'cause the phones aren't working." that was suuuch a disaster bi owen moment for me. i too would get a little revved up if tosh and ianto both bullied me at once <3
aaand finally... the biggest Evidence of all....
➤➤ he's a leather jacket bisexual. need i say more
and that's all! thanks for reading!
[credit for the dividers used in this. didn't tumblr used to have built-in dividers? i miss that.]
#mine#torchwood#torchwood posting#owen harper#tell me why im nervous to post this fhdskfds#my anxiety is like someone's gonna get mad at me for this somehow#shhhhh#beating it with a broom#look at my post boy
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Got around to watching The Star Beast, so thoughts:
The good:
Donna Noble is back!
Murray Gold is back!
Love the opening credits. Best they've been since Matt Smith (Capaldi's credits weren't bad, but this sequence is better).
Beep is so cute! The special effects department/props department deserve all the praise.
Beep is so evil! Love to see my little war criminal embrace their megalomania.
Sylvia's reaction to hearing the Doctor's voice was priceless!
I love how they addressed trans issues. It didn't feel like a tv show telling us that they support trans people and that we should too. It felt like a tv show showing us trans issues. They had a trans character and their family facing problems that a trans person and their family could (and do) face in the real world, and they let the audience decide if they are okay with that happening or not. Showing people a particular side of an issue will always be more helpful than simply telling people that their side is wrong. The hardcore transphobes won't be swayed either way (and probably would only be watching to authenticate their hate) so addressing the issue with them in mind would have at best alienated the audience and at worst insulted them (looking at you last few minutes of Orphan 55).
I particularly liked that they included Sylvia's difficulty with knowing what to say to Rose. It's clear she loves her granddaughter exactly how she is (a great contrast between her treatment of Donna in series 4) but she doesn't know if she's doing things right. It's something that I don't often see addressed in internet fandom spaces, where every small slight is condemned as a terrible offense. Changing cultures is a learning curve.
I think they had a shot of Rose at Donna's wedding at the beginning, which helps (but doesn't really solve) the age issue. Donna started dating Shaun in 2009 and is not visibly pregnant at the end of that year, meaning 2010 is the earliest possible year Rose could have been born, making Rose 13 if this episode is set in 2023. Having the wedding scene from the End of Time be set after Rose was born helps with believing Donna could have been pregnant during that story.
The TARDIS looks pretty cool. I love the call back to the classic TARDISes.
The Doctor proudly proclaiming that Beep was defeated by the DoctorDonna as he holds Donna in his arms 🥹
Shirley Anne was awesome.
Donna's little speech about Wilf when convincing Sylvia to let her go, reminding us that Wilf also suffered a loss when Donna lost her memories.
The psychic paper not catching up and listing the Doctor as a "mistress".
Rose inheriting the metacrisis. There is a catch to this that will be explained in the next section, but by and large I loved the idea.
The not-as-good:
I was hoping for a few more non-RTD references considering it's the 60th anniversary. I know we still have two more specials to go, so I should be patient, but it's still a little disappointing.
I'd hoped they would do something a little different than the comic. The comic is great, so this isn't really a bad thing, I'd just hoped for something more.
Having the metacrisis be a reason for Rose's transness (is that a word?) wasn't great. Everything else about the reveal was great - the toys, the shed, her name - but her gender being part of that just cheapened the issue they were doing so well with. Just for the sake of being clever. I suppose you could say they were making a point about time lord gender, but that point has been made. It got made years ago. It wasn't needed.
For most of the episode, Finney being older than her character didn't bother me... except when they showed her friend, who was played by someone much closer her character's supposed age. The age difference was very hard to ignore in those scenes.
Beep mentioning "the boss". Very menacing and very foreboding... but the Most High does not have a boss. The Most High is the most high and death upon whoever says otherwise!
Donna and Rose just letting the metacrisis go kind of ruins her goodbye in Journey's End and is somehow both lazy and overthought. Sharing the metacrisis between two people would have been a convincing enough reason for it to not kill Donna. They had their fix it already. And it was a good one! They didn't need to add another, much worse one.
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From Page to Screen: The Star Beast
Growing up can feel like a lifelong process. I’m an adult, but I’m obsessed with a time-travelling alien show. Part of you will always feel like a kid, but another part knows the past is the past. While I may fantasise about revisiting my past like the Doctor, I admit it wouldn’t feel the same. I’ve changed. The ‘80s could never feel like the present. Every hairdo dated. Every new record in the shop window is a relic. Childhood always stays with you, but as an ever further memory. Understand then the implication that when my household of 30-40-somethings finished watching “The Star Beast,” we were like children.
In my “The Eve of the 60th,” article, I talked about how I don’t have a childhood nostalgia for Doctor Who. But sometimes, the things we love inspire a childlike enthusiasm within us. Somehow, Russell T Davies managed to retcon my past. In this timestream, Natalie has childhood nostalgia for Doctor Who. Using the TARDIS, RTD has managed to time travel back to our hearts. There’s something warm and fuzzy (and I don’t just mean the Meep) in my chest and I’d like to talk about it.
There are some Doctor Who reviewers who seem to think it’s impossible to talk about the Doctor Who episodes they enjoyed. But if we learned anything from the Jedi, it’s that walking the path of the light side is harder. Snarky shittiness is fun to partake in because it’s easy and immediately gratifying. But I’m not here for shittiness. I’m here for the love. It feels so good to say “I loved The Star Beast,” but it doesn’t mean I don’t have notes. I started out writing about the Chibnall era from a place of enthusiasm. I can’t help what happened after the fact.
My enthusiasm at the beginning of the Chibnall era isn’t a bad place to start this review. Because after “The Woman Who Fell to Earth,” I still possessed said enthusiasm. Seeing Jodie Whittaker as the first woman Doctor was a joyous experience. And seeing David Tennant in the TARDIS again was just as joyful. It’s a fabulous feeling, but I was burned the last time I felt this way. I further temper my expectations because, as I said, I do have notes.
When you spend a large portion of your time either watching, listening, reading, writing, or thinking about Doctor Who, you forget that to some, it’s just a TV show. It’s one of the many they try and watch but miss the odd episode. So while I may roll my eyes at the goofy PowerPoint presentation at the beginning of Saturday’s episode, I have to remind myself that not everyone has been obsessed with Donna Noble for years. Some people might need a little reminder. Fine. While the casuals and newbies are getting caught up on the Nobles, I’ll be over in the corner frothing.
Previously I mentioned that I was withholding judgement for Murry Gold’s new intro music until I heard the full mix. Now that I’ve heard it I can say I liked it much better. It’s far more bombastic with proper engineering. The intro sequence itself was colourful but safe. I enjoyed watching the TARDIS skim the perimeters of the time vortex like a surfer catching a wave. It’s ironic that Dan Slott admitted to writing The Silver Surfer to be like Doctor Who, as it was the Silver Surfer I thought of during this sequence. People have been musing that the Disney influence may have Doctor Who going down the path of the MCU, but this one is pure coincidence. The intro is stunning and fits this exciting new era perfectly.
It’s not as though “The Star Beast,” were an adaptation of a Marvel comic published in 1980. Oh it was? Oh right. Well they got us on this one! Surely they wouldn’t copy the MCU further by hiring the directors of Loki. Oh they have? Oh right. Well at least they didn’t do a Marvel Studios type of production logo that shows different characters across the franchise to play before every new show. Oh they did? Well damn, I guess they are going Marvel. It makes sense when you consider that many people said Loki was doing Doctor Who better than Doctor Who was doing Doctor Who. And on top of that, “The Star Beast,” is a fantastic comic in its own right. I would say Russell T Davies is a mad genius for mining gems from the extended Whoniverse, but he’s done it before with “Human Nature.” My only regret is that this somewhat undoes the continuity of the comics. The nerd in me can’t help but acknowledge the fact that the same comic recently canonically destroyed the Thirteenth Doctor’s sonic screwdriver, and put the Fourteenth Doctor on course to Skaro where we saw him briefly in the Children in Need special. Timestreams.
“The Time Beast,” has now gone the way of “Shada.” Both stories take place across multiple Doctors and multiple forms of media. Not only is there an audio adaptation of Shada featuring Paul McGann, there’s also an audio adaptation of The Star Beast starring Tom Baker. Add the upcoming Target novelisation and you’ll soon have both stories in book form. It’s the fandom’s new “The Doctor’s Daughter was played by the Doctor’s daughter who then went on to marry the Doctor who played her father in the episode ‘The Doctor’s Daughter.’” Get ready to hear that ad nausea. All of this is to say I love when Doctor Who acknowledges its other media and this one was well played.
This adaptation of the Pat Mills and Dave Gibbons comic is a loose one. While the Meep and Wrarth Warriors look fantastic, some minor liberties have been taken with the story. Yet it’s hard not to admire how Russell T Davies has woven the Noble family and a narrative about gender identity in such a way that it feels seamless. Themes of duality and stereotyping are heavy throughout this episode. Speaking of gender identity, I totally called it with Rose’s choice of name. I said I hoped they would use the trans experience of choosing ones own name to tell a wibbly wobbly timey wimey story, and they did. But this also brings me to my biggest sticking point in the entire episode. I’ve seen a lot of people online using the word “clunky,” and that’s exactly what I would call it. Having Rose choose her name from a latent human/Time Lord meta-crisis going on inside her was great. However, having it be a factor in her gender identity left me a bit cold. It may have worked better if it had been implied that Rose was non-binary at some point before.
Ultimately, it feels like a cis male trying to write an empowering trans narrative and missing the mark a bit. It’s like your uncle using the wrong language to awkwardly say “I support you.” It’s in no way problematic, but it could have done with being passed through a few different trans people’s hands before going into production. Donna’s line "Anyone has a go, I will be there and I will descend,” is the Doctor Who equivalent of David Lynch telling transphobes to “fix their hearts of die,” and I want it on a pin. As a trans woman, I do appreciate the trans representation, but it didn’t quite stick the landing. Moving forward, my personal preference would be to just let trans characters exist. We don’t need you to constantly point out our differences. On the other hand, we did get what seems like very positive disability representation. My disabled Whovian friends all seem to agree that having Shirley Anne Bingham with her rocket chair and a wheelchair-accessible TARDIS made them feel seen. One out of two ain’t so bad, Russell.
It’s funny to me that it took the Doctor becoming a man again to even start asking questions about gender. Chris Chibnall felt as though he was afraid of bringing up the Doctor’s new gender. It felt very “I don’t see colour, I just see people,” like mentioning the Doctor’s gender would have been the real sexism. I can think of three moments where the Doctor’s gender comes up in the Chibnall era- when the Doctor called herself daddy, when Captain Jack thought Graham was the Doctor, and when the Sontarans thought the Doctor was a companion. It wasn’t until Juno Dawson, a trans woman, wrote “The Good Doctor,” did we get a great conversation about the Doctor’s non-binary nature. I guess “The Star Beast,” was right, trans people are fucking magic.
Seeing David Tennant in his new threads with a sonic screwdriver that draws shields in the air was very cool. He and Catherine Tate haven’t missed a step, and of course, they haven’t, they’ve been playing the same characters on Big Finish for years. But people still felt the need to point it out, so here’s me doing it too. That’s quality. Their meeting again played out almost exactly as I predicted it would in my article “The Future of Doctor Who.” The Doctor is going to see Donna behind some packages, freak out when he realises it’s her, but come running like a puppy dog at the name “Rose.” Only in this instance, the Doctor is torn away from this intriguing discovery by what appears to be an alien craft crashlanding in London. Donna, of course, remained oblivious, as per the terms and conditions of the the Doctor’s neural block he placed on her 14 years ago.
This “new” Doctor prefers to play things close to his chest at first. He avoids Donna and UNIT alike. He still doesn’t know why he has this face again, or why out of all the people in time and space, the TARDIS decided to put that face in front of Donna Noble. If there is a reason, he’s not going to assume what it is, or who might be responsible. I loved watching the Doctor question Shaun about Donna. The fact that the Doctor still remembers the name Nerys after hundreds of years made me laugh out loud. It’s nice to see the Doctor being Doctory. He’s skulking around. He’s getting clues. He’s not making assumptions. Already he’s learned that the rocket hadn’t crashed. Something is not as it seems, and the Doctor intends to find out what.
Meanwhile, on the other side of town we meet Fudge who tells Rose about the alien space pod that landed near their houses. Fudge is one of the few characters who kept his name from the comic. They don’t even call the Meep "Beep" anymore (sort of.) As in the comics, Fudge is an excitable boy interested in science and space. He also plays a major part in helping the episode feel like classic Davies era stuff. One thing we often missed from both the Moffat and Chibnall era was the human cost of alien invasion. Watching Fudge’s reaction to the streets of London turning molten was a nice reminder that the danger was real. Seeing the BBC news correspondant being thrown into the back of a UNIT van made me happier than you might expect. I was reminded of Trinity Wells giving us news briefs. I missed the clever ways in which Davies made the world feel involved in his stories while also getting a bit of exposition out of it. It was at that moment that I realised RTD and Doctor Who were officially back.
While going back to the house to grab her phone, Rose meets the Meep hiding amongst her bins. Right away she feels kinship to the Meep who she sees as a misanthrope hiding from oppressors. Of course, she gives the Meep sanctuary. Even though the E.T. moment of Donna discovering the Meep among Rose’s “gonks,” had been played over and over throughout the trailer, it still made me laugh. Catherine Tate has great comedic timing, and watching Rose attempt to draw her attention away was charming. Everyone but Shaun seems hellbent on hiding aliens from Donna, especially Sylvia. I found Sylvia’s transition into a sort of June Whitfield à la Ab Fab entertaining. She’s just let herself in making enormous sausage rolls and tuna curry.
The Doctor says things like “I absolutely love her,” now. Even Sylvia feels warmer toward Donna. Her insistence that the Meep doesn’t exist, even as its holding onto Donna’s leg doesn’t come from her old streak of meanness, but rather from a place of protection. She’s horrified by the prospect of Donna seeing an alien and it burning up her mind. She’s carried the facade this long. This falls into line with the character growth she began experiencing toward the end of the original RTD run and I am happy she didn’t regress.
Most of the Donna Noble story remains in tact and accounted for. Shaun? Still her husband. The lottery winnings? Gave it away. Nerys? Still a snake in the grass, despite the accident. The only one missing is Wilf who the Doctor fears is dead. Honestly, who can blame him though? The only times people say “He’s no longer with us,” are usually when someone has either left their job or died. I guess it’s a nice fakeout for people who didn’t see behind-the-scenes photos from some guy on Twitter. We are given hints that we’ll see him at some point, probably in “The Giggle.” I liked the implication that UNIT has put him up in some comfortable digs. It’s nice to imagine that Wilf and Benton are probably playing chess in a posh retirement home somewhere.
UNIT is back in a major way, and it appears to have some new players. I feel like we’ll see more of Major Singh and Colonel Chan. It would be nice to get some recurring UNIT soldiers again. I feel like they missed a chance with Ross Jenkins in “The Poison Sky.” Kate Stewart is set to return, but replacing Osgood is Shirley Anne Bingham. I loved Osgood, but after seeing Shirley take those soldiers out with darts hidden in her chair I thought “Oh no, I think I fancy her.” She’s got a mischievous air about her that makes her feel a bit cheeky. It will be a lot of fun to see what Ruth Madeley brings to the table. I hope they don’t shunt her off as quickly as the rest of them.
After a daring escape through the lofts of several people’s homes, the Doctor and the Noble-Temples escort the Meep to safety. But after witnessing the Wrarth Warriors’ tendency toward non-lethal force, the Doctor begins to piece together who might have taken over the minds of Colonel Chan and his men. The Doctor decides it’s time for the Meep to plead its case in the court of a parking garage. After gathering two Wrarth Warriors as witnesses, the Doctor dons a barrister’s wig and invokes Shadow Proclamation Protocols 15, P and 6. And dammit wasn’t it good to hear David Tennant invoke the Shadow Proclamation again? Blissful, even.
One thing I particularly liked about the barrister’s wig is that it calls back to the Fourth Doctor in one of my favourite stories- “The Stones of Blood.” Not only was it good to see the Fourth Doctor referenced in what was originally a Fourth Doctor story, but it also mirrors the circumstances of the original trial quite well. In both cases, an evil villain is posing as a harmless innocent and it’s on the Doctor to prove it. Like the black sun of the comics, a Psychedelic sun turned Meepkind into hideously evil monsters. Their once gentle natures now give way to sadism and conquest. The last remaining Meep, the worst of them all, stands before us today. If you had read the comic book like I did, you would have known this to be true, but up until the reveal, my wife would have died for the Meep. She was mostly alone in this as everyone else saw the Meep’s “I will either die or turn evil,” t-shirt quite early on. Interestingly, some people were actually drawn in by the Meep’s lies.
Casting off its ruse, the Meep’s face contorts as it produces a laser gun from its marsupial pouch. I absolutely love the transition from Puss In Boots to Dr Evil’s cat. The marriage of CGI and practical effects had me wondering how they managed the change. I imagine they had two separate sculpts for the head. One cutesy floof and one twisted grin. I know it’s difficult work, but I love an old fashioned person in a costume. It was cool to get a glimpse into the performance with the Cicely Fay interview on Doctor Who Unleashed. As a person interested in practical effects, this was right up my alley. It’s nice to see that no matter how big Doctor Who gets, they’ll still use a performer in a suit.
The Meep takes the Doctor and company back to its ship to keep them as an in-flight meal. But before the Meep can get them all on the ship, UNIT intercepts leaving only the Doctor and Donna onboard. It’s up to them to stop the Meep before the ship’s dagger drive takes out 9 million Londoners upon lift-off. Evoking the MCU once again, the Doctor deprograms Donna like she’s the Winter Soldier or Black Widow calming the Hulk. The code awakens the Doctor Donna which causes her to exhaust artron energy. We get another classic David Tennant yells at God moment as yet another member of the Noble family is separated by glass. But just as things begin to feel hopeless we learn that not only is Donna not dead, but Rose is also part human and part Time Lord. Using her brief taste of Time Lord consciousness, Rose fully disables the Meep’s ship and the molten cracks from the dagger drive powering up disappear. This was so cheesy and I adored it. Classic RTD right there.
A recurring argument I see in favour of Chris Chibnall is to point out how people often complain about things the Thirteenth Doctor does that other Doctors also did. According to this theory, every Doctor has their own “giving a brown man up to the Nazis,” moment. You know, kind of like when the Eleventh Doctor murdered Solomon by teleporting a bomb onto his ship as he was escaping. He could have teleported the bomb anywhere but chose murder. Who was it that wrote “Dinosaurs on a Spaceship,” again? Chris Chibnall? Oh. We do get a bit of that here with the Fourteenth Doctor ejecting the Meep from its ship. But the Meep was refusing to know when it was beaten. It’s the Sycorax all over again- no second chances. It’s dumb to call the Doctor a pacifist, but is it better that the Twelfth Doctor pushed the Half-Faced Man in “Deep Breath,” or that he talked him into jumping? These are some pretty heavy concepts, but no, the Nazi thing was still worse.
I was glad to see the human/Time Lord meta-crisis taken care of in this first story. It’s nice that Donna is out of the woods and able to have some final adventures with the Doctor before she bows out again. It would have been kind of distracting for them to have to keep worrying about her mind burning every time someone said the word Doctor. It also allows us to fully enjoy the TARDIS reveal. Watching David Tennant run through the slick new interior like a little boy was euphoric. It was cute to get confirmation that even the Doctor has a moment of discovery whenever there is a new console. You always assume the Doctor just knows how to pilot any configuration of TARDIS controls, but even he sometimes has to ask “What’s that?” The TARDIS redesign was well worth the wait. Such a gorgeous set. It’s easily my second favourite TARDIS interior after the Eighth Doctor’s. The changing colour of the round things will offer so many different moods. White for normal function, red for the cloister bell, and purple for the disco party. The Doctor should get some roller skates now. Maybe if they visit the ‘70s at some point. I pray there’s a mirror ball.
Along with a possible mirror ball, the new TARDIS console comes decked with a coffee machine. If you’ll recall “The Doctor’s Wife,” the TARDIS doesn’t always take the Doctor where he wants to go, but always takes him where he needs to be. This means that the TARDIS dropped the Doctor off next to Donna, redecorated knowing about Donna’s tendency toward spilling coffee on computers, and offers her a cup of coffee. That’s some 3-D chess there, old girl. But wherever it is she was so keen to take them in “The Wild Blue Yonder,” she seems as equally keen to escape. From some of the stills I've seen, I wonder if it isn't some sort of evil TARDIS they've found themselves inside.
Judging by Davies' past penchant for planting the seeds of future stories across multiple seasons, it may be a while before we meet the Meep's cryptic boss. Will this boss have anything to do with the woman in Dubai who is gaga over Rose's gonks? Was that just a red herring? Perhaps this boss is actually the Toymaker and I'm overthinking it. But why would he be interested in two-hearted creatures? Is he searching for two-hearted species to track down the Doctor for some revenge? I have so many questions! As wonderful as it is to be curious about Doctor Who again, we'll still have to wait until next week. But the longer wait is over. Doctor Who is back, and isn’t that exciting?
#doctor who#the star beast#beep the meep#the meep#Fourteenth Doctor#David Tennant#Donna Noble#Catherine Tate#Shaun Temple#Rose Noble#Yasmin Finney#Russell T Davies#Shirley Anne Bingham#Ruth Madeley#Miriam Margolyes#Karl Collins#Sylvia Noble#Jacqueline King#14th doctor#bbc#tardis#Disney+#doctor who 60th anniversary#wrarth warriors#timeagainreviews
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What the Whoniverse could learn from RTD's first era:
The Stolen Earth and Journey's End are one hell of a two parter that has The Sarah Jane Adventures along with Torchwood to crossover into the main series. Characters and elements from each spin-off it utilized as a means of helping the Doctor against the greatest threat the Daleks have ever posed.
However, it also involves aspects that few wouldn't be able to catch on quickly. I hadn't seen The Sarah Jane Adventures since it never made it to the States as far as I know. However, I knew that Sarah Jane was still investigating alien phenomenon as "School Reunion" showed. Of course, she'd have a supercomputer in her attic. I also assumed that Luke was a boy she adopted before learning his origins in "Invasion of the Bane."
Kind of wish we saw Maria and Clyde when Luke called them with their actors on the sets of their homes. Maybe have them gawk at the Daleks from afar and hold on as the Earth is towed back. Maybe a cameo of Rani if they felt bold enough to promote SJA Series 2.
Torchwood, on the other hand, I had seen in full before Series 4 and as such, I was able to appreciate some nods to the spin off such as Gwen calling her husband, Rhys, or telling Ianto that she'd rather go down fighting like Owen and Tosh.
However, I wouldn't have needed to have seen the spin off since I'd have known that Jack had a team in his sect of Torchwood since Series 3. We're just meeting them in the main series proper.
Additionally, we don't need to know about Rhys to understand that Gwen's calling her loved ones during this worldwide crisis. "Owen" and "Tosh" are easy to identify as previous members of Torchwood that had died in their dangerous line of work. Their two seasons of adventures are just self-contained enough to be basically backstory for them.
As such, Series 4's finale feels less like you had to have seen both spin-off to understand and more like they pique your interest in them. What was Jack up to during Series 3 and 4? What's going on with Sarah Jane these days?
That's really what the new Whoniverse should take a cue from. The Main Series crossing over with the spin-off should have us feeling less like we missed out and more like, "Cool, I know what I'm putting on my watch list ASAP."
Thought?
#doctor who#torchwood#the sarah jane adventures#dw#dw series 4#doctor who series 4#russel t davies#captain jack harkness#gwen cooper#ianto jones#sarah jane smith#disney#bbc#bbc studios#disney+#spin-off#franchises#franchise#franchise building#spinoffs
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"The Giggle"
You know it's been a while since I've gone truly absolutely batshit over a Doctor Who episode, but here we are. Spoilers, obviously, under the cut.
First of all: UNIT
While I'm not a huge fan of The Doctor working for/with Earth-based Space police, I think it's a great idea to have the companions in a safe environment where they have a place to use all of the knowledge they've gathered during their journey throughout the starts. They get paid to continue doing what they love and while it does set things up to have future (LIVING) companions to make little cameos (or even an option for a spin-off series, I think that it's ultimately a good choice that RTD decided to let the companions have a space where they can live, grow, and continue to help.
One problem I have with this is that this is exactly where Martha and Mickey went at the end of 10's run -- and yet absolutely 0 (zero) mention of them or their whereabouts. They're the OG companions joining UNIT, so where TF are they??
Also this guy?? The Vlinx?? I both love and hated that we didn't get much explanation for this Guy in the Chair. Just "Oh you're helping?! Sure! Absolutely no reason to think that this new alien and the weird thing that's happening are related ANYWAYS--"
A bit like Panda from JJK where it's just "yeah and this is Vlinx, it works here, moving on,"
LOVE the jab about antivaxxers using the narrative of the Zeedex. It DOES help, but since you're asking the masses (who all wholeheartedly believe that they are right and everyone else is wrong) to put this on, it becomes a bit harder -- we saw how Kate reacted the moment she willfully put it on. Also return of our #Queen for her role as the News Anchor. Glad she has a name now.
Secondly: Donna <3 my absolute beloved. She has grown so fucking much. From yelling at the world because that's the only way to be heard to quietly asking The Doctor what is wrong. She has grown into her own woman, though of course still missing a lot of main action before the metacrisis was resolved (I could write a whole other deep dive about that episode too). When she noticed that the laughter was notes -- "The Giggle" hiding behind the screen, I was so proud of her. This is why the Doctor needs an "every day" human -- and Donna is so blunt that she won't hold back on her observations, though I have to wonder if the whole recorder conversation with Rose was how she came out. I hope so, that's just so chaotic.
I've seen some people argue that there is still some TimeLord in her because of how smart she's been in these last few episodes.
To that I say
"bitch, do you not remember the bees disappearing???"
Donna Noble is a genius and an idiot. Both can exist in the same person, in the same character, and that's exactly what they proved with the previous episode.
and SPEAKING OF her being a genius
She loves The Doctor, not romantically, but in a "platonic soulmate" kind of way that makes my heart full. When she realized that The Doctor never mentioned Mel or any of their adventures, she pointed it out. Not only that, she told The Doctor point-blank that there's always something that the Time Lord seems to be running from. There's never really been a moment when he's stopped and talked about any of the shit that he's been through and she can tell that it's starting to wear on him.
"Maybe that's why your old face came back. You're wearing yourself out"
and he immediately changes the subject and charges forward despite her telling him a harsh truth. She's travelling with him again, sure, but it was supposed to be some short little trip and I think the main reason she went with him in the first place (whether or not she will admit it) is because she saw her friend in crisis and wanted to be around to help -- to figure out what exactly he needed from her. With each episode, she's tried to guess why his old face came back, but nothing stuck.
The fucking puppet show.
Now, I feel like this is a great way to catch up new fans with any old Doctor trauma that they may have missed. It was also a way to shove it into The Doctor's face just how many of his loved ones that he was responsible for killing.
Now, before I hear any one say "but what about ______??"
Rory wasn't as close to The Doctor as Amy had been. "The first face this face saw" and while they did become closer later on, he would always have a special place in his heart for Amy. He watched her die for fucks sake.
Martha wasn't mentioned because as far as he knows, she's still alive and kicking ass. That's part of the reason he will up and abandon certain companions, so he doesn't get them hurt.
The Fam - left behind and alive. Remember 2/3 of the original Fam chose to step away from the TARDIS and Yaz was left before 13 could regenerate as she "needed to do this on [her] own". While, yes, I'm sure the Doctor feels guilty about leaving them behind, it's not nearly as bad as getting them killed.
Anyone else had either survived as far as The Doctor was aware, or hadn't been as close as those particular companions. That is why those 3 were chosen.
Now, back to the puppet show
Mentioning not only the lost companions but also the Flux
God I do not have the time to go into this half-assed recreation of a tragedy trying to be as big and bad as the Time War and Gallifrey. I feel like Chris Chibnall felt snubbed with a female presenting Doctor and gave us the most half-written mediocre bull shit he could have. RTD is already having to fix it with mentioning it several times and exactly what happened in the aftermath. Just looking up "Doctor Who Flux" you get so many results that all try to "explain" it.
If your audience has to look up how your writing makes sense, you aren't smarter or cleverer than the masses, it's just shit writing.
However,
While the actual Flux episodes and following regeneration made it hard to understand not only what happened, RTD breaks it down.
There was a terrible decision to be made. The universe was dying. The Doctor had to choose and a lot of deaths now lay on the Time Lord's shoulders.
BUT! That was also the only piece of The Doctor's trauma that couldn't be waved away with
Which is when The Doctor challenged the Toymaker to a game.
Back too 2023, we get...quite honestly one of the best scenes I've seen in New Who, only rivalled by Here Come the Drums with the Master dancing along. No, Rasputin doesn't come close to this cunty rendition of Spice Up Your Life.
Amazing, cunty, terrifying, entertianing, and fun.
"I think they're still falling" -- BITCH?!?!?! Ugh. I want more of the Toymaker. What a fun villain and Neil Patrick Harris knocked it out of the goddamn park. No matter what you thought about this episode, this dance routine was a highlight.
I also love the reference to when The Doctor had tried to reason with The Master, asking to go amongst the stars with fun filled adventures, taking on the burden of being their jailer and caretaker for the rest of eternity if it meant that humanity was safe.
Of course, we all know what comes after the Toymaker refuses the call to the stars.
I immediately started crying. Before The Doctor even started with those last words, I wasn't ready to say goodbye. We went from "I don't want to go" to "allons-y". From him dying alone in his TARDIS to being immediately surrounded by loved ones
"He's not dying alone"
And he didn't have to.
I choked on my crying so hard I almost died myself. I know David Tennant had always said that he thought The Doctor was asexual to some degree, but this is just ridiculous. /pos
But, when you consider the salt line at the edge of the universe and how that myth became a reality because of The Doctor's actions -- the fact that bigeneration was once a myth and now a reality suddenly opens up a whole door of possibilities for this upcoming season with Ncuti Gawa.
Now, The Doctor(s)
14 was consistently surprised in their actions, their off-the-hand comments. Something that 10 always struggled with was saying how much people meant to them.
And one thing about 14, they are filled with love. They openly say "I love ____" whereas 10 never did.
"Rose Tyler, I--"
Having to leave those he loved behind, never wanting to admit when he cared more than he did. As long as he spun and ran away from his feelings, they could never catch up to him. Right?
14 is different, always saying "I'm here", "You're okay" and slinging around the word "love" as if they would never grow tired of it. 14, obviously, is The Doctor after Amy, Clara, Billie, and the Fam. After avoiding a family with the Ponds, losing Clara after realizing they were toxic for her, a friend who never expected anything more from them, and Yaz's fam who only wanted to be a safe space for them to be able to turn to. Yaz, the last companion that was pushed away by The Doctor, had loved them and told them so and gotten nothing in return.
And there were so many different ways that 14 showed this love. So many hugs!! So many reassurances!! And so much love that The Doctor was sharing amongst everyone who could hear them -- and yet not a drop of that love or compassion showed inwards.
I am so emotional about this hug, it's not even funny. Literally healing their younger self. The love, the understanding, the "I'm here" -- finally someone who understands literally everything 14 has gone through. The acceptance of the hug (THE TUCK INTO THE NECK?!?!?FSKFBWILDNLADN) I fell to my knees!!!!! SOBBING!!!!!!!!
BUT!!! Not only is 15 born on the battlefield, but also born surrounded by love and fun. Pants or not, 15 is ready to save the world and make it a good time for those around them. Self assured, fun, smiling, and loving-- 15 jumps into the world with a confused hug and love for their past & current self. After years of therapy, I keep hearing some of the same phrases along the lines of "you have to look to your past/younger self and let them know that it's okay, that they shouldn't have had to go through all of that alone" and this was exactly that, only on a Time Lord scale.
Now, personally, I had fun watching the game of catch with the Toymaker after 15 was introduced. I thought it was a fun way to share the spotlight with Gawa as the 15th Doctor and let the audience know some hints as to what we have to look forward to.
The terms of endearment melted my little heart. I'm always a sucker for a good nickname, both in real life and in fiction and 15 was full of them.
"Honey, sweetie, pumpkin pie, you are too traumatized to be flying the TARDIS right now, get OUT and take a NAP"
That was basically what was said, right?
And then this...home. The Doctor having a family. This is quite honestly the perfect, happiest ending that The Doctor wearing this particular face could have had. All those years running away, fighting hard, and keeping on a strong face, and this is what that was for. All that running and avoiding, and love for everyone else but themself and now they finally can take a break and focus on taking time to say "what the hell". Maybe go to therapy. There's so much fic potential for this as well, the kinds of companions they could run into casually or little every day struggles that are literally alien to them.
I've seen a lot of posts upset that this plot point seemed to be circling around two points: 1) this a repeat of the metacrisis ending and 2) not the first time The Doctor had domestic bliss.
To that, I say:
the metacrisis Doctor was half human and would be able to grow old with Rose in that parallel universe. It was also the traumatic ending of the DoctorDonna (or so we thought) and on that beach, the Doctor, the Time Lord Doctor, still couldn't say how much Rose meant to him. He also said that living life, day after day, was the one thing that he could never have.
2. On Tranzalore, The Doctor was not resting. He was taking care of the tear in the universe and defending it from the monsters that would constantly be on the attack. Every day was a fight. And when he spent those 24 years with River Song, he knew that this was the last time they would meet before her end. How can you relax when you know that these are the last moments you're going to have with your loved one. You watched them die and this is the best that you can do with them in their last days, knowing that you can't stop death from coming.
And there is something so incredibly healing about The Doctor allowing themselves to stay here, with only occasional trips to the Moon with their favorite niece. and the possibility of them perhaps becoming a Curator -- who knows!!
And now we have Ncuti Gawa's 15th Doctor to look forward to and all of time and space!! I am so incredibly excited to see where this takes us on Christmas.
#basically: AAAAHHHHHH OH MY GOD#fourteenth doctor#doctor who#doctor who 60th anniversary#doctor donna#14th doctor#rant post#tumblr essay#welcome ncuti gawa#Doctor Who is Not Dedd
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Ok so... that episode. Mixed thoughts. First half I felt was really strong. The second half...well.
As usual I'm going to kind of vomit my thoughts out as bullet points. It'll be quite rough though, as I'm way too tired to break these down more carefully right now, and just want to say my piece before I go to bed:
LOL at UNIT being so out in the open now. Couldn't help but think of all the big bold 'secret' signs from the classic series when I saw that.
The Vlinx is a really odd addition... did anyone else think about Splinx (from the Mines of Terror game) when they heard the name?
MEL! I did find it curious that some of the reporting on her appearance was ambiguous about when it would be, so I guess that explains that. Kind of an odd choice for a UNIT / Toymaker story, but establishing her as a character at UNIT works fine.
Now that I think about it, wasn't POTD specifically written with awareness of who / what RTD would be using in the specials? If so, I guess that explains why Mel didn't play a part in the plot.
Speaking of which, they're definitely going for this UNIT spin-off aren't they? I mean... makes sense. It seems they're building off what we saw in POTD anyway.
Trinity Wells coming back was a fun surprise, given how long it's been since we've seen her.
The political commentary of 'being right' is kind of perfect. Between this and the trans representation in The Star Beast, it kind of feels like RTD is laying out this thesis for the next few years.
I kind of like how they did the Toymaker in this one? Though he's perhaps a little too flamboyant and 'Master'-y for me, I do think the stuff with his accents etc was quite clever. I also think there was clearly some thought about the more dated racial stuff with the character, which that line about the weather kinda felt like it was hinting at?
I liked all the little ways they hinted at the Toymaker's "crystal guardian" backstory, with him sitting outside of "Chaos and Order".
Speaking of which... did he imply he beat the the Black and White Guardians? Cause if so...
Not gonna lie, when the Doctor started talking about a mistake he made when he was young, a part of me really genuinely thought they were about to mention Divided Loyalties. The line about the 'face' the Toymaker wore didn't help.
I'm also glad we got the Celestial Toyroom stuff, as I wasn't sure how much we were going to get in this episode? I think the creepiness with modern effects was great. I kind of wish we got to spend more time there though, ala the original story.
Conversely, I also feel like we could have gotten a bit more out of the idea of the Toymaker escaping into the universe? We got a glimpse of that in 'realistic' terms with the outer world, and a more campy fun vibe inside UNIT, but I would equally love much more focus on the world going mad, both mentally, but also physically. I dunno, it feels like there's two ambitious stories you could have gone with, but the episode kind of half-and-halfed it.
The stuff with Amy, Clara, Bill and the Flux. I needed that. Seriously. As someone whose literally spent all last week thinking about how it's all been one line of tragedies for the Doctor, connected from one to the other, getting that acknowledged in text was great.
The twist with the Master getting trapped too was a bizarre addtion, and honestly unnecessary. It felt like that story (I can't remember which, sorry EU fans, an EDA I think) which offhandedly implies both the Master and Rani are dead. I feel it could have worked a bit better if it was another major character we haven't heard of in some time, like Rassilon or someone, instead of someone we saw just a few episodes ago.
I will say the games were disappointing. I get there's only so much you can do with recognisable simple games, but I definitely wish we got something a bit more complex than "biggest number wins" and "catch". This is a story that really needed a good resolution, ideally based on the Doctor outwitting the Toymaker, and we didn't really get that. I'm not upset about it, just felt weak.
That being said, the focus on rules with regards to 'best of three' was perfect. Exactly what I wanted more of tbh.
I'm surprised by the "One Who Waits", after being teased in marketing as referring to the Toymaker, actually being someone else. RTD's been doing a surprising amount of sequel hooking actually...
I'll get more into the mechanics in a second, but I do like the resolution being about the Doctor's own mental health? It feels like the right conclusion, not just based on the past couple episodes, but also based on Thirteen's character arc, as well as everything that happened before her. I'm sure fans will (rightfully) eat that up and talk about it a lot.
Ok, so let's seperate out the BIG thing, and my thoughts on it. Warning: I'm about to get uncharacteristically negative for me:
I had seen the leaks about the bigeneration, and am really disappointed at how accurate they were, though I had kind of accepted it based on the accuracy of The Star Beast's leaks.
Funny enough, I genuinely do quite like ideas of weird stuff to do with regenerations in terms of splitting etc. I genuinely have had some thought before about the idea of it from an assimilation kind of view, merging together, kind of a more horror-y take on the Master's plan in POTD.
But... did we have to do this with Tennant? I mean, don't get me wrong I love him and have genuinely loved what he brought to Fourteen, distinguishing him from Ten and giving him the feel of that extra history since then... but did he really need to be the Doctor to get a life after regeneration? After all, Ten is the one who 'didn't want to go'. Granted him such a thing really feels like it's going against not just the 'embrace change' message of DW in general, but even Ten's own arc specifically?
(This is a thought I had after writing everything else here, but it's also kind of messed up that he's the one to get this conclusion, when we literally just had a whole arc about 13 and Yaz not having enough time together because of 13's incoming regeneration...?)
I don't think I need to spell out the issues of having two 'current' Doctors, not just in-universe, but also out of universe, and the shadow that now hangs over Ncuti's series, whether or not we get more with 14. The TARDIS splitting was really bad too.
That being said, there is one saving grace, in that it's seemingly implied that the rest of 14's life still comes before 15, somehow, based on what the latter said about being better because 14 will take the time to rest, recover and reflect on everything that's happened?
This is the one thing that doesn't make me want to throw the resolution away, as it does seemingly provide some clarity. If RTD sticks by that line, it would suggest it's less that there's two whole new Doctors, and more that 14 has been given some grace of having a bit more time before he turns into 15. That there's still technically a linear progression of Doctors, it's just one gets to hang around a little while to give the new one a cleaner mental slate. How on earth that would work however, is a whole other question...
I mean... couldn't we have just done this by time travel instead? Rather than introduce this whole new, kinda show-breaking concept? You could still get your hypothetical Tennant and past companions miniseries (which seems like it'll be a thing) or whatever alongside 15's own debut. Just let it be non-linear, and let us meet and travel with 15 before we get a peaceful, recovered 14 regeneration?
Also... if we ARE going play fast and loose with the ideas of regeneration... why didn't Tennant's face coming back play into this? Like... what a weird choice to make that the 'mystery' of the specials, throw in a crazy regeneration sequence... then just suggest it's a bit of a subconscious message. If we are going to get crazy with what regeneration can do, why not go all in with stuff like the Guardians of the Edge, or the Valeyard or something? Have fun with the internal identities lore of regeneration?
So yeah, to summarise my thoughts on the bigeneration... I really think RTD might have gone a step too far this time. I spent a little time after the last episode talking about how the lack of resolution on the Flux was one of my bigger complaints about the Chibnall era, but this writing decision feels even more baffling. If Doctor Who is going to have a 'jumping the shark' moment, we might have just witnessed it.
That being said, as someone who hates being too negative, I did find a silver lining in that the dialogue implies he's planned ahead how to get out of some of these issues, with regards to two concurrent Doctors etc. It just doesn't feel good being in this situation at all, when it wasn't needed in the first place.
Overall thoughts
I didn't hate the episode. In fact I was very much in to most of it! There were a lot of good ideas, across the Toymaker, the Giggle etc. although I do feel some were woefully underused within the episode. It's just that they're all kind of marred by that one big bad idea at the end.
Like I said, the stuff focusing on the Toymaker and the Doctor's history, plus his time since he travelled with Donna was great. The Giggle was a fun satirical concept, if again underused, and the Toymaker's argument for targetting Earth was pretty great. The resolution of forcing the Doctor to settle down, for a little while, and be with friends is decent too, and a nice conclusion to come to, even if the way it came about was a mess.
I suspect, and hope, we might get some more details not just about how this will all work (or maybe just opening up the question without getting too specific), but also about any possible plans for spin-offs and whether or not they will overlap with the stuff in this episode, which may or may not alleviate my worries.
But for now.... yeah, I'm concerned, sorry.
#Doctor Who#The Giggle#DW Spoilers#Doctor Who Spoilers#Doctor Who 60th Anniversary#DW negativity#Fourteenth Doctor#Fifteenth Doctor#RTD#I'm not going to go full “anti-RTD” or anything#don't worry#(I don't exactly want to see that myself either)#and will probably keep being quite positive and creative about the show#if occassionally critical of certain things#but this is probably the most worried I've been#far more than I ever was with the Timeless Child lore#even if I do still have some of my own critiques there#(TLDR I kinda want someone - maybe RTD - to pull an Unnatural History and open it up more to interpretation)#gallifrey being re-destroyed and the flux being unresolved are up there but probably still second and third to this in my head
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So I'll start with the fact that I am, indeed, a fan of Chibnall's era. I am an even bigger fan of the 13th Doctor. I'll also start with the fact that I quite literally grew up with RTD's writing and loved Ten with all my heart. But now I am an adult and some of RTD's writing has left me a bit scared.
Here's my "live streaming" review on The Star Beast. SPOILERS BELOW!
I'm going in order of how I processed things, so it's gonna be chaotic.
My first essay is this: You know why this post is so long? It's because we're not livestreaming things anymore. I'm not immediately with other fans in real time, typing out our little posts. I'm quite literally doing this at my leisure. I'll miss watching DW live.
Now then, in order!
1. The music? Ten out of ten. I have always loved Gold's compositions and he did not let us down. And this opinion is only being generated from the new(er) theme song. Which leads me to...
2. Look at the B U D G E T. Even the opening credits has a budget that you can just FEEL. Those stars/galaxies? Very nice... And then I have to chuckle over the low level lighting / 2000s era effects of David Tennant's full profile voiceover of Donna and his story.
3. Him taking the boxes, seeing Donna's face, and slowly putting the boxes back is an RTD special and I LOVE that kind of comedy. It just makes me chuckle. And then him having a full blown panic over hearing Donna shout "Rose!" which...
4. Having these little call back moments feels rather bitter since we're calling this a reboot of the show. UNLESS the reboot is when Nucti starts up? But the fact that I'm confused just shows how bitter I should be. Again, my Chibnall love is showing. I don't believe in yet another reboot for DW, but that's a marketing thing over anything else... I hope.
5. I'm glad the 2000s Rose/Doctor shipping era lives strong through the name Rose. I know those fans are going to be happy and they deserve it.
6. NOW... Donna having a family. Okay. I'll have a separate post but... Does anyone else think that Donna having a husband just doesn't fit for her? Especially with her memories erased? Idk, I just never envisioned Donna getting married after the whole Lance thing. BUT I'm glad she's happy and the husband seems so nice.
7. Donna giving up that lottery money? Also strange considering she lost her memories. The first time we meet Donna we get this feeling that she's a bit shallow, which makes sense because she has to develop as a character. That was her character development so here KEEPING the money would have made more sense here. Which...
8. Rose. That's all. She's great!
9. Hey, can't help but notice, but when did the 14th Doctor have time to make a new screwdriver, huh? What gives? AND - AND there's not a single hint of 13's sonic on there. HMM. What the heck!
10. FORGOT SOMETHING. Whatever the line was "that says mistress" "Oh, catch up, will you?" I don't know how to take in this scene quite yet, but it's making me pause. It felt... Off kilter. Maybe cause I love 13 so much, I don't know. There's always callbacks to other faces when the Doctor first regenerations, but this felt... Wrong? Also, TEE HEE my mind went to Missy IMMEDIATELY and I love that little connection my fic writing brain is going wild.
11. WHY DOES UNIT HAVE SO MUCH MONEY???? Look at this uniforms, holy cow! I almost don't like it? Like, they're an underground agency. WE JUST SAW THEM GET DESTROYED BY CYBERMEN IN THE POWER OF THE DOCTOR. Are we just ignore that entire episode or...?
12. Donna not being able to keep a job? Yeah, THAT one I believe haha.
13. "I will burn down the world for you, darling" says Donna Noble to her transgender kid. WHICH IS AMAZING, WHICH MADE ME SMILE SO WIDE I WAS HAVING A PARTY IN MY BRAIN. There's my Donna!
14. "Gramps used to talk about flying saucers" oh god my heart. I teared up a little, not going to lie. Wilf, I think about you every single day. You made the Doctor the person he is today.
15. MEEP IS SO CUTE. OH WOW. I know "evil" is coming but SO CUTE RIGHT NOW.
16. To go from some excellent animatronics from the Meep to whatever those alien, fly things are was HILARIOUS. What, we'd run out of money for those costume's? Were they meant to look like a typical RTD alien back in the 2000s? How does that work?
17. WHAT THE ACTUAL FLYING FUCK WAS THE SONIC DOING. Wait, did Disney give the sonic some magical powers? Why are we suddenly writing in the air? How are we getting readouts of the ship from the sonic like that? Could it do that before? Why would we not do that before? I'm dying that's so funny.
18. Shirley seems cool!!! I hope we get more of her! And I love the nod to PROPER representation. Chibs did a good job of that as well. Edit: REAL representation! Good on RTD. The scene with the stairs and she says "don't make me the problem"... I am not a wheelchair user but I do hope that was properly done.
19. "I absolutely love her [Donna]" LOOK AT 14 HAVING FEELINGS! Aww, I hope 15 follows through with the feelings! 11, 12, and 13 have been so locked up, so scared to love... Having a Doctor that's ready to loudly embrace their love for things would be such a good character development. (My fear would be RTD ripping that away in the most tragic way possible, but that's a future problem I suppose).
20. I'm at the scene where Rose is talking to the Meep in the shed, and just, again, THE MUSIC. We did have some good musical moments in 13's era but, even I have to admit, nothing as pretty as this. It really is something, round of applause once again.
21. LISTEN. L I S T E N. I don't condone slapping the Doctor. I don't. In fact, it's wrong. It's very wrong. And you can't slap 13, can you? So slapping 14 shouldn't make sense. It's the definition of sexist. It's just not something you should do. BUT. B U T. Jackie's "stitch this, mate" is always in my head and now THIS "here we go again" after Sylvia gives the Doctor a good slap... I laughed, okay? It was funny! But really, in the good year of 2023, there shouldn't be comedy like that. That joke should have died. BUT I LAUGHED. So I'm to blame as well.
22. "Never mind about the ferret from mars." I LOVE the mars callback from Donna, thank you very much.
23. Kate looking after Wilf damn near brought tears to my eyes. Kate, you are the real hero of the DW universe. Thank you.
24. This is... This is gonna be another post. But. Okay. So. The whole "you're assuming he as a pronoun". Right. Okay. I know groups of people that talk like that. Both online and in person. Personal life spoiler, I work(ed) in musical theater. I've seen it all. I, personally, do not like this whole... "Let's be really obvious about it" thing. And also highly believe in someone else first telling me, when it fits, what their pronouns are. Having someone pull the defensive "YOU ASSUMED" crap doesn't work because humans don't think like that. It's a whole other rant, but yeah. This felt forced and I hate when shows do that. Representation is important but FORCING that representation doesn't help.
25. what's the. what's the sonic doing. what. how'd it. we got lines in the air. we got unbelievable shield. we. he waved it like a wand and now. what the. how'd. (Yo, not me head cannoning that this is 13 banging around in 14's head demanding that they have a better way to protect their friends. Love it). I WILL HAVE A LOT MORE THOUGHTS ON THIS.
26. DW has money now. That will continue to blow my mind.
27. "This is a sonic screwdriver and if it's good at one thing, it's resonating concrete". Oh yeah, Doctor? I'd like to bring forth you, never once, being able to do it. Not once! (And now it's good at creating magical shields and complex, alien holograms, but that's point #25)
28. Where'd in hell's name did he get that wig and how soon can Donna throw it out a window?
29. MEEP YOU - YOU UTTER AHOLE. Man, it was SO CUTE
30. O k a y. I take back, holy crap what point am I on? I take back point #7. So there's some of the Doctor left in her, eh? That's why! I dig that. I really, really dig that. Sorry for being a downer, that was my mistake.
31. I too can come up with technobabble bullcrap that means nothing. I sometimes think that's RTD's biggest failing, his incessant need to over describe things. EDIT. JEEZ, a good five minutes later as we're STILL talking gibberish.
32. Hey, I see you "glass wall between Donna and the Doctor" and raise you "glass wall between Wilf and the Doctor". OW. I demand emotional compensation!
33. Listen, I just got over 13 keeping every. single. emotion inside of her. She never raised her voice, she never really cried, she never had a chance to just scream and yell and be angry at the universe. The fact that there's 14 RIGHT HERE, screaming, because to save Donna, he has to lose her YET AGAIN. Just angry and devastated and grieving... It's a stunning scene, it's a scene that makes sense, but my 13 loving little heart says that this is 13's moment to be angry and it was taken from her.
34. Also, ha, I know Disney bought DW, but did we just "Winter Soldier" Donna Noble. We gave her trigger words to keep her memories at bay? Really?
35. "Hold on a minute," said in Ten's/Fourteenth's voice... Was that.. Was that ELVEN'S theme music while Donna was being, well, Time Lady Donna? Because that was... That was GOLDEN. How amazing is that? What a great idea!
36. You MONSTER, RTD, making Fourteen hold Donna the same way he held the Master? What the hell is that about?
37. The.. The nonbinary, but binary. I... It's... Something! Okay, I'll get there. I'll have a post about it. Maybe. But. Yeah, it's something!
38. DOES UNIT HAVE AVENGERS *cough* sorry it's been a while for Marvel me *cough* STARK TOWER. WAS THAT STARK TOWER? Damn, Disney, you really did bring us back to superwholock Avenger's "Clint in the vents" era, huh?
39. "It's a shame you're not a woman anymore, because she would have understood... Something a male presenting Time Lord will never understand." You can't... You can't do the whole "nonbinary" thing and that just immediately point out gender like that. What. The defeats the entire purpose. The whole point you're trying to make is that gender DOESN'T matter, and yet... And the Doctor has always, always been nonbinary. I refer to the Doctor as "they" when speaking as a collective whole, and many of us have done that. I use pronouns when talking about specific Doctors because humans have always used pronouns. Again, 11 and 13 have made mention that gender has NEVER mattered to them. I just... You can't be poking a bear and then expecting the bear to not to come after you if you've changed the poking object from a stick to a teaser.
40. I gotta laugh that Rose and Donna had the most peaceful "regeneration" we've ever seen. Somewhere in there, a Doctor or two is screaming lol.
41. Oh... The TARDIS is ugly. DON'T HIT ME. STOP HITTING ME. I MEAN It. Not, for real though, Oh my god, what. Why. The colors. Or lack of colors, really. What the fuck. Where's the... Where's the personality? Where's the sass? I've loved every single TARDIS change but THIS... This is a hard one to swallow.
42. The TARDIS having an shit fit over Donna spilling coffee on her is WONDERFUL. That's so funny to me. With everything she's been through with 13, that was just the best way for her to get her revenge!
All in all, strange episode, yeah? I mean, what WAS that plot? It was really more of setup for the next episode, and double really meant to reunite ten and Donna, which was well done, but also... Why? It just felt a bit all over the place but very much cushioned by nostalgia.
I'm done now. My fingers HURT.
As always, and as I say in all my fics, I'm here if you want to chat. Reblog this, PM me, tag me in stuff!
#dw spoilers#dw#doctor who#david tennant#donna noble#dw 60th#doctor who spoilers#dw specials#the doctor#fourteenth doctor#the star beast#DW the star beast
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