Doctor Who 30.1 reaction
Apr. 6th, 2008 03:42 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
tree_and_leafThanks to the miracle of of VPNs, I was able to watch the first episode of the new season on the iPlayer. Liked it a lot better than I expected to - it was Who by the numbers a lot of the time, but competently done, and I liked Donna a lot. Am surprised by how good an actress Catherine Tate is; the scenes with her granddad were particularly touching, and she works well with Tennant.
The would-be humourous 'mate' misunderstanding at the end of the episode was a bit over done, but that was the script, not either of the actors. That said, most of the character stuff was excellent - the Doctor's guilt about Martha was handled really well. Donna's characterisation looks promising, though I'm rather sad that she gave up on Earth after a not very good package holiday; on the other hand, I loved her drift into Sarah-Jane-esque paranormal investigating (and given that she didn't have the Doctor's resources to help in infiltrating companies, she's actually rather better at it than he is). Pity the journalist was portrayed so inconsistently - on the one hand, her determination is impressive; on the other, she seems to be set up as the ineffectual butt of audience humour.
Once again, really, really weird religious overtones. The Doctor now seems firmly established as a Messiah figure, albeit one with whacking great personal flaws (at least he's now showing some awareness of them, as when he admits that Martha was brilliant, both as a person and in her effect on him, and that he nevertheless hurt and damaged her through his own fault). It's surely not entirely coincidental that Donna offers, as an excuse for her being unable to talk to her mother when she's actually in danger because she was looking for the Doctor, that she's "In a church, praying". And also significant that both her unsympathetic mother and her sympathetic grandfather react to the idea with bewilderment and contempt. God doesn't seem to feature in anyone's minds in this version of the Whoniverse, despite the coquetting with religious imagery; the nearest you'll get to transcendence is an encounter with aliens. There's something quasi-religious about Grandad's dreams and faith in the future of humanity among the stars - an odd moment that, when he talks about how "we'll" get to Venus one day, and one that felt weirdly dated. It could have been someone talking in the sixties, except that then they would have given a much more optimistic timetable. Classic science fiction, anyway, but of the naively optimistic sort that I thought wasn't possible anymore - and in any case sounds more like Classic Trek than Who.
So if religion, apparently, isn't a source of meaning, and neither is an ordinary life on earth, then we're left with the Doctor, who RTD seems to be convinced is a sort of atheistic Jesus (I read somewhere in comments to a reaction post that Davies has formulated thoughts along these lines in the latest DWM - can anyone tell me what he actually said?). Except, of course, it doesn't really work - not just because the Doctor, lonely god or not, is not God the maker of all things, but also, and perhaps more fundamentally, because the Doctor isn't human. He doesn't belong here; he's just passing through. Which is why it makes sense that Donna's encounter with the Doctor, rather than transforming her life in a positive way, left her to wait about with no sense of purpose other than to keep watching for the Doctor to come back. (Of course, this is a slightly premature criticism, given that it's the start of the season, but what with Sarah Jane in School Reunion, and all the doleful shots of Rose, we've developed a pattern of people being left changed by the Doctor, but so changed that they no longer have any purpose apart from him). There's no way I can think of that you can fit the Doctor's lonely god act into the sacramental, incarnational emphases of Christianity, where the transcendent other reveals itself precisely in the mundane and every-day, though I suspect RTD doesn't realise this.
On the other hand, I did find one of Donna's speeches, where she describes how the day with the Doctor made her see things differently, and she thought she'd be different, and then she woke up the next day to find the world and herself just as they were, resonated with my experience of the religious life, because generally, even after an epiphanic moment, any change is not immediate, or at least isn't immediately apparent - it has to be lived through, slowly and at times painfully or drily.
Returning to Who, though - I feel a lot more excited about this season than I did, even though the episode as a whole was a bit ho-hum. Tennant and Tate are good together, and I have my hopes for Donna. Ten, too, was a lot more likable - not so smug and arrogant, and willing to admit his mistakes. That, of course, is the other problem with setting him up as a quasi-Jesus: it looks even worse when he behaves like a self-centred git. Three could be an arrogant, selfish so-and-so at times, but it was easier to take when he was portrayed as an eccentric, charming, somewhat self-centred but essentially well-meaning alien traveller and scientist than some sort of divinity and the fire at the heart of the universe, or however Tim put it.
So, yes: bring on the Romans (though I'm not sure, on the whole, I wouldn't rather have One, Barbara and Ian as my guides to the era...)
The would-be humourous 'mate' misunderstanding at the end of the episode was a bit over done, but that was the script, not either of the actors. That said, most of the character stuff was excellent - the Doctor's guilt about Martha was handled really well. Donna's characterisation looks promising, though I'm rather sad that she gave up on Earth after a not very good package holiday; on the other hand, I loved her drift into Sarah-Jane-esque paranormal investigating (and given that she didn't have the Doctor's resources to help in infiltrating companies, she's actually rather better at it than he is). Pity the journalist was portrayed so inconsistently - on the one hand, her determination is impressive; on the other, she seems to be set up as the ineffectual butt of audience humour.
Once again, really, really weird religious overtones. The Doctor now seems firmly established as a Messiah figure, albeit one with whacking great personal flaws (at least he's now showing some awareness of them, as when he admits that Martha was brilliant, both as a person and in her effect on him, and that he nevertheless hurt and damaged her through his own fault). It's surely not entirely coincidental that Donna offers, as an excuse for her being unable to talk to her mother when she's actually in danger because she was looking for the Doctor, that she's "In a church, praying". And also significant that both her unsympathetic mother and her sympathetic grandfather react to the idea with bewilderment and contempt. God doesn't seem to feature in anyone's minds in this version of the Whoniverse, despite the coquetting with religious imagery; the nearest you'll get to transcendence is an encounter with aliens. There's something quasi-religious about Grandad's dreams and faith in the future of humanity among the stars - an odd moment that, when he talks about how "we'll" get to Venus one day, and one that felt weirdly dated. It could have been someone talking in the sixties, except that then they would have given a much more optimistic timetable. Classic science fiction, anyway, but of the naively optimistic sort that I thought wasn't possible anymore - and in any case sounds more like Classic Trek than Who.
So if religion, apparently, isn't a source of meaning, and neither is an ordinary life on earth, then we're left with the Doctor, who RTD seems to be convinced is a sort of atheistic Jesus (I read somewhere in comments to a reaction post that Davies has formulated thoughts along these lines in the latest DWM - can anyone tell me what he actually said?). Except, of course, it doesn't really work - not just because the Doctor, lonely god or not, is not God the maker of all things, but also, and perhaps more fundamentally, because the Doctor isn't human. He doesn't belong here; he's just passing through. Which is why it makes sense that Donna's encounter with the Doctor, rather than transforming her life in a positive way, left her to wait about with no sense of purpose other than to keep watching for the Doctor to come back. (Of course, this is a slightly premature criticism, given that it's the start of the season, but what with Sarah Jane in School Reunion, and all the doleful shots of Rose, we've developed a pattern of people being left changed by the Doctor, but so changed that they no longer have any purpose apart from him). There's no way I can think of that you can fit the Doctor's lonely god act into the sacramental, incarnational emphases of Christianity, where the transcendent other reveals itself precisely in the mundane and every-day, though I suspect RTD doesn't realise this.
On the other hand, I did find one of Donna's speeches, where she describes how the day with the Doctor made her see things differently, and she thought she'd be different, and then she woke up the next day to find the world and herself just as they were, resonated with my experience of the religious life, because generally, even after an epiphanic moment, any change is not immediate, or at least isn't immediately apparent - it has to be lived through, slowly and at times painfully or drily.
Returning to Who, though - I feel a lot more excited about this season than I did, even though the episode as a whole was a bit ho-hum. Tennant and Tate are good together, and I have my hopes for Donna. Ten, too, was a lot more likable - not so smug and arrogant, and willing to admit his mistakes. That, of course, is the other problem with setting him up as a quasi-Jesus: it looks even worse when he behaves like a self-centred git. Three could be an arrogant, selfish so-and-so at times, but it was easier to take when he was portrayed as an eccentric, charming, somewhat self-centred but essentially well-meaning alien traveller and scientist than some sort of divinity and the fire at the heart of the universe, or however Tim put it.
So, yes: bring on the Romans (though I'm not sure, on the whole, I wouldn't rather have One, Barbara and Ian as my guides to the era...)
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(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-06 04:59 pm (UTC)The idea of people left changed but drifting by the Doctor is an old fandom one - I remember a story from the early 1990s where there is a general meeting of old companions recounting their loss of direction and failed relationships, ending with the new recruit - Ace - ringing the doorbell.
(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-06 05:39 pm (UTC)Now that you mention it, I think to some extent that's why I've never really been able to 'get into' Doctor Who, and why it especially bothers me that the current writers seem to play up the romantic angle to such an extent. I have friends who'd never seen Doctor Who before its most recent incarnations, and they're so caught up in the Doctor/Rose (or Doctor/Martha) aspects of the story that it colours most every conversation they have about the series. Adding the quasi-religious aspect doesn't help, either.
(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-06 08:02 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-06 08:12 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-06 08:52 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-07 01:32 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-06 07:05 pm (UTC)an old fandom one - I remember a story from the early 1990s where there is a general meeting of old companions recounting their loss of direction and failed relationships, ending with the new recruit - Ace - ringing the doorbell.
Actually, I think I've read that, but I hadn't realised it was quite so pervasive in the fandom. It doesn't seem a necessary consequence of canon.
(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-11 11:01 pm (UTC)Although not Martha -- at least not if you count Torchwood as an extension of canon. She moves on and makes something of her life, even if aliens are still involved. But you're definitely right about both Rose and Donna. And the girl from Voyage of the Damned just ended up dead.
(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-14 07:07 am (UTC)That's true. But the general tendency is a bit worrying.
(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-14 10:15 am (UTC)