Some thoughts on Journey's End
Nov. 19th, 2008 09:11 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
missroseroseI finished the fourth season of Doctor Who last night (thanks, Alfie!), which was on the whole far better than the third. Much as I hate to say it, Donna was a far more interesting companion than Martha ever was, even if her first appearance was frankly more grating than interesting - she soon made up for it as her character grew and changed.
I've been mulling over the finale, which struck me as rather darker than the previous seasons. I'm putting my thoughts for each character behind a spoiler cut (not that it'll probably be that interesting if you haven't seen the show, anyway.) If you've seen it but need a recap, Wikipedia has a fairly good one (Part 1, Part 2).
Rose Tyler: While it was good to see her again, and I liked the part she played in Turn Left (an excellent episode on the whole), in Journey's End it honestly didn't seem like she had that much to do. Her entire role in the episode was either mooning over The Doctor, or being mooned over in return - and to be paired off with his human-clone at the end.
Cyrano mentioned that bringing her back sort of cheapened the very effective emotional punch of leaving her stranded in an alternate universe, which is true, but it didn't bug me so much because if there's one thing we've seen in Doctor Who, it's that Nothing Is Final. (How many contortions have the writers gone through to bring back the Daleks time and again? What is the percentage chance that we'll see even more of them, despite Clone!Doctor having supposedly destroyed their whole race?) Still, it does cut the strength of one of the series' best moments, and it seems like if the writers were going to do that, they should have given Rose a bigger part in the finale - as it stands, she barely even has any dialogue. Donna was the pivotal character in this episode, which is as it should be, but if Rose wasn't going to play a strong role, why go to all the trouble to bring her back? Giving her a happier ending was sweet, but didn't seem to justify the cost, storytelling-wise.
On the subject of Rose and Clone!Doctor, at least, I'm optimistic. It's definitely a messed-up start to a relationship ("So, you're like, the dude I fell in love with, except you're not,"), but from what we've seen they are virtually identical, and people have gotten over weirder things in relationships. So I'm going to go with the "sweet romantic ending" idea rather than "Rose stuck babysitting fake Doctor" idea.
I think there are some separate, very interesting dynamics taking place during that last scene in Bad Wolf Bay, but I'll save that for a bit later since they don't have to do directly with Rose.
Martha Jones: Oh for the love of Davros, isn't poor Martha ever going to get any real character development? She already spent a season being underwritten and poorly established; now she's running around in the few guest slots she's allotted doing things that might or might not jibe with her character, if we had any idea what her character was actually like. The big question that frustrates me with Martha is, why? Why was she a medical student to begin with? Why did she fall for The Doctor - what part of her personality responded to him? What prompted her to join this secret military organization she's apparently in now when before she seemed relatively pacifistic? The only way she gets any screen time is when she's making a Big Plot Point, which is almost always when she's reacting to events in the script. We never get any real insight into what she might think of events, or what she might do if people weren't constantly ordering her about. Freema Agyeman does well with what she's given, and Martha's has always had the potential to be awesomely nifty, but as currently (under)written she's essentially a big pushover. C'mon, guys - let her have some of these great character moments you gave Donna and The Doctor and Rose (and even Mickey and Jackie, eventually).
Jack Harkness: Speaking of great character moments - Jack's instinctive reaction to the Daleks' declaration of invasion? I was in stitches. I need to rent me some Torchwood so I can get the blanks filled in as to what he's been up to. Also, random thought: How long, subjectively speaking, has he had that Royal Air Force overcoat that looks so fantastic on him? He had it when we first met him, and again when we saw him a few months later, then he got catapulted back in time a few hundred years that he lived through on a day-by-day basis, so...a few centuries, at least? What do they make their clothing out of in the 51st century, carbon nanotubes?
The Doctor: Poor Doctor. He spends all this time running around manically, picking up and losing and reacquiring companions the way people do hobbies or skills, constantly jabbering on about this or that new or exciting thing - why? Because he's on the run...from himself. His past, those he's left behind, the many who have died because of him, the many people he's lost all haunt him, and he can't confront any of it. He's potentially the smartest creature in the universe, and yet he fails at basic self-examination.
Part of the reason this outing with the Daleks was far more effective than, say, "Daleks in Manhattan" was the way it took advantage of that aspect of his personality. Davros rubs his face in it, making him look at all the parts of his existence that he can't stand, jeering that by merely existing he does more harm than good (a debatable point, but Davros is pretty much on par with a Bond villain, so hey). And the Doctor, with his Harry-Dresden-esque-must-do-the-right-thing-I'm-responsible-even-for-repercussions-I-couldn't-have-foreseen complex, cracks - not a lot, but a little bit. It's more strain than he can handle, especially on top of (as far as he's aware) losing the TARDIS.
Which is part of what makes the next bit, where the Doctor-Donna and an outright clone of himself show up, mighty interesting.
Donna, Clone!Doctor, & Doctor-Donna: Here we get to the complicated one, and the bits that have actually inspired some speculation as well as just reaction. I realize my thoughts on the matter are kind of convoluted, but bear with me here.
First off, Donna's ending bugged the absolute piss out of me. I realize that this probably stems from my living in a strongly individualistic culture, but I tend to think of my identity as being a combination of my genetics and (even more) my experiences, and what I've learned (or not learned) as a result of them. What the Doctor did to her was frankly worse than rape - stealing away an entire year's worth of experiences, and a particularly unique and character-forming set of experiences at that, is such a consummate invasion on such a personal level as to be frankly inexcusable. If there had been some indication that the personality changes she'd gone through had stayed with her, even if she couldn't consciously remember the experiences, it mightn't have stuck in my craw so badly; but no, she was thoroughly Donna The Temp From Chiswick again. And while the Doctor might reassure her family that the universe was a better place for her travels with him, everything she'd seen and heard - everything she'd learned - was rendered moot.
So why would the Doctor go to such an extreme? The reason given - that her brain would have short-circuited had she kept the Doctor's consciousness - makes some sense, but breaks down after a point. Surely the Doctor, with his near-godlike telepathic abilities, could have excised the parts of his mind that she'd assimilated without touching the memories of their travels together. He did something similar with Rose after she'd absorbed the consciousness of the TARDIS - Rose woke up without the ability to manipulate time and space but still perfectly able to remember what had happened. Even if he'd had to take out the whole memory of that particular escapade, surely Donna could have kept the memory of, say, their trip to Pompeii, or the giant wasp chasing Agatha Christie. So, what gives?
Here's my theory (and this is where I dive off into pure speculation, so be forewarned): I don't think he had to. I think he overreacted. And I think that what he did to Donna is what's weighing on him most heavily at the end of the episode.
When I first watched the sequence where Clone!Doctor and Doctor-Donna show up and save the day, I was puzzled - it seems like the Doctor's reaction, as it usually is when faced with something new and interesting that he's never seen before, should have been "Brilliant!" followed by his usual nonstop excited diatribe about how it probably happened, what the implications are, etc. But that's exactly the opposite of what happens. He becomes withdrawn, almost angry, and outright sullen at times. Part of this is that he's scared for Donna, sure, but I think an even bigger part of it is this: for the first time, he has to face himself - he literally has no choice. And not just once, but twice over, and right after he's just had his face rubbed in everything he hates about himself. Right when he's already feeling vulnerable, when he's already slightly cracked.
His clone-self is hard enough to deal with - all the abuse that he heaps upon his head on the beach at Bad Wolf Bay applies just as well to him, and he knows it. But eventually he can sock him away in an alternate universe with Rose, an ending where everyone's more or less happy, and that's fine.
But Donna - there's a snarl of a problem. Donna not only has incorporated his abilities, she's absorbed his consciousness - all his knowledge and memories, everything that makes him a Time Lord, that makes him him. He's concerned about her, but I think it's even more than that - he's angry. Hell, he's probably enraged. She can see everything about him that he refuses to look at, everything he hates about himself. It's an invasion on almost as large a scale as the one he perpetrates on her, and while it was unintentional, the damage is done and there's morally nothing he can do about it...
...until her brain starts to short-circuit from the strain. And there it is, his glorious opportunity to fix it all and regain his mental solitude - and of course it's for her sake! Her brain would overload if she even started to remember him, or anything about him, so of course he has to get rid of all of her experiences with him! It has nothing to do with the fact that she's seen him naked (literally as well as figuratively), and he just can't deal with that. Nothing whatsoever.
I don't think it was a vengeful act, per se - for all his faults, the Doctor isn't a vengeful sort. But I think there's a definite streak of self-interest there, and the line about "Oh, but we had a good run of it, didn't we?" (or however it went just before he mind-melds with her) sounded, rather than nostalgic or sorrowful, almost joyous. He can have his privacy back, he can pretend the whole thing never happened, and it's For Her Own Good.
But in the end, just like everything else, it haunts him. You can see it in his face when he sees Donna The Temp From Chiswick jabbering away on the phone - in his haste to regain his isolation, he's taken away everything good that he did for her, all the growth that she'd achieved, everything she'd learned. He tells himself it was for her own good, but in a way, he's proved Davros right. And, in the end, he's right back where he started - isolated, alone with his thoughts. Exactly what he hates.
Again, this is mostly speculation, but it does explain some of the reactions that I didn't quite get the first time through. I may have to watch the episode again to see if it jibes, or if it needs revising.
...Holy crow, that's a long entry. I suppose that makes sense, given that I've been working on it between paperwork for most of the day. To give credit where it's due, that's some pretty damn good storytelling to inspire this kind of rumination as well.
Anyone else out there who's seen the episode, do you have anything to add/refute? I'd be interested in other folks' take on it.
I've been mulling over the finale, which struck me as rather darker than the previous seasons. I'm putting my thoughts for each character behind a spoiler cut (not that it'll probably be that interesting if you haven't seen the show, anyway.) If you've seen it but need a recap, Wikipedia has a fairly good one (Part 1, Part 2).
Rose Tyler: While it was good to see her again, and I liked the part she played in Turn Left (an excellent episode on the whole), in Journey's End it honestly didn't seem like she had that much to do. Her entire role in the episode was either mooning over The Doctor, or being mooned over in return - and to be paired off with his human-clone at the end.
Cyrano mentioned that bringing her back sort of cheapened the very effective emotional punch of leaving her stranded in an alternate universe, which is true, but it didn't bug me so much because if there's one thing we've seen in Doctor Who, it's that Nothing Is Final. (How many contortions have the writers gone through to bring back the Daleks time and again? What is the percentage chance that we'll see even more of them, despite Clone!Doctor having supposedly destroyed their whole race?) Still, it does cut the strength of one of the series' best moments, and it seems like if the writers were going to do that, they should have given Rose a bigger part in the finale - as it stands, she barely even has any dialogue. Donna was the pivotal character in this episode, which is as it should be, but if Rose wasn't going to play a strong role, why go to all the trouble to bring her back? Giving her a happier ending was sweet, but didn't seem to justify the cost, storytelling-wise.
On the subject of Rose and Clone!Doctor, at least, I'm optimistic. It's definitely a messed-up start to a relationship ("So, you're like, the dude I fell in love with, except you're not,"), but from what we've seen they are virtually identical, and people have gotten over weirder things in relationships. So I'm going to go with the "sweet romantic ending" idea rather than "Rose stuck babysitting fake Doctor" idea.
I think there are some separate, very interesting dynamics taking place during that last scene in Bad Wolf Bay, but I'll save that for a bit later since they don't have to do directly with Rose.
Martha Jones: Oh for the love of Davros, isn't poor Martha ever going to get any real character development? She already spent a season being underwritten and poorly established; now she's running around in the few guest slots she's allotted doing things that might or might not jibe with her character, if we had any idea what her character was actually like. The big question that frustrates me with Martha is, why? Why was she a medical student to begin with? Why did she fall for The Doctor - what part of her personality responded to him? What prompted her to join this secret military organization she's apparently in now when before she seemed relatively pacifistic? The only way she gets any screen time is when she's making a Big Plot Point, which is almost always when she's reacting to events in the script. We never get any real insight into what she might think of events, or what she might do if people weren't constantly ordering her about. Freema Agyeman does well with what she's given, and Martha's has always had the potential to be awesomely nifty, but as currently (under)written she's essentially a big pushover. C'mon, guys - let her have some of these great character moments you gave Donna and The Doctor and Rose (and even Mickey and Jackie, eventually).
Jack Harkness: Speaking of great character moments - Jack's instinctive reaction to the Daleks' declaration of invasion? I was in stitches. I need to rent me some Torchwood so I can get the blanks filled in as to what he's been up to. Also, random thought: How long, subjectively speaking, has he had that Royal Air Force overcoat that looks so fantastic on him? He had it when we first met him, and again when we saw him a few months later, then he got catapulted back in time a few hundred years that he lived through on a day-by-day basis, so...a few centuries, at least? What do they make their clothing out of in the 51st century, carbon nanotubes?
The Doctor: Poor Doctor. He spends all this time running around manically, picking up and losing and reacquiring companions the way people do hobbies or skills, constantly jabbering on about this or that new or exciting thing - why? Because he's on the run...from himself. His past, those he's left behind, the many who have died because of him, the many people he's lost all haunt him, and he can't confront any of it. He's potentially the smartest creature in the universe, and yet he fails at basic self-examination.
Part of the reason this outing with the Daleks was far more effective than, say, "Daleks in Manhattan" was the way it took advantage of that aspect of his personality. Davros rubs his face in it, making him look at all the parts of his existence that he can't stand, jeering that by merely existing he does more harm than good (a debatable point, but Davros is pretty much on par with a Bond villain, so hey). And the Doctor, with his Harry-Dresden-esque-must-do-the-right-thing-I'm-responsible-even-for-repercussions-I-couldn't-have-foreseen complex, cracks - not a lot, but a little bit. It's more strain than he can handle, especially on top of (as far as he's aware) losing the TARDIS.
Which is part of what makes the next bit, where the Doctor-Donna and an outright clone of himself show up, mighty interesting.
Donna, Clone!Doctor, & Doctor-Donna: Here we get to the complicated one, and the bits that have actually inspired some speculation as well as just reaction. I realize my thoughts on the matter are kind of convoluted, but bear with me here.
First off, Donna's ending bugged the absolute piss out of me. I realize that this probably stems from my living in a strongly individualistic culture, but I tend to think of my identity as being a combination of my genetics and (even more) my experiences, and what I've learned (or not learned) as a result of them. What the Doctor did to her was frankly worse than rape - stealing away an entire year's worth of experiences, and a particularly unique and character-forming set of experiences at that, is such a consummate invasion on such a personal level as to be frankly inexcusable. If there had been some indication that the personality changes she'd gone through had stayed with her, even if she couldn't consciously remember the experiences, it mightn't have stuck in my craw so badly; but no, she was thoroughly Donna The Temp From Chiswick again. And while the Doctor might reassure her family that the universe was a better place for her travels with him, everything she'd seen and heard - everything she'd learned - was rendered moot.
So why would the Doctor go to such an extreme? The reason given - that her brain would have short-circuited had she kept the Doctor's consciousness - makes some sense, but breaks down after a point. Surely the Doctor, with his near-godlike telepathic abilities, could have excised the parts of his mind that she'd assimilated without touching the memories of their travels together. He did something similar with Rose after she'd absorbed the consciousness of the TARDIS - Rose woke up without the ability to manipulate time and space but still perfectly able to remember what had happened. Even if he'd had to take out the whole memory of that particular escapade, surely Donna could have kept the memory of, say, their trip to Pompeii, or the giant wasp chasing Agatha Christie. So, what gives?
Here's my theory (and this is where I dive off into pure speculation, so be forewarned): I don't think he had to. I think he overreacted. And I think that what he did to Donna is what's weighing on him most heavily at the end of the episode.
When I first watched the sequence where Clone!Doctor and Doctor-Donna show up and save the day, I was puzzled - it seems like the Doctor's reaction, as it usually is when faced with something new and interesting that he's never seen before, should have been "Brilliant!" followed by his usual nonstop excited diatribe about how it probably happened, what the implications are, etc. But that's exactly the opposite of what happens. He becomes withdrawn, almost angry, and outright sullen at times. Part of this is that he's scared for Donna, sure, but I think an even bigger part of it is this: for the first time, he has to face himself - he literally has no choice. And not just once, but twice over, and right after he's just had his face rubbed in everything he hates about himself. Right when he's already feeling vulnerable, when he's already slightly cracked.
His clone-self is hard enough to deal with - all the abuse that he heaps upon his head on the beach at Bad Wolf Bay applies just as well to him, and he knows it. But eventually he can sock him away in an alternate universe with Rose, an ending where everyone's more or less happy, and that's fine.
But Donna - there's a snarl of a problem. Donna not only has incorporated his abilities, she's absorbed his consciousness - all his knowledge and memories, everything that makes him a Time Lord, that makes him him. He's concerned about her, but I think it's even more than that - he's angry. Hell, he's probably enraged. She can see everything about him that he refuses to look at, everything he hates about himself. It's an invasion on almost as large a scale as the one he perpetrates on her, and while it was unintentional, the damage is done and there's morally nothing he can do about it...
...until her brain starts to short-circuit from the strain. And there it is, his glorious opportunity to fix it all and regain his mental solitude - and of course it's for her sake! Her brain would overload if she even started to remember him, or anything about him, so of course he has to get rid of all of her experiences with him! It has nothing to do with the fact that she's seen him naked (literally as well as figuratively), and he just can't deal with that. Nothing whatsoever.
I don't think it was a vengeful act, per se - for all his faults, the Doctor isn't a vengeful sort. But I think there's a definite streak of self-interest there, and the line about "Oh, but we had a good run of it, didn't we?" (or however it went just before he mind-melds with her) sounded, rather than nostalgic or sorrowful, almost joyous. He can have his privacy back, he can pretend the whole thing never happened, and it's For Her Own Good.
But in the end, just like everything else, it haunts him. You can see it in his face when he sees Donna The Temp From Chiswick jabbering away on the phone - in his haste to regain his isolation, he's taken away everything good that he did for her, all the growth that she'd achieved, everything she'd learned. He tells himself it was for her own good, but in a way, he's proved Davros right. And, in the end, he's right back where he started - isolated, alone with his thoughts. Exactly what he hates.
Again, this is mostly speculation, but it does explain some of the reactions that I didn't quite get the first time through. I may have to watch the episode again to see if it jibes, or if it needs revising.
...Holy crow, that's a long entry. I suppose that makes sense, given that I've been working on it between paperwork for most of the day. To give credit where it's due, that's some pretty damn good storytelling to inspire this kind of rumination as well.
Anyone else out there who's seen the episode, do you have anything to add/refute? I'd be interested in other folks' take on it.
