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Just to clarify, I mean it was "pathetic" in the word's literal/literary sense, not in the sense that I think it's a bit rubbish.

In fact, I think it's close to genius.

Seeing the Doctor, after he's explicitly tried to take on a Christ-like role and failed miserably (Astrid's self-sacrifice beating him to it), forced by circumstances into being framed by religious iconography is devastating - surrounded by fake glory as he's forced to see the fraudelence of that he claimed.

Imagine an actor whose wife has just left him, just before he has to go on stage to perform a romantic comedy. Or imagine an athlete's coach whispering in his ear than he's been secretly spking him with performance-enhancing drugs just as the athlete is about to step up onto the podium to be presented with the gold medal. Imagine any circumstance in which you've just found out that you're not what you think you are, then have to act that part to the full.

That's what's going on in that scene - the Doctor's been forced to acknowledge that (to quote the obvious) he's not the messiah, he's a very naughty boy. And just at that moment the grim, inevitable logic of the plot compells him to pose for would should be his messianic 'hero shot'.

The storytelling, the imagery and Tennant's acting all come together to make a scene I think is totally pathetic and is pure television gold.

Sorry for the confusion. redface



True, true. The only thing that's stopping me going along with this entirely is that the writers who you say misunderstood her so badly in Time and the Rani are the same two people who created her, wrote her first story and established all the evidence you cited.

How 'wrong' can they get her motivations when they created her, and how inconsistent can they be when she'd only had one previous story to establish what they might be?



Nitpicking, I'd say that the Doctor's over his "survivor's guilt" by Nine's "And d'you know what? So was I!" line and that what's going on in Ten's head is an entirely different angst-bubble. He's over the self-doubt of guilt and into a new sort of stark moral clarity, the unstainability of which is what's giving him gyp nowadays.

But yeah, I agree that between one thing and another the Doctor seems a more burdened figure in the Welsh series than in most of the English one. But I think that's mostly due to the relationship between plot and character being very different nowadays. Speaking (very) broadly then in the old series there was often something of a gulf between character and story. The plot came first, the characters within it did what the plot told them to do and if they were lucky they got a surface layer of personality applied to them. Leela's given no reason to want to marry Andred, but she does because that's what the plot wants her to do. Nobody bats an eyelid because that's the sort of storytelling that's going on.

In NewWho then (again speaking very broadly) there's a different sort of storytelling going on. One in which 'What Happens to Someone?' and 'Why Did Someone Cause That To Happen?' are more closely bound-up. Plot more often proceeds from what characters want and feel rather than what characters want and feel being ignored in order to shoehorn them into the plot.

So what's going on in the Doctor's head feels more foregrounded...when Tom's Doctor went into a big gloomy old sulk for a solid four episodes at a time we wen't given any particular reason why that might be. When Sylv's Doctor was weighed down with the colossal responsibilities of seeing and knowing all the terrible things he did then we were rarely let in on what the things in question might be. With Ten, it's just that we know what his deal is so when that stuff's foregrounded in the maintext (which isn't all that often compared to the ammount of screentime he spends grinning, capering and goofing around) then it seems more signifigant because it's part of a story rather than a detail of surface characterisation.

In terms of the performance and script then the current Doctor is probably the most bubbly and upbeat we've seen. It's just that, on the occasions when he isn't, this time it means something.

If, as a viewer, you're interested in seeing the Second Doctor as a hunted, haunted animal, running like there's no tomorrow because he knows that all tomorrow can bring is the time he'll have to stop - then that stuff's there in the show as an optional extra if you want it. If, as a viewer, you're interested in seeing the Fifth Doctor as a seething mass of righteous anger, breathlessly trying to find a way to express itself through a genteel exterior - then that stuff's there in the show as an optional extra if you want it. But Nine and Ten's 'issues' and burdens aren't optional. They seem more pronounced just because now plot and character are more closely related then the stories don't make sense without them.



A good point, that's really got me thinking. As soon as I've some free time, brace yourselves for a mini-essay on on how I think the Time Lords work and when I think they don't. smile

Glad I could help! Voyage of the Damned tries to do all sorts of clever postmodern things and fails at many of them, so a lot of this stuff needs a bit of unpacking.

A lot of people seemed to have trouble with the scene thinking it was saying, "Look everyone! The Doctor's a bit like Jesus!" when in the context of the plot, the themes and the performance it's saying, "Y'know what? He really, really isn't."

Still, for outrageously tacky and heavy-handed "Look everyone! The Doctor's a bit like Jesus!" moments we'll always have the American Telemovie though! rolleyes

Looking forward to the essay, Richard. smile
I always enjoy your replies, even if I argue with them or totally disagree.

And as for the Pip & Jane discrepancy, I'd first wonder if there's any difference in the editing by other people between the two scripts. There seems to have been a mighty chaotic mess going on in that department in those days, from what I've read....

Welp, there you are. Somebody could successfully write the Rani as a scientist who only cares about her experiments and nothing for their results and their impact on the universe. That can be just as dangerous as an obsessive megalomaniac out for power.
Remember #5's conversation with Davros? What if the Rani did create that tiny vial containing a virus so deadly it could wipe out all life in the universe, just because she could? She probably wouldn't actually use it, unlike Davros, because she's coldly practical & if you're dead you can't analyze results & if everything else is dead you have no more lab rats even if you could somehow survive. But there the thing is. Would someone else try to get it? How would you dispose of it? How could you keep others from making more once the knowledge exists?
The Rani has all the cold, dispassionate reason of the Time Lords but without a trace of compassion or their sense of responsibility towards the universe.

It was Four actually on the whole virus thing. "To hold in my hand a capsule that contained such power..." As most of you should know, bit of a Dalek/Davros fan. But I've yet to see Mark of the Rani, probably should do that this week, so until I can't really say anything, because Time and the Rani and Dimensions in Time were just terrible examples of who the Rani is, and all in all terrible stories. It always breaks my heart to say a McCoy story is terrible, seeing as he's one of my favorite Doctors.

But the book that RTD used to make Human Nature and Family of Blood was a McCoy >_> story. It was not an episode but it was a 7th Doctor story.

You can read the book on the Doctor Who website. Just go to Classic Series and click on the link.