The next relevant interview is the After Elton one here (http://www.afterelton.com/TV/2009/7/russeltdavies), an interview which appeared on 31 July (after the show had aired in the States) but was based on an interview conducted with RTD after it had aired in the UK but before it had aired in the US, so a more immediate response to a predominantly British fan reaction. Now, in dealing with After Elton RTD cannot possibly assume that his interviewer is unware of gay rights issues or is looking at it from a straight perspective. And yet he still commented in a way which assumed he was leaping to conclusions about the nature of the reaction to Ianto's death:
AE: I understand Ianto dying in order to push Captain Jack to do what he needed to do. But a lot of fans felt like they never got to see Jack and Ianto as the full-fledged couple that they wanted to see them as. We only began to see that in this miniseries. So how do you respond to viewers who feel cheated that they got the tragic death without seeing the relationship. TD: That’s the point actually. Both in fiction and in life. When someone dies you lose all that potential. You grieve over everything they could have been. Everything you hoped for them. Everything they might have achieved with their lives, everyone they could have loved. Every job they could have had. Every joy they could have had. It’s gone.
That’s proper grief. I think what you’re talking about there is people lamenting the fact they never saw what could have been. That’s grief.
I think you’re being polite and part of what you're saying is that it wasn’t a properly sexualized relationship … that we didn’t show enough details … I think that’s absolute nonsense. [Editor's note: I wasn't referring to their sexual relationship, but their romantic/emotional one.]
Therefore, even in an interview conducted by an out gay man for a publication aimed (predominantly) at a gay male audience he was obviously blocking out suggestions that there was a legitimate beef about the death scene and the plot development, and projecting onto his audience and his questioners views they had not expressed. That continues further down the interview.
At San Diego Comic con the figure "nine" appears for the first time:You know the campaign to send [packets of] coffee [to the BBC] to save Ianto's life? There's a campaign, because he was a coffee boy. But do you know how many packets of coffee they've received so far? Nine. So I think people writing online might sound like thousands of people, but they are nine. And they have the proof in the office, they are nine. (http://io9.com/5324964/we-asked-russell-t-davies-our-most-pressing-doctor-who-question)
Again, not gendered as a comment originally made - but also, provably untrue at the date when made. Euros Lyn and John Barrowman at the very same con made a point of praising the efforts of the Save Ianto Jones campaigners (who were, from what I could see incidentally, doing their best to distance themselves from the lunatic fringe who'd been appalling to James Moran on his blog and on twitter) for raising £4200 at that date for Children in Need.
So when the Editor of the After Elton said
Editor's note: I subsequently had a chance to speak with Davies again at the Television Critics Association tour in Los Angeles on Wednesday evening. Curious if his appearance at Comic-Con, as well as the passage of a little time had softened his point of view about the fan reaction, I asked Davies if he stood by all of his previous statements. He did so emphatically saying he believed the "controversy" over Ianto's death was bascially "nine hysterical women."
that seems to be an attempt to see whether RTD's views had changed following the initial kneejerk reaction, and the fact that it was expressed to be a follow-up to an interview conducted some weeks earlier and that these provably mythical "nine packets of coffee" have now become "nine hysterical women" really shows RTD's attitude hardening and, in fact, what looks like ex post facto rationalisation of some genuine and widely held artistic complaints about COE.
Long Comment: part two
The next relevant interview is the After Elton one here (http://www.afterelton.com/TV/2009/7/russeltdavies), an interview which appeared on 31 July (after the show had aired in the States) but was based on an interview conducted with RTD after it had aired in the UK but before it had aired in the US, so a more immediate response to a predominantly British fan reaction. Now, in dealing with After Elton RTD cannot possibly assume that his interviewer is unware of gay rights issues or is looking at it from a straight perspective. And yet he still commented in a way which assumed he was leaping to conclusions about the nature of the reaction to Ianto's death:
Therefore, even in an interview conducted by an out gay man for a publication aimed (predominantly) at a gay male audience he was obviously blocking out suggestions that there was a legitimate beef about the death scene and the plot development, and projecting onto his audience and his questioners views they had not expressed. That continues further down the interview.
At San Diego Comic con the figure "nine" appears for the first time:You know the campaign to send [packets of] coffee [to the BBC] to save Ianto's life? There's a campaign, because he was a coffee boy. But do you know how many packets of coffee they've received so far? Nine. So I think people writing online might sound like thousands of people, but they are nine. And they have the proof in the office, they are nine. (http://io9.com/5324964/we-asked-russell-t-davies-our-most-pressing-doctor-who-question)
Again, not gendered as a comment originally made - but also, provably untrue at the date when made. Euros Lyn and John Barrowman at the very same con made a point of praising the efforts of the Save Ianto Jones campaigners (who were, from what I could see incidentally, doing their best to distance themselves from the lunatic fringe who'd been appalling to James Moran on his blog and on twitter) for raising £4200 at that date for Children in Need.
So when the Editor of the After Elton said that seems to be an attempt to see whether RTD's views had changed following the initial kneejerk reaction, and the fact that it was expressed to be a follow-up to an interview conducted some weeks earlier and that these provably mythical "nine packets of coffee" have now become "nine hysterical women" really shows RTD's attitude hardening and, in fact, what looks like ex post facto rationalisation of some genuine and widely held artistic complaints about COE.