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solitary_summer ([personal profile] solitary_summer) wrote2010-12-31 07:48 pm
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My sister originally invited me to celebrate New Year with them, but since we're all sick to various degrees we decided to call it off, which is why I'm sitting at home, sipping herbal tea, blowing my nose every two minutes, and randomly surfing the internet on New Year's Eve. All of which isn't exactly newsworthy, I know, I know. However, in the midst of all this aimless surfing around I stumbled across this:

[livejournal.com profile] green_maia writes here:

I think I've figured out why I dislike Steven Moffat's writing.

In RTD-verse, the universe is bigger than the Doctor.

In Moffat-verse, the Doctor is bigger than the universe.

I'd have commented there, but she disabled comments on this entry; I hope I'm not breaking lj-etiquette quoting her here, but I really love this thought, because I've been trying to figure out why S5 left me feeling so meh, but without much success so far.

I don't agree with her post only insofar as for me the point of Waters of Mars is that Adelaide kills herself to stop someone who really has the power to fundamentally subvert the laws of the universe and change the fate of humanity; if Ten merely had delusions of grandeur, then her death would be rather meaningless. For me the parallel that is too obvious to ignore is The Second Coming: Stephen Baxter isn't a fraud, he really is the son of God; it's precisely because of that that Judith convinces him to kill himself in order to give humanity responsibility and freedom.

So IMO Ten is only morally wrong in Waters of Mars, not factually wrong. I'm not a hundred percent sure this is entirely consistent with the way RTD wrote the Doctor before, because right until the end of S4 the Doctor struggling with and against a universe that has Daleks and death and loss and generally doesn't work according to his wishes is such a big, recurring theme. The idea that he actually could change that, not because of something like the solution of the Skasis Paradigm in School Reunion, but simply because he is a Time Lord, only creeps in at the end of S3 when the Master says he has the right to change history, and the Doctor concedes that.

But regardless, for me the premise of Waters of Mars is that what he claims is true, that there really is nothing he can't do any longer, just as the Time Lords would really have abolished time if he hadn't stopped them. Ten's arc at this point effectively becomes something of a theological problem. RTD built up Ten as a sometimes genuinely benevolent and helpful, sometimes wilful and capricious sort-of God not to replace God, but to deconstruct the concept, to show that even being saved is too high a price to allow someone to have power over life and death.

The story of The End of Time is that Ten acknowledges this and voluntarily gives up this power again for the benefit of the universe, and for his own salvation.

In the end [livejournal.com profile] green_maia is absolutely right, the underlying idea of RTD's DW is that even if the Doctor can be bigger than the universe, the universe absolutely should be bigger than the Doctor. And while I'm not sure I'd describe Eleven as a God in his tiny universe (I've watched S5 so cursory that I'm reluctant to make any definitive statement about it), she's also right that in S5 the universe did feel a lot safer and more controllable. Memories can be rewritten and time can be changed to achieve a happy ending, whereas in the RTD era the fact that time could be changed wasn't a guarantee for safety—rather the opposite: 'Nothing is safe' (The Unquiet Dead).

And I miss that. I miss the sense of wonder at something big and mysterious and essentially uncontrollable that for me was still absolutely there in the 'Everybody Lives' at the end of The Doctor Dances, but wasn't there any longer when the ghost of River Song was resurrected on a computer HD and we were being told that this was a blessing. Death, of course, is part of the uncontrollable. Death is still the ultimate uncontrollable. In The Doctor Dances Nine says, 'Everybody lives, Rose. Just this once. Everybody lives!' and the 'just this once' made all the difference. That's why, even though I only wanted to write about the deaths I also ended up rambling so much about life and being human, because it's part and parcel of the same thing. It's in DW, and it's also in TW, although there the balance between the wonderful and the terrible is even finer and more precarious.


And there's something else that I think is very, very true and that hope [livejournal.com profile] green_maia won't mind me quoting:

Sometimes it seems like people don't choose their stories, stories choose their people. When a story takes over your imagination, it doesn't exactly give you a feeling of agency. The story swoops down and grasps you in its talons and flies off with you and all your frantic struggling is for naught. Or, the story takes off with someone else and you watch as they sail away, scratching your head and wondering what, exactly, they see in it.

[identity profile] neifile7.livejournal.com 2010-12-31 07:20 pm (UTC)(link)
Thank you for linking this and adding your thoughts; it's a lovely, thoughtful discussion, and I think I mostly agree. (And at some point, I fully intend to catch up with your other recent meta, and possibly have something to say in turn. :D)

[identity profile] solitary-summer.livejournal.com 2010-12-31 07:31 pm (UTC)(link)
You're welcome! :) I just realised she deleted the first entry, though, which I think is a pity because it was such a good thought, and also makes me feel really guilty. It wasn't locked (or I'd never have seen it), so I thought linking should be okay... Damn.
elisi: Edwin and Charles (You need a fez by ?)

[personal profile] elisi 2010-12-31 10:11 pm (UTC)(link)
Oh I'm sorry she deleted it. But I'm SURE she won't mind you picking up on her thoughts!
elisi: Edwin and Charles (Ten (glowing) by 1erecedwardfan)

[personal profile] elisi 2010-12-31 08:53 pm (UTC)(link)
You know, this is rather helpful in showing me *why* people don't click with Moffat's Who. I hesitate to say that you're 'wrong', because of course every interpretation is valid, but I am trying to work formulate my thoughts...

But let me try.

In The Doctor Dances Nine says, 'Everybody lives, Rose. Just this once. Everybody lives!' and the 'just this once' made all the difference.
Remember, this was a Moffat episode. (And thus had very limited input from RTD.) Just like 'Girl in the Fireplace' is Moffat, and is quite literally the Doctor as the hero on the white horse, rescuing the damsel in distress. (I don't think I'm going anywhere with this, I'm just pointing it out for now.)

The thing is, life and death were RTD's specific themes, and he was exploring them in very specific ways. You cannot apply the same methods to Moffat's Who's view of life and death, because they mean different things. You say:

The story of The End of Time is that Ten acknowledges this and voluntarily gives up this power again for the benefit of the universe, and for his own salvation.
This is absolutely correct. He accepts death (which he has fought/wrestled with most of his life as Ten) and we see the result in Eleven: Death is accepted as just another part of life. 'Everything has to stop, or nothing ever gets started', the Doctor tells Amy. The Doctor himself accepts his own unmaking in The Big Bang without any sturm und drang. ('An old man dies, a young girl lives'... Never thought I'd end up comparing 'Sin City' and DW, but there you are.) Abigail accepts her death, and it is never suggested that it is somehow avoidable. Moffat quite simply isn't interested in those themes - they're there, in the background, but not what carries the show.

Memories can be rewritten and time can be changed to achieve a happy ending, whereas in the RTD era the fact that time could be changed wasn't a guarantee for safety—rather the opposite: 'Nothing is safe' (The Unquiet Dead).
Can I point to 'A Christmas Carol' as the perfect example of how re-writing things can make the situation worse? Or just bad in a different way... One of the things I love most about Eleven (and I'd have said this to green_maia, if she'd allowed comments), is how he constantly fails. He is late for Amelia, something he spends the rest of the season trying to make up for; he fatally misjudges the starwhale situation; he is defeated by the new Daleks; he nearly gets Amy killed (it's River who saves her life), etc. etc. - and the consequences of rewriting history completely will not be seen until S6, but I'm pretty sure they won't be negligible.

[cutting here, cause it's getting too long...]
elisi: (Storytellers by kathyh)

[personal profile] elisi 2010-12-31 09:08 pm (UTC)(link)
Now to go back to my point about RTD vs. Moffat - Moffat's main theme is stories. 'We're all stories in the end', says the Doctor. His saving of River is *hugely* symbolic, considering that she is a walking, talking extra-textual element in the Doctor's life. River is the keeper of the Doctor's story - quite literally. That she ends her life in The Library is hugely important. She is not given a 'happily ever after' - when we see her, in the end, she is telling the story of the Doctor to the children in her charge. She is in many ways a Moffat self-insert, just like the Doctor is at the end of The Big Bang (see icon). And you should listen to what she says:

"When you run with the Doctor, it feels like it will never end. But however hard you try, you can't run for ever. Everybody knows that everybody dies, and nobody knows it like the Doctor."
Acceptance of death, right there.

But of course, this is the bit everyone latches onto:

"Some days are special. Some days are so, so blessed. Some days, nobody dies at all. Now and then, every once in a very long while, every day in a million days, when the wind stands fair, and the Doctor comes to call... everybody lives. Sweet dreams, everyone."

This is River reading a story to the children from her book. Maybe the story of Jack, Rose and the Doctor in war torn London. Or maybe the story of Amy, Rory, River and the Doctor at the end of the universe... It's an echo of The Doctor Dances, that one-in-a-million chance that Everybody Lives, and it does makes for a brilliant story. And the story is the point of the whole thing. (Moffat's S4 episodes stand out like crazy amongst the rest of S4, since he knew at the time that he was going to take over and clearly decided to go all-out and cram a ton of foreshadowing, continuity and future references into his allotted slot.)

That's all for now, I'm half asleep. Sorry about rambling, you just made me think! And Happy New Year! :)

[identity profile] solitary-summer.livejournal.com 2010-12-31 09:40 pm (UTC)(link)
No, thank you for rambling, this helped a lot. And a happy new year to you, too! :)

Sometimes I think we all spend a lot of time rationalising our emotions. I think your interpretation is completely right; I can't argue with it at all. At the same time...On some instinctive level I hated the thought of River locked in that computer. (I know she has a whole library to explore. But still. But still.) She was such an active, physical character, in love with travelling and adventure; for me the end felt wrong and claustrophobic. I can't help it. I'm sorry. She chose her death. No one asked her if she wanted to be resurrected into a computer. At least with Donna we see what was happening is tragic and kind of wrong.

I guess the story-within-the-story theme just isn't for me...

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[identity profile] solitary-summer.livejournal.com 2010-12-31 09:09 pm (UTC)(link)
Now I also feel horribly guilty for spoiling your New Year... :(

Remember, this was a Moffat episode.
I know, this is why I picked it out and why it baffles me so much that it feels so different from his other episodes. TEC/TDD are easily my favourite S1 episodes. I don't know what changed after that...

You cannot apply the same methods to Moffat's Who's view of life and death, because they mean different things.
Moffat quite simply isn't interested in those themes - they're there, in the background, but not what carries the show.
I know, and I hope it doesn't sound like I'm blaming him for writing differently. I'm just trying to figure out why his writing doesn't click with me... I hate it when I don't understand myself.
elisi: (Eleven/Amy (foreheads) by meathiel)

[personal profile] elisi 2010-12-31 09:41 pm (UTC)(link)
Now I also feel horribly guilty for spoiling your New Year... :(
SPOILING? I was bouncing with glee when I saw your post, cause I could finally try to put down all the thoughts that maia's post sparked in me, but that I couldn't use there. I should have started with a big THANK YOU! *g*

I know, this is why I picked it out and why it baffles me so much that it feels so different from his other episodes. TEC/TDD are easily my favourite S1 episodes. I don't know what changed after that...
Early days? Also, Moffat was probably trying to write to whatever specs RTD had given him, tying it in with the overall themes of the season. The Girl in the Fireplace does the same thing (I always feel that that ep and School reunion are almost a two-parter). Blink is such a standalone that it doesn't really count. And SitL and FotD are Moffat giving us a preview of his own brand of the Whoniverse.

I know, and I hope it doesn't sound like I'm blaming him for writing differently. I'm just trying to figure out why his writing doesn't click with me... I hate it when I don't understand myself.
Oh I know that feeling! F.ex. I adored S2 of Being Human, except for the finale which really didn't work for me. I've managed to pinpoint why, but it still irks me, because I want to like it. Am hoping things will look up in S3. *crosses fingers*

Oh, and I should have mentioned the Doctor's speech at the end of 'Vincent and the Doctor' as the perfect example of Moffat Who's view of life and death - the whole 'pile of good things and bad things'. Also, I often come back to the scene in the Silurian episodes when Rory & co bring Alaya's body down. The Doctor's reaction is just very quiet and disappointed - no ranting, no shouting, no 'How COULD you?' So much more pragmatic. (And older.) I'm not saying this is *better*, just that his attitude is very different from Ten's (very justified) volatility and anger in the face of stupid, pointless death.

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[identity profile] sensiblecat.livejournal.com 2010-12-31 10:47 pm (UTC)(link)
The phrase "all passion spent" comes to mind with Eleven, and at times it's quite comforting.

I've written before that in my view RTD sees the Doctor's story as a tragedy - which doesn't mean it can't be redeeming - and I think he was enormously influenced by "Hamlet". In "Hamlet" we see a character go through all the agonies of knowing he's going to die - because that's what happens when you become a revenger. You have to die to make things right and Shakespeare's audience would have totally bought that. And Hamlet doesn't want to die - he could do so much! You go right up close and walk every step of that road with Hamlet before he goes on a road trip (killing a few pirates en route) and comes back ready to accept the inevitable:

"You will lose this wager, my lord...

....Not a whit, we defy augery. There's a special providence in the fall of a sparrow. If it be now, 'tis not to come; if it be
not to come, it will be now; if it be not now, yet it will come:
the readiness is all. Since no man knows aught of what he leaves,
what is't to leave betimes? Let be."

I've had a lot of struggles with EOT but I think I can see the argument now that Ten does, finally, accept his death as part of the necessity of limiting his power, a power that could destroy the universe if allowed to continue unchecked. That's what interests RTD, how we as human beings can set moral limits on ourselves for our mutual safety in the absence of a deity.

But Moffatt writes about the Doctor as the eternally unknowable; even when he screws up we aren't in a position to judge or challenge him. We must trust that things will turn out right even when there are underlying issues that bother us. The important thing is that we tell the story; that is what will redeem us by giving us security and hope. And that story can only be told if we don't examine the Doctor too closely, but simply accept who he is and what he is able to do.
elisi: Edwin and Charles (Space Gandalf by atruebluesky)

[personal profile] elisi 2010-12-31 11:02 pm (UTC)(link)
I shouldn't be here, so I'll be very swift! Love the Hamlet comparison, but I think the main shift in Moffat isn't that the Doctor is unknowable, but that it's no longer the Doctor who is on a journey now, but the Companion(s) - the Doctor is the enabler, the wizard, the guide, and his 'unknowableness' comes from this change in character function. This is why I love 'Space Gandalf' so very much - he's not Frodo any longer (another good Ten-parallel), but the one overseeing the journey. :)

[identity profile] solitary-summer.livejournal.com 2011-01-01 11:02 am (UTC)(link)
I've written before that in my view RTD sees the Doctor's story as a tragedy - which doesn't mean it can't be redeeming - and I think he was enormously influenced by "Hamlet".

Very interesting, and a very good comparison. I'd perhaps add that for me it's more than going through the agonies of knowing he's going to die; Hamlet IMO is one long confrontation with death in its various aspects: first his father's death and trying to deal with the shock of that, his own weariness of life and the question of suicide, and how that changes when death isn't just an abstract far-away prospect any longer, the question of whether to kill or not to kill and the consequences of that decision, the things that are worth dying for (or not), ultimately the physical reality of it in the graveyard scene... Of course, as you say, in the end it always comes down to—has to come down to—the personal element, the personal acceptance.

That's what interests RTD, how we as human beings can set moral limits on ourselves for our mutual safety in the absence of a deity.

I agree; as I said to [livejournal.com profile] green_maia below, I think for RTD the story is not an end, but a means of asking the big questions about life and death, whereas SM focuses more on the process of story-telling and its intricacies.
elisi: Edwin and Charles (Ten (WoM) by nilhuanwen)

[personal profile] elisi 2011-01-01 11:39 am (UTC)(link)
Re. Hamlet, you've seen this, right?

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[identity profile] green-maia.livejournal.com - 2011-01-02 21:29 (UTC) - Expand

[identity profile] caz963.livejournal.com 2011-01-01 04:45 pm (UTC)(link)
But Moffatt writes about the Doctor as the eternally unknowable; even when he screws up we aren't in a position to judge or challenge him.

I think that's a very good point. And -

We must trust that things will turn out right even when there are underlying issues that bother us.

- I can't help but wonder if Moffat had been the one to bring back the show, with Rusty following, whether these would be things I'd be struggling with as much as I am.

[identity profile] green-maia.livejournal.com 2011-01-01 06:22 am (UTC)(link)
Hi,

[livejournal.com profile] elisi linked me to this post. I'm sorry I deleted the entry; I was worried it was offending people. I'll copy-and-paste it below for reference, in two parts since it's over the character limit for comments. I hope that's okay! If not, please feel free to delete it. (A large chunk of my post was a quote (quoted with permission) from [livejournal.com profile] kaffyr's post Time and Tide - it's one of the best pieces of meta I have ever read, and I urge everyone to read it.)

don't agree with her post only insofar as for me the point of Waters of Mars is that Adelaide kills herself to stop someone who really has the power to fundamentally subvert the laws of the universe and change the fate of humanity; if Ten merely had delusions of grandeur, then her death would be rather meaningless.

My interpretation is that the Doctor's actions started a cataclysm in time that would have eventually destroyed the universe -
("Father's Day" established that you can't violate the laws of time without destroying the universe)
(the power to set in motion something that will destroy the universe is very different from the power to do whatever you want) (the human species, currently, has the power to destroy most life on earth, and we might just do it if we don't stop ourselves soon, but that's not at all the same as being able to make every wish come true)
(and even the Time Lords couldn't do everything - they could destroy the universe but they couldn't win the Time War while the universe continued to exist)

- Adelaide's suicide stopped the cataclysm and saved the universe.

Adelaide Brooke saved the universe single-handedly. That's how I choose to interpret it, anyway!



I miss the sense of wonder at something big and mysterious and essentially uncontrollable that for me was still absolutely there in the 'Everybody Lives' at the end of The Doctor Dances, but wasn't there any longer when the ghost of River Song was resurrected on a computer HD and we were being told that this was a blessing. Death, of course, is part of the uncontrollable. Death is still the ultimate uncontrollable. In The Doctor Dances Nine says, 'Everybody lives, Rose. Just this once. Everybody lives!' and the 'just this once' made all the difference. That's why, even though I only wanted to write about the deaths I also ended up rambling so much about life and being human, because it's part and parcel of the same thing. It's in DW, and it's also in TW, although there the balance between the wonderful and the terrible is even finer and more precarious.

Word.
Edited 2011-01-01 06:42 (UTC)

[identity profile] solitary-summer.livejournal.com 2011-01-01 10:03 am (UTC)(link)
First of all, I'm really glad you aren't offended that I quoted your post. I could still delete or lock this, though, if you'd prefer that, because I completely understand being worried about offending people. I was tip-toeing around for months after CoE aired because most of my friendslist at the time hated it vocally...

Adelaide's suicide stopped the cataclysm and saved the universe.
Adelaide Brooke saved the universe single-handedly. That's how I choose to interpret it, anyway!


Ah, sorry. I clearly misunderstood what you meant.

and even the Time Lords couldn't do everything - they could destroy the universe but they couldn't win the Time War while the universe continued to exist

Very good point.


I think for RTD the story is a vehicle, not an end. As Queen Victoria says in Tooth and Claw: 'And that's the charm of a ghost story, isn't it? Not the scares and chills, that's just for children, but the hope of some contact with the great beyond.' He may not believe in the 'great beyond', but he goes for the big questions regardless: What is life, and how do we live it.

For SM, as [livejournal.com profile] elisi points out, the story itself, the process of story-telling and everything connected to that, is much more in the foreground. It's all a clever riddle, a puzzle, story within a story; a game, in a way. This adds a layer of meta that can certainly be interesting, but also diminishes the sense of immediacy, because in a way it removes the viewer from the story. I think you're absolutely right, it feels smaller.

[identity profile] green-maia.livejournal.com 2011-01-01 02:10 pm (UTC)(link)
I could still delete or lock this, though, if you'd prefer that, because I completely understand being worried about offending people.

Actually, I was going to ask you if you'd mind if I posted a link to it?

Part of the reason I deleted my post was that I was worried about offending people, but another part was that as I thought more about it I realized that saying that Eleven is a god was going too far. You, in this post, articulate my problems with SM's writing in a far more restrained way - and say it far better!!

(I have an almost allergic reaction to "Silence in the Library" and "The Forests of the Dead" - both episodes make me feel claustrophobic - I know they're two of the most popular episodes of the series but I can't stand either of them - and what the Doctor does to River makes me ill.)

I was tip-toeing around for months after CoE aired because most of my friendslist at the time hated it vocally...

I think CoE is among the best five hours of television ever aired. I watched it for the first time last last May and I've re-watched it many times since and every time I see it I am more awed by it, and love it even more.

he goes for the big questions regardless: What is life, and how do we live it.

For SM, as elisi points out, the story itself, the process of story-telling and everything connected to that, is much more in the foreground. It's all a clever riddle, a puzzle, story within a story; a game, in a way. This adds a layer of meta that can certainly be interesting, but also diminishes the sense of immediacy, because in a way it removes the viewer from the story. I think you're absolutely right, it feels smaller.


Yes.

Stories-about-stories-and-storytelling don't have to be like that. Have you ever read Davita's Harp by Chaim Potok? It's about stories and storytelling as a way to not be broken by the horrors of the world. (It's one of my favorite books of all time.)

RTD's writing always feels real.

SM's feels like we, the viewers, are the ones stuck in a pretty computer simulation...

Part 1

[identity profile] green-maia.livejournal.com 2011-01-01 06:24 am (UTC)(link)
I think I've figured out why I dislike Steven Moffat's writing.

In RTD-verse, the universe is bigger than the Doctor.

In Moffat-verse, the Doctor is bigger than the universe.




In RTD-verse, the universe is bigger than the Doctor. He is brilliant and he has a time machine, but what he can do is a single drop in the vast ocean of what he cannot do. He may, in a moment of insanity, think that there is nothing that he cannot do, but he is wrong - not just morally wrong, but factually wrong.


[livejournal.com profile] kaffyr wrote in Time and Tide (still my favorite meta of all time):

Water runs downhill. Time moves forward....You can’t stop water....Now think about time. You can’t stop it, either. Like water, it runs downhill. It runs in one direction – yes it does, eventually. Even in a universe that welcomes the Doctor, and pretends to run by an entirely different set of rules, a set which allows time to swirl and eddy like water round rocks, to be routed into ditches, imprisoned in pipes or held back from its proper course behind a levee or a dam. Time runs in one direction, and nothing out of Gallifrey can change that.

Time Lords called themselves that, but they weren’t, not really. They could manage time, certainly, but they could never really master it, and they knew that, because they knew time so well. They knew the rules they lived by weren’t their rules. They were time’s rules; the universe’s rules, even in a fairy tale universe.

The last Time Lord’s no different. The Doctor may jump from day to year to century at a whim, as a child jumps from stone to stone in the river, but he’s ruled by time and ushered forward by its pull as surely as that child’s motion is ultimately ruled by what the river allows her to do.

The Doctor was born. He has aged. He has died and returned, nine times he’s done it, and each time he’s returned he has been one step older. He cannot grow younger, no matter that he has dark hair now where he once had white. Ultimately, he is as linear as any human, as linear as the rest of any universe – his or ours. He still runs downhill, because that is the only direction time ultimately allows any of us to take.


We live in time. We are born into it, carried along in it, die in it. And he’s known that forever....But time came to Mars, water rose on Mars, and the Doctor forgot....It’s not surprising, not for the Doctor, who has, after all, lived centuries of a life that could trick one into thinking one can bargain with time. It’s not surprising for someone who’s lost so much, over and over again, who’s destroyed so much and saved so many at such personal cost. After enough time passes, after enough pressure from the implacable currents, even the strongest, the most steely of souls suffers metal fatigue, creaks, screams and crumples. Someone can become desperate to break the rules, or forget them.

That kind of forgetting, though? It’s sin; forgivable, but mortal.

All the mortal sins are about defying the laws of physics, you know....When you try to turn time uphill, you will ignore the knowledge that sits not only in your head, but your gut, and pretend you can change the laws. You will pretend that Gallifrey made those laws when, really, you know in your bones that Gallifrey simply bowed to them. And you will still do it, and it will be wrong....Water runs downhill. When you try to thwart water, it will drown you. Time moves forward. When you try to thwart time, you will sink beneath its waves like a stone.

Part 2

[identity profile] green-maia.livejournal.com 2011-01-01 06:24 am (UTC)(link)
In Moffat-verse, the Doctor is bigger than the universe. The universe is very very small - just a playroom, really, where anything you wish to happen can happen. Time can be re-written. If it can be remembered, it can come back.

Ten in his broken arrogance sometimes thought he was god. Other people sometimes treated Ten like a god.

But Eleven really is a god - a whimsical child-god playing with his toys in a tiny, claustrophobic world where there's nothing he cannot do.

elisi: Edwin and Charles (Oncoming Storm by dashafeather)

Re: Part 2

[personal profile] elisi 2011-01-01 11:36 am (UTC)(link)
You know, I've waffled at great length here, but having slept on it, I think this summary (by [livejournal.com profile] snowgrouse) really says it all:

I've discovered the main difference between Ten and Eleven (or, well, Rusty's and Moff's ways of writing the Doctor, really). Observe:

Ten: "I. AM. AMAZING!" *Does something amazing, poses proudly*
Rose: *licks teeth*
Martha: *gazes longingly*
Donna: "Harrumph."

Whereas...

"Eleven: Just watch this, c'mon, you'll see, I am ama--" *falls on his arse*
Amy: *facepalm*


Eleven is so charmingly fallible, so reluctant to take himself seriously, so prone to getting things wrong, that saying he is 'god-like' is as incongruous as claiming that the Master is just a little unhinged. IMHO of course! :)

Also HELLO! How's 2011 treating you?
elisi: Edwin and Charles (Doctor/River (secrets) by la_esmeralda)

Re: Part 2

[personal profile] elisi 2011-01-01 12:08 pm (UTC)(link)
One more thing, re the 'size' of the universe - and this is more me thinking, than responding directly to what you're saying. Because one the reasons I'm so grateful for the shift that Moffat brought, is this (I am generalising on a massive scale, obviously):

In Rusty's Who there was never light at the end of the tunnel - it was always just another train. I don't say this is a bad thing, and I admire him *hugely* for what he did and find the things he explored fascinating. But - it was like watching a Joss show. Every time people were happy I'd curl up, waiting for horrible things to happen, because they always would.

In Moffat's Who there is no tunnel at all. There's just the great and terrible world, full of good things and bad things; and the good things don't always soften the bad things, but vice-versa, the bad things don't necessarily spoil the good things and make them unimportant. And if we can add to people's pile of good things, then that is something to celebrate.

So... for me 'size' is a moot point, it's just a different perspective. ♥

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[identity profile] solitary-summer.livejournal.com 2011-01-01 12:47 pm (UTC)(link)
This is so hard. When I read [livejournal.com profile] green_maia's post, it resonated with me so completely, it was like one of those comic book light bulb moments.

And then I read your arguments, and I keep thinking, she's also right, why am I not seeing it like that? Why can't I?

Here's another thing - maybe the sense of control ('a whimsical child-god playing with his toys in a tiny, claustrophobic world where there's nothing he cannot do') doesn't come from Eleven, but from Moffat? Maybe it's a side effect of those clever timey wimey stories where at least some of us are maybe too aware that he's arranging the characters in a certain pattern? (OTOH it's not as if RTD didn't do the same, only in different ways...) Maybe it has something to do with Eleven's slightly paternalistic professor attitude?

And however much Rose or Martha might admire the Ten, or Donna want to go travelling with him, we see him pitched against a universe that doesn't give him what he wants, whether it's the big things, or the small ones, all the time, right from the beginning of Nine's story.

the bad things don't necessarily spoil the good things and make them unimportant.

I didn't get that from RTD's DW; just maybe that the balance is harder to achieve.

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[identity profile] caz963.livejournal.com 2011-01-01 04:58 pm (UTC)(link)
This - the post and discussion - is fascinating and I don't really have anything substatial other than to say that -

I'm just trying to figure out why his writing doesn't click with me...

- it's the same for me. I've said before that I recognise Moffat's a good writer; he writes great, snappy dialogue and he can come up with brilliant plotlines (whether they're as brilliantly executed is another thing, though!)

With SM I absolutely recognise that there are touching elements in his stories, clever elements, and often very pretty images, but at some point I tend to lose interest because it doesn't come together in a way that I find satisfying.

Yep.

And I love the comparison you make between RTD's using the story as a vehicle rather than as an end in itself. I've never tried to say that one is better than the other - and I know that's not what you're doing either - just that one method "speaks to me" more than the other, and that I'm trying to work out why.

[identity profile] solitary-summer.livejournal.com 2011-01-01 05:28 pm (UTC)(link)
Thank you. :) It's been an interesting discussion for me, too.

To be absolutely, perfectly, completely honest, I even considered whether I might be influenced by the post-CoE RTD bashing and parts of fandom being very vocal about how SM would ~save Doctor Who~, but I already had the same problem with everything he wrote after TEC/TDD, so I don't really think it's that. And since I'm not the alone in my reaction, it probably does have something to do with different writing styles...

[identity profile] caz963.livejournal.com 2011-01-01 11:58 pm (UTC)(link)
parts of fandom being very vocal about how SM would ~save Doctor Who~

I think that THAT may be part of the reason why I've been reacting the way I have, if I'm honest. I try to be even-handed and open-minded, but I get such a feeling of "Emperor's New Clothes" from those parts of fandom you're talking about, that it annoys me. They've forgotten that RTD is a huge part of why DW was brought back in the first place.

But for the rest of it, I think it's certainly down to the differences in style and the differences in the way we respond. I wrote my own ramble about what I perceive to be some of those differences a while back - about half way through S5, so some of it might be a bit out of date now.

(edited to fix link)
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[identity profile] zanthinegirl.livejournal.com 2011-02-04 07:46 pm (UTC)(link)
Here on a rec from [livejournal.com profile] green_maia. I somehow missed her link when you posted this-- maybe because she took the original post down too quickly.

Anyway interesting post. I like season 5 and Eleven more than you guys do but you helped clarify why Ten and RTD just resonates so much better with me than than the current versions.
Edited 2011-02-04 19:46 (UTC)