(no subject)

[solitary_summer]

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:

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 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 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.

Comments

[solitary-summer.livejournal.com]

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 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.

[green-maia.livejournal.com]

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...

[solitary-summer.livejournal.com]

*blush* Thank you! And or course I won't mind if you link this.

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 argued about this with elisi above, but, yes. On a gut level I hate the ending.

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.

I must admit I haven't even heard of the author before, but I'll definitely give it a try.

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

With RTD I might dislike details or elements of the story, but overall I've yet to watch something he wrote that didn't fascinate me on some level. 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. And as you said, it's the stories that grab you, not the other way round. (I love how you put that; it's so right.)