Rewatching the end of the Tennant Doctor Who series, I am reminded that Moffatt is problematic as fuck.
There's a lot of reasons for this. I do not pretend to have all of them.
This is one of them.
He has no understanding of humanity. Or of the point of the companions.
The world is saved by Donna Noble, who can only do so by becoming a Timelord.
[ I mean: It's also not great that The Companions all try to blow up the earth / the daleks. But, that's a different rant. ]
The point of the companions is their humanity. Being human infects the doctor and makes him something besides a soulless god.
And while that is how the Donna plotarc starts, it is the opposite of where it ends. Her destiny is to become a Timelore and lose her humanity. Without her doing that, existence ends.
When Donna is the Doctor Donna, she has his mind and ethos. She isn't human. Oh, sure, she has one heart, but so does the Half Doctor, and he's not human.
There's a similar moment in the first season, when Rose becomes the Bad Wolf. The difference is she has mere power, and is driven by her humanity. She makes mistakes, like Jack. The Doctor Donna has the knowledge and soul of a Timelord. She can not just see the time vortex, but understands it.
Compare to when Martha Jones saves the world: She walks the earth. That most human of movements, and talks to people. That is her greatest contribution: conversation. Not guns or teleports or power: walking and stories.
Meanwhile, Donna does her best Tennant impersonation. Loses her own personality, subsumed in his.
This is also why neither Clara nor River Song work well as a companion.
River Song was never human and, while her initial introduction is as an independent awesome human, her plot arc is to become more and more subordinate to The Doctor.
Clara, that impossible girl, is never really human. She's a Dalek or whatever, then she doesn't exist. Then she's never in place. I don't know how that ends, but I imagine it negates her humanity.
And that's part of the problem with Moffat as show runner: He doesn't understand the importance of humanity.
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When you put it that way, it does sound bad. I have not watched much Doctor Who after Rose, so I can't really comment on the quality level of Moffat's era.
ReplyDeleteBut I can comment that the general thing has some precedent in classic Who. The 4th Doctor had non-human companions for a while after the incredibly popular Sarah Jane Smith. She was so popular, that there was a conscious attempt to avoid writing another companion too similar too her (Sarah Jane Smith syndrome).
(Technically, Leela was human, but from a far future rather alien tribe which had long forgotten anything about Earth.)
Before Sarah Jane Smith, there were actually a string of roughly similar human women, of which Sarah Jane Smith continued the pattern. Close enough that the same story could be easily modified if necessary for switching companions (like, if a story were delayed until after a switch or whatever).
But then, Sarah Jane Smith syndrome. She was on for 3 seasons - like Rose. She outlived her first Doctor - like Rose. She was even popular enough to spawn her own spinoff show (twice!).
After SJS, the 4th Doctor would go on to have a weird variety of alien companions, including 2 regenerations of a Time Lady Romana and a robot dog. He wouldn't have (sort of) another normal human companion until his very last story, which was really an introduction to the first 5th Doctor companion. And even then, she had to be made distinct by not even being British...she was Australian, and the next human companion would be American).
Okay, maybe Rose wasn't on the level of Sarah Jane Smith's popularity, but the point is...this sort of radical departure from human companions for a long time has happened before in Doctor Who.
And during this time, there were criticisms similar to your criticism. Douglas Adams in particular seemed to not "get" humanity in Doctor Who. (Although, at least he freely admitted he didn't "get" Doctor Who when he wrote the deliciously bizarre The Pirate Planet.) He'd go on to write Time Lord-centric stories. This era would see a lot of stories where there were no humans, and it built up a lot of Gallifrey/Time Lord lore and world building (which was pretty lacking before).
Moffat is also too much a fan of the Doctor. He's incapable of really criticizing him, and instead celebrates his mere existence at every opportunity like he's a gift to the universe no matter what he does.
ReplyDeleteI agree about Clara and River Song, but I do feel compelled to point out that the Donna arc was all RTD's responsibility, not a Moffat idea.
ReplyDeleteNew Who has presented us with a universe where anything can happen but what always happens is miserable companions and a lonely doctor. Always they go for trashy over any of the other perfectly suitable options for wrapping up story arcs. I don't think they actually care what they are or aren't saying about humanity; they just want high impact drama. It's like EastEnders.
ReplyDeleteRose gets trapped is another universe, heartbroken. Martha loves the doctor and so leaves him because he can't live her back. Donna is saved from the monotony and misery of modern existence, only to have every bit of joy wiped from her memory.
Season 5 is still my favourite. Fun companions, an unpredictable doctor and amazing conclusion to the season which actually ends on a happy note.
It's been a mixed bag since then but mostly it's just stuck to the formula. One episode each season in a space station with six crew who get picked off one-by-one. One episode of period drama with a historical figure. One in a residential area of London.
The last thing Dr Who should be is predictable.
I had to stop watching partway through the Moffat run, because it was incredibly aggravating and nothing like the Doctor Who I grew up on. My stopping point was partway through the River arc, because WTF WTF WTF. Also the hatred of women in general is only very thinly veiled. That's not my Doctor.
ReplyDeleteSoooo happy to be done with Moffat. We tried to watch Sherlock recently, and there were several times where I'm like "yeah no I hated when you did that on Who too"
ReplyDeleteYas, Patty Kirsch! The Sister arc, I am guessing?
ReplyDeleteI don't think we even got that far. Gave up at the trial in season 2
ReplyDelete