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The thing is, it's never the viewer's job to make the telly okay. Sometimes, though, I wonder how much of what we see depends more on us than what's on the screen. Subjectively, much of the criticism of this season confuses me. Subjectively, I have no idea where half of it comes from.
So this chick is driving her boy's car but she's such a shitty driver, she can't help but crash into THE WHOLE UNIVERSE and the boy ends up having to write such a big cheque to fix the situation, he's probably not even gonna exist after it clears.
So this boy, he loves this chick so much, he lets her drive his car, and he never lets anyone drive his car, but this chick, he trusts. So when some jerk carjacks her because he wants some payback on the boy, and crashes his ride into THE WHOLE UNIVERSE, the boy is pretty much willing to write whatever cheque he has to to make things right again; it's the whole universe, after all. And it was his car.
Which story do you like better?
So there's this girl, and she bites psychiatrists. She runs away on the night of her wedding, all legs and lips and short skirts, inappropriately kissing men who aren't interested like some kind of drunken harlot. She gets her boyfriend killed, and when he comes back made of plastic, it's about five minutes before she's yelling at him and trying to kiss strangers at their wedding. But at least someone managed to marry her, so that's something.
So there's this girl, and she bites psychiatrists. She runs away on the night of her wedding, abandoned kid in a grown-up's body. There are too many rooms in her house, so she runs. Too much of her life has been stolen, she's made of gaps, she can't communicate and it takes her boy dying in her arms, and her dying in his before she works it out. It's a wedding, and it's growing up, and it's not the end.
Which story do you like better?
So this roman soldier remembers he used to be a wimp who let his bitchy girlfriend push him around. And he didn't let her wear her ring and figured eventually she'd snap back to reality and realise he's been waiting and deserved her. Instead he died, came back as a roman, waited and deserved her. Shame she was still a bitch.
So there's a roman soldier, and he's not really a real boy. He's the shell of a boy who loved a girl and died for her because he never understood there was more to life than a village. A shell of a boy who tried to wish himself real and failed. A thing-boy who held onto the shell of a memory (from a universe that died in 102 AD) for 2,000 years, because he knew his plastic heart was full of love. It's a wedding, and it's growing up, and it's learning there is more to life than a village, and it's not the end.
Which story do you like better?
There's a mad man in a box. He's frivolous and annoying and has no understanding of the weight of his decisions. He's paternalistic and controlling. He's childish. He's unemotional. He's a collection of disassociated character tics. He's ugly, he's boring, he's got a bow tie.
There's a mad man in a box. He's brand new and ancient. He's quiet, stoic, understated, noble. He's silly, he's childlike, he's easy to read. He's finally more than a collection of disassociated character tics. He's gorgeous, he's intriguing, he's got a bow tie.
Who do you like best? Which man is in which story?
Because this story - it's arbitrary - a series of coincidences masquerading as a fairytale hanging on a half dozen repeated themes because writers only ever tell one story. The out of order, years-apart meetings, repeated voices of the dead, girls who love the Doctor and girls the Doctor loves, time loops, paradoxes, River Song. Throw it all on a board and play pin the plot on the donkey, if we throw enough symbolism out there we can pass it off as myth.
There's a story. It's cyclical and unending. It's about a boy and a girl and a boy and a girl, about magic boxes and magic books, about running away and running back. It's about burning at the centre of time, about creation and destruction in the same instant, about death, about sacrifice, about bedtime stories (the most important things left in the universe). It's about legs and lips and it's all right, we can buy a fez. It's about joy and of course Amy wants to kiss them all, it's a fairytale and no one ought to be a frog. It's about a dozen repeated themes because writers only ever tell one story, but this is a good one. This is the best.
I know which story I like better.
Subjectively:
One of my favourite exercises in writing is to remove all the adjectives and see what's left. The near lack of them is one of the things that renders translated haiku so beautiful to me.
Smith's Doctor has no adjectives.
Tennant's had nothing but.
So this chick is driving her boy's car but she's such a shitty driver, she can't help but crash into THE WHOLE UNIVERSE and the boy ends up having to write such a big cheque to fix the situation, he's probably not even gonna exist after it clears.
So this boy, he loves this chick so much, he lets her drive his car, and he never lets anyone drive his car, but this chick, he trusts. So when some jerk carjacks her because he wants some payback on the boy, and crashes his ride into THE WHOLE UNIVERSE, the boy is pretty much willing to write whatever cheque he has to to make things right again; it's the whole universe, after all. And it was his car.
Which story do you like better?
So there's this girl, and she bites psychiatrists. She runs away on the night of her wedding, all legs and lips and short skirts, inappropriately kissing men who aren't interested like some kind of drunken harlot. She gets her boyfriend killed, and when he comes back made of plastic, it's about five minutes before she's yelling at him and trying to kiss strangers at their wedding. But at least someone managed to marry her, so that's something.
So there's this girl, and she bites psychiatrists. She runs away on the night of her wedding, abandoned kid in a grown-up's body. There are too many rooms in her house, so she runs. Too much of her life has been stolen, she's made of gaps, she can't communicate and it takes her boy dying in her arms, and her dying in his before she works it out. It's a wedding, and it's growing up, and it's not the end.
Which story do you like better?
So this roman soldier remembers he used to be a wimp who let his bitchy girlfriend push him around. And he didn't let her wear her ring and figured eventually she'd snap back to reality and realise he's been waiting and deserved her. Instead he died, came back as a roman, waited and deserved her. Shame she was still a bitch.
So there's a roman soldier, and he's not really a real boy. He's the shell of a boy who loved a girl and died for her because he never understood there was more to life than a village. A shell of a boy who tried to wish himself real and failed. A thing-boy who held onto the shell of a memory (from a universe that died in 102 AD) for 2,000 years, because he knew his plastic heart was full of love. It's a wedding, and it's growing up, and it's learning there is more to life than a village, and it's not the end.
Which story do you like better?
There's a mad man in a box. He's frivolous and annoying and has no understanding of the weight of his decisions. He's paternalistic and controlling. He's childish. He's unemotional. He's a collection of disassociated character tics. He's ugly, he's boring, he's got a bow tie.
There's a mad man in a box. He's brand new and ancient. He's quiet, stoic, understated, noble. He's silly, he's childlike, he's easy to read. He's finally more than a collection of disassociated character tics. He's gorgeous, he's intriguing, he's got a bow tie.
Who do you like best? Which man is in which story?
Because this story - it's arbitrary - a series of coincidences masquerading as a fairytale hanging on a half dozen repeated themes because writers only ever tell one story. The out of order, years-apart meetings, repeated voices of the dead, girls who love the Doctor and girls the Doctor loves, time loops, paradoxes, River Song. Throw it all on a board and play pin the plot on the donkey, if we throw enough symbolism out there we can pass it off as myth.
There's a story. It's cyclical and unending. It's about a boy and a girl and a boy and a girl, about magic boxes and magic books, about running away and running back. It's about burning at the centre of time, about creation and destruction in the same instant, about death, about sacrifice, about bedtime stories (the most important things left in the universe). It's about legs and lips and it's all right, we can buy a fez. It's about joy and of course Amy wants to kiss them all, it's a fairytale and no one ought to be a frog. It's about a dozen repeated themes because writers only ever tell one story, but this is a good one. This is the best.
I know which story I like better.
Subjectively:
One of my favourite exercises in writing is to remove all the adjectives and see what's left. The near lack of them is one of the things that renders translated haiku so beautiful to me.
Smith's Doctor has no adjectives.
Tennant's had nothing but.
