Doctor Who 29.13: "Last of the Time Lords"
Jul. 2nd, 2007 06:49 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
annathepiperBit late to the game with this, but we didn't get to watch the episode until last night... and then I wanted to mull for a bit before I went ahead and posted. Picoreview: some things I really liked about this ep, some things I thought were really shaky. Russell T. Davies is good for big flashy season-enders, but sometimes the plot points kinda feel... a little optional. ;)
Also, anybody besides me keep wanting to call this episode "Last of the Red Hot Time Lords?" No? Maybe it's just me then. Anyway...!
Well. Let's talk about the stuff that annoyed me in this episode, first.
There wasn't any real surprise here, since![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
solarbird called the big plot twist early on--i.e., the Balls From Space being the human survivors from Part 1. That knocked some of the wind out of the sails to start with, more so for Dara than me, I think--but still enough for me that it wasn't really as riveting as it should have been.
Having Ten get out of his godawful situation of being the Master's captive, humiliated, and physically accelerated into a withered little husk of a Time Lord by setting it up so that everybody on Earth would be focusing on him at the same time... eh. I know my Doctor fu is not as strong as many, but that did not play well for me. We know that Time Lords are at least somewhat telepathic, and we know from Classic Doctor era that Time Lords more skilled at the process than the Doctor can control their regenerations--Romana being an example of this. Hell, we know from Ten that as long as there's enough ambient regeneration energy in the body, a Time Lord can exert enough control to grow a lost body part.
Given all this, it seems like a good idea at least on paper that the Doctor should be able to reset himself physically under the proper conditions. I can even buy that having a planet's worth of telepathic encouragement can give him the juice he needs to pull it off (since this wasn't a regeneration, but essentially a full shapeshift and a restoration of lost mass). But the way it played out on camera came across rather cheesily, and way too Peter-Pannish, too "I do believe in fairies! I do believe in fairies!"
Also, Ten, I love you dearly, but you're not a Jedi. So what the fuck was up with that mental knocking of the Master's gizmo out of his hand? To the best of my knowledge, there isn't any evidence that Time Lords are telekinetic on top of being telepaths, so that actually played worse for me than "I do believe in Doctors!"
The Master's death scene... way, way too schmaltzy. Ten flipped out way too much about the idea of the Master dying. Yet another thing that I think makes sense on paper, but which played out wrong when filmed.
Last but not least, the timeline resetting itself was for me way too reminiscent of Superman: the Movie, and the whole thing with Supes making the flow of time reverse by reversing the rotation of the Earth. Don't get me wrong, I love that movie. But all I can think of iskathrynt's crack upon finally seeing it, about how you really need industrial-strength cables to suspend your disbelief when you're watching it. And here, while the destruction of the Paradox Machine logically means that the timeline should reset itself--again, the way they portrayed it was too damned cheesy.
Balanced against all of this, here's the stuff I liked.
I liked all the little details about how the Master had so thoroughly seized control of the Earth--things like "the islands of Japan burning", conditions in Russia, that kind of thing.
Martha's parents being united in their hatred of the Master, and, once everything reset back to normal, staying united. That was cool. So was the clearly concerted effort at the beginning of the episode to try to take the Master down. Not much dialogue involved with that, but I did like how all the characters' motions were smoothly choreographed, visually showing their accord and resolve.
Even though the romantic sucker in me went "sniff" at Martha's exiting speech to the Doctor about why she was leaving, it also made absolute sense as the correct thing for her to do if she wants to preserve her own emotional health. It helps to know as well that we haven't seen the last of her. ;)
I liked the doctor guy who met Martha when she came ashore after her sojourn abroad, and for that matter, I liked that Martha had become a legend specifically because of that wandering of the earth. And the whole idea that the Doctor had encouraged her to set up the big red herring about the weapon in four parts, also cool. Certainly the Doctor has a long and colorful history of having similarly cunning plots--Seven comes to mind as a similarly cunning Doctor--so it was good to see that.
I did, despite my overall dislike of the Master's death scene, like his last snarky little "I win!" remark.
And I have to admit, I giggle and giggle and giggle at the idea that Jack Harkness eventually becomes the Face of Boe. ;>
So, all in all, a somewhat schizoid episode. Definitely the shakiest of the season enders of the New Doctor so far, but not without its merits. It'll be amusing to see how the next season kicks in if it's on the Titanic, and whether we'll get any in-jokes about the Doctor's previous visits to that particular historical event. ;) It was an amusing little callback that the last thing we saw this time around was Ten crying, "What? What?! WHAT?!?" like he did last season, too.
Also, anybody besides me keep wanting to call this episode "Last of the Red Hot Time Lords?" No? Maybe it's just me then. Anyway...!
Well. Let's talk about the stuff that annoyed me in this episode, first.
There wasn't any real surprise here, since
solarbird called the big plot twist early on--i.e., the Balls From Space being the human survivors from Part 1. That knocked some of the wind out of the sails to start with, more so for Dara than me, I think--but still enough for me that it wasn't really as riveting as it should have been.Having Ten get out of his godawful situation of being the Master's captive, humiliated, and physically accelerated into a withered little husk of a Time Lord by setting it up so that everybody on Earth would be focusing on him at the same time... eh. I know my Doctor fu is not as strong as many, but that did not play well for me. We know that Time Lords are at least somewhat telepathic, and we know from Classic Doctor era that Time Lords more skilled at the process than the Doctor can control their regenerations--Romana being an example of this. Hell, we know from Ten that as long as there's enough ambient regeneration energy in the body, a Time Lord can exert enough control to grow a lost body part.
Given all this, it seems like a good idea at least on paper that the Doctor should be able to reset himself physically under the proper conditions. I can even buy that having a planet's worth of telepathic encouragement can give him the juice he needs to pull it off (since this wasn't a regeneration, but essentially a full shapeshift and a restoration of lost mass). But the way it played out on camera came across rather cheesily, and way too Peter-Pannish, too "I do believe in fairies! I do believe in fairies!"
Also, Ten, I love you dearly, but you're not a Jedi. So what the fuck was up with that mental knocking of the Master's gizmo out of his hand? To the best of my knowledge, there isn't any evidence that Time Lords are telekinetic on top of being telepaths, so that actually played worse for me than "I do believe in Doctors!"
The Master's death scene... way, way too schmaltzy. Ten flipped out way too much about the idea of the Master dying. Yet another thing that I think makes sense on paper, but which played out wrong when filmed.
Last but not least, the timeline resetting itself was for me way too reminiscent of Superman: the Movie, and the whole thing with Supes making the flow of time reverse by reversing the rotation of the Earth. Don't get me wrong, I love that movie. But all I can think of is
kathrynt's crack upon finally seeing it, about how you really need industrial-strength cables to suspend your disbelief when you're watching it. And here, while the destruction of the Paradox Machine logically means that the timeline should reset itself--again, the way they portrayed it was too damned cheesy.Balanced against all of this, here's the stuff I liked.
I liked all the little details about how the Master had so thoroughly seized control of the Earth--things like "the islands of Japan burning", conditions in Russia, that kind of thing.
Martha's parents being united in their hatred of the Master, and, once everything reset back to normal, staying united. That was cool. So was the clearly concerted effort at the beginning of the episode to try to take the Master down. Not much dialogue involved with that, but I did like how all the characters' motions were smoothly choreographed, visually showing their accord and resolve.
Even though the romantic sucker in me went "sniff" at Martha's exiting speech to the Doctor about why she was leaving, it also made absolute sense as the correct thing for her to do if she wants to preserve her own emotional health. It helps to know as well that we haven't seen the last of her. ;)
I liked the doctor guy who met Martha when she came ashore after her sojourn abroad, and for that matter, I liked that Martha had become a legend specifically because of that wandering of the earth. And the whole idea that the Doctor had encouraged her to set up the big red herring about the weapon in four parts, also cool. Certainly the Doctor has a long and colorful history of having similarly cunning plots--Seven comes to mind as a similarly cunning Doctor--so it was good to see that.
I did, despite my overall dislike of the Master's death scene, like his last snarky little "I win!" remark.
And I have to admit, I giggle and giggle and giggle at the idea that Jack Harkness eventually becomes the Face of Boe. ;>
So, all in all, a somewhat schizoid episode. Definitely the shakiest of the season enders of the New Doctor so far, but not without its merits. It'll be amusing to see how the next season kicks in if it's on the Titanic, and whether we'll get any in-jokes about the Doctor's previous visits to that particular historical event. ;) It was an amusing little callback that the last thing we saw this time around was Ten crying, "What? What?! WHAT?!?" like he did last season, too.
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no subject
Date: 2007-07-03 05:09 am (UTC)This Doctor is doing it wrong. He's got reasons of course, but he's wrecking his poor companions and that's just not right. He's not truly likeable, off-kilter, especially in the Family of Blood and this story arc.
no subject
Date: 2007-07-03 10:16 am (UTC)And I still want to slap Jack around for walking out on the poor lonely Doctor. I mean, if Jack could stand waiting a full century for the Tardis to come around, surely a mere year of waiting shouldn't have destroyed his resolve! Would have done doc a world of good if he could have had somebody immortal around for a century or two -- maybe he'd be more willing to open up at last if he didn't have the reasonable expectation of his companion dying or walking out after a mere year or two. *sigh*
no subject
Date: 2007-07-03 03:38 pm (UTC)On the one hand, I feel like it's a bit unfair to the Doctor. First of all, Martha's only real complaint with him has not been that he's an asshole, but rather, that he has absolutely no romantic interest in her whatsoever. Like she herself says, he does like her perfectly well, but he hasn't given her a second look in a romantic sense. Martha is absolutely justified in being stressed out about this, and also in telling him that she really needs to take a step back and be away from him now. I'd totally feel the same way. :)
However, not being in love with the girl is not the Doctor's fault. In fact, if he had fallen in love with her so quickly, I'd have taken issue with that story-wise. He was so clearly in love with Rose and is still so clearly not quite over her loss yet that I think it's too soon for him to develop that strong an emotional attachment to anybody else.
On the other hand, I will agree that he was a bit of a jerk in the earlier stretches of this episode--the scene where Martha's yelling at him that this is all his fault comes to mind, as does his stone-faced reaction when she asks him if that's what he does, get bored and leave his companions behind. But that played for me only as "a bit of a jerk", and within reasonable boundaries. ;)
And, in contrast to the actions of his predecessors, Ten now has two incidents on record of coming this close to bringing another woman onto the TARDIS, in blatant obliviousness to his current companion's attachment to him. ;) I'm sure that Rose would have been less than thrilled if he'd actually successfully brought Reinette from "Girl in the Fireplace" on board... and while Martha wasn't around for his scene with Joan at the tail end of "Family of Blood", clearly that would have been just a knife in the wound for Martha, who was spending the whole damn episode being upset that the Doctor had gone and fallen for another woman.
Hrmm. All this said, this doesn't mean I don't like Ten, or that I think he's unjustifiably off-kilter. I do think he is off-kilter some, but it makes sense to me in the overall flow of story from Nine's first episode clear down to here. He is after all on record as carrying around a huge pile of angst from being the only survivor of the Time War. Given that, I'm absolutely buying that he's latching onto each and every crumb of possibility of having another friend around that he can find. And that at the same time, he's not handling it gracefully--especially after having gone and fallen in love with Rose and losing her so dramatically. I also strongly suspect that his recent regenerations being younger and haler (and therefore perhaps more inclined to be romantically emotional ;) ) must surely be very weird for him.
But. It would be nice to see him begin to realize all this stuff; there are writers on the show who could certainly handle that sort of emotional development. It will be interesting to see what happens next season and whether Martha's scheduled return partway through will stabilize their relationship.
no subject
Date: 2007-07-04 02:10 am (UTC)On the other hand, yeah, if he was waiting this long, you'd think he'd have at least made an effort to keep in touch. ;)
no subject
Date: 2007-07-04 04:28 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-07-04 06:42 pm (UTC)Though yeah, it'd be pretty damned hard for any of them to top the Doctor. ;)
no subject
Date: 2007-07-08 01:55 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-07-08 03:17 am (UTC)