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Doctor Who 6.04 The Doctor's Wife
Oh, goody, I have a Charles Vess icon for a Neil Gaiman-written episode. You know, I had the highest hopes and the deepest fears about a Gaiman ep -- kind of the feelings Gaiman inspires in me overall, he hits-or-misses like a sniper taking out a target hiding in an explosives factory -- but it turns out neither were true. The best thing I can say about this ep overall is that it was better than the previous three.
- I'm just raising my hand here to say I'm really, sincerely, genuinely done with objects -- especially ships -- always manifesting as female, and always manifesting as some kind of dreamy scattered child-goddess female at that. Yes, in nautical tradition ships are always female. This doesn't actually make them female. This is not proactive inclusion of female characters. Anthropomorphic spaceships do not count as female characters: they give the writer the excuse to make them as giggly, tits-heavy and childlike as they want, and then put it down to "oh, but it's really just a spaceship POSSESSING a woman so it's fine" when it's like it's funny, somehow I REALLY doubt this episode would have been written with the TARDIS possessing a man, would've been too homo for the dashing Doctor. And that's not a coincidence. Seriously, if you plan on arguing that the woman-TARDIS trope was not at all sexist... imagine this episode with the TARDIS in a man's body. Surely it should act the same way. It's a TARDIS. It wouldn't care. But it ain't happening.
- AnthroTARDIS also sounded exactly like Delirium. I'm just saying.
- Overall, though, the ep had more internal logic than the past three... not that that's... hard... but still, I followed the storyline more or less, even if the rules were really overpowered and I had little suspense about what was going on because anyone could do anything, in usual DW-is-a-game-of-Exalted fashion.
- Didn't really dig the Les Miserables Meets Sweeney Todd look of the costumes, but that may be because I'm cynical to that aesthetic in general, Neil Gaiman is the Tim Burton of comics.
- I'm starting to feel bad for Arthur Darvill. The camera keeps panning to him for reaction shots for what are supposed to be deeply emotional moments and you can tell he's going, "wait, why the fuck would Rory care about the anthroTARDIS's body dying? Everyone dies in this goddamn series. He doesn't have dramatic music swelling to tell him how to feel. He's probably just confused. What is he even doing here. Was this what he planned for his life. I -- NEVER MIND FINE HAVE THIS BEWILDERED ANGSTY FACE"
- Their referring to House as "House" -- "House eats TARDISes." Fanart please to be happening.
- "I've killed hundreds of Time Lords." "I've killed all of them." Good line.
- The one thing I did particularly like was using the possibility of there being more Time Lords as a plothook for the Doctor -- I hoped there'd actually be some, but didn't expect it, and his finding the closet of distress signals was a cool moment. Like, a reason for his emotional reaction for once. This series is full of narmy attempts to provoke emotional reactions. Rarely does it actually warrant one from a character.
- A prophecy that might involve comparing a river and a pond, I'm so surprised.
- I'm just raising my hand here to say I'm really, sincerely, genuinely done with objects -- especially ships -- always manifesting as female, and always manifesting as some kind of dreamy scattered child-goddess female at that. Yes, in nautical tradition ships are always female. This doesn't actually make them female. This is not proactive inclusion of female characters. Anthropomorphic spaceships do not count as female characters: they give the writer the excuse to make them as giggly, tits-heavy and childlike as they want, and then put it down to "oh, but it's really just a spaceship POSSESSING a woman so it's fine" when it's like it's funny, somehow I REALLY doubt this episode would have been written with the TARDIS possessing a man, would've been too homo for the dashing Doctor. And that's not a coincidence. Seriously, if you plan on arguing that the woman-TARDIS trope was not at all sexist... imagine this episode with the TARDIS in a man's body. Surely it should act the same way. It's a TARDIS. It wouldn't care. But it ain't happening.
- AnthroTARDIS also sounded exactly like Delirium. I'm just saying.
- Overall, though, the ep had more internal logic than the past three... not that that's... hard... but still, I followed the storyline more or less, even if the rules were really overpowered and I had little suspense about what was going on because anyone could do anything, in usual DW-is-a-game-of-Exalted fashion.
- Didn't really dig the Les Miserables Meets Sweeney Todd look of the costumes, but that may be because I'm cynical to that aesthetic in general, Neil Gaiman is the Tim Burton of comics.
- I'm starting to feel bad for Arthur Darvill. The camera keeps panning to him for reaction shots for what are supposed to be deeply emotional moments and you can tell he's going, "wait, why the fuck would Rory care about the anthroTARDIS's body dying? Everyone dies in this goddamn series. He doesn't have dramatic music swelling to tell him how to feel. He's probably just confused. What is he even doing here. Was this what he planned for his life. I -- NEVER MIND FINE HAVE THIS BEWILDERED ANGSTY FACE"
- Their referring to House as "House" -- "House eats TARDISes." Fanart please to be happening.
- "I've killed hundreds of Time Lords." "I've killed all of them." Good line.
- The one thing I did particularly like was using the possibility of there being more Time Lords as a plothook for the Doctor -- I hoped there'd actually be some, but didn't expect it, and his finding the closet of distress signals was a cool moment. Like, a reason for his emotional reaction for once. This series is full of narmy attempts to provoke emotional reactions. Rarely does it actually warrant one from a character.
- A prophecy that might involve comparing a river and a pond, I'm so surprised.
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Poor Arthur Darvill. He is working so damn hard.
It was better than I feared, but as ever I find myself so blinded by everyone's FACES that it takes me a while to go "hey wait a minute." I AM SUSCEPTIBLE TO NARM, I GUESS.
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This season of Who has been SO full of Music Tells You How To Feel. Can they lay off the narm for one episode? Do something that's not supposed to be sadde? At this point, esp. after Pandorica Opens/Big Bang, you've got to wonder why anything emotionally impacts Amy or Rory at all any more. Also, I LOLed at the fakeout Rory death. RORY'S DEAD. MUST BE TUESDAY. I hope he dies in every episode.