Why 10.2 is 11 and 10 is a lost soul who should go to Rose

[rabid1st]

Also...a discussion of the idea of "theme" or "point" in Doctor Who. In case you don't want to read all of this...because it is soooo long...I will just tell you...

Doctor Who is about the Doctor saving the day and making everything okay again, even against impossible odds.

Well, now, we know a thing or two about RTD's trials as a writer. My heart goes out to him, working under deadline, knowing he's done something wrong, seeing it, but unable to see the fix in time for broadcast.

I know a number of us (17 or so) did see that this ending was wrong and even how it could be fixed...but we still don't know that it WILL be fixed. "No Pony for Christmas" seems to be the cry going 'round. And given my problems in RL I'm not sure I will be watching at Christmas in any case. Still, I do have hopes of an eventual pony.

But let's talk about theme...to see why. RTD said once, after Doomsday, that Doctor Who was about hope. He said since hope was the central point of the show Rose was never slated to die in the episode. It would be too bleak and hopeless. Our hope was that one day, somehow, she and the Doctor would see one another again. Many Old School fans get all frothy at the mouth when I say that. They try to convince me that "change" is what the show is all about...but I stubbornly insist that change is not change if the manner of it never changes.

And anyway, change is a side effect of the show going on so long. It is a tribute to the brilliance of some early casting people that they managed to pull off Patrick Troughton and Jon Pertwee and make us believe that the Doctor can change into a completely different man and yet remain the same inside. Also, let's not forget the wonder of Jamie and the excellent early loss of Susan.

These casting accidents and the creative scrambling that surrounded them...led to a brilliant concept...change the Doctor out for someone new...change his companions out, too. House MD is trying this with less success with the ducklings. Anyway, it worked most of the time to change the Doctor and his companions. But to say that is WHY the show works...is completely daft. Doctor Who works because when the Doctor arrives you feel like he can save the day.

He will bring a sense of balance and joy and intellect to the problem you are facing. The child in all of us responds to the idea of a very dashing and completely unthreatening person making us or our situation better. The reason the Doctor works...has nothing at all to do with suffering and self-denial and everything to do with endless possiblities. RTD started introducing sadness and loss into that mix. For a bit of time it works...we feel the heartstrings stir. But the reason little kids can't really grasp the angst is beautiful idea is because little kids expect the Doctor to save Rose...not abandon her.

Kids can love again. Many loved Martha. Many more loved Donna. Kids can understand loss and pain. But what is harder to understand...is that the Doctor can be defeated like this. That he could lose the one person who means the most to him...would be bad...but that he would throw that love away...is anti-hope.

Seeing TEN with Rose...seeing him suffer without her for two seasons...seeing him run to her arms it becomes obvious that he loves her. Knowing that she has crossed universes to get back to him...seeing her run to save him at the beginning of Turn Left...and then his dying again in the same general circumstances in Stolen Earth...hearing her beg him to stay with her...kids are going to get that Rose loves the Doctor.

But it is far too much to ask of the inner child to say...well...they love one another but they just can't be together...because the Doctor just can't do that.

Can't do what?

Uhm...have babies? No, better not go into the sex! Uhm...stay in one place for a bit? No, he's done that before on Gallifrey! Smart kids will remember he said he's been married before and had a family before even...he says so in the Doctor's Daughter. Uhm...he can't love someone? But he loves Rose. And didn't he love his wives and his kids?

Uhm...Rose has to go away and babysit the bad Doctor? No, she really doesn't! Why does he even need babysitting...isn't he supposed to kill the Daleks? Well, it would be too hard to have two Doctors and Billie's not under contract. Huh? Okay, not that meta. Well...we don't want a show about the Doctor hanging around the house doing dishes and stuff? Except probably Rose won't be staying home making babies...she works at Torchwood...there's lots of aliens there. Or we could just skip ahead to when he starts traveling again...after Rose dies.

Yeah, RTD is right...and so is my inner child...there's no reason for the Doctor to dump Rose on that beach except to torment and deny himself...and well...be less heroic.

You will want to do that, too, inner child...deny yourself a little rest and happiness. Oh! OH! I know...wait...he's afraid to see her die. Death is very scary. Of course, the Doctor doesn't really mind OTHER people dying so much...does he? Okay, he minds, he tries to help...but he's seen a lot of death. So, it must just be that he loves Rose so he would rather see her in prison with the bad Doctor than wait around himself and see her die.

CRAP! Yeah...you can't explain this and make it sound like anything but a handful of wimpy excuses for the Doctor NOT saving the day and finding a way to make everything okay again. And the last minute save, against impossible odds, is the whole point of Doctor Who. If he can't save true love, as Buttercup's beloved Westley would say, then what kind of hero is he?



Rae

Comments

[bananasandroses.livejournal.com]

Bravo, this is brilliant (and if Moffat makes the Doctor all lovey-dovey with River Song that’ll just rub salt into things; can’t put that past him, sadly.)

He needs to go to Rose, dammit.

[rabid1st.livejournal.com]

YES! It really is the solution that works. It is the only way to truly clear Rose's memory from tainting the show as we go forward...and it is also something the Doctor needs to feel better about life.

You can't base a happy show in self-denial. There is a reason he offers people jelly babies and hugs and hope. There is a reason he was sampling that marmalade in Fear Her...he's not all about self-denial. He's all about bananas and roses, yeah! He danced the night away in 21st Century France...and invented the banana daquari. He knew Madame was going to die...but he still had a good time.

Rae

[nisrin]

I agree completely. It would be one thing to go into a new chapter of the Doctor's story with him uplifted by his past, a spring in his step because he has loved and been loved, buoyed because he has saved the world and he's ready to save it again. Instead, every experience is another burden for him to bear, more angst piled on, more loneliness. Denying himself Rose is denying himself the chance to be happy, and I can't sympathize with him when his misery is so self-inflicted.

Thanks for your support

[rabid1st.livejournal.com]

Right! I mean...who is it that is insisting he can't be happy? Some very small-minded people. All he's getting here is a little rest...and even if 10.2 acted as his "temp" and married River and saved Donna and found Jenny again and the Master...that would be so very cool. 10.2 could have a little fun for his lifetime...and then 10 could come back all refreshed from a lifetime with Rose. There are so many ways to make this work...and knowing RTD knows that it doesn't work...well...there is no reason not to have ONE of those ways happen.

And RTD knows the KISS is very wrong...I hope he knows why. It is because, once again, that is a false kiss...Rose kisses 10.2...he doesn't kiss her. For the real kiss...you need Rose's REAL Doctor...and he has to kiss HER. Oh. and he should be a real brave little soldier and tell her he loves her, too.

Rae

[fidesangelus.livejournal.com]

I say again, Ten needs a serious dose of Rose because at the rate he's going I doubt I'd even want to claim I used to like him. Seriously, he's playing God and doing a bad job of it by seeming to try and make himself miserable. At least when Nine was all bitter and unhappy he wasn't taking away other people's right to choose the outcome of their life. Pfft.

Yeah I'm a bitter Betty at the moment but again, your thoughts were extremely intelligent and thought out. I hope you get your pony at Christmas, I just don't really know how you will but I'll hope none the less. :)

[rabid1st.livejournal.com]

I shall tell you how...because it is simple really...it is a coda.

The episode starts out sunny and happy and goes bad as Ten discovers his future isn't happy and peppy afterall...that he's still a lonely god...and he doesn't like himself.

Then, in a coda...he figures out that HE can't stop this future...but 10.2 can. And he goes back to that beach and switches bodies with 10.2...it will take about 15 minutes...and required David and Billie to do one more day of shooting back during the Christmas shoot.

And we go on with the specials with 10.2 in his proper body. David Tennant plays the tenth and the eleventh Doctor...and can come back to the show when he is 70 if he wants. He and Billie can come back any time...that's their gift for bringing the show back from oblivion.

Rae

[fidesangelus.livejournal.com]

*claps* I've always been a fan of your codas dating all the way back to your Iced Coda.


*wibbles* I miss Rae's Lee/Kara fics.

And David needs to move on from Doctor Who while he can still potentially have a career not involving blue boxes and giant pepper shakers. (Not that we don't adore both, I'm just saying...) Its a scary thing to do but look at the awesome Ms. Billie. She's doing fantastic and is on massive billboards in LA.

[amybtvsfreak.livejournal.com]

That's why I firmly believe that when she took the Vortex into her, it did something to her and she will be around as long as the Face of Boe, or possibly longer. Plus, the Doctor taking that out of her (or so he thinks, because he's been wrong before) did the same to him. And even though they are separated for centuries, a millenia, or longer, they will find their way back to each other and still be able to pick up where they left off. And maybe, that's how he can leave her now, even though he desperately loves her, because he can see those threads converging once again (just as he mentioned seeing Donna's threads coming together), and he knows that the time will come when they'll be thrown together once again.

That's my theory, and I'm stickin' to it like superglue. 10.2 can kick the bucket and be "protected" by Rose (even though that theory is rubbish to me, but whatevs...), and then do her thing until she can get back to her Doctor. (Or maybe even with 10.2's help)

I wish I had the patience to write a fanfic describing what I see in my head.

[rabid1st.livejournal.com]

I wish you had the patience to write it, too. But that...is a serious rewrite. That is the way the show ends a long time from now. Or...after 2010...if we don't fix this now. It is true the they would need to get David and Billie back onboard for a movie in 2011 or something...and act out your idea...for the Doctor...but it has a lot of variables.

The reason I like the giving of regenerations or the body switch is that it gets us out of the 13 regenerations trap, too...and it allows DT to continue on the show if he wants...come back anytime he wants...at any age (though they have that now...but 10.2 is not fully the Doctor).

Also, I sort of like the out of having a Doctor who could age...if 10.2 is 11 and gets the regeneration ability...then his body could age...but not die. So we could send him off and then show him as an old geezer and then regenerate him...and have the actor able to return as a fat old fart in a corset sometime with no worries.

Rae
not trying to wobble your theory at all.

[sunnytyler001.livejournal.com]

RTD said himself he was not happy with this ending so... He's got 4 specials to find THE PERFECT ending. And I quite like your idea of Ten II being Eleven.

[rabid1st.livejournal.com]

The reasons I believe that is the perfect solution are many.

It deals with all of the fans who are writing 10.2/Rose as if 10.2 was the Doctor...because it makes him the Doctor. Can't argue with that. Some, of course, will continue to ignore canon.

It shows that 10 is really in love with Rose...since it would mean he was willing to break the laws of time to make her happy. And, I hope, that he was willing to give up his lifestyle to be with her.

It allows the Doctor to deeply honor the great love we have actually witnessed...yet it frees him to love again later if the show or fans ever want to go there.

It is a solution that can be reconciled to both Old School and New School canon...we have seen the Doctor put his consciousness into a watch...we have seen the Master get new regenerations and a new body and still be the "same man" inside...we must assume that the old Master should he meet the new...would be the "same man."

It could be used to explain the real life bother of slight aging in future new who Doctors...as the actors age.

It solves the horrible dilemma of our hero being a man we can no longer respect.

It resets the Doctor to a truly unique creature...no longer just a left over Time Lord...10.2 becoming 11 means that the Doctor is one of a kind in the cosmos. A man with the depth of temporal sensitivity of a Time Lord and the emotional temperment of a human being...without just papering over his differences with a "half-human on my mother's side" remark.

It is an easy fix on paper...and in the studio...demanding only that two Davids be there to explain the Time Lord science.

Of course, Billie SHOULD be there, too, to clarify the emotions and make sure the fans understand that this is the truth of these characters. But since it is a very short shoot...this one...I think RTD could get Billie back for a day to fix something she obviously regarded as a mess.

At this point...I think he might already have had her and David fix it already.

Rae

[sensiblecat.livejournal.com]

Well, I'm still reading...but little bits keep trickling out that shows how completely on the same page you and RTD are - in theory. He mentions the wonderful moment in "Monsters Inc" when the two monsters realise their whole life has been about scaring children, and it needn't be that way. He talks about the ending of "Life on Mars" being absolutely wonderful - a man commits suicide, jumps off a building to live in his dreams.

So what went wrong? He said, before he wrote a word of S4, that it would end with the Doctor broadcasting to the Earth that he would always protect it, that it would be the happiest ending ever. And he said he always knew the ending in advance and wrote up to it. But none of it fits JE.

Things come up and make it harder to reach your goal. Billie decided to go on honeymoon for the whole of January, throwing the recording schedule out of kilter. RTD felt under enormous pressure to use the tagline "One of them dies" so he'd get those record viewing figures for JE and leave the show in great shape. SM came up with a "Doctor's wife" script and, it seems, you don't argue with the Moff. And who knows what happened, or is happening, concerning DT's plans?

The untold backstory, as far as you can infer it from the text, is that everyone was going to quit together at the end of S4, and the master plan would have worked a lot better if one of those people had been Tennant. Now maybe he changed his mind, or was leaned on, and decided to stay.

Or it may just be that RTD truly believed he'd be able to write the Duplicate Doctor and Rose as a happy ending, and he turned out to be wrong.

One thing I can tell you, Billie doing the 2008 Xmas special was seriously discussed.

What comes through, over and over, is that RTD is torn between an impossible job that's slowly killing him, and his companions leaving one by one, and the adrenaline rush and sheer joy of doing the job of his dreams.

And I quote:

"When Julie is looking at me like I can save them, I'm too polite. But I'm the man who fixes things. They don't need to hear my problems, just that I can fix theirs. That's more than a production problem. That's me. I don't tell them what I'm really thinking. Maybe things would be better if I did. People would help. But I just don't" (email, Feb 26, 07)

That remind you of anybody?

This is good to know, too.

[rabid1st.livejournal.com]

Yeah! I know he understands self-sacrifice for the good of the many. But he also should know that the Doctor didn't work for him as a boy because the Doctor was a martyr. It worked because the Doctor could do the impossible...make it all better. It is okay for RTD to give up...but it isn't okay for the Doctor to deny everyone he cares for...the happiness they deserve.

If you look back in my journal...you will see that I said I went through this same thing in Disheveled. I think all authors get to the burnout stage...even without the time pressures and contracts of a television show. The thing is...I expected myself to fix it, too. And I would hope that Billie would help if RTD asked her. She might have taken a longer honeymoon than expected...but she also might have come back for a day shoot.

RTD and I are a lot alike, I believe...fundamentally...in our committment to telling the best possible story. And part of that is keeping the ending, the surprises to yourself. I do see that he was going to a place where everyone became the Doctor's family...where the whole world, the whole human race were part of him. And I think that's a good place to go...but not before the Doctor learns to love again.

DT staying does make it very hard...and yet, they DO have a duplicate Doctor...it is NOT hard if you allow the "dead" Ten to go to his "dead beloved." Then, you have 11 as David Tennant...and you have a Doctor who really can be the protector of humanity rather than our lofty GOD figure.

10.2 is better because he will always protect people...rather than break them...because with that little bit of Donna inside...he would KNOW when to stop. He would know how to show he cared...or did not care for someone. Rose is perfect for the Doctor as he is now...because she can tolerate him and keep her sense of self. She is focused and she understands that he is also focused.

I am willing to concede that poor RTD was just exhausted...at this point...and therefore, I can excuse JE. What this reminds me of is a thing that happened with the creator of Babylon 5 when he lost one of his main actresses. He went on with his story with this huge mistake in the middle. It vexed his storytelling mind so much...that a year or more later he wrote a short story for a magazine trying to correct that mistake. I admired HIS honest, too...but not his inability to see and fix the mistake for real.

RTD has 4 more episodes...and this is easy to fix. Of course, he doesn't have a beta babe. I can't tell you how many times the right question from a beta gave my exhausted mind the fix on something. I could be RTD's beta babe.

I wonder what that pays? :grin:

Rae
thinking Julie looking at him and expecting him to fix it...and Billie not wanting to walk out that door...might well allow him to fix it...even if it means sacrificing some of what he wanted to do in the Specials.

[rabid1st.livejournal.com]

Oh...and you needn't worry...people will all too soon start arguing with the Moff. :grin:

He's brilliant in stand alone but he is going to suck if he tries to bring that James Bond Doctor to the emotional trainwreck we have now. Actually...James Bond/Fingersnap Doctor is going to suck week after week no matter what happens to our emo Ten.

Rae

[rabid1st.livejournal.com]

And okay...this is February. The fix, I think...happened in April. Before Billie went on her baby trip to the beach. I think it happened there because David was filming in April...and his vacation was originally the month of May but ended up being only 2 weeks long. Things got changed for the Christmas production...I think. But did they get changed enough...or are they only a set up...I don't know. It's hard to imagine RTD saying all this...knowing it...getting the same rain of divine sparks that I get about this story and not seeing what needs to be done.

Or...worse...not letting it be done because he equates pointless self-sacrifice and doing everything on your own with heroism. I think he's coming to see that it's not heroic at all...just painfully stupid. And I think it is beautiful that it is the Rose in his head that is arguing with him...because BOY she is yelling at me over that ending. She's reminding me, as you know because I wrote it up, that SHE wants to help the Doctor find rest and peace. She is the way...the one who can help him.

Rae

[frodolass.livejournal.com]

If he can't save true love, as Buttercup's beloved Westley would say, then what kind of hero is he?

Oh, you surely know how to make my fangirl heart stop and sigh with hope and gladness. ^__^

I'm sure RTD gets it. I'm even sure he can fix it. But does the BBC want that, in the end? Because we all know how shipperphobic they are. They can never commit on paper (or html) to the idea of the Doctor even loving Rose, because that would ruin his kid friendly Christ-figure image. >__

[rabid1st.livejournal.com]

But then...that is another beautiful thing about 10.2 as 11...we can claim that he DOESN'T love Rose. We can say that when 10 saw her there on the street...his hearts when WHAM! And he runs to her like 'the biggest love story you've ever seen' as RTD said in the confidential. And then, he's shot down by a Dalek...that he makes the wrong choice...he distills all of that love and hope and joy at seeing her...and that gives him the power to cast off the NEXT DOCTOR.

Rose didn't want him to leave...and unlike in RTD's original idea, where he leaves her but something goes into the hand that comes back as her beloved Ten later. In the CANON version...the beloved Ten keeps the Doctor's body. But we can say...that the REAL Doctor is 10.2...and he had to be kissed. He didn't kiss Rose. Nor did he say that HE loved her. He said 10 was going to say he loved her. And that's a big distinction if they've split emotionally.

See? Having Nine love Rose and then Ten love Rose was sort of unprecidented...because he changes his tastes and mannerisms when he changes his form. But maybe this love was just VERY strong...so strong that it kept him from regenerating properly.

So...then...when you send 10 off to Rose...you are sending the romantic love off as well. And you have a new non-emo Doctor for Moffat and the BBC. That's the thing...10 needs to go....to fix it for everyone. Because now...what we have isn't a Doctor that doesn't love Rose...we have a Doctor who loves her so much he's willing to inflict his sadness and loss on us. If RTD could have written TEN as not loving Rose...it might have worked...but he never does...not even at the end.

Rae