stunt_muppet

Not like you could avoid it if you were on the internet at all today, but I suppose I should spoiler-cut it nonetheless.



...Is it bad that my first thought, upon hearing the news, is "I wonder how long it will take for the internet to explode"?

To be honest, I kind of figured that Tennant would leave after the 2009 season, since the gap year seemed like a good way to ease him out, and he's been taking on other jobs and things, so I can't say I'm shocked.

But still. While I've had my issues with Ten's writing, I'll be sad to see Tennant go, since he's a wee enthusiastic little fanboy and I love listening to his commentaries, interviews, and everything. And there was something uniquely heartening about seeing someone who used to be such a fan live his dream.

On the other hand, he's had a three-year run - he'll have a four-year run by the time he bows out. That's longer than many other Doctors got. And I think he's done a fairly good job of it, even when the scripts were less than spectacular, and really, what else can Ten even go through at this point? It feels like his story, over the course of the specials, can come to a natural conclusion, like he can complete his character arc.

And I'm looking forward to what Eleven will bring. I'm looking forward to a new direction for the series, new blood and new ideas. Such is the nature of the show, and while my first transition (Nine to Ten) was hard, I think hanging out in Old Who fandom has made me a little better at moving on.

So, au revoir and bon voyage, Ten. It's been fun. Occasionally frustrating, but fun.

Anyway. I originally had a few meta-ish thoughts on the Second Doctor's era, but they all boil down to a relatively simple observation.

The thing I've realized, while re-watching The Seeds of Death and Tomb of the Cybermen (and thus earning a new Whovian convert, hurrah) is that, out of all the Doctors I've seen, Two seems like the happiest of all of them. Not that his stories were all sunshine and roses, because they weren't, but Two seemed the most comfortable out of all of them with traveling, and, to an extent, with his own identity. By the time he'd reached his second incarnation, he'd started to shake off the burden of being an exile, thinking of himself as a traveler (and thus a citizen of the universe) rather than an outcast. (and thus a citizen of a certain race/people, but cut off from them). He seems truly happy to be exploring, like he's chasing new horizons purely for the sake of doing so and not because he has nowhere else to go. Not that One was never happy, but from what I've seen of One, he still had a melancholy edge to him, and the reminder that he was indeed an exile, that he was traveling in an old and broken spaceship because he couldn't go home again, still hung in the air (see The Massacre, for example).

Two, I feel, has started to come to terms with his life, to be comfortable with his travels, with who he is, and, significantly, with the TARDIS as "home" (he calls it as such in Tomb of the Cybermen). He's learned to walk among humans while neither obliterating or emphasizing his alien nature; Two passes for human fairly frequently and easily, and sometimes doesn't bother to correct people when they assume he's human - he doesn't need to, unless he feels he's being insulted.

And, more to the point, he seems more at ease around humans. After the initial confusion of his regeneration, he gets along quite well with Ben and Polly; he comforts and supports Victoria when she needs it; he helps teach Zoe how to be human even though he isn't himself; and, of course, he finds his one true soulmate in Jamie XD. (Confession: I am a hypocrite. Normally, I am all about how departure is part of a companion's arc, and every companion has got to leave sometime, etc, etc, etc, but I really, truly think that if it hadn't been for The War Games, Jamie would have stayed until he died. I really believe it. I can't imagine him leaving of his own free will.)

Of course, part of that is just Troughton being made of win; Two onscreen has such a palpable joie de vivre and curiosity and wonder; he seems at once restless and yet content with being restless, in a way that no other Doctor really does.

And it almost makes me teary, watching that, because I can't help but remember that it all gets taken away from him, and he's left with Issues for the rest of his lives. I don't think he was ever quite as happy and quite as fulfilled as he was when he was Two. Three's got all his attendant issues with confinement and destabilization and identity; Four starts out with almost the same kind of zeal that Two had, in the wake of his release from exile, but by Season 17 we can already get the sense that he's starting to burn himself out, that being in one place for so long has distorted his sense of who he is and what he does, and now that the initial burst of energy is gone he doesn't quite know what to do with himself (heck, you can see this as early as Pyramids of Mars, if not earlier). Then we get to Five, who seems (to me) to overcompensate for that directionlessness by becoming not only reserved but distinctly self-sacrificing. Still haven't seen enough of Six and Seven to know how the Issues carry over from Five, but I'm certain that Six getting mindscrewed by his own people (again) doesn't help one bit. And then we get to Eight, and the Time War, and whatever else happens with Gallifrey and the Doctor's head in whichever Eight canon you're following. And from hence spring Nine and Ten and Time Lord Emo. I'm interested to see where this heads with Eleven, actually, because the character arc strikes me as fairly consistent. Depressing, yes, since talk about peaking early, but consistent, nonetheless.

Sigh. Two serials may be my comfort food, good for feeling warm and fuzzy, but at the same time, coming off of New Who, seeing how happy the Doctor could be back then gives it that grim note that I can't quite shake.

I had another bit of thinky-thoughts here regarding Three/Brig, Three/Delgado!Master, and power dynamics, since yes actually I have been inordinately musing on the topic since I posted That Fic What I'm Vaguely Ashamed Of, but I think that will have to wait until the morrow, since I am tired and my brain is beginning to feel foggy and weird. Of course, that makes three posts now that I'm setting aside for the weekend, so I suspect I'll spend much of Friday night blogging like crazy.

Still not doing NaNo. Contemplating doing wrisomifu, if only for its name, but at this stage I'm wary of signing up for anything, since I've already got pending ficathon deadlines and Chemistry has started to get difficult again. (Speaking of which, have Cliche Ficathon prompts gone out yet? I just don't want to get caught short, is all.)

I can't believe it's almost Halloween, guys. I haven't got a costume or anything. I haven't even thought about a costume, because it's all seemed so far off. I don't know what I'm going to do about that.