DW 8.04. Listen.
Before I start:
I come across this a lot. ‘What is [insert specific issue from any episode] teaching our children?’
Or worse: ‘Doctor Who is telling our children to [insert most problematic interpretation possible of any episode]!’
The thing is, children are not little sponge-like automatons. I doubt a single one went and threw themselves in front of a lorry after seeing Donna doing so. (Although the ‘dying and waking up somewhere else’ part of Donna’s story (and the Ponds, repeatedly *g*) reminds me of The Brothers Lionheart by Astrid Lindgren. Don’t think any children tried jumping out of windows either.) Nor is Doctor Who a public service instruction guide for modifying child behaviour. It’s a family show whose aim is to entertain.
Plus, children are all different. Just like adults they like different things. They take different things away. So - as I can’t speak for anyone else - this was MY 8 year old’s main reaction to ‘Listen’:
Once it was revealed/implied who the little boy in the barn was she nearly fell of the sofa in sheer excitement. (I wish I was exaggerating.) And then had to TELL US how she WORKED IT OUT - and how THAT WAS THE DOCTOR and IT’S THE SAME BARN and so on. It made it rather hard to catch Clara’s lovely monologue, to be honest.
She is unlikely to ‘turn her back’ on scary things btw. When she has a nightmare she comes RUNNING TO OUR BEDROOM and stands outside the door telling us all about it. Until we either let her in our bed or walk her back to her own and settle her there. (Incidentally, Clara’s line - 'Do you know why dreams are called dreams? Because they’re not real' works an absolute treat.) Children are quite capable of separating fact from fiction. She has watched ‘Blink’ and thought it thoroughly underwhelming - that was supposed to be scary? The only thing that has properly freaked her out so far is ‘Journey to the Centre of the TARDIS’ - she DID NOT like ‘the burning lava people’. Oh, and there was the *adorable* time when she wouldn’t go to bed because she thought there might be Silents on her ceiling. I got around that one by pointing out that they are about 7 foot tall, and if they were hanging from her ceiling she would be bumping into them.
There is nothing wrong with pointing out problematic issues. But as the mother of three very different daughters, I know that there is nothing as simple as ‘children’. Although if you want to generalise, then I want to say that kids are smart. Which brings me to the actual meta...
Listen
Listen is basically the Doctor getting himself all worked up in the middle of the night and making Clara come check the closet for monsters.
(x)
This sounds flip, yet it is uncannily accurate. Because this episode is not about a monster or a problem that needs solving or saving a world - no, this episode is about the Doctor. Specifically, the Doctor’s fears. Not the big obvious ones, but childhood fears. Those deep fears we never talk about. He dresses it up in fancy words, does research, makes a good case - and yet, it’s all about his childhood nightmare. He wants to be proved right, even as he is scaring himself silly. (That is what both the scene in Rupert’s bedroom, and the one at the end of the universe, is all about. He is… not exactly rational.)
Because here’s the thing. The Doctor always takes children seriously.
AMY: So is this how it works, Doctor? You never interfere in the affairs of other peoples or planets, unless there's children crying?
DOCTOR: Yes.
In S6, we even had a whole episode dedicated to nightmares. From ‘Night Terrors’:
DOCTOR: It means I've come a long way to get here, Alex. A very long way. George sent a message. A distress call, if you like. Whatever's inside that cupboard is so terrible, so powerful, that it amplified the fears of an ordinary little boy across all the barriers of time and space.
ALEX: Eh?
DOCTOR: Through crimson stars and silent stars and tumbling nebulas like oceans set on fire. Through empires of glass and civilizations of pure thought, and a whole, terrible, wonderful universe of impossibilities. You see these eyes? They're old eyes. And one thing I can tell you, Alex. Monsters are real.
And because of children’s nightmares, the Doctor intervenes and changes children’s lives. Here’s a handful of examples:
Those five, specifically, have their lives altered by the Doctor (and in Melody’s case, he is the monster she is scared of). Well most of the children he meets have their lives altered (just look at George), but in these we see the consequences when they’re adults.
But this episode turns the tables - why is the Doctor so attuned to children? We have been given hints in the past - and now, finally, have the answer we suspected (with thanks to Owls):
DOCTOR: It's never easy being the only child left out in the cold.
NANCY: I suppose you'd know."
DOCTOR: I do, actually.
The Empty Child
REINETTE: Oh, Doctor. So lonely. So very, very alone.
DOCTOR: What do you mean, alone? You've never been alone in your life. When did you start calling me Doctor?
REINETTE: Such a lonely little boy. Lonely then and lonelier now. How can you bear it?
The Girl in the Fireplace
DOCTOR: Hundreds of parents walking past who spot her and not one of them's asking her what's wrong, which means they already know, and it's something they don't talk about. Secrets. They're not helping her, so it's something they're afraid of. Shadows, whatever they're afraid of, it's nowhere to be seen, which means it's everywhere.
The Beast Below
MAN: Why does he have to sleep out here?
WOMAN: He doesn’t want the others to hear him crying.
MAN: Why does he have to cry all the time?
WOMAN: You know why.
Listen
Every adult was once a child. And because Doctor Who is a timey-wimey kinda show, it often crosses from one time period to another, shows what was (or what will be):
DOCTOR: We all change, when you think about it. We're all different people all through our lives. And that's okay, that's good, you've got to keep moving, so long as you remember all the people that you used to be.
And we have seen all the people the Doctor used to be - but always the adult. Have seen how he interferes in the lives of his companions (and anyone else he comes into contact with). He is the Time Lord, the one with the power, the one who lays down ideas, the one whom their lives get shaped by, or around. (And in the case of Amy and River, people complained about this rather a lot.)
‘Listen’ turns that on its head. ‘Listen’ places the Doctor where the Companion/that week’s main character usually sits. The same place where little Rupert Pink is. (Just so we can’t miss the parallels.) Two little boys who grow up to choose their own name, yet go down different paths. But linked by a small plastic soldier without a gun… (What this show does with imagery is downright breathtaking in its clever simplicity. What defines that figure? The fact that he’s a soldier, or that he doesn’t have a gun? One figure, two meanings. It’s all very Clara.)
My point being: The Doctor was a child. And what’s more, he was a child just like the others we have seen. Frightened and alone.
We suspected this - see the quotes above - but he very rarely talks about his childhood (see ‘The Sound of Drums’ for an unusual glimpse). So what shaped him?
One answer: Clara.
She was the monster under the bed, and the quiet, reassuring voice in the darkness. (One Clara, two meanings. Clara is always opposites, simultaneously.) And what does she say?
I’m gonna leave you something just so you’ll always remember: Fear makes companions of us all.
I have seen quite a few people having issues with this. Which is understandable - it’s not easy to grapple with. People united in fear is not exactly something to be desired, is it? (Just look at Midnight.) Why on earth was that the line chosen for her to repeat and put emphasis on?
(I could point out that obviously the point of the whole thing is that fear is something that will always be there, how you choose to respond to it is what matters. But I can go deeper, so I will.)
You see, this is where I am, well, grateful that I hurt my foot. Because thanks to being generally immobile, I’ve had time to watch early Doctor Who. So far ‘An Unearthly Child’ and ‘The Daleks’. And it is fascinating what you discover…
From ‘An Unearthly Child’ (Part 2: ‘The Cave of Skulls’): [Plot spoilers]The Doctor, Susan, Barbara and Ian have been captured by cavemen, who have tied them up and stashed them away in the Cave of Skulls of the title. They are trying to cut Ian's bonds so they can get free. The Doctor tells Barbara to try to remember the way they came so they can find their way back to the TARDIS once they're out
BARBARA (a little surprised): You're trying to help me.
DOCTOR (slightly mumbling): Yes, fear makes companions of all of us, Miss Wright.
BARBARA: I never thought you were afraid.
DOCTOR: Fear is with all of us and always will be. Just like that other sensation. Your companion referred to it.
BARBARA: Hope.
DOCTOR: Yes that's right. Hope.
So in one way - if you have an issue with this, go back to 1963 and confront the writer, Anthony Coburn. Because this very, very first Doctor Who story is… unsettling. There are no moral absolutes, or simple answers - just primitive, fearful people with a whole bunch of different motivations and impulses. Morally it’s hugely complicated and you'd be hard pressed to argue whether or not the cavemen are better or worse off at the end. And the Doctor is not the hero. Indeed it is not until 'The Daleks' that he begins to find any kind of moral certainty (Twelve was spot-on in ‘Into the Dalek’ to define himself in reaction against the Daleks - that is exactly what happens). Heroes are made, not born, and it is Ian and Barbara who make the moral decisions initially - the Doctor is interested in science, discovery and self-preservation. (If [Plot point]the macguffin that he needed to get the TARDIS to work hadn’t been left in the Dalek city, he’d have quite happily left the Thals to their fate. Not his problem!)
With yet more thanks to Owls, here is a perfect quote that illustrates what I mean:
“There used to be an idea that the role of the companion was to potter along beside [the Doctor] and have things explained to [them]; but I don’t think that’s true at all, it’s never been true. I think it’s a very dynamic relationship. I think the Doctor is this strange, occasionally often very dangerous man, and he needs to be in a dialogue with someone as strong as he is, intellectually and spiritually… to make him the hero he can be. Without that person by his side, that very special person, he’s nowhere, he’s a threat. I think if you look at all the great Doctor Who companions from the old series, from the new series, that’s what they do. I think they make him better, and him better saves us all.”
Moffat
So yes, Clara shapes him (by mirroring back everything she has been given so far, as she always does), but this has always been the case. ('My friends have always been the best of me.')
They all shape him, every one of them, and he becomes their Doctor.
Although all of this almost misses the point. Because at the heart of this, it’s just an immensely beautiful scene. Let’s go back to ‘A Christmas Carol’, as that is the story where the Doctor deliberately re-writes someone’s life:
DOCTOR: Did you ever get to see a fish, back then, when you were a kid?
SARDICK: What does that matter to you?
DOCTOR: Look how it mattered to you.
SARDICK: I cried all night, and I learned life's most invaluable lesson.
DOCTOR: Ah. Which is?
SARDICK: Nobody comes.
But the Doctor comes - and Kazran’s life is not the same. In the same way, Moffat here re-writes the Doctor’s life, except he does so in such a clever way that it fits seamlessly. (‘I didn’t rewrite it - you just didn’t know it happened until I showed you!’)
So, just like in ‘A Christmas Carol’, Clara comes to help a little boy who feels abandoned and lonely. I think it’s very important that Clara is someone who works with children, whatever shape that takes (junior entertainment manager, governess, nanny, teacher). Her specific role is one of protector/nurturer, which we first see in The Snowmen (she is very devoted to her young charges) and is then firmly established in The Rings of Akhaten. In the beginning it is shown when she instinctively follows Merry Gejelh, calms her panic and encourages her to overcome her fears. Later on, when the Doctor has gone to defeat the sun and failed, we see two flashbacks in her memory:
ELLIE [memory]: And I will always come and find you. Every single time.
DOCTOR [memory]: We don't walk away.
So she sets off to save the Doctor. Armed with a leaf and a story.
(And we see that she is furious in ‘Listen’ when the Doctor sends her away before the door opens, because he wants to see the monsters, but won’t allow her to stay.)
But she is not a warrior-protector like River (or say, Ace). She is the one who will find him when he’s lost. Who will remind him of who he is. Who will guide him when the path is uncertain. Who will protect him and tell him off and generally make sure he’s OK and not doing foolish things.
She is the one who will come to check the closet for monsters (even if she’s busy and not in the mood)... And soothe a frightened child to sleep.
~ ♥ ~
(She also happens to be the monster under the bed, but the question 'Clara Who?' is a subject for another post.)
I come across this a lot. ‘What is [insert specific issue from any episode] teaching our children?’
Or worse: ‘Doctor Who is telling our children to [insert most problematic interpretation possible of any episode]!’
The thing is, children are not little sponge-like automatons. I doubt a single one went and threw themselves in front of a lorry after seeing Donna doing so. (Although the ‘dying and waking up somewhere else’ part of Donna’s story (and the Ponds, repeatedly *g*) reminds me of The Brothers Lionheart by Astrid Lindgren. Don’t think any children tried jumping out of windows either.) Nor is Doctor Who a public service instruction guide for modifying child behaviour. It’s a family show whose aim is to entertain.
Plus, children are all different. Just like adults they like different things. They take different things away. So - as I can’t speak for anyone else - this was MY 8 year old’s main reaction to ‘Listen’:
Once it was revealed/implied who the little boy in the barn was she nearly fell of the sofa in sheer excitement. (I wish I was exaggerating.) And then had to TELL US how she WORKED IT OUT - and how THAT WAS THE DOCTOR and IT’S THE SAME BARN and so on. It made it rather hard to catch Clara’s lovely monologue, to be honest.
She is unlikely to ‘turn her back’ on scary things btw. When she has a nightmare she comes RUNNING TO OUR BEDROOM and stands outside the door telling us all about it. Until we either let her in our bed or walk her back to her own and settle her there. (Incidentally, Clara’s line - 'Do you know why dreams are called dreams? Because they’re not real' works an absolute treat.) Children are quite capable of separating fact from fiction. She has watched ‘Blink’ and thought it thoroughly underwhelming - that was supposed to be scary? The only thing that has properly freaked her out so far is ‘Journey to the Centre of the TARDIS’ - she DID NOT like ‘the burning lava people’. Oh, and there was the *adorable* time when she wouldn’t go to bed because she thought there might be Silents on her ceiling. I got around that one by pointing out that they are about 7 foot tall, and if they were hanging from her ceiling she would be bumping into them.
There is nothing wrong with pointing out problematic issues. But as the mother of three very different daughters, I know that there is nothing as simple as ‘children’. Although if you want to generalise, then I want to say that kids are smart. Which brings me to the actual meta...
Listen
Listen is basically the Doctor getting himself all worked up in the middle of the night and making Clara come check the closet for monsters.
(x)
This sounds flip, yet it is uncannily accurate. Because this episode is not about a monster or a problem that needs solving or saving a world - no, this episode is about the Doctor. Specifically, the Doctor’s fears. Not the big obvious ones, but childhood fears. Those deep fears we never talk about. He dresses it up in fancy words, does research, makes a good case - and yet, it’s all about his childhood nightmare. He wants to be proved right, even as he is scaring himself silly. (That is what both the scene in Rupert’s bedroom, and the one at the end of the universe, is all about. He is… not exactly rational.)
Because here’s the thing. The Doctor always takes children seriously.
AMY: So is this how it works, Doctor? You never interfere in the affairs of other peoples or planets, unless there's children crying?
DOCTOR: Yes.
In S6, we even had a whole episode dedicated to nightmares. From ‘Night Terrors’:
DOCTOR: It means I've come a long way to get here, Alex. A very long way. George sent a message. A distress call, if you like. Whatever's inside that cupboard is so terrible, so powerful, that it amplified the fears of an ordinary little boy across all the barriers of time and space.
ALEX: Eh?
DOCTOR: Through crimson stars and silent stars and tumbling nebulas like oceans set on fire. Through empires of glass and civilizations of pure thought, and a whole, terrible, wonderful universe of impossibilities. You see these eyes? They're old eyes. And one thing I can tell you, Alex. Monsters are real.
And because of children’s nightmares, the Doctor intervenes and changes children’s lives. Here’s a handful of examples:
Those five, specifically, have their lives altered by the Doctor (and in Melody’s case, he is the monster she is scared of). Well most of the children he meets have their lives altered (just look at George), but in these we see the consequences when they’re adults.
But this episode turns the tables - why is the Doctor so attuned to children? We have been given hints in the past - and now, finally, have the answer we suspected (with thanks to Owls):
DOCTOR: It's never easy being the only child left out in the cold.
NANCY: I suppose you'd know."
DOCTOR: I do, actually.
The Empty Child
REINETTE: Oh, Doctor. So lonely. So very, very alone.
DOCTOR: What do you mean, alone? You've never been alone in your life. When did you start calling me Doctor?
REINETTE: Such a lonely little boy. Lonely then and lonelier now. How can you bear it?
The Girl in the Fireplace
DOCTOR: Hundreds of parents walking past who spot her and not one of them's asking her what's wrong, which means they already know, and it's something they don't talk about. Secrets. They're not helping her, so it's something they're afraid of. Shadows, whatever they're afraid of, it's nowhere to be seen, which means it's everywhere.
The Beast Below
MAN: Why does he have to sleep out here?
WOMAN: He doesn’t want the others to hear him crying.
MAN: Why does he have to cry all the time?
WOMAN: You know why.
Listen
Every adult was once a child. And because Doctor Who is a timey-wimey kinda show, it often crosses from one time period to another, shows what was (or what will be):
DOCTOR: We all change, when you think about it. We're all different people all through our lives. And that's okay, that's good, you've got to keep moving, so long as you remember all the people that you used to be.
And we have seen all the people the Doctor used to be - but always the adult. Have seen how he interferes in the lives of his companions (and anyone else he comes into contact with). He is the Time Lord, the one with the power, the one who lays down ideas, the one whom their lives get shaped by, or around. (And in the case of Amy and River, people complained about this rather a lot.)
‘Listen’ turns that on its head. ‘Listen’ places the Doctor where the Companion/that week’s main character usually sits. The same place where little Rupert Pink is. (Just so we can’t miss the parallels.) Two little boys who grow up to choose their own name, yet go down different paths. But linked by a small plastic soldier without a gun… (What this show does with imagery is downright breathtaking in its clever simplicity. What defines that figure? The fact that he’s a soldier, or that he doesn’t have a gun? One figure, two meanings. It’s all very Clara.)
My point being: The Doctor was a child. And what’s more, he was a child just like the others we have seen. Frightened and alone.
We suspected this - see the quotes above - but he very rarely talks about his childhood (see ‘The Sound of Drums’ for an unusual glimpse). So what shaped him?
One answer: Clara.
She was the monster under the bed, and the quiet, reassuring voice in the darkness. (One Clara, two meanings. Clara is always opposites, simultaneously.) And what does she say?
I’m gonna leave you something just so you’ll always remember: Fear makes companions of us all.
I have seen quite a few people having issues with this. Which is understandable - it’s not easy to grapple with. People united in fear is not exactly something to be desired, is it? (Just look at Midnight.) Why on earth was that the line chosen for her to repeat and put emphasis on?
(I could point out that obviously the point of the whole thing is that fear is something that will always be there, how you choose to respond to it is what matters. But I can go deeper, so I will.)
You see, this is where I am, well, grateful that I hurt my foot. Because thanks to being generally immobile, I’ve had time to watch early Doctor Who. So far ‘An Unearthly Child’ and ‘The Daleks’. And it is fascinating what you discover…
From ‘An Unearthly Child’ (Part 2: ‘The Cave of Skulls’): [Plot spoilers]The Doctor, Susan, Barbara and Ian have been captured by cavemen, who have tied them up and stashed them away in the Cave of Skulls of the title. They are trying to cut Ian's bonds so they can get free. The Doctor tells Barbara to try to remember the way they came so they can find their way back to the TARDIS once they're out
BARBARA (a little surprised): You're trying to help me.
DOCTOR (slightly mumbling): Yes, fear makes companions of all of us, Miss Wright.
BARBARA: I never thought you were afraid.
DOCTOR: Fear is with all of us and always will be. Just like that other sensation. Your companion referred to it.
BARBARA: Hope.
DOCTOR: Yes that's right. Hope.
So in one way - if you have an issue with this, go back to 1963 and confront the writer, Anthony Coburn. Because this very, very first Doctor Who story is… unsettling. There are no moral absolutes, or simple answers - just primitive, fearful people with a whole bunch of different motivations and impulses. Morally it’s hugely complicated and you'd be hard pressed to argue whether or not the cavemen are better or worse off at the end. And the Doctor is not the hero. Indeed it is not until 'The Daleks' that he begins to find any kind of moral certainty (Twelve was spot-on in ‘Into the Dalek’ to define himself in reaction against the Daleks - that is exactly what happens). Heroes are made, not born, and it is Ian and Barbara who make the moral decisions initially - the Doctor is interested in science, discovery and self-preservation. (If [Plot point]the macguffin that he needed to get the TARDIS to work hadn’t been left in the Dalek city, he’d have quite happily left the Thals to their fate. Not his problem!)
With yet more thanks to Owls, here is a perfect quote that illustrates what I mean:
“There used to be an idea that the role of the companion was to potter along beside [the Doctor] and have things explained to [them]; but I don’t think that’s true at all, it’s never been true. I think it’s a very dynamic relationship. I think the Doctor is this strange, occasionally often very dangerous man, and he needs to be in a dialogue with someone as strong as he is, intellectually and spiritually… to make him the hero he can be. Without that person by his side, that very special person, he’s nowhere, he’s a threat. I think if you look at all the great Doctor Who companions from the old series, from the new series, that’s what they do. I think they make him better, and him better saves us all.”
Moffat
So yes, Clara shapes him (by mirroring back everything she has been given so far, as she always does), but this has always been the case. ('My friends have always been the best of me.')
They all shape him, every one of them, and he becomes their Doctor.
Although all of this almost misses the point. Because at the heart of this, it’s just an immensely beautiful scene. Let’s go back to ‘A Christmas Carol’, as that is the story where the Doctor deliberately re-writes someone’s life:
DOCTOR: Did you ever get to see a fish, back then, when you were a kid?
SARDICK: What does that matter to you?
DOCTOR: Look how it mattered to you.
SARDICK: I cried all night, and I learned life's most invaluable lesson.
DOCTOR: Ah. Which is?
SARDICK: Nobody comes.
But the Doctor comes - and Kazran’s life is not the same. In the same way, Moffat here re-writes the Doctor’s life, except he does so in such a clever way that it fits seamlessly. (‘I didn’t rewrite it - you just didn’t know it happened until I showed you!’)
So, just like in ‘A Christmas Carol’, Clara comes to help a little boy who feels abandoned and lonely. I think it’s very important that Clara is someone who works with children, whatever shape that takes (junior entertainment manager, governess, nanny, teacher). Her specific role is one of protector/nurturer, which we first see in The Snowmen (she is very devoted to her young charges) and is then firmly established in The Rings of Akhaten. In the beginning it is shown when she instinctively follows Merry Gejelh, calms her panic and encourages her to overcome her fears. Later on, when the Doctor has gone to defeat the sun and failed, we see two flashbacks in her memory:
ELLIE [memory]: And I will always come and find you. Every single time.
DOCTOR [memory]: We don't walk away.
So she sets off to save the Doctor. Armed with a leaf and a story.
(And we see that she is furious in ‘Listen’ when the Doctor sends her away before the door opens, because he wants to see the monsters, but won’t allow her to stay.)
But she is not a warrior-protector like River (or say, Ace). She is the one who will find him when he’s lost. Who will remind him of who he is. Who will guide him when the path is uncertain. Who will protect him and tell him off and generally make sure he’s OK and not doing foolish things.
She is the one who will come to check the closet for monsters (even if she’s busy and not in the mood)... And soothe a frightened child to sleep.
~ ♥ ~
(She also happens to be the monster under the bed, but the question 'Clara Who?' is a subject for another post.)