Fannish 5: Five Happy Endings You Don't Like
I had to think about this for a bit. It surprised me how many books and TV shows I watch that have sad endings. Also, because I cannot answer these questions without going into depth about what I don't like, the answers tend to be long. You have been warned.
1) ( Doomsday. )
1) ( Doomsday. )
It's probable. I get the two finales mixed up, most likely because in both cases the Doctor spends so much time fussing about Rose.
I'll be damned if I ever watch that episode again, but wasn't it implied that the Doctor and the Clone share a common set of memories? I remember Rose hesitating and the Clone whispering something in her ear - I think it was implied that he completed the sentence the Doctor never got to finish in Doomsday - and that was when she got all teary-eyed and kissed him.
Yes, that was implied, and that's STUPID. If you had sentient cookie dough and baked half of it into chocolate chip cookies one day and the other half three days later, the cookies made three days later wouldn't have the same memories as the cookies made first. It would be made from the same dough, but it wouldn't be the same cookie.
But even if the clone has the same memories, the same emotions and the same love for Rose, that doesn't make him the Doctor. He hasn't had the same experiences. He can remember being a child on Gallifrey...but at the same time, he knows that he, personally, never was a child and never saw Gallifrey. He can remember every adventure that the Doctor had with Rose...but he knows that he isn't the Doctor.
I would think that the dissonance between what he remembers and what he's personally experienced would be a SERIOUS problem, mentally and emotionally. And if it wasn't at first, it would become one.
Rose was a complete waste of whatever potential she still had - they kept showing little cameos of her throughout the whole season, indicating that - woohoo! - big stuff's gonna happen. And when she finally appeared, she didn't really do squat, she was just there to look pretty, get a big gun and a Doctor-shaped sex toy.
Agreed. IN SPADES. You can read my rant about Rose Tyler here.
And because Donna - in my opinion, the best of the new companions - deserved some attention too, she got to have her memories wiped and her personal development annihilated. Screw you, Russell T. Davies and whoever else thought it was a good idea.
I have real issues with mind control and destruction of memory. If you want me to hate a character, have him or her rip into someone's mind and destroy some memories. I guarantee you that I will not forgive the character. I did not forgive Ten. I kept watching and hoping that someone would fix this massive fuckup, but no one ever did.
And I'm glad that someone else still feels the way I do about Deathly Hallows.
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I remember *instantly* thinking that the relationship between Rose and Handy would be first-quality fanfic material. Dealing with their conflicted feelings: his identity crisis, and her longing for the old Doctor who faced dangers on a regular basis; him trying to change to accommodate her better, and her missing the thrill and the action, which she considered an inseparable part of the man she loved. And finally, showing how Rose comes to love Handy for who he is, not just a Doctor look-alike, and Handy learning to care for Rose because of what they'd been through together, not because he was cloned with a ready-made set of feelings.
It has a potential to be touching, brutal, honest, heart-wrenching and heart-warming at the same time, but, like I said - it's fanfic material; the series will never show us any of that. And what we did see was little more than a half-baked immature fantasy. Russel T. Davies couldn't bear to see his precious Rose stranded in a parallel world without her man, so he broke his own canon's rules and pulled a few more out of thin air, just to give her a completely contrived, implausible "happily ever after".
To which I promptly say: "Go play in interstellar traffic".
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