JUST when I reached the decision to stop watching Doctor Who...

Sep 21, 2011 21:18

Dear Toby Whithouse,

I want to marry you and buy you ice cream.

(but I'm keeping my last name, you silly twit)

Love always,
C,

who has had the worst week, the very worst, dear flist, but then I watched The God Complex, and now all is (temporarily) well.

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penny_lane_42 September 29 2011, 00:06:46 UTC
SUCH A GOOD EPISODE.

Mostly I loved the fact that faith was dangerous came only from it being powerful, not inherently immoral or wrong or foolish.

YES!!!!!

Rita is amazing. And as much as it broke my heart to see her die, at least she got an AWESOME death scene. I am so in love with her.

He doesn't have ideals, he just sticks to what's real and what's there and what's doable.

This is a really interesting read. I was kind of all over the place with Rory-as-lacking-faith, but the way you phrase it makes total sense.

It's immense. It's self-reflective. It's... a pity he phrased it in terms of taking on her husband's name (come on, really?), but it's a big, big, big thing he did, giving her the freedom to - not be magical? Not define all of herself through him? To recognise the ways in which he's pathetic. It was him apologising for the way he's loved her wrongly, loved this miniature fake version of her. Apologise for that time he yelled at her for something she didn't remember, just because she wasn't behaving like he thought glorified little Amelia should. And, honestly, he can only love her truly now, now that they do, really, see each other.

YES YES YES!

And I looooved the scene of him kind of kicking them out of the TARDIS, because it reminded me of sort of the inverse of Martha's "this is me getting out" (still one of my all-time favorite DW moments). This is the guy who burnt up a sun to say goodbye to Rose and who wiped Donna's mind even when she begged him not to. And now he's realizing the way in which he just utterly screws up peoples' lives because he can't let go and HE LET GO. HE MADE THAT DECISION. ACTUAL MATURITY. I was thrilled.

It reminds me of Rory's speech way back when about how the Doctor refuses to see how dangerous he makes people to themselves. Because: YES.

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laeria September 29 2011, 21:24:15 UTC
Rory... well. I have headcanon here: I think Martha has faith in knowledge, Nine has faith in stupid apes generally, Ten has faith in Rose particularly, Donna has faith in herself, like, gains it gradually and then is stripped from it in a heartbreaking way... Eleven has faith in something, causality, happy endings, ~stories~.

Rose and Rory, though, don't have this kind of faith. They don't wait for anything external. They don't even think about it. They do things. But they don't have faith in themselves the way Donna does (Donna, who KNOWS you have to save somebody when you can't save everybody, Donna who believes she's the most important woman in the universe and sacrifices herself in accordance with that) - they don't do what they do because they believe it will work. For them, it's like... Rory will guard Amy for 2000 years. Rose will open up the TARDIS and eat its heart out. But not because they have a deep inner optimism or whatever; just because they have. no. other. choice. Giving up doesn't even occur to them.

This is the guy who burnt up a sun to say goodbye to Rose and who wiped Donna's mind even when she begged him not to. And now he's realizing the way in which he just utterly screws up peoples' lives because he can't let go and HE LET GO.

I don't see it that way, mostly 'cause it's not the same guy. It's the same... entity, but, I think, the personality changes alter a whole lot of stuff. Like, Nine had no trouble letting go, he had trouble connecting. Ten didn't have trouble connecting but clung like a traumatised koala. Eleven kinda connects and kinda can let go (see: Van Gogh), but he has huge issues with change. And in this instance, he finally embraces change. Which, kinda a requirement for being a Well-Adjusted Time Lord, innit.

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