Thoughts on Doctor Who: The End of Time

[lord_darkseid]

I'm posting this so that any other fans who've watched David Tennant's final episode can give their feelings on his time in the role as well as Russell T. Davies's run as producer. Please know that within these posts, I'm allowing for spoilers on everything so if you haven't seen the finale, please don't be angry by the commentary either under this

Comments

[refrainofdreams]

I liked a lot of what RTD did as a director, where he went but he had a really bad habit of leaving big plot holes by not finishing something, but then bringing things back that should have been left alone.

A lot of people see his biggest mistake as being Rose's character. Personally, as a self proclaimed Sap, I loved her. I hated what happened to her with a burning, flaming passion.

The woman who kept showing up to Wilf, I think was either his mother, or Romona - but as I said in my own entry on the subject - if it was Romona, how did he know it was her? Also, the comment the President Time Lord dude said about weeping angels - makes me wonder if maybe ex time lords who have done something wrong are where the Weeping Angels from Blink come from. That'd be something cool to explore, especially since Blink was one of Moffat's episodes and he is of course the new writer for the show.

Something I'd like to know, who the hell is the Ood that kept showing up and how exactly did he get there? Is he really there or is the Doctor just seeing him because he can hear the ood-song in his head?

I agree with moon_ferret on the bit about Donna. That just absolutely killed me - the way she left him. She went from super temp with no self esteem and nothing special about her to being someone so amazing who really felt she could be brilliant, which she is, back to temp with nothing going for her. At least if she had to stop traveling, she didn't remember. I agree that her dying would have been a much easier thing to deal with, but if she had to leave the doctor I'm glad she doesn't remember. I think if I had seen the stars and gone where she had and then it was taken away and I knew I'd never had it back, it would be so much worse than if I just never knew it happened at all.

End of Time

[refrainofdreams]

My OH and I, usually very different - I'm the sentimentalist and he loves action and clarity - both thought End of Time was a waste of time. The plot, IMO, was an overly referential, self-consciously clever mess, with Episode One an unduly involved buildup to a weak punchline. The long-drawn-out ending had me wondering where the end credits had gone and why whoever edited this had decided to assume the persona of a seven-year-old girl rather than a TV professional. (It's great that Russell T. Davies's reign has brought little girls into Who fandom but I didn't expect them to end up running the show.) Sarah Jane's farewell to the Doctor had real grace and charm, but Jack's and Donna's were stereotyping pure and simple - the idea that sex, or money, can compensate anyone for a sense of emptiness and loss is a trivial note on which to wrap a relationship with two great characters.

I love David Tennant's Doctor and thought that the wailing, whining, overly self-indulgent exit he was given betrayed the character. Contrast with Eccleston's dignified, joyous exit line, which still tears at my heartstrings far more effectively than Tennant's. I think this was a very sad way for a great performance to end, but I don't mean that in the way Russell T. Davies intended.