A Drive By Spot of Episode Love
I finally got my season three box set, and I’ve been watching The Runaway Bride, probably for the sixth or seventh time. I’m sure everybody has that episode that they know isn’t the greatest episode ever, but they love it to bits regardless, and The Runaway Bride is mine.
For a start, I’m a sucker for a good fun action sequence and the TARDIS car chase was brilliant and fun. Having something that is normally an inanimate prop suddenly coming down the motorway is spectacular to behold. And speaking of spectacular, as is the two looks into space that we get - they’ve got to be two of the greatest special effects pieces of the series so far.
And while the episode has this madcap caper feel to it, it’s also got two of the most brutal scenes of New Who. Firstly the Lance berates Donna scene. She genuinely loves him, and he’s gone and not only lied to her and used her, he has been slowly and willingly poisoning her - murdering her. And then he goes and tops it off by letting loose a tirade about how awful and thick she is. Just the cruelty of the way Donna’s heart is broken and the humiliating way she finds it out, it’s amazing Donna can still stand, never alone a moment later defend the Doctor.
Then, later, you have the Doctor going homicidal - that being the scene used in Family of Blood to scare daughter-of-mine away, and with good reason. You never see Ten go darker than you do in TRB. Not for the Daleks, or the Cybermen and certainly not for the Master. It’s not just some light and fluffy distraction, it’s got a punch to it. And it’s even subversive at points. The Christmas Star killing people? Oh, I love it. And it’s humans that destroy the star in the end. For once we’re not useless.
Probably also helps with my love of this episode that I adore Donna and the Donna and the Doctor duo. I was one of the two percent of the Internet that was leaping for joy at the news that Donna was to become a companion. I adore her at the beginning when she’s got the Doctor stunned and I adore her at the end when she’s grown as person. It’s so much fun to see the normal Doctor-Companion role somewhat reversed. He’s desperately trying to keep up with her rather than someone else trying to keep up with him. And she makes him smile. Not that big ‘smile to mask the pain’ grin, but that small and shyer genuine smile.
Oh, yeah, and David Tennant’s never more adorable as Ten then his is in that rooftop scene.
In short, The Runaway Bride shall forever have my affection. And season four cannot come quick enough (I’m looking forward to the season four teaser at the end of VotD more than I am the actual episode).
ETA: Just caught the VotD trailer. You can tell the Doctor's getting older, he's knocking half a century off every time he states his age.
For a start, I’m a sucker for a good fun action sequence and the TARDIS car chase was brilliant and fun. Having something that is normally an inanimate prop suddenly coming down the motorway is spectacular to behold. And speaking of spectacular, as is the two looks into space that we get - they’ve got to be two of the greatest special effects pieces of the series so far.
And while the episode has this madcap caper feel to it, it’s also got two of the most brutal scenes of New Who. Firstly the Lance berates Donna scene. She genuinely loves him, and he’s gone and not only lied to her and used her, he has been slowly and willingly poisoning her - murdering her. And then he goes and tops it off by letting loose a tirade about how awful and thick she is. Just the cruelty of the way Donna’s heart is broken and the humiliating way she finds it out, it’s amazing Donna can still stand, never alone a moment later defend the Doctor.
Then, later, you have the Doctor going homicidal - that being the scene used in Family of Blood to scare daughter-of-mine away, and with good reason. You never see Ten go darker than you do in TRB. Not for the Daleks, or the Cybermen and certainly not for the Master. It’s not just some light and fluffy distraction, it’s got a punch to it. And it’s even subversive at points. The Christmas Star killing people? Oh, I love it. And it’s humans that destroy the star in the end. For once we’re not useless.
Probably also helps with my love of this episode that I adore Donna and the Donna and the Doctor duo. I was one of the two percent of the Internet that was leaping for joy at the news that Donna was to become a companion. I adore her at the beginning when she’s got the Doctor stunned and I adore her at the end when she’s grown as person. It’s so much fun to see the normal Doctor-Companion role somewhat reversed. He’s desperately trying to keep up with her rather than someone else trying to keep up with him. And she makes him smile. Not that big ‘smile to mask the pain’ grin, but that small and shyer genuine smile.
Oh, yeah, and David Tennant’s never more adorable as Ten then his is in that rooftop scene.
In short, The Runaway Bride shall forever have my affection. And season four cannot come quick enough (I’m looking forward to the season four teaser at the end of VotD more than I am the actual episode).
ETA: Just caught the VotD trailer. You can tell the Doctor's getting older, he's knocking half a century off every time he states his age.