Donna Recs and HRG Recs
I'm involved fandoms for the characters. It always starts with me wanting more of x character and my fandom obsession of late has been with two characters, Donna Noble from Doctor Who and Noah Bennet from Heroes. It's kind of odd since they’re both very different. Anyway, I bring fic recs, graphic novel recs and fanvid recs connected to both characters. But I also decided to write a bit about just why I adore them in an attempt to capture the reason for my obsessions of late.
Donna Noble Recs
Loud mouthed, determined and ballsy, Donna’s the Doctor’s match when it comes to sheer force of personality; in fact she bests him in that regard for a good portion of The Runaway Bride. This for me is a welcome after Rose and Martha, both great characters but who seemed to lose themselves in the Doctor’s emotional neediness (thankfully Martha seems to realise her awesomeness and get out of there before she was left crying on a beach), whereas Donna seems to stand a chance of retaining herself. And Donna due to initially beginning life as a one episode character is a comedic foil as well as a friend, giving potential for a shake up of the ordinary Doctor-Companion relationship.
Donna takes a lot of slack both on screen and off it from fandom and characters she interacts with for being thick and completely unaware of the world around her. Number one priority for Donna when we first met her is her wedding and she’s quite the Bridezilla - alien abductions will not stand in the way of her completing her trip down the aisle. But over the course of The Runaway Bride it’s slowly revealed to both the audience and the Doctor that Donna is brave, compassionate and a lot smarter than most give her credit. No, she may not be able to point to Germany on a map, but she’s got the Doctor pegged after one adventure. He does need somebody to stop him.
I like characters for their flaws, they're what makes them interesting. They give them something to overcome, they can bring about some inner conflict and can bring about external conflict. Not to mention from character flaws often arises great comedy and the fact that many character flaws are strengths in the right context. The wonderfulness of Donna is that she is flawed. She’s certainly got a messed up set of priorities, something which I can relate too even though mine are the exact opposite. And you know what, she’s not pretty when she cries, and she's that way because she's written and acted as normal human - not some person on a pedestal, but one of the rest of us and I love that. And while a good percentage of Who fandom doesn’t like Donna, I adore her to bits.
On to the recs…
There is very little Donna fic and the vast, vast majority of Donna fic is comedy. She’s not a character that seems to lend herself to angst fic, which I find odd since leaving the Doctor left her at the end of The Runaway Bride jobless, husbandless and confused as hell. Though the comedy Donna fic tends to be brilliant, so here are a few recs.
Timecock Not Supplied by nostalgia_lj (Unrated, but about a PG-13, Ten/various people and inanimate objects)The Doctor and Donna versus the cliche of Alien Sex Pollen. - The Doctor’s shagging everything in sight and in order to save him, and probably by extension the universe, Donna, Martha and Jack have to somehow fix it: “Wanted: Time Lord to save other Time Lord with weird alien sex.” Whoya going to call? Bloody funny, this fic completely wins for having Donna take on certain other Time Lord.
Not Her Type by lordshiva (PG-13, Ten/Donna) Donna has standards. - Donna and the Doctor get captured and Donna worries that they’re going to be made to have sex, which Donna’s mind is so much worse than having their brains eaten, or maybe it’s not. Wonderful for brilliant Donna and Ten dialogue, and particularly relevant given the that exchange in the season four trailer.
It Happens to Every Time Lord by shaggydogstail (R, Ten/Donna) 'C'mon Doctor,' said Donna, tossing her hair back. 'Penetrate me with your mind.' - Again with the Doctor and Donna sex fic, though this time it’s alien psychic mind sex that they attempt, ‘attempt’ being the key word. Bloody hilarious with spot on dialogue and a rather familiar to humans problem.
The Dark Rider by calliopes_pen (PG-13, Gen) Mysterious deaths in a small New England town intrigue Donna and The Doctor. Is a ghost really behind it, or is it an alien threat? - I love good plotty fic, something resembling a mini episode of the show and this does that complete with wonderful Donna and Doctor interaction. The Doctor and Donna take on a foe. Or more specifically, Donna takes on the Headless Horseman and the Doctor sits back and makes popcorn.
Once More, With Martians by biichan (PG, Donna/One) The thing about Time Lords is that they can meet you centuries before you first meet them. - Guess who’s Susan’s Grandmother. Plus Girl!Doctor and that SJS crack theory and the greatest pick up line ever for the absolute win.
Fanvid - Boulevard of Broken Songs by hollywoodgrrl - On the odd chance you haven’t seen this, go download and watch now. It’s amazing, blending in four different songs to cover four different characters expressing their different stories. Mostly Martha and Rose, with Donna making an appearance and the Doctor getting the final say.
Bennet Recs
In a show about people with superpowers, former middle-management henchmen turned rouge agent HRG (short for The Man in Horn-Rimmed Glasses)/Mr. Bennet/Noah Bennet is the Batman of Heroes. He wins battles against much more powerful foes using experience, intelligence, cunning and, well, a gun. He’s the kind of guy that would make sure to bring kryptonite to a meeting with Superman. Except, unlike Batman, HRG has little to no hesitation of killing a person to achieve his ends - even an old friend - and rarely holds an altruistic motivation. As a result, some of the things he’s done would make him an irredeemable character if not for the fact that he’s a devoted father and husband who holds family above everything else. Through the episodes of the show and sometimes within them and even within a scene, he swings between being monster and being a geeky suburbanite dad that seems to have stepped out of a 1950s sitcom. Although, while his wife and kids are the people he fights for and the ones he’s constantly trying to protect, this hasn’t stopped him from doing some downright nasty things to them in order to keep them safe.
But I really love him because HRG is a tragic figure, and I love a good tragic figure. Being quite capable of empathy, he clearly does want to be a kind family man and not a killer, but as a result of his past and the abilities of his adopted daughter the threats to him and his family keep coming, and even if they didn’t, he’d still never be able to feel safe. Deception and ruthlessness is the only way he knows how to react to these threats and this reaction only serves usually to drive his family away from him. But the most tragic heartbreaking thing of it all is that somewhere along the way Noah Bennet has accepted he’s a condemned soul and knows redemption is not coming, so will do anything in his power to protect the souls of those he feels are innocents, stubbornly blind to how futile this effort may be, and I just want to hug him for it.
Plus Jack Coleman’s rather hot in a guy in his late forties kind of way.
Graphic Novels
If you haven’t been reading them, the official graphic novels are brilliant for HRG fans. He’s made more appearances than any other character, although they made his history a bit murkier (i.e. Continuity? What continuity?). Ones that should not be missed are:
Fathers and Daughter - In which HRG gets pissed at Eden’s father some time after her death.
Hell’s Angel - This recounts the house fire in which Bennet and Claude ended up with the orphaned Claire.
The Death of Hana Gitelman (Part One, Part Two) - At Bennet’s request, Hana takes out the Company’s tracking satellite (particularly gorgeous illustrations in this one)
Team Building Exercise - A young and pre-Claude Bennet takes part in a bagging and tagging mission in Russia.
Elle’s First Assignment (Part One, Part Two) - Season one nostalgia (Zach! Eden! Odessa!) Around the time of the pilot, Elle’s assigned to spy on Claire. HRG isn’t pleased.
Normal Lives - Bennet takes some time off of hiding his family from the Company to take out a dangerous super with a baseball bat. What was I saying about batman?
And in fan made graphic novels - No.1 Bear by prettyannamoon - A brilliant little flashback story in the wake of Company Man, which tells the origin story of HRG’s habit by buying Claire teddy bears from around the world. So beautifully sweet, and the art is wonderful.
Fanfic
Hell is by selenak (PG, Gen) Five snapshots of Noah Bennet. - A wonderful character study written post The Line which focuses very much on the company man rather than family man aspects of Bennet’s life and features a lot of the Company gang - Claude, Thompson, Ivan and Eden. Stark and so heartbreaking, particularly the way he chooses to spend the evening after shooting Claude This, for me, until proven otherwise, is totally canon.
Five Stages by varcinie (PG, Sandra/Noah) Five moments of Sandra and Noah. - This wonderful fic covers Sandra and Noah from their first date (he wins her over with lab notes XD) to Cautionary Tales. Must be read for just the adorableness of how varcinie has written their relationship and for having Sandra’s voice absolutely spot on.
Caesar’s Wife by indyhat. (PG-13, Gen) Bennet's never woken him at five in the morning just to ask him to come to the office. - There is a lot of Bennet and Claude and Claude/Bennet fic out there and this is a brilliant example, it’s plotty gen with brilliant characterisation. Bennet is suspicious, Claude not exactly being above suspicion and Thompson as creepy as hell.
Strings by fantasticpants (R, Sylar/Bennet dubcon)It's beautiful, the lack of control - not just as a weapon - I have little use for those, nowadays. They're children's toys - messy crayons in the hands of a true master, nothing more. But as an experience, a pure sensation - it flows so freely, colored in entropy, fundamentally flawless - It's art. - The episode from Fallout to Distractions are some of my favourite of Heroes, in large part due to the Silence of the Lambs thing Bennet and Sylar had going. And here is again, with Bennet on the back foot, combined with some of the best characterisation and character observations of them that I’ve read.
Untitled by bookelfe (Unrated, about PG, Gen) Set between 2x09 and 2x10; Sandra Bennet receives a visitor. - A gen piece in which Sandra and the Haitian, two sadly neglected characters in fandom, meet, talk and mourn. This fic deals with the complicated relationship between mindwiper and mindwipee, something I’ve never before seen touched upon and runs with the presumption that the Haitian remembers the memories he takes, which is a fascinating idea. Plus the ending absolutely wins.
Fanvids
Goodnight Moon by Bradcpu - This vid is just wow. Heroes is the best shot show on TV and this vid uses some of those wonderful comic book camera angles to great effect in exploring some of the relationships between parents and children on Heroes with a constant sense of creepy menace throughout.
What is Love by fantasticpants - Cracktastically, this explores what is love in Heroes verse between the male characters, and the nature of male love on Heroes is that they beat the living crap out of each other, with fists, guns, swords, sticks, telekinesis, nuclear explosions, paintbrushes, tuning forks - pretty much whatever is on hand. Yep, it’s four and a half minutes of your favourite male characters being violent towards each other. Loads of fun! Plus fanstasticpants doesn’t skimp on the Christopher Eccleston.
Donna Noble Recs
Loud mouthed, determined and ballsy, Donna’s the Doctor’s match when it comes to sheer force of personality; in fact she bests him in that regard for a good portion of The Runaway Bride. This for me is a welcome after Rose and Martha, both great characters but who seemed to lose themselves in the Doctor’s emotional neediness (thankfully Martha seems to realise her awesomeness and get out of there before she was left crying on a beach), whereas Donna seems to stand a chance of retaining herself. And Donna due to initially beginning life as a one episode character is a comedic foil as well as a friend, giving potential for a shake up of the ordinary Doctor-Companion relationship.
Donna takes a lot of slack both on screen and off it from fandom and characters she interacts with for being thick and completely unaware of the world around her. Number one priority for Donna when we first met her is her wedding and she’s quite the Bridezilla - alien abductions will not stand in the way of her completing her trip down the aisle. But over the course of The Runaway Bride it’s slowly revealed to both the audience and the Doctor that Donna is brave, compassionate and a lot smarter than most give her credit. No, she may not be able to point to Germany on a map, but she’s got the Doctor pegged after one adventure. He does need somebody to stop him.
I like characters for their flaws, they're what makes them interesting. They give them something to overcome, they can bring about some inner conflict and can bring about external conflict. Not to mention from character flaws often arises great comedy and the fact that many character flaws are strengths in the right context. The wonderfulness of Donna is that she is flawed. She’s certainly got a messed up set of priorities, something which I can relate too even though mine are the exact opposite. And you know what, she’s not pretty when she cries, and she's that way because she's written and acted as normal human - not some person on a pedestal, but one of the rest of us and I love that. And while a good percentage of Who fandom doesn’t like Donna, I adore her to bits.
On to the recs…
There is very little Donna fic and the vast, vast majority of Donna fic is comedy. She’s not a character that seems to lend herself to angst fic, which I find odd since leaving the Doctor left her at the end of The Runaway Bride jobless, husbandless and confused as hell. Though the comedy Donna fic tends to be brilliant, so here are a few recs.
Timecock Not Supplied by nostalgia_lj (Unrated, but about a PG-13, Ten/various people and inanimate objects)The Doctor and Donna versus the cliche of Alien Sex Pollen. - The Doctor’s shagging everything in sight and in order to save him, and probably by extension the universe, Donna, Martha and Jack have to somehow fix it: “Wanted: Time Lord to save other Time Lord with weird alien sex.” Whoya going to call? Bloody funny, this fic completely wins for having Donna take on certain other Time Lord.
Not Her Type by lordshiva (PG-13, Ten/Donna) Donna has standards. - Donna and the Doctor get captured and Donna worries that they’re going to be made to have sex, which Donna’s mind is so much worse than having their brains eaten, or maybe it’s not. Wonderful for brilliant Donna and Ten dialogue, and particularly relevant given the that exchange in the season four trailer.
It Happens to Every Time Lord by shaggydogstail (R, Ten/Donna) 'C'mon Doctor,' said Donna, tossing her hair back. 'Penetrate me with your mind.' - Again with the Doctor and Donna sex fic, though this time it’s alien psychic mind sex that they attempt, ‘attempt’ being the key word. Bloody hilarious with spot on dialogue and a rather familiar to humans problem.
The Dark Rider by calliopes_pen (PG-13, Gen) Mysterious deaths in a small New England town intrigue Donna and The Doctor. Is a ghost really behind it, or is it an alien threat? - I love good plotty fic, something resembling a mini episode of the show and this does that complete with wonderful Donna and Doctor interaction. The Doctor and Donna take on a foe. Or more specifically, Donna takes on the Headless Horseman and the Doctor sits back and makes popcorn.
Once More, With Martians by biichan (PG, Donna/One) The thing about Time Lords is that they can meet you centuries before you first meet them. - Guess who’s Susan’s Grandmother. Plus Girl!Doctor and that SJS crack theory and the greatest pick up line ever for the absolute win.
Fanvid - Boulevard of Broken Songs by hollywoodgrrl - On the odd chance you haven’t seen this, go download and watch now. It’s amazing, blending in four different songs to cover four different characters expressing their different stories. Mostly Martha and Rose, with Donna making an appearance and the Doctor getting the final say.
Bennet Recs
In a show about people with superpowers, former middle-management henchmen turned rouge agent HRG (short for The Man in Horn-Rimmed Glasses)/Mr. Bennet/Noah Bennet is the Batman of Heroes. He wins battles against much more powerful foes using experience, intelligence, cunning and, well, a gun. He’s the kind of guy that would make sure to bring kryptonite to a meeting with Superman. Except, unlike Batman, HRG has little to no hesitation of killing a person to achieve his ends - even an old friend - and rarely holds an altruistic motivation. As a result, some of the things he’s done would make him an irredeemable character if not for the fact that he’s a devoted father and husband who holds family above everything else. Through the episodes of the show and sometimes within them and even within a scene, he swings between being monster and being a geeky suburbanite dad that seems to have stepped out of a 1950s sitcom. Although, while his wife and kids are the people he fights for and the ones he’s constantly trying to protect, this hasn’t stopped him from doing some downright nasty things to them in order to keep them safe.
But I really love him because HRG is a tragic figure, and I love a good tragic figure. Being quite capable of empathy, he clearly does want to be a kind family man and not a killer, but as a result of his past and the abilities of his adopted daughter the threats to him and his family keep coming, and even if they didn’t, he’d still never be able to feel safe. Deception and ruthlessness is the only way he knows how to react to these threats and this reaction only serves usually to drive his family away from him. But the most tragic heartbreaking thing of it all is that somewhere along the way Noah Bennet has accepted he’s a condemned soul and knows redemption is not coming, so will do anything in his power to protect the souls of those he feels are innocents, stubbornly blind to how futile this effort may be, and I just want to hug him for it.
Plus Jack Coleman’s rather hot in a guy in his late forties kind of way.
Graphic Novels
If you haven’t been reading them, the official graphic novels are brilliant for HRG fans. He’s made more appearances than any other character, although they made his history a bit murkier (i.e. Continuity? What continuity?). Ones that should not be missed are:
Fathers and Daughter - In which HRG gets pissed at Eden’s father some time after her death.
Hell’s Angel - This recounts the house fire in which Bennet and Claude ended up with the orphaned Claire.
The Death of Hana Gitelman (Part One, Part Two) - At Bennet’s request, Hana takes out the Company’s tracking satellite (particularly gorgeous illustrations in this one)
Team Building Exercise - A young and pre-Claude Bennet takes part in a bagging and tagging mission in Russia.
Elle’s First Assignment (Part One, Part Two) - Season one nostalgia (Zach! Eden! Odessa!) Around the time of the pilot, Elle’s assigned to spy on Claire. HRG isn’t pleased.
Normal Lives - Bennet takes some time off of hiding his family from the Company to take out a dangerous super with a baseball bat. What was I saying about batman?
And in fan made graphic novels - No.1 Bear by prettyannamoon - A brilliant little flashback story in the wake of Company Man, which tells the origin story of HRG’s habit by buying Claire teddy bears from around the world. So beautifully sweet, and the art is wonderful.
Fanfic
Hell is by selenak (PG, Gen) Five snapshots of Noah Bennet. - A wonderful character study written post The Line which focuses very much on the company man rather than family man aspects of Bennet’s life and features a lot of the Company gang - Claude, Thompson, Ivan and Eden. Stark and so heartbreaking, particularly the way he chooses to spend the evening after shooting Claude This, for me, until proven otherwise, is totally canon.
Five Stages by varcinie (PG, Sandra/Noah) Five moments of Sandra and Noah. - This wonderful fic covers Sandra and Noah from their first date (he wins her over with lab notes XD) to Cautionary Tales. Must be read for just the adorableness of how varcinie has written their relationship and for having Sandra’s voice absolutely spot on.
Caesar’s Wife by indyhat. (PG-13, Gen) Bennet's never woken him at five in the morning just to ask him to come to the office. - There is a lot of Bennet and Claude and Claude/Bennet fic out there and this is a brilliant example, it’s plotty gen with brilliant characterisation. Bennet is suspicious, Claude not exactly being above suspicion and Thompson as creepy as hell.
Strings by fantasticpants (R, Sylar/Bennet dubcon)It's beautiful, the lack of control - not just as a weapon - I have little use for those, nowadays. They're children's toys - messy crayons in the hands of a true master, nothing more. But as an experience, a pure sensation - it flows so freely, colored in entropy, fundamentally flawless - It's art. - The episode from Fallout to Distractions are some of my favourite of Heroes, in large part due to the Silence of the Lambs thing Bennet and Sylar had going. And here is again, with Bennet on the back foot, combined with some of the best characterisation and character observations of them that I’ve read.
Untitled by bookelfe (Unrated, about PG, Gen) Set between 2x09 and 2x10; Sandra Bennet receives a visitor. - A gen piece in which Sandra and the Haitian, two sadly neglected characters in fandom, meet, talk and mourn. This fic deals with the complicated relationship between mindwiper and mindwipee, something I’ve never before seen touched upon and runs with the presumption that the Haitian remembers the memories he takes, which is a fascinating idea. Plus the ending absolutely wins.
Fanvids
Goodnight Moon by Bradcpu - This vid is just wow. Heroes is the best shot show on TV and this vid uses some of those wonderful comic book camera angles to great effect in exploring some of the relationships between parents and children on Heroes with a constant sense of creepy menace throughout.
What is Love by fantasticpants - Cracktastically, this explores what is love in Heroes verse between the male characters, and the nature of male love on Heroes is that they beat the living crap out of each other, with fists, guns, swords, sticks, telekinesis, nuclear explosions, paintbrushes, tuning forks - pretty much whatever is on hand. Yep, it’s four and a half minutes of your favourite male characters being violent towards each other. Loads of fun! Plus fanstasticpants doesn’t skimp on the Christopher Eccleston.