(no subject)
So Twin is home, and she brought her Doctor Who DVDs with her. I finally got around to watching the S3 Confidentials, and there was something RTD said about Martha in the Smith and Jones one that sorta struck me.
In the Confidential, RTD said something like how Martha's story is unrequited love, so many people could more easily connect with her than with Rose, who had the most amazing man in the world thinking she was the most amazing woman. And that makes a bunch of sense--no one expects someone as epic as the Doctor to fall in love with them, and who doesn't have experience with unreciprocated crushes?
In that respect, I am not like Rose. I've had one boyfriend in my life, and that ended five years ago. Definitely not the big love of my life.
And in some ways, I am quite a bit like Martha. I'm no med student, but I am in college--I'm the same age Rose is, but already better educated. I come from an upper middle class family, like it seems the Joneses are, and there's several of us, not just me and my mum. I've had a lot of opportunities, and have been able to take advantage of them, like Martha. Even our sense of humor is similar--in The Shakespeare Code, when the Doctor tells her that she could tell people she met Shakespeare and she says "Then I could get sectioned", that's something I might say, or at least think.
But what RTD thought would help me connect with her is instead the source of my disconnect. I've had a bunch of crushes in my life, but one thing I have always been able to do is keep perspective. In the last post I made where I expressed my bafflement with Martha's infatuation, someone mentioned how she was taking all the hints she could find, and that made a lot of sense. With my crushes, I do look for hints that they might like me, but I don't ignore hints--or anvils--in the other direction. In that Confidential, Freema Agyeman says she thinks Martha would have taken the Doctor's shutting down of her flirting as a challenge, and that does give me more insight into the character and why she pursued him even when he said he wasn't interested.
So now I understand Martha a lot better, but while I can sympathize with her, I can't empathize. The way she reacts is just so far from the way I would react that any understanding I have of her is completely intellectual. And that crush is such a big part of her character development in S3, which totally didn't help. In the Confidential, they said Martha (and all contemporary human companions, really) was meant to be the audience's window into this life, that we would experience this stuff through her. Frankly, I found the Doctor much easier to understand, and rather than empathizing with Martha, I empathized with him. This probably means my experience of S3 was quite a bit different from someone who could really get Martha's side of the story.
I like Martha. When I rewatch S3, I like her better now that I can understand her motivations, and I like her in S4. But even now that she's moved past the crush, I think the initial disconnect was too strong, because I still don't feel the love for her that I know many people do.
Also, throughout the Confidentials, whenever David Tennant was speaking (as himself), I was pretty much constantly going "Oh David. You're so cute." *g* Now I'm going to go watch his video diaries, where I imagine that to be an even more constant refrain. :p
In the Confidential, RTD said something like how Martha's story is unrequited love, so many people could more easily connect with her than with Rose, who had the most amazing man in the world thinking she was the most amazing woman. And that makes a bunch of sense--no one expects someone as epic as the Doctor to fall in love with them, and who doesn't have experience with unreciprocated crushes?
In that respect, I am not like Rose. I've had one boyfriend in my life, and that ended five years ago. Definitely not the big love of my life.
And in some ways, I am quite a bit like Martha. I'm no med student, but I am in college--I'm the same age Rose is, but already better educated. I come from an upper middle class family, like it seems the Joneses are, and there's several of us, not just me and my mum. I've had a lot of opportunities, and have been able to take advantage of them, like Martha. Even our sense of humor is similar--in The Shakespeare Code, when the Doctor tells her that she could tell people she met Shakespeare and she says "Then I could get sectioned", that's something I might say, or at least think.
But what RTD thought would help me connect with her is instead the source of my disconnect. I've had a bunch of crushes in my life, but one thing I have always been able to do is keep perspective. In the last post I made where I expressed my bafflement with Martha's infatuation, someone mentioned how she was taking all the hints she could find, and that made a lot of sense. With my crushes, I do look for hints that they might like me, but I don't ignore hints--or anvils--in the other direction. In that Confidential, Freema Agyeman says she thinks Martha would have taken the Doctor's shutting down of her flirting as a challenge, and that does give me more insight into the character and why she pursued him even when he said he wasn't interested.
So now I understand Martha a lot better, but while I can sympathize with her, I can't empathize. The way she reacts is just so far from the way I would react that any understanding I have of her is completely intellectual. And that crush is such a big part of her character development in S3, which totally didn't help. In the Confidential, they said Martha (and all contemporary human companions, really) was meant to be the audience's window into this life, that we would experience this stuff through her. Frankly, I found the Doctor much easier to understand, and rather than empathizing with Martha, I empathized with him. This probably means my experience of S3 was quite a bit different from someone who could really get Martha's side of the story.
I like Martha. When I rewatch S3, I like her better now that I can understand her motivations, and I like her in S4. But even now that she's moved past the crush, I think the initial disconnect was too strong, because I still don't feel the love for her that I know many people do.
Also, throughout the Confidentials, whenever David Tennant was speaking (as himself), I was pretty much constantly going "Oh David. You're so cute." *g* Now I'm going to go watch his video diaries, where I imagine that to be an even more constant refrain. :p