The Doctor and Vincent (have I mentioned I'm an Art History student?)

[sjazzmreow]

This was a wonderful thing. It was a beautifully constructed episode, a beautifully designed episode, and such a refreshingly humanistic episode.

I'll say first that I loved the role art and art history got to play. And the jokes! Because yeah, Michelangelo was a whinger. He was the whinger - the finest sculptor since ancient Greece and one of my favourite artists - but such a grouch that Rapheal even decided to immortalise his a-socialism. Normally I'm so alone in my cracking and appreciating Michelangelo jokes - this is why I love the Doctor (though insulting impressionism made me glare a little). And an easel as a weapon? That was the most kick arese thing I've ever seen. And building a Van Gogh sky - that was beautiful.

I was worried when I first saw the preview for this episode. Van Gogh is someone I care a great deal for, and his history is so known and so intense that any gimmick or spin they might have put on it could go so very, insultingly, disgustingly wrong. I worried that they might make his madness a result of alien influences, or that they would ignore his troubles and make him a hero. But it was an incredibly respectful episode, and dealt with his depression so honestly. And they did give him a redemption, a happy ending in a way, but it was happy for him, in a way that makes sense in regards to the historical figure, rather than turning things around to dwell on the narrative of some television program.

Because saying that he was the greatest artist of all time is a big statement, but saying that he was one of the very saddest is not.

It's arguable just how much Van Gogh's mental problems affected his work - some would say very little, though I personally think it possible to see great agony in some of his pieces. Regardless, more than perhaps any other master, we have constructed this very clear idea of Van Gogh, this great empathy for him and his life.

He was lonely. Nothing he ever did worked for him. He moved about, never at ease, never at home, trying things and always, always failing at them. His brother was the only person who consistently cared for and supported him, but they were separated much of the time. He was so tortured he cut off his own ear, checked himself into asylums, took his own life, and he did all of it alone and unappreciated.

And that's what we got in this episode; just a man, who signed his paintings with his first name, and was so hugely unloved and unhappy.

And so seeing him standing surrounded by his paintings, something he'd accepted as having so little value but were all he could or cared to create nonetheless, watching him listen as someone explained so clearly just how loved he is, how incredibly important he is - because he is so, so important; art builds art builds culture and influences other forms of creation and all that is what builds human history - that breaks your heart.

And he didn't have to get taken on some epic adventure through time and space to make up for the fact that he was going to kill himself. They didn't move him to live on, a happy life on another planet or time period. He lived the life the real Van Gogh lived, died the death he died, but recieved probably the best bit of kindness possible for him first. And that, that's a really big deal. That they handled history so delicately, handled an individual's personal history so delicately, and handled a mental illness with such great care.

However, one small thing that I did not like, was the "For Amy" inserted onto the sunflowers. I understand it from a narrative standpoint, but at the same time, just as I didn't want to see the Doctor given any false moments of glory for "fixing" Van Gogh, I didn't want to see Amy given any false glory for something she has no place in. Crediting a fictional character as inspiring one of the greatest artists of all time with his most recognisable motif, that I did not like. Amy Pond is fine, but she will never be as important as Vincent van Gogh. I know the show does similar things all the time, but so far, I think, Amy's not proved herself to be near spectacular enough to deserve being insinuated into history, let alone into the creation of something so great.

But that's a little thing, amongst what was otherwise, I think, a far, far greater thing than I ever expected to see.