Happy Fourth of July!
Because it's still Friday here, Happy Fourth of July to the Americans on my flist! Hope you had a happy and safe holiday with loved ones.
And to the non-Americans to whom this applies, Happy Day Before the Doctor Who Finale! Gone completely mad with anticipation yet?
And to everyone else, Happy Friday. ;)
***
So about that Fourth of July "community event" I was supposed to co-plan...well, it went. My useless co-planner of an Assistant Manager contributed all of $10 worth of decorations from Dollar Tree and two words of creative input. Despite this and having no less than 6 days to throw an event together, the planning and set up went amazingly well. Special thanks to the Target dollar section and a brainstorming session with some of my fantastic co-workers.
We had samples, a "Guess How Many Coffee Beans Are In This Iced Venti Cup" game where people could win a pound of coffee, a Ping Pong Ball Toss-type game involving throwing small wiffle balls into plastic cups, a book drive/donation raffle to support the local elementary school, and a table where kids could decorate Starbucks cups using markers and some fun art supplies I found in the Target dollar section. Each station was set up to account for proper traffic flow and everything.
I had Arjo and Stephanie to help me out with signage and general fun-bringing. I adore them.
The little corner of our store we cordoned off for the event. On the left are the tables for the coffee bean game, donation raffle, and ping pong game. The last of which was contained in a cardboard box to keep in badly aimed wiffle balls. The middle table held our samples. On the right is the cup decorating table for the kids.
A better view of the games, donation bucket, samples, and Steph's adorable signs
Arjo calculating his next turn for the ping pong game while Steph cutes it up for the camera at the decorating table
Arjo's gorgeous, if uninformative, sign
From here, you can see my genius ping pong toss set-up. UC-educated liberal arts major here, folks
Fellow Shift Lead Lisa demonstrating her mad ping pong ball toss skillz. Note the line on the ground from where people had to throw. I'm mean, I know
"I can't see like this!" -Lisa discovering the constrictions of taping googly eyes to one's eyelids
Does our event look like something's missing? That's right: we're missing actual event participants. Because of the complete short notice of the event and the fact that we barely have any lobby customers on the Fourth, we kind of expected a lame turnout. But the District Manager said we had to have an event, so we did. And I figured that if we're gonna be lame, we might as well go all out.
In the two and a half hours we had the event, we had exactly three customers and one kid partake in the event. In all, we raised $2, which puts us $38 in the hole, budget-wise. Arjo, Steph, and I spent most of our time coloring cups and tossing wiffle balls from the decorating table.
All in all, though, I'm actually quite proud of us and our set up. At least now we know that if it was absolutely necessary to throw together a small carnival in our store, we can do it in a few days with a little ingenuity, a trip to Target, and $40. I'm sure I can tie this into being the American way or something, but my head is too cloudy with medicine to do so properly.
***
First off, a belated welcome to fellow Whovian, miss_prufrock, to the ol' flist!
Oh, Lordy, the Who fandom seems to be imploding around me. One part is flailing about that cliffhanger, another part is all spazzy about a certain quasi-reunion, yet another part (read: me) is still in tears about the sheer tragedy of said reunion, and everyone seems to have love/hate opinions about all of the guest companions and/or the storyline.
I meant to post this epic, teary, rambling write-up of 'The Stolen Earth.' However, a wicked head cold has rendered my brain a little useless, and I only have a few hours to post this before all of my hopes/dreams/theories/spec become null and void. Thus, I present my disjointed thoughts that I typed over the past week, which have been edited down to be somewhat less-disjointed thoughts.
Hey, remember when the premiere date for 'Partners In Crime' was approaching, and we--namely, the spoiled Rose fans--were all, "Yay, it's coming back! But how 'bout we just get to the finale and work our way backwards? Bring on the Rose!" And then 'PIC' aired, and while we were watching, we realized that, hey, this ep was going pretty well. Donna's awesome, and OMG, Unexpected!Rose!
Well, here we are, folks. 12 episodes later with not one, but two, full episodes of post-'Doomsday'!Rose under our belts. Funny how quickly time passes.
Also, just for the record, RTD was a lying liar who lies when he said Rose was gone forever. But it's Rose, so I forgive him.
I did my very, very best to not post a knee-jerk reaction post that would quite possibly consist of nothing more than, "OMG, the Doctor and Rose break my heart, and I love Ianto. And Luke. Also, the Doctor is not regenerating. Shut up." Yay, me.
* Title Sequence: This cracked me up because everyone and their moms were there. It was sweet, though, that all of the companions were listed. Nearly gave me whiplash, though, with the speed at which they came at the screen.
* Donna: First off, and as always, I love her. Rose and her chemistry with the Doctor aside, Donna has become my favorite companion. I fear for her in the finale. Especially because I have a strong feeling that there's something up with the heartbeat heard when Donna was sitting on the stairs. I'm sure it's important, and I'm sure I can come up with a decent theory, but my mind is too focused on other things for me to put too much thought into this. And what loss Donna is going to have?! My favorite theory so far is that the Time Beetle is still on Donna's back, this is yet another alternate timeline, and Donna will, again, have to sacrifice herself to make it right again. But this goes back to my entirely rational fear that something terrible is going to happen to our beloved Donna.
* The disappearing bees! I knew they were going to be important! Okay, so did everyone else, but I swear I came to that conclusion on my own!
* The "teleconference" was a smart way of bringing everyone together for the first time without having to shove everyone in the same room. My only quibble is that Jack didn't get to properly flirt with Sarah Jane and Donna yet. But go Donna for noticing Jack first. They're my new 'ship, yes, they are.
* Rose's jealousy at Martha being the fourth screen in was surprising but understandable, given the situation. Martha was the only person there she hadn't met, after all. In any case, it was a nice little juxtaposition/reflection of Martha's jealousy of Rose way back when.
* Rose trying to connect when the Doctor was on screen and the Doctor saying that Rose was the only one not present (on the split screen, obviously) were just so sad.
* Yet another reason why I don't like Donna's mom: she didn't let Wilf get the damn webcam. Speaking of which...
* Wilf(!): He is where Donna gets her awesomness. I love that he tried to take out a Dalek with a paintball gun and that he called Rose "sweetheart" just like he calls Donna. And his line deliveries are priceless. "[Sylvia] thinks [webcams] are naughty." Hee!
* Daleks and Davros: Okay. See. Maybe it's because i'm not an Old Skool Whovian. Maybe it's because I'm too blinded by 'shipper-tinted glasses. Whatever the case, every time there's a Daleks-only scene, I mentally check out. I give Nick Briggs all the credit in the world for giving them great voices, but seeing those giant pepperpots rasp at each other just isn't interesting. Granted, I'll slightly excuse the choice to bring them back because all of the present companions have encountered them--their individual experiences made their reactions to hearing "Exterminate!" for the first time all the more emotionally charged--but seriously? After the awfulness of Helen Raynor's ghastly S3 Dalek two-parter, I thought we were done with them. That said...
* Dalek Caan: Originally, he, like the others, bugged the crap out of me. Upon second viewing, though, he cracked my shit up. "I fleeeeeeeeew!" lol
* Torchwood:
- It was--for lack of better word--sweet that Gwen remembered Owen and Tosh by saying she'll go down fighting just like them.
- I suddenly really, really miss Owen and Tosh. If anything, I wanted the Doctor to meet Tosh and him being all, "Didn't you work for UNIT?" And her being all, "Didn't you have huge ears and a leather jacket?"
- After seeing the trailer after 'Left Turn,' I urged my sister to watch TW (S2 mostly because S1 is kind of rubbish). Catching a few eps over her shoulder as she watched, I was reminded of how much I utterly adore S2 Ianto. "Slight loss of dignity. No change there." So much love.
* SJA: Boy, am I glad I DVRed this show when Sci-fi started airing it. Not only did I understand what the hell was going on in Sarah Jane's scenes, but I was already familiar with the adorableness that is Luke. (BTW, Thomas Knight at the table reed shown on the Confidential? Trying too hard to look cool.) Now if only they could've found a reason to write Maria's hot dad in. Rawr.
[Warning: This is the part of my post where I get a tad fangirly. Non-'shippers be warned.]
* Rose: Oh, where to begin? I really, really missed her. Admittedly, she seemed a little off in 'Left Turn,' but this is the Rose we know. And really, I know I shouldn't talk. I started watching in September and lost Rose in October. I've waited all of 9 months for her return. Most fans have been waiting two years. Hats off to you all for keeping the love and the 'ship alive even when all seemed lost. Without you guys, I wouldn't have a 'ship to sail on.
Topic? I love Rose. Mostly, I'm just relieved that even though Rose has matured, become totally bad ass, and gotten a little harder, she seems to fundamentally be the same Rose. She still beams the same way she does when she sees the Doctor, still is the bravest little former shopgirl in the universe, still is able to crack a little joke to alleviate the tension even when her heart is breaking.
* That Scene. You know which one I'm talkin' 'bout: I was so terribly spoiled for the Doctor and Rose's reunion. That said, when Donna told the Doctor, "Why don't you ask her yourself?" I wibbled a little. The Doctor and Rose seeing each other across the devastation reminded me of Sydney and Vaughn in 'Phase One' when they had their first kiss amidst the SD-6 rubble. Except Sydney and Vaughn's eyes didn't meet across a frakkin' 2 mile-wide room, and they actually made it to the middle for the Best Kiss Ever.
And yeah, the running towards each other was so terribly cheesy, but damn if I loved it. The look on the Doctor's face as he ran full tilt to Rose (or, as DT put it in the most interesting part of the Confidential, "all [the Doctor wants] in the universe")! He was just so unabashedly happy. My heart absolutely broke for this man who hasn't really been content since 'Doomsday.' And as soon as those grins appeared on their faces and they started running towards each other, there went all my fears that they've been apart for so long that their reunion would be awkward or that Rose changed so much that she didn't love him anymore. I could only imagine would would've happened if they reached each other. I'm guessing there would've been a massive tackle hug and bruised ribs from Rose's comically large gun.
BTW, the running? Dude. The Doctor was running. I don't think we've seen him run so fast before, and we've seen him run.
In retrospect, I really, really, really wish I wasn't spoiled for the Doctor/Rose reunion. But really, even if I didn't know about the Dalek shooting him, they both started running so damned far away from each other that something had to happen to one of them before they reached each other. Even my sister was telling the screen, "Run faster!"
What kills me the most about this scene is that, in the on set pictures of this scene, Rose is clutching the Doctor's hand when he's on the ground. Because of the framing, though, it isn't visible. Hand-holding was such a big thing for them ("Sometimes you need a hand to hold." ... "Who's gonna hold his hand now?"). It would've been nice to see.
* ...So Rose knows about Jack and his immortality and all that? Because she absolutely didn't react to seeing him on that screen. I suppose that 'Turn Left' implied that she knew he was alive and working for Torchwood, but it would've been nice to get an explicit explanation.
* Way to play on fears that Tennant is leaving, Uncle Rusty: That was the most obvious yet worrying cliffhanger imaginable. The Doctor is not going to regenerate, or at least regenerate in the traditional actor-swap sense. Even when he started getting swallowed up in that all-too-familiar bright light, I 100% 97% believed this. Only the collective fandom freak out made me second guess myself. I have no real proof to back up my guess other than it being too obvious a turnout. Does it look like he's regenerating? Is it the cliffhanger to the finale? Did RTD write it? If the answer to these is "yes," then he's not regenerating.
* Okay, so he won't regenerate. But still...: That said, Rose's teary "But he can't [regenerate]. Not now. I came all this way" brought tears to my eyes. These two break my heart. I couldn't even fully appreciate the Ultimate Team TARDIS Companion trifecta of Rose-Jack-Donna because I was too busy getting my heart broken by Rose's pleas for the Doctor to not regenerate just yet.
* Theories
- [Finale casting spoilers, but if you've seen promo pics, you're fine] Sarah Jane will be saved by none other than the Tin Dog himself, Mickey Smith. Because, really, everyone else is otherwise occupied and/or without a Really Big Gun.
- [Based on a bit of on-set spoilers] Donna will somehow get her memory wiped. Don't know how or why, but it may relate to the previously mentioned parallel timeline theory.
- Jack, Ianto, Gwen, Sarah Jane, and Luke are safe--as well as present-day England and Cardiff, really--because both Torchwood and Sarah Jane Adventures were renewed for new series. Okay, so this wasn't a theory as much as a statement with supporting evidence.
- Something about The Master. Brain is too fried to expand on this in any way.
- Again, the Doctor won't regenerate properly. I have a feeling this has something to do with the Doctor Detector/Hand in a Jar, due to the constant anvilicious shots of it. Otherwise, why is it still in the Control Room?
- Harriet Jones (former Prime Minister) wasn't really Harriet Jones. Initially, I was all excited to see her, but something about her countenance struck me as fishy. Later, someone pointed out that the badge she flashed looked suspiciously like a psychic paper. Hmm.
* Quick note about the Confidential: The special effects, make-up, props, etc. teams are fantastic, they really are, and their work is amazing. They absolutely deserve whatever credit they get and more. But is it totally necessary to dedicate 40 of the 45-minute Confidential on the recreation/lighting/shooting of Davros? For the love of cripes, in this episode, there was Companionpalooza, Rose and the Doctor were (almost) reunited before he totally got shot, the Earth was stolen. It's not really cool to shove reactions to those in a measly 5 minutes. I did, however, enjoy the small glimpse we had of the table read, complete with casting spoilers for the next ep and Eve Myles adorably giggling when Nick Briggs gargled out the first "Exterminate!" Also, the return of Fanboy!Tennant, now with camera phone action. And it was far too appropriate to end the Confidential with Uncle Rusty and his evil laugh.
All in all, I really enjoyed this episode. Even if the Dalek portions grated, the clever bits (e.g. the teleconference) were brilliant, and the build up to the Doctor/Rose reunion was perfect. And don't ever say that Uncle Rusty doesn't know how to write emotional scenes.
And! Bonus for you Doctor/Rose 'shippers to kill time before the finale airs, a short list of fics--both old and new--that have totally brought me to tears/made my 'shipper heart go all a-flutter in the past few days:
* "A Thousand Languages" by madlori: A beautifully written story of Rose's life with the Doctor and the end of his with her
* "In Between Time" by _starrystarry: One of my absolute favorite older fics. To quote, "If someone told the story of her life, like in a book or on TV or something, they would probably leave these bits out." Lovely.
* "How To Take Chances" by hippiebanana132: The twelfth of hippiebanana132's S4 Thirteen Series; because there's absolutely nothing wrong with a little hopeful fluffy angst before it all comes crashing down
* "The Distant Stretch of City Lights" by elsi_disappear: My favorite, favorite theory of how Rose and the Doctor part after 'Journey's End'
* "Love, Sex, Babies" by earlgreytea68: Part of the amazing, wonderful, fantastic Chaos Theory series; the Doctor attempts to explain the birds and the bees (and the dogs and the humans and the biology) to his son. So. Much. Love.
Next week's episode is 65 minutes! Can I get a "Hell, yeah"? And if S2's finale is any indication, I bet I will be crying for about 20 minutes of that. But of course I have a closing shift on Saturday. It's my fault, though. It was a trade-off to get Fourth of July off. I didn't actually think about what I agreed to until it was too late.
In the meantime, I'll pop some Tylenol PM, make me some Magical Sick Tea, and try to get some rest, for I am still sick. Gotta be all rested up for work and that small matter of surely crying my heart out during tomorrow's finale.
Happy Weekend, all!
And to the non-Americans to whom this applies, Happy Day Before the Doctor Who Finale! Gone completely mad with anticipation yet?
And to everyone else, Happy Friday. ;)
***
So about that Fourth of July "community event" I was supposed to co-plan...well, it went. My useless co-planner of an Assistant Manager contributed all of $10 worth of decorations from Dollar Tree and two words of creative input. Despite this and having no less than 6 days to throw an event together, the planning and set up went amazingly well. Special thanks to the Target dollar section and a brainstorming session with some of my fantastic co-workers.
We had samples, a "Guess How Many Coffee Beans Are In This Iced Venti Cup" game where people could win a pound of coffee, a Ping Pong Ball Toss-type game involving throwing small wiffle balls into plastic cups, a book drive/donation raffle to support the local elementary school, and a table where kids could decorate Starbucks cups using markers and some fun art supplies I found in the Target dollar section. Each station was set up to account for proper traffic flow and everything.
I had Arjo and Stephanie to help me out with signage and general fun-bringing. I adore them.
The little corner of our store we cordoned off for the event. On the left are the tables for the coffee bean game, donation raffle, and ping pong game. The last of which was contained in a cardboard box to keep in badly aimed wiffle balls. The middle table held our samples. On the right is the cup decorating table for the kids.
A better view of the games, donation bucket, samples, and Steph's adorable signs
Arjo calculating his next turn for the ping pong game while Steph cutes it up for the camera at the decorating table
Arjo's gorgeous, if uninformative, sign
From here, you can see my genius ping pong toss set-up. UC-educated liberal arts major here, folks
Fellow Shift Lead Lisa demonstrating her mad ping pong ball toss skillz. Note the line on the ground from where people had to throw. I'm mean, I know
"I can't see like this!" -Lisa discovering the constrictions of taping googly eyes to one's eyelids
Does our event look like something's missing? That's right: we're missing actual event participants. Because of the complete short notice of the event and the fact that we barely have any lobby customers on the Fourth, we kind of expected a lame turnout. But the District Manager said we had to have an event, so we did. And I figured that if we're gonna be lame, we might as well go all out.
In the two and a half hours we had the event, we had exactly three customers and one kid partake in the event. In all, we raised $2, which puts us $38 in the hole, budget-wise. Arjo, Steph, and I spent most of our time coloring cups and tossing wiffle balls from the decorating table.
All in all, though, I'm actually quite proud of us and our set up. At least now we know that if it was absolutely necessary to throw together a small carnival in our store, we can do it in a few days with a little ingenuity, a trip to Target, and $40. I'm sure I can tie this into being the American way or something, but my head is too cloudy with medicine to do so properly.
***
First off, a belated welcome to fellow Whovian, miss_prufrock, to the ol' flist!
Oh, Lordy, the Who fandom seems to be imploding around me. One part is flailing about that cliffhanger, another part is all spazzy about a certain quasi-reunion, yet another part (read: me) is still in tears about the sheer tragedy of said reunion, and everyone seems to have love/hate opinions about all of the guest companions and/or the storyline.
I meant to post this epic, teary, rambling write-up of 'The Stolen Earth.' However, a wicked head cold has rendered my brain a little useless, and I only have a few hours to post this before all of my hopes/dreams/theories/spec become null and void. Thus, I present my disjointed thoughts that I typed over the past week, which have been edited down to be somewhat less-disjointed thoughts.
Hey, remember when the premiere date for 'Partners In Crime' was approaching, and we--namely, the spoiled Rose fans--were all, "Yay, it's coming back! But how 'bout we just get to the finale and work our way backwards? Bring on the Rose!" And then 'PIC' aired, and while we were watching, we realized that, hey, this ep was going pretty well. Donna's awesome, and OMG, Unexpected!Rose!
Well, here we are, folks. 12 episodes later with not one, but two, full episodes of post-'Doomsday'!Rose under our belts. Funny how quickly time passes.
Also, just for the record, RTD was a lying liar who lies when he said Rose was gone forever. But it's Rose, so I forgive him.
I did my very, very best to not post a knee-jerk reaction post that would quite possibly consist of nothing more than, "OMG, the Doctor and Rose break my heart, and I love Ianto. And Luke. Also, the Doctor is not regenerating. Shut up." Yay, me.
* Title Sequence: This cracked me up because everyone and their moms were there. It was sweet, though, that all of the companions were listed. Nearly gave me whiplash, though, with the speed at which they came at the screen.
* Donna: First off, and as always, I love her. Rose and her chemistry with the Doctor aside, Donna has become my favorite companion. I fear for her in the finale. Especially because I have a strong feeling that there's something up with the heartbeat heard when Donna was sitting on the stairs. I'm sure it's important, and I'm sure I can come up with a decent theory, but my mind is too focused on other things for me to put too much thought into this. And what loss Donna is going to have?! My favorite theory so far is that the Time Beetle is still on Donna's back, this is yet another alternate timeline, and Donna will, again, have to sacrifice herself to make it right again. But this goes back to my entirely rational fear that something terrible is going to happen to our beloved Donna.
* The disappearing bees! I knew they were going to be important! Okay, so did everyone else, but I swear I came to that conclusion on my own!
* The "teleconference" was a smart way of bringing everyone together for the first time without having to shove everyone in the same room. My only quibble is that Jack didn't get to properly flirt with Sarah Jane and Donna yet. But go Donna for noticing Jack first. They're my new 'ship, yes, they are.
* Rose's jealousy at Martha being the fourth screen in was surprising but understandable, given the situation. Martha was the only person there she hadn't met, after all. In any case, it was a nice little juxtaposition/reflection of Martha's jealousy of Rose way back when.
* Rose trying to connect when the Doctor was on screen and the Doctor saying that Rose was the only one not present (on the split screen, obviously) were just so sad.
* Yet another reason why I don't like Donna's mom: she didn't let Wilf get the damn webcam. Speaking of which...
* Wilf(!): He is where Donna gets her awesomness. I love that he tried to take out a Dalek with a paintball gun and that he called Rose "sweetheart" just like he calls Donna. And his line deliveries are priceless. "[Sylvia] thinks [webcams] are naughty." Hee!
* Daleks and Davros: Okay. See. Maybe it's because i'm not an Old Skool Whovian. Maybe it's because I'm too blinded by 'shipper-tinted glasses. Whatever the case, every time there's a Daleks-only scene, I mentally check out. I give Nick Briggs all the credit in the world for giving them great voices, but seeing those giant pepperpots rasp at each other just isn't interesting. Granted, I'll slightly excuse the choice to bring them back because all of the present companions have encountered them--their individual experiences made their reactions to hearing "Exterminate!" for the first time all the more emotionally charged--but seriously? After the awfulness of Helen Raynor's ghastly S3 Dalek two-parter, I thought we were done with them. That said...
* Dalek Caan: Originally, he, like the others, bugged the crap out of me. Upon second viewing, though, he cracked my shit up. "I fleeeeeeeeew!" lol
* Torchwood:
- It was--for lack of better word--sweet that Gwen remembered Owen and Tosh by saying she'll go down fighting just like them.
- I suddenly really, really miss Owen and Tosh. If anything, I wanted the Doctor to meet Tosh and him being all, "Didn't you work for UNIT?" And her being all, "Didn't you have huge ears and a leather jacket?"
- After seeing the trailer after 'Left Turn,' I urged my sister to watch TW (S2 mostly because S1 is kind of rubbish). Catching a few eps over her shoulder as she watched, I was reminded of how much I utterly adore S2 Ianto. "Slight loss of dignity. No change there." So much love.
* SJA: Boy, am I glad I DVRed this show when Sci-fi started airing it. Not only did I understand what the hell was going on in Sarah Jane's scenes, but I was already familiar with the adorableness that is Luke. (BTW, Thomas Knight at the table reed shown on the Confidential? Trying too hard to look cool.) Now if only they could've found a reason to write Maria's hot dad in. Rawr.
[Warning: This is the part of my post where I get a tad fangirly. Non-'shippers be warned.]
* Rose: Oh, where to begin? I really, really missed her. Admittedly, she seemed a little off in 'Left Turn,' but this is the Rose we know. And really, I know I shouldn't talk. I started watching in September and lost Rose in October. I've waited all of 9 months for her return. Most fans have been waiting two years. Hats off to you all for keeping the love and the 'ship alive even when all seemed lost. Without you guys, I wouldn't have a 'ship to sail on.
Topic? I love Rose. Mostly, I'm just relieved that even though Rose has matured, become totally bad ass, and gotten a little harder, she seems to fundamentally be the same Rose. She still beams the same way she does when she sees the Doctor, still is the bravest little former shopgirl in the universe, still is able to crack a little joke to alleviate the tension even when her heart is breaking.
* That Scene. You know which one I'm talkin' 'bout: I was so terribly spoiled for the Doctor and Rose's reunion. That said, when Donna told the Doctor, "Why don't you ask her yourself?" I wibbled a little. The Doctor and Rose seeing each other across the devastation reminded me of Sydney and Vaughn in 'Phase One' when they had their first kiss amidst the SD-6 rubble. Except Sydney and Vaughn's eyes didn't meet across a frakkin' 2 mile-wide room, and they actually made it to the middle for the Best Kiss Ever.
And yeah, the running towards each other was so terribly cheesy, but damn if I loved it. The look on the Doctor's face as he ran full tilt to Rose (or, as DT put it in the most interesting part of the Confidential, "all [the Doctor wants] in the universe")! He was just so unabashedly happy. My heart absolutely broke for this man who hasn't really been content since 'Doomsday.' And as soon as those grins appeared on their faces and they started running towards each other, there went all my fears that they've been apart for so long that their reunion would be awkward or that Rose changed so much that she didn't love him anymore. I could only imagine would would've happened if they reached each other. I'm guessing there would've been a massive tackle hug and bruised ribs from Rose's comically large gun.
BTW, the running? Dude. The Doctor was running. I don't think we've seen him run so fast before, and we've seen him run.
In retrospect, I really, really, really wish I wasn't spoiled for the Doctor/Rose reunion. But really, even if I didn't know about the Dalek shooting him, they both started running so damned far away from each other that something had to happen to one of them before they reached each other. Even my sister was telling the screen, "Run faster!"
What kills me the most about this scene is that, in the on set pictures of this scene, Rose is clutching the Doctor's hand when he's on the ground. Because of the framing, though, it isn't visible. Hand-holding was such a big thing for them ("Sometimes you need a hand to hold." ... "Who's gonna hold his hand now?"). It would've been nice to see.
* ...So Rose knows about Jack and his immortality and all that? Because she absolutely didn't react to seeing him on that screen. I suppose that 'Turn Left' implied that she knew he was alive and working for Torchwood, but it would've been nice to get an explicit explanation.
* Way to play on fears that Tennant is leaving, Uncle Rusty: That was the most obvious yet worrying cliffhanger imaginable. The Doctor is not going to regenerate, or at least regenerate in the traditional actor-swap sense. Even when he started getting swallowed up in that all-too-familiar bright light, I 100% 97% believed this. Only the collective fandom freak out made me second guess myself. I have no real proof to back up my guess other than it being too obvious a turnout. Does it look like he's regenerating? Is it the cliffhanger to the finale? Did RTD write it? If the answer to these is "yes," then he's not regenerating.
* Okay, so he won't regenerate. But still...: That said, Rose's teary "But he can't [regenerate]. Not now. I came all this way" brought tears to my eyes. These two break my heart. I couldn't even fully appreciate the Ultimate Team TARDIS Companion trifecta of Rose-Jack-Donna because I was too busy getting my heart broken by Rose's pleas for the Doctor to not regenerate just yet.
* Theories
- [Finale casting spoilers, but if you've seen promo pics, you're fine] Sarah Jane will be saved by none other than the Tin Dog himself, Mickey Smith. Because, really, everyone else is otherwise occupied and/or without a Really Big Gun.
- [Based on a bit of on-set spoilers] Donna will somehow get her memory wiped. Don't know how or why, but it may relate to the previously mentioned parallel timeline theory.
- Jack, Ianto, Gwen, Sarah Jane, and Luke are safe--as well as present-day England and Cardiff, really--because both Torchwood and Sarah Jane Adventures were renewed for new series. Okay, so this wasn't a theory as much as a statement with supporting evidence.
- Something about The Master. Brain is too fried to expand on this in any way.
- Again, the Doctor won't regenerate properly. I have a feeling this has something to do with the Doctor Detector/Hand in a Jar, due to the constant anvilicious shots of it. Otherwise, why is it still in the Control Room?
- Harriet Jones (former Prime Minister) wasn't really Harriet Jones. Initially, I was all excited to see her, but something about her countenance struck me as fishy. Later, someone pointed out that the badge she flashed looked suspiciously like a psychic paper. Hmm.
* Quick note about the Confidential: The special effects, make-up, props, etc. teams are fantastic, they really are, and their work is amazing. They absolutely deserve whatever credit they get and more. But is it totally necessary to dedicate 40 of the 45-minute Confidential on the recreation/lighting/shooting of Davros? For the love of cripes, in this episode, there was Companionpalooza, Rose and the Doctor were (almost) reunited before he totally got shot, the Earth was stolen. It's not really cool to shove reactions to those in a measly 5 minutes. I did, however, enjoy the small glimpse we had of the table read, complete with casting spoilers for the next ep and Eve Myles adorably giggling when Nick Briggs gargled out the first "Exterminate!" Also, the return of Fanboy!Tennant, now with camera phone action. And it was far too appropriate to end the Confidential with Uncle Rusty and his evil laugh.
All in all, I really enjoyed this episode. Even if the Dalek portions grated, the clever bits (e.g. the teleconference) were brilliant, and the build up to the Doctor/Rose reunion was perfect. And don't ever say that Uncle Rusty doesn't know how to write emotional scenes.
And! Bonus for you Doctor/Rose 'shippers to kill time before the finale airs, a short list of fics--both old and new--that have totally brought me to tears/made my 'shipper heart go all a-flutter in the past few days:
* "A Thousand Languages" by madlori: A beautifully written story of Rose's life with the Doctor and the end of his with her
* "In Between Time" by _starrystarry: One of my absolute favorite older fics. To quote, "If someone told the story of her life, like in a book or on TV or something, they would probably leave these bits out." Lovely.
* "How To Take Chances" by hippiebanana132: The twelfth of hippiebanana132's S4 Thirteen Series; because there's absolutely nothing wrong with a little hopeful fluffy angst before it all comes crashing down
* "The Distant Stretch of City Lights" by elsi_disappear: My favorite, favorite theory of how Rose and the Doctor part after 'Journey's End'
* "Love, Sex, Babies" by earlgreytea68: Part of the amazing, wonderful, fantastic Chaos Theory series; the Doctor attempts to explain the birds and the bees (and the dogs and the humans and the biology) to his son. So. Much. Love.
Next week's episode is 65 minutes! Can I get a "Hell, yeah"? And if S2's finale is any indication, I bet I will be crying for about 20 minutes of that. But of course I have a closing shift on Saturday. It's my fault, though. It was a trade-off to get Fourth of July off. I didn't actually think about what I agreed to until it was too late.
In the meantime, I'll pop some Tylenol PM, make me some Magical Sick Tea, and try to get some rest, for I am still sick. Gotta be all rested up for work and that small matter of surely crying my heart out during tomorrow's finale.
Happy Weekend, all!