Alternative Vampires, Alternative Realities: Thoughts on Doctor Who 5x06 & 5x07

[zahrawithaz]

To sum it up quickly: Did not enjoy, and Hmm. Interesting.

Comments

[selenak]

I think they would have remained in a dream!TARDIS, but not forever; their bodies need fluids and food, after all, and anything they ate in the dream state would have been imaginary, so they would have died.

re: Dream Lord: the great thing is that they have their cake and eat it there. He's new, but the idea of a being embodying the Doctor's darker qualities is not. In the Sixth Doctor era, during the multi-episode story "Trial of a Time Lord", it turns out that the guy prosecuting the Doctor is really the Valeyard, who came into existence between his twelfth and thirteenth regeneration and in classic sci-fi fashion got all the dark stuff. Back then, I thought the idea was good but the execution was poor, because the Valeyard was played as a standard muwahhahaa type of supervillain, whereas here the execution of the Dream Lord concept is very good and the creepiness heightened by the fact he is Doctor-ish, only with a vicious twist. (BTW, you can fanwank this by declaring the Sixth Doctor was the blusterish type, hence the Valeyard

[zahrawithaz]

That makes sense, I suppose--it would have been a slow, self-imposed but oblivious suicide. But what does the psychic pollen, a mind parasite, get out of it? If it's going to feed on the Doctor's darkness you'd think it would keep him alive for longer than that. (Then again, I suppose maybe he could last quite a while.)

Ah, so that's the Valeyard! Hmm. It does sound like this was a much better realization; I did find Mr. Jones extremely creepifying.