The Ponds. A little meta. (Spoilers for AGMGTW)
The Ponds
If Doctor Who has one eternal truth, it is that the Doctor changes those he meets. Whether he makes them *better* is up for discussion, but no one is the same.
Remember when we first met Rory? How worried we were that he seemed... a bit of a loser? We wondered what Amy could see in him, and we were concerned he’d be treated like Mickey (I love Mickey dearly, but he was always second-best). How far we’ve come...
In AGMGTW to war he even gets his own mirror in Commander Strax, the Sontaran whom the Doctor turns into a nurse.
Who got the better deal?
I’m not going to delve in too deeply, but I love Rory’s dual nature, and he’s worthy of an essay of his own.
Instead I shall jump sideways to Amy, and point out a visual (and story) parallel which struck me very forcefully:
Amy - the girl left behind, her pain almost forgotten, overlooked, as the Doctor runs towards something else, delighted, joyful.
But as well as parallels there are also staggering differences.
Amy in The Eleventh Hour was still very much a child - brittle, scared, sceptical, terrified and almost physically incapable of believing in the man who had broken her trust as a child.
Rory was ‘sort of a boyfriend’ - hopelessly in love, but unable to work out how to prove it, always second best to the memory of The Raggedy Doctor.
And now...
Amy is a young woman, someone who has seen the end of the universe and who has brought the Doctor back from non-existence through sheer force of will. And she's a mother.
Rory is her husband, her true love (Amy would rather die than be separated from him), and The Last Centurion, a man who proved his love with such endless patience and devotion that he’s become a legend. And he's a father.
Their lives are the stuff of fairy tales - soaring, tragic, and yet completely down to earth. They've gained so much, they've lost so much.
And here’s where the story has turned down a new path. Well... It’s the oldest path on the show, but it is being followed through to an extent I don’t think we’ve seen before.
To quote Moffat (from this interview):
"I suppose what I'm interested in - and it's developed organically from Amy's particular situation, of him always being late - is that the Doctor has sort of hung around in her life for far too long. He never says it out loud, but he obviously has an MO. 'I'll get out before I screw up their chances of happiness. I'll run away, and let them grow up. I'll go and find somebody else to mess about with.' But he's accidentally ended up with a married couple in the TARDIS, because he ran alway with Amy on the night of her wedding, and now he's in the most dreadful pickle. "
"It's quite nice to force him to live through their lives a bit. He'll grow to realise that he sort of can't leave. He was meant to be the last crush before the serious relationship. The last fling. You know he's the stripper at the stag. He's not meant to be there for any length of time.... but damn it, he can't help it now. He's stitched into that family in the most overt way."
Now the familiar parts I shall illustrate with a couple of quotes:
MARTHA: I didn't tell my family. Kept it all so secret and it almost destroyed them.
DONNA: In what way?
MARTHA: They ended up imprisoned. They were tortured--my mum, my dad, my sister... It wasn't the Doctor's fault, but you need to be careful. 'Cause you know the Doctor, he's wonderful, he's brilliant, but he's like fire -- stand to close and people get burned.
~~
AMY: So they took her anyway. All this was for nothing.
DOCTOR: I am so... sorry. (goes to hug her bust she backs away)
JENNY: Amy... it's not his fault.
AMY: (crying) I know, I know.
Stand to close and you get burned... We’ve seen this over and over again, the question always being whether the companions thought it worth it (they usually did). And they tended not to point the finger. (It’s not his fault...)
Except this time - this time someone lays the burden and the responsibility squarely at the Doctor’s feet:
RIVER: And now they've taken a child... the child of your best friends... and they're going to turn her into a weapon, just to bring you down. And all this, my love...in fear of you.
Because this the other side. We always have the parents imploring the Doctor to keep their children safe (Jackie, most notably, and dear Wilf worrying about Donna), and it’s a promise the Doctor tries his best to keep. However there’s no doubt that he leaves a trail of destruction:
MICKEY: Yeah, don't think I sat on my backside for twelve months, Doctor. I read up on you. You look deep enough on the Internet... and in the history books, and there's his name. Followed by a list of the dead.
Rose ends up in a parallel universe. Martha leaves to look after her traumatised family. Donna... Oh Donna.
He finds them and breaks and re-makes them and then he leaves them behind:
MARTHA: It's all right for you. You can just come and go, but some of us have got to stay behind.
~~
DOCTOR: Called you an idiot. Sorry, but there's no way we could have rescued your men.
OCTAVIAN: I know that, sir. And when you've flown away in your little blue box, I'll explain that to their families.
Now the quotes above illustrate how this story has gone further. The prequel showcased it in the most heartbreaking way. He can’t just leave. This time the victim isn’t a young adult, eager to explore the universe and aware of, and ready to accept, the dangers that come with this. It’s a child. An innocent, lost because of him.
Is it any wonder he doesn’t pick the phone up...
Anyway, my point is: I am very pleased that the Doctor’s stitched into the Pond family... Of course it is currently BREAKING MY HEART, but I love it even so. And a not inconsiderate part of this is the fact that the Doctor’s story is subservient to that of his companions.
In that prequel our hearts ache for the hopelessness of the Doctor... But even more so for poor Amy. He is tangled up in her story, and has broken it.
It reminds me of an observation by someone (I forget who), who said that Rusty’s Who was the Doctor’s story told through the eyes of his companions, and Moffat’s Who is the companions’ story told through the eyes of the Doctor.
ETA: And here's a beautifully perfect Moffat quote that reinforces it:
The story happens to the companion, not The Doctor. It’s only when he’s got someone to show off to that its happening. That’s why I think the story starts again every time a new person takes that decision to go into that blue box.
(I am also perfectly aware that Rusty to thank for introduce companion's families etc on a much more integral scale. However he steered away from this towards the end.)
And here's the thing - when it comes to the Ponds, the focus stays squarely on them, not on the Doctor.
The big reunions (Rory bringing Melody back to Amy; River revealing who she is to her parents) are done without the Doctor there. He might be the person responsible for the turn their lives have taken, the thing around which their story bends and changes, but he isn't the story itself, they are.
(Also see River, but that is topic for another post.)
ETA2: Another Moffat quote, and outside the cut because I think this is relevant to EVERYONE, but fits in this post beautifully.
Back in my Press Gang days my defense was always this: sex will always be an exciting mystery to children, they'll always want to to know about it. And they'll learn about it, inevitably, from scary porn and all those barmy urban myths that circulate playgrounds. As a counter to that, shouldn't responsible kids telly at least try to right the balance? Shouldn't there be someone out there (apart from your boring parents and your boring teachers, who cares what they say) saying that sex is a natural, sometimes funny, sometimes wonderful thing, that decent, kind, nice people do with other decent, kind, nice people. Rather than a sleazy forbidden horror whispered about behind the bike shed.
Amy and Rory ~ ♥
If Doctor Who has one eternal truth, it is that the Doctor changes those he meets. Whether he makes them *better* is up for discussion, but no one is the same.
Remember when we first met Rory? How worried we were that he seemed... a bit of a loser? We wondered what Amy could see in him, and we were concerned he’d be treated like Mickey (I love Mickey dearly, but he was always second-best). How far we’ve come...
In AGMGTW to war he even gets his own mirror in Commander Strax, the Sontaran whom the Doctor turns into a nurse.
Who got the better deal?
I’m not going to delve in too deeply, but I love Rory’s dual nature, and he’s worthy of an essay of his own.
Instead I shall jump sideways to Amy, and point out a visual (and story) parallel which struck me very forcefully:
Amy - the girl left behind, her pain almost forgotten, overlooked, as the Doctor runs towards something else, delighted, joyful.
But as well as parallels there are also staggering differences.
Amy in The Eleventh Hour was still very much a child - brittle, scared, sceptical, terrified and almost physically incapable of believing in the man who had broken her trust as a child.
Rory was ‘sort of a boyfriend’ - hopelessly in love, but unable to work out how to prove it, always second best to the memory of The Raggedy Doctor.
And now...
Amy is a young woman, someone who has seen the end of the universe and who has brought the Doctor back from non-existence through sheer force of will. And she's a mother.
Rory is her husband, her true love (Amy would rather die than be separated from him), and The Last Centurion, a man who proved his love with such endless patience and devotion that he’s become a legend. And he's a father.
Their lives are the stuff of fairy tales - soaring, tragic, and yet completely down to earth. They've gained so much, they've lost so much.
And here’s where the story has turned down a new path. Well... It’s the oldest path on the show, but it is being followed through to an extent I don’t think we’ve seen before.
To quote Moffat (from this interview):
"I suppose what I'm interested in - and it's developed organically from Amy's particular situation, of him always being late - is that the Doctor has sort of hung around in her life for far too long. He never says it out loud, but he obviously has an MO. 'I'll get out before I screw up their chances of happiness. I'll run away, and let them grow up. I'll go and find somebody else to mess about with.' But he's accidentally ended up with a married couple in the TARDIS, because he ran alway with Amy on the night of her wedding, and now he's in the most dreadful pickle. "
"It's quite nice to force him to live through their lives a bit. He'll grow to realise that he sort of can't leave. He was meant to be the last crush before the serious relationship. The last fling. You know he's the stripper at the stag. He's not meant to be there for any length of time.... but damn it, he can't help it now. He's stitched into that family in the most overt way."
Now the familiar parts I shall illustrate with a couple of quotes:
MARTHA: I didn't tell my family. Kept it all so secret and it almost destroyed them.
DONNA: In what way?
MARTHA: They ended up imprisoned. They were tortured--my mum, my dad, my sister... It wasn't the Doctor's fault, but you need to be careful. 'Cause you know the Doctor, he's wonderful, he's brilliant, but he's like fire -- stand to close and people get burned.
~~
AMY: So they took her anyway. All this was for nothing.
DOCTOR: I am so... sorry. (goes to hug her bust she backs away)
JENNY: Amy... it's not his fault.
AMY: (crying) I know, I know.
Stand to close and you get burned... We’ve seen this over and over again, the question always being whether the companions thought it worth it (they usually did). And they tended not to point the finger. (It’s not his fault...)
Except this time - this time someone lays the burden and the responsibility squarely at the Doctor’s feet:
RIVER: And now they've taken a child... the child of your best friends... and they're going to turn her into a weapon, just to bring you down. And all this, my love...in fear of you.
Because this the other side. We always have the parents imploring the Doctor to keep their children safe (Jackie, most notably, and dear Wilf worrying about Donna), and it’s a promise the Doctor tries his best to keep. However there’s no doubt that he leaves a trail of destruction:
MICKEY: Yeah, don't think I sat on my backside for twelve months, Doctor. I read up on you. You look deep enough on the Internet... and in the history books, and there's his name. Followed by a list of the dead.
Rose ends up in a parallel universe. Martha leaves to look after her traumatised family. Donna... Oh Donna.
He finds them and breaks and re-makes them and then he leaves them behind:
MARTHA: It's all right for you. You can just come and go, but some of us have got to stay behind.
~~
DOCTOR: Called you an idiot. Sorry, but there's no way we could have rescued your men.
OCTAVIAN: I know that, sir. And when you've flown away in your little blue box, I'll explain that to their families.
Now the quotes above illustrate how this story has gone further. The prequel showcased it in the most heartbreaking way. He can’t just leave. This time the victim isn’t a young adult, eager to explore the universe and aware of, and ready to accept, the dangers that come with this. It’s a child. An innocent, lost because of him.
Is it any wonder he doesn’t pick the phone up...
Anyway, my point is: I am very pleased that the Doctor’s stitched into the Pond family... Of course it is currently BREAKING MY HEART, but I love it even so. And a not inconsiderate part of this is the fact that the Doctor’s story is subservient to that of his companions.
In that prequel our hearts ache for the hopelessness of the Doctor... But even more so for poor Amy. He is tangled up in her story, and has broken it.
It reminds me of an observation by someone (I forget who), who said that Rusty’s Who was the Doctor’s story told through the eyes of his companions, and Moffat’s Who is the companions’ story told through the eyes of the Doctor.
ETA: And here's a beautifully perfect Moffat quote that reinforces it:
The story happens to the companion, not The Doctor. It’s only when he’s got someone to show off to that its happening. That’s why I think the story starts again every time a new person takes that decision to go into that blue box.
(I am also perfectly aware that Rusty to thank for introduce companion's families etc on a much more integral scale. However he steered away from this towards the end.)
And here's the thing - when it comes to the Ponds, the focus stays squarely on them, not on the Doctor.
The big reunions (Rory bringing Melody back to Amy; River revealing who she is to her parents) are done without the Doctor there. He might be the person responsible for the turn their lives have taken, the thing around which their story bends and changes, but he isn't the story itself, they are.
(Also see River, but that is topic for another post.)
ETA2: Another Moffat quote, and outside the cut because I think this is relevant to EVERYONE, but fits in this post beautifully.
Back in my Press Gang days my defense was always this: sex will always be an exciting mystery to children, they'll always want to to know about it. And they'll learn about it, inevitably, from scary porn and all those barmy urban myths that circulate playgrounds. As a counter to that, shouldn't responsible kids telly at least try to right the balance? Shouldn't there be someone out there (apart from your boring parents and your boring teachers, who cares what they say) saying that sex is a natural, sometimes funny, sometimes wonderful thing, that decent, kind, nice people do with other decent, kind, nice people. Rather than a sleazy forbidden horror whispered about behind the bike shed.
Amy and Rory ~ ♥