Of songs and suns: Rings of Akhaten and River parallels
All right, so like most of us DW fans around the world, I watched the Rings of Akhaten, with ALL THE SYMBOLISM-and in-between loving Clara and wondering about Clara and the grandfather theme and her mum’s role in the story (there’s something, there’s something, there’s something going on with herrrrrr…) I just couldn’t seem to stop thinking about River. Happens to me a lot in episodes she’s absolutely not supposed to appear in, except that here there were REASONS!
That little girl. Let’s go through the Merry/Melody parallels:
-the names! Okay, never mind that.
-two scared little girls running away. Obvious.
-two little girls apparently without a family to look out for them (no background on Merry’s side), chosen as babies (for Melody, actually before she was born) and brought up by a religious order with one sole purpose to their lives. They are special; they are alone, and yet surrounded by people preparing them to the roles they were chosen for. One is a weapon; the other, a vessel of knowledge and a sacrifice. And stuff wants to eat them, at least metaphorically: the "spaceman" that is in fact the astronaut symbolizing River being forced into killing, and the parasite feeding on life, and memories, and souls. It seems that both girls have their free will and individuality stolen from them and fed to the creature/thing that holds them.
-two brave little girls, however: Merry is scared of "getting it wrong", but willing to be a sacrifice. Melody is different, she called for help and tried to run-but I’m reminded of the line "It’s all right. It’s quite all right. I’m dying." Of course she knew she was going to regenerate-but from the feeling I get, both girls are used to having their lives ruled by something way bigger than themselves… If that makes sense.
-singing themes. More about this later.
-the knowledge and storytelling themes. As soon as Merry explained her role, all I could think about was the Library. Merry knows all the songs and the stories, River tells the Doctor’s future in her diary; they know the secrets-secret songs, secret names. Please note that this is an episode in which songs and knowledge and memories are concretely used to advance the plot and save the characters’ skins. Foreshadowing!
-symbolic elements: water vs. fire. Here it’s opposed, however-Merry’s flamboyant cloak vs. Melody’s astronaut suit or black and white photos, the darkness of the New York regeneration scene; rising from the water vs. being pulled into the fire. Regeneration light pouring out reminds of the light of the eaten memories, though. Not sure how this might be interpreted, but it’s lovely.
That’s it for the parallels. This might not be the first little girl with Melody sides-but seriously, knowledge and songs. KNOWLEDGE AND SONGS.
Those people are called the Sun Singers.
Big Bang memories:
RORY: But that's the sun.
DOCTOR: Is it? Well, here's the noise that sun is making right now.
(The Tardis noise.)
DOCTOR: That's my Tardis burning up. That's what's been keeping the Earth warm.
And guess what Song is trapped inside, sunshine?
So, we have two suns of destruction-one greedy pseudo-god, and one burning time machine whose explosion will cause cracks that swallow things so they’ll never have existed. What else have we got? We have good lines. First, "we don't stop running until we are out from under the shadow". Sorry, did you say shadow? *clutches heart* Library feels, again. And then there’s "Song’s over". Which is REPEATED. The chorister says it once. The Doctor says it TWICE, once before him, once after. "That’s it, then. Song’s over." The exact same sentence. And song, not the song. Each time, I had that great thrill racing through me. Because of course I had to think of River-and the end of her big arc (though it ended in s6, Trenzalore has yet to come). As the huge fangirl I am, the mere possibility that she could be "over" should have me appalled, but I want her to have an epic closure-not just keep hanging around till the writers/audience get tired of her, but go out with a bang! Heh. (Though a whimper is good too. Love a whimper.)
The song is over, because two little girls failed in their purpose: the "god" is awake, and the Doctor is left to feed it his memories, his "secrets that should never told". Likewise, Melody, now grown-up, refused to kill her love. Even before that, she took him back from the very brink of death-when she was shown she had a future, a future in which he loved her. A future in which she mattered as a person, not a weapon-like Merry matters as one unique little girl, not a sacrifice. Back to the point-neither song could put gods to sleep (or rather, a parasite and a good man…). In the end, the great secrets must be given.
What else could it mean, "Song’s over"? Well, it does remind strongly of Ten’s "Your song is ending". And the songs mean stories in there, too-think of the people singing songs of Donna Noble. And both times, we HEARD the songs, the music-the Ood song, and the Sun Singers. So. IS REGENERATION COMING? Be it Eleven’s end (well, that would be after the anniversary ep, at least) or River’s (in whichever way they might mean it, since she already died in the Library, blah blah)… I simply CAN’T wait for that finale…
Let’s finish on the word song itself … River Song, because Melody Pond-but where did the name Melody come from? Amy named her daughter after her daughter, timey-wimey loop-a circle with no beginning. Where did that come from? Pond is important (why is it a duck pond if there are no ducks, the name leads Clara to the Doctor, through Vastra’s one-word questions-truth, pure and singular), and it turned into River because she’s the only water in the forest. (Too bad Trenzalore is made of fields and that "I am the Doctor and I am afraid" line seems to come from another episode, I was getting feels. Oh, look, Clara’s mum is called Ravenwood.) Please let the other side of that name also have plot relevance. It’ll make me feel better-my first thought when I heard of a character called River Song was "most Mary-Sue name ever" =P
I have no coherent conclusion to this pile of errant thoughts, so I’ll pimp as an ending: the Rings of Akhaten post of elisi’s meta, which never fails to be the best thing ever (and she’s the one whose stuff made me way more symbolism-aware), promethia-tenk treating the New Age to a gorgeous Ponds and River vid with lovely bits of Clara-I’m not getting over the fact that this is actually her first, it’s so good-and this lovely Clara fic of honeynoir’s, which deserves way more comments than it has thus far.
Thanks for reading!
That little girl. Let’s go through the Merry/Melody parallels:
-the names! Okay, never mind that.
-two scared little girls running away. Obvious.
-two little girls apparently without a family to look out for them (no background on Merry’s side), chosen as babies (for Melody, actually before she was born) and brought up by a religious order with one sole purpose to their lives. They are special; they are alone, and yet surrounded by people preparing them to the roles they were chosen for. One is a weapon; the other, a vessel of knowledge and a sacrifice. And stuff wants to eat them, at least metaphorically: the "spaceman" that is in fact the astronaut symbolizing River being forced into killing, and the parasite feeding on life, and memories, and souls. It seems that both girls have their free will and individuality stolen from them and fed to the creature/thing that holds them.
-two brave little girls, however: Merry is scared of "getting it wrong", but willing to be a sacrifice. Melody is different, she called for help and tried to run-but I’m reminded of the line "It’s all right. It’s quite all right. I’m dying." Of course she knew she was going to regenerate-but from the feeling I get, both girls are used to having their lives ruled by something way bigger than themselves… If that makes sense.
-singing themes. More about this later.
-the knowledge and storytelling themes. As soon as Merry explained her role, all I could think about was the Library. Merry knows all the songs and the stories, River tells the Doctor’s future in her diary; they know the secrets-secret songs, secret names. Please note that this is an episode in which songs and knowledge and memories are concretely used to advance the plot and save the characters’ skins. Foreshadowing!
-symbolic elements: water vs. fire. Here it’s opposed, however-Merry’s flamboyant cloak vs. Melody’s astronaut suit or black and white photos, the darkness of the New York regeneration scene; rising from the water vs. being pulled into the fire. Regeneration light pouring out reminds of the light of the eaten memories, though. Not sure how this might be interpreted, but it’s lovely.
That’s it for the parallels. This might not be the first little girl with Melody sides-but seriously, knowledge and songs. KNOWLEDGE AND SONGS.
Those people are called the Sun Singers.
Big Bang memories:
RORY: But that's the sun.
DOCTOR: Is it? Well, here's the noise that sun is making right now.
(The Tardis noise.)
DOCTOR: That's my Tardis burning up. That's what's been keeping the Earth warm.
And guess what Song is trapped inside, sunshine?
So, we have two suns of destruction-one greedy pseudo-god, and one burning time machine whose explosion will cause cracks that swallow things so they’ll never have existed. What else have we got? We have good lines. First, "we don't stop running until we are out from under the shadow". Sorry, did you say shadow? *clutches heart* Library feels, again. And then there’s "Song’s over". Which is REPEATED. The chorister says it once. The Doctor says it TWICE, once before him, once after. "That’s it, then. Song’s over." The exact same sentence. And song, not the song. Each time, I had that great thrill racing through me. Because of course I had to think of River-and the end of her big arc (though it ended in s6, Trenzalore has yet to come). As the huge fangirl I am, the mere possibility that she could be "over" should have me appalled, but I want her to have an epic closure-not just keep hanging around till the writers/audience get tired of her, but go out with a bang! Heh. (Though a whimper is good too. Love a whimper.)
The song is over, because two little girls failed in their purpose: the "god" is awake, and the Doctor is left to feed it his memories, his "secrets that should never told". Likewise, Melody, now grown-up, refused to kill her love. Even before that, she took him back from the very brink of death-when she was shown she had a future, a future in which he loved her. A future in which she mattered as a person, not a weapon-like Merry matters as one unique little girl, not a sacrifice. Back to the point-neither song could put gods to sleep (or rather, a parasite and a good man…). In the end, the great secrets must be given.
What else could it mean, "Song’s over"? Well, it does remind strongly of Ten’s "Your song is ending". And the songs mean stories in there, too-think of the people singing songs of Donna Noble. And both times, we HEARD the songs, the music-the Ood song, and the Sun Singers. So. IS REGENERATION COMING? Be it Eleven’s end (well, that would be after the anniversary ep, at least) or River’s (in whichever way they might mean it, since she already died in the Library, blah blah)… I simply CAN’T wait for that finale…
Let’s finish on the word song itself … River Song, because Melody Pond-but where did the name Melody come from? Amy named her daughter after her daughter, timey-wimey loop-a circle with no beginning. Where did that come from? Pond is important (why is it a duck pond if there are no ducks, the name leads Clara to the Doctor, through Vastra’s one-word questions-truth, pure and singular), and it turned into River because she’s the only water in the forest. (Too bad Trenzalore is made of fields and that "I am the Doctor and I am afraid" line seems to come from another episode, I was getting feels. Oh, look, Clara’s mum is called Ravenwood.) Please let the other side of that name also have plot relevance. It’ll make me feel better-my first thought when I heard of a character called River Song was "most Mary-Sue name ever" =P
I have no coherent conclusion to this pile of errant thoughts, so I’ll pimp as an ending: the Rings of Akhaten post of elisi’s meta, which never fails to be the best thing ever (and she’s the one whose stuff made me way more symbolism-aware), promethia-tenk treating the New Age to a gorgeous Ponds and River vid with lovely bits of Clara-I’m not getting over the fact that this is actually her first, it’s so good-and this lovely Clara fic of honeynoir’s, which deserves way more comments than it has thus far.
Thanks for reading!