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Finished with Doctor Who Season 1
I loved the finale. What can I say ... I have this huge sappy weakness for "last stand" stories. Even if the Daleks STILL remind me more of giant salt shakers than something you'd run away from. (Being attacked by an army of shoulder-high, heavily armed salt shakers is nothing to sneeze at, though.) And Jack in Rambo mode, and the Doctor sending Rose home in the Tardis, and the origins of Bad Wolf ... much love, yes. Even if it's really, really best NOT to think about the time travel too much.
However, I'm starting to have, well ... problems with the way that the Doctor and Rose behave towards the people around them. Rose and the Doctor aren't bad people, but they're not particularly nice people -- it's not that they're deliberately cruel, but they just don't bother to care. Like leaving Jack behind on the space station (not that, I gather, it's a big deal to him or that he even minds; but it's the principle of the thing, dammit -- abandoning your allies on a space station full of dead people in a dead solar system is very bad form) or the way Rose has been treating Mickey, especially given how often he goes out of his way to help her.
Rose and the Doctor are very committed to high ideals -- saving the universe, that sort of thing -- but when it comes to the little, day-to-day things, like, say, behaving like decent human beings towards other people (aside from each other), they fail at it. Whereas, someone like Mickey, or Rose's mother, could care less about the fate of the universe -- what they do instead is protect and help the people they care about. It's a lot easier for me to sympathize with Mickey defending Rose's mom with a bat than to sympathize with Rose exploiting her boyfriend's affection for her in order to obtain his help chasing after the Doctor.
With the exception of each other, they're far more committed to their ideals than to the welfare of individual human beings. It seems like they're willing to give the people around them just enough information and assistance to really get them in trouble, and then turn them loose to fend for themselves -- like taking Rose's genius boy-toy from the museum to the year 200,000 and then abandoning him in an alien environment that he knows nothing about to sink or swim. I realize that the people around them are adults and are responsible for their own decisions, but at some point you *do* have responsibility for the effects of your actions on other people; it's not enough to fall back on the "Well, I know I talked him into it, but it's not my fault he said yes" defense. It's almost like they're little kids playing with toys -- getting what they want out of other people, but failing to notice the effects of their actions on anyone else.
They're willing to sacrifice themselves to save the universe, or apparently each other, but when it comes to anything beyond that, they're kind of self-centered, aren't they?
And sometimes they aren't even willing to take the saving-the-universe step, like the Doctor refusing to push the button to destroy the Daleks. Okay, I understand that he doesn't want to become like them -- that it's a violation of everything he believes in. But, at this point, he's not saving anyone but himself -- he's sacrificing the universe on the altar of his own conscience. The Earth is dead, everyone on the space station is dead; if he activated the device, all he'd be killing would be the Daleks (and himself). By pushing the button, he saves the universe; the only thing he stands to gain by not pushing the button is to keep his hands clean, at the cost of countless lives. Violating his own ideals to save the universe would be a tremendous sacrifice, but it's a sacrifice he wasn't willing to make; he chose himself and his own conscience over the lives of countless innocents.
Luckily Rose took the choice out of his hands, so there were no consequences for his failure to act. Convenient, that.
The ultimate problem here is that I'm finding it harder to empathize with the characters the more I see of them. I can't quite seem to sink into full appreciation of their devotion to each other when that devotion is generally at the expense of everyone else. Jack's comment about saving Rose, that "she's worth it" -- er, I'm not really sure that she is, actually, given that she's done very little lately except for single-mindedly pursuing the Doctor through time and stepping on whoever she has to in order to do that.
My, this has turned into a wee bit of a rant. ^_^ I'm certainly looking forward to seeing the Tennant episodes -- it's just that I'm having trouble right now emotionally engaging with the characters, because more and more they're turning out to be people I feel slightly skeevy empathizing with.
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I think most of my viewpoint on Rose being selfish and immature does have to do with the way she interacts with the people she cares about (Mickey, her mom, Jack, even the Doctor at times). She actually seems more "giving" with people she doesn't really know -- like the Dalek, or going after the little boy on the roof. She'll throw herself into danger to protect a stranger's life, but doesn't seem to extend the same mentality to looking after people that she loves. I can't really explain it to my own satisfaction, actually, unless it's just that she's very young and is still working on the transition from being the one who is looked after, to the one who looks after people.
She gives him a human connection; he has trouble relating to humans at all, trouble even explaining things in a way a normal person can understand (especially when he's been alone for a while, judging by what you see of him after he's been by himself; look at how wacked he is in the first ep!)
See, that's how I saw her at first, but now I'm not sure if she's influencing him so much as he's influencing her. In some ways, it's for the good -- she's getting a lot more concerned with the big picture, fate-of-the-universe type of things, and that's good, even if it's put her in a place where she can't relate so well to the people she used to be close to. But I think that she's also picking up on some of the Doctor's attitudes in a fairly negative way. Have you read the Discworld books? One scene in there that's really stuck with me is Carrot's "Personal is not the same thing as important", and the aftermath of that scene in which Vimes reflects that a good man who truly believes that is more dangerous than an evil man (or something along those lines). I kept thinking of that scene while watching the finale, because it seems like that is very much how the Doctor lives his life -- with one glaring exception, Rose herself -- and that she's picking that up from him, but at the same time losing sight of what makes her human.
This is fun. *g* And of course I don't mind you defending the character; it's always interesting to get my thought processes in order and, sometimes, to reassess my own attitudes if I just don't have the evidence to support them!
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Hmmm...well, Rose didn't leave Jack on Satellite 5; that was all the Doctor's doing and in the little 'Barcelona' special he sorta lies to her about it (Rose doesn't seem to remember anything that happened during her stint as the Bad Wolf, and the Doctor wants to keep it that way...) The way she treats Mickey and her mother...I don't see it as that terrible. The worst thing she does to them is say 'see you later' when they know she's going into terrible danger - but she's young enough that she really has no good concept of her own mortality; she doesn't think she can die, not with the Doctor, so why should they worry? And she'd have to tell them goodbye anyway, if she ever wanted to live a real life. That's just what growing up is.
For me, with Rose, there's few times I can think of that I really think, "Wow, she shouldn't have done that, she should have done this instead." And most of those are when she's dealing with her mother, and, well, girl leaving home with her mum, and Jackie's not exactly the most understanding sort, bound to be friction there. She's gone for 12 months and didn't call; but she did think of her mother, it's just that the TARDIS screwed that up a bit! And being able to apologize to your mother about something like that, realizing your mother's real fears about you and separating them from the clinging parents sometimes do when their only child is leaving them for the first time - there's definitely maturity required there, and Rose doesn't have it yet. But it doesn't bother me because she has so much caring and compassion in her, I was pretty much assuming she would grow into it naturally.
Mickey is older than her; Jackie's her mother. Rose has always been cared for by them. And the Doctor and Jack are both older and vastly more experienced in seemingly everything. So Rose, with them, still feels like a child, depends on them as a child does, and tends to regard them from a child's naturally self-centered angle. And all of them encourage this, in their ways; Jackie doesn't want her little girl growing up so fast, and the Doctor likes the admiration, etc. But I think it's something Rose is outgrowing on her own. And I don't think she takes them completely for granted; she does things like invite Mickey along, and buy souvenirs for her mother - she thinks of them, she's trying to make them part of her new life.
"Personal is not the same thing as important", and the aftermath of that scene in which Vimes reflects that a good man who truly believes that is more dangerous than an evil man (or something along those lines).
Ahh, I've only read a scattering of DW - er, DiscWorld! mass abbreviation conflict, Cap'n, the engines are failing! - so don't know this bit...what exactly is his meaning? Someone who's putting their personal emotions above doing the right thing? Because the Doctor can do that, as most people will, but I don't think he does it easily...he can only certainly protect so many people. Nearly everyone he gets close to in his travels he invites along on the TARDIS; Rose is one of the only ones to accept the invitation, but he innvites lots. And I think it's because he sees so much death, anyone he starts to care about, he wants to protect, and keeping them with him is the only way...
--or does it mean the opposite, that you should put personal caring above the grander goal? Because the Doctor does have such great compassion. He's not great with emotions, not gentle with people's feelings. And he doesn't let death affect him. But he loves any and all life; he'd never sacrifice any innocent life, not if there's any way he can stop it (guilty life...that's another discussion.) The Doctor is not 'ends justifies means,' very much not, to the point that he's unwilling to use the anti-plastic even at the last resort; he risks all to keep Pete Tyler alive (and that's not just for Rose's sake, I don't believe); he gives up Rose to keep his promise to her mother; bringing himself to kill the lone Dalek, even after all it and its species did, almost shatters him; and he can't commit a second genocide even for the sake of the universe...
--This is too much fun! But I'll stop now, get to back to non-Who things~ XD
The LJ comment limit is not my friend
*snicker* Hey, it's your life, after all!
The way she treats Mickey and her mother...I don't see it as that terrible. The worst thing she does to them is say 'see you later' when they know she's going into terrible danger
Ehhh ... I see the way she treats Mickey as quite a bit worse than that. She basically doesn't let him go, putting him in the position where he'd have to be the one to leave HER -- and, infatuated as he is, he's not willing to do that. Yes, she goes off with the Doctor (repeatedly), but with the clear expectation that she thinks he'll put his life on hold to wait for her. Even when she leaves at the start of the 2nd season (we just watched the first 2 eps of that tonight), she kisses him goodbye in a boyfriend-girlfriend kind of way. When she needs something from him, she doesn't hesitate to call -- but when he asks for any kind of commitment from her, she doesn't give it. She turns to him for comfort, but when he's feeling insecure about himself, she doesn't offer any kind of comfort back -- e.g. in the Season 2 premiere, when he tells her, "You really love him, don't you" and she just turns away. "I may not come back; you're free; move on with your life" may just be a formality, but she's never offered him that; and in fact her reaction to finding out that he's seeing someone else definitely indicates, to me, that she expects him to simply wait for her. I really loved the Season 2 premiere (and I'm liking the new Doctor quite a lot), but it *still* bothers me that she doesn't seem to reciprocate the comfort, support and help that Mickey offers her.
In fact, of all of it, it's her treatment of Mickey that bothers me the most. Yes, she's young and immature and doesn't have a really good grasp on the quid-pro-quo of human relationships yet; I understand that. But she just doesn't *ever* seem to grasp that she's doing him a disservice by behaving the way that she does towards him. And, yes, they did offer him the chance to come along, and he did decline -- but it's obvious that some people aren't temperamentally suited for time travel (e.g. Genius Boy, the ill-fated boyfriend from the museum), and it's likely that he wouldn't have fared too well if he *had* come along.
I definitely thing that Rose is doing the right thing by doing what she wants to do and traveling with the Doctor, certainly. She's got to live her life. But part of growing up is learning to live your own life while still keeping up with your responsibilities towards people who love you and depend on you (a theme which Supernatural has spent a lot of time developing). She's got a friggin' time machine; all she has to say is, "I'll be back day after tomorrow at 1:30 p.m. if I'm still alive; see you then and we'll have lunch." She could be gone for YEARS and still come back at a set time and place. The only time she's ever done that on the show was the "back in ten seconds" thing near the beginning and, well, she didn't. She's been doing a little better lately; I liked the Christmas episode. But, still, her "see you guys in five minutes or fifty years, I don't know which, but you'll be waiting for me when I get back, right?" attitude leaves me feeling uncomfortable.
well, Rose didn't leave Jack on Satellite 5; that was all the Doctor's doing and in the little 'Barcelona' special he sorta lies to her about it
I didn't really get that from "Barcelona", which we just watched -- she says "Let's go back and find Captain Jack", so she definitely knows that he's alive and back where they came from. I mean, I'm not saying that she's kicking Jack's dying body off a ledge here, and she's got other things to keep her busy, plus the Doctor doesn't seem concerned (he just tells her Jack's busy) so she's picking up that from him. There are extenuating circumstances. But it's still very obvious that Jack is NOT in her "risk everything to save them" circle of people, and her mother and Mickey sort of waver in and out of that category. The only person she really, consistently worries about and tries to protect is the Doctor. Which is touching, yes, and sweet, but also kind of codependent and maybe a bit unhealthy, since she doesn't act that way towards anyone else.
Re: The LJ comment limit is not my friend
I think the reason Rose's treatment of Mickey didn't bother me so much was because I wasn't very sympathetic to Mickey's position. Mickey is a couple years older than her, he should be the more mature one, but he isn't really doing anything with himself except following her around. He lets Rose walk over him, and yes, it's beause he's in love with her; but he's pathetic about it. He doesn't ever tell her off, doesn't ever tell her she has to choose. I saw a lot of the problems with the Rose/Mickey dynamic as being Mickey's flaws at least as much as Rose's. If Mickey had just gotten on with his life, had told her firmly "I'm seeing someone else now, sorry," as he had a right to do, then that would be one thing. But Mickey suggests a hotel room like they're still together; he makes sure he always is there for Rose, runs from his new girlfriend and pushes himself forward to be taken advantage of, because he's trying to win her back (and that's a confusing issue right there, because the Doctor isn't exactly her boyfriend no matter what Mickey thinks, and the competition is pretty much impossible.) Mickey's at least as codependent on Rose as Rose is with the Doctor...
I also believe that Rose doesn't quite realize how deeply in love Mickey really is...I get the feeling they grew up almost like brother and sister, since they apparently knew each other since Rose was a baby. And you do have a tendency to take family for granted, because family always will be there...
As far as the rest goes - well, she's got a time machine, but she's got a time machine that's, errr, not exactly the most reliable piece of equipment in the universe. Twelve hours, twelve months...she really shouldn't make promises when she can't keep them!
But, still, her "see you guys in five minutes or fifty years, I don't know which, but you'll be waiting for me when I get back, right?" attitude leaves me feeling uncomfortable.
That's the thing, I guess...I don't think this is the right attitude to have, necessarily, but I can so understand it, it's just such a natural attitude, that I have trouble faulting Rose for it. If she kept this attitude for all her life, yeah...but she's young, and so enjoying herself, I guess I think that kids have a right to a couple years of selfishness, before taking on the responsibilities of maturity. The Doctor, yeah, he's another story. But Rose is young enough that it doesn't bother me to see her being immature.
And Jack...aside from the outer demands of the story, which called for the char to be put aside, I didn't get from Rose's "let's go back and find him" that she knew for certain he was alive and well, but she didn't quite have reason to think otherwise. Rose was sent back to Earth before anyone actually died, and doesn't remember returning - she doesn't know for sure that the Daleks actually managed to kill anyone, much less everyone. And the way the Doctor tells her "He's got things to do, rebuilding the Earth" - it's hurried but it certainly sounds like it might've been Jack's choice to stay. And then she's plunged right into another crisis with the Doctor's new regeneration, so...
(a lot of this is subjective, definitely, and I'm biased toward Rose, so... ^^;)
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Ahh, I've only read a scattering of DW - er, DiscWorld! mass abbreviation conflict, Cap'n, the engines are failing! - so don't know this bit...what exactly is his meaning?
Oh, sorry. "Personal is not the same thing as important" -- It's not exactly "the end justifies the means"; it's more like, doing the right thing is more important than acting on one's personal feelings -- or, in the specific context of that particular scene, obeying the law (and keeping to one's moral code) is more important than taking revenge for one's girlfriend getting killed. (And Vimes's opinion on the whole thing is that leaving personal feelings out of the equation entirely is more dangerous than leaving them in.)
It's not an exact parallel, and it's difficult right now to come up with specific instances of scenes that made me think of the Doctor that way -- that for him, the individual or the personal wasn't nearly as important as the bigger picture.
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