Did anyone like Martha?

[Obiwanshinobi]

"When I was your age television was called BOOKS!"

 

[The Mirrorball Man]

Are you the kid from The Princess Bride?

That's it? That's all you got? You'd best return to a thread better suited to your comprehension.

Well, this was actually intended as a friendly wink, I wasn't trying to attack your honor. Though it's true that if you think love stories are "sickening", maybe you should talk to someone about it.

 

[Steve67]

Are you the kid from The Princess Bride?

That's it? That's all you got? You'd best return to a thread better suited to your comprehension.

Well, this was actually intended as a friendly wink, I wasn't trying to attack your honor. Though it's true that if you think love stories are "sickening", maybe you should talk to someone about it.

You twist my words and disregard all that other great stuff I posted. I never wrote that love stories were sickening. I was referring to the Doctor-Rose relationship:

"but it's not the goopy theatrics that The Doctor and Rose had. It was positively sickening at times."

 

[Sci]

Well, to each his own, but I cannot even begin to understand why someone would prefer simplistic, more two-dimensional characterization to a more fully fleshed-out character. To me, that's literally akin to saying you'd prefer to watch, say, Superfriends rather than Bruce Timm's Justice League, or that you'd prefer the Adam West Batman to Christopher Nolan's The Dark Knight. There comes a point where too much simplicity of characterization means inferior quality of the show -- and it's hardly as though even the nuWho companions are the height of sophisticated characterization on modern television.

You can have deep friendship without it being romantic or otherwise sentimental mush.

Certainly. But you didn't say that. You said, and I quote: "That's part of the problem I have with nuWho: the over emphasis on assistants (and to a lesser extent, their families). It's a change I don't like, as IMO they were merely supposed to serve as an expositionary tool so that the Doctor didn't have to talk to himself all the time."

You said, in other words, that you disliked the fact that nuWho has made the companions into main characters alongside the Doctor rather than walking plot devices.

A show doesn't have to be from the internet age to be considered "sophisticated."

Of course not. I never said it did. But neither were the majority of programs from early in television's history as sophisticated as the majority being aired in the modern era. Television today is more likely to abandon the episodic format, more likely to use some variation of the long-term plot arc, more likely to have sophisticated characterization, and more likely to contain metatexual awareness.

Since when are hamfisted and egregious displays of emotion sophisticated? You can have friendship which is a kind of love, but it's not the goopy theatrics that The Doctor and Rose had.

This is subjective, but I honestly don't know what you're talking about here. The Doctor and Rose never behaved in a way I haven't seen plenty of people behave in real life. If anything, I found their relative restraint frustrating; there was really no reason that was consistent with their characterizations for RTD not to have Rose and the Doctor begin an actual, openly-declared romantic relationship after the mid-point of Series Two. In particular, I never really bought the idea that Rose would react to boarding the TARDIS again and seeing the Doctor at the end of "The Satan Pit" after thinking she'd lost him by doing anything other than running up to him and kissing him.

It was positively sickening at times.

Why?

It shouldn't be about "Will they or won't they?",

I agree. At a certain point, "Will they or won't they?" should give way to either, "They have" or "They'll never." I like the way Moffat has handled the Doctor/Amy relationship -- it went from some will-they-or-won't-they? in "The Eleventh Hour," "Victory of the Daleks," and "Flesh and Stone" to a definite "Nope" in "Amy's Choice," "Day of the Moon," etc.

it should be about The Doctor and the (hopefully) brilliantly-realized sci-fi concepts, or the sociological and moral concepts that make science fiction so interesting.

See, the problem here is that you're saying, in essence, that Doctor Who should not be an actual story. Stories require characters -- characters with recognizable emotions, relationships, and motivations. Otherwise, you don't have characters, you have figures whose behavior is inherently arbitrary. Without characters, you don't really have a story, you have, at best, a fictitious essay pretending to be a story.

Doctor Who should absolutely have brilliantly-realized sci-fi concepts. It should absolutely have sociological and moral concepts. But it should also have strong characterization, because if it doesn't, then there's no good reason to present those concepts in a fictional context.

To put it another way, let's look at historical fiction. Historical fiction -- "costume dramas" -- require many of the same practices as science fiction. They require a lot of worldbuilding; they have to create a vivid, three-dimensional world that presents to the audience the various ways in which the world of the past differed, in technology and in social structure, from the present. And yet no one would argue that historical fiction should not feature vividly-drawn characters in favor of those sociological and technological concepts -- and rightly so. Because people know full well that people lived in the past, and that as such historical fiction has an obligation to create naturalistic characters. You can't separate the technological and sociological concepts of historical fiction from the obligations of vivid characterization -- and neither should you be able to do so with science fiction.

It's a show about the journey, the adventure, and the exploration of time. You know, "to boldly go..."

Well, yes and no. Specifically, modern Doctor Who is about humanity's journey throughout time. But either way, there's no point in doing a story about boldly going if your characters are so two-dimensional that they're not boldly going, just going. That's the mistake Star Trek: Voyager made. They were so busy going that no one was feeling bold anymore -- no one was feeling anything anymore.

I find the needless emphasis on emotional manipulation, whether it be "sophisticated" or not, to be a hinderance to the show's concepts. RTD is a Coronation Street/Queer as Folk kind of writer and that style was imposed on Dr Who, to the delight of many, but I found it to be mawkish and embarrassing.

Then, like I said, you're really not looking for a story. You're looking for a speculative essay pretending to be a story.

 

[Steve67]

Certainly. But you didn't say that. You said, and I quote: "That's part of the problem I have with nuWho: the over emphasis on assistants (and to a lesser extent, their families). It's a change I don't like, as IMO they were merely supposed to serve as an expositionary tool so that the Doctor didn't have to talk to himself all the time."

You said, in other words, that you disliked the fact that nuWho has made the companions into main characters alongside the Doctor rather than walking plot devices.

That's right. I especially don't like how most of these characters--and yes, their families--have been shoved down our throats. I watch Dr Who for The Doctor, not Mickey, not Rory, and sure as hell not Martha's mother. And yes, the assistants are strictly take-or-leave--and making one of them the love of the Doctor's life was just too much.

Of course not. I never said it did. But neither were the majority of programs from early in television's history as sophisticated as the majority being aired in the modern era. Television today is more likely to abandon the episodic format, more likely to use some variation of the long-term plot arc, more likely to have sophisticated characterization, and more likely to contain metatexual awareness.

It's an argument for another thread, but on the whole, I tend to have mixed feelings on season-long story arcs. If one likes the arc in question, they're great; if not, they can render an entire season unwatchable. Hey, don't soap operas have long arcs?

The Doctor and Rose never behaved in a way I haven't seen plenty of people behave in real life. If anything, I found their relative restraint frustrating; there was really no reason that was consistent with their characterizations for RTD not to have Rose and the Doctor begin an actual, openly-declared romantic relationship after the mid-point of Series Two. In particular, I never really bought the idea that Rose would react to boarding the TARDIS again and seeing the Doctor at the end of "The Satan Pit" after thinking she'd lost him by doing anything other than running up to him and kissing him.

I've already alluded to my preference to the unspoken affection, the implied but present bond. I don't object to their being love and admiration; I've already stated that. For all of today's "sophistication"--read: over-the-top sentimentality (Donna's grandfather; Van Gogh story) and hammered-home emotionalism ("Doomsday") in the guise of "realism" and "modern TV storytelling" I find today's shows to be just as over-the-top and melodramatic as, say, a 1940s Bette Davis movie. Murray Gold's clearly in love--to keep with nuWho's theme--with the sound of his own arrangements and all this is in step with the worst aspects of the Tennant-Piper lovefest.

See, the problem here is that you're saying, in essence, that Doctor Who should not be an actual story. Stories require characters -- characters with recognizable emotions, relationships, and motivations. Otherwise, you don't have characters, you have figures whose behavior is inherently arbitrary. Without characters, you don't really have a story, you have, at best, a fictitious essay pretending to be a story.

People here keep equating Soap Opera theatrics with "deep" and "meaningful" drama, but it's just not so. NuWho employs these things and viewers lap it up. It's all the more ironic in this age of the dying daytime soap, which has merely moved to a later time slot.

Doctor Who should absolutely have brilliantly-realized sci-fi concepts. It should absolutely have sociological and moral concepts. But it should also have strong characterization, because if it doesn't, then there's no good reason to present those concepts in a fictional context.

Once again, all this can be done without dragging Ali MacGraw and Ryan O'Neal-style storylines into it.

To put it another way, let's look at historical fiction. Historical fiction -- "costume dramas" -- require many of the same practices as science fiction. They require a lot of worldbuilding; they have to create a vivid, three-dimensional world that presents to the audience the various ways in which the world of the past differed, in technology and in social structure, from the present. And yet no one would argue that historical fiction should not feature vividly-drawn characters in favor of those sociological and technological concepts -- and rightly so. Because people know full well that people lived in the past, and that as such historical fiction has an obligation to create naturalistic characters. You can't separate the technological and sociological concepts of historical fiction from the obligations of vivid characterization -- and neither should you be able to do so with science fiction.

I agree, but let's leave Jackie Tyler and the rest of the Eastenders out of it. The Doctor should spend less time leaping about like some cosmic Jerry Lewis and more like the dramatic force he should be.

It's a show about the journey, the adventure, and the exploration of time. You know, "to boldly go..."

Well, yes and no. Specifically, modern Doctor Who is about humanity's journey throughout time. But either way, there's no point in doing a story about boldly going if your characters are so two-dimensional that they're not boldly going, just going. That's the mistake Star Trek: Voyager made. They were so busy going that no one was feeling bold anymore -- no one was feeling anything anymore.

If that were the case, then people would be more excited about who the next assistant would be, and all that emotional "weight" she'd bring, and of course her friggin' family...rather than the next regeneration.

As for Trek, TNG didn't exactly have anyone feeling anything, did it? You'd think from sitting through seven seasons of that, there'd be something between those characters. All the feeling died with TOS. But once again, another thread.

I find the needless emphasis on emotional manipulation, whether it be "sophisticated" or not, to be a hinderance to the show's concepts. RTD is a Coronation Street/Queer as Folk kind of writer and that style was imposed on Dr Who, to the delight of many, but I found it to be mawkish and embarrassing.

Then, like I said, you're really not looking for a story. You're looking for a speculative essay pretending to be a story.

I can play that simplification game: Then NuWho viewers are looking for soap opera masquerading as intelligent, adult drama.

BTW, I appreciate the excellent discussion in this thread. It's a rare thing in the age of the "TOS Five Word Thingy."

 

[Whofan]

Ace was a developed companion years before Rose. There's even some similarities between Ace and Amy's arc (Time travel manipulations, paradoxes and stuff).


Instead of just putting up a clip from Survival which you say has bad acting you should actually watch ghost light curse iof fenric survival and understand that oldwho had companions who were people instead of walking plot devices too

 

[Nerys Myk]

Rose is my favorite, hands down.

Same.

Really, her return could only help the show, at this point.

What a frightening thought...there were moments in the second series where I considered stopping watching because the giggling schoolgirls routine she and Ten had was so grating. Shame as she'd been really good with Eccleston.

Sadly it wouldn't surprise me to see her and 10.5 return in 2013...with luck it'll only be briefly though.

10.5 grows up to become the Cushing Doctor.

 

[Newspaper Taxi]

...And the Cushing Doctor regenerates into the Shada Doctor somehow! It's all starting to make sense!