Christmas Invasion, more thoughts

[kerravonsen]

Well, I've just re-watched The Christmas Invasion with the commentary (Russell T Davis, Juile wassername, and someone-else-i-forget). I ended up having to go my last-resort method, which was to play the episode on my main PC, and the commentary on my laptop, since each application wanted to hog the soundcard. I also kept on pausing one and the other, because I wasn't certain I had them lined up correctly, and then I'd over-correct, and so on. Oh well.

Harking back to my previous post, I am now even more convinced that it was Doctor-Sue, because RTD was saying how he felt the task of the episode was to convince people that this really was the Doctor, how he had to come in and save everyone at the last minute or he wouldn't be a hero, and so on. In other words, he really was beating us over the head with it, because he was afraid Tennant would be rejected by all the new viewers who'd never seen a regeneration before. And while it's true that you can't just treat a regeneration like it's nothing remarkable, because you wouldn't be true to the characters that way, there's more than one way of milking the angst out of that. But RTD felt that the best way of proving him a hero was (a) to make sure he is the only one who can save the day (b) at the last minute (c) and have everyone else emoting about how helpless they are without him. That's the telling-not-showing mistake, really. Which is kind of an odd assertion for me to make about a visual medium, but there's different kinds of telling, I guess. It's rather sad that RTD didn't see another way of doing it; he even made a remark in the commentary that Tennant performed so well that maybe they wouldn't have needed to done "this is the Doctor, really!" so much -- but then immediately corrected himself and said that yes, they needed to do it.

They didn't need to do it. I really don't think that having your new hero asleep for most of the episode is a good way of us getting to know him, y'know? Gee, now I wish there was a whole different first-Tennant-episode in which we actually do get to see him in action, and have real reactions to his regeneration, instead of melodramatic weeping over his bedside. That's a cheap shortcut; it bypasses all the real coming-to-terms stuff.

But, hey, it's done, we have to live with it.

At least this gives me some hope that RTD might be a bit more restrained in the coming season, being relieved of the "regeneration anxiety" of this episode.

Taking RTD's scripts... I think he's really good at the character moments, lovely dialogue, but his weakness is that he is easily tempted to go the cheap and easy Mary-Sue/melodrama route... or perhaps not so easily tempted, but we sure do notice when he fails to resist -- perhaps because we feel he should know better?
Interestingly enough, looking at the extras on some of the 2005 DVDs, an interview with Christopher Eccleston, he said that one of the main reasons he came on board was because RTD was writing it. Which kind of makes sense, RTD being strong with characters, would be the kind of writer who really appeals to actors. And to character-junkie fans, I have to admit that.
Just... a bit of restraint, hmmm?

I think Russell T Davis did a much better job of conveying "yes, this is the Doctor" in the Children In Need special, than he did in the whole of the Christmas Invasion.

Comments

[jhall1.livejournal.com]

...RTD was saying how he felt the task of the episode was to convince people that this really was the Doctor, how he had to come in and save everyone at the last minute or he wouldn't be a hero, and so on. In other words, he really was beating us over the head with it, because he was afraid Tennant would be rejected by all the new viewers who'd never seen a regeneration before.

I find it rather alarming that RTD seems to have so little confidence in the perceptiveness of his audience. I hope he doesn't think that everything needs to be pitched at a Lowest Common Denominator level.

[kerravonsen]

I find it rather alarming that RTD seems to have so little confidence in the perceptiveness of his audience.

I think he assumes that the majority of his audience are children, at least from some of the remarks he's made.

[jhall1.livejournal.com]

But I think he's mistaken if he assumes that children aren't perceptive. (Except for very young ones, perhaps, at whom surelt the programme isn't being aimed.)

[kerravonsen]

But is it really a matter of perceptiveness that he's worried about? He doesn't want to lose his audience, so he's not trusting them to be able to make their own judgement, he has to force them to come along with him. Which, of course, some parts of his audience (such as me) finds very alienating.

[jhall1.livejournal.com]

I think that we're saying the same thing, really. He didn't trust the audience to be able to perceive that the regenerated Doctor has all the essential characteristics of the old one without it being rammed down their throats.

[kerravonsen]

Maybe he's second-guessing himself. After all, just because he's a fanboy, doesn't mean that the fickle never-seen-the-old-Who audience would stay with it.

It doesn't help that he doesn't seem to have anyone around to slap him with a fish when he goes overboard.

[kalypso-v.livejournal.com]

The thing that baffles me is that I've really enjoyed RTD's previous work (well, Revelations was preposterous melodrama, but I think it was meant that way), and he's a fanboy, so I had very high expectations. And, well, I'm not disappointed, because I enjoyed a lot of the last season, but I kept noticing the episodes I enjoyed least were the ones he wrote.

[kerravonsen]

Maybe the problem is that he is a fanboy, so he can't just relax and see how it goes... It matters too much to him, so to speak.

[kerravonsen]

(looks at icon) (blinks)

That wouldn't be Star Cops in the background of that, would it?

[kalypso-v.livejournal.com]

Er - yes! It was a rather convoluted comment on the end of the last series, I think.

[kerravonsen]

That Rose was sick? Was this a "spoilers for PotW" comment, or a "I don't like Rose" comment?

Gee it's been a long time since I've watched Star Cops...

[kalypso-v.livejournal.com]

Um... I think I got the idea from the BBC's Bad Wolf (http://www.badwolf.org.uk/) site, which appeared during the season. If you follow the link to "Revelations" and scroll down to "The Bad Wolf in music", one of the songs - I think it was the French chansons, but it's refusing to open for me to check - was suddenly interrupted by a voice reading the Blake poem, which did seem uncannily like the Star Cops virus. I was wondering whether I made the icon before seeing the final episode, as it's Boom Town Rose, but looking back at my files I did try it with Glowy Bad Wolf Rose and just didn't like it as much. It was one of my earliest efforts with Gimp.

[mistraltoes.livejournal.com]

RTD was saying how he felt the task of the episode was to convince people that this really was the Doctor, how he had to come in and save everyone at the last minute or he wouldn't be a hero, and so on.

This reminds me of my frustration with the last few seasons of Buffy, in which Buffy always had to be shown to be right, even when it made no sense, and also the Buffy writers' assertion that Buffy couldn't learn anything, because being the main character, she couldn't change too much. It's just talking down to the audience--always a mistake--although in the case of Who, it's probably exacerbated by the writer's being a fan.

[kerravonsen]

and also the Buffy writers' assertion that Buffy couldn't learn anything, because being the main character, she couldn't change too much

What, you mean, everyone around the main character is allowed to change, but the main character his/herself isn't? No wonder fans tend to go for secondary characters! What a load of codswallop. It's just like the reset button, only worse. Especially as the Buffy writers were intelligent enough not to go for the reset button in general in Buffy. Bah!

although in the case of Who, it's probably exacerbated by the writer's being a fan

Yeah, I've been wondering about that. RTD being a fan does have its advantages, he does know his stuff, and if he didn't then everyone would be moaning and complaining (I think part of the reason for the awfulness of the 8th-Doctor movie was that it jarred so much in certain places). However it's also a disadvantage because... he can't step back and trust the audience.

[kalypso-v.livejournal.com]

By the way, matildabj's icon suddenly made me wonder - is there a deliberate reference to Adam Adamant (http://www.bbc.co.uk/cult/classic/adamant/) in the Tenth Doctor's look and weapon of choice?

[kerravonsen]

Well, it wasn't mentioned in the commentary. I mean, we know there's deliberate references to Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy and The Lion King because they're in the script... but I think the sword fighting was just general swashbuckling. The commentary mentioned a few other times the Doctor had done swordfights before, so I don't think it needed to be anything other than self-referential.

[kalypso-v.livejournal.com]

I remember the Third Doctor fighting the Master. No, it was the look more than anything - Tennant does have a slight resemblance to Gerald Harper, and then there's the slightly retro coat, and the blonde sidekick, and being a hero slightly out of place in modern London. Though as the website points out, AA was created by the same people who thought up Doctor Who, so I suppose it could be two-way.