I should’ve choked on the words in that title, but I absolutely stand by them. RTD fan or not, I am on the edge of my seat here. Let me clarify—I love RTD’s premiere eps, but never has one scared the pee out of me and left me with a billion questions this way. I can’t help but be impressed.
First? I was not expecting body bags.
I wanted the episode to start where The Impossible Astronaut ended, with Amy shooting the little girl in the spacesuit. Should’ve known that just isn’t how Moffat rolls. Instead, Amy is run down in the desert by Canton Delaware, who was a friend last time I checked! The image of his men throwing that body bag in front of Amy was powerfully evocative–shocking, with an extra touch of horror.
But the orphanage was just ridiculous.
Amy and Canton (friends again, his defection just another twisty trick from the Doctor) are looking for the little girl in an orphanage, and find a dimly lit building with a haunted caretaker. You just know the aliens are inside, and it’s all downhill from there. There’s graffiti on the walls in blood red: the words “Get out”. The caretaker doesn’t know how it got there but Amy sees the same words on his wrist. So not good.
Then Amy’s in a dark room with rows of empty beds (had a quick, pleasant flashback to Nine in Series One, the hospital scene in The Empty Child…aww, I loved Nine). The door shuts and she can’t get out…that’s when she sees that her hand is blinking red like an answering machine in the 80’s.
Did I mention that the Doctor implanted a recording device in their hands to keep track of alien sightings?
Last week in The Impossible Astronaut, we learned that looking away from the aliens causes a person to forget having seen them. The device is supposed to solve the problem. But here’s what makes it interesting, what, actually, makes it positively ingenious. When Amy met the alien last week the audience might have been omniscient, but this week? Oh, we’re stuck in Amy’s head. That means if Amy sees an alien, we won’t know until that light is blinking—and if Amy misses time, so do we.
Fear builds in quick flashes—Amy runs to the window and sees her arm covered in ‘crap, I saw an alien’ tally marks, but just a second glance shows the marks all over her face; scores of sleeping aliens are hanging from the ceiling (funny when the Krillitane did it in School Reunion, not so much this time); some weird lady talking through a hatch in a door that suddenly has no hatch—by the time Amy went into the little girl’s room, I’ll admit, I was scared. Deliciously so.
Other highlights?
There’s another Badass-Extreme moment for River Song. Amy’s rescued in a room full of aliens (reminding me of Nine and Captain Jack saving Rose from the middle of the Dalek fleet in The Parting of the Ways), which have been revealed as the Silence. River guards the Doctor while he stalks around being brilliant, and their banter sizzles. Great stuff, but she’s best when she starts taking the aliens out one by one, spinning gracefully as she rains destruction on their enemies. Much like the Doctor, I’m getting kind of attached to her. They had their first kiss and it was both awkward (the Doctor flails his arms and acts as if he’s never been kissed before by anyone, never mind River) and sad (River realizes that his first kiss with her must be her last with him).
The romance of Amy and Rory took a few harrowing twists and turns this time as well. Rory and the Doctor arrive at the orphanage too late to find Amy; all they find is her little red recorder, which is somehow still recording her although no longer physically attached. Rory tells her he’s coming for her and the Doctor explains that she can’t hear him. Rory, looking less than friendly, responds with, “She can always hear me, Doctor. Always. Wherever she is and she always knows that I am coming for her, do you understand me? Always.”
Sweet, but Amy takes some of the wind out of his sails by pleading for the Doctor to come rescue her. Later, a desolate Rory is holding her device when she starts talking about someone with a stupid face that she loves…you can see his spirits lift until she says, “My life was so boring until you dropped out of the sky.” Even I thought she was talking about the Doctor.
Luckily Amy is rescued and she refers to Rory’s stupid face. All is well again, until she starts talking about last week’s mystery pregnancy. She told the Doctor she was, now she tells him she isn’t. The audience knows that Amy saw a picture of herself holding a baby in the creepy little girl’s room, but she can’t quite grasp the memory. When the Doctor asks why she told him instead of Rory, she admits she had worried that the pregnancy would have been affected by her time traveling, whether or not her child would come out with a ‘Time Head’. Funny, but now there is doubt again for Rory (who is naturally eavesdropping), because why would the kid have a ‘Time Head’ unless the mom messed around with a Time Lord? Only it turns out Amy knows he’s listening, so then she must’ve been just messing with him. Right?
Except for this mind-blowing ending:
Questions, questions, questions. The aliens here were the Silence and now they’re defeated. Can that really be the end of it after they spent the entire fifth series hinting about ‘The Silence Will Fall’? That would seem anticlimactic and so seems unlikely. Amy is and isn’t pregnant; that girl is always weird. There’s a little kid out there who regenerates and the suggestion is that Amy is her mother. So Rory still has something to worry about after all?
I’m excited. I’m intrigued. And I’ve already said I’m impressed. This series is going new places, and this time I’m going with it.
Well, I just watched the opener to Doctor Who’s Sixth Season, thanks to BBC America On Demand and an unplanned day off from work. I was very impressed, and for an RTD-Rose fan, that’s really saying something.
Granted, I watched almost the entire Fifth Season while still mourning for Russell T. Davies and crew. I’d become so attached to the likes of Rose, Donna, Jackie, Captain Jack, and Mickey; it felt like the Tenth Doctor was grieving for them with me the last time I saw him. Yet this new Doctor starts off as if he popped into existence in Amelia Pond’s yard. Where did my Doctor go, and by that I don’t mean Christopher Eccleston or David Tennant, I mean the character I’ve been growing attached to for years? It seemed as if an entire new TimeLord had taken off with the Tardis. Add Steven Moffat’s public near-disdain for the romance of Rose Tyler and blatant disregard for previous canon—I was left pretty resentful.
Luckily, that’s almost the entire Fifth Season. The episode The Lodger was so fun and Matt Smith so completely charming, I found myself believing in the Eleventh Doctor at last. That episode actually made my top ten!
It helped this angst-lover that the relationship between Amy and Rory intensified enough to draw me in emotionally. I cared when he was sucked into the light and forgotten. By the time Rory reappears in The Pandorica Opens, the scene where he (unsuccessfully) fights his auton instructions to kill the woman he loves was an absolute tearjerker. It wasn’t Doomsday, but it was something.
River Song, whom I hated on sight in Season 4 just because she showed up out of nowhere and was automatically the Doctor’s closest companion ever, had become the character to watch in Season 5 (if only because she was the one connection to past seasons). Still, she won me over all on her own with her confidence and flirtation, culminating in the scene where she faces down the dalek that she believes has killed her Doctor. I can’t resist that kind of badass.
So…new season, new possibilities, and old grudges almost completely vanquished (with the help of the Christmas Carol episode…yes, I believe that Eleven was thinking about Rose when Kazran asked, “One last day with your beloved…which day would you choose?” How could it be River when he doesn’t even trust her yet? He may suspect that he will love her, but it makes more sense for his mind to run on his last love’s tragic end.) Eleven got my attention right away by announcing he was 1100-&-some-years-old, which annoyed me until I realized it was a plot point. Amy, River, and Rory have been summoned, apparently just to watch the Doctor die at the hands of an unidentified being in a spacesuit…except it turned out they weren’t the only ones. The more familiar 900-&-change-year-old Doctor has also been tapped, and his friends can’t tell him what they know. Ooh, intrigue. Plus, I loved when River slapped the Doctor—it reminded me of all the times he got slapped in the past (Jackie, Martha’s Mom, Donna), which made me smile.
The monsters here are nicely scary; Ood-like, suit-wearing aliens that electrocute people, yet as soon as you look away from them you forget they exist. I’m not in love with Moffat, but he’s very good at creepy. I’m less impressed with the spacesuit figure, though that’s the big threat to the Doctor. Honestly, Vashta Nerada anybody? Same outfit, presumably different insides. Moffat is so good with his cinematic experience, his storytelling ability, yet he consistently forgets that these “stories” are part of a series, and yes, we do remember what we’ve already seen in the last 5 seasons. Come on, buddy, acknowledge your venue.
The episode ends with a one-two punch: Amy announces she’s pregnant (WTF?!) and before I can even comprehend the implications of that, she jumps up and shoots in the direction of a figure in a spacesuit with the face of a desperate little girl.
The End.
Okay, so first, is this pregnancy for real? Amy isn’t a normal person, what with her Universe-altering abilities, so nothing about her can be accepted as fact. I can’t really figure out how a pregnancy would work with an official companion, unless Karen Gillian plans to leave after two seasons. Actually, if she lasts more than two seasons, she’ll be the longest lasting companion since the reboot. So, who knows?
As for the shooting, I can’t blame Amy for trying to save the Doctor at her first opportunity. Yet no one expected to see a terrified child possibly in the path of her bullet, and the show ends with both the Doctor and Amy looking horrified. Suddenly I couldn’t believe I’d have to wait an entire week until I can find out what happened. Wow.
I’m looking forward to the rest of the season, though I wonder how I’ll feel about that break between now and the second half, which airs in the fall. I have heard that my favorite 5th season character, Craig (played by James Cordon in The Lodger), will make a return appearance.
Eleven lost a lot in his previous incarnations, but he wouldn’t have gotten where he is without the ability to move on. I guess I’m finally ready to let him.
So I thought I’d make a list of my favorite episodes, from Davies through Moffat. (Makes sense, I’ve never seen any of the others.) I’ve tried to give a reason for each without giving too much away for those who haven’t seen them (but there are some spoilers), and then added a little dialogue. I also completely cheated, by including two-parters as one episode, thereby giving me an excuse to list more favorites. 😉 So what, come at me, bro.
1. Dalek – Series 1, Episode 6, written by Robert Shearman – This was the first episode where I realized I’d crossed the line from ‘watching this because my roommate put it on’ to being an actual fan. Hats off to the dalek for looking more ridiculous than any villain I’ve ever seen in my life and still managing, by the end of this episode, to impress me as a hard-core, death-dealing badass. Shearman and Eccleston convinced me in one intense, dramatic hour that this plunger-wielding trash bin was serious business.
The Doctor: What’s the nearest town?
Henry Van Statten: Salt Lake City.
The Doctor: Population?
Henry Van Statten: One million.
The Doctor: All dead. If the Dalek gets out it’ll murder every living creature; that’s all it needs.
Henry Van Statten: But why would it do that??!!
The Doctor: Because it honestly believes they should die.
2. Bad Wolf/The Parting of the Ways – Series 1, Episode 13, written by Russell T. Davies – This might actually be my favorite episode. Daleks wiping everybody out, Captain Jack’s last stand, Rose’s inability to give up, and then of course, the Bad Wolf was amazing. The part where the dalek shoots and she stops it with her hand?? “All things must come to dust…I want you safe…My Doctor.”
Rose: No, I didn’t mean that! But it was… it was a better life. And I – I don’t mean all the travelling and… seeing aliens and spaceships and things – that don’t matter. The Doctor showed me a better way of living your life. (to Mickey) You know, he showed you too. That you don’t just give up. You don’t just let things happen. You make a stand. You say no. You have the guts to do what’s right when everyone else just runs away, and I just can’t–
3. New Earth – Series 2, Episode 1, Davies – I don’t know if this is a fair choice, since I thought the ending was kind of ridiculous. Honestly, you just spray the vaccine cocktail on one person and then it gets passed along by touch? Lame. But Cassandra, and by that I mean Billie Piper and David Tennant as Cassandra, was just too much fun. Hilarious ep, very entertaining, and for me, sometimes that’s enough.
The Doctor: You were supposed to be dying.
The Face of Boe: There are better things to do today. Dying can wait.
Cassandra: Oh I hate telepathy. Just what I need; a headful of Big Face!
4. Tooth and Claw – Series 2, Episode 2, Davies – Of course I would like a werewolf ep, and the guy in the cage really did scare me when he was talking to Rose, and when he was changing and they were all chained up. I was impressed that this family show could actually freak me out that much. Good stuff!
Sir Robert: Nevertheless, that creature won’t give up, Doctor, and we still don’t possess an actual weapon!
The Doctor: Oh, your dad got all the brains, didn’t he?
Rose: Being rude again!
The Doctor: Good, I meant that one. You want weapons? We’re in a library! Books! The best weapons in the world! This room’s the greatest arsenal we could have – arm yourselves!
5. Love and Monsters – Series 2, Episode 10, Davies – Even though the Doctor and Rose were barely in this one and the ending was kind of sad and disturbing, I couldn’t resist the character Elton, who was charming and loveable. The “I said not Blue!!” part was pretty funny, too. 🙂
The Doctor: [Upon appearing from the TARDIS. To Elton] Someone wants a word with you.
Rose: You upset my mum!
Elton: [glances at the Abzorbaloff] …great big absorbing creature from outer space, and you’re having a go at me?
Rose: No one upsets my mum.
6. Army of Ghosts/Doomsday – Series 2, Episode 13 & 14, Davies – had no idea what the ghosts were and was shocked by that, and by what came out of the void ship, but it was awesome to see them go against each other. Beyond that, I need only 3 words: Bad. Wolf. Bay. :’-(
Rose: The first nineteen years of my life, nothing happened. Nothing at all, not ever. And then I met a man called the Doctor. A man who could change his face. And he took me away from home in his magical machine. He showed me the whole of time and space. I thought it would never end.
The Doctor: [with Rose on an alien planet] How long are you going to stay with me?
Rose: Forever.
7. Partners in Crime – Series 4, Episode 1, Davies – the mime scene with Donna was, for me, the funniest scene in any of the five seasons that I’ve seen yet, and that is saying something. The Rose cameo was so unexpected that my heart jumped in my chest.
The Doctor: …With Martha, like I said, it got… complicated. And that was all my fault. I just want a mate.
Donna: You just want to mate?!
The Doctor: I just want a mate!
Donna: You’re not mating with me, sunshine!
The Doctor: A mate! I want a mate!
Donna: Well, just as well, cos I’m not having any of that nonsense! You’re just a long streak of…nothing!
8. Turn Left – Series 4, Episode 11, Davies – this episode interested me, partly because I’d been waiting the entire season for Rose to come back, but partly because of the idea that making a different choice (especially the one between having faith in yourself or having none) would have such a drastic effect on the world. “There’s something on your back!” Delightfully creepy.
Wilfred: Sweetheart, come on. You’re not gonna make the world any better by shouting at it.
Donna: I can try.
9. The Stolen Earth/Journey’s End – Series 4, Episodes 12 & 13, Davies – Great fun to see all the companions and Harriet Jones, whom I always liked and felt sorry for in Christmas Invasion. I liked the end-of-the-world desperation that both episodes had. Loved the reunion of Rose & the Doctor (though how could I not, being the big Rose-Doctor shipper that I am), and everything that followed for them, though it certainly took getting used to.
Human Doctor: You made me.
The Doctor: Exactly, you were born in battle, full of blood and anger and revenge. Remind you of someone? That’s me when we first met, and you made me better. Now you can do the same for him.
Rose: But he’s not you.
The Doctor: He needs you, that’s very me.
10. The Lodger – Series 5, Episode 11, written by Gareth Roberts – I was having trouble with Moffat’s Who, and part of that was Matt Smith, who I could not see as a 900 year old Time Lord. However, in this one Smith was particularly irresistible and I found myself finally and completely won over. There is also a sweet love story, and the scene where the Doctor transfers memories through a head-butt has definitely made my top 10 funniest Doctor Who scenes ever. 😀
Craig: If you ever need me out of your hair, just give me a shout. [winks]
The Doctor: [winks back, pause] … Why would I want that?
Craig: Well, in case you want to bring someone over? Like a girlfriend, or… [looks at the Doctor’s clothes] boyfriend?
The Doctor: Oh! Oh, yes, yes, I will. I will shout, something like… “I WAS NOT EXPECTING THIS!”
(Total spoilers for season 1, 2, and 4 in this post; there is, in fact, no point in reading this post at all if you have not watched all of Doctor Who, Seasons 1-4. The following clip is from Journey’s End.)
You have to look at things from Rose’s point of view. Of course, from the outside in, you might think she’d betrayed the Doctor when she’d kissed that human hybrid. Why would she do that, you wonder? It wasn’t his hand that she’d been holding all those times before the devastation at Canary Wharf. Not his arms she’d thrown herself into time and time again, even most recently when they’d finally, finally reunited, after she’d worked so hard to get back to him. No matter how much the two men look and think alike, this guy is a stranger and the actual Doctor was standing right there. Besides, you might rightfully point out, it isn’t as if she had loved the Doctor only in that one form; that body, that man. No, their bond had been formed and solidified before he ever had brown eyes, great hair, and a suit. Did she forget him? That original Doctor in Rose’s life?
So go back with her. Remember what her life was like before Nine. Working as a shop girl, dating a boy she’d known her entire life, having given up on college, taking care of herself and living with her mother, watching the men come and go because her father was long dead. Anyone can imagine where a life like that would have led without the influence of extraordinary circumstances to intervene. How did the Doctor put it? Get up, go to work, come home, watch TV, eat chips, and go to bed only to start the same the next day.
Then this man shows up, and maybe they made a really odd pair, because you can bet she never expected to feel anything like that for him. Compare him with Mickey, and see that he wasn’t exactly her type. Too old, too snappish…but she knew he was special right away, and it wasn’t long before she understood the extent of his loneliness. She saw the pain in him and realized that she could fill some of that void, heal some of that pain. Rose was tough when she needed to be, but it would be hard to find a softer, kinder heart.
It had to be gratifying, later, to realize that she’d become important to someone so obviously vital and unique himself, not just in the world but in the Universe. They shared things that no one else could possibly understand. The 9th Doctor was always aware of her, watching what she did and said, saving her when she got into trouble, celebrating with her when she did something clever, and always challenging her to be her best self. This is a guy who saved and damned entire worlds while she watched. Try having a relationship with someone like that, just you and that person, together against the Universe. She knew she was never going back to her ordinary life. Not even death in some foreign world or time was scarier than that.
Except he sent her back, didn’t he? Because her death would be a worthy sacrifice in her eyes, but not in his. Better that she lived somewhere, somehow. Better that she finished out her days with her loved ones. He would gladly die alone, knowing she was able to live.
Now here’s where you need to pay attention, you need to really remember what happened. This girl, this young girl, was home safe with her mother, with her boyfriend, where she belonged, right? He’d done it; he’d rescued her, impossibly, from an entire fleet of daleks, and then sent her away in his own time machine, dooming himself to save her.
Recall now what she did about it. The idea of leaving him there to die alone was completely unbearable to her. She was freaking out, sick with the desperate knowledge that he was alone, sacrificing himself with no hope of rescue. She got into that Tardis, and while she didn’t know the danger of looking into its heart, nor did she care. She just had to get to him, at any cost. And she did, and she saved him, saved the future human race, and, incidentally, turned Captain Jack Harkness nearly immortal.
Except…she still lost the Doctor. All that effort and he was still gone and she’d never see him again, not that way, not ever. She didn’t even know it was coming; she’d no earthly idea what he was babbling about before he burst forth with golden light and became someone entirely different.
Take a second before going forward and think what that would be like, to lose someone like that. Yes, it wasn’t long before she realized this new man was, in fact, her Doctor. Yet is that really so? The Doctor himself would say that each time he regenerates, a new man walks away. SOMETHING dies. He is always surprised to find he still looks human, in fact. So the man who found her, who changed her entire life, who shared so much with her that they became like a married pair, was gone. In dreams, she must’ve still seen his face…
But it wasn’t as bad as it could have been. In this case, Rose, quite literally, had made him a new man. When she’d met him, he’d been bitter and hard, formed by his experiences in the Time War, haunted by the shattering knowledge that he’d been the one to end the existence of his own people, filled with cutting loneliness in a world that didn’t know or care to know that he even existed. Being with Rose had shown him differently, and loving her…for he did love her, something he’d been aware of at least since the dalek soldier had pointed it out when holding her captive in that underground museum…loving her had changed him even more. He was happy to sacrifice himself to save someone as sacred as she had become to him…and that sacrifice made him into a happier, lighter version of himself.
Here is where things get complicated. Her time with her first Doctor had made her love him quite unexpectedly, something she wasn’t even aware of until she thought she’d lost him for good. Yet here he is again, except this time…well, a little more her type. Physically.
It didn’t really help that other women kept “connecting” with him all the time. This had started in his old form too, that floozy “Lynda with a y” who wanted to jump aboard his ship at the Bad Wolf Corporation. Okay, so she died there. And maybe she wasn’t a floozy. But he’d liked her hadn’t he? Rose had been less than thrilled. With his tenth regeneration, she’d have more chances to feel less than thrilled. Less rude, more charm, that was part of the problem.
Except this isn’t infatuation, this is love, and when it is mutual you know it. Rose knew it.
So we skip way ahead to Canary Wharf, where she made that choice that women sometimes must make, when you can either follow the man you love into a scary, unknowable future or stay your mother’s child, safe and sound in a familiar world. Rose never even blinked, not when it came down to it. Maybe if she’d had more time to wallow over it…but it was do or die and she knew she’d rather die than lose him. But this time she forced him to agree. He was angry with her, because he didn’t want to be the reason she lost everything…yet he let her. He wanted her to stay, too.
Only she lost him anyway. Again.
And this time the separation seemed irrevocable, the heartbreak made worse by an even further closeness. They’d been through so much…and she’d chosen him, chosen him forever. Even if he’d already known it was never going to work, when you love someone, sometimes you take what you can get. Not that she’d have accepted anything else.
In so much pain was she, that she followed his voice in her dreams to the literal end of the earth. There wasn’t a choice, not for her. Only it was just for a good bye, and a lousy one at that. She couldn’t touch him. She could only fall apart, and finally say out loud the unspoken truth between them. Yet they’d be cut off before he could say it back. Not cold comfort, no comfort at all.
The End.
Right?
Give me a break. Who would believe that Rose, the chick who drove the Tardis back to the center of a dalek fleet, would have given up? Can you see her doing that? Accepting what had happened, maybe striking up her relationship with Mickey again, working for Torchwood and getting to know the father she’d never had? I wonder if it even fleetingly crossed her mind.
Because I bet instead that she was already thinking that if they’d found a way before to cross worlds, they could do it again. Her father was an important man in Torchwood, and she’d been the Doctor’s companion. Surely they’d want her help. Surely they’d be willing to help her in return.
Of course, the Doctor had said it was wrong to do it, that Universes could collapse and the Worlds, all Worlds, might just end. He wouldn’t want her to take that chance. He had been so mad at Torchwood; if they’d never done such things, he wouldn’t have lost Rose in the first place. Not then, not that way.
Well, I think she’d have done it anyway and just let him be mad about it. Let him sulk and stew, but she’d be with him again and he’d just have to get over it. I’m betting that when the stars started going out and she realized what it meant, she only doubled her efforts. I’m betting she’d have crossed the worlds regardless. The fact that they needed him only meant she had to move quicker.
So she’d crossed worlds, and faced untold dangers, and rewritten history…all to see him. To be with him.
To hold his hand.
When she thought he was going to regenerate in front of her, yet again, she’d been frantic. She knew, KNEW, that this next doctor would be like starting all over again. And she is only human. Her feelings, her heart, can’t keep up with all the changes and whose to say this new Doctor would feel a thing for her? Fortunately, he stayed himself and at long last she was able to hold him, be held by him. Then she stood at his side: while he watched the Tardis supposedly destroyed; when they towed the Earth back where it belonged.
So back where this started. At Bad Wolf Bay a second time, when she realized he’d brought her back to the world she’d fought so hard to escape and he told her she had to stay there…with “him”. This fake, second Doctor. She had but moments to try and understand.
Here was this human hybrid Doctor…and she stared and tried to find a difference and could not, because there just aren’t any. He had all the memories, as if he’d been through everything with her when he certainly had not. Even the ones from before…from the first Doctor. He had those, too.
But that’s the crux of why it is so wrong. Because she’d been in love with the Doctor before he had this face, this body. It was not this incarnation that she loved, but the Doctor himself, and he was saying she’d never see him again. But he loved her and she knew it! It was wrong.
Only he wasn’t going to even try to say it this time, not ever. Why hurt himself with the admission? What was the point? In over 900 years, he’d learned something that young Rose was never going to be able to accept; love does not conquer all. It couldn’t conquer the fact that they were different species. He was never going to be able to settle down and grow old with Rose, much as he might have liked the chance. She was going to grow old and die and all he could do was watch; he’d told her that, hadn’t he?
So, fine. He could give her this, and in a way, he could give it to himself. Some other world, where he could love her the way he wanted to, be with her properly, live and die together…and if it meant he had to watch her fling herself into the arms of some mirror-image man…if it meant he could never see her again, touch her hand, hear her voice…well, maybe he just would rather take most of the pain onto himself, rather than let her waste her life on a man who wasn’t human, whom she eventually would have to lose anyway.
Okay, that is his logic, but our Rose, our fighter, our crosser of worlds, why would she ever give in? She’d never listened to him before, right? Why start now?
Well, maybe she didn’t mean to. It wasn’t supposed to be like that. She was supposed to fling herself at him, her Doctor, the proper Doctor, and tell him that he was right; it doesn’t need saying, not when it can be expressed with one true kiss. The kiss should have been his.
Rose would have done that, probably meant to do that. But maybe he’d been telling her for so long that they couldn’t work it out. He was always going to do his own thing. And if you think she’d ever forgotten Sarah Jane and the hard lesson she’d learned at that school, you’d be wrong. How long was he going to keep her around? She’d been willing to deal with that later, and he said it was different with her, right? Except it didn’t seem like she believed that. One day there’d be another Madame Pompadour and she’d be left as a dinner lady in some time where she didn’t belong…
Okay, maybe not. And the chance to grow old with the human Doctor wasn’t enough to blind her to the fact that he wasn’t her Doctor. So what did it? What tipped the scales…?
Look again. It was the Doctor. He was looking down at her with those same sorrowful dark eyes. He’d taken her hand, just as he’d always done, and it’d felt the same as it always felt. He’d leaned in, he’d said…
You can’t imagine how much it would have meant, but try. She’d been waiting, waiting so long to hear those words. She’d said them herself and then he’d been gone…
So aside from being a Fangirl, I can specify that I’m a Shipper. If you didn’t already know, a Shipper is someone who fixates on a certain relationship or pairing in any fandom, whether intended by the creators of said fandom or just imagined by the maniacal shipper. So here are my current favorites, in no particular order, and the reasons behind them.
Romantic Relationships:
Doctor/Rose – Doctor Who (OTP!!!) – As mentioned in my first post, they are my current favorites. Rose is a young woman with a boring dead-end life, little money, a boyfriend she’s known forever, and no future prospects when she bravely leaves it all behind to be whisked off among stars, planets, past, and future by one badass alien. That’s why when I say Doctor/Rose, it doesn’t just refer to the 9th or 10th Doctor, but the Doctor himself, in any incarnation after 9. I know it couldn’t have worked out for them long term, I just believe that on some level they will always be in love.
Veronica/Logan (LoVe) – Veronica Mars (OTP) – This is another top favorite of mine, because the relationship wasn’t originally intended by the writers, and I never saw it coming since they started out the series as mortal enemies. Their first kiss was epic on its own and the relationship took over the entire show for me from that point on. All her other boyfriends couldn’t touch this guy, even if he was a little crazy. Besides, save someone’s life 100x, you’re entitled to burn down a few community pools when you need to.
Buffy/Angel – BTVS (OTP) – They were best the first 3 seasons. I almost forgot about them until YouTube reminded me, but Buffy and Angel were the reason I got into that show in the first place. The relationship built slowly because it was hard for them to be together but they were always drawn to each other. Until he loses his soul and tortures her for a season. After that, it didn’t matter who she met, she was always going to love Angel more. Of course, since this is how I feel, I didn’t find any interest in the Cordy/Angel match or any other when he got his own spin-off.
Elena/Stefan – Vampire Diaries – Sorry Damon fans, he is an incredible character but if you’ve read the original trilogy you know that all Elena wanted from that first time she saw him was to be with Stefan. The TV show might be different, but that could be why I don’t watch it. I must have read that original trilogy a billion times and am loyal to that version. I also don’ t know what happened with any books after the trilogy, because the reviews are poor and I’m told that Damon’s character is pretty much castrated.
Bella/Edward – Twilight Saga (OTP) – books & movies. A lot of people have a problem with the new brand of vamps Stephanie Meyer invented, but I’m not worried about them sparkling in the sun. This is a great love story, even if the first book dragged in parts. I don’t really get the ‘Team Jacob’ point of view; in the books I mostly wanted to punch him. Love him in the movies though.
Sookie/Bill – True Blood/Southern Vampire Series (OTP) – Both the TV series and the book for this pair, although True Blood has more passion because of the searing-hot chemistry between the actors. Like Damon, Eric is such an awesome character and everybody likes a witty, bad-boy type, but how do you forget that first look Bill and Sookie shared in Merlottes, that went on forever?? The way I see it, they are so in love and would be perfect for each other, except events beyond their control continually pull them apart. That doesn’t mean they aren’t meant for each other.
Robin/Barney (Swarkles) – How I Met Your Mother – I think they want similar things and I like all these little hints between them, even when she was supposed to be Ted’s great love. I don’t actually mind that they broke up, although that wasn’t my favorite episode. I mean the show is still going, they’re both pretty funny when they’re single, and when I’m shipping, sometimes its more fun watching and waiting for subtle hints and moments between them when they’re apart than actually watching them happy together. I do feel like the writers will eventually reunite them, and I hope by then they can approach the idea in a unique way that suits the characters, instead of trying to make them fit the ‘ideal couple’ mold, the way that Marshall and Lily do.
Christina/Jesse – Point Pleasant – This is a show that not many people would remember, because only 8 episodes actually aired. But she was the daughter of the devil and he was the lifeguard who saved her when she washed up on the shore. She had dark powers and even a being from Hell in the form of Grant Show trying to get her to embrace her evil heritage, yet her love for Jesse (and the friends she makes) keeps her human. The show is full of mystery and darkness, all the characters are constantly choosing between good and evil, and nobody firmly belongs to one side or the other. I ended up buying the DVD set just so I could at least find out how the season would have ended.
So these are the ships that I’ve been into for the past few years, but I’m always on the hunt for more. If anybody knows of some pairings that I might be missing out on, I’d love to hear about them. 🙂
Otto the Fangirl 