(no subject)
So, I have to admit. I was really excited for yesterday's episode. For me, it was very much a case of missing the Doctor. Not Tennant, mind you--while I do love and adore David, and miss him greatly onscreen, I found myself really just missing our hero. The flawed, funny, mad, clever, strange, wonderful Doctor. And my thoughts on Matt Smith were basically, as long as he can encompass all those conflicting emotions and qualities, as long as he can embody the Doctor for me, then I will love and adore him, too.
Don't get me wrong--I will still fight anyone who says David wasn't The Doctor. And I still miss Rose desperately. And I do feel a bit icky trying to reconcile this idea that the Doctor is still the Doctor regardless of the regeneration yet now he that he's changed faces, he's completely a free agent for nubile, young companions and their Kiss o grams. (Oh, Moffat. Sigh.)
But I digress.
Despite all these feelings, basically all I wanted from the first episode was the sense that the show I loved was back.
And I sort of got that.
I thought the storytelling was almost 100 percent awesome. Moffat, despite his tendency to rely a little too much on making the show "sexy," really crafted some genuinely sweet, terrifying, exhilarating moments in the episode.
-In particular, I loved little Amelia Pond and her tale of woe--only an aunt to care for her, and one who isn't around, at that. A house that houses an alien. Scottish in a village of Englishmen. She is so alone, but so plucky, that the instant the Doctor fell in love with her--at that table, remarking on her amazing unruffleability--so did I. In fact, knowing she grows up into Amy Pond sort of made me sad; while I do like Amy, I think a child companion would've been SO cool and SO interesting, especially for this Doctor. (And also would've called less attention to the fact that Matt Smith is very obviously in his mid-twenties.) Less of a Doctor-lover concept, more of a real Doctor-daughter concept. Oh well.
-Amy Pond is interesting. On one hand, I could really love her--I find I empathize with her, just as the viewer has done with previous companions. In fact, I felt that she's similar to Rose and Donna in that she's trapped in this dead-end life, but dreaming of something more, something wild, something beyond imagination. And she's brave. Maybe stupidly brave, but so is every other companion ever, hah. Also, she's gorgeous; I quite enjoy watching her, and her wide doe eyes. You take what you know of her past, and her dark humor, and the fact that she's been telling everyone and sundry about the "raggedy" Doctor and his magic time box, and you can't help but like her. She's largely endearing!
However, on the other hand, I really am tired of this idea that companions can just leave people they love behind without second thought; Rose did it to Mickey and Jackie, and I never quite forgave her, and Amy is, it seems, doing it to her fiancee. Yes, she asks if he can make it in time for tomorrow--but a) she calculatedly does not tell him what tomorrow is, and b) she knows by now not to trust the Doctor's driving. I just felt that instead of making Amy seem human, this selfishness turned me off of her, and really is putting a cramp in my ability to freely enjoy the journey alongside her, which--I assume, is what the viewer is meant to do.
-Rory! I liked Rory well enough, as well as Amy's adorable neighbors. I like that we may get to see more of Amy's village, I can only hope that there's more fleshing out of her character and background, instead of making her past all about her yearning for the Doctor to come back.
-The Doctor. Oh, Matt. You are very good. Very, very good. Funny, spastic, clever, larger-than-life, and endearing like a puppy dog. But I can't help but feel as if you were playing dress up in some parts. When you get all big and blustery near the end--I didn't buy it. When you come save Amy, I didn't feel any sense of HURRAH! THE DOCTOR'S HERE! Some parts of the episode were amazing--the line about the aunts, the concern you showed for Amy's vocation, the whole sequence in the beginning...spot-on and A+. But I will definitely need to have you grow on me. There's no immediate sense of "OH. Oh, okay," and I wager there won't be for a few more episodes at least. I will say one thing, though--he does grow on you lookswise. Though he's got a strange face, it's very mobile and kind. I would like to see it get angry and dark, thunderous, though. Tennant and Eccleston were particularly good at the brooding.
All in all. I did enjoy it, I just wish I enjoyed it a little more. The writing slipped a bit when it came to the stupid prophetizing near the end. Oh, so this series it'll be "silence", huh? Last series it was the stars going out. In the face of such cleverly-planted hints like Bad Wolf and Harold Saxon, verbal warnings so early on seem sort of....obvious. And trite. We'll see. Moffat, please to be more The Doctor Dances/Empty Child than, say, Silence in the Library/Forest of the Dead. Or The Girl in the Fireplace. (But that's my Rose/Doctor shipper piping in, haha.)
For now, I am enamored of Matt Smith and Karen Gilliam's chemisty. I will write Doctor/Rose fic forever, but my rpf muse might expand slightly to fit in these two kids, too.
Can't wait to see next episode!