Doctor Who: "Gridlock" thoughts...

[fajrdrako]

I liked the title.

It was a Sunday evening treat for myself: watching Doctor Who all my myself, on the sofa - well, with Logan, but he only emitted the occasional editorial chirp.


It wasn't quite what I expected - in some ways. I guess the 'trapped in the slipstream of traffic' was not unexpected, but the exaggeration of the situation at first almost lost me - and then seemed quite wonderful. I loved the various people the Doctor met, and I loved his dropping from car to car.

I was sorry to see the Doctor and Martha were apart for so much of the episode, because I do so like them together. I missed their interchanges. Still, when they were together, what we got was wonderful - less banter, more honesty.

Things I particularly loved:
- the Doctor telling Martha about Gallifrey in the beginning, but not telling her the truth
- the Doctor being only too aware (and regretful) that he had not told her the truth
- the Doctor's reflection that he had been "too busy showing off"
- the Doctor's description of Martha as a stranger - and hers of him as a man she hardly knows, but has faith in
- the cats (even though I'm really not a cat person, no, not at all, honest! well... sometimes.)
- the Doctor's moods. For some reason I find hard to analyze, I most love the Doctor when he is angry. Here we had him angry, regretful, joking, reflective, sympathetic, and so on, but his best moment was when he told the mood-dealers to close up shop because he'd come after them when he'd found Martha.
- come to think of it, I really loved the mood-drug vendors
- the cat-nun and her dedication to the Face of Boe. I was delighted to see the Face of Boe again - he's one of my favourites.
- the guy in the bowler hat
- the guy in white
- the garish girls
- the lines about the Doctor's coat - and its origin story
- was Rose mentioned? I am one of those fans who has loved and cherished each time when the Doctor has said her name, but I'm still glad if this time he didn't, just to prove we're not in a rut. I didn't notice Mr. Saxon, either.
- I liked it that the visual appearance of the place was so unlike that of New New etc. New York in "New Earth"

I could have done without the creatures at the bottom of the fast lane, but ... I guess they served their purpose: entertaining the eight year olds, and being metaphorical bottom-feeders.

Of course I liked the ending, not so much because of what the Doctor was saying, but because he was saying it to Martha. Seems to me she's reached some sort of turning point. Will the Doctor need an excuse to take her on the next adventure?

Am I right to think that the title refers to the Doctor, locked in his pattern of grief with regard to Rose and denial with regard to Martha? Or am I just being fanciful there?

Comments

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

My sister's argument was that for this banter to make sense there must have been at least a residue of anti-gay semntiment.

Sure, but this was hardly a utopian society. They had all sorts of weirdnesses, and probably the fumes had made them all more stupid than they should be. (For example, they all believed in a police force that didn't exist. They weren't swift in catching on.)

[wijsgeer.livejournal.com]

I believe humanity is essentially a group/herd species. Being deprived of the opportunity to irectly (not just electronically) interact an essential form of its intelligence get lost. (Sure there is individual intelligence as well, but groups have their own way of figuring things out. Noot allways the right thing, but neither do individuals)

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

That's true enough, and once people start making assumptions that 'this is the way it is', it's amazing how long they can put up with absurdities. History is full of such examples - just as our current world is. This is why SF can weave parody so deftly: take a common assumption and put it in a different context, and it becomes clear that it's absurd.