Doctor Who: "Rose"...
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So. Doctor Who series 1, episode 1, 2005, "Rose".
I suppose you could say this was a fateful episode for me, because it was the first Doctor Who episode I saw, and it plunged me into this wonderful new fandom, but that wouldn't be true. I had seen two episodes of Doctor Who before that, and they didn't take. One was something with, I think, William Hartnell. Didn't like it, don't remember it, this was about twenty-five years ago. The other was the Paul McGann movie, which ... I'm not even sure what to say about it now. My reactions to it have changed over a decade or so. Let's just way I wasn't impressed at the time.
Having heard the new series was good, some time in the late spring of 2006 I watched "Rose". I thought the story was lame. But the characters... the set-up... the dialogue... Without being bowled over, I was intrigued. Curious. I particularly liked the Doctor. Rose seemed just a kid, but the Doctor?
I wanted more. Could hardly wait for more. I'm sure I would have denied it then still, but I was hooked. Guilty pleasure, perhaps?
So now, going back from the perspective of having seen all of series 3, and the comparative sophistication of having digested a lot of Doctor Who lore in the past year... have my reactions to it changed?
I still think the story is lame. And silly. And the dialogue, compared to some later episodes, is lame and silly in some places, and brilliant in others. It isn't just Christopher Eccleston's brilliant acting - I'll swear, he could make something worth watching out of anything. Anything!
But it isn't just him. For one thing, Billie Piper is also remarkably good, in an understated way (or perhaps an overstated way? with Rose, it's hard to be sure) that is easy to overlook because it's so in-your-face. Rose is as Rose is. The more I watch, then as now, the more I appreciate Rose, an utterly brilliant character from the beginning.
For another, the... I'm struggling for the right word here. Atmosphere, perhaps. Setting. The mixing of mundane and fantastical. The lightness with underpinnings of darkness. Bits of dialogue - both humour and drama - that rise above themselves. The set up of themes that are still unfolding.
Okay, let's take this with some detail of annotation. I watched it with occasional reference to the book Doctor Who: The Shooting Scripts - which to a besotted fan like myself, is one of the most beautiful books ever. I was amused to see differences between the shooting scripts and the finished dialogue - not big differences, but interesting ones - for instance, in the book (p. 18) Mickey says to Rose, "See ya!" while in the TV show he says, "Good-bye." In another place, two scenes are transposed.
But what's really interesting is the bits of exposition that were translated into action. For instance, I love Russell T. Davies' initial description of Rose in our first introduction to her, right at the beginning. Her alarm clock has gone off. Don't we all hate the sound of alarm clocks? For obvious reasons? Don't we all know exactly what Rose is thinking and feeling at that moment? Don't we all feel the same thing? What Russell T. Davies says is:
ROSE TYLER sits up in bed, gathers herself for a second. She's 19, her bedroom's a mess, she's got another bloody day at work, and she's so much better than this.There you have it - the major theme of series 1, and maybe of series 2. Rose's story arc, set up in its entirety. The sense of boredom and uselessness and the tedium of life - and somewhere out there, still unseen, adventure waiting to happen.
And then we come back to the very same thing in "Army of Ghosts", at the end of Rose's saga, seeing her on the bus: "For the first nineteen years of my life, nothing happened. Nothing at all. Not ever. And then I met a man called the Doctor."
Thoughts on watching:
- It charms me that Rose's bedroom is so pink. I'm not sure why pink is a signature colour for Rose in first season - a pun on her name, perhaps? - but it works.
- Rose kisses Jackie before going off to work. This episode sets up a lot of the Rose-Jackie relationship, one of my favourite in the series. I love Jackie; and the combination of good scripting for her, and brilliant acting by Camille Coduri, makes her incredibly real, and the nuances of the relationship between them so clear. (It's never remotely so clear regarding Francine and Martha, where the relationship is a one-note thing.) Does Jackie not work? She says (in "Doomsday") that she used to work in a shop, but she doesn't seem to work at all when we see her in series 1 or 2. Why not? Does she have some sort of pension? Pete's life insurance, perhaps? Or are we supposed to think she's on social assistance?
- I love the scene (without dialogue) where Rose meets Mickey for lunch at Trafalgar Square. It sets up so much about their relationship and character, at its best. Which shares aspects of its worst. It's so very playful.
- The shooting script describes Mickey as 'laddish'. I never remember or understand exactly what that means. Immature?
- So we get the spooky bit where Rose is wandering the basement of Henrick's with the lottery money, with spooky dummies stalking her and Wilson nonresponsive and doors closing.... and then, fateful moment, the Doctor is there saying "Run!" and they run and it all begins. I found myself this time trying to track what happened to the lottery money. Right before the Doctor appears, when the dummies are menacing her, the bag of money is in her right hand. When she starts running, holding the Doctor's hand, it's gone. I guess she dropped it right before he appeared.
- There are, in the world of television, some great first-meeting scenes. One is the first meeting of Mulder and Scully in X-Files: "Nobody down here but the FBI's most unwanted." One is the meeting of Duncan MacLeod and Methos in the Highlander episode "Methos": "...Methos?" "Mi casa es su casa." Or in Smallville, Clark Kent and Lex Luthor, meeting as Lex's speeding car hits Clark on the bridge and he goes over. I love moments like those. And I love this one: "Run!" So they run. Sets the tone for so much.
- Just for the record, I love their initial dialogue, in the elevator. In fact I probably love all the Doctor/Rose dialogue in this episode - it's close to banter, but it's edged, it's mysterious, it's both a meeting of minds and a contrast of human and alien. I love the way the Doctor's viewpoint is just out of synch with the human, so Rose is struggling to understand him, and intrigued, and instinctively trusting. How soon does she realize just how strange he is? How soon does she realize he is an alien?
- I don't understand why Jackie calls the person on the phone "Debbie-on-the-end" - is that a reference I don't know?
- I like the contrast here, that Mickey and Jackie both - though the love Rose - are quite self-serving in their reactions. Jackie wants money for Rose in compensation. Mickey wants to watch the match at the pub. The Doctor has his own agenda, but it isn't that he's out for something.
- The scene the next day where the Doctor comes to visit Rose's flat does so much to characterize him. The bit about the ears implies he hasn't looked in mirrors much since his last regeneration. We get some wonderful lines ("He's gay and she's an alien"), the byplay with the cards, and a bit of dialogue I particularly love:"What are you doing here?"
"I live here."
"Well, what do you do that for?"
"Because I do."
And I love the line, "someone blew up my job." When does she later say, "It's practically his way of saying hello?" - I usually hate puns but I do get a kick out of the Doctor's "Armless" line. And this might be a good place to point out that I love it that they had Christopher Eccleston use his natural accent, it adds so much to the role - I can't imagine his Doctor with another accent, and I think Ten would be much better with the Scottish accent that is natural to David Tennant.
- Compared to most of the rest of this, I don't much like the moment of cluelessness when Rose thinks the Doctor is joking (like Mickey did) about being strangled by the plastic hand; just as I don't much like his later moment of cluelessness when he doesn't see the London Eye. (Conceptually, anyway. I love the way Eccelston acts that moment.)
- In the following scene, the brilliant lines just follow fast and furious. "Ten out of ten for observation." Or:
Doctor: "Is that supposed to sound tough?"
Rose: "...Sort of."
Followed by: Rose: "Is that supposed to sound impressive?"
Doctor: "...Sort of."
And in retrospect, his line "I'm a long way from home," is quite moving. And the double -dialogue of "the entire world revolves around you" which ends with the exchange:Rose: "You're full of it."
Doctor: "Sort of, yeah."
I says so much about them both: that she's impressed with him, but won't let it go to her head; that he's got a streak of self-deprecation entwined with his self-confidence. - And this scene includes that bit of monologue that I love so much I want to quote just for the fun of it:
It's like when you were a kid. The first time they tell you the world's turning and you just can't quite believe it because everything looks like it's standing still. I can feel it. The turn of the Earth. The ground beneath our feet is spinning at a thousand miles an hour, and the entire planet is hurtling around the sun at sixty-seven thousand miles an hour. And I can feel it. We're falling through space, you and me. Clinging to the skin of this tiny little world, and if we let go... That's who I am. Now, forget me, Rose Tyler.
But it is, of course, already way too late for that. - For the first time here I really noticed the theme of the TARDIS noise. The TARDIS is of course a whole mythic theme in itself, but this show uses the noise it makes so effectively. Rose hardly notices the TARDIS when she first sees it. Then she hears it, and has to go running back - arriving too late to see it. I am reminded specifically of two other times when the sound of the TARDIS makes people run: when Mickey and Jackie hear it at the beginning of "The Christmas Invasion", and when Captain Jack hears it at the end of "End of Days".
- When Rose goes to Mickey's flat, why does he tell her not to read his e-mails?
- The scene with Clive. In retrospect, I am reminded of Elton - putting Elton not in Clive's role, but in Rose's. Love the kid's line: "Dad! It's one of your nutters."
And I like the way Clive is something of a Cassandra. Ominous. So much so that Rose doesn't believe him, decides he's a nutter himself. I love the line about Death being the Doctor's constant companion, but even more I like, "If the Doctor's making housecalls... then God help you."
Clive is the only person actually known to us you is killed by the Nestene Consciousness. Is it a judgement on him for doubting the Doctor? - Mickey as plastic man: another bit that seems particularly lame to me. (And Rose again is clueless.) I rather like how it begins, though, with Mickey's hands being stuck on the lid of the trash bin. There's something convincingly nightmarish about that part. Otherwise - the scene where plastic-Mickey makes his hands into cleavers reminds me of some of the more hokey graphics of 1960s Marvel comics, where villains like the Sand-man or the Super-Skrull used to do that. Knowing that Russell T. Davies is a fan of these comics explains a lot.
- Again in the shooting script, I love Davies' decription of the TARDIS here, at Rose's first sight of the interior: the whole place humming with suppressed energy.
- Significant interplay about whether the Doctor should or does care about Mickey's fate, and the underlying question of how much Rose cares. Yes, she cares, but she's not dwelling on it either as they run off to the London Eye. I am a little confused about Mickey's mother, when Rose is fussing about telling her what happened: I thought we learned in "The Rise of the Cybermen" that she wasn't around, and Mickey was raised by his gran. Well, the mother wasn't dead, so maybe she reappeared when Mickey was grown. Or maybe it was just a retcon. (Not the Torchwood kind.)
- Antiplastic. Of all the lame ideas in the episode, I love that one the most.
- The best bit of the London Eye conversation is the moment where - for the first time - the Doctor says, "Fantastic!"
- Love Rose's line: "The breast implants." Cracks me up. So... realistic, so insidious, so suited to Rose's quirky humour and her sense of the mundane and the bizarre.
- The Doctor: "I'm not here to kill it. I've got to give it a chance." Nice ambivalence, when the Nestene C. sees the antiplastic and quite rightly throws a fit and the Doctor claims he wasn't going to use it. (Yeah, right.) There is an ambivalence to this whole scene that I find interesting and maybe don't entirely understand. How serious is the Doctor about destroying the Nestene Consciousness and saving everyone on Earth? Was he as helpless as he seemed? Was he manipulating Rose? I like the implications here - never fully clarified - that he is, or can be, extremely machivellian, and deceitful.
- The only thing I like about the scenes of the dummies attacking London is the bit at the end, where one of the dummies is lying there with its leg stuck up in the air.
- When Rose says, "The end of the world," is that a foreshadowing of the next episode?
- In the climactic scene, I like it that the Doctor appears to be giving up (I'm not convinced he is, but I'm not sure he isn't, either) - though why it would help Rose to run at this point is a mystery. If the Nestene Consciousness has taken over the planet, where could Rose run to?
- I love it when the Doctor says with total glee, "Now we're in trouble!"
- I loved the moment where Mickey runs in terror out of the TARDIS. I like Mickey's exaggerated cowardice throughout this section. At the time, it mostly seemed like a contrast to Rose and the Doctor. In retrospect, it's a great contrast to what Mickey himself eventually becomes - a hero. But here, it's Rose who gets to be the hero.
- I like the way Rose has to make a decision between what she thinks she ought to do and what she wants to do. This choice is another recurring theme through the series.
- I love the ending. Absolutely love it. In the language of series 2 or 3, she makes her choice, lured by the fateful words, "It also travels in time." But it wasn't those words that made her change her mind, I don't think. It was the fact that the Doctor came back to give her another chance to make the right decision.
I love the way the Doctor switches back and forth from a rather formal, courtly politeness (with legalistic implications) to his own casual, forthright manner.
I love, absolutely love, the line, "I couldn't save your world. I couldn't save any of them." We don't, on first hearing this, understand the reference to the Time War. We don't realize that the Doctor is thinking of his own people too, and knows his own guilt.
I do go on and on, don't I? I'm sure there's more I'd like to say, but enough is enough... for the moment.
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Date: 2007-07-14 09:28 pm (UTC)I didn't get into the series till April 2006 - I can't believe it was so late! And I wasn't completely hooked to start with even though I did find Christopher Eccleston fascinating... That reaction has stood the test of time. *g* I think it was Dalek and Father's Day that really hooked me - by that time, I was in the throes of a happy obsession and devouring two or three episodes a day.
for instance, in the book (p. 18) Mickey says to Rose, "See ya!" while in the TV show he says, "Good-bye."
When does Mickey say that? I didn't think he said anything when she leaves with the Doctor. Apart from "for what?" in response to her saying "Thanks". Her reply, "Exactly!" makes me cringe a bit because it's cruel and because it's true. Poor Mickey, he really doesn't shine here, does he?
In another place, two scenes are transposed.
Which two scenes? ::is too lazy to look it up for self::
2 For all her faults, I love Jackie. She loves Rose fiercely, I have no doubt of that, but she seems determined not to let her make anything of herself: her view that Rose should apply for a job in the butcher's, and that working in Henrik's was giving her airs and graces? No wonder Rose dropped out of school and never did her A-levels! Iknow, I know - the infamous Jimmy Stone (s?) had something to do with it too. *g*
And I don't think Jackie does work. I very much doubt that Pete had any sort of life insurance. She's probably living on the social services. It's a council flat - she's a single mum after all. Though they seem to have had the same flat when Pete was still alive. And it may just be fanon that she does part-time hairdressing from home. I can't think where it might be mentioned but it'll be to see if it crops up anywhere.
3. I noticed today that there's almost no dialogue, just the music that bowls everything along with such momentum right up till the moment when Rose reaches the basement.
4. Does blokeish mean anything to you? Immature, yes, interested in not much more than football and going down the pub for a few pints and a laugh. This definition (http://www.allwords.com/word-laddish.html) is even less complimentary. *g*
6. I love their first meeting. We just see his hand take hers, her startled look and then his face as he says, "Run!". Pure genius. I love the way they hold hands, later in this episode and all through the series. They have such an extraordinary connection, right from the beginning. Nothing in series 2 and 3 comes close to this, for me. Doctor/Rose 4EVAH!!! *g*
8. Debbie-on-the-end I'd take to be Debbie who lives in the end flat on their floor - the flats all open onto a common access balcony, so it would make sense to refer to her this way. Like saying Mrs-X-next-door or So-and-so-across-the-road.
9. Mickey and Jackie both - though they love Rose - are quite self-serving in their reactions
Yes, I do get the feeling that Rose has often had to be the most adult person around. Jackie seems completely feckless and I think it's telling that she sometimes dresses younger than her teenaged daughter. She's obviously obsessed with looking younger than her age - that crack about the shock of the explosion having aged Rose so that she looks older than her mother, frex. ::casts eyes up to ceiling:: I think poor Rose puts up with a lot and feels responsible, even, for Jackie. I mean, the reason she initially refuses the Doctor's offer is because of her mum and having to look after "stupid lump" Mickey.
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Date: 2007-07-14 10:13 pm (UTC)LOL. Not really surprising: but I'd already heard intriguing comments from various people that had made me curious, including
I wasn't completely hooked to start with even though I did find Christopher Eccleston fascinating... That reaction has stood the test of time.
Yes - absolutely!
I think it was Dalek and Father's Day that really hooked me
I think after "Rose" I might already have been hooked, though not quite realizing it. My next opportunity to watch an episode was in May 2006 and it was "New Earth", followed by "School Reunion". I was eager to see them. Very eager. Yes, by that time I was hooked.
I tend to blame Eccleston but I think the bulk of the blame really goes to Russell T. Davies - after "Rose", anyway. But even, a bit, for "Rose" too, because I did appreciate the good dialogue - if not the dorky story.
I have much more to say (of course) but I have to get a souffle out of the oven or dinner will be burned. You've probably gone to bed by now anyway - so. More later!
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Date: 2007-07-14 10:31 pm (UTC)Dalek was pivotal for me, but I was already hooked before that. Maybe not impressed - but hooked. I was 'getting it' on a visceral level even when I was bemoaning the stupid stories - well, particularly the stupid villains.
When does Mickey say that? I didn't think he said anything when she leaves with the Doctor.
No, not then. It's near the beginning when he's going off to the pub and she isn't, and he's taking the plastic arm to the trash bin.
Which two scenes? ::is too lazy to look it up for self::
In the fast-moving action sequences near the climax, where we're cutting back and forth between the dummies attacking people like Clive and Jackie, and the Doctor and Rose facing the Nestene Bath-pit. There's a bit where Jackie's scene is moved around.
I notice scene #38 is 'omitted'. I wonder what it was.
Her reply, "Exactly!" makes me cringe a bit because it's cruel and because it's true.
I kind of love that. I mean, it's clear Rose cares about him, but there's no glamour there.
Poor Mickey, he really doesn't shine here, does he?
Not at all. I don't remember what I thought about him first time I saw it. Looking back now, I feel sorry for him. I wonder if Davies has the "Mickey growth arc" planned from the beginning.
For all her faults, I love Jackie.
As do I. And her flirting with the Doctor here - I love it.
she seems determined not to let her make anything of herself: her view that Rose should apply for a job in the butcher's, and that working in Henrik's was giving her airs and graces? No wonder Rose dropped out of school and never did her A-levels!
I lvoe all that, and it all adds to the sense that Rose is "so much better than this", but doesn't know it. I also like the contrast between this relationship and the relationship between Martha and Francine - Francine seems a bit of a snob and doesn't want anything to get in the ways of Martha's success, both academically and professionally. Even though I really think Francine is right, I love Jackie so much more!
She's probably living on the social services.
That would be my guess. It fits the profile.
Though they seem to have had the same flat when Pete was still alive.
I believe that here there are situations where you get to keep the place you already had, at reduced rent, if you're on welfare. It's part of the attempt not to have all the welfare cases together in housing that then gets slummy - landlords have to take a certain number of welfare tenants.
it may just be fanon that she does part-time hairdressing from home.
I hadn't come across that, but I wouldn't believe it. Jackie's own hair doesn't look like a hairdresser's. And Rose's hair doesn't look as if her Mum were a hairdresser.
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Date: 2007-07-15 01:24 pm (UTC)Well, certainly, it's different in series 2 because Tennant is so different. I adjusted to it, I think, but I find his Doctor generally more elusive and less clear. Less open.
Debbie-on-the-end I'd take to be Debbie who lives in the end flat on their floor
Makes perfect sense. Don't know why I didn't think of that.
She's obviously obsessed with looking younger than her age - that crack about the shock of the explosion having aged Rose so that she looks older than her mother, frex. ::casts eyes up to ceiling::
We see the Doctor teasing her about this in "Doomsday".
I think poor Rose puts up with a lot and feels responsible, even, for Jackie.
I think so. If often shows in little ways - and you can see it explicitly in "Love and Monsters" (where she charges to Jackie's defense) and "The Rise of the Cybermen", where she tries to treat the other Jackie as if she were the Jackie Rose knows. Perhaps some of her joy with the Doctor is not just in his company, or the adventure and freedom he brings her, but in at elast partial freedom from the responsibility of taking care of Jackie and Mickey.
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Date: 2007-07-16 03:42 pm (UTC)I agree with this too. I think most of her life she's been responsible for someone and that's another thing I love about 'Rose', they were able to convey that Rose had to frequently be the adult and practical one.
I think the Jimmy Stone thing is the aberration although... thinking about it Rose might have ended doing the same thing for Jimmy. She ended up taking care of him and that ended, from the hints we get, into a rather disastrous relationship.
With the Doctor Rose can finally act her age *and* be an adult. She can enjoy life and find purpose.
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Date: 2007-07-14 09:29 pm (UTC)Gah, can't remember. It's a great line, though. What I love about that scene at the front door is the way she says "You, inside, right now" and grabs him and manhandles him inside the door - and he looks surprised but HE LETS HER. Makes me laugh every time. Go, Rose!
I rather like the "There's a strange man in my bedroom" bit too - Jackie's not one to let an opportunity go by. *g*
13. And the double -dialogue of "the entire world revolves around you" which ends with the exchange:
Rose: "You're full of it."
Doctor: "Sometimes, yeah."
Doesn't he actually say "Sort of, yeah" both to that question and to her "so what you're saying is that the entire world revolves around you?" I know the shooting script has "sometimes, yeah" as his answer to both, but I don't think that's what he actually says. And I like it better with him echoing her previous "sort of". It's a lovely bit of dialogue, and the back and forth and the fact that they're walking through the estate keeps it from sounding exposition-y.
Okay, I think I have to go to bed. More tomorrow. Hurrah for Nine!
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Date: 2007-07-15 01:31 pm (UTC)Yes, it's wonderful. It improves with knowledge of the situation and the characters. I think it already illustrates his vulnerability to Rose - and 'vulnerability' isn't quite the word I mean, but it's close.
I rather like the "There's a strange man in my bedroom" bit too - Jackie's not one to let an opportunity go by. *g*
I find that far funnier than it ought to be. Possibly because she has no idea who/what he is. Possibly because she's just trying too hard. It's a nice illustration of their two different worlds.
Yes, of course he says "sort of", and I meant to type that. It's part of the joy of the scene.
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Date: 2007-07-15 01:35 pm (UTC)+ + +
JACK [running to the window]
I was gonna send for another one, but somebody's gonna blow up the factory.
[He glares at the Doctor]
ROSE
Oh, I know - first day I met him, he blew my job up. That's practically how he communicates.
+ + +
http://who-transcripts.atspace.com/2005%20Transcripts/10_thedoctordances.htm
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Date: 2007-07-15 05:38 am (UTC)It's a kind of young male culture, sports and cars and going out with mates. Suggests the kind of life that doesn't include long term pair bonds or childcare. Not taking things very seriously.
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Date: 2007-07-15 01:12 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-07-18 11:12 am (UTC)(no subject)
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Date: 2007-07-15 05:55 am (UTC)I actually came in to watching the series much later, I beleive I came in just before the Captain did actually. Mind you I watched some of the Fourth, and Fifth Doctors when they aired on PBS during my childhood. So I wasn't coming in without any idea what was going on.
And I beleive the reference to 'Debbie-on-the-end' is in reference to her location on the floor of the building that they live in. Like she's on the end by the staircase or something.
Thats what I always took it as.
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Date: 2007-07-15 01:14 pm (UTC)Well, do come and join us! I'd been hoping to watch more with
I beleive I came in just before the Captain did actually.
What luck! That's a good place to pick up on the series.
the reference to 'Debbie-on-the-end' is in reference to her location on the floor of the building that they live in.
Right - that woudl make sense. Thanks!
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Date: 2007-07-15 12:18 pm (UTC)But it is, of course, already way too late for that.
Reminds me of Lymond and Philippa and the anvil moment. *g*
16. When Rose goes to Mickey's flat, why does he tell her not to read his e-mails?
That always makes me laugh. I've always assumed that typical guy that he is (and a bit of a lad!), he probably has sex or porn related stuff that he doesn't want her to see. Hee.
17. Is it a judgement on him for doubting the Doctor?
No, I don't think so, I really don't think DW is that judgemental as a show! It's just a way of upping the stakes a bit, getting a character we know killed.
18. Mickey as plastic man: another bit that seems particularly lame to me. (And Rose again is clueless.)
It is a bit lame, but in retrospect, I love that Rose doesn't notice. It's quite a statement about how stale their relationship has got, that she doesn't even notice that he's been replaced!
19. Again in the shooting script, I love Davies' decription of the TARDIS here, at Rose's first sight of the interior: the whole place humming with suppressedenergy.
Nice! And the way Rose is initially almost more scared of what she finds inside the "wooden box" than she is of the murderous plastic Mickey is a lovely touch. I like her look of panic and the way she stops short, can't believe her eyes and shoots straight back outside without even thinking about it. Because, yes, it would be the most unbelievable and scary thing to experience without warning, as she does.
20. # I am a little confused about Mickey's mother, when Rose is fussing about telling her what happened: I thought we learned in "The Rise of the Cybermen" that she wasn't around, and Mickey was raised by his gran. Well, the mother wasn't dead, so maybe she reappeared when Mickey was grown. Or maybe it was just a retcon.
The fact that Mickey was brought up by his gran, who was dead by then - the fateful bit of loose carpet on the stairs - doesn't mean that his mum didn't keep in touch. I'm quite happy with her not being able to fact bringing him up (on her own?) but not losing touch completely. Since his gran is dead, she'd be his only surviving relative - hence Rose's thought. Works for me, anyway.
22. # The best bit of the London Eye conversation is the moment where - for the first time - the Doctor says, "Fantastic!"
I love the bit just before that when they quarrel over Rose's smallminded concern over Mickey while the Doctor is trying to save the planet (Nine's view) and the Doctor's callousness and complete disregard of Mickey as a person (as Rose sees it). Such completely different viewpoints. And yet they make up really quickly - Rose extends the olive branch with a question about the Police Box and the Doctor is only too willing to accept this offer of reconciliation and to tell her about his beloved TARDIS. There's a similar dynamic when they quarrel in The End of the World, on the viewing platform. ::hearts the Doctor and Rose::
Okay, more later. *g*
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Date: 2007-07-15 01:49 pm (UTC)Funny in how many ways Lymond and Philippa are, in my mind, the perfect romance, with the perfect romantic characterization. One doesn't think of Rose as being Philippa-like, but in some ways she is: Loyal, resourceful, brave, adventurous, grown beyond her own background. And Rose likes to 'fix' people, too. And in both cases, they will give Lymond or the Doctor what-for when everyone else is afraid to talk to them.
Anyway, the anvil moment. As you know from the story I wrote, for me the 'anvil moment' for the Doctor is immediate, practically as soon as "Run!", but for Rose - ? Maybe that conversation. Maybe the growing realization from earlier (in her flat) that he's so very different, or the later realization (when she first goes into the TARDIS) that he's an alien.
That always makes me laugh. I've always assumed that typical guy that he is (and a bit of a lad!), he probably has sex or porn related stuff that he doesn't want her to see.
Trying to shield her delicate sensiblities? Or just trying to hide some of his kinks? Maybe he's afraid she'll tease him later for his taste in women!
the way Rose is initially almost more scared of what she finds inside the "wooden box" than she is of the murderous plastic Mickey is a lovely touch.
Yes, I really like her reactions here. And the bit of dialogue: And she means it.
I really don't think DW is that judgemental as a show!
No, it's really pretty big on the 'forgiveness' pattern. We know Clive just enough, but not quite enough to be very upset at his demise. Well... close, maybe. I'd love to have seen him meet Elton in "Love and Monsters", since I see a strong thematic link there.
It's quite a statement about how stale their relationship has got, that she doesn't even notice that he's been replaced!
Yes, and quite a statement that she doesn't expect more from him than stock answers. And proof she isn't looking at him very closely.
I'm quite happy with her not being able to fact bringing him up (on her own?) but not losing touch completely.
I like that, too. It also gives a sense of the way the story isn't as simple as a simple explanation would make it seem. Sort of like the Doctor telling Martha in "Utopia" that Jack was 'a friend' who used to travel with him on the TARDIS, which is true, but gives so little of the real story of who/what Jack is. The whole implication that life goes on whether we're looking them or not, and everyone is more than the amalgamated fragments of their own stories.
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Date: 2007-07-15 03:26 pm (UTC)I was telling
But I'm gonna catch up!
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Date: 2007-07-15 03:30 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-07-15 05:56 pm (UTC)http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jackie_Tyler
Some fans complained that Rose was written as snobby and unrealistic, because she went off with the Doctor and saved the Earths and the Universes, but couldn't get motivated to make life better on her street.
Some of us argued back...
a) She learned about the big picture first, because the Doctor was the first person to show her any picture at all. Rose and Jackie couldn't know what they didn't know before that, because that kind of ignorance is systemic.
b) We noted that the folks calling Rose snobby were usually UKers with working class backgrounds who were reacting to their own class system. They resented the perceived villification of Jackie, because she dared to resent Rose for going off with an "aristo," while she and Mickey stayed behind and dealt with real life, or because she dared to tell Rose in AoG that that life could end or not be what Rose hoped.
c) They resented that Rose moaned about her great new cushy life with a rich alt-Dad and great new job. These were all valid points, up to a point. But, they were letting their understandable biases color narrative structure. RTD wrote a dark fairytale for Rose, Jackie, and Mickey. Their dreams came true at a high price.
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Date: 2007-07-16 01:47 am (UTC)Some fans complained that Rose was written as snobby and unrealistic, because she went off with the Doctor and saved the Earths and the Universes, but couldn't get motivated to make life better on her street.
Huh? Does that make any sense at all? Did they want Rose to be a social worker or something?
What's so highbrow about the Doctor? Knowledge? Power? He was maybe arguably of the elite of Gallifrey, but Gallifrey is gone. He's just a guy travelling around in his own Police Box. What's "aristo" about that? (Maybe it's having an affair with Mme de Pompadour that does it.)
RTD wrote a dark fairytale for Rose, Jackie, and Mickey. Their dreams came true at a high price.
Yes, exactly. Rose got to live her dream but the price of her dream was the dream itself.
I like the approach.
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Date: 2007-07-16 01:59 pm (UTC)But it isn't just him. For one thing, Billie Piper is also remarkably good, in an understated way (or perhaps an overstated way? with Rose, it's hard to be sure) that is easy to overlook because it's so in-your-face. Rose is as Rose is. The more I watch, then as now, the more I appreciate Rose, an utterly brilliant character from the beginning.
Oh, yes, before this I remembered Billie Piper was one of those pop stars and I didn't know what to think but the moment she appeared on screen she stopped being Billie Piper for me and simply becomes Rose. She inhabits the role so well. In fact when I see Billie in her interviews I can clearly tell Billie Piper apart from Rose. It's amazing how that happens.
Like you I also love RTD's description of Rose in the first scene, its just so spot on. You can really see Rose was looking for something more but can't exactly figure what it could be.
Rose kisses Jackie before going off to work. This episode sets up a lot of the Rose-Jackie relationship, one of my favourite in the series. I love Jackie; and the combination of good scripting for her, and brilliant acting by Camille Coduri, makes her incredibly real, and the nuances of the relationship between them so clear. (It's never remotely so clear regarding Francine and Martha, where the relationship is a one-note thing.)
Agreed. I loved Jackie as much as I love Rose both characters are so well drawn and played with so much charm that their flaws become part of their characters. She's real and the relationship between Rose and Jackie very well realized. I can't say the same thing about Francine though, something about her character grates at my nerves.
I love moments like those. And I love this one: "Run!" So they run. Sets the tone for so much.
Yes. So very much yes.
And this scene includes that bit of monologue that I love so much I want to quote just for the fun of it:
It's like when you were a kid. The first time they tell you the world's turning and you just can't quite believe it because everything looks like it's standing still. I can feel it. The turn of the Earth. The ground beneath our feet is spinning at a thousand miles an hour, and the entire planet is hurtling around the sun at sixty-seven thousand miles an hour. And I can feel it. We're falling through space, you and me. Clinging to the skin of this tiny little world, and if we let go... That's who I am. Now, forget me, Rose Tyler.
But it is, of course, already way too late for that.
Oh, this scene! This scene is the whole reason why I fell in love with the show. It's just... so perfect. I love the intensity, the alien-ness and the scope and Rose, listening and being taken in by this man, saying these things. It's really hard not to fall in love after that.
Love Rose's line: "The breast implants." Cracks me up
Never fails to make me laugh!
I love the ending. Absolutely love it. In the language of series 2 or 3, she makes her choice, lured by the fateful words, "It also travels in time." But it wasn't those words that made her change her mind, I don't think. It was the fact that the Doctor came back to give her another chance to make the right decision.
I love that too, from the beginning and end she's made her choice and she falls in love with this dangerous life and still willingly takes it, in fact when faced with death she always makes it clear to the Doctor that it was her choice in coming and not his.
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Date: 2007-07-16 03:20 pm (UTC)One of the reasons I most love this series is the way these themes are consistent, and the references build on themselves and each other.
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Date: 2007-11-22 11:45 pm (UTC)I had watched DW on and off when I was a teenager on PBS (mostly Four, Five, and Six) and wasn't exactly a fan, but it was on and I'd watch it. When I heard that they were restarting the show, what really caught my attention was the casting - first of all that they'd cast Christopher Eccleston (who had done by far my favourite work on television in the 1990s, and therefore seemed awfully "high" for the show) and Billie Piper (who'd annoyed the hell out of me with "Because We Want To" and therefore it seemed like pandering to audiences); then, that they'd cast them together. It just boggled the mind.
Friends in England reported that the show was surprisingly good, so I bought the DVDs sight unseen when I went to London for a visit, because I figured nothing with CE was a complete waste of time, although I had my doubts that he would be light enough for the show - some people still don't think he was, but I think his comic timing is vastly underrated and that the show actually "came up" to his level of dramatic complexity in S1. I'll admit to being amused for a moment with the plastic hand strangling him just because the thought crossed my mind: "This is Christopher Eccleston. Wrestling with a plastic arm. And turning purple. Impressive shade of maroon, actually." I liked his cheekiness, and the glitter in his eye, his wild shifts from silly to serious. There's one moment in his "chat" with the Nestene Conciousness where on first viewing I thought he was a little too realistic for the tone of show, the way his voice broke on "I couldn't save them. I couldn't save anyone." I thought it was too intense for such a silly show; instead, we discover just how good an actor he is - he's giving you foreshadowing of things we won't know for 5-6 episodes yet. Brilliant.
BP impressed me despite myself. I loved her in those scenes with Mickey and Jackie, particularly in the aftermath of the shop blowing up, when she's sitting on the couch and talking with Mickey while Jackie was going on and on. She was so natural in her acting; I remember going back the first time after watching S2 and rewatching S1, and she really was much more "real" in S1. She was good in S2, but she had flattened out and wasn't as responsive and naturalistic, it was more "acting". I don't know if that's character development or (I suspect) a difference in who she's acting with.
I remember seeing that walk-and-talk after the "armless" the first time and being blown away by the naturalness/ease of the acting between them, and also the intense intimacy. The range of teasing; the ease with which they jostled each other, walking in each other's space; and his tenderness when he asks if she's all right, echoed later by that beautiful little moment after she's run into the TARDIS for the first time (and run back out again, taken a lap, and gone back in - brilliant!): "Are you an alien?" "Yeah. That all right?" "Yeah." They just click, like nothing I've ever seen before or since. I don't care who liked who best behind the scenes: BP and CE are a match made in acting heaven.
Favourite Jackie moment: she's rambling on about compensation and saying, "Arianna got 2000 off the council because the man behind the counter said she looked Greek. I mean, she is Greek, but that's not the point..." The line is funny, but CC's delivery is just wonderful. And if I hadn't loved her before, her performance on the DW Weakest Link just made me adore her.
BTW, my End of the World post is here (http://nina-ds.livejournal.com/20848.html), if we want to talk about that one, too (I always do!).
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Date: 2007-11-23 02:52 am (UTC)Good! Because for some reason I am particularly missing both Doctor Who and Torchwood just now and itching for a chance to discuss them more.
I had been shown one story-arc of an early series of Doctor Who in the 1980s, and I didn't like it at all. Not in the slightest. Intended never to watch the show ever, ever again.
In the 1990s I allowed myself to be persuaded to watch the Paul McGann movie. I didn't like it at all. Vowed never to watch the show again. Etc.
So when people told me the 2005 revamped Doctor Who was very good, I flat out didn't believe them. Except that the people who were telling me this were people whose literary taste I respected, and they weren't saying "It's good, considering it's a kid's show," or "It's good, if you like shows with corny alien monsters," they were taking it seriously. And that caught my interest and curiosity. Then when a British friend told me that one of the recurring characters was bisexual, I was intensely curious.
I watched "Rose". Wasn't exactly blown away, but it made me laugh, and even moved me, and caught my attention in a positive sort of way. I really, really liked Christopher Eccleston.
Then some time later, in Montreal, a bunch of friends showed me two episodes that hadn't been aired in Canada yet - "New Earth" and "School Reunion". I enjoyed both and realized that I actually liked the show (a lot) and wanted to see more. Went and bought the DVD set for series 1, fell in love with it, and the rest was history.
I didn't think I liked Rose much, but her story really grabbed me by midway through series 1 and I think she's one of the best examples of character development I've seen on TV. I'd never heard of Billie Piper except for this, so I had no preconceptions.
he's giving you foreshadowing of things we won't know for 5-6 episodes yet. Brilliant.
I love that too, and it's so beautifully done - it's something you don't even understand till later, and when you don understand, it's so moving.
I think Rose's great story arc/character development was mostly in series 1; in series 2 she seemed a little weaker because they had to backpeddle - what do you do after you've become a god and gone back to being a normal person? I think she has some wonderful passages and scenes - I should list "the ten great Rose moments" - but really, once we'd got to "The Parting of the Ways", her story was told, except for the addendum, "how I died". As I see it, Rose's story in series 1 became the hero's journey, in which through learning courage and original thought and the power of love, Rose sacrificed herself to save the universe. Except then the Doctor sacrificed himself for her - in effect, he became the price she had to pay for getting the power to save the world.
So then: she's human, she's with the somewhat-changed Doctor, and they have adventures. Mickey develops. She doesn't change much. Her only story thereafter is her 'death' - how she was torn from the Doctor. Interestingly, her decision at the end of "Doomsday" was not to save the world at any risk to herself, it was to stay with the Doctor at any risk to herself. And of course she lost her heart's desire - she couldn't stay with him.
I don't care who liked who best behind the scenes: BP and CE are a match made in acting heaven.
It was the perfect coming together of actors and script and directing as well. It raised the material above itself to an incredible level.
I could do my "ten favourite Jackie moments", too. And yes, I loved her on The Weakest Link. Jackie's story arc, though comparatively peripheral, was a surprise and a delight.
I will go to your "End of the World" post, but not tonight, as it's getting late. Looking forward to it!
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