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Am I having a midlife crisis?
There was indeed a pleasing amount of John Hurt in "The Day of the Doctor."
Briefly, because I have to be awake in a very few hours to meet with a jeweler— Yes,![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
poliphilo, ashlyme, I loved him. Of course he regenerates immediately following the parting of the three Doctors: he was created to end the Time War and with that task accomplished, he can cease to be. He told the Moment that he had no desire to survive the destruction of Gallifrey, for which his punishment would have been to live; because he finds another way, crazy, timey-wimey, continuity-bending as it is, he is allowed to die. And he leaves the time anomaly understanding that he will retain no memory of the events contained within it, but because he regenerates when he does, he—the Warrior, the War Doctor, the secret who deserves the name after all—dies knowing what he tried to do; it's Eccleston's Nine who won't remember. There are ways in which this would have made a perfect Christmas episode. Tennant and Smith's Doctors have been running from their past, but Hurt's is the one confronted with his future, forced to assess whether he likes the pattern he's about to set in place: the man who regrets, the man who forgets . . . Why do you have to talk like children? What is it that makes you ashamed of being a grown-up? He's battle-wearied, self-sick, resourceful as a suicide; he remembers the name he cast off, knowing a doctor's business was to save, not sacrifice, the way fallen angels remember turning their backs on heaven. (Naturally he's all the more aghast at his future incarnations: if he last remembers being the Eighth Doctor who died trying to save even someone who despised him, or that master game-player the Seventh who talked the Daleks into self-destruction, then "Chinny" and "Sandshoes" must seem a very poor recompense for all the blood on his hands, all the endless, interleaving centuries of struggle. He was young on Karn, already shadowed. How long does it take for a Time Lord to grow old?) And yet he's not all grim, with his mordant exasperation and gradually, gloriously, his lightening sense of hope. He catches fire as brightly as his mercurial counterparts; he realizes and improvises as swiftly as they do. He is younger than they are, seeing no way out but the dreadful sacrifice he was born to make, and when shown the chance of a different future he fights for it, gladly, instead of merely against. He burns away into life-gold light, smiling. It could have been a golem story, too. I have my arguments with some of the plot, but John Hurt is not one of them. Nor that burning-eyed glimpse of Capaldi's Twelfth Thirteenth Doctor, split-second to set the record straight.
(I still wanted more.)
Briefly, because I have to be awake in a very few hours to meet with a jeweler— Yes,
poliphilo, ashlyme, I loved him. Of course he regenerates immediately following the parting of the three Doctors: he was created to end the Time War and with that task accomplished, he can cease to be. He told the Moment that he had no desire to survive the destruction of Gallifrey, for which his punishment would have been to live; because he finds another way, crazy, timey-wimey, continuity-bending as it is, he is allowed to die. And he leaves the time anomaly understanding that he will retain no memory of the events contained within it, but because he regenerates when he does, he—the Warrior, the War Doctor, the secret who deserves the name after all—dies knowing what he tried to do; it's Eccleston's Nine who won't remember. There are ways in which this would have made a perfect Christmas episode. Tennant and Smith's Doctors have been running from their past, but Hurt's is the one confronted with his future, forced to assess whether he likes the pattern he's about to set in place: the man who regrets, the man who forgets . . . Why do you have to talk like children? What is it that makes you ashamed of being a grown-up? He's battle-wearied, self-sick, resourceful as a suicide; he remembers the name he cast off, knowing a doctor's business was to save, not sacrifice, the way fallen angels remember turning their backs on heaven. (Naturally he's all the more aghast at his future incarnations: if he last remembers being the Eighth Doctor who died trying to save even someone who despised him, or that master game-player the Seventh who talked the Daleks into self-destruction, then "Chinny" and "Sandshoes" must seem a very poor recompense for all the blood on his hands, all the endless, interleaving centuries of struggle. He was young on Karn, already shadowed. How long does it take for a Time Lord to grow old?) And yet he's not all grim, with his mordant exasperation and gradually, gloriously, his lightening sense of hope. He catches fire as brightly as his mercurial counterparts; he realizes and improvises as swiftly as they do. He is younger than they are, seeing no way out but the dreadful sacrifice he was born to make, and when shown the chance of a different future he fights for it, gladly, instead of merely against. He burns away into life-gold light, smiling. It could have been a golem story, too. I have my arguments with some of the plot, but John Hurt is not one of them. Nor that burning-eyed glimpse of Capaldi's (I still wanted more.)
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Yes, this is the thing that made it for me. I am forever saying that Tennant's and Smith's Doctors are too similar, and seeing them paired like this emphasised the likeness. Hurt's reaction to them picked out where my problem lies, and made an opportunity of it.
Not that I would expect Matt Smith's Doctor to be less whimsical, more adult, now that the paradox has been accomplished: but he doesn't have to, because there was that moment of Capaldi...
I see that Elizabeth I has now merged seamlessly with Miranda Richardson's Queenie. And that John Martin was struggling to reproduce the art of Gallifrey (this last does not surprise me).
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Now post-Christmas Capaldi's Doctor can stop treating his Companions as puzzles to solve in order to distract himself from what he himself is. I've the impression Moffat was writing himself into a corner and can now breath easily again. Questing for Gallifrey allows far more adventures across space and time.
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And yet he's not all grim, with his mordant exasperation and gradually, gloriously, his lightening sense of hope.
I was (very pleasantly) surprised by the humor of John Hurt's Doctor. I'm glad they wrote to that strength of Hurt's, as well as the gravitas.
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I didn't have much experience of Tennant's Doctor going in, but I've had plenty of problems with Smith's, and I am both impressed and appreciative of the ways the script called him out on them, particular since Moffat wrote them there in the first place. I am not quite sure I am convinced it was a conscious act of characterization leading to this episode so much as a brilliant way of retconning an inconsistent immaturity, but it worked for me.
Not that I would expect Matt Smith's Doctor to be less whimsical, more adult, now that the paradox has been accomplished: but he doesn't have to, because there was that moment of Capaldi...
Yes! He's a teaser for the audience, obviously, and a nice way of canonizing thirteen Doctors instead of twelve, but he's also an assurance of the future: things have changed. The Doctor doesn't have to run backward into recrimination or distraction anymore; he doesn't have to refuse to grow up (because look what happened the last time he tried) because this time he tried, it was an act of hope rather than despair. He can move forward again.
And that John Martin was struggling to reproduce the art of Gallifrey (this last does not surprise me).
I was expecting Gallifrey to be frozen within the time-slice of painting, since I thought it belonged now to a timeline that no longer exists (Gallifrey falling, burned), but I guess it remains as an artifact no matter the uncertain quantum/many-worlds state of Gallifrey itself? And also I suppose that would have been too simple. Tom Baker would have known where it was all along. (Tom Baker probably knows anyway.)
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I think there's a very good chance. I am looking forward to him. Even if I didn't really get a scene with him and John Hurt.
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Totally agreed; see above! I didn't think of it in terms of forgiveness, but it does make sense of Capaldi's age—I don't mean that it needed defending in the first place, but rather than just being an incidental fact, it is now thematically resonant and moving. That is an exceedingly neat trick.
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Amen! I had, as I said, some arguments: I understand what the Zygon plot is doing there, but it feels very arbitrarily grafted except for the parallel of Kate's some-must-be-sacrificed-if-all-are-to-be-saved willingness to nuke London (and I can't decide about the resolution: I like the notion of manipulating both sides to the same perspective when rational argument fails, because it matches both the War Doctor's pessimism and the Tenth and Eleventh's more impatient, tricksterish shortcuts of accepted behavior, but I'm not sure how I feel about memory wipes as the solution for world peace), and Moffat has a tendency to overexplain at moments that should be numinous, as when it takes forever for Hurt's Doctor to realize that the blond-haired woman appearing behind closed doors is the Moment, or when Smith's Doctor rattles on about curators past the point where it's plain he's about to be confronted with the results of his wish. But it's the first full episode I've seen in seasons* that I haven't wanted to rewrite or significantly restructure. It's full of lovely things and painful things and a lot of it is clever, but very little of it is facile. I just liked it.
And Hurt is just that good. He stands there and he has already acted Tennant and Smith off the screen. He can do more breathing than any number of actors with gesticulating. Even the script notices!
* [edit] While looking for another post, I found my review of "Victory of the Daleks." I really liked Matt Smith's Doctor to begin with!
Now post-Christmas Capaldi's Doctor can stop treating his Companions as puzzles to solve in order to distract himself from what he himself is. I've the impression Moffat was writing himself into a corner and can now breath easily again. Questing for Gallifrey allows far more adventures across space and time.
On all fronts agreed.
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John Hurt hardly ever gets lead roles! I had to rewatch a film from 1984 for one of them! I was so pleased!
I'm glad they wrote to that strength of Hurt's, as well as the gravitas.
He explodes so well at the other Doctors. "The pointing again! They're screwdrivers! What are you going to do, assemble a cabinet at them?"
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The Curator moved me, too. I like to imagine him never wholly retiring, solving strange art crimes in his old age.
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They have very much that dynamic, but strangely reversed: for once the Doctor is bound to time in a way the Moment isn't. She can see ahead of him; she knows his possibilities. (I think she must have the name because she is the moment that is all time at once. I'm not sure we're ever told how this ultimate weapon was meant to work, but I wondered if it was not just destruction, but destruction in a way that could never be undone: no going back to retrieve what was lost, re-run events to make it come out all right this time; not even a time-lock, but a complete eradication from the timestream itself. Hence the conscience, and hence the Moment's intervention: once the War Doctor uses it, there will be, even for a Time Lord, no going back.) Hurt's Doctor has been from one end of time to another, fighting the war, but he still doesn't know what happens to him until the Moment starts cracking his timeline open. It's much more sophisticated than a superweapon that simply refuses to let itself be used—this is a weapon that actively works to make its attempted user find another answer to the problem.
He went into it with joy, and no other Doctor ever got that.
I think you're right. Maybe Smith's Eleven will be able to take a cue from him.
The greatest crime of this fiftieth anniverary—taking "The Night of the Doctor" and "The Day of the Doctor" together—was giving us just enough of McGann and Hurt to want so much more.
I like to imagine him never wholly retiring, solving strange art crimes in his old age.
Even if the Curator is a never-explained, never-revisited tantalizing loose end, he was the correct way to end this episode. It wasn't just the fact that Tom Baker is still the face of Doctor Who for so many viewers; he's onscreen for two, three minutes and he is as alien, mysterious, appealing, and faintly perilous as a Doctor should be. I don't know how he's supposed to square with the Doctor dying at Trenzalone; I don't know if he is the Doctor, or some strange echo; it doesn't matter. He doesn't even have a scarf. He's right.
Also, you could write that person.
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Talk to me about Shada?
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I had *so much fun* watching the anniversary show.
(And I watched it with a friend who had never seen any of the new series. It was terrific for her too. Moffatt is inconsistent, he's blown stories before and will surely blow them again; but this one, out of the park, over the county line, still going.)
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Okay, that's cool.
(Of course you can jump in! Anywhere in the conversation! That's what posts with multiple comment threads are for!)
Moffatt is inconsistent, he's blown stories before and will surely blow them again; but this one, out of the park, over the county line, still going.
Yes. I was so worried. I did not have to be upset over this one!
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(I miss him so, so much. He's my Doctor.)
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My Doctor seems to have turned out to be John Hurt!