Russell and David
I know that I’ve been critical of Russell T. Davies before, particularly in relation to some of the Doctor Who plots before — I’m not going to rehash old ground — but just because I think he’s not done everything right certainly does not mean I think he’s done everything wrong.
The new Doctor Who adventures are at a much higher level than most of the previous adventures. Okay, in some respects this is only natural — technological advances between Patrick Troughton’s tenure and David Tennant’s mean special effects and costumes are so much better that it’s not even fair to make a comparison, but in some other key areas — characterisation, plot, dialogue and so on — it’s perfectly fair to make the comparison.
Look at the way Russell has handled various story arcs, for example — the Bad Wolf motif running through the first series — and you’ll see the clues in retrospect. They were there, but we didn’t pick up on ‘em all first time round. Yes, the denoument to the Master’s story was a bit deux ex machina (planet helps Doctor develop enormous psychic powers) but the backstory given to the villains of the piece is far, far better than it ever used to be.
The Master is no longer just a pantomime villain who happens to be a rogue timelord: he actually has a history, a reason for developing the way he did. I am very much a fan of old-style Doctor Who, but all too often a particular baddie was just churned out without a sufficiently good reason as to why they were there.
Let’s not forget that the original Doctor Who series weren’t all storming successes: for every story with the brooding atmosphere of The Horror of Fang Rock, you’d have something a lot less credible, such as The Invasion Of Time; let’s not forget that while people (including myself) have criticised the new episodes for being at times formulaic and with a tendency for the Doctor to hit uponn the right idea at just that specific point in time necessary, the old Doctors were just as bad.
After all, how many of the classic Doctor Who serials fell into that “base under siege” sort of a story? Loads of the buggers. This didn’t stop good examples of the genre — The Moonbase and The Horror of Fang Rock, for example — being seen as classics. For each original and particularly well-crafted story you can think of for one Doctor, you can probably point to another which was a bit of a stinker… (Pertwee – The Green Death vs Carnival of Monsters, for example).
So it’s unfair and an example of the rose-tinted glasses stuff to think that Doctor Who in the past is something that has ever been let down by the new version, which has taken a lot more time over continuity and actually seems to care about the Doctor Who universe hanging together as a coherent whole rather than just reimagining it between one serial and the next.
And — thank Rassilon — we’ve not had to put up with more than a token appearance of a comedy robot dog.
Russell has taken the script writing of Doctor Who up to a new, particularly exacting high standard. He doesn’t always live up to that target level which he sets himself — and other writers — but he has done Doctor Who a great service by setting that standard there. So thank you, Russell. I may be critical from time to time, but that is only because you have set the standard at such a high level.
David Tennant will also be leaving Doctor Who this winter: having reinvented the role in his own particular image more than any Doctor since the Baker/Davison era (although Eccleston’s part in the revival cannot be overlooked either). I can’t say I’ll be sad to see the end of “allonsy” although despite my initial misgivings (“David bluddy Tennant? who the hell’s he? Oh, that’s him? I can’t imagine him being any good…”) he has proven to be one of the best ever Doctors, bringing real emotion and pathos to the role instead of just furiously muggin his way through the latest script.
Indeed, for the new generation, he will probably define Doctor Who in the way that Tom Baker did for a previous one…
Whether or not he’s the best Doctor to date I’ll leave aside — this is more a question of age and personal preference than some definable ‘best’ — but in my opinion what he has done is provide the highest quality acting seen in Doctor Who to date.
Like Russell, he too has ramped up the popularity of Doctor Who, and I think that the role of Doctor Who is now very much seen as a heavy, important role, as opposed to some minor kids show, which is certainly the impression given in the mid-80s. The whole thing seems more serious; it’s a lot less frivolous; and it actually delivers some quality programming.
I just wanted to put on record my thanks to them for all the good work they’ve done, and to wish them both all the best in the future. Of course, if I don’t like the christmas finale, I’ll still feel entirely free to attempt to tear it to shreds…
…and then next year I can cast my critical eye over Stephen Moffatt and Matt Smith!
John H says:
December 13th, 2009 at 12:24 pm
I agree with a lot of what you say. I think we owe RTD a debt of gratitude for reviving the series. I can’t help being irritated by a lot of the “cheats” in his scripts, though – so many of his stories (particularly the end-of-season specials) seem to rely on a “deus ex machina” and even the recent Waters of Mars (that seems to have gone down well) had the Doctor denying something he had insisted was an unchangeable absolute. I also think RTD’s insistence on getting Christmas references and snow into every Christmas special plumbs depths of tackiness rarely seen in the old series.
In comparison with Sylvester McCoy – and, to a lesser extent, Colin Baker – both Tennant and Eccleston have disproved Tom Baker’s assertion that the role is “actor proof”. It really does need an accomplished actor, which is why it worked so well with Tennant and Eccleston. Colin Baker struggled a bit under the weight of a clownish costume and misguided direction from his producer and (in my opinion) McCoy was just totally out of his depth, lacking in both the charisma and acting talent needed.
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