Doctor Who 10x12, "The Doctor Falls"
Jul. 1st, 2017 08:37 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kindkitAs an actual season finale/last episode for Twelve that would have been awfully bleak, but of course we still have the Christmas special coming up. And if the BBC allows a Christmas special to be bleak, I'll eat my hat.
Anyway, it ultimately wasn't bleak for Bill, which makes me happy. I wonder if Moffat himself gets the credit for knowing to avoid Dead Lesbians, or if someone whispered in his ear.
I am bothered by the way much of the death and destruction in this episode hinged on a plot hole, or rather a plot contradiction. In last week's episode, it took about ten years of bottom-of-ship time for the Doctor to explain time dilation and then ride the elevator down to find Bill (too late). In this one, we were told that if the Doctor and co. took the elevator back up, this would give the Cybermen a thousand years (!!!) to develop their weaponry and prepare their attack. I don't think so.
Also in the episode, the Doctor gave a small child a bomb and himself became a suicide bomber after mowing down Cybermen by the dozens. Now, I've often found myself frustrated by New Who's frequently sanctimonious insistence that non-violence is always the answer, but I think I have moral whiplash now.
Simm!Master and Missy killing each other makes sense, and their helpless laughter at the realization was a great character moment. I do wish they'd given John Simm more to do than lounge around and make adolescent remarks about "girls," though. (I want to ascribe Simm!Master's dismay that he's going to regenerate into a woman to something other than misogyny, although heaven knows he's shown misogyny aplenty in the past. Still. My idea, the first fic idea I've had in ages, is that he's been a woman before and had the bad luck to experience something Time Lords rarely suffer from--gender dysphoria. (Note that I don't think Missy has gender dysphoria; rather, something went wrong in this earlier regeneration and left the Master in a body at odds with his internal gender identity. Naturally he expects that this will happen again when he becomes Missy and hates the prospect.)
Simm!Master and Missy's interactions were . . . well, I have absolutely no objection to the Master being attracted to one of his other incarnations--surely this must be an unmentionable Time Lord kink?--but once again, Moffat made everything heterosexual. Similarly with Nardole and the community leader woman. Some lip service was paid to the fact that Master/Doctor love/hate has mostly not been heterosexual, and I guess I'm glad even for that, but I am fed up to the back teeth, and have been for years now, with Moffat's unwillingness to put queer male characters or male/male relationships onscreen except in the most de-eroticized possible fashion. Twelve and Simm!Master lacked much spark, and while that could be the actors, it could also very well be Moffat's choice. (Important note: as a matter of representation, I think it's really good and really important that we had Bill this season, as the first queer companion whom the Doctor accepted and didn't try to run away from. I love Bill and I'm glad she's not exactly dead, and as I said above, I give Moffat credit for writing her a happy ending. None of this changes the fact that, like a lot of straight male showrunners/writers, Moffat is apparently a lot more comfortable with queer women characters than queer men. He's willing to acknowledge that desire and love between men exist, which makes him better than some, but he keeps it mostly offscreen and certainly far, far away from his major characters. It was RTD who first wrote a heterosexual romance for the Doctor, for which I'll never quite forgive him, but Moffat vastly extended the Doctor's straightness and has made both the Master and the Master/Doctor relationship straight as well.) /the rant I keep ranting because Moffat keeps fucking doing it
I don't believe Missy/the Master is really dead and gone. The Master has a way of coming back from the dead, and even in this episode we saw the Doctor awaken and start to regenerate after he'd seemed dead for hours. And there's no way the BBC is going to kill such an important character in such a money-making franchise.
I prefer not to believe that Simm!Master is about to regenerate, either. Surely it takes more than a small knife to one of his hearts? I just don't want to think of his story ending, even though he's the worst incarnation of the Master in terms of sadism on both a small and a large scale. (I want to believe he lives and finds the Tenth Doctor at some hidden moment of Ten's timeline, and whatever happens between them sets the stage for Missy's apparent redemption. Because "lovers turned enemies but they still love each other and are ultimately drawn back together" is my bulletproof kink and I will never not want a happy or happy-ish ending.)
So, anyway. This season has dragged me back into New Who enough that I'm going to be very sad to see Capaldi go. I'm hoping that the new Doctor will again be someone older who can act, not someone who's just young and hot. I'm trying not to think about the prospect of Chris Chibnell as showrunner, because it makes me nervous.
Anyway, it ultimately wasn't bleak for Bill, which makes me happy. I wonder if Moffat himself gets the credit for knowing to avoid Dead Lesbians, or if someone whispered in his ear.
I am bothered by the way much of the death and destruction in this episode hinged on a plot hole, or rather a plot contradiction. In last week's episode, it took about ten years of bottom-of-ship time for the Doctor to explain time dilation and then ride the elevator down to find Bill (too late). In this one, we were told that if the Doctor and co. took the elevator back up, this would give the Cybermen a thousand years (!!!) to develop their weaponry and prepare their attack. I don't think so.
Also in the episode, the Doctor gave a small child a bomb and himself became a suicide bomber after mowing down Cybermen by the dozens. Now, I've often found myself frustrated by New Who's frequently sanctimonious insistence that non-violence is always the answer, but I think I have moral whiplash now.
Simm!Master and Missy killing each other makes sense, and their helpless laughter at the realization was a great character moment. I do wish they'd given John Simm more to do than lounge around and make adolescent remarks about "girls," though. (I want to ascribe Simm!Master's dismay that he's going to regenerate into a woman to something other than misogyny, although heaven knows he's shown misogyny aplenty in the past. Still. My idea, the first fic idea I've had in ages, is that he's been a woman before and had the bad luck to experience something Time Lords rarely suffer from--gender dysphoria. (Note that I don't think Missy has gender dysphoria; rather, something went wrong in this earlier regeneration and left the Master in a body at odds with his internal gender identity. Naturally he expects that this will happen again when he becomes Missy and hates the prospect.)
Simm!Master and Missy's interactions were . . . well, I have absolutely no objection to the Master being attracted to one of his other incarnations--surely this must be an unmentionable Time Lord kink?--but once again, Moffat made everything heterosexual. Similarly with Nardole and the community leader woman. Some lip service was paid to the fact that Master/Doctor love/hate has mostly not been heterosexual, and I guess I'm glad even for that, but I am fed up to the back teeth, and have been for years now, with Moffat's unwillingness to put queer male characters or male/male relationships onscreen except in the most de-eroticized possible fashion. Twelve and Simm!Master lacked much spark, and while that could be the actors, it could also very well be Moffat's choice. (Important note: as a matter of representation, I think it's really good and really important that we had Bill this season, as the first queer companion whom the Doctor accepted and didn't try to run away from. I love Bill and I'm glad she's not exactly dead, and as I said above, I give Moffat credit for writing her a happy ending. None of this changes the fact that, like a lot of straight male showrunners/writers, Moffat is apparently a lot more comfortable with queer women characters than queer men. He's willing to acknowledge that desire and love between men exist, which makes him better than some, but he keeps it mostly offscreen and certainly far, far away from his major characters. It was RTD who first wrote a heterosexual romance for the Doctor, for which I'll never quite forgive him, but Moffat vastly extended the Doctor's straightness and has made both the Master and the Master/Doctor relationship straight as well.) /the rant I keep ranting because Moffat keeps fucking doing it
I don't believe Missy/the Master is really dead and gone. The Master has a way of coming back from the dead, and even in this episode we saw the Doctor awaken and start to regenerate after he'd seemed dead for hours. And there's no way the BBC is going to kill such an important character in such a money-making franchise.
I prefer not to believe that Simm!Master is about to regenerate, either. Surely it takes more than a small knife to one of his hearts? I just don't want to think of his story ending, even though he's the worst incarnation of the Master in terms of sadism on both a small and a large scale. (I want to believe he lives and finds the Tenth Doctor at some hidden moment of Ten's timeline, and whatever happens between them sets the stage for Missy's apparent redemption. Because "lovers turned enemies but they still love each other and are ultimately drawn back together" is my bulletproof kink and I will never not want a happy or happy-ish ending.)
So, anyway. This season has dragged me back into New Who enough that I'm going to be very sad to see Capaldi go. I'm hoping that the new Doctor will again be someone older who can act, not someone who's just young and hot. I'm trying not to think about the prospect of Chris Chibnell as showrunner, because it makes me nervous.
