Sea Devils And Die: GeroniMoffat's Doctor Who In The 2010s

when would they have switched places?

during the quarantine maybe?

I thought the entire point was not that Amy "grew up" by becoming a domestic drone but that The Doctor basically ditched another set of companions because shit was getting too real (see: the departures of Susan, Sarah Jane).

Yeah -- I thought that was rather obvious. Unless you're being willfully obtuse.

Look-In magazine! Respect due.
"With respect, you're fired" gave me a little lol.

I really liked this episode. Brought to mind how many of my favourite books/films reference spooky hotels with dreamlike moving walls etc. ALSO, I liked how Rory was the 'rational' one with no belief system to do for him.

He didn't have to ditch Amy while calling her "Amy Williams", a name she clearly never wanted (and shouldn't have to want). The idea that Amy's version of growing up and losing faith in childish things is capitulating to her husband's desires and taking his name is gross. It's also gross because Amy's last name has always represented adventure on the show ("a bit fairytale", "Melody Williams is a geography teacher, Melody Pond is a superhero"), so the Doctor calling her that and saying that that's who she really is (should be) seems to represent putting away "childish" things, as if a woman keeping her own name and rejecting her husband's is symbolic of immaturity.

Not going to stop watching.

Thought it was kind of "in reality, I'm kind of a dick. you need to realise that."

Why on Earth would you keep watching a show you hate so much? Are you that desperate to be unhappy that you feel forced to subject yourself to things you don't like?

Because it's a show that I'm invested in and that I want to be better than it is? Because I like the concept and some of the characters? And if I dropped everything that trafficked in this particular brand of bullshit I'd quickly be without any forms of entertainment.

I'm not a fan of the "Williams" thing, but I don't think it was about reinforcing a female-subjugated domesticity. It was just lazy writerly shorthand to signify an identity shift.

PRIME NUMBERS!

also the girl from Darjeeling Limited was in this.

If so, I need to watch Darjeeling Limited.

The fact that it's lazy writerly shorthand makes it worse though? It's the unexamined assumption that taking her husband's name=growing up that makes it so insulting. I mean, I wouldn't expect that they would do that while fully cognizant of the implications (perhaps giving them too much credit here, idk), I do think that it was a shorthand to signal her identity shift. That doesn't make it better to me, that just makes it more clear that that particular belief is just background noise to them and acceptable within the framework of how they think about women, marriage, etc. I mean, society is full of the unexamined assumption that a woman not taking her husband's name is emasculating or immature or some hairy feminist thing. x-posts

Maybe, but maybe not.

I think the show has dealt far too much with Rory and Amy's relationship to make it as simple as "taking your husbands name is the way to have a normal existence". It's unfortunate that the lazy, shorthand for an identity-shift encroached upon an area of feminist issue, but I don't think the show that grand, subjugating claim either. At the end of the day, it's not about creating (a very specific kind of) female empowerment.

After having slept on it, the thing I liked the most was the Muslim nurse and The Doctor's seeming admission that he'd be much better served by her as a companion than a needy, whiny, self-entitled, abusive arsehole. Although he'd probably keep the bloke who used to be made out of plastic.

Then that got me thinking - is NuWho Doctor defined and affected by his companions? Ecclescake started out out tough but the slide to Emo Doc had started midway through S1 and went full-on through S2 I WUB YOU nonsense. He gained the ability not to act in S3 and then became family obsessed in S4 which led to his eventual fate - trusting The Master and The Timelords to be doing the right thing because they were 'family', then poisoning himself to save Wilf 'for' Donna.

Over S5 and S6 we've seen him as a selfish, petulant child, who doesn't unstand how people think and often does irrational things just because they benefit him. We've also seen him throw himself at the opposite sex (Marilyn Monroe, the French Queen at the beginning of this series) whether he has an emotional attachment to them or not and as cocky and arrogant when it suits him, being abusive to the people that care about him for his own ends. Also he seems to have an inexplicable attachment to Melody/River that seems more like a family tie than anything.

Or is this just a coincidence?

Thought it was kind of "in reality, I'm kind of a dick. you need to realise that."

I got this feeling from it as well. I don't think it was the show as much as it was the character that wanted Amy safely packed away into a version of a safe life that appeals to him. I don't think he cares how she feels about it. I didn't even hear him call her Amy Williams and I'm sure I'd have been annoyed by it if I had. We were already too busy complaining about yet more magic and yet more sickening Murray Gold swelling choral music, and yet more "oh the Doctor, he is so ancient and lonely, you know," business. Bleurgh.

I really hated this. I want a new Doctor, I want Gillan to go away and get a role that challenges her ability, I want the Doctor-companion relationship to be solid enough that I care even a tiny bit when they split up at the end of the episode, and I want them to drop the high concepts JUST. ONCE.

The fact that it's lazy writerly shorthand makes it worse though? It's the unexamined assumption that taking her husband's name=growing up that makes it so insulting. I mean, I wouldn't expect that they would do that while fully cognizant of the implications (perhaps giving them too much credit here, idk), I do think that it was a shorthand to signal her identity shift. That doesn't make it better to me, that just makes it more clear that that particular belief is just background noise to them and acceptable within the framework of how they think about women, marriage, etc. I mean, society is full of the unexamined assumption that a woman not taking her husband's name is emasculating or immature or some hairy feminist thing. x-posts

Already feeling sorry for the poor bugger you end up marrying, love.

Likewise, asshole.

Cup of tea please, scotstvo.

While he's making that - yeah, always worth examining the fallback assumptions of popular TV, especially in a programme that has done so much to examine sexual difference and in a series that has repeatedly presented strong woman/weak man relationships and consciously bucked marriage name tradition. Didn't actually notice the Amy Williams thing but did feel slightly queasy at the suburban house and fast red sports car for Rory.

Which of course suggests it's a quite deliberate ploy - either the doctor camouflaging them from the danger, or a more general, 'I'll give you what I think you are beginning to think you want and see how you get on, because the only companion I can travel with is a willing companion.' So they are given the most cliched and traditional set-up to play with. I don't think there's an implied judgment there that it's bad.

It's a bit weird to me because Amy pretty clearly was still a willing companion who was willing to take the risks involved. It's The Doctor who decided the risk was too great without asking her how she felt about it or what she wanted. I mean, obviously, he can decide who he wants and does not want on the TARDIS, but the idea that it's what Amy wanted (or is even starting to want subconsciously) seems off to me. He just decided without any input from her at all that what she should want is a house and a car and the whole Amy Williams life he thinks he has been "letting" her put off because of a childish faith in him. And everything about it was Rory's dream, from the house to the car to a wife that stays home and safe with him. I wish there had been something there that seemed more "Amy" at the very least.

I'd like to think there's something more to this storyline, but it really does seem to be about Amy growing up and putting the Doctor in a drawer with all her other childish things. And that's a pretty common fantasy trope that the girl has to leave behind adventure for domesticity whether she wants to or not. I'd love to see it subverted, but I don't have much faith.

I definitely noticed the surname thing, esp since at the start of the episode he calls A+R "assorted Ponds"!

(unless there was further context that I missed - we were a bit frazzled when we sat down to watch it on iplayer, since we'd put the telly on at broadcast time only to realise that this was the week of the digital switchover here and the tuner took 40 minutes to retune all its channels. Got to do it again in 10 days, rssnfrssn)

Amy "grew up" by becoming Amy Williams

yeah i am with you on this one, that was bullshit

tho presumably that was their old house he took them back to, the one they were living in at the beginning of the series?

but anyway yeah for all moffat's "we have a married couple now and we need to deal with that" all they seem to do is rehash the amy's-choice domesticity-or-adventure binary foreverrrrrr -- the baby/search-for-melody stuff could have been a way for them to genuinely focus on the married couple as a partnership or w/e and they basically just handwaved her out of the way and continued with the same all-that-defines-them-is-romantic-primacy tedium.

also: "oh no your faith in me and my ~saving you~ is what is putting you in danger! stop believing me, because i just told you to, and i will ~save you~ (OH AND THEN i will ~save you~ again by leaving you behind)" is duuuuumb

It's a bit weird to me because Amy pretty clearly was still a willing companion who was willing to take the risks involved.

The only thing I'll say in the Doctor's defence here (because basically I agree with you), is that Amy has less of an idea than the Doctor has of what the risks actually are.

On the other hand, not every female companion the Doctor has ever had has been required to put away her life of adventure. Sarah Jane didn't, and nor did Martha. Also some of them used to get killed, which needs to happen more in the new series or the risks involved are frankly not that huge.

tho presumably that was their old house he took them back to, the one they were living in at the beginning of the series?

Didn't think so, the way he gave her the keys to it, but it would admittedly be odd not to take them back to their house/flat, unless he were genuinely putting them in a simulacrum of the traditional suburban ideal in order to hide them.

The house in the first episode didn't have a blue door.

oh so it's either shitty continuity or yet more timey wimey bobbins

I also didn't get how easily Amy lost her faith in the doctor while he was still there with her and after he'd worked out the monster fed on faith and said it OUT LOUD WHILE SHE WAS THERE

because the faith was ill-founded, and not based on her actual experience. she knew this, really, and was thus able to let it go

oh so it's either shitty continuity or yet more timey wimey bobbins

...or just a new house

Or a lick of paint.

Already feeling sorry for the poor bugger you end up marrying, love.

― scotstvo, Sunday, September 18, 2011 2:21 AM (3 hours ago) Bookmark

could you not do this please, in all seriousness. it's rude and belittling

I'd like to think there's something more to this storyline, but it really does seem to be about Amy growing up and putting the Doctor in a drawer with all her other childish things.

Yeah, this is what I'm hoping/expecting it's not. If it is I will absolutely share your revulsion. I mean, 'growing up into autonomous woman who is no longer in thrall to the doctor' would have been okay, but 'growing up into outmoded female stereotype of domesticity' is definitely not. But I actually *cannot imagine* that this programme is going to go there.

Already feeling sorry for the poor bugger you end up marrying, love.

Hooray, a justified use of the Suggest Ban button.

i really missed how Amy is going to become a stereotype of domesticity.

emil.y otm and I also hope that that's not where Amy's character ends. Personally I think he's just keeping them both safe until it's time for him to die. xpost

"For such a creature, death would be a gift. So accept it and sleep well. (pause) I wasn't talking about myself."

I can't remember whether the doctor knows that Amy and Rory know exactly when he's going to die (did Amy tell RealDoctor or FleshDoctor? that was never actually made clear) - but at some point, he's going to have to go back to *their* past and set up his own death.

Have to believe that FutureAmy+Rory are also part of that plan somehow - it'd be odd if all we saw of them from now on were past versions of them.

Does that make sense? damn you timey-wimey.

i really missed how Amy is going to become a stereotype of domesticity.

― Gukbe, Sunday, September 18, 2011 8:30 AM (37 minutes ago

surely 'amy williams' was more about amy's affections being centered on rory over the doctor, and not about fealty and goodwifiness?

I think the doctor calling her 'amy williams' alone would've been fine, but that + leaving her at the door to explore the adventures of marriage + hot red car for Rory all at once, was where it went from dubious to all out ick.

(did Amy tell RealDoctor or FleshDoctor? that was never actually made clear)

yes it was, and he does

I get the "Williams" thing, but I'm not sure why NOT going on a series of life-threatening adventures = repressed wife. Don't lots of people live pretty decent, unrepressed lives when they're married and living in the suburbs? Unless we're making connections to the Toby Jones episode, in which Amy was the barefoot-and-pregnant wife of her nightmares?

And the car was just an awesome car?

Because it's not what Amy wants? Nothing wrong with the quiet life other than that Amy has never once expressed or indicated a desire for it.

But what should The Doctor have done?

Asked her what she wanted instead of giving her some sort of one-size-fits-all idea of domestic bliss + Rory's dream car?

But she's coming back!

It just seems to me that there's a lot more emotionally at work than there is culturally at work in this whole bungled situ. Rory is clearly along for the ride, out of loyalty to both the Doctor and Amy, but he wouldn't be doing this on his own, just for kicks. The Doctor is (I think) very aware that his motivation for including Amy is driven by (a) guilt (b) narcissism and is (c) wildly destructive to her life. He's not comfortable with her hero worship, and he's too immature (or something) to deal with it properly. Like with Rose, Donna, Martha, he's got to put her down before he kills her. He feels, rightly or wrongly, that her continued companionship will be terrible for her life. So he drops her off at home, giving her a pretty house (with a suspicious blue door) and her husband a big red car in the hopes of making a quiet, gracious exit. He's wrong – the exit provides him further control of her life - and the final 'Amy Williams' is ill-timed and a snide little pat on the head, but - at least as far as what we've seen actually indicated on screen - the goodbye is a lot more about the Doctor's discomfort w/ killing or destroying everything around him than it is with trying to force Amy into a certain lifestyle. And that's if there isn't something behind his motivation (blue door, plastic doctor copy, strange speech abt. death, his own looming awareness suggesting maybe otherwise).

By the way, I want to point out that Rory actually mentioned that Amy had beaten him with a shoe, and he flinched when she approached. Not to dredge up last week's feminist objection, but IIRC, I was chastised a few dozen posts back for suggesting she was the physical aggressor in the relationship.

I don't know. Maybe you're right. Odd conversation though.

"What do you want to do?"
"Stay with you."
"No. What else?"

xpost

The whole not-asking the 'want to continue' question was addressed explicitly earlier in the episode with the box of candy conversation. Of course she's going to want to continue -- who wouldn't?* *(Except Rory, who's got good reason to be done w/ all the gallivanting).

Would it have been better if he got them a studio conversion in Dalston and left them with an Oyster card?

Excluding companions from the specials

nu-Who companions who left of their own volition:

Mickey, Martha, River (tho obv she keeps coming back)

nu-Who companions who were left by the Doctor somewhere against their wishes:

Rose, Adam, Donna, Amy

I don't remember if Jack was abandoned or decided to leave. Rory, despite being psyched about the house, came back with three champagne glasses and seemed genuinely surprised that the Doctor had left them there so, while it's a safe bet that he would have been happy to leave the TARDIS for that new flat, it's unclear that he was ready to go without a proper goodbye.

Given that it is a virtual impossibility that this is the final goodbye for Amy and Rory, while I definitely see the logic behind the arguments against the show here for how it's handling the Doctor/Amy relationship, I don't think it's nearly as straightforward as "Amy needs to grow up and become a domestic drone." Setting aside the wholly reductionist idea that the only avenue open to Amy after traveling with the Doctor is staying at home catering to Rory's wishes, it's very clear to me that the series is not done with the relationship yet and that this is not meant to be anything other than plot mechanism to move Amy and Rory into position for the finale. This all strikes me as setup for the Doctor's 200 years of running alluded to at the beginning of the season; if Amy and Rory don't have anything to do with events after the Doctor gets shot and his body is burnt on a pyre, I will agree 100% with the terribleness of this goodbye. I don't think this is a goodbye, though; this is almost exactly what the Doctor did to Sarah Jane at the end of The Hand of Fear, only this time the Doctor dumped his companions at a residence they could move into as opposed to on a street corner in entirely the wrong neighborhood of London, carrying a box full of ludicrous nonsense. Also, Amy and Rory have left the Doctor for extended periods of time twice now; once for their honeymoon and once after discovering that River was their daughter. Narratively, this feels like another one of those interludes. From a real-life angle, if Karen and Arthur were leaving the series, we would have heard about it by now.

This Doctor definitely seems to be willing to stampede over the idea of free will; I feel that some amount of this dissatisfaction is intentional, as most of the storytelling from this season has revolved around how the Doctor treats most of his companions like really smart pets.

^ kickin' post. I think there's a certain amount of paternalism that we come to expect from the Moffat-Smith-Doctor: he's 900 years old, and he's never been painted as a particularly nice and angelic fella', as was RJD-Tennant-Doctor. You can't watch the two preceding seasons and expect him to behave in a way that does anything less than veer between condescending and fawning. (As DJP put it, treating his companions like very smart pets). It's easy to read malice or perpetuation of gender/sex preferences into his actions, and maybe they're inadvertently eeking out of the writers' fingertips, but I think a simpler explanation - and more likely one - is that he's more selfish and arrogant than many other Doctors, and his darkness is directed at everyone and more obvious in his treatment of Amy b/c occasionally she dares to contradict him.