Doctor Who 4×10: Midnight
Jun. 18th, 2008 02:24 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
http://rusty-halo.com/wordpress/?p=2612
I've been delaying writing a review of this, mainly because it's my favorite episode of the season and I'm having a hard time un-jumbling all the thoughts that are running through my head.
It's also really emotional. First because it's kind of like watching an entire episode of a puppy getting kicked. Y'know, if the puppy was a supergenius Time Lord. That + the end of The War Games + the latest chapter of Praxis = me really really wanting to give the Doctor a big hug right now.
And second because it just gets me on a personal level, that whole "cast out the 'freak'" group mentality. (Overly-personal TMI: I attended five different schools five years in a row when I was a kid, so I got used to being the "weird new kid" that everyone else would pick on to make themselves look cooler. I think one of my defining memories is of all the girls in my fourth grade class surrounding me on the playground and hitting and kicking me for being "strange." I'm not trying to be whiny or asking for sympathy--I'm over it and I'm sure many people reading this have experienced the same or worse--I'm just saying why this episode particularly upset me. It's a dark side of human nature that many of us have direct experience with in one way or another.)
And this is such an honest portrayal of it--maybe sped up a bit for time but basically a really harsh but true look at that kind of group mentality, the demonization of "the Other" out of fear and insecurity and cruelty. I honestly don't get all the people who are saying "the alien was so scary," "it was terrible how the alien manipulated them," because in my opinion it was ALL THEM. The text leaves it ambiguous, but I really felt like the alien was just emulating the humans, and it picked up their fear and hate and copied it. The real monsters in this story were the people, and for those of you who don't think humans would really do that, um, I envy your naivety. (Plus, certainly the story is also more interesting this way, if the humans only got back what they put in, a la the cave scene in The Empire Strikes Back.)
It was similar to a lot of stories that explore mob mentality and the darkness lurking inside the everyman. The first things that came to my mind were The Lottery, Lord of the Flies, and The Crucible. Stephen King also likes to explore similar issues (Carrie and Wizard and Glass, for example, and I'm sure there are better ones). Lots of people online also mentioned the AtS episode "Are You Now or Have You Ever Been" and the Twilight Zone episode "The Monsters are Due on Maple Street." (Also I've had Marilyn Manson's "Dogma" stuck in my head since I saw the episode. :P) It's a rich theme, and I think this episode is right up there with the best of them. It's superbly written and while it's about human nature in general, it also doesn't hesitate to draw very direct parallels to today's world (airlines, terrorism, immigrants).
And to the people complaining that the humans' actions don't make sense, that all they had to do was stop talking, that rescuers were on the way--yeah, that's the point. Humans are not logical creatures, especially when in a panic; every word was driving them into further hysteria.
It's also interesting because it's a subversion of everything we expect from RTD's Doctor Who: the Doctor's faith in humanity, his ability to charm and talk his way out of danger, and the humans who become better for having known the Doctor. Here the Doctor's faith is misplaced, his charm fails utterly, his speech loses its power, and the experience brings out the darkest side of the humans. I love that RTD said in the Confidential that this is the anti-"Voyage of the Damned." I love VotD--it's a great disaster-movie pastiche--but this is its flipside, a look at atrocities that are likely to actually happen in such a situation.
And it's a great character study of the Doctor. I've seen complaints that he was acting abnormally rude and arrogant in this one, but I don't believe that at all. He was acting exactly as he always does, impatient and socially clueless, expecting his charm and the fact that he, y'know, helps, to keep the humans on his side. He did what we've seen a million times before, only this time the people around it saw him in the worst possible light, and he just dug himself in deeper when trying to correct their misinterpretations. (Which also goes to show you just how much he needs a companion--not just someone to look out for him but someone to correct his excesses and, almost literally, to translate his alien behavior into something that humans who don't know him can understand.)
If anything, the Doctor was more concerned about reassuring the humans than usual--at first he obeys the driver and doesn't tell anyone they're stopped awaiting rescue, and he repeatedly says things like "Just a little pause, that's all," "I can guarantee you, everything is fine," and "We are going to get out of here, I promise." He even does his "trying to boost the underdog" thing when he has Dee Dee explain the air system to the group. And yes, he does bite off more than he can chew, just like in VotD--he truly wants to save everyone, believes he has the best shot at doing so, but the tragedy is that he isn't a god and he can't always help. Here it works against him, since they lose confidence in him once his reassurances turn out to be false. He's trying his best to comfort them, but unlike in VotD, they don't accept his authority, and his attempts at comfort only unsettle them more.
And why does he unsettle them so much? All of his strengths become weaknesses in this situation. He stands out as different--brainy, arrogant, booked at the last minute, and traveling *alone* OMG (it's notable that the two scapegoats are the ones traveling alone--the episode is all about fear of the unknown and the group expelling the outsiders). Plus, his instinct to lead puts him in the spotlight--the Doctor certainly never learned to keep his head down! And his curiosity, his fascination--he can't put the humans above all else, not when there's an amazing new life form to discover. He just is not human, doesn't see them as inherently more important than all other forms of life, and as with Queen Victoria, he brings out these peoples' most intolerant sides. (I love him so much for his pacifism and his insistence on giving this new form of life a chance, btw. I think a tolerant and peaceful approach is always right, even though it doesn't always work out.)
And how heartbreaking that it starts with an exploration of how much the Doctor needs people. He begs Donna to come along (how cute was that scene? I LOVE THEM) and tells her "it's no fun if I see it on my own," but then later tries to cover and claims to love traveling alone. Oh, Doctor, you suck at pretending you're okay. He's practically bouncing at the opportunity to bond with the passengers, and takes absolute glee at getting to know them and to hear all their banal human stories. He loves humanity, he's adopted them as his people now that the Time Lords are gone, and that's what makes it hurt so much when they reject him. The species he's saved and bonded with and cheered on throughout time is about to cast him out for being too strange and different, for not being able to fit in.
And the scariest thing in the episode, the Doctor losing control, helpless and terrified and so alone. It was like "42" if that had been, y'know, written well. David Tennant absolutely KILLED ME in that scene. The big eyes, the unshed tears, the terror in his voice, the fact that he was fighting the possession and losing, and somehow it was all so much worse because he had to repeat the horrible words that thing was saying. I hope Tennant wins awards or something for that scene, because it was one of the most riveting things I've ever watched. (This is the first episode of Doctor Who where I was shocked when it ended because I was so absorbed that I completely lost track of time.)
And I love that he wasn't okay at the end, that he was clearly still traumatized. Unlike the manufactured situations that have led to his recent traumas (magical sparkly daughter, magical sparkly maybe-wife), this felt earned by the story. His belief in humanity is core to the Doctor's character, something we've seen throughout his run; even though he knows about their dark side, of course he would still be shattered by what he experienced in this episode. And THANK GOD DONNA WAS THERE TO HUG HIM. Even though she was barely in this episode, her scenes were golden. They encompassed the best aspects of the Doctor/Donna relationship: their funny banter and their unspoken understanding and ability to comfort each other. Donna, I love you so much. Please don't ever leave. (*cries*)
The other characters are also all wonderfully drawn. (I've seen people squeeing over some of them, and uh, what? Everyone but the hostess comes out of this looking like a pathetic excuse for a human being. Even if we do all have such flaws, I wouldn't want to be in a room with any of them after this episode. *shudders*)
So let's look at the people. We have:
Sky - Well, we don't really see much of her flaws, since she's possessed so quickly. But even in her brief screentime, we get a wonderful sense of a three-dimensional character. She's in a bad mood, not atypical for a traveler, she's depressed over her lost relationship (RTD, I love your casual inclusion of queer people, please never stop), she starts out looking wary of the Doctor but shares a lovely little smirk with him when she realizes he's shut down the in-flight entertainment, she opens up to him about her relationship, and--for some reason we never find out--she's the most terrified in the group. (And I love the ambiguity in this episode--so much extraneous plot stuff is left out because we don't need to know it, because it's not relevant to the story we're being told, like why Sky's scared or what the alien is/wants. This is really an amazing script that sticks to its core themes and doesn't meander.)
Joe and Claude - We don't get much exploration of them since they get killed so quickly, but even in their few moments we get a sense of their personalities, easy-going Joe and observant Claude, and it actually hurts when they die. (Uh, Moffat? You could really learn from this. *eyes random crew members that he failed to develop at all in two whole episodes*)
Val, the mother - At first she just seems like your typical average middle-aged woman. (And she is, OMG, that's why she's so creepy.) Snapping at her teenage son, laughing at her husband's insipid jokes, getting excited about the complementary slippers, contemplating whether to consume a juice pack. Average and banal, loves her family, and HOLY CRAP DID SHE JUST ADVOCATE MURDER?
I actually think she's the worst of them, bloodthirsty and superior and utterly lacking in self-awareness. At the end, she's already retconned what happened and cast herself as righteous. When she says "I said it was her," I think she half-believes it herself. (And maybe my one complaint about the episode is that she's yet another horrible mother written by RTD. I know some mothers are like this, but, dude, not all. But this script is so perfect that I'll forgive it here.) She actually reminds me of those women you see campaigning against heavy metal or comics or video games--so sure of their own righteousness, so unaccepting of anything that doesn't fit into their tiny little boundaries of what the world should be.
Biff, the father - He's loving and protective toward his family. He's a bit cheesy and unimaginative (he and Val complain loudest when the entertainment dies), but sociable and funny and, oh hey, the second member of the group to cheer on the idea of murder. And it's all tied into masculinity with him, too--he doesn't even consider the Doctor's argument about why they shouldn't commit murder, just hears it as a challenge to his manliness when the Doctor tells him he wouldn't be able to do it. He even yells at the professor for not being a real man when the professor hesitates to help him drag the Doctor to his death. It's all about being the manly patriarch and protecting his family, not about finding the truth and doing the right thing.
Jethro, the son - Jethro doesn't seem so bad at first. A bit misanthropic, but nothing out of the ordinary for a teenager in the rebel phase. (Good to know they've got goth/emo kids throughout time and space!) He's observant and smart but ultimately we find out that his rebellion is just a facade. He knows that what's happening is wrong, and yet he agrees with his parents when they insist that they saw the alien transfer from Sky to the Doctor, and he even helps his father drag the Doctor to die. The rebel is a follower after all, and I almost think it's worse because he clearly knows it's wrong and does it anyway.
Professor Hobbes (haha, Hobbes--I love you, RTD) - At first he seems like a harmless, eccentric old professor. Reminiscent of Mr. Copper--he likes to espouse his knowledge, but doesn't quite know what he's talking about a lot of the time. A bit pompous, yeah, but kind of funny--and then we see his dark side. The more his knowledge is threatened, the more insecure he gets, and the more he insults Dee Dee in order to make himself look bigger. He's a bully, like the others, and particularly egregious because his main target is the woman he's supposed to be mentoring, whom he knows is smarter than he is. He's weak-minded and so eager for an ego boost that he even drops his suspicion of possessed!Sky as soon as she appeals to his vanity by asking for his help specifically. (That alien learned a lot about human psychology by whatever assimilation thing it was doing.)
Dee Dee - She and the hostess are the most sympathetic of the main characters. She's smart, she thinks on her feet, she's sweet and unassuming. Her biggest flaw is lack of confidence--she keeps her mouth shut and lets the professor talk down to her and treat her poorly. At first her only victim is herself, but in the end she's a coward. She just wants to go home, just wants to be safe, and turns her head away when she knows the Doctor is about to be murdered. (If she'd helped the hostess, maybe they could have ejected Sky without anyone else having to die, but instead she closed her eyes.)
The hostess - Definitely the hero of the episode! The one example of human goodness, the woman who sacrifices herself to save the others. But she's certainly not perfect either; in fact, she's the first to suggest murdering Sky. At that point, Sky had done nothing more harmful than repeat words; they didn't know for sure that 1) she was possessed, that 2) the thing possessing her was malignant, or 3) that the thing possessing her was responsible for shearing off the drivers' cabin (or if it was intentional). The hostess was driven by professionalism--it's her job to protect the shuttle, but it's also her job to protect the passengers, of which Sky was one. And yes, of course she was hurting over losing Joe and Claude--she knew them best and seemed genuinely upset at their deaths--but that doesn't mean that vengeance is the right choice. In retrospect, things might have ended better if they'd thrown out Sky at that point, but that still doesn't mean it would have been justified with the knowledge they had then. And in retrospect, things might have ended better if they hadn't been so bloodthirsty in the first place--if the alien was truly emulating them, maybe it was her suggestion of murder that drove it to its worst.
I love that these people are so average. The Doctor didn't get trapped with a bunch of aberrant screw-ups; he got trapped with a bunch of everymen. At the beginning, we see all of their flaws as harmless, relatable, even cute. Dee Dee lacks confidence, Professor Hobbes covers his insecurity with pompousness, the hostess is coldly professional, Biff and Val are banal and unimaginative, and Jethro, for all his rebellion, seems to be a bit of a follower at his core. ("Emo"? Back in my day we'd have called him "Goth." I feel old!) But all of these things seem cute when we first meet them. The way they descend into justifying murder is just absolutely chilling, the way the tone of the episode changes from light and funny to dark and cruel before you even realize what's happening. (People complaining about the tone-shift? It's a feature, not a bug.) RTD purposely gets you to like and relate to these characters before he shows you the evil of which they are capable. The point is that we all have these dark aspects to our natures.
***
Other random notes about this episode (yes, I took notes, shut up):
* The tone shift reminds me of "Bad Wolf." It starts out as a light-hearted parody of modern culture, which makes it quite shocking when the story suddenly gets dark.
* The bonding scenes at the beginning are quite chilling to watch in retrospect!
* "Lost Moon of Poosh" - another lost planet-type thing.
* "The Medusa Cascade" - I don't know what it is but just hearing the words are starting to freak me out.
* "Ladies and gentlemen and variations thereupon" - I LOVE YOU RTD. And that your future is tolerant of trans/intersexed/alien/whatever variations from the gender binary.
*
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* Right before she's possessed, Sky screams "You're the hostess; you're supposed to do something!" And in the end, she does. Again, commendations to RTD for this excellent script.
* Lesley Sharp, who plays Sky, is absolutely amazing. The transformations she goes through are mind-blowing, and her eerie reptilian movements scared the hell out of me. Talented human acting pwns big special effects every time.
* The whole idea of the repetition is really interesting and probably deserves an essay of its own. RTD says in the Confidential that the Doctor's words lose their power because the repetition makes them seem tainted and false. The Doctor loses his greatest weapon here, his ability to talk himself out of anything. And speaking of the power of words--a recurring theme on Doctor Who--having your words "stolen" is such an eerie thought.
* The Doctor's ability to recite the square root of pi to the thirtieth digit probably freaks out the humans nearly as much as Sky's ability to repeat it. No wonder they turn on him. (Would they have turned on a different group member if he wasn't there? Or would they have just killed Sky?)
* The Doctor tells the group to be quiet, over and over, which is what they should have done. He's right, though of course they don't listen. He's not setting a great example either, though--his curiosity gets the better of him and he can't help interrogating the alien, even when he knows they should stop provoking it.
* There's a really slippery slope here. From "Could we kill one possessed person?" to "We'll kill you if you get in our way" to Val shouting that Dee Dee will be next simply for arguing against the group. If the hostess hadn't shocked them into guilt with her sacrifice, I could easily see them killing Sky, the Doctor, and maybe even Dee Dee just to cover up their own awful behavior and enforce their group norm.
* The use of light in this episode is awesome. I especially love Sky's hideous shadow lurking behind her as she first turns around, and the halo of light surrounding her when she pretends to have been freed. There aren't any explicit references to religion here, but they were definitely lurking in the symbolism. And by the end, they are practically shouting "Burn the witch!" what with all the chanting of "Cast him out!"
* Why does the alien go after the Doctor? Is it because he talks the most? Because he's the smartest? Because he's the most interested in it? Because he's the easiest to cull from the herd? Because he's the most scared (the same reason it went after Sky)? Because it's picked up on the humans' bloodthirstiness toward him and is simply emulating that? Another thing that I love for being ambiguous.
* I suppose one argument against the alien being benign and simply emulating the humans' darkness is that it doesn't pick up any of the Doctor's compassion or empathy.
* Even Dee Dee quickly starts rationalizing Sky's murder. For once I'd like to see a human being with firm pacifist ideals similar to those of the Doctor. They do exist!
* The Doctor gets impatient and comes across as more arrogant when he can't get the humans to understand what he understands. Yet another reason he needs a companion to "translate" from Time Lord to human.
* I'll bet he couldn't use the psychic paper to "prove" himself because they're so firmly expecting to see something bad that it would end up making things worse.
* Wonderful exploration of the psychology of the crowd, and of the way we see what we want to see, when Val insists that she saw the alien pass from Sky to the Doctor, and Biff and Jethro back her up. (Val, Biff, and the professor believe it because they want to believe it, and Jethro knows it's wrong but follows the crowd anyway.)
* The Doctor tells the group "You decide who you are. Could you actually murder her or are you better than that?" I love that belief in free will, that the Doctor inspires people to choose their own better natures. Well, usually. Here they choose their worst natures, but I still appreciate the emphasis on free will.
* The professor tells Dee Dee that she is "making a fool of herself pretending to be an expert." No, dude, that's you. And the alien tells the group that it's the Doctor creeping into their heads and making them fight--no, guys, once again that's you. This episode is all about scapegoating, blaming an external entity so that we don't have to face our own imperfections. This is why I really don't like the interpretation that this alien was an incarnation of the Beast, or was inherently evil. That's so typical, to blame the darkness on an outside force and remove culpability from the people who actually committed the atrocities. It was the humans who scapegoated the Doctor and were prepared to kill him simply for defending Sky, even before he became possessed himself.
***
And finally, after all that tl;dr meta, I will add that it would've been impossible to hate this episode no matter what, on account of the perfectly shallow fact that it gave me this moment:

screencap snagged from here
Current Mood:
exhausted

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