Touching on NuWho...
Oct. 26th, 2007 08:17 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
avevale_intelligencerWhen I first encountered fandom, back in the early post-Devonian period, I quickly learned about the various divisions and dissensions within the fan community, and the group that was always spoken of in hushed whispers was the Doctor Who fans. I'm not sure I ever even saw one, in those early days; a lot of my fellow media fen watched Doctor Who religiously, of course, as did I, but there was a difference between that and being a Doctor Who fan as such (or "per say," as people amusingly write these days).
Proof, if proof were needed, that that spirit lives on to this day is supplied in the vitriolic letters between various segments of fandom in the SF magazines. Three such caught my eye yesterday in the pages of SFX (whose editor doesn't seem to have considered that publishing letters from one section of the readership being obnoxious and pissy about another section of the readership might not be calculated to win them any new readers, especially now they aren't the only fish in the sea). Phrases such as "grow up" and "if you don't like it, don't watch it" and so on were bandied about freely. And, of course, hilariously enough, each group thinks it is the only one being mature and sensible, and all the others are dweebish, pop-eyed anoraks with no social skills.
Of course it isn't that simple. I haven't liked NuWho since halfway through the first season (and I tried, oh gods, I tried) but, as alluded to in song earlier, I can't not watch it. It's too almost-good, and there's too much there that I've loved since I was a dweebish, pop-eyed child, and the defects are so glaringly obvious and remediable that it's impossible not to think that one day they might get it right. There are wonderful ideas in NuWho, great stories, and if it only didn't call itself by that name, if this gurning prat wasn't pretending to be *my* Doctor, I could enjoy it with a whole heart. And that attitude is neither mature nor sensible, but I'm afraid I can't help that.
They talk about having a companion who doesn't hero-worship the Doctor being a new and wonderful thing, as if the whole idea of companions hero-worshipping the Doctor hadn't been brought in with Rose Tyler, because for some unfathomable reason the makers decided that this family series needed unresolved sexual tension. They repudiate accusations of "stunt casting," when it's painfully obvious that from its very beginning NuWho has been made dependent on "stunt casting"--what else was Eccleston?
And, of course, they equate popularity and success with merit. Gods know I've been stamped on enough times for doing that myself, and sometimes I believe it's true...but I think that if they had been able to bring back the real Doctor Who with modern production values, if they had not made any of the changes they didn't have to make, it would have been just as popular and successful, if not more so, because this character, that ship, are embedded in our dweebish, pop-eyed national soul. All RTD had to do to be where he is today, surfing the biggest wave on the shore of British television, was bring back Doctor Who in some economically workable form. He didn't *have* to make the changes that make my teeth itch every time I watch it, turn the Time Lord into a working-class hero, turn the companion into a Mary Sue with added soap opera, turn the TARDIS into some sort of broken-down camper van that can't even run without throwing the passengers all over the floor. He didn't have to do that. He did that because he wanted to, and because he could, and because there was so much about the series that he hated with a passion.
Which, if nothing else, proves he's a true Doctor Who fan.
Proof, if proof were needed, that that spirit lives on to this day is supplied in the vitriolic letters between various segments of fandom in the SF magazines. Three such caught my eye yesterday in the pages of SFX (whose editor doesn't seem to have considered that publishing letters from one section of the readership being obnoxious and pissy about another section of the readership might not be calculated to win them any new readers, especially now they aren't the only fish in the sea). Phrases such as "grow up" and "if you don't like it, don't watch it" and so on were bandied about freely. And, of course, hilariously enough, each group thinks it is the only one being mature and sensible, and all the others are dweebish, pop-eyed anoraks with no social skills.
Of course it isn't that simple. I haven't liked NuWho since halfway through the first season (and I tried, oh gods, I tried) but, as alluded to in song earlier, I can't not watch it. It's too almost-good, and there's too much there that I've loved since I was a dweebish, pop-eyed child, and the defects are so glaringly obvious and remediable that it's impossible not to think that one day they might get it right. There are wonderful ideas in NuWho, great stories, and if it only didn't call itself by that name, if this gurning prat wasn't pretending to be *my* Doctor, I could enjoy it with a whole heart. And that attitude is neither mature nor sensible, but I'm afraid I can't help that.
They talk about having a companion who doesn't hero-worship the Doctor being a new and wonderful thing, as if the whole idea of companions hero-worshipping the Doctor hadn't been brought in with Rose Tyler, because for some unfathomable reason the makers decided that this family series needed unresolved sexual tension. They repudiate accusations of "stunt casting," when it's painfully obvious that from its very beginning NuWho has been made dependent on "stunt casting"--what else was Eccleston?
And, of course, they equate popularity and success with merit. Gods know I've been stamped on enough times for doing that myself, and sometimes I believe it's true...but I think that if they had been able to bring back the real Doctor Who with modern production values, if they had not made any of the changes they didn't have to make, it would have been just as popular and successful, if not more so, because this character, that ship, are embedded in our dweebish, pop-eyed national soul. All RTD had to do to be where he is today, surfing the biggest wave on the shore of British television, was bring back Doctor Who in some economically workable form. He didn't *have* to make the changes that make my teeth itch every time I watch it, turn the Time Lord into a working-class hero, turn the companion into a Mary Sue with added soap opera, turn the TARDIS into some sort of broken-down camper van that can't even run without throwing the passengers all over the floor. He didn't have to do that. He did that because he wanted to, and because he could, and because there was so much about the series that he hated with a passion.
Which, if nothing else, proves he's a true Doctor Who fan.