Last of the Time Lords

Dear Gary—

I have to again recall Army of Ghosts/Doomsday in viewing Last of the Time Lords; each declares itself as a sham, not to be taken seriously as narrative. However those previous stories are almost subtle in their approach compared to the in-your-face attitude of Last of the Time Lords. Last of the Time Lords loudly and proudly thumbs its nose at the audience; this is pure spectacle; pure emotional manipulation; don’t even bother worrying about the plot because it will all be undone in the end. To this I say: OK, Doctor Who. At least you’re up front about it.

“The year that never was.” Superman style, all is reversed; it never happened. All the sorrow; all the pain; all the suffering; all the grief; all the destruction; all the despair; none of it. Except that the Doctor, the Joneses, Jack, and a handful of soldiers remember it. “The eye of the storm.”

And we the audience remember it; even though the slate was wiped clean and we can say it never happened, we still had to sit through it. This is the magic act of our three ring circus. Ta Da! The disappearing year. Now you see it, now you don’t.

But first we see it, and it is rather grim. It is relentlessly dark and depressing and without hope; standard apocalyptic cinematic fare. Poor Martha has to trudge through this world on her own, and she is the one saving grace of this drudgery. “Great; I’m traveling with a doctor,” she says, but it is not the Doctor. The Doctor is a shrunken, shriveled version of himself living in a bird cage. Yet Martha can smile when she witnesses his transformation into a troll. “The Doctor’s still alive,” she says, and she takes inspiration from the thought. Martha is a fitting guide in this dreary world of the Master’s making.

“Martha Jones, they say she’s going to save the world.” Martha has become a legend in the year that she has been walking the Earth. (Isn’t it conveniently contrived, Gary, that it has been exactly 365 days?) We only get a few lines to cover that year, the year that never was. The beginning of Last of the Time Lords presents that year between it and The Sound of Drums as a fait accompli. We are spared the majority of the death and destruction and desolation as Martha made her journey and the Master built his rockets. Martha has now returned to English soil and our story picks up.

It’s a vaguely interesting adventure as Martha and her newly met companion Dr. Tom Milligan hook up with Professor Docherty and take down a sphere. The reveal of the actual nature of the Toclafane is gruesomely effective. Martha’s explanation about the Time Lord gun is perfunctory and her capture at the safe house is mundane, but necessary. After repeated viewings I find the subtleties of Professor Docherty to be the most intriguing aspects of these segments.  My first few times through I could never understand Martha’s need to give her those flowers at the end. I got that her son was being held captive and that is why she was cooperating with the Master, but it is not as simple as that and those first few times I didn’t see the intricacies of her performance. Now I see that Docherty demonstrates the real devastation of the Master’s world; that loss of all hope that Martha is fighting against. Docherty so wants to believe, but desperation has taken hold too deeply. As Martha leaves Docherty asks her, “Martha, could you do it? Could you actually kill him?” She so wants to believe. But she does not see murder in Martha’s eyes. She does not believe that Martha can save the world, and so Docherty betrays her. It is true despair; the loss of faith.

Last of the Time Lords is all about faith and hope; and it is rather ironic, given Doctor Who’s proclivities, that this episode has such blatantly religious overtones. It is a bit disturbing as well, this trend towards depicting the Doctor as a god. Except that it is done in such a childish way. Docherty portrays the subtleties, but overall the show is played for pure theatrics. It is akin to Bible stories for children like I had as a kid, with lots of pictures and big print and simple words. It goes for the gut with little attempt to appeal to the intellect.

The Master plays the devil to the Doctor’s god; the baby faced Master taking impish glee in his sadism. The Master is so basely repugnant hiding under his glib, fun-loving façade. That would be the devil; not the cartoonish horned beast from The Satan Pit, but a silver tongued viper in pleasing form. Except the Master is so over the top frenetic and madcap that the Archangel network can be the only explanation for his hypnotic control of the populace, coupled with the terror of the Toclafane.

The Doctor as a god (and I’ll get to that dramatically juvenile transformation in a moment) descends upon the cowering Master in his all-powerful mode. What I like about this kiddie lit version of Satan’s Fall From Grace, however, is that the omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent Doctor is abandoned for: “I forgive you.” The mighty battle between good and evil boils down to a war between faith and despair. Forgiveness is an act of faith; free for the taking. Despair is a rejection of that forgiveness. The Doctor cradles the dying Master in his arms imploring him to accept life; to accept love; to accept forgiveness. The Master, in an exercise of free will, refuses. In this one respect, Doctor Who gets it right.

But an episode of Doctor Who is not the Bible, the Doctor is not God, and the Master is not Satan. This is a show drawing upon religious themes merely for the spectacle it creates.

And it is quite a spectacle; clap if you believe.

There’s the rub; you have to believe if you are to clap. If not, if you choose to exercise your free will and reject, you have fallen from the good graces of Doctor Who. I still want to believe; I therefore suspend my disbelief; accept that Last of the Time Lords is nothing but an entertaining exhibition riddled with inconsistencies, fallacies, and plot holes; sit back to enjoy despite the occasional bouts of boredom; and clap my hands off in the end, adding my voice to the mighty shouts of “Doctor!” cascading through the air and elevating the Doctor to lofty heights.

All the while retaining a healthy dose of skepticism.

Ah, Gary. What this show has driven me to.

Let me get my feet back under me, Gary. I’ll start by returning to that year that never was so conveniently marked out at exactly 365 days. Seems the Master accomplished quite a lot in that short span of time. The destruction is easy and only a matter of moments, but the construction of hundreds of thousands of rockets each equipped with a black hole converter is a miracle of sorts given the material and time constraints. The Doctor, the Joneses, and Jack, on the other hand, accomplished very little and waited until that last day to mount any kind of resistance. Their plan seems fairly simple and shouldn’t have required the space of a year to formulate. But then, it is merely a device to show the audience that their spirit is still alive and to slip in the isomorphic controls angle and I suppose to give the actors something to do even if it is ineffectual.

My biggest question concerning this year however: how in the world did the Doctor know exactly when Martha should return; how did he know about the ‘Count Down’ and when precisely it would take place; and why did he let this year happen at all when all along all he had to do was take out the Paradox Machine? I know, Gary, that’s three questions; but its three questions in one (or a triune question if you will).

But I’ll allow the year. What I do find fascinating, though, is that the Master had a tiny little Doctor suit on hand. Oh, and the Peter Pan spell not only brings the Doctor back at full strength and power and young of age, but it also grows shoes on his feet.

I would feel sorry for the Toclafane stuck at the end of the Universe; except the Toclafane are a pathetic bunch of insane, infantile cannibals who deserve their fate if that is the best they can muster in the face of adversity. If I thought I was the last of the Human Race only to discover that I was not alone, that there was one other, but then discovered that that other was none other than a Toclafane (or let’s say Hitler to put a human face on him), I would not then do all in my power to save him. If a Toclafane (or Hitler) is the best my race has to offer I would therefore think that Mankind doesn’t deserve to survive. However, I refuse to believe that the Toclafane represent the whole of Mankind from our far distant future. I have a little more faith in my race than apparently Doctor Who has. (If that is a contradiction in faith, well then Gary I’ll invoke the Doctor Who Paradox Machine.)

I want to say a word about Lucy, as long as I am talking about faith and forgiveness. Lucy was fine with the Master’s world of death and destruction until it became personal. After that year that wasn’t the Master was revealed as a wife beater and adulterer; it was only then that she turned against him. I have little faith or forgiveness for Lucy; although I admire her as a character.

For all the convoluted spectacle, however, whether it works or it doesn’t, Last of the Time Lords does succeed in sending off both Jack and Martha Jones as companions of the series. Jack is given the short end of the stick for the bulk of the episode, but The Face of Boe reveal makes up for everything.

This leaves me with Martha. I have liked Martha all along, but there is that nagging unrequited love element that mars her stint as companion. For starters, it is beneath her character. It is an obvious device that falls flat. More importantly, however, it keeps her and the Doctor at arm’s length. There is never a camaraderie or ease in their relationship; it is always distant and awkward. When Martha takes her first leave of the Doctor they are reserved and formal in their good-byes. Martha returns, however, and she calls the Doctor out. In a roundabout way, but she does nonetheless. “So this is me, getting out.” For all of his emoting, this Tenth Doctor can be cold, and when his companion wears her heart on her sleeve this can be cruel. It is time for Martha to leave and she does it on her own terms. The show might have asked us to clap mightily for the Doctor in order to raise him from his bird cage, but I reserve my heartiest applause for Martha. “This is me, getting out.”

I find I have created my own bit of convoluted mess here, Gary, and so this is me getting out . . . at least for now. Like Martha and the Master, there is hope for a return. I’m still a believer and will continue on this ever long slow path.