The Snowmen

Dear Gary—

I’m going to give Doctor Who a ‘Pass’ on this one. The Snowmen is another Story Lite in which the narrative is sacrificed for larger agendas, but it is just so darn entertaining that I’ll forgive it. Madame Vastra and Jenny are an improbable duo representing yet another Doctor Who slap in the face to the rich history of English literature (“You realize Doctor Doyle is almost certainly basing his fantastical tales on your own exploits?”), but this “lizard woman from the dawn of time” detective and her sometimes leather clad Victorian maid/wife are great fun. Their “psychotic potato dwarf” butler Strax, the Sontaran raised from the dead, is ridiculous and an insult to his proud warrior race, but he is the height of hilarity. Together with the Doctor and Clara this team makes for an amusing hour of television. It’s therefore OK that the villainy of the tale is given short shrift.

The purpose of the story is to introduce the impossible Clara, the recurring character who keeps dying but who is destined to become the Doctor’s companion. (Wasn’t that Rory?) Now it has been firmly established in New Who that the impossible is not only possible but most likely probable, so I take little interest in this mystery the show is fostering regarding Soufflé Girl aka Oswin Oswald aka Clara Oswin Oswald. It is going to be some contrived thing that is hinted at throughout the season and revealed with great fanfare in the spectacular finale. I can wait. For now, however, I am enjoying the feisty new barmaid (or is she a governess?) leading a double life for no good reason and her chemistry with the Eleventh Doctor.

The Doctor has just lost the companionship of Amy and Rory (even though I still maintain that he could see them whenever he wants but for whatever reason is stubbornly sticking to this idea that they are dead to him) and he has decided to take his TARDIS and go home, which for him is a cloud above a park in 19^th century London. The Doctor has a long tradition of sulking so it is no surprise that he chooses to indulge himself now. Along comes the charismatic Clara and he begins to take an interest in life once more. He has been constantly reminded, in this New Who world of his, that he needs someone by his side at all times; Clara gives proof to this. I am reminded, Gary, of the charming interplay between the Fourth Doctor and Sarah as she chides him out of his childish snit in The Brain of Morbius.

Intelligence and curiosity—two qualities the Doctor can’t resist; Clara has them and then some. Something else the Doctor can’t resist: “Pond.” Clara passes her one word test with this coincidental utterance that captures the Doctor’s attention and ties in with the threadbare plot.

“Shut up, I’m making deductions; it’s very exciting.” The Doctor is clearly excited to be engaged in the world once again as he takes on the guise of Sherlock Holmes to start his investigation. He’s having fun; Clara, Strax, and to a lesser extent Vastra and Jenny, are the perfect personalities to complement his playful ingenuity. He becomes increasingly joyous as the action takes off and his companions commit to this lighthearted farce whole heartedly. (Strax: “Sir, please do not noogie me during combat prep.”)

The fun and games comes to a screeching halt, however, when the ice woman pulls Clara down from the Doctor’s cloud and she lies dying in the Latimer home.

This is where the story gets in the way.

“Well, we can’t be in much danger from a disembodied intelligence that thinks it can invade the world with snowmen.” No, they can’t. The Doctor himself says it: “You can’t conquer the world using snowmen. Snowmen are rubbish in July.” The answer to this by the Great Intelligence is a woman made of ice. I have to point out that ice can melt just as well as snow. She can also shatter, as she does when she plummets to the earth with Clara in tow.

It is the weakest of all links. I’m not even sure if the GI is in control of this alien snow or if it is just coincidental that the alien snow fell at the same time that the GI decided to make contact with a discontented orphan boy. And the Doctor is right about the rubbish snowmen. Just take a heavy stick to them; or better yet a shovel. Or run away. How much damage can these snowmen actually do? Can we really believe they are carnivorous? Their main purpose seems to be in service to the “I said I’d feed you; I didn’t say who to” joke. A joke much better executed (dare I make it three in a row?) by Twilight Zone’s “To Serve Man.” I can’t see that the desperate men asking for their fair wages are in any danger. Especially since this snow has been hanging around for—how many years has it been? Is the snow or the GI in charge? The boy, now man, Dr. Simeon, isn’t in charge. Or is he? Did he start the ball rolling when he expressed his “they’re silly” sentiment? Did this snow that mirrors simply pick up on his misanthropic notions and run with them? But where does the GI fit in? What came first, the snow or the GI? And why has it taken its sweet time in doing whatever it is doing?

The snow needs to evolve; it needs human form; blah, blah, blah. So it waits for a governess to accidentally fall into a pond? The pond is water, not snow. It freezes; OK; but that’s ice. Where does the snow fit in? Why not lie in wait for a person to be buried in an avalanche? How does a woman frozen in ice help the snowmen, much less the GI? And it took how many years for this to occur? Just long enough for the little boy to grow up to be Richard E. Grant I guess. And who is pulling the strings? Why the need for spoonfuls of snow from individual snowmen? And what’s with the giant snow globe?

It is all a tenuous web of intrigue that never holds up upon close examination.

But why examine too closely? It’s all so amusing the way it plays out, and the tie in to Classic Who (“a map of the London Underground, 1967; key strategic weakness in metropolitan living”) is delightful. It’s only an excuse of a story at any rate; an excuse to re-introduce Clara and to get the Doctor moving again after his Pond loss. In this it succeeds, and it does so in highly entertaining fashion. That’s what New Who is all about; style over substance. In this case style wins hands down.

The Doctor is off in his TARDIS to find the impossible mystery girl who has died twice over. I’ll stick with him on his journey, Gary . . .