"Oh my God... I'm the tin dog!"

[drakyndra]

Yes, it's the obligatory School Reunion review. Well, it was this or that bloody assignment, and this is more fun.

Firstly: slight gloatiness, because I commented last week (on the lack of character development that ep had) that I thought that this and the next episode would be the big ones for character stuff. And boy, was I right...


Firstly, as much as I loved Tooth and Claw last week, I loved this one so much more. Easily my favourite Ten episode so far, and it's defintely in my very favourite bunch (I have no definitive order, but this is up with the best)

But back to my run through:
Anthony Stewart Head makes a great greasy villain. "Poor...thin child."

Also, within one minute of the show starting, a little kid gets eaten. Awesome.

Ten as a teacher. Glasses!Ten as a teacher. God, I wish I'd had a physics teacher like that. (Also, on a random note, I love that bag he carries in. No idea why)

His "physics" thing is cracktastic brilliance. I think it's the expression that makes it. And "I hope someone is getting this all down." I love the way he paces and says things weird though - he's a fascinating teacher.

"Correctamundo... a word I have never used before and hopefully never will again." *sporfles*

Also, Milo is such a Hermione.

Rose the dinner lady! I love her expression here, it's fabulous. And how she reacts to the Doctor when he is being just so adorably silly and weird.

Great big toxic barrels. Yeah, that's not at all suspicious.

Torchwood, with a bit more subtlty this week. And you are such a bitch to Mickey, Rose (This will not be the last time I say this).

Boom, scream, "It's fine, she does that." *falls over laughing*

The whole computer stuff is brilliant. I love the music, and the graphics are just creepily brilliant, as is the editing.

Sarah Jane, eee! "Oh, I can see everything... quite clearly." So very, very true, especially later in this episode.

Ten replacing a teacher who won the lottery on a ticket posted through her door... oh, you're a sneaky fellow, aren't you, Doctor?

The look on his face when he sees Sarah Jane... now that is "I can't believe my own eyes" disbelief and joy. Ten does joy well, really. And then he gets all stammery and incoherant, and there is such happiness and love there.

And his grin when she starts being all investigative...and then in the corridor, when he is all dreamy and almost as if he would cry from the happiness of it...

Ah, Kenny, the adorable suspicious fat kid. You can't not love him. (Oh my God, they don't kill Kenny! *grins*)

Ah, night sneaking...

"Fine, team... gang... comrades." *sporfle* And you are so adorable, Mickey, even when you are being a dweeb.

The look on Sarah's face when she sees the TARDIS - It's indescribable. And then when she backs away, and the Doctor is there, it's utterly heart-breaking. This is where I think I started tearing up somewhat. That entire meeting "Everyone died, Sarah."

"I can't believe it's you." Scream. "Okay, now I can." *grins*

"You can tell you are getting older, your assisstants are getting younger." Sarah is delightfully catty here. And I love how the Doctor apparently has no idea how to react.

"Like a little girl... nine, maybe ten years old, I'm seeing pig-tails and a frilly skirt." As much as I love Mickey, this was genius. And the expression on Ten's face here was awesome.

The Rose-Sarah Jane bitching is great, as is Ten's complete confusion and all. And Mickey seems so very amused by it all. (The complete spy music in this section also amuses me)

K-9! Awww! I love how ten is all *glee* and Rose and Mickey are just like "...Right."

"I've prepared an "I told you so" dance, that I can show you later!" *sporfles* Mickey, you are made of love! I love the fact that this is Mickey finally getting back at everything. Giving Rose a taste of her own medicine and all.

Monsters on the roof. How gargoyle looking are they?

TCI ref, hurrah! And then the whole conversation was wonderful - the Doctor assuming Sarah was okay when she so wasn't: "You were getting on with your life." "You were my life."

And he just doesn't understand what she is saying, is just so alien. Because he truly can't comprehend a life without the excitement and adventure, pinned down in just one place and time.

"You could have come back."
"I couldn't." Said so quietly and sadly. Because he just can't bear to see the people he loves grow old.

The glee when K-9 recognises him. Awww.

"I'm no dinner lady... and I don't often say that." Hehe.

"Add another suitcase full of bad." Best. Quote. Ever.

"Oh my God... I'm the tin dog." Poor Mickey. And you see, here, how that journey starts. This is where he wants to be something more.

And then we get the big Doctor-Rose showdown. It's all great stuff, and very clever.

"Is that what you are going to do to me?" "No, not you." Oh Doctor, you really do lie to yourself so much. Because you will leave her in the end, or she'll leave you. Nothing lasts forever, nothing gold can stay, and yet I think that every time, with every companion, he is convinced it will last. He travels throughout all of time and space, and yet he only ever lives for the moment, for the now. And then he takes those moments and makes them last a lifetime, and then he keeps them locked up, never looking back, never looking forward, just taking now and loving it and whoever he is with for who and what it is.

And yeah, the batshit shippers are all "OMG, this means Rose is special!" But as special as she is, she isn't unique. He loves her, but he loves them all. They are all special and precious and loved.

"Humans age. They wither, and decay, and imagine that happening to someone that you..." Yeah, it's love. It's always love. He loves them all, not just Rose, and Rose has just been hit with a great honking dose of reality, that she is just the now, not the forever, and she won't last. She will be loved, but in due course lost and locked away in his head.

"You can spend the rest of your life with me, but I can't send the rest of my life with you. I have to live on. Alone." Loneliness is a big them with Ten. Nine was Time War guilt, and now Ten is loneliness - Nine was too bust angsting about what he did to ever realise what it meant in the long term, and now Ten has realised just what it means. God, I love how he is near tears at this point. Tennant is astounding here.

Hehe, big battle music. But poor Mickey. And then the westen music, for the big confrontation.

Finch and the Doctor - slashiest thing ever. Srsly. Finch trying to get the last Time Lord angst going, and ten being all businessy, and "If I don't like it, then it will stop." Ten's da man, and he knows who's in charge.

"I'm so old now. I used to have so much mercy." Ho boy. No second chances, and yet he is aware of what he is becoming. *shivery* "You get one warning. That was it."

"Soon, you will embrace us. The next time we meet, you will join with me." Bwahaha! Could that be any more subtexty?

"That'll be me talking to a metal dog, then." Oh Mickey, I love you still!

Sarah and Rose bitching. *glee* ZOMG, Rose ships Doctor/TARDIS! That is so the best thing ever. And then they are all giggly, and the Doctor turns up and they get even worse, and his little whiny "Stop it!" is just so adorable.

Ooh, suspicious Kenny is being clever. Good kid. Run little fat boy, run!

"We are in a car." Oh, that is so cute. And wonderful how the fat loner, the tin dog and the metaphorical tin dog manage to get this stuff worked out for themselves.

Is it just me, or is Rose freaking out when she does that big Maths thing hilarious?

"Become a God..." And oh, the look on the Doctor's face when Finch is tempting him with the Godmaker thing. He was all fine and dandy, until the Time Lords were brought up, and then... he was considering it, he was seriously considering it. And he would take it up, he's got that "I know best" thing going on, and yet he is so aware of the cost, but for that one moment when he realises he could stop the Time War...

That's powerful. That's Galadriel with the One Ring, considering taking the world - the universe and shaping it his own image. Beautiful and terrible, in which he is the great authority and power, in which everyone he loves will live forever, young and beautiful, and all his enemies never are...

And the way Tennant plays it, blank and distant and quiet, he's dreaming, imagining, he can see it there, right behind his eyes and when he just has that faint smile... *shiver*

"Everything has it's time, and everything ends." And it takes Sarah Jane and her words on loss to snap him out of it, but he can still feel it, that desire, that need, and he has to shatter the image so he can't see it, that apple on the tree of knowledge, that terrible, wonderful power that he wan't so badly, no matter how wrong he knows it would be...

And you see him take a deep breathe, resign himself, to get the strength to smash that image, to say no, because he wants that, he wants it so badly...

My plea to the fandom: Someone has to write an AU fic in which he takes Finch up on at offer. Someone has to write that AU, that epic with Ten taking that power despite himself, and all the consequences of that. Because God it'd be good - it'd be Anakin Skywalker done properly, it'd be the fall of Lucifer, it'd be amazing.

I don't think I have ever wanted a fic so much as I want that.

And then we get the gand together, and the monster attack (Is it just me, or is Finch striding purposefully into the dinner room followed by a swarm of Krillitanes oh so very cool?) And the Doctor doing the lion tamer thing with a chair.

And then K-9 saves them! I love you, "shooty dog thing"!

And Kenny being smart (despite lack of chips), and the Doctor giving Mickey an important role... him saving the pupils with a shrug and then just unplugging the computer made me sporfle.

K-9, you are so noble. And the way Tennant says, "Goodbye, old friend." And then "Good dog." "Affirmative!" with the little ear waggle and tail wave. *sniffs*

But seriously, what other show is there on television that could make you cry over a robot dog?

And then they blow up the school. And Kenny getting all the cred from it, yays!(Hurrah for the Blowing Shit Up Agenda!) And K-9... *wails*

But "You've redecorated!" Nice. Sarah and Rose coming to terms with one another, and all that.

Mickey is a companion! *does dance of joy*

Then again, pretty much every single line Mickey had was the stuff of joy. Oh you snarky, self-aware guy, how I love you. No, you're not just a tin dog. *hugs Mickey*

But, did you see Rose's look when the Doctor said Mickey could come along? Me-ow! That was... one of the most incredibly bratty things I have seen Rose do.

Also, "Some things are worth getting your heart broken for." This ties in most excellently with Sarah Jane's insight to the Doctor earlier about how how "Pain and loss, they define us as much as happiness or love."

It's all very much like one of my Religion and Society essays (quotes from which will most likely haunt me forever): "The pain now is part of the happiness then." To love is to suffer, and if you open yourself up to love, you also open yourself to the pain that invariably comes with it. And as much as that was a comment on the companions, it also says a lot about the Doctor - he loves the Universe, truly loves it, and because of this, he has - and still does - suffer so hugely.

"Find me, if you need to, one day." Lovely. Passing the baton, and finding a comrade.

"Say it, please. This time." She wants closure, she wants finality, it's the only way she can move on. She isn't the Doctor, for whom all time is present, who can lock memories away in his head, and make them the here and now, for whom love is forever, even if he never things about it.

"Goodbye... my Sarah Jane!" And he gave it too her. With that wonderful hug you can tell she wasn't expecting. *sighs* And he gave her a new K-9! *sniffs*

"He replaced you with a brand new model... he does that." And that's Sarah again, seeing things clearly, but now able to move on with her life.

Note: pretty much all of my talk about love here was the general love, not just shippiness. But the love that the Doctor has for all his companions, which yeah, might verge more into shippiness with some than others, but it all comes from the same place, the some sort of love. Because I find that a hell of a lot deeper, and more touching than ship stuff here. Not that I'll stop reading it, of course...


Non spoiler review: Complete and utter brilliance. For only the second time (the first being PotW), Doctor Who has managed to move me to tears. But more than that, it was funny, it was insightful, we had character development liek whoa (Mickey, the Doctor, Rose getting a great big stomping of reality), and it was fun. I LOVE YOU, SARAH JANE! And I want a K-9.

Also, if anyone dares to tell me that "Christopher Eccleston would have done this episode so much better," I will KICK THEM IN THE FACE.

Next week: watch the fandom go boom! *evil cackle*

Comments

[mittendorfer.livejournal.com]

""You can spend the rest of your life with me, but I can't send the rest of my life with you. I have to live on. Alone." God, I love how he is near tears at this point. Tennant is astounding here."

That is a truly "getting it" moment. If anyone watching did not get what the Doctor is about from this scene they never will. It was perfect and beautiful.

*awaits boom*

[drakyndra.livejournal.com]

It was perfect and lovely and wonderful, and anyone who says anything bad about Teh Tennant's acting as the Doctor from now on will get a right thumping from me.

The boom shall be most entertaining.

[lizbee.livejournal.com]

I'm completely with you regarding the need for an AU. Dark and epic and full of hubris, yes.

[drakyndra.livejournal.com]

*wants to read it NOW dammit*

[lizbee.livejournal.com]

Ten: ...so then, with the help of some alien child-eaters, I became a god and changed history so that the Time Lords weren't wiped out in the Time War.
Romana: OMGWTFBBQ?
Ten: But don't worry, I made sure the Daleks stayed wiped out. More extinct than ever before!
Romana: Are you on drugs? Or merely drunk on your own hubris?
Ten: Can we have sex now?
Romana: ...no.
Ten: But I'm a god!
Romana: Remember the good old days, when we used to roam the galaxy saving planets and destroying religions? I don't know about you, but I kind of miss that suddenly.
Ten: That doesn't sound good. I'm off to protect my favourite planet, Earth, by any means necessary.
Rose, Sarah Jane, Mickey and Harriet: Uh oh.
Ten: ANY MEANS NECESSARY.
K9: Mistress, I am detecting dangerous levels of hubris!
Sarah Jane: I know, K9, I know. ALL OF THIS WOULD HAVE BEEN PREVENTED IF HE'D LISTENED TO ME IN "GENESIS OF THE DALEKS"!
Ten: Good point. Maybe I should go back and use my godlike powers to change history some more...
Everyone: NO!
Romana: No, wait. That's a brilliant idea. Off you go, Doctor.
Ten: *goes back*
Four: *bitchslaps him into oblivion* Not even your godlike powers are a match for your own past!
Readers: That would border on profundity if it made sense.
Ten: *dies in Rose's arms*
Romana: Now, while the readers try to sort out why he didn't use his godlike powers to recover and regenerate, let's steal the TARDIS and have wacky adventures and UST.
Everyone: YAY!

And they all lived happily ever after, until the humans died of old age.

...I have an outline at least?

[furrybanana.livejournal.com]

Doctor Who is absolute, absolute love. But I seriously think my parents would kill me if I downloaded whole episodes off the internet, the consequence of which, I haven't seen anything since PotW. But you do write the best reviews. I admire people who can write stuff like that, when there's probably a thousand others around, and not knowing whether people will actually read theirs. But they obviously do, cos they're so good.

[drakyndra.livejournal.com]

Hurrah, someone likes my reviews!

[yattara.livejournal.com]

Euh hey. *waves.*

Very nice review that was. :)

Me is miriel_ithildin from Journal_Fen, mind this post?

[drakyndra.livejournal.com]

Hello! *waves back*

And there are no probs with you showing up.

[yattara.livejournal.com]

Glad to hear it. :)

[donnaimmaculata.livejournal.com]

It gives me warm happy fuzzies every time I come across someone who likes Mickey (and dislikes Rose's treatment of him). After School Reunion, I have great hopes that their dynamics will change, though. Rose can no longer bond with the Doctor as a) she knows she's not the only one who's ever bonded and b) Mickey will be there to watch her every step and maybe - hopefully - his presence will force her to think about the ramifications of her actions with regard to him.

I really disliked the uber-sweet Ten/Rose dynamics in the first two episodes, but now it seems the producers did it on purpose to smack the audience (and Rose) in the face when presenting the harsh reality in School Reunion. So well done there.

I'm seeing pig-tails and a frilly skirt.

In the Harry Potter fandom, there would already be plenty of fics.

Ten/Finch = UST like whoa. And I fully expected David Tennant to end up in the pool, because NE proved that the production team likes getting him wet and who could blame them?

[drakyndra.livejournal.com]

Try leftbehind__. For all your Mickey Smith needs! *hearts that comm*

And I can't wait to see how Mickey works out as a companion, and how it effects the Doctor and Rose. Now that is going to be interesting. Not to mention the spoilers about this next episode...

And I tended to annoy Rose somewhat in the last few eps. But then she gets the cluebat of reality, and it's harsh, but she so needs it. Needs more of it, apparently, after her bitchy face when Mickey asks to come along.

And that's the glory of the HP fandom, yes?

And that was one of the slashiest scenes I have ever seen. "You shall join with me"? Dear me...

And it's great having a production team who know exactly how fanservice should go.

[donnaimmaculata.livejournal.com]

Mickey as a companion has such great potential, if only because of his history with Rose, who no longer can abuse him as the reliable guy back home where she can pop why whenever she feels like it. I think the Doctor might even be happy about Mickey coming along if he realised that his relationship with Rose was likely to turn awkward and difficult. Now Mickey will function as a buffer. But maybe that's just me over-interpreting things.

Well, lets just say that no matter how obscure your kink is, the HP fandom reliably provides the fics for it.

It was incredibly slashy. It was slashy even before they opened their mouth, only because of the crackling energy between them.

That's why they have Ten flirt with just about everyone and -thing he encounters. I mean this man has chemistry with a tin dog and an instrument console.

[drakyndra.livejournal.com]

For all the talk about Rose and her great plot arc and all, it's Mickey who has really had the great character development. And can I just say that though I really disliked Rose in parts of this episode, the fact that this was done purposefully to highlight her flaws (and thus get rid of some of her borderline Sueishness) restored my faith in the production team. Interesting how htey contrasted Sarah Jane gracefully accepting her time has passed, and moving on, with Rose being so petty and childish as someone else is added to the companion list.

HP fandom: Batshit crazy, but a fic readers paradise.

Oh yeah. Good actors, good intense actors, and what do we get? Whoa.

Dude, even Rose ships Ten/TARDIS! The guy's just an alien slutboi tease.

[donnaimmaculata.livejournal.com]

Mickey really was granted a great character arc, wasn't he? I like that it happened so much in the background. It makes it much more subtle than Rose's development, as she's always been so much in focus.

I find it very interesting how much my perception of Rose is based on her relationship with the Doctor. I found the way she simply left Mickey standing there in Rose highly annoying, but it didn't make me dislike the character as such, and even though she kept leaving Mickey throughout season 1, I was sorta all right with it. It was very much who Rose was and fitted into her characterisation as a very young, slightly thoughtless girl. But with Ten, it all got too much for my taste.

I liked how they contrasted Rose and Sarah Jane, too, but I didn't particularly like how it was Sarah Jane who started the cat fight by making the remark about Rose's age.

I <3 Ten/TARDIS being canon. And as far as I understand, a Time Lord and his TARDIS form an almost biological unit, right? Which would make Ten's love for the TARDIS appear very narcissistic indeed.

[drakyndra.livejournal.com]

That was one of the big themes of last season - the ordinary person becoming ore than just ordinary. And Mickey seems to be epitomising that.

I think the reason Rose is starting to become annoying is because the writers seem to be easing back on the "Rose is so speshul" Sue-ish stuff that always vaguely bugged me, admitting she has flaws and showing her actions in their greater meaning. The honeymoon is over for her, she's getting into the real world. I think it's the contrast between Nine and Ten that brought it to life - Nine clung to her, was terribly needy emotionally, and so angsty and intense that Rose being childish and cheerful was needed to lighten the atmosphere.

But with a lighter, happier Doctor (or at least one who is less needy and clingy), the balance goes out of whack. Instead of contrasting personalities, you get more similar ones, and that becomes a bit overwhelming.

Sarah Jane was a little bitchy there, though I can see how it's entirely understandable - she's having this deep, emotional reunion, and reliving the life she lost so long ago, and then this girl shows up and is demanding what's going on. She took away from the specialness of that moment, and Sarah lashed out a little at that.

Well... not so biological as a more telepathic link. It isn't a part of him, it's just connected to him. So less narcississtic, but it's still an old bond, the longest relationship in his life.

[donnaimmaculata.livejournal.com]

I think one reason why I like Mickey is that I identify with him more than I do with Rose. I would not have gone off with a stranger in a blue police box just because he offers me adventures*. I would have stayed behind and searched the Internet for information on him, which is exactly what Mickey does. Then, months later, when I got to know the Doctor better, I might decide to join him.

Oh my God, I'm a tin dog!

Amen to everything you said about Nine/Rose and Ten/Rose. That's exactly it.

I do understand why Sarah Jane felt miffed about Rose's being there, but the feminist in me would prefer the experienced, independent, headstrong woman not to get bitchy about a man just because he happens to travel with a curvy blonde. Ah well.

*Well, unless he looked like David Tennant.

[drakyndra.livejournal.com]

I can't remember where I read it, but this quote just summed things up perfectly, I reckon: "Rose is who we wish we could be. Mickey is who we are."

Yes, that is how I see the Doctor/Rose deal for the first few eps. And now there is the consequences of this episode, and then Mickey on board, and then the next few episodes, so it will be interesting to see where it goes next. (Another good comment I saw somewhere that this episode was the reason Ten and Rose have been so cloying so far - so that it gives this episode a bit more power behind it)

I am all for strong independent women. Doesn't mean said women can't feel a little jealous once in a while. And she got over it, and moved on, which is the important bit.

[melliyna.livejournal.com]

I've just been able to read this review and it is much *love* Unfortunately my computer refuses to download the Doctor Who episodes (I think it's decided that downloading things off the internet is immoral) so I have seen anything past the Christmas Invasion.

I'll think I'll just have to keep glaring at the ABC in the hope that they'll finally decide to buy the rights.

[drakyndra.livejournal.com]

ZOMG Your computer is in a conspiracy with the ABC!

[melliyna.livejournal.com]

OH NOES! Now it will never let me get Doctor Who and when it does it will only be for two months in the middle of summer *is devastated like whoah* ;)

[days-of-yore.livejournal.com]

'Torchwood, with a bit more subtlety this week.' A new definition of subtley which means GIANT FLASHING RED LETTERS. ;D

I wish so much I had the fandom smarts to write that fic.

Also, I wonder how many zillions of reviewers have used that particular LJ cut. I've done exactly the same. Great minds.

[drakyndra.livejournal.com]

Hey, giant flashing red letters are still more subtle than the Torchwood Torchwood Torchwood speech that was last week.

So do I, dear, so do I.

But it's such a good LJ cut...

[melliyna.livejournal.com]

*sticks hand timidly up in the air* I don't normally do shameless self promotion but I've kind of written the beginnings of a "Doctor takes Finch up on his offer" AU and would love to know if it's at all worth continuing with. If it isn't feel free to brutally tell me so.

http://melliyna.livejournal.com/103026.html#cutid1 (the link)

I feel slightly embarrassed with myself now.