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| 4th Doctor Tom Baker and a Cyberman |
I have been in the throes of an extremely passionate affair with the television show Dr. Who. Yes, yes. It's true. I have accepted the nerdery and the addiction, which is the first step right? Ok, so I've
been watching Dr. Who everyday all day for about the last few weeks, and I am having a very real and visceral reaction to the storyline. Mainly I am having an emotional reaction in my loins regarding my love for David Tennant (Hello, Scotsman. Delicious accent.), and the sadness I feel for his
incarnation of The Doctor. Before I really got into this series, I'd only seen a few random episodes, and recognized David as Barty Crouch Jr.
from Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (Polyjuice, Mad-Eye, Dark
Mark and the lot of it. Squirrly, skinny, David.), also, he played
Hamlet onstage in London, and then reprised his role for a BBC film version. Hamlet is one of my least favorite Shakespeare plays because
I think Hamlet is a whiny twat, but, upon listening to his soliloquy, and hearing him suck in and exhale every single word so magnificently, I became so infatuated with this person, that I literally cannot stop
looking at him. I cannot stop listening to him, cannot stop internally fainting whenever he smiles that crooked toothed smile and I cannot stop thinking about Dr. Who, and how sad it is that he is who
he is. The Doctor I mean. I've bounced back and forth through the seasons, and while I do enjoy David Eccleston (Season 1 of the rebooted series), David's Doctor is able to convey all of the darkness
the Doctor carries with him. All 903 years of war, and darkness, and companions who he can never really be with because he is able to regenerate, thus granting him eternal life, and because eventually,
they will die. He can never have a proper life because he is the Lord of all time and space, a warrior consumed by his obsession and devotion for keep everything safe, he is brilliant and destructive, a
living god sailing through infinite galaxies transforming every person he meets by simply taking their hand and leading them to understand they were meant for so much more.
I feel such sadness for the Doctor that I wish I could save him. We all do. Anyone who has watched and who has felt any obsessive connection to the show will say the same. The Doctor may be a
foppish, snarky, bastard, but he has seen and lost nearly everything in his life, and with the exception of his love of Rose and River, he has lived an extrordinarily long and lonely life. He is all alone in
an infinite blackness, travelling...forever.
I think about The Doctor, and I think about his sad life, and I feel a genuine pain in my chest, my heartbeat quickening with every episode hoping that just this once, The Doctor can be happy, that he will live
forever, happily with Rose...but he can't. He can never be anything more than a lonesome man, a solitary child and protector of the universe. Maybe it is David's face that I'm drawn to, I mean of
course it is, but when I look into his sad eyes at the end of any episode where he has lost a companion, or anything, my heart burns for him.
I tore myself away from the tele and The Doctor today for about two hours, and in that time, (and yes, I realize what I am about to say is VERY dramatic), I felt as if I had been ripped away from my child, or
from the love of my life, and I thought about how much I was affected by this silly little television program. A few months ago, a similar thing happened when I started watching Breaking Bad. I couldn't stop
watching, I couldn't stop thinking about the show, what was going to happen with the plot, and what was going to happen to the characters who I had become so attached to. It was like I was a part of
something, but I couldn't do anything to help anyone. I feel so connected to these characters that I can't bear to think about what it will be like when they are no longer in my life. Why haven't I finished or caught up with Breaking Bad? I can't think about what will happen to Jesse and Walt. I can't handle my emotions regarding
who is going to die or live and what the consequences will be. I have two episodes left of Season 4 of Dr. Who but I'm stalling, because these will be my last few moments with David as The Doctor...as my Doctor. It is as if he is dying, and there is nothing I can do. I just want to keep as many moments with this person as I can. I want to keep him in my memory, in my present and not my past. I never want to let him go, but this is the way it must be. This is always the way. This is the only way.
Clocks tick on, sleep cycles begin and end, moons wax and wane, and the earth spins on forever. My love for this Doctor and for this television program, is perhaps the most complete and absolute love I have ever had for something on the TV. When his time is over, and when he regenerates into Matt Smith, I will feel as if I am being left behind as the Doctor travels on to his next greatest adventure. Acceptance of loss is letting go, and while the Dutchman must always have a captain, my incarnation of the Doctor will remain safely stored
in my memory...forever...travelling through the infinite possibilities within my brain, leading me to my next story, my next confessional of my love for television, or my love for David Tennant, of sad
soliloquies, or of being a flippant youth.
Quite right. Allons-y!
[WHIRRING TARDIS]
