Doctor Who - Season Finale Superlatives

[mijan]

Remember those cheesy "Superlatives" from your high school year book?  The Best ____, the Worst ____, the Most _____.  You get the idea.

Well, here's the Best, Worst, and Most for the season finale of Doctor Who, according to lil' old me.

Most Random Returnee: Harriet Jones

Best Line: "I can't tell you what I'm thinking right now." - Jack

Most Under-appreciated Hero:  K-9

Most Unexpected Ally: Dalek Caan  (Dude, I seriously cheered.)

Most Obvious Part of the Ending: human!Doctor going with Rose

Most Bad-Ass Part: Rose strutting down the street with a huge ray-gun.

Most Kick-Ass Part: Donna treating the Daleks like remote-control robots.  "And now the other way..."  Made. Of. WIN.

Most Devastating Part: Knowing that the Doctor was leaving Donna, and would be alone again, and mostly that Donna would never remember.

Greatest Need to Bitch-Slap: Donna's mother for still being a bitch after all that.

Coolest Part: Thinking back to all the times that people said, "So YOU'RE Donna Noble," and thinking, "AH!"

Cheesiest Part:  The TARDIS pulling the entire Earth.  I'm sorry, but my scientifically oriented brain was just not able to suspend reality and accept that the atmosphere wouldn't just blow right off the surface of the planet during transit.  Also, without some sort of dampening field, the acceleration and deceleration would have ripped the planet apart, and flung every living thing off the surface of the earth.  (The human!Doctor, and #10 regenerating into 10th Doctor again tie for 2nd place in this category.)

Biggest Cheering Point: human!Doctor and Doctor!Donna whisking away the TARDIS just before it's destroyed.

Best Snickering Point: Jack winking from the floor.

Biggest Sporfle: Mickey telling Jack "enough" with the hugging.

Most Obvious Question: What did human!Doctor whisper to Rose?  (We can guess, naturally, but damn it, can't I just hear it?  C'mon.)

Least Obvious Question: So is this still the 10th Doctor, or is it technically the 11th?

Worst Part: The fact that it's the Daleks... AGAIN.  Are they really dead this time?  I mean, REALLY?

Best Part: Watching all the companions and friends flying the TARDIS together.  (Sadly, this was dampened by the cheese-tastic-ness of the TARDIS pulling the earth like a cosmic tow-truck.)

Favourite Random Line: "You're naked."  "Yes."

Any ideas for more categories?  Or any nominations for these categories that you think are more worthy of the title?

My brain is still stuck on all of this.

Am I the only person who didn't cry?

Comments

[fiona-fawkes.livejournal.com]

Quite honestly, to see Rose jump on the her half-Doc like that, just because he said those magic words? *gags* I'm just sitting her having the last laugh because her happy little take-home Doctor is also HALF-MOTHERFUCKINGDONNANOBLE!!!!! Boy is Rose gonna be regretting this in the morning. And she can't return him. No receipt. :D

And thank you for reminding me of Donna spinning the Daleks around and 'round. I'm still sniffling over her moment of supreme wicked awesomeness, but that made me smile.

Er, I think I'm okay to be hugged again. I've gotten that initial emotional burst out of my system.

[fiona-fawkes.livejournal.com]

Oh, and I vote that he's still Ten. He only used the regenerative energy to heal, then shot it out of his hands and into his hand. Hmm... that might have to be my vote for cheesiest moment.

[mijan.livejournal.com]

Hmmm... true. And yeah, it's pretty close for me between the re-generating #10 and the TARDIS-the-planetary-tow-truck, but the latter won out for me.

[lunalovegoddess.livejournal.com]

"I'm just sitting here having the last laugh because her happy little take-home Doctor is also HALF-MOTHERFUCKINGDONNANOBLE!!!"

Word to your muggle. I was sitting here, too, giggling about the look on Rose's face. The "but, it's not the same!" look. She finally gets the Doctor, plus change. I loved the DonnaDoctor (male) so much, especially during scenes with Doctor Donna (female). Catherine Tate is such a versatile actress, really. It's been quite a run.

I love the irony that a piece of the Donna-that-was-brilliant lives on in a parallel world... with Rose. *snort*

[firebird157.livejournal.com]

There was much cheering for unexpected ally Dalek Caan from me as well ... wonder if he cursed himself out for not listening to Dalek Sec back in Manhatten.

It took me a while to realise but the thing with the hand is not unprecendented. cf the fifth Doctor story Arc of Infinity. The redirecting the regeneration energy was odd but not excessively so.

Is DT now technically eleven? Hard to say... he did use up the energy however, so possibly. Though as RTD said on "this morning" on Friday if and when he reaches 13 they'll no doubt wave the 'crystal of zog' and give him another 13.

I teared up a bit in the scene when he took Donna's memories but I didn't actually cry.

Oh and the Daleks clearly have Joker Immunity so I imagine they'll be back - just like the Master.

[fiona-fawkes.livejournal.com]

I think I was ready to like Rose again, if not love her maybe a little. She was good in these last few episodes, she really was. But to see her be all But I don't want him 'cause he's not the real thing... Oh wait, he loves me, never mind *jumps* there at Bad Wolf Bay just brought back everything that I hated about her the first time around. That bit spoiled her comeback for me. If she'd of just hugged him or even just taken his hand, then I'd have been okay with it. But the suck-face kinda spoiled it for me.

[x-shabutie-x.livejournal.com]

Best Line: "I can't tell you what I'm thinking right now." - Jack


Mine too! I cracked up!

I grew up with this show from a child. My first Doctor was Tom Baker in the original series. I loved the Daleks, K-9 was my favourite dog ever and when it came back I was elated!

OMG did I cry last night! The Doctor, all alone again. Losing Rose for a second time and even good mate Donna isn't allowed to remember him for a millisecond without her head kersploding! The episode that still makes me cry the most is the one where Rose and the Doctor get separated and they're both at the wall. *sob*

I also cried because it's going to be another age before the next series comes out. All we seem to be getting next is the xmas special and 4 specials next year! They better hurry up with the New Torchwood series that's all I can say!

[slumber.livejournal.com]

I don't know what category this might belong to, but has no one picked up on the fact that human!Doctor can technically be spawn/son/offspring of Doctor/Donna?? They've been SUCH an old married couple for the whole season, minus the gag-me-then-kill-me-now cheesiness of romance, that of COURSE they'll have a by-product. :|

Didn't cry either.

[tildathebuilder.livejournal.com]

I didn't cry, but that might have been the medication ;) My daughter on the other hand was distraught that the Doctor was going to be lonely without Donna

Most resilient prop: Captain Jack's indestructible coat.

[lunalovegoddess.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I know what you mean. As a fan of the classic series (pre-Davies), I'd been used to the Doctor being somewhat asexual towards his companions. I mean, imagine being a Time Lord; you've evolved from a complete different species entirely, and your brain holds the equivalent of a computer, plus you live upwards of 1000 years if you're lucky. In some ways, I'd imagine that a companion would seem much like a child, that it would feel wrong to pursue a romantic relationship. Plus, his world had been destroyed.

But, I liked Rose before, and I wanted to like her again. I was beginning to like her more in these episodes, liked how she'd become stronger without the Doctor. To have that character development suddenly evaporate and reduce her to a pouting child who is not satisfied with their present, but as soon as a man says he loves her, well... all is forgiven, innit?
That rankled. (Almost as much as Tonks suddenly being so insecure after falling in love with Remus.) It didn't do the character justice.
In the end, it seemed like the Doctor was almost as disappointed in her as I was for initially rejecting his double, because he knew she was a better person than that. In the morning, I thought about writing a short fic in which we view her thoughts as she processes that the human Doctor is actually in essence the same man, just without the current memories. That her Doctor tried to give her what she wanted in his clone, because he could not offer that to her as he is now. (Does that wording make sense to you?) Like how her father realized that this world's Jackie was still the woman he'd fallen in love with long ago, and not grown as cold and materialistic as his late wife.

In short, what I'm trying to say is that I'd love Rose again if Davies had shown that she was processing the fact that this wasn't a poor substitute for the Doctor, but rather, that this DonnaDoctor might be a better match. I'd have liked her to say, "We'll work it out as we go along," rather than immediately cling to him.

(I did like how he told her to make a good person out of the DonnaDoctor, though. Rose needs to be challenged, to be given a task.)

In terms of character development, though, Donna had the greatest impact on The Doctor. He'd been through losing Rose, the worst pain ever, right? And she helped him through it, seen him at his darkest, and wasn't half in love with him so she was able to hold a mirror up to him. And now, while he will always love her, Rose isn't smelling as sweet, is she?
I drew a lot of parallels to River's relationship with the Doctor, actually. It's like comparing the love I had for my first girlfriend to the love I have for my husband. It was real, but immature, and meeting her again a few years ago, I realized that it wouldn't have quite worked out now because I'd grown. She hadn't. My husband and I have been on a twelve-year rollercoaster ride, in which our love has been tested and polished. Based on my experiences since we broke up, if she had stayed with me, I can't say that she would have handled the same events well, especially pregnancy. Looking from the perspective of the person that I have become, she seems somewhat self-centered in retrospect. It's difficult to imagine her putting someone else's needs before her own. It simply did not occur to her to consider how things might affect others. In contrast, I've always been a team player: I had to help Mom pay bills, to take care of younger family members, to focus on what is good for the group as a whole rather what benefits me. My husband actually keeps me from sacrificing my needs, and encourages me to speak up if I'm feeling overwhelmed.

~ends babblefest~

[http://users.livejournal.com/__babbes__/]

love this!

I think I've got one:

Best Throwback to Previous Seasons: The Doctor to Gwen Cooper, "Is your family of old Cardiff descent?" "Yes, all the way back to the 1800s." "Oh, I knew it!"

[lunalovegoddess.livejournal.com]

*found my point buried in the anecdote*
That there could have been a better way to illustrate that Rose always wanted things that the Doctor, as a Time Lord, could not give her... and that as a human, he can. So, while I'm happy with the whole "I Can Haz Doktor?" outcome, I'm glad that the parallel world storyline is done with, because I much prefer the Doctor as he is now, wandering the stars.

[mijan.livejournal.com]

Agreed! I was thinking about that, and was really glad to see it come around. I'll add that to my list. :D

[mijan.livejournal.com]

Absolutely! Fi actually commented that the coat came out of the incinerator unscathed. I excused it as a Torchwood technology. 51st century fabrics, perhaps?

[regasssa.livejournal.com]

I thought: Well, if they can do that, why don't all Time Lords just cut off bits of their bodies when they're regenerating and leave them hanging around the place? The Master could have really gone to town with that idea for immortality...

My sister says 'Ginger kids' - the Donna Noble Factor - and I think that'd be brilliant. *snickers*

I didn't cry - except almost when the old guy was saying goodbye to the Doctor. Yay for all the people piloting the TARDIS, but yes, towing is bad. And just the whole DoctorDonna thing is just...my brain protested at being -told- so much. And oh look, more Daleks, but once again, no escapees. Can't they just accept that they're going to keep bringing the daleks back and let a few of them get away each time? And admit it?

Although, with that scene, with the Rose and the nonDoctor...I reckon both Doctors were thinking the same thing, and knew it had to be that way, and that the other Doctor kind of tricked Rose a bit to make her stay with him. But the snogging was bad. She should have...cried on him, or something. Argh. I heard shippers around the world scream for joy, however. Cue Epilogueish happy endings.

[firebird157.livejournal.com]

I thought: Well, if they can do that, why don't all Time Lords just cut off bits of their bodies when they're regenerating and leave them hanging around the place? The Master could have really gone to town with that idea for immortality...

They need to be primed with regeneration energy from the original so it wouldn't really work. Though it does explain why the Time Lords kept biodata extracts of themselves in the Matrix.