Doctor Who failed because it wanted continuity without the baggage
So I was watching an analaysis of House MD and how House’s Head/Wilson’s Heart was the peak of the series but was also the beginning of the end. The argument being the show broke its formula but was afraid of actually straining too far from it, and only really started experimenting in the final season when it was too late.
And I realized that’s almost what happened to Doctor Who.
Since New Who’s inception the series has had this delicate balancing act of overarching plotlines/character arcs and episodic time/space adventures. Sometimes, it works really well like with Bad Wolf, the Crack in s5, and s10 with Missy. And other times, it fails like with season 4’s finale, s6’s finale, Clara’s impossible girl, s8, s9, the Timeless Child, Ruby’s mom, Sutekh, and most recently the get Belinda home plot, it falls flat on its face.
What all the bad ones have in common is an unwillingness to commit to both changes in the status quo, and altering the characters just so you get the scene you want.
Gonna use Journey’s End here because it’s the first giant example of this and was a sign of what was to come. But I think it gets a pass with a lot of people because what it’s contradicting is classic who, not new who. And without knowing the past history, it seems cool and interesting.
Davros is reintroduced to the franchise and 10 mentions he tried to save his life. And then at the end when Davros is about to burn to death, 10 offers an escape only for Davros to reject it.
This moment only works if you ignore everything Davros was up until that point, AND who the Doctor had become by the end of classic who.
Davros, beyond the taking over the universe with the daleks bit, was willing to do whatever it took for the sake of his own survival. He allowed the Thalls to destroy and murder most of his own kind so the dalek program wouldn’t get shut down. When the Daleks turned on him, the second he got the chance, he turned tail and made his own, more pure, faction. (But in reality was just predisposed to serving him.) When a weapon he wanted to use to take over the universe is actually turned against him to destroy his home planet and then is coming to him to finish the job, he leaves all of his subordinates to die to escape with his own life just seconds to spare.
Under NO circumstances would Davros refuse the Doctor’s help if it the only other option was death. He quite literally created the daleks so his own people could continue to exist.
Not only that, but yelling about how the Doctor is the Destroyer of Worlds is stupid because he knows the Doctor did that long before this moment. Because the Doctor Destroyed Skaro. Yelling this at the Doctor should mean nothing. It’s something he would use to taunt him during a more intimate moment or when they spend the first half of the episode monologuing at each other. Not here. But of course it does now. Because now the Doctor, for unknown reasons, wants to save Davros’ life.
The reason I hammer this home so hard is because the 7th Doctor, IN THE TV SHOW, not only destroyed Skaro but also tried to kill Davros too. Davros wasn’t saved by the Doctor’s mercy, dude just got to his escape pod mere seconds before the ship was destroyed. The Doctor came to the conclusion there is no salvaging the daleks, and allowing them to continue to exist will only hurt more and more innocent people. And since he and the power, he needs to destroy them all.
And if we’re being honest, since the Doctor wiped out both Dalek factions here, his failure to kill Davros probably allowed the Time War to occur in the first place.
So fast forward to Journey’s End. Where it’s revealed the doctor tried to save Davros’ life, DURING THE TIME WAR.
You know, that thing the Doctor has spent the whole show angsting about because he did a lot of bad things? Well the one bad thing he didn’t do was try to kill dalek hitler.
And to add insult to injury, 10 tries to save Davros AGAIN. When the plot of this story would likely not be happening were it not for Davros’ chance survival in remembrance of the daleks.
This isn’t even in line with 9 or 10’s character development with respect to past encounters with the Daleks. As in sympathetic when it looks like they’re actually changing for the better. Davros in this episode has displayed no remorse what so ever.
All of this is hand waved away with “time war.” But in reality it’s just the writers wanting things to play out a certain way while still having familiar faces. The way Journey’s end is written absolves the 10th Doctor of all fault for morally grey decisions. Even the ones the 10th Doctor wasn’t around for like with the Time War attempted Davros rescue.
It was Tentwo that started the fire and was violent not the 10th Doctor.
Davros CHOSE to stay behind so it’s not 10’s fault he probably (but didn’t) burned to death.
And the Doctor HAS to wipe Donna’s memories otherwise she’ll die. He’s got no choice here.
This is what I mean when I say the show wants continuity but without the baggage. It understands that recurring characters and story arcs are cool and wants to use them, but also wants them to fulfill specific narrative purposes, even if it conflicts with how the characters and plot had been written up until that point.
It doesn’t want the baggage of a companion legitimately dying because of the Doctor’s failures. So you get metaphorical deaths that write the characters out of the series, but absolving the Doctor of all fault (save for Bill and s10 is good so like why am I even mentioning it lol), while leaving the door open for them to return.
In general the writers ESPECIALLY don’t want the Doctor to make any bad decisions that he has to live with.
It wants backstory but never actually developing it or using it in a substantive way beyond vague references and winks to the audience.and it certainly doesn’t want it to constrict what can happen in the plot. Which is part of why the timelords are excused within 3 seasons of them finally returning to the narrative.
The writers see the past plot and character writing of the show, a lot of which they wrote, as a limiter. It’s a wall in a maze they’d rather just walk through instead of work around to solve. And then they want all the praise for getting through the maze even though they cheated and the audience all saw they cheated.
They’re terrified not of the audience calling them out for the cheating, but the story they are writing having long term consequences beyond cool characters showing up again later on.
