Doctor Who - the 9th doctor

I discovered recently that there is a new doctor in town - in fact there has been for a good 2-3 years now, and I've missed out because we don't get cable. But thanks to trusty Netflix Ross and I have now watched the first season of the new, improved Doctor Who, and I must say that it has left me filled with deep emotion and excitement and love and tenderness and awe. I really do love a good science fiction show, and this has the added benefit of having such a history to draw on, and such a history with me as well. I remember fondly the college years of Tom Baker adoration, in which I knitted myself an overly long scarf that I tripped on repeatedly. I certainly feel as much love and tenderness for Christopher Eccleston as I ever did for Tom, and this despite the fact that I only get a single season of Chris; he bowed out after one, stating a wish to not be typecast and perhaps there was something about the grueling schedule...

The new Doctor Who captures the feel of the classic, while doing away with the sexist roles, embarrassingly low-budget sets, and some of the silliness. Ross and I kept exclaiming to each other about the intensity of the new episodes. There is some genuine scariness here! A sense of real danger for our heroes, even with the return of old enemies the Daleks who have been given more mobility and hence more menace.

There's a website called Television Without Pity, which I stumbled upon in my search for Firefly material (another SF show to adore), and I must say that the people who submit recaps and comment in the TWOP forums are admirably intelligent and well-written people. The site draws talent. I checked out the recap for the last Doctor Who episode and was floored by the depth of passion this writer had, and the fine job he/she did of conveying that passion.

So. I just read some of that TWOP pity stuff again cos I thought I'd paste some in here, but you really have to watch the TV show first, and fall in love with it, and know the Doctor and Rose and their relationship, and THEN see, or read about the final episode. I can't just paste it in for you.

Christopher Eccleston is wonderful. Apparently he and Daniel Craig were both in some BBC show from the late 90s called "Our Friends in the North", which one can't get in America on video tape or DVD. Rats. Chris has this wonderful manic Doctor Who energy about him, the way the Doctor always seems to see the world with fresh eyes, a unique appreciation, but also he has a sadness, a seriousness, as the manic smile slips into a deadpan gaze. He's the last of the Timelords; the rest died in the great war, and he conveys that solitude, that inner emptiness, beneath the sprightliness the Doctor has always had. I want to draw him, or do a sculpt.