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One fan's perspective... (no spoilers)
So, what with the Amy wank/kerfuffle/thing and the apparent split through fandom into RTD and Moff factions (where all the Old!Who fans are sitting back and going 'Been there, done that, got the T-shirt 30 years ago!'), I've been thinking, and have almost written out the following in the response to a dozen different posts. Instead I thought I'd try to put it here.
First of all, I've always been someone who hangs out at the outskirts of fandom. I don't like arguments. I deeply dislike bashing. I tend to only click on the links to the happy reviews on the newsletters. Basically I like to sit in my own happy little corner and love my shows in peace.
Because that's the thing - I love them. It started with Buffy, then Angel, then Doctor Who and then Torchwood. (There are other shows I like too, but I'm not fannish about them, so they don't figure in this post.) Yes, sometimes they're flawed (hello most of S1 of TW and, oh, Daleks in Manhattan to grab a couple of examples), but just because the episodes are rubbish doesn't mean I dislike the characters. It's not their fault they got stuck with a bad story. And generally, a bad story can be fixed with some judicious fanwanking.
Which brings me to my point - I love my shows, period. I love them, because what I want from them is something they never fail to give me: Continuity, layered storytelling, arcs, themes, character exploration and development, and - of course - great, exciting, surprising, involving and evolving stories. Of course, I also hope that those stories will have as little as possible race/gender/queer etc fail, but I am able to separate this from my enjoyment of what I'm watching. (The Master forcing all of Martha's family to be servants is problematic, yes, and RTD should be made aware of it. However, it is perfectly in character for the Master to do it. Of course, it is not an issue that affects me personally, and if it did I might feel differently.)
Anyway, what I'm trying to say is I don't need anything from the story other than a good story. I don't need it to be a showcase for anything, I don't need for my ship to have a happy ending (although that would be neat, and I'd squee for days!), I don't need for things to turn out how I want them. I sit down to be told a story - at the moment Moffat's story of the Doctor - and I'm not expecting it to line up with the story I'd tell. As long as it doesn't go too far off track, I'm happy. (Can I point out that I loved 'The End of Time' btw.? Because I did, and as far as I can tell, this is not a popular opinion. I think S2 Doctor/Rose a bit cloying, but I still cry when I watch 'Doomsday'. These are the stories we have, maybe they could have been better, but that is a moot point. They could also have been worse. The 'should have been' position I don't understand.)
So, about Amy and feminism and Moffat and RTD and writing strong female characters. Well others have spoken about Amy quite eloquently. Personally I am exceedingly fond of her, since she's a wonderfully complex, flawed and rather damaged character, and I might write some proper meta on her some day. For now, let's just say that her outfits are the least interesting thing about her, imho.
Now before I deal with writing women, and RTD Vs. Moffat, let me talk about Joss Whedon for a moment. Joss, as everyone knows, sees himself as something of a feminist. And Buffy the Vampire Slayer is, for the most part, brilliant in this respect. It has strong women characters to overflowing, a heroine who is flawed and brilliant and strong, and I love her to distraction. However, Joss has created other shows. Let's look at Angel for a moment, since it is Buffy's 'sister'-show/spin-off. Is AtS full of strong women. Hmm. Yes and no. The gender problems on AtS are many, and difficult, and every major female character gets killed off. Some of them in ways that are rather infuriating. I happen to love Angel very, very, very much (it's good I don't have to choose between BtVS and AtS, 'cause I'd never be able to), but I can still see the genderfail quite clearly.
It seems to me, that RTD shares a lot of the same flaws and strengths as Joss. Because whilst there are definitely problems with the way he writes women (especially older women) on Doctor Who (for some good meta on the problematic nature of Rose and Donna's fates can I point you here), it is a fact that on Torchwood his women tend to rock - especially in 'Children of Earth' which has a huge number of strong female characters, all of them as complex and rich and different from each other as the male ones. Why does he fall down in one who and shine in another? I don't know. But I know that I adore Rose, Martha and Donna (as well as Suzie and Tosh and Gwen) to absolute pieces, and that my world would be less without them. (Ditto Amy and River.)
Most important of all (to me) they're all interesting. They're all part of my show, and because I love my show, I love them too, even though I identify more with some than with others. All I ask is that they're well written, and on the whole they are.
I think I was going to say something about Moffat too, wasn't I? Well looked at objectively, Moffat is (so far) better at writing women on DW than RTD. However, he's failing (so far) when it comes to including anything approaching queerness. So... swings and roundabouts?
*sighs*
I dunno. I just love my show. If it's got strong, well written women (who don't end up dead) fantastic. If it doesn't kill off all the POC (maybe even gives them good stories) - even better. If it also has gay people - better still. But they're... additional bonuses, and I don't necessarily expect them. Which I guess means that either I'm deeply cynical or a complete Pollyanna. Or a bit of both. :)
And that's it. I'm honestly not sure what I was trying to say, but it's there now. Thoughts anyone?
First of all, I've always been someone who hangs out at the outskirts of fandom. I don't like arguments. I deeply dislike bashing. I tend to only click on the links to the happy reviews on the newsletters. Basically I like to sit in my own happy little corner and love my shows in peace.
Because that's the thing - I love them. It started with Buffy, then Angel, then Doctor Who and then Torchwood. (There are other shows I like too, but I'm not fannish about them, so they don't figure in this post.) Yes, sometimes they're flawed (hello most of S1 of TW and, oh, Daleks in Manhattan to grab a couple of examples), but just because the episodes are rubbish doesn't mean I dislike the characters. It's not their fault they got stuck with a bad story. And generally, a bad story can be fixed with some judicious fanwanking.
Which brings me to my point - I love my shows, period. I love them, because what I want from them is something they never fail to give me: Continuity, layered storytelling, arcs, themes, character exploration and development, and - of course - great, exciting, surprising, involving and evolving stories. Of course, I also hope that those stories will have as little as possible race/gender/queer etc fail, but I am able to separate this from my enjoyment of what I'm watching. (The Master forcing all of Martha's family to be servants is problematic, yes, and RTD should be made aware of it. However, it is perfectly in character for the Master to do it. Of course, it is not an issue that affects me personally, and if it did I might feel differently.)
Anyway, what I'm trying to say is I don't need anything from the story other than a good story. I don't need it to be a showcase for anything, I don't need for my ship to have a happy ending (although that would be neat, and I'd squee for days!), I don't need for things to turn out how I want them. I sit down to be told a story - at the moment Moffat's story of the Doctor - and I'm not expecting it to line up with the story I'd tell. As long as it doesn't go too far off track, I'm happy. (Can I point out that I loved 'The End of Time' btw.? Because I did, and as far as I can tell, this is not a popular opinion. I think S2 Doctor/Rose a bit cloying, but I still cry when I watch 'Doomsday'. These are the stories we have, maybe they could have been better, but that is a moot point. They could also have been worse. The 'should have been' position I don't understand.)
So, about Amy and feminism and Moffat and RTD and writing strong female characters. Well others have spoken about Amy quite eloquently. Personally I am exceedingly fond of her, since she's a wonderfully complex, flawed and rather damaged character, and I might write some proper meta on her some day. For now, let's just say that her outfits are the least interesting thing about her, imho.
Now before I deal with writing women, and RTD Vs. Moffat, let me talk about Joss Whedon for a moment. Joss, as everyone knows, sees himself as something of a feminist. And Buffy the Vampire Slayer is, for the most part, brilliant in this respect. It has strong women characters to overflowing, a heroine who is flawed and brilliant and strong, and I love her to distraction. However, Joss has created other shows. Let's look at Angel for a moment, since it is Buffy's 'sister'-show/spin-off. Is AtS full of strong women. Hmm. Yes and no. The gender problems on AtS are many, and difficult, and every major female character gets killed off. Some of them in ways that are rather infuriating. I happen to love Angel very, very, very much (it's good I don't have to choose between BtVS and AtS, 'cause I'd never be able to), but I can still see the genderfail quite clearly.
It seems to me, that RTD shares a lot of the same flaws and strengths as Joss. Because whilst there are definitely problems with the way he writes women (especially older women) on Doctor Who (for some good meta on the problematic nature of Rose and Donna's fates can I point you here), it is a fact that on Torchwood his women tend to rock - especially in 'Children of Earth' which has a huge number of strong female characters, all of them as complex and rich and different from each other as the male ones. Why does he fall down in one who and shine in another? I don't know. But I know that I adore Rose, Martha and Donna (as well as Suzie and Tosh and Gwen) to absolute pieces, and that my world would be less without them. (Ditto Amy and River.)
Most important of all (to me) they're all interesting. They're all part of my show, and because I love my show, I love them too, even though I identify more with some than with others. All I ask is that they're well written, and on the whole they are.
I think I was going to say something about Moffat too, wasn't I? Well looked at objectively, Moffat is (so far) better at writing women on DW than RTD. However, he's failing (so far) when it comes to including anything approaching queerness. So... swings and roundabouts?
*sighs*
I dunno. I just love my show. If it's got strong, well written women (who don't end up dead) fantastic. If it doesn't kill off all the POC (maybe even gives them good stories) - even better. If it also has gay people - better still. But they're... additional bonuses, and I don't necessarily expect them. Which I guess means that either I'm deeply cynical or a complete Pollyanna. Or a bit of both. :)
And that's it. I'm honestly not sure what I was trying to say, but it's there now. Thoughts anyone?
no subject
Ah. Now this is my own fault for writing meta in the middle of the half term with children disturbing me every other moment, and then posting immediately. I didn't mean that Moffat's women are better or more interesting (and given the number of people who can't get a handle on Amy, RTD is quite probably the better character-creator), but that from a feminist perspective Moffat's women (so far at least) are subjected to less writerly fail. (I hope that makes sense. Again, see BtVS and AtS. The only woman left standing at the end of the latter was Harmony, and she was already dead.)
Getting to how Rose and Donna's stories ended, I see it as a symptom of RTD's belief that no one would ever willingly stop traveling with the Doctor - therefore it must be unwilling. In both Rose and Donna's cases, they want forever and can't have it so they must be forced out.
This is very, very true. (As soon as Donna said 'forever' I thought 'Oh great, now something HORRIBLE is going to happen to her!' and assumed the crash position. Joss scarred me FOR LIFE!)
He goes for maximum pain but pulls back so that they have the trappings of a happy ending if you don't think about it too closely. They have love and money and family but didn't get to make a positive choice to leave.
Which is where it is problematic from a feminist point of view. From a story point of view though, I don't mind. :)
Anyway, thanks for commenting. You have several pic spams that I've yet to check out. Will get there though, don't worry...
no subject
I don't know yet if Moffat is better or worse at endings or at long term characterization of women. Right now if I compare both of their first 9-10 episodes, they are about the same. It will be interesting to look back in a couple of years when we can compare a few seasons of each showrunner.
no subject
\o/ (Thank you btw, for pulling out that bit, 'cause it wasn't as clear as it should have been.)
RTD has significant problems with ending his female character's stories. (Also - mothers! Big mother issues.)
Ooooh yes. :)
Which may be why he doesn't have the same issues in CoE. He is not trying to do a long term story with them - it's a discrete few hours of show. Think Harriet Jones. If we just look at season one, she's a great character and there is very little fail. It's when we look at the rest of her story that there are issues.
*nods* (You're making me think. Might have to get back to you.)
I don't know yet if Moffat is better or worse at endings or at long term characterization of women. Right now if I compare both of their first 9-10 episodes, they are about the same. It will be interesting to look back in a couple of years when we can compare a few seasons of each showrunner.
Very true. People keep making big sweeping generelisations, and those always irk me (take RTD and women, and forgetting all about CoE f.ex.), especially when there's not much to compare.