Starting Stats: 1.1.1, An Unearthly Child
Doctor: One
Companions: Susan Foreman, Ian Chesterton, Barbara Wright
So... whoa. I'm watching the first ever episode of Doctor Who.
I love that we meet the companions first, before we meet the Doctor—or rather, I love how RTD kept up that tradition in Rose. Human connection! Fantastic.
"Susan Foreman—she your problem too?" Oh, of course she'd be a troublemaker. But I won't say that's my girl just yet.
Ian: "That's your problem, eh? Whether to hand over your class to her, or—"
Barbara: "No, not quite."
I already really like Ian.
Barbara: "I asked if I could work with her at her home, and she said that would be absolutely impossible, as her grandfather didn't like strangers."
Ian: "He's a doctor, isn't he? That's a bit of a lame excuse."
Awwh, come on, Doctor! PARTY IN THE TARDIS! It could be fun!
Hee. The address they gave the school is a junkyard.
Ian: "Hmm. That's a bit of a mystery. Well, there must be a simple answer."
Barbara: "What?"
Ian: "Well, we'll... ah, have to find out for ourselves, won't we?"
Barbara: [biting back a smile] "Thank you for the 'we.'"
I LOVE COMPANIONS.
... AHAHAHAHAHA THAT'S SUSAN? She's not at all how I imagined her. Hair done up in a beehive, listening to that newfangled rock and roll music. I thought she'd be all petite sweetness and light, like Sarah Jane. But she's clearly got a bit of a bite to her. Love that.
[Barbara lends Susan a book]
Susan: "Thank you very much! I'll return it tomorrow."
Barbara: "Oh, that's not necessary—til you've finished it."
Susan: "I'll have finished it."
And now Susan is... hand-drawing a Rorschach blot? I don't even know.
Hee! Barbara—or rather, Jacqueline Hill—flubbed a line but they kept it in. It's so cute and low-budget!
... okay, now I'm starting to get annoyed. They're just listing all the ways Susan's freaky and smart and... well. It's making her come off all freaky. xD Get to the point, show! And let me love her!
[watching her enter an empty warehouse]
Ian: "She is fifteen, you know. She could be meeting a boy. Did that ever occur to you?"
Barbara: "I almost wish she were. It would be so normal."
(Teehee Jimmy Stone. And now back to your regularly scheduled Classic episode).
They've found the TARDIS!
Ian: "Feel it! Do you feel that?"
Barbara: "It's a... faint vibration."
Ian: "It's alive!"
Well that's an interesting conclusion to jump to, Ian. Nice to know you earned that degree in science.
And there's the Doctor! In a funny hat and a funny scarf. Ohhhh, Doctor.
Okay, One's a grumpy curmudgeon. Which I knew, but... come on, Doctor, where's your sense of wonder?
And ohhhhhh, welcome to the TARDIS. Go on. Go on, then. Say it. Someone say it.
Barbara: "Is this really where you live, Susan?"
Susan: "Wh—yes."
Doctor: "And what is wrong with it?"
Ian: "It... it was just a box—"
Come on. One of you has to say it.
IS NO ONE GOING TO SAY IT'S BIGGER ON THE INSIDE?
Susan: "The TARDIS can go anywhere."
Barbara: "I don't know what you mean, Susan."
Susan: "Oh, I made up tardis from the initials-- Time And Relative Dimension In Space. I thought you'd both realize when you came inside and saw the different dimensions from outside!"
Close enough. (Also: Susan named it? Awwwwwwh.)
Susan: "Why won't you believe us?"
Barbara: "We just want you to tell us the truth."
Doctor: "You have heard the truth! We are not of this race. We are not of this Earth. We are wanderers in the four dimensions of space and time, cut off from our own planet and our own people by eons and universes and a power beyond the reach of your most advanced sciences."
I like the "I can feel the Earth turnin'" speech better, methinks.
... oh, shoot. Is he going to KIDNAP Ian and Barbara? Is that how this goes down? Susan's begging for him to let them go. This is not okay.
"I was born in the 49th century," says Susan. Good to know!
Oh, come on. Really? The Doctor just laughed an evil laugh. Oh, show.
This is... really upsetting, actually. The Doctor zapped Ian, and Susan's all upset and crying, and it's all... argh. This is not what I signed up for. Where are the speeches about how awesome humans are? Where's the sense of adventure? One is so not My Doctor.
There are three more parts to Unearthly Child, but I honestly don't think I can get through them right now. Eesh. I guess I'll just have to take One in very small doses.
I need some dancing Bernard Cribbins to cheer myself up.
That's better.
I've wound up really liking One (and hating Susan with a passion—srsly if this is what kid Time Lords are like, *I'm glad they're all dead*). The next three parts of An Unearthly Child were actually pretty interesting and high-concept for the time. There are cavemen, and caveman politics!
ReplyDeleteThe way I've fanwanked One's personality is that he doesn't know about humans really—he's never travelled with any, and he's so young compared to now. I'm about half way through One's available episodes (Netflix) and already he's grown a whole lot more fond of his human companions and humans in general. He still does all sorts of morally questionable things, but he still does that, just for different reasons.