happydalek (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
happydalek) wrote2010-01-30 08:34 am
happydalek) wrote2010-01-30 08:34 am
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A Restless Fan, I Am.
Doctor Who has undergone a changing of the guard, and fandom speculation and opinions are running high. Some are sure they'll like the new direction, others are sure they'll hate it. Many are of the "wait and see" persuasion, and some feel so betrayed by the direction the show has gone in the recent past that they are beyond caring at all (or at least would like to be). It all makes me feel terribly restless. You can't get a more open-ended, fantastic premise than Doctor Who has, and that has allowed the show to endure in a variety of incarnations for over 40 years. I love it for that versatility, and yet...I am dissatisfied. I've learned that as a fan I'm drawn to things that are flawed, and a great part of my enjoyment of them comes from making them interactive, if through no other means than my own desire to "correct" those flaws. I never wrote fanfiction before I got into Doctor Who, and I think it's because I never had another fandom that had so much unrealized potential.
I love Doctor Who for what it is, and what it has been, but I also desperately want it to be different. For instance, I want to explore the inside of the TARDIS. I want it to be a mysterious place full of odd, fantastic, wonderful and creepy things. I want the Doctor to be alien, to have feelings and thoughts that we can't always quite understand. I want to know him as the ancient time-traveler that he is, who loves life and loves humans, but is not human. I want him to go to planets unlike any we've ever seen before, encounter beings unlike any we are familiar with, and have the kind of adventures that make us think more broadly about life, the universe, and our place in it. I want a greater diversity of companions, not just in age, race, gender, class, appearance or species, but of personality. Remember when the Doctor had companions who were there against their will, or because they had specific things to learn or places to go? And who says we even need a constant companion? Why can we not have a succession of fascinating one-off characters?
I want Doctor Who to be and have all of these things, and yet I also want it to remain as the staple I know and love, and that is probably a paradox. But aren't paradoxes something Doctor Who does all the time?
I love Doctor Who for what it is, and what it has been, but I also desperately want it to be different. For instance, I want to explore the inside of the TARDIS. I want it to be a mysterious place full of odd, fantastic, wonderful and creepy things. I want the Doctor to be alien, to have feelings and thoughts that we can't always quite understand. I want to know him as the ancient time-traveler that he is, who loves life and loves humans, but is not human. I want him to go to planets unlike any we've ever seen before, encounter beings unlike any we are familiar with, and have the kind of adventures that make us think more broadly about life, the universe, and our place in it. I want a greater diversity of companions, not just in age, race, gender, class, appearance or species, but of personality. Remember when the Doctor had companions who were there against their will, or because they had specific things to learn or places to go? And who says we even need a constant companion? Why can we not have a succession of fascinating one-off characters?
I want Doctor Who to be and have all of these things, and yet I also want it to remain as the staple I know and love, and that is probably a paradox. But aren't paradoxes something Doctor Who does all the time?