{"id":134291,"date":"2017-08-20T10:01:26","date_gmt":"2017-08-20T16:01:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/?p=134291"},"modified":"2017-08-20T10:10:43","modified_gmt":"2017-08-20T16:10:43","slug":"binge-watching-ninth-doctor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2017\/08\/20\/binge-watching-ninth-doctor.html","title":{"rendered":"Binge-watching the Ninth Doctor"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>I had some time this week — with business trips and band rehearsals dragging off fellow family members — to watch the thirteen episodes of\u00a0Doctor Who<\/em> that starred Christopher Eccleston as the Ninth Doctor, the series that started the “New Who” reboot of the show in 2005.<\/p>\n

Man, I’m sorry he only lasted a season, because Eccleston rocked. The Ninth Doctor reminds me, in some ways, of Tom Baker’s Fourth Doctor — a bit madcap much of the time, alternating with bouts of deadly seriousness. He’s angrier, though, sometimes almost cruel. And his experiences just coming off of the Time War, wherein he was responsible for the destruction of the Daleks\u00a0and<\/em> the Time Lords, has left him as seriously damaged goods. His desire for a Companion, for anyone to want to spend time with him, is palpable to the point of pathos, but his simmering anger and self-loathing over his war-time actions sometimes causes him to lash out or make bad decisions in a way that has rarely plagued the other regenerations of the Doctor.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Billy Piper’s Rose Tyler has long been one of my least favorite Companions, but this rewatch has confirmed that’s in large part due to how she was written with the\u00a0Tenth<\/em> Doctor (David Tennant), as an improbable romantic interest. In this season, at least, Rose is a relatively grounded everywoman, and watching her deal with the seduction of being a Companion, despite its effects on her mother and ostensible boyfriend, and dealing as well when it seems that will all be taken away from her, are some of the better parts of Rose’s tenure on the show.<\/p>\n

The Ninth Doctor’s relationship with Rose is more as a father figure than Ten’s romantic one, at least to my mind (if unsupported in any interview material I found). He acts toward her as the long-absent father who shows up and showers the kid with gifts, who’s desperate to build a relationship, who intrinsically bristles at the mother, loathes the boyfriends, gets overly-critical\u00a0in the child’s\u00a0shortcomings, but ultimately revels in doing all sorts of Dad things with her (“Let’s take a trip and see something cool!”). Yeah, there’s a kiss at the last episode, but no metaphor is perfect, and that’s kind of a weird moment anyway.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>It’s also worth noting the other Companion who comes along for the ride late in the season, Capt. Jack Harkness (played by John Barrowman). It was a true delight seeing him early days as repentant con man, always ready with some pansexual inuendo, but noteworthy in the last few episodes for his savage, fierce loyalty to both Rose and the Doctor.<\/p>\n

While no season of\u00a0Doctor Who<\/em> is without flaw, this particular series has some particularly good ones: \u00a0“The End of the World,” “Dalek,” “Father’s Day,” “The Empty Child \/ The Doctor Dances” “Bad Wolf \/ The Parting of Ways” stack up, in my mind, with anything else that’s been done on the show.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>The key to these things is Eccleston’s Doctor, who easily riffles through turbulent emotions like a deck of cards, who feels so contemptuously apart from humans (see Pertwee’s Third Doctor, or even Capaldi’s Twelfth) but is passionately admiring and protective of them, whose trauma from the Time War is still on his sleeve but who’s trying to get better, who is guilty of mass slaughter, but turns away from it over the season\u00a0multiple times, whose “daft old face” lights up in a way that can always bring a smile even when you know he’s not smiling on the inside.<\/p>\n

Damned fine stuff, and a great push-start to the New Who. I regret he was around for a short a time as he was, but I’m glad he was there.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I had some time this week — with business trips and band rehearsals dragging off fellow family members — to watch the thirteen episodes of\u00a0Doctor Who that starred Christopher Eccleston as the Ninth Doctor, the series that started the “New Who” reboot of the show in 2005. Man, I’m sorry he only lasted a season, … Continue reading “Binge-watching the Ninth Doctor”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":134302,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[43],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-134291","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-media-tv-doctor-who"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/Doctor-Who-ninthdoctor-1.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":41875,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2014\/04\/30\/what-we-saw-and-didnt-see-of-the-ninth-doctor.html","url_meta":{"origin":134291,"position":0},"title":"What we saw and didn't see of the Ninth Doctor","author":"***Dave","date":"Wed 30-Apr-14 2:53pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Hmmmm. No, still a bad decision. I wouldn't have assumed Eccleston had showed up for filming if his digitally-composited face had shown up for the regeneration by 8.5. (It's not like the cameo by Tom Baker.)It would have been simple enough to contact him and ask for permission to do\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":27462,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2012\/04\/19\/the-fantastic-ninth-doctor.html","url_meta":{"origin":134291,"position":1},"title":"The “Fantastic” Ninth Doctor","author":"***Dave","date":"Thu 19-Apr-12 5:56pm","format":false,"excerpt":"We've been watching Doctor Who reruns with Katherine, and she's been loving them. Last night we finished the \"First Series\" (contemporary), featuring Christopher Eccleston as the Ninth Doctor. While there are a lot of folks who rave over David Tennant and Matt Smith, I, for whatever reason, really love Eccleston\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Doctor Who"","block_context":{"text":"Doctor Who","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/media\/franchises\/media-tv-doctor-who"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/04\/doctor_eccleston1-225x300.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":9990,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2006\/10\/01\/tenth_doctor_second_serie.html","url_meta":{"origin":134291,"position":2},"title":"Tenth Doctor, Second Series, First Impressions","author":"***Dave","date":"Sun 1-Oct-06 8:21am","format":false,"excerpt":"Watched Doctor Who: The Christmas Invasion and the \"New Earth\" episode of Doctor Who on the DVR last night. Okay, so David Tennant isn't bad. He hasn't established a...","rel":"","context":"In "Doctor Who"","block_context":{"text":"Doctor Who","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/media\/franchises\/media-tv-doctor-who"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/images\/tardis.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":134404,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2017\/08\/23\/the-world-of-british-acting-sometimes-seems-pretty-small.html","url_meta":{"origin":134291,"position":3},"title":"The world of British Acting sometimes seems pretty small","author":"***Dave","date":"Wed 23-Aug-17 5:15pm","format":false,"excerpt":"And here we have a 2012 National Theatre production of Antigone, with the major role of Creon being played by Christopher Eccleston -- the Ninth Doctor in Doctor Who, and the title role being played by ... Jodie Whittaker, now cast as the Thirteenth Doctor. Small world, ennit. (Lovely accents,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/Antigone_31.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/Antigone_31.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/Antigone_31.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/Antigone_31.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/Antigone_31.jpg?resize=1050%2C600&ssl=1 3x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/Antigone_31.jpg?resize=1400%2C800&ssl=1 4x"},"classes":[]},{"id":11353,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2007\/09\/14\/jesus_who.html","url_meta":{"origin":134291,"position":4},"title":"Jesus Who?","author":"***Dave","date":"Fri 14-Sep-07 6:51am","format":false,"excerpt":"A Welsh church that as featured in a Series 1 Doctor Who episode (it doesn't say, but presumably the time travel one) is planning a special Doctor Who-themed youth...","rel":"","context":"In "Doctor Who"","block_context":{"text":"Doctor Who","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/media\/franchises\/media-tv-doctor-who"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/images\/tardis.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":29112,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2012\/08\/02\/christopher-eccleston-as-malekith-the-accursed-fantastic.html","url_meta":{"origin":134291,"position":5},"title":"Christopher Eccleston as Malekith the Accursed – Fantastic!","author":"***Dave","date":"Thu 2-Aug-12 10:58am","format":false,"excerpt":"Yeah, this is pretty damned geek-cool. Embedded Link Christopher Eccleston cast as the villain in Thor 2, geekdom is immediately overwhelmed This is bigger than Zachary Quinto playing Spock, and even bigger than David Tennant showing up in a Harry Potter movie. Christopher Eccleston, best known in Nerdville for playing\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/134291","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=134291"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/134291\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":134304,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/134291\/revisions\/134304"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/134302"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=134291"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=134291"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=134291"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}