And if I ever meet the man who claimed that my opinions on Peter Davison didn't count 'cus I was a girl again, he's going to get a slap.
Back when my classic buying was erratic and sparse, when the Doctor would reference events we did not understand or companions we'd never met, we dreamed of watching an entire classic series in order - as originally broadcast, savouring the cliffhangers and soaking up the atmosphere. For continuity more than anything else - Sontaran Experiment's length means that you can waste most of an episode wondering where the hell the TARDIS was, and what was this Nerva thing anyway if watched out of the blue.
I'm past that now, because my buying is more focused towards villains or companions I recognise, and my grasp of the wider mythology is better. It still crosses my mind every now and then - and there are only a few sensible candidates, considering the ones I've almost completed. There's season 12, with Harry, and it'd be nice to sort out that continuity once and for all. Or season 19, again because of the little tags which allow story to story to blend into one unit. And finally, season 21 - both the very best and very worst of candidates. The best, because thematically as well as for continuity, it deserves to be watched in one go. And the worst, because at the end of the 12 weeks, I might kill myself.
This is at the heart of why I love S21 - what I consider to be a series of unbroken excellence only rivalled by the 7 episode run between Human Nature and Time Crash. What a soul destroying experience it all is.
Warriors of the Deep really gives me a few minutes of genuine misery at the end of the episode. Resurrection, about half an hour. By the time you get to Caves, we are talking days, because if you're keeping score at home, this is the moment the "nicest" Doctor gets dropped into some of the least pleasant episodes of all time.
It's the contrast that kills. A certain correspondant on Pagefillers uses the "dump any doctor in another doctor's episode" approach to argue that PD is a bad doctor. And maybe he has a point, depending on your conception of who the Doctor should be. But conversely, when it comes to S21, no other Doctor would work, nor make it so involving. The clue is in the cricket, because this is the moment he realises the rest of the universe will not play ball.
Because with any other Doctor, S21 would last about 45 minutes. You could certainly chop three episodes out of Warriors of the Deep (mind you, might come as a relief to some), because no other Doctor would resist using the hexachromide that long. And maybe, numerically, they'd be right to do so. But then the main charm of the episode would be gone - an ending which is both a success and a failure on so many different levels. Now maybe you can use this decision as fodder for why he's an inferior edition. The point is, you're talking about it.
And that is at the core of why I love the Fifth Doctor and his era, for challenging our easy assumptions about the role. The Doctor is an atrocious hypocrite - we can see that easily - so actually putting the Doctor through the thinking process for his actions was a novelty, putting that very controvosy into the show. He steps back and tries to work out the "best" way to act. We can debate whether there's a difference between 4 gassing Solon and 6 gassing Shockeye, but now the Doctor's thinking about it too.
The Fifth Doctor spends three seasons utterly defiant in the face of what he fights against. The two words that come to mind are very heroic, and very brave. You might say, "well, they're all heroic" - to which my response is, "they're all compassionate idealists too..." I'm talking about a particular type of moral courage. It's one thing for the Doctor to risk his life for his beliefs. It's another thing to risk other people's lives.
Now what is this? Cowardice, as Davros suggests - certainly there is an element of not wanting to take that step on a personal level. Indecision - but who's interested in watching a guy who has all the answers?
Yet there is a bravery in not compromising your beliefs. Steve Moffat, wonderfully, described him as a better man than the universe he was trying to save. Even as the situations get darker, he remains reliable. The type of person you'd want to rescue you, if you didn't also know that as an extra in a Peter Davison story, your life span is equivalent to that of a Spinal Tap drummer. He's letting these things happen, but surely there's a nobilty in trying to do it properly? The New Adventures might trot out "he who fights monsters might become a monster himself, and when you look into the abyss the abyss looks also into you." on a regular basis, but it's 5 we really feel it for - because by the end, he's not the person he wanted to be. The moment when, finally, he gets it "right" in Planet of Fire by letting the Master fry is not glorious, nor is it a relief - it's horrible. Even his treatment of Turlough and Kamelion in that episode would not, with any other Doctor, seem so shockingly wrong.
That alone suggests the whole "nice-compassionate-innocent" thing, all those poor criticisms dragged out every time, have some serious merit to them - and I intend to attack them one at a time.
Let's start with "he's too young!", or the argument that he's regressed. The Doctor does this every now and then - 8 and 10 are exactly the same. He gets into a dark cycle, and then one day he regenerates and it's a breath of fresh air. Canonically, if you had spent a hundred years feeling like the Fourth Doctor - all crazy grins and confidence - then suddenly, you weren't any more, you'd want to reexamine and rethink. It's like having the carpet dragged from underneath you, and having to work out from scratch who you are and what you stand for.
I actually love the age vs. youth dynamic. The Doctor always arrogantly assumes authority wherever he goes - the problem is, the Fifth can't get away with it any more. This is most notable in Four to Doomsday. In the first episode, he is happy ordering his companions around - but this soon stops working, and by the final episode he is politely asking Adric whether or not he wants to help out. "Seemed young for his age," he muses of Bigon, obviously unsure what to make of his own appearance.
What is wrong with a Doctor who tries to have a nice time? Let it not be forgotten that the first two doctors were merely on a joyride of the universe, the Third was dragged kicking and screaming into adventure, and the Fourth just couldn't help getting into trouble.
A bit rubbish? This is at the core of why he's great. His Doctor is completely rubbish a lot of the time, but who wants a hero who has it easy? You know he can screw up, and more importantly, so does he. Instant tension, instant drama. They even junk the sonic screwdriver early on - the security blanket is gone. Two episodes later, they kill a companion* for the first and only time.
Adric's death does not come of any act of the Doctor's - he behaves just as he always has. It's the world which has suddenly got mean, and it won't be easier from here onwards.*excluding Katarina, Kamelion and Sarah Kingdom for not being companions; excluding Peri and Jack for coming back to life; exclusing Rose and Donna for not actually being dead despite any number of limp prophecies.
And he feels things between episodes - your capability is my callousness. He tries to reason with everyone in Warriors of the Deep, it doesn't work, so in Resurrection of the Daleks, he breaks out the gas at the first oppertunity; but he can't bring himself to kill Davros, and evidently spends some time mulling over that before he next bumps into the Master for Planet of Fire because of the choices he eventually makes in that episode. Cause, effect, and the suggestion of a process between our weekly 25 minute dose.
It's often brushed off as "naive", but I feel that is over-simplistic. He knows the universe is filled with evil, he can just never shake that sincere sense of horror every time he finds it. Steve Moffat rightly identifies that if he didn't really, honestly feel it every single time, he'd have stayed at home like the rest of us do when there's a war on, instead of chasing off to right wrongs. At this point, he's been facing evil all over the galaxy for half a century, and again and again, no matter how many times he wins, nothing changes and there is always more bloodshed. This strikes me as far more natural a reation: to become reflective about the merits and methods of his lifestyle, walking around with the weight of the universe of his shoulders, compared to other incarnations who will happily step over bodies.
Wet? No - merely sane. If the Doc is cheerily smiling away and dancing around the villain, then I can't get all that bothered about any supposed dangers. The Third Doctor had things to say about facing your fears, and one of the true treats of the Fifth Doctor era is that when evil rears its ugly head, you can tell he's scared - but that's not going to stop him, not for a moment.
In short, it's about the quality of heroism. If you are an invulnerable superman, diving into a burning building means far less than if you are aware of very real limitations, that you are flawed and fallible.And ultimately he knows it. Why is Caves of Androzani a great episode? Hundreds of reasons, but for our purposes, today I'm voting that it's a perfect departure because it evolves naturally out of everything that's gone before. Now of course, it's an adorably Fiveish thing to do to throw away his life for someone he's only just met, but I find it hard to believe that any other Doctor in the circumstances wouldn't have done the same. Yet it's the buildup that really sells it.
At its most simplistic, this is a Doctor who absolutely cannot lose another friend under his charge, with Earthshock peeping around every corner. Yet, thematically, I think the true payoff is about interferance. We've established that he very rarely got the balance right between violence and mercy. If Planet of Fire is the moment he compromises, then Caves is a demonstration that he simply no longer cares. He doesn't help the good guys, or hinder the bad guys - as if anyone could work out which were which - and focuses on one good action, simple and without stain. He's decided who he is - or at any rate, what he isn't. The working title for Caves of Androzani was Chain Reaction. I've always liked that.
Each Doctor regards himself as superior to his predecessors, but there is a sense of undeniable relief in "change, my dear, and not a moment too soon." In this way, regeneration approaches the human conception of past lives: earlier incarnations who have each had a lesson to learn, understanding it before moving on through death to a new life, one which has the advantage of that knowledge. The contradictions and complications played out across PD's three years have already evolved into a new direction in Season 21, but regeneration crystalises them. I'd almost argue that Planet of Fire was the Fifth Doctor's final episode - the out-of-character arrogance and determination of Caves only lacks Colin Baker's multi-colour dreamcoat. Death merely makes the change a cleaner break. The Sixth Doctor learns from his predecessor's experimentation, action over hesistation, certainty instead of introspection, and the strength to brush over mistakes and plough on for his clear conception of justice. Which also gets criticised by all and sundry, but I'll leave my defence of that for another day.
The usual criticisms are not necessarily incorrect, merely approached from the wrong direction. The Fifth Doctor stood for something better, something he very rarely achieved. Yet he remains admirable for trying, regardless of success or failure. He's a hero precicely because it is never easy.
And finally, I'm going to get personal, Mr Tim Miner of Pagefillers, since your grossly unfair character critique has kept me up to the small hours of the morning:
"He doesn't rush headlong into danger" (you say of the man whose first response in The Awakening is to plunge into a collapsing cloister to save a stranger? Who thinks it's a good idea to dive out of a spaceship without a spacesuit in Four to Doomsday? Who attempts to crash land a space-freighter while dying, simply to save a friend? My goodness, I could probably find you an example of this in most episodes)
"He doesn't rig up a lot of gadgets" (True: the only things which come close are Nyssa's sonic booster, and breaking the control box in Terminus. I would argue, however, that this is not a vital Doctor trait. It's certainly not the second thing I think when someone says "Doctor".)
"He doesn't seem to be driven by insane curiosity." ("Hmmm, big empty spaceship with no air. This way Tegan!", "No, Tegan, we can't leave, I want to find more about King John!", "Oooh Turlough, why don't we find out what that blip is on the scanner?", "Come on Peri, race you to those blowholes?")
"He doesn't seem to want to fight evil at any cost." (Bullshit...)
"He doesn't drop names" (no, not so often, but again - is this a vital Doctor trait? It's certainly common, but if you want to define the core of the character this is merely cosmetic. He doesn't have curly hair either.)
"He doesn't seem to be driven by a desire to see everything the universe has to offer" (wrong! He is driven by a desire to see the nice bits of the universe. He takes Tegan to see her grandfather, attempts to take her to her future and goes to a costume party merely to play cricket.)
"He lets himself get locked up and doesn't try to pick the lock" (...but from strength, not weakness. He always learns far more from smiling politely and going along with things - it's his own brand of Troughton's disarming daftness. Think getting executed in Arc of Infinity to meet Omega, not rocking the boat in Black Orchid to get a better grip of the situation and tricking Stein into revealing the Dalek plan and that Davros is aboard, all while moments from a sticky death in Resurrection of the Daleks. He can escape in his own sweet time. Don't forget that playing along, either for time or for an advantage, is also as key a Doctor trait. Off the top of my head, the Second Doctor "well now I know you're crazy" in Tomb of the Cybermen, the Seventh Doctor more than once in Curse of Fenric, the Third Doctor's act with the Master in Claws of Axos are three that come to mind, but there are many many more.)
"He doesn't tell madmen and dictators where they can get off" (again, I think this is a grossly unfair statement, and there's a Tereleptil, Cyberleader, Davros, Sharaz Jek and an Eternal naming himself as Striker queuing to see you. Also, see the above point: staying silent is often as smart as shouting)
"His companions aren't just along for the ride, they often dictate his activities." (This is undeniably true. What isn't necessarily concrete is where this is a good or bad thing. Mr Miner obviously sees it as bad, and I certainly agree it's different. But I like it. How many fufilling relationships have you had when one of the group makes the decisions and has all the fun, with the others are just hanging about? It creates a far more complex dynamic in the TARDIS. It's also overlooked, but he also bullies and orders his companions about far more than any other Doctor. They feel they have the right to question his decisions, as a result of his apparent youth. Take Earthshock - the Doctor is in control, but he cares enough for Adric to let him make him that angry. He doesn't simply say no: it's about persuading him that he is wrong. And please, no one deny that we had five fantastic companion departures. But I concede that this, at least, is a matter of personal opinion)
And here ends the damn lesson. Time for me to go to bed.
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