A few random thoughts on this year’s Doctor Who Christmas special, “The Runaway Bride” (very minor spoilers below):

I kept wondering if something was wrong with the sound because the music seemed so horrendously inappropriate and obtrusive. Murray Gold’s music wasn’t this bad back in season one, was it? I remember there being a few good moments back then. Now it feels as though the show loses whatever dramatic tension it ever manages to achieve, thanks to the noisy elevator music.

Not that there was really much dramatic tension going, anyway, especially in the last 15-20 minutes once the (other) pantomime lady showed up. The only good thing I can say about Sarah Parish’s performance is that she seemed to be doing a weird homage to Nabil Shaban (who played a slug named Sil back in the 80s.)

The episode mostly seemed to be a final insult (of many) to poor old Rose, as the Doctor attempts to replace her with possibly the stupidest companion he’s ever had. (Yes, dumber than Dodo.) Rose wasn’t super-educated, but the show made a point of showing over and over again that she was a quick learner who asked the right questions. She was curious. She figured things out on her own. Until she became unbearably smug in season two, these characteristics made her really likeable and admirable. Donna, by contrast, doesn’t know and doesn’t care. Alien spaceships and cyber-armies (from previous episodes) completely went over her head (so to speak). The script hammers home the point that she’s a total moron, and then makes a point of telling us she’d be a good replacement for Rose. WTF?! But it’s supposed to be okay, because of the constant sentimental invoking of the Doctor’s bond with Rose, and how sad he is, and how much he wishes he was dirty dancing with Rose instead of fighting robot Santas. The show wants us to love Rose (even though she’s gone) but not respect her.

Russell T. Davies always responds to straw man criticisms of his writing on Doctor Who: supposedly people don’t like it because they don’t want to see character development, or emotions, or subtext or whatever. Not me. I’m for those things. I’ve written tons of fanfic in my head where Nyssa decides to avenge the destruction of Traken instead of sweeping it under the rug, or where Adric’s death has a lasting impact on the Doctor. Yay for character development. I haven’t really seen much on Davies’ Doctor Who so far, to be honest. I’ve seen a lot of moments smushed together, but the Doctor can’t (or won’t) change, and Rose hardly did.(Random thought: what would have been really interesting is if we’d seen Rose getting sick of the Doctor and deciding to leave him, which after all is what 99 percent of his companions have done in the past. Or Rose’s feelings about the Doctor becoming more mixed and less luvvy duvvy. That would have constituted development instead of a single note held for two seasons.) Anyway, the end of season two saw the departure of the show’s entire supporting cast, which means we get a blank slate. Will we see an actual arc this time around? Or will it be like (shudder) Torchwood?