30 Days of TV - Day Fifteen
May. 16th, 2010 10:52 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
caz963Today, it's the turn of my favourite female character.
I didn't have to think about this one at all really. Well, no, actually I did, because I had to make sure that I was choosing my favourite rather than the one that's currently on my mind.
But the answer was the same -
Donna Noble
I know she was only in Doctor Who for one season and one special, but she really made an impression on me. I think she's the one companion in nu-Who that almost everyone seems to like - even the Ten/Rose or Ten/Whoever shippers. I suppose that's because - from their point of view - she didn't threaten their favoured pairing, but that aside, there's no denying that Donna was awesome.
She was, in a way, every one of us. She thought she was ordinary, and thought that way about herself right up until she became the DocrorDonna, just for that shining moment.
I've said this many times before, but Donna was the companion Ten needed - someone to give him a kick up the arse from time to time. She understood him like no other human did, she wasn't in awe of him or blinded by infatuation - but she loved him anyway.
Even when she was terrified, she always stepped up to - and usually beyond - the plate. On the Sontaran ship for example; and the moment in Fires of Pompeii where she not only agrees with what the Doctor has to do but won't let him do it alone where other companions would have just watched him - is I think, one of the best moments of nu-Who.
But apart from Ten, Donna was so much her own person. She was a bit older than the other regular companions, she was more clear about who she was as a person, even if, as we found out, she wasn't always too keen on who that person was. She didn't have a great relationship with her mum, but fortunately, Wilf was there to temper that. It was obvious that Donna and Wilf thought the world of each other, and you could see where Donna got her sense of humour, and her humanity and her sense of adventure. The woman she became when she was with the Doctor is, I like to think, the one she would always have become, and hope that she did become (because otherwise the end of JE would depress me even more than it already does!) even after she had to leave all of it behind.
She was the first companion in nu-Who that I felt I could identify with. When Handy finally voiced what I'd been thinking for ages - that all the gobbiness was a cover for her insecurities, it really hit the mark. (If you've not guessed by now, I'm also gobby and insecure!). I loved her compassion, her empathy and her humour, and the fact that while she wasn't afraid to get in the Doctor's face, she wasn't too stubborn to back off when she saw it was the right thing to do.
Donna is the companion by which all the others will be measured. There's not been one like her before and it's hard to see there being one again.
I didn't have to think about this one at all really. Well, no, actually I did, because I had to make sure that I was choosing my favourite rather than the one that's currently on my mind.
But the answer was the same -
Donna Noble
I know she was only in Doctor Who for one season and one special, but she really made an impression on me. I think she's the one companion in nu-Who that almost everyone seems to like - even the Ten/Rose or Ten/Whoever shippers. I suppose that's because - from their point of view - she didn't threaten their favoured pairing, but that aside, there's no denying that Donna was awesome.
She was, in a way, every one of us. She thought she was ordinary, and thought that way about herself right up until she became the DocrorDonna, just for that shining moment.
I've said this many times before, but Donna was the companion Ten needed - someone to give him a kick up the arse from time to time. She understood him like no other human did, she wasn't in awe of him or blinded by infatuation - but she loved him anyway.
Even when she was terrified, she always stepped up to - and usually beyond - the plate. On the Sontaran ship for example; and the moment in Fires of Pompeii where she not only agrees with what the Doctor has to do but won't let him do it alone where other companions would have just watched him - is I think, one of the best moments of nu-Who.
But apart from Ten, Donna was so much her own person. She was a bit older than the other regular companions, she was more clear about who she was as a person, even if, as we found out, she wasn't always too keen on who that person was. She didn't have a great relationship with her mum, but fortunately, Wilf was there to temper that. It was obvious that Donna and Wilf thought the world of each other, and you could see where Donna got her sense of humour, and her humanity and her sense of adventure. The woman she became when she was with the Doctor is, I like to think, the one she would always have become, and hope that she did become (because otherwise the end of JE would depress me even more than it already does!) even after she had to leave all of it behind.
She was the first companion in nu-Who that I felt I could identify with. When Handy finally voiced what I'd been thinking for ages - that all the gobbiness was a cover for her insecurities, it really hit the mark. (If you've not guessed by now, I'm also gobby and insecure!). I loved her compassion, her empathy and her humour, and the fact that while she wasn't afraid to get in the Doctor's face, she wasn't too stubborn to back off when she saw it was the right thing to do.
Donna is the companion by which all the others will be measured. There's not been one like her before and it's hard to see there being one again.
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no subject
Date: 2010-05-16 10:25 pm (UTC)When I reallized she was a companion, I thought, "How awesome is this?" She's my age, she's a redhead, AND she is curvy like me! Not the stereotypical impossibly thin/blonde/plastic beauty that we get so much of here in the States. It was so refreshing to see someone who looked like a real person. Plus, like you as well, I tend to shoot off my mouth a lot and have a very large collection of insecurity.
In fact, a few days ago, while watching PiC yet again, it struck me that not only was Donna putting all her baggage on board the TARDIS, she was also putting all her symbolic baggage on the TARDIS as well (baggage that she had been carrying around in her car all that time). Sometimes a hatbox is just a hatbox, but sometimes...
Well, I doubt that's what RTD (shakes fist while still yelling, "Damn you, RTD!") had in mind, but nevertheless, I think it makes sense.
no subject
Date: 2010-05-16 10:32 pm (UTC)I really hope that we can get away from companions who have to appear younger than the Doctor. The best ones so far have been Donna, Adelaide and Wilf - which should tell Moff & Co something...
no subject
Date: 2010-05-16 10:52 pm (UTC)You might even say that about the Doctor while you're at it. A Doctor that looks like he could be one of my students...
Were Matt Smith and Karen Gillan picked because DW is suppose to be a children's show and these two fit the demographic the producers are trying to reach?
no subject
Date: 2010-05-16 10:58 pm (UTC)DW is supposed to be a family show, so to an extent, the age of the actors shoudn't be a factor. But when the two leads are so close in age, I think it is, because a part of the audience is going to be 'left out', if that makes any sense.
no subject
Date: 2010-05-16 11:17 pm (UTC)Donna had the advantage of seeing Ten at his best *and* his worst when they first met, unlike Rose or Martha. I loved that Ten had to work hard to win her over when they first met. I think that's what made their relationship equal and so successful for me. She already knew what he was capable of before she became a full-time companion, and she acknowledged all of it.
Now I miss Donna even more.