BUT MOFFAT IS SUCH A GoOD WRITER GUISE.
I mean, how many companions can really pass this test?
Name one thing about Rose’s that doesn’t involve the Doctor, her mom, her dad, Mickey, or her job when she met the Doctor. I’m drawing a blank.
When she was sixteen she dropped school and moved out because she was in love with Jimmy Stone, which resulted in her never getting her A-levels. He later broke her heart and she returned to live with Jackie.
Is that enough?
RTD may have his flaws when it comes to writing (nobody’s perfect anyway) but at least he made the effort to give us glimpses of the life the companions had before meeting the Doctor. Moffat doesn’t care because that’s obviously not that important.
Rose got the bronze in an under-sevens gymnastics tournament; Rose’s best mate was named Shareen, and they used to skip school sometimes to go to the shops and look at boys; Rose loves chips and likes pizza and tolerates football; Rose has never learned French, though Jackie thinks she should’ve.
These are all things we learn within the first six episode of series one. And that’s not counting the remarkable depth and breadth provided when one fully incorporates her parents, which were restricted despite not being on Amy’s list. And you can say BUT THAT’S NOT FAIR, AMY DIDN’T HAVE PARENTS, but lol now she does and they’ve never explored how that changed her, and LOL PETE’S DEATH HAD A MASSIVE, VISCERAL EFFECT ON ROSE AND THE PLOT OF THE SHOW AND WAS MENTIONED SEVERAL TIMES BEFORE IT WAS EXPLORED AND IT’S A PART OF HER.
Rose’s life on the Powell Estate is more vividly rendered and thoroughly examined in just the Aliens of London/World War 3 two-parter than Leadworth has been in the two seasons we’ve known the Ponds. It’s not just Rose we learn about; we learn about her family in her absence, we see Mickey and Jackie interact and learn and grow together, painting a picture of their past and building a future, because they have a relationship COMPLETELY INDEPENDENT OF ROSE. We learn that Rose is the kind of person who knows exactly where things are in her boyfriend’s kitchen, even when he doesn’t, even when she hasn’t stepped foot in his flat in a (technical temporal) year. We get cut aways to the British *and American* newscasts of plot events, for chrissake.
I mean, I’d make similar lists for Martha and Donna, or heck, even for any of the one-off guest companions from SINGLE EPISODES in Rusty’s era who’ve had more thoroughly-painted backstories than Amy Pond, but I’d give myself carpal tunnel and sacrifice several hours typing it all out.
The two showrunners are incomparable.
I was about to say the whole bronze under sevens thing but professor spork did a much better job. None of Moffat’s companions even compare. He just doesn’t flesh them out at all.
EXACTLY
I think I’m going to ask this post to marry me I love it so much
[image: whovian confessions image of Amy Pond, with caption that says “a friend of mine once asked me if I could tell her anything about Amy’s life which doesn’t include the Doctor, Rory or the fact that she’s a kissogram. I could not answer”].
I’m not even a Doctor Who fan and I love this analysis.
Reblogging this again. I like Amy as a character, for the potential of what she could be. But Moffat…well, he doesn’t make it easy to love her because though she is a strong, somewhat likable character, she is quite one dimensional. Her character revolves around Rory and the Doctor. I can’t name one thing she does exclusively for her. Unlike Martha, Rose, and Donna.
The worst thing to me is that there are really intense things that HAPPEN to Amy, things that should impact her, change her, shape her as a person, yet we only get to see those things in relation to the Doctor and Rory.
Take the single most horrific and vomit inducing storyline Moffat has given us as an example: Amy being kidnapped and held pregnant without her knowledge or consent for 9 months, having her child stolen from her, leaving her infertile and unable to ever bear a child and raise them.
How does Amy feel about that? Did SHE want a family? Does she mourn the loss of this possibility in her life? Does she wake up having nightmares about her captivity? About what happened to Melody? Does she even want more children after what has happened to her, or does the idea of bringing another baby into the world after Melody terrify and sicken her?
We don’t fucking know.
All we know is that RORY wanted kids and AMY feels bad that she can’t give RORY kids. That’s literally the only exploration of her feelings on this topic.
-flips a table-
Let’s bring Oswin into this too.
Her entire EXISTENCE is for the Doctor. I love her to bits but we really don’t know much about her life other that the parts related to the doctor. We know about her parents and the leaf and that she takes care of the two kids and she’s brave enough to sacrifice herself for the doctor, but we don’t know anything about CLARA. This entire season has barely focused on Clara and her character development, and instead focused on a rip off romance plot of the doctor trying to figure out “his impossible girl”
YES GOD this is why I disagree with moffat’s running the show! His companions are built around the doctor and (with a bit of a exception with rory) THEY DO NOT CHANGE AT ALL.
Amy’s big purpose in life seams to be to like produce river song so the doctor can have another formal love interest.
I never like to post steven moffat hate because I really appreciate him but I do agree with most of this.
