thoughts on the meaning of Donna’s story
I haven’t been talking much about Donna because I’m so sad about her ending. I don’t think it was the wrong story choice; it’s a tragedy. It’s presented as a tragedy. It’s meant to rip your heart out and stomp all over it. It’s not in any way implying that Donna is less than any other character, or less amazing than you thought she was. The tragedy gets its power from the fact that Donna was so wonderful.
And I know there’s people claiming that the Doctor should’ve respected Donna’s choice, but even if you leave aside the issue of informed consent (hi her brain was not functioning properly), she didn’t say “I’d rather die.” She said “I want to stay.”
People, she couldn’t stay. She made her choice and she couldn’t have it. She was dying right there. It wasn’t a matter of respecting her wishes or not; it was a matter of choosing between two things she didn’t want, death or a mindwipe.
Yeah, the Doctor probably should have talked to her about it earlier, before things got so bad. But the solution would’ve been the same; the pain just would have been dragged out longer.The Doctor runs from pain, doesn’t want to face this horrible situation until finally he’s forced to. That’s selfish, but it’s a selfishness that comes from heartbreak. He doesn’t want to lose Donna and doesn’t want to hurt her, so he puts it off as long as possible. A mistake, yes, but so understandable. Tell me you’ve never fled from something difficult because you didn’t want to face how much it would hurt.
And how horrible, to make Donna choose either death or a memory wipe, when she wants neither. Honestly, I think the Doctor did the kindest thing for her, to make it quick and get it over with. Because the more she had to think about it, the more it would have broken her heart.
And I don’t understand the idea that death is better. Maybe it’s because I see death as final, but either way, the Donna we know ends. Yes, it’s sad that she loses the knowledge of how amazing she is, but um, if she’s dead, she doesn’t know how awesome she is either. On account of being dead. At least with the mindwipe, she’s got a chance of discovering herself again.
I’m trying to think about what the overall theme of Donna’s story is. And I think, honestly, despite how sadly it ended, it’s a hopeful story. It’s a story about human potential.
When we meet Donna, she seems utterly banal. Sure, she’s funny and entertaining but ultimately she’s shallow, she’s an ignorant person living a very small life, thinking only of herself and ignoring the world around her. But put into the right situation, her better side comes out. And there’s not just one right situation; “Turn Left” shows this explicitly. Donna’s always had potential, but it’s been squashed down by a pointless life, by celebrity gossip and consumerism and a passionless job and an emotionally abusive mother. Maybe the story is that the shallow modern world discourages our better sides from coming out? Or of how much influence our family dynamics have on who we become?
Because when Donna does face adversity, when she’s forced to experience suffering and see it happening to other people, that’s when her compassion and bravery come to the fore. And when Donna experiences wonder, the creation of the earth, the realization that the universe is so much bigger than she imagined, that’s when her passion and energy and heroism come out. But she needs those challenges in order to realize her potential.
And it’s also a story that says that even people who seem set in their ways can change. Usually we get these heroic realization-of-potential stories for really young people. In fiction, middle-aged people (especially women) often seem set in stone; they are what they are and can’t be anything else. But Donna gets a non-traditional coming-of-age story, a story about someone who realizes the life she thought she wanted isn’t enough, that the person she became isn’t who she wants to be. She changes at a point where most people have already decided who they are, which shows that realizing your potential isn’t an option limited to the young; even the most average set-into-their-lives people can grow into heroes. It’s not just the alternate hero!Donna of “Turn Left,” but the mere fact that she changes so late in life, that should give us hope that she’ll find another way to live a fulfilling life, via yet another path.
I don’t know. I honestly think the mindwipe is a better story than a heroic death. A heroic death is predictable; a character going from nobody to heroic martyr is one of those basic stories that we’ve seen a million times before. It’s emotionally satisfying, yeah, but it’s kind of a closed story. This story is a lot more open, and disturbing, and makes you think and ask a lot more questions. What made Donna a hero? How much of it is the influence of her family? Or the influence of the world around her? Was it the adversity she experienced, or the wonder, or both? Do most seemingly average people have that potential, or is it something rare in Donna? Can she do it again? Why or why not?
So many people seem offended that the story hurts, but, you know, it’s supposed to hurt. That’s why it’s so powerful and resonant, because the audience cares. RTD wasn’t trying to kick Donna down, or punish her fans. He was trying to tell a heartbreaking and thought-provoking story, at which he succeeded brilliantly.
Current Mood: 
contemplative
76 Responses to “thoughts on the meaning of Donna’s story”
a_white_rain on July 8, 2008 1:51 pm | Link
Part of me still thinks it was overkill – but I do agree with you on what Donna’s story was supposed to be.
On the bright side, RTD made it easy to fanwank away in fic.
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rusty-halo on July 8, 2008 1:56 pm | Link
One thing that’s definitely true about this episode: it leaves open a million possibilities for fanfic!
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a_white_rain on July 8, 2008 1:58 pm | Link
That’s what RTD is going to do. Read fix it fic.
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Yonmei on July 8, 2008 2:08 pm | Link
No. Just – no.
I’m going to blog about this at more length on feministsf, because I need to write about how impossibly let down I am by this ending.
Not because, as you alleged, I “hate” the Doctor – but because it is profoundly out of character for him not even to try to save a companion and a friend. And with Donna, he didn’t try.
Always before, companions have – if the Doctor could help it – been better for knowing the Doctor (as you yourself noted): the only equivalent that I can think of are Jamie and Zoe, who were mindwiped by Time Lords very much against the Doctor’s will when the Doctor was a helpless prisoner.
Donna’s not better for knowing the Doctor. She’s mindwiped. She’s lost everything. And the Doctor didn’t even try to save her.
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rusty-halo on July 8, 2008 2:16 pm | Link
There was never any implication in the narrative that he could’ve done anything but wipe her mind or let her die.
You can blame RTD for creating that dilemma (though I’m not sure why he deserves “blame,” since it’s a powerful story), but I can’t understand blaming the Doctor for not choosing an option that didn’t exist in the story the way it was presented.
I think we should agree to disagree about this, since we’re obviously seeing the entire show from completely different perspectives.
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Yonmei on July 8, 2008 2:19 pm | Link
There was never any implication in the narrative that he could’ve done anything but wipe her mind or let her die.
There should have been. That’s the point. The Doctor always tries. Setting up a narrative in which the Doctor doesn’t try to save a friend – is just wrong.
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rusty-halo on July 8, 2008 2:21 pm | Link
Okay!
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JayDK on July 8, 2008 2:36 pm | Link
We did see the Doctor try to save Donna, as much as he could — we saw him save her life.
As we’ve seen, if there is any option to save someone, the Doctor always tries. If there’s nothing he can do, if he’s helpless, he says that he’s sorry. The Doctor told Donna how sorry he was — and then he did the only thing he could to save her life. The Doctor did save Donna; he did the best he could. It wasn’t very good, but that was because the only option better than death was still awful. But it was also still better than death. Those are the kinds of choices that the Doctor has to make all the time, because there often isn’t a good choice available, just the choice that is the lesser of two evils.
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Yonmei on July 8, 2008 2:43 pm | Link
We did see the Doctor try to save Donna
No, we didn’t. We saw him mindwipe her: we saw him choose one of two options to destroy her, without even trying to find a means of saving her.
“He never gives in and he never gives up, however overwhelming the odds against him.” Not true any more. Dammit.
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JayDK on July 8, 2008 2:53 pm | Link
I completely disagree. I think we as viewers know the Doctor well enough to know that if he had any other way of saving Donna’s life, he would have tried it. He would never have done this if there was a better option. I trust what I’ve seen on screen of the Doctor’s ceaseless efforts to help his friends, his enemies and pretty much anyone who crosses his path enough to believe that he made the best choice he could under the circumstances.
I also disagree with the idea that death and and mindwipe are equally destructive options. Death is the end; no more Donna, not ever. Donna’s mindwipe is tragic, but she’s still alive, she’s healthy, she’s with her family, and all of her potential is still alive. One option left Donna alive, with the chance she could again grow into more, and that’s the one the Doctor chose — because he does never give up and never give in. He believes in Donna, even the Donna who never met him.
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Yonmei on July 8, 2008 3:01 pm | Link
I think we as viewers know the Doctor well enough to know that if he had any other way of saving Donna’s life, he would have tried it.
I think we as viewers know the Doctor well enough to know that he would have tried to save Donna – and that his failure even to try is horrifyingly out of character.
For decades we’ve seen “the Doctor’s ceaseless efforts to help his friends, his enemies and pretty much anyone who crosses his path” – so why didn’t he make any effort at all to save Donna? It’s out of character for him to simply to despair and give up without even trying – even if it seemed hopeless.
because he does never give up and never give in
You just admitted, above, that you think he does and he did. He gave up. He mindwiped Donna. He didn’t even try.
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JayDK on July 8, 2008 3:07 pm | Link
I think we have irreconcilable definitions of what it means to save Donna. I think the Doctor did try and did save Donna as best he could, even though she suffered a tragic loss in the process.
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justhuman on July 8, 2008 8:09 pm | Link
I don’t see it as setting up a narrative where he doesn’t try. It’s a narrative where he can’t, which is an entirely valid twist on previous stories where the Doctor proves over and over again that he will try no matter what it takes.
Only allowing stories where he can try is a Mary-Sue mechanism – the universe orders itself so the Doctor has the opportunity again and again to prove his heroic nature. Sometimes the hero loses and sometimes the hero never has a chance.
my 2 cents
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katesutton on July 8, 2008 2:24 pm | Link
I think we have to take the Doctor’s belief that there is no other answer at face value. He really, really is not the man to do that to someone without having no other choice.
It IS a tragedy and it’s meant to kick us in the gut, but…Donna is awesome because Donna is Donna, not because she had a Time Lord mind foisted on her. The thing the Doctor gave her-and Rose, who is like her-that she didn’t have before was opportunity. She can get there without him, especially now that she has her mother on her side.
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rusty-halo on July 8, 2008 2:33 pm | Link
I think we have to take the Doctor’s belief that there is no other answer at face value. He really, really is not the man to do that to someone without having no other choice.
Of course. Frankly, it’s so obvious that it doesn’t need to be said. But DW fandom has the magical ability to create wank out of thin air, so of course they’re wanking anyway.
I’ll just be over here enjoying an amazing story.
Donna is awesome because Donna is Donna
Exactly. And she’s still Donna, just a different version, one who still has all the potential of our Donna inside her.
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Yonmei on July 8, 2008 2:50 pm | Link
I think we have to take the Doctor’s belief that there is no other answer at face value.
No, we don’t.
Why should we?
Look, this is a narrative thing – Rusty Halo before kept trying to make this an attack on the Doctor, and it’s not.
The metacrisis resulting in DoctorDonna happens: the Daleks are destroyed: the TARDIS escapes and tows the Earth back to its rightful place in orbit. (A narrative that can throw that physical impossibility in…)
Now, in character, the Doctor – having saved the world (again), knowing that DoctorDonna has only hours before the metacrisis starts destroying her mind, does not despair, does not give up, does not give in – he tries to save her.
Trying to save Donna would have, should have, taken priority over pretty much anything else. Including returning Rose to the other universe: she and Jackie are not going to die/be mindwiped if they miss the walls closing.
Doing nothing and then taking one of two options to destroy her just doesn’t work.
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katesutton on July 8, 2008 3:07 pm | Link
I’m afraid I just can’t agree with you. The Doctor said he had to do this or Donna would die. Just because they didn’t *present* that particularly well or the way you would have liked them to does not mean that it was not, in fact, true. The fact that he didn’t go rushing off, giving it his priority reinforces the notion that the only answer was to wipe the memories.
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Yonmei on July 8, 2008 5:50 pm | Link
Yes: he despaired. He gave up. He concluded that the only thing he could do was a mindwipe. That’s what I’m saying: he didn’t try. That’s not the Doctor. He doesn’t give up or give in.
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katesutton on July 8, 2008 5:53 pm | Link
No, he didn’t despair. I’ll own I’m wrong if the show brings back Donna and revives her memories and shows us he was wrong. But it didn’t show us that. I get that you’re angry they didn’t show the Doctor going through the thought process and coming up short. But he *did do this.* He came to the conclusion that the only salvation for Donna was in losing her memories. It’s very strange to conclude from that that he didn’t try and didn’t care.
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Yonmei on July 8, 2008 6:15 pm | Link
I get that you’re angry they didn’t show the Doctor going through the thought process and coming up short.
No: I’m angry they showed him giving up.
It’s very strange to conclude from that that he didn’t try
I’m going by canon: what we saw on screen. What we saw on screen was the Doctor giving up – not trying to save Donna. I appreciate that people will start writing fix-it fanfics, and that your preferred option is that there is a missing scene where the Doctor is trying to save Donna, but that’s not what we saw – that’s not what happened in the episode.
and didn’t care.
Oh, please. Just as I pointed out to Rusty Halo that I didn’t hate the Doctor, at no point in this have I said he didn’t care. He didn’t try. Try. Care. Two different words.
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katesutton on July 8, 2008 6:42 pm | Link
There’s not much of a point in our discussing this further; as far as I’m concerned, your interpretation centers around something that did not happen onscreen, nor was it ever implied. YM, as always, MV.
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Yonmei on July 9, 2008 3:16 am | Link
as far as I’m concerned, your interpretation centers around something that did not happen onscreen, nor was it ever implied.
That’s odd: I think that’s just what I said to you. I agree that a discussion which ends with one person repeating back what the other person has just said to them is probably going nowhere: likewise, a fannish discussion where one person is reduced to claiming that their fannish interpretation of the episode is the right one, more canon than what we actually see on screen.
And unfortunately, while I saw nothing on screen where the Doctor tried to save to Donna: you evidently think you did. So, uh, yeah.
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Yonmei on July 9, 2008 3:16 am | Link
as far as I’m concerned, your interpretation centers around something that did not happen onscreen, nor was it ever implied.
That’s odd: I think that’s just what I said to you. I agree that a discussion which ends with one person repeating back what the other person has just said to them is probably going nowhere: likewise, a fannish discussion where one person is reduced to claiming that their fannish interpretation of the episode is the right one, more canon than what we actually see on screen.
And unfortunately, while I saw nothing on screen where the Doctor tried to save to Donna: you evidently think you did. So, uh, yeah.
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Yonmei on July 9, 2008 3:16 am | Link
as far as I’m concerned, your interpretation centers around something that did not happen onscreen, nor was it ever implied.
That’s odd: I think that’s just what I said to you. I agree that a discussion which ends with one person repeating back what the other person has just said to them is probably going nowhere: likewise, a fannish discussion where one person is reduced to claiming that their fannish interpretation of the episode is the right one, more canon than what we actually see on screen.
And unfortunately, while I saw nothing on screen where the Doctor tried to save to Donna: you evidently think you did. So, uh, yeah.
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Yonmei on July 9, 2008 3:16 am | Link
as far as I’m concerned, your interpretation centers around something that did not happen onscreen, nor was it ever implied.
That’s odd: I think that’s just what I said to you. I agree that a discussion which ends with one person repeating back what the other person has just said to them is probably going nowhere: likewise, a fannish discussion where one person is reduced to claiming that their fannish interpretation of the episode is the right one, more canon than what we actually see on screen.
And unfortunately, while I saw nothing on screen where the Doctor tried to save to Donna: you evidently think you did. So, uh, yeah.
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trepkos on July 8, 2008 2:50 pm | Link
You’re not including Donna in the category “middle-aged” are you?
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Yonmei on July 8, 2008 3:02 pm | Link
Oh god, I hope not. I loved that about Donna – that she wasn’t in the Rose or Martha mold.
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rusty-halo on July 8, 2008 3:14 pm | Link
Catherine Tate is 40, which I think of as right around the boundary where “middle aged” starts, yeah.
I’m not trying to be wanky or insulting, I swear. I just mean that Donna’s in an age group that usually gets ignored when it comes to heroic coming-of-age stories, especially for women, and that I find her story inspirational.
And I’m really pleased that RTD chose to tell this story for a woman who’s not in her teens or twenties, because there aren’t nearly enough stories about women beyond that age group who get stories about finding themselves instead of about being mothers or finding a man.
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Yonmei on July 8, 2008 5:52 pm | Link
And I’m really pleased that RTD chose to tell this story for a woman who’s not in her teens or twenties, because there aren’t nearly enough stories about women beyond that age group who get stories about finding themselves instead of about being mothers or finding a man.
Except Donna didn’t get that story. She got a story about being mindwiped. That is the story RTD chose to tell: a woman who wanted to be more than she’d been handed, but ended up right back where she started with no memory of ever getting to find herself.
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rusty-halo on July 8, 2008 3:15 pm | Link
Wikipedia:
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Paratti on July 8, 2008 2:58 pm | Link
Great post.
Death in a there is no fluffy afterlife dead means dead universe or an admittedly tragic medical procedure to save her life and leave open at very least that she is alive and at best that she can reach her potential again. It’s what’s technically known as a no-brainer.
As well as the necessary cost to pay to buy back that level of extreme Peril for the universe. In story terms it has to be paid by a character we the audience and the Doctor himself loved. It can’t work by offing a non-core character lots of the audience, the main character and the writer don’t care about. That leads to flatness and lack of good human drama. Instead we got good human drama. Yes it hurt. It had to in pure storytelling terms. So it did.
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rusty-halo on July 8, 2008 3:17 pm | Link
Thanks. :)
Alive = better than dead. Yes. I cannot believe Doctor Who fandom is actually arguing about this. (!!!)
In story terms it has to be paid by a character we the audience and the Doctor himself loved.
Exactly. The story had to hurt to be effective.
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10zlaine on July 8, 2008 3:20 pm | Link
HA HA that you wrote a post on the very same thing I was thinking. Which is funny because I can imagine your fingers flying over your keyboard and it sounding like you are working so Martin doesn’t even think otherwise…
But, anyway, with only the memory wipe, even though she never *met* the doctor, he’s with her always, and she’ll progress tangentially in a slightly different way than before but still, *with* him.
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rusty-halo on July 8, 2008 3:28 pm | Link
I want you to write some posts about this. I know brilliant things are going on in your head. (Well, except actually you should be writing papers!)
And, yeah, I sort of think it’s like the Agatha Christie thing. Even though she doesn’t remember any of it, the ways that it changed her are still there in her neural pathways. Maybe. It’s ambiguous.
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Paratti on July 8, 2008 3:52 pm | Link
Ooh:) Of course. That’s why we got the Agatha eppy. Headsdesk that I didn’t spot that before.
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rusty-halo on July 8, 2008 4:09 pm | Link
Sadly, I’d accidentally read a spoiler for Donna’s ending before the season even started. :( I’d tried to forget it, but as soon as I saw that Agatha Christie episode, I knew it was going to happen. So I tried to at least take as much hope from that episode as I could.
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evemac on July 8, 2008 5:46 pm | Link
Ah yes! That’s what I’ve been trying to say for a while now, that just because her conscious mind is wiped, doesn’t mean everything’s gone. She still has the potential.
And wow, I had completely forgotten about the total parallel we have with Agatha Christie’s story. And I haven’t seen *anyone* bring it up, either!
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butterfly on July 8, 2008 3:50 pm | Link
Thank you. Yes. Donna didn’t want to die. At no point did Donna say she wanted to die. What she wanted was to keep the Time Lord knowledge and stay in the TARDIS for the rest of her life, which wasn’t an option. The only choices were mindwipe or death. And what the Doctor did was tragic, but better than the alternative.
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rusty-halo on July 8, 2008 4:10 pm | Link
Exactly. Sometimes the only choice is the lesser of two evils. It’s tragic, but it’s no one’s fault.
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Yonmei on July 8, 2008 5:53 pm | Link
Except Donna didn’t get that story. She got a story about being mindwiped. That is the story RTD chose to tell: a woman who wanted to be more than she’d been handed, but ended up right back where she started with no memory of ever getting to find herself.
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rusty-halo on July 8, 2008 6:59 pm | Link
But who’ll be remembered as a hero throughout time and space for all the lives she impacted.
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Yonmei on July 9, 2008 3:56 am | Link
Mindwiped. That’s other people’s stories, not Donna’s.
The story that RTD chose to tell of Donna Noble is a woman who wanted to travel and see the universe, who got to do things for a while – but who got smashed back to her old life with no memories even of what she did, and the reason she has no memories is because the Doctor mindwiped her.
Seriously, if you’re going by “Oh, but people remember her, so that’s OK!” there is no difference between “she got mindwiped by the Doctor” and “she died a heroic death saving everyone”.
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LizBee on July 8, 2008 5:53 pm | Link
I agree, on all counts. And I’m glad we had “Turn Left” to demonstrate that Donna doesn’t need the Doctor to grow and become brilliant in her own right.
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rusty-halo on July 8, 2008 6:16 pm | Link
Thanks. :)
I liked your post on the topic as well.
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Yonmei on July 9, 2008 3:59 am | Link
I wish we did. We’ve got the narrative of “Turn Left” to demonstrate that when Donna found the Doctor and chose to adventure with him, she changed her life completely. And now we have the narrative of “Journey’s End” to demonstrate that though she tried to change her life, she wasn’t allowed to do so permanently – she had to be rewound and wiped back to the beginning.
I understand the people who are trying to believe that they saw the Doctor try to save Donna. But the people who are trying to argue that mindwiping Donna is okay – no.
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candogirl on July 8, 2008 6:25 pm | Link
I don’t think people only object to it hurting emotionally, I think they object to some shoddy storytelling. I do think the horror over what happened to Donna also comes down to ones belief on what makes a life worth living. I personally would rather live a brilliant but short life, than a long and meaningless one. I’m not saying that there’s no hope for Donna here, but they didn’t leave much room for optimism.
That’s neither here nor there for me, though. The reason that I was really upset by the Doctor’s actions was that they had specifically stated earlier in the episode that Donna could think of solutions that the Doctor couldn’t. They pointed out that her human mind allowed her to see things differently and approach problems from a different angle. If the Doctor had consulted her, it’s possible that Donna could have just saved herself.
Aside from that, I think you can assume that Donna would rather die than give up that life, because she gave up her life in Turn Left so she could have this existence.
The fact that she wasn’t asked implies that the Doctor didn’t value her input and that flies in the face of everything else we’ve seen this year, which is that they were partners making the hard choices together.
On top of that there was all that crap with Rose where he decided that what she wanted didn’t matter either. Having both events happen so closely, imo, made them more jarring.
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rusty-halo on July 8, 2008 6:35 pm | Link
I personally would rather live a brilliant but short life, than a long and meaningless one.
But… she still did live the brilliant life. She just doesn’t know about it. Same way as she wouldn’t know about it if she was dead, only this way she gets a second chance.
Donna would rather die than give up that life
But death also means giving up that life. There’s no difference between death and a mindwipe except with the mindwipe she still gets to live a life with the potential of being awesome again.
If the Doctor had consulted her, it’s possible that Donna could have just saved herself.
I thought the way the scene was filmed implied that she also knew it was coming and had tried to ignore it the same way he had. I’m pretty sure they both had it in their minds and knew there was no other solution, but neither of them wanted to face it. YMMV.
Having both events happen so closely, imo, made them more jarring.
I agree. The Doctor was quite disconcerting in this episode. I think he made some stupid choices that made things worse for all involved, including himself. He’s a mess. Which I think was part of the point.
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candogirl on July 8, 2008 7:06 pm | Link
But death also means giving up that life. There’s no difference between death and a mindwipe except with the mindwipe she still gets to live a life with the potential of being awesome again.
No, death means giving up living. It doesn’t mean giving up the life that she led. It means finishing a journey. It’s a very different thing, at least imo.
But… she still did live the brilliant life. She just doesn’t know about it.
If our memories are meaningless, if our experiences don’t define us, than what is the point of living at all? Imo, it doesn’t really matter that people in the past or the future know about her, it matters that Donna Noble knows the truth about Donna Noble.
I thought the way the scene was filmed implied that she also knew it was coming and had tried to ignore it the same way he had…YMMV
My mileage does indeed vary as I thought the way it was filmed showed that she had not realized what was about to happen.
<He’s a mess. Which I think was part of the point.
The Doctor’s always a mess these days. The point was already made.
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rusty-halo on July 8, 2008 7:09 pm | Link
Imo, it doesn’t really matter that people in the past or the future know about her, it matters that Donna Noble knows the truth about Donna Noble.
But if she was dead, she wouldn’t know the truth about Donna Noble either. She’d be a corpse. Her memory wouldn’t exist that way either.
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candogirl on July 8, 2008 7:32 pm | Link
But if she was dead, she wouldn’t know the truth about Donna Noble either. She’d be a corpse. Her memory wouldn’t exist that way either.
It’s knowing who you are and what you’re made of while you’re alive that matters. Nothing matters to the dead.
If we use the logic you’ve presented above, well, she’ll be dead eventually anyway. So what does it matter that she gets a new life? Why not just let her die? The memories she’ll create the second time around matter as little as the first set. The brilliant new life she could potentially experience has as little value as her original one. If nothing that happens in our lives matters, than why does it matter that she lives?
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rusty-halo on July 8, 2008 8:19 pm | Link
It’s knowing who you are and what you’re made of while you’re alive that matters. Nothing matters to the dead.
Yes, and it still happened whether she forgets it or is dead.
So what does it matter that she gets a new life?
What? Because she’ll have a second chance to live her life, experience joy and sorrow, change the world or just be there for her family.
If nothing that happens in our lives matters
What? Of course it matters.
I think we must have a different concept of death. To me, death is the end. Permanent. That’s it. Her memory is gone either way, whether she lives or dies. At least if she lives, she gets a second chance, instead of rotting in the ground as a corpse.
What she did with the Doctor still happened, and still matters to all the people she saved during her adventures. But it’s lost to her regardless of whether she’s dead or mindwiped. So why is dead better?
In either case, she loses her memories. It’s just in one case she also loses her consciousness and physical form, whereas in the other case she keeps those and gets another chance.
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candogirl on July 8, 2008 9:41 pm | Link
At least if she lives, she gets a second chance, instead of rotting in the ground as a corpse.
No. If you think about it someone else is getting a chance. Also, I think we have the same concept of death. I just think we differ in how much value the make up of a life has.
What? Of course it matters.
That’s my point.
What I do from day to day, the interactions that I have, the people that I love, the places that I travel, are me. I wouldn’t want to lose them, because to lose them is to lose myself. The mind wipe is the loss of self, not death. In fact, Donna is dead. She just happens to still be alive.
I’m not saying that what Donna did with the Doctor didn’t matter, I’m saying that it possibly matters more than anything. The choices that she made, the places that she saw, the demons that she fought, etc…, make up who she is. To wipe that away is to kill Donna Noble much more thoroughly than death.
You seem to be saying that as long as her body is breathing it doesn’t really matter that she lost her past, which I disagree with. We spent a whole series watching her grow and change into a person that she wanted to be. The mind wipe sends her back to the person she was trying to escape. She didn’t value that life as highly as the one she was creating, which is why it’s so damn sad.
She will have a new life now, and it may be better or it may be worse, we most likely won’t ever know. But if the Doctor came back in another year and wiped this life because it was killing her, would that be okay? What if it happened over and over again? Where is the line drawn?
In FotD/SitL, River Song tells the Doctor not to change a moment of what happens between them. She says it because that is the life that she loves, it’s the life she wants to live. To her that path is worth taking even though she knows it can only lead to her death.
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rusty-halo on July 8, 2008 9:50 pm | Link
To wipe that away is to kill Donna Noble much more thoroughly than death.
How? In the objective sense of the universe, those things still happened. In the head of Donna Noble, they didn’t, regardless of whether she’s dead or mind-wiped.
You seem to be saying that as long as her body is breathing it doesn’t really matter that she lost her past
What? No. I said it’s a horrific tragedy. I just think it’s still better than being dead.
The mind wipe sends her back to the person she was trying to escape.
Which is still better than being no person at all. Dead!Donna is not the Donna we loved either. She’s a corpse, with no chance of ever rediscovering her potential.
River Song tells the Doctor not to change a moment of what happens between them. She says it because that is the life that she loves, it’s the life she wants to live. To her that path is worth taking even though she knows it can only lead to her death.
Yes, and Donna still took that path. Whether she dies forever or just gets mindwiped, our Donna dies in that moment. The only difference is that with the mindwipe she gets a second chance.
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candogirl on July 8, 2008 11:42 pm | Link
Which is still better than being no person at all.
In your opinion. Frankly I’d rather live my life on my terms and be myself when I die. Her not knowing is her being cheated. Donna’s new life is like Rose and the Blue Doctor, it’s a new chance but it’s not the real thing. I feel that matters.
Again, I’ll ask, where does the line get drawn? How many times can a life be erased without it mattering? You are who you are and you live the life you live, taking those experiences away for some people would be unacceptable.
The only difference is that with the mindwipe she gets a second chance.
Not really though. Another Donna gets a chance, our Donna is dead regardless. She may be fabulous, she may be nothing. We won’t know so I can’t judge the worthiness of her only remembering the new version.
How? In the objective sense of the universe, those things still happened. In the head of Donna Noble, they didn’t, regardless of whether she’s dead or mind-wiped.
I said before that I believe those things only really matter if she remembers them. I’m not saying her actions disappear, I’m not saying that the life she lived wouldn’t matter to other people. I’m saying that if she doesn’t remember them they have no relevance. The fact that memory disappears when she dies is inconsequential because so would her new memories. Donna will die eventually no matter what, the thing that matters is who she is/who she knows herself to be while she lives/lived.
If she had died at the end of this episode, she would have been herself until the very last moment. She would have been the person she wanted to be and been living the life that she wanted up until her last breath. She might not have gotten to have more time, but she still would have lived a full life.
I think that you’re assuming that I think they should have killed her, but I never said that. I think they should have come up with a better story, honestly. At the end of the day the whole thing felt like a cop out to me. RTD said he couldn’t/wouldn’t kill a companion and he once again portrayed a companion that had promised forever, so he pushed the reset button. It’s a family show so I didn’t expect him to really push the envelope here by killing her, still I think it’s a not so great message being offered. It’s an extension of a recurring theme with RTD that people can be replaced by copies and that does bother me.
I do believe we’re at an impasse. It was very nice talking to you though, I looked around a bit and there was some good stuff posted here. I’ll just add a giant WORD to your post about Rose. That girl rocks and people need to give some respect.
G’night!
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rusty-halo on July 9, 2008 12:01 am | Link
It was an interesting conversation, and I’m cool with agreeing to disagree. Glad you liked my Rose post. :)
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candogirl on July 9, 2008 12:39 am | Link
I liked this post too!
I mean I do see where you’re coming from on it. I just see where other people are coming from too.
:)
Ach, I know I said I was going to bed and I am, but I just wanted to say that the interesting thing about the end of Donna’s story for me was what it says about the Doctor and how alien he is.
The Doctor is obviously defined by time. I would imagine a Time Lord would also have a healthy amount of fear regarding death, the idea of not regenerating must be pretty unnerving. I feel that the Doctor approached this as a regeneration for Donna. In his mind, she won’t be the same but she still gets to live, just like he does. His fear is death and not the loss of self.
The debate, as we’ve been having, is whether losing one’s own personal history in order to gain more time is worth it. I feel Donna would say no, but I feel the Doctor would say yes. I think it’s unfair for some to say that he’s just being an ass here, because what he does is so in character.
He’s so used to changing, has so many memories, and each regeneration is as important as the one before it, so I don’t think he would see this as something to even hesitate on. For him it’s a personal loss, he will miss Donna, but I don’t think he feels that the loss is the same for her. Obviously he knows she would mourn the loss of him and of the adventures they had, but the Doctor always liked Donna, always saw what she had within herself. I would imagine he feels she’ll have that fantastic life regardless and that what she doesn’t know won’t hurt her.
I just disagree.
The bleakness of the ending, I thought, aside from the obvious, was in his seeing how far back Donna had gone. To see that it’s not the same as a regeneration. To understand that her past will not inform her present the way that his would.
I could be full of shit about all of that, but it’s something I’ve been mulling over today.
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rusty-halo on July 9, 2008 12:55 am | Link
Hmm, that’s interesting. I agree that it reveals how alien the Doctor is, and I think you’re right that he might not realize how drastic it is because he’s so used to change.
I expanded on this in a comment below, but mostly I think it comes down him thinking that he’s bad for his companions, and not recognizing the good that results from his influence.
All he sees is Astrid, Jenny, and River dying for him, and Martha ready to destroy the earth, and all the martyrs and deaths that he’s inspired. He doesn’t see how his influence has empowered them and turned them into heroes; he just thinks that he’s destroyed them. He took to heart everything Davros said, that he’s a destroyer of worlds who turns ordinary humans into weapons.
And that’s the irony, that because he doesn’t want to destroy Donna by letting her die for him, he destroys her by erasing himself from her mind. Because to him, he’s nothing but a bad influence, and she’s better having never known him.
And, obviously, he’s so, so wrong. Which shows that he’s an arrogant ass and also that he’s quite tragically self-loathing. In the end, he fails to realize how wonderful he is, just like Donna fails to realize how wonderful she is.
(Now I’m getting all sad for them again!)
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Yonmei on July 9, 2008 4:00 am | Link
Thank you for saying that: I was beginning to think I was the only one who cared…
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txvoodoo on July 8, 2008 7:09 pm | Link
I agree, I agree, I agree.
If I say anything more, I’m gonna be wanking in your journal and that’s not polite. :D
(hold me back, Laura!)
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rusty-halo on July 8, 2008 7:10 pm | Link
Oh, you’re welcome to wank here. Everyone else does! :P
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txvoodoo on July 8, 2008 7:16 pm | Link
Someone above made me really angry. It’s probably better if I *don’t* go up and say exactly what I’m thinking ;)
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rusty-halo on July 8, 2008 9:51 pm | Link
Ah. Yes. Perhaps. I empathize completely, though.
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justhuman on July 8, 2008 8:14 pm | Link
Great post. I was all, huh? when I heard so many fans thinking she’d be better off dead. I can understand being upset and/or pissed at the storyline, but generally speaking being dead advances no one’s condition.
…Well, unless we’re talking Buffy or Angel ;-)
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rusty-halo on July 8, 2008 9:55 pm | Link
I can’t believe “Donna would be better off dead” is a serious argument people are actually having! Doctor Who fandom never ceases to amaze me with its absurd ability to wank about anything.
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soundingsea on July 8, 2008 9:58 pm | Link
I’m so, so glad that she didn’t die, because that would have been so traumatic for her family. This way, she’s at least got a chance of being happy. And maybe her mother will be more nurturing of her, this time around.
Great analysis.
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rusty-halo on July 8, 2008 10:04 pm | Link
Thanks. :)
I’m trying to think of a similar metaphor. If you asked me if I wanted to be mentally regressed to the fucked-up mess of hormones and angst I was in high school, I’d say HELL FUCKING NO. But if my only other choice was death? Then, yeah, the mindwipe would be better. Because at least I’d get to grow up again, at least I’d still have my family and friends and cats and they’d still have me. It would be horrific, but still infinitely better than simply being dead and ending forever.
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soundingsea on July 8, 2008 11:02 pm | Link
It’s like when a family member has a brain injury. Maybe they’re not the exact same anymore. Maybe they are heavily medicated at first, and for years, and it’s personality-altering. But you still love them, and you’re still extremely glad they woke up from that coma.
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Jerry on July 8, 2008 10:37 pm | Link
I think it depends on whether you make an in-story vs out-of-story distinction between real and fictional people. If the Who-verse was real, and I were, for example, Wilf, I’d be very glad that Donna was not dead, and could continue to live and potentially regain much of what she’s lost. But for me as a viewer, her story appears to be over, and it ended where she began, rendering all of her character development null and void. And I don’t really see that as a tragedy (as a downfall freely chosen out of heroism, or one brought on by character flaws would be), but rather a case of her being smited specifically for her virtues by a God who’s basically an asshole.
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rusty-halo on July 8, 2008 10:46 pm | Link
I agree that it’s different from an in-story vs out-of-story perspective. I just think that both work for me.
In-story, yes, I’m glad that Donna has her family, and they have her, and she gets another chance at life.
Out-of-story, I’m glad that they didn’t go with a predictable heroic death, but told a story that raises a ton of questions about what makes us who were are, about how our families and environments impact our development, about how different we’d be in different circumstances, if our destinies are fated or subject to random chance, how much our experiences define us, whether any random person has the potential to be a hero in the right circumstances, and on and on. It hurts a lot, but I actually think it’s a very provocative and powerful story choice.
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rusty-halo on July 8, 2008 10:48 pm | Link
And… the story wouldn’t work if Donna wasn’t wonderful, because we wouldn’t care. But how is that smiting her for her virtues? It seems to me that it’s *highlighting* her virtues, because everyone who watches that episode is going to be thinking about how wonderful Donna was, and mourning her, and hoping mind!wiped Donna can be awesome again, and maybe even looking at their own banal lives and thinking what they should be doing differently…
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Jerry on July 8, 2008 11:00 pm | Link
As I see it, Donna is directly punished for the things that save the world, which rubs me the wrong way. I’m sure I’m supposed to be moved by how sad it is, but instead it strikes me as arbitrary and unfair. And hearkens back to the Whedonverse’s tendency to punish characters for their growth.
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rusty-halo on July 8, 2008 11:10 pm | Link
But… how is she “punished” for her growth? There’s never any implication that she did anything wrong, or that she doesn’t deserve to be awesome. It’s just a tragedy that happens because the bad guys are evil and the story’s more effective if it has a real cost for the characters we love.
I’m sorry you didn’t like it. :(
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caia on July 9, 2008 12:20 am | Link
I was just discussing Donna with someone with a different perspective… she said it was not that death is better, but that Donna should get to choose. I argued that saving a friend from suicide is something we’d all try to do. She agreed, but said that if someone she loved was refusing lifesaving medical treatment, she’d tell them she thought it was a mistake, but let their choice stand.
One could argue that Donna saying “I want to stay” meant the same as “I want to die” — that the rest of the thought was, “here, even if it kills me, even if it’s only for five minutes. I want to die as as I’ve lived.”
Assuming she did mean that, the Doctor’s taking that choice away from her becomes more ambiguous vis-a-vis his character. I was arguing it was still a human thing to do (as opposed to a godlike thing).
I consider him leaving Rose off in alt!verse, when she objects, more of a godlike act. After all, there were other non-death choices she could have made.
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rusty-halo on July 9, 2008 12:39 am | Link
Well, but there’s so many issues with the Donna-choosing thing. Because she’s not in her right mind (it’s ambiguous how distorted her thoughts are at that point, but there’s definitely something off already), and she never chooses to die. She says she wants to stay, but does that mean “I want to stay for five minutes until I die” or does it mean “I want to stay forever and I refuse to even consider either of the other possibilities”?
Would you really watch someone you loved die in front of you? When they were in a mentally unstable state and you weren’t sure they were capable of choosing?
The Doctor does make creepy deterministic decisions in this episode. I think they stem both from his arrogance and his self-hatred, strangely enough.
On one level, how dare he make these decisions without even consulting with the people he’s making them for, without even talking about it? It’s absolutely wrong, even if his decisions are for the best. It shows a horrible lack of respect and reveals that he does consider himself superior to humanity, even to the humans he loves most.
But the season as a whole makes more sense to me now. They’re not just doing awful things to the Doctor because David Tennant cries pretty. It’s a set-up for the finale. Astrid dies for him, Jenny dies for him, River dies for him, he watches his companions turn into soldiers and killers and martyrs, and he cannot stand what he does to people. He doesn’t recognize all the ways he makes them better; he just recognizes the ways he destroys them.
And, the irony, that’s why he destroys Donna. Because he cannot stand the thought of her staying with him, her dying for him, so he erases all the wonderful development she’s had. Because to him it’s not worth it, to him he destroys his companions and he doesn’t recognize the value his influence has on them. It’s the same thing with Rose; he doesn’t send her away because he doesn’t love her. He sends her away because he loves her too much; he doesn’t want to destroy her, to watch her kill or die because of him.
It’s deeply fucked up. But it makes emotional and thematic sense to me, and is a very powerful story. And Donna’s ending ties right into it, because it’s the Doctor not recognizing the value of how wonderful his companions become because of him, but only wanting to protect them from his “bad influence.”
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caia on July 9, 2008 12:47 am | Link
I agree; Donna’s brain was iffy. But it seemed like she’d preferred to die rather than go home before. As I said, I was the one to whom the Doctor’s choice for her seemed sympathetic; you don’t have to convince me of that.
I guess the question is, where do you go with the deeply fucked up? I think the deeply fucked up is a compelling storyline, but only if it’s treated as such… and we just don’t know yet where they’re going with it.
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rusty-halo on July 9, 2008 11:25 am | Link
Hmmm, I guess the difference is that I think it was definitely treated as deeply fucked-up. The Doctor pushes away everyone he loves and ends up alone and miserable. I don’t think they have to go anywhere else with it; that’s a pretty fitting conclusion in itself.
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