4.1: Partners In Crime
Synopsis: The Doctor and
Donna Noble, last seen over a year ago in The
Runaway Bride, are investigating, separately, a firm selling diet pills that seem to work suspiciously well. Both parties
set about posing as Health and Safety inspectors, infiltrating the company and speaking
to its clients. They learn that the pill
causes fat cells to galvanize within a human body and somehow form another
body, a living creature, simply called an Adipose, which simply "gets up
and walks away". Each pill creates one Adipose, weighing about a
kilogram apiece, causing the subject to lose weight.
Eventually, the Doctor and Donna cross paths and begin running and shouting together, while attempting to perform the same work they had been doing before (with actually less success). The Doctor eventually realizes that Ms. Foster, the "CEO" of the firm, is a child-care provider to an alien family, and is "seeding" the Earth, creating offspring. This is a violation of galactic law, and the Doctor vows to stop her.
In a panic, Foster decides to perform full parthenogenesis on all clients, which would convert every ounce of their tissue into Adipose creatures, effectively killing a million people. Via an underground computer hub, the Doctor and Donna are able to manipulate the system just in time to stop this occurring. Ms. Foster is killed by the alien family because she's a witness/accomplice to their crimes, but the Adipose babies are loaded into a spaceship and brought home.
With the adventure finished for now, Donna decides to take the Doctor up on his earlier offer to travel with him. As she is attempting to set up a key-drop so that her mother can find where she's left the car, Donna inadvertently speaks briefly to a blonde woman who turns out to be Rose Tyler. Rose walks away without saying a word, and seems to disappear like an apparition.
Golden Comic Moment: A fairly hearty nod must go to the Adipose babies themselves for being so darn cute and for actually being as innocent as they seem. They are a memorable Doctor Who creature, and are really quite comical in their own right (have you ever noticed the one who skips down the street in the scene with the hoards of Adipose outside the pub?). It's almost unfortunate that they were introduced in a season-opener with a new full-time Companion. Their adorableness becomes rather incidental in the grand scheme of things.
Because, really, how could the Golden Comic Moment not be the scene with the Doctor and Donna seeing each other through the windows on either side of Ms. Foster's office? From a storytelling standpoint, it is an awesome use of the keep-missing-each-other conceit and an unexpected payoff to all the separate cloak-and-dagger stuff they've been doing. From an acting standpoint, it's brilliantly performed, and shows off the oft-touted, and as of this writing, repeatedly-exploited, chemistry between Tennant and Tate.
And if all of that weren't true, it would just be kind of a silly, funny scene. But with all of that, it becomes funny and also effortlessly pivotal.
Golden Fangirl Moment: "Oh, that's interesting! Seems to be a bioflip digital stitch specifically for..." the Doctor says, just before stopping short, realizing there is no one to talk to. He is examining one of the pill necklaces from the weight-loss firm, and analyzing what it does. He's doing what he does best - sussing out clues and being incredibly clever, but, alas, he has no Companion at the moment.
Internally, we know that this is done so that we can see his loneliness and how badly he really needs someone to come into his life, just as Donna needs someone in hers. It sets up their later meeting. Plus, as a Martha fan, it's a little vindicating thinking that he might be, off the cuff, talking to her, only to realize she's not there. Oh, what's that? Does he miss her? He does talk about her later with fondness and wistfulness, admitting that she did him some real good...
But totally externally there are a couple of cool things as well. First of all, we love when the Tenth Doctor puts on those glasses and talks total nonsense at eight hundred miles per hour. He's capping of the whole sexy-geek-chic thing, while also taking a new hairstyle out for a spin.
Second of all, the silence following his stopping-short is rather long as silences go, and it is very effectively rendered. The camera pulls away from the TARDIS console, revealing a giant room, and one small, lonely man, just standing there with his hands in his pockets. And perhaps we are, once again, projecting, but there might be a touch of regret and apology in that moment.
Cringeworthy Moment: Doctor Who in the twenty-first century definitely has a history of Companions with feisty mums. Both Jackie Tyler and Francine Jones smacked the Doctor around a bit, out of concern for the undue amount of influence the man seemed to hold over their daughters. Jackie just wanted Rose to be safe. Francine just wanted Martha to finish medical school. However, neither of them seemed mean nor hateful.
And then, there was Sylvia Noble. Just about every moment she is on-screen, especially if her gums are flapping, is worthy of a cringe. Her first appearance in season 4 has her delivering this little gem of pure bile to her only child: "You're never gonna find a man, not while you're on the dole! Look at you, sitting there, dressed up, looking like you're job-hunting... you've got to do something. It's not like the 1980's, no-one's unemployed these days, except you. How long did that job with Health and Safety last? Two days, and then you walk out! 'I have other plans!' Well, I've not seen them. It's no good sitting there dreaming. No-one's gonna come along with a magic wand and make your life all better." And the way it is edited, in montage-like fashion, suggests that the rant goes on for much longer than the episode has to spare.
This makes us cringe for two reasons. 1) Donna's a good gal. She's been through a lot. She's a grown woman, granted, living with her mother, but given what we know about the events of the past year or so, we can give her a pass. Her mother just needs to quit acting like Donna's a pot-smoking teen who never comes out of the basement. We can see the look of despair/debasement/depression that falls over Donna's normally lively face, and it hurts us to see it. And, 2) it is an extremely heavy-handed way of showing the audience that Donna's life is rubbish and she really does need, as Sylvia says, someone to come along with a magic wand (or a Police Box) and make her life all better.
One of the reasons why we like, and "buy" Martha Jones as a Companion is, apart from one disastrous family dinner, she didn't seem to need the Doctor to complete her life, or take her away from something. She went for the adventure (and for the handsome man, of course), in spite of the fact that she really did have other things to do. Rose and Donna both had an element of "save me from my drab life," when they ran off with the Doctor. And yeah, it's kind of what makes Martha cool, but we also think that perhaps both Rose and Donna deserve a bit better. And maybe even the Doctor.
Golden Moment: It is not a single Golden Moment, but a series of lovely little ways in which we get glimpses of Donna 2.0.
Donna 1.0, of The Runaway Bride was a loud, superficial, insecure battering-ram. She slapped the Doctor, accused him of possibly murdering his previous Companion. She repeatedly insisted he was a Martian, and had already badgered a man into marrying her (sort of). Oh, and she had effectively had her head in the sand during any previous alien attacks, making her perhaps the only person in the western world unaware of alien life in the universe. She had her softer moments, and she won the Doctor over well enough to get an invite into the TARDIS on a semi-permanent basis, but basically, she was fairly unlikeable in the 2006 Christmas special.
But starting now, we get to see how much she has grown and earned her stripes to be a proper Companion. We see that she has evolved as an intellectual being, as well as a soul. This is the Donna we grow to love, the one who is inquiring, and says things like, "I looked everywhere, you name it. UFO sightings, crop circles, sea monsters... 'cause the thing is, Doctor, I believe it all now! You opened my eyes! All those amazing things out there, I believe 'em all!" and cringes over the fact that she once let the Doctor slip away. She softly and deftly asks whether the Doctor is still on his own, wonders after Rose, and acknowledges that saying one is going to live a life of adventure is not the same as living one.
Remnants of Donna 1.0 always exist, and are usually entertaining, and there is, in fact, a Donna 3.0 as well (a part-Time-Lord incarnation who does not last very long). But it's 2.0, the intelligent, compassionate Companion to the Tenth Doctor that goes down in Doctor Who history.
And these moments make it all the more gut-wrenching to watch when the Doctor leaves the Nobles' house at the end of the season and Donna says, "Yeah, see ya," and continues yammering on the phone with her mates.
Why I Beg To Differ: Doctor Who Magazine cites two Golden Moments. The first is the quiet conversation between Donna and her grandfather, up on the hill. They consider it Golden because it is a nice little slow-down, and a lovely piece of very human drama, summing up a family's life in just three minutes of dialogue. Yet, it still discusses the loftier things the show has to offer, such as space travel and the future of the human race. Also, as the author points out, so much good drama hinges on that simple secret that must not be spoken, namely the Doctor himself. Wilf clearly would like to know more about what happened to Donna and Lance back in The Runaway Bride, but his wistful granddaughter cannot say.
The second is the brilliant moment, mentioned above, when the Doctor and Donna are miming through windows at one another. Should this really even need to be justified?
Honestly, it's pretty hard to argue with that second one - it's the moment most people remember best when considering Catherine Tate's run. But in light of how things go over the course of this season, and for the rest of the Tenth Doctor's life, the "little" moments in which Donna reveals that she has evolved into someone really worth knowing, they serve a greater purpose, and really are Golden, in retrospect.
Eventually, the Doctor and Donna cross paths and begin running and shouting together, while attempting to perform the same work they had been doing before (with actually less success). The Doctor eventually realizes that Ms. Foster, the "CEO" of the firm, is a child-care provider to an alien family, and is "seeding" the Earth, creating offspring. This is a violation of galactic law, and the Doctor vows to stop her.
In a panic, Foster decides to perform full parthenogenesis on all clients, which would convert every ounce of their tissue into Adipose creatures, effectively killing a million people. Via an underground computer hub, the Doctor and Donna are able to manipulate the system just in time to stop this occurring. Ms. Foster is killed by the alien family because she's a witness/accomplice to their crimes, but the Adipose babies are loaded into a spaceship and brought home.
With the adventure finished for now, Donna decides to take the Doctor up on his earlier offer to travel with him. As she is attempting to set up a key-drop so that her mother can find where she's left the car, Donna inadvertently speaks briefly to a blonde woman who turns out to be Rose Tyler. Rose walks away without saying a word, and seems to disappear like an apparition.
Golden Comic Moment: A fairly hearty nod must go to the Adipose babies themselves for being so darn cute and for actually being as innocent as they seem. They are a memorable Doctor Who creature, and are really quite comical in their own right (have you ever noticed the one who skips down the street in the scene with the hoards of Adipose outside the pub?). It's almost unfortunate that they were introduced in a season-opener with a new full-time Companion. Their adorableness becomes rather incidental in the grand scheme of things.
Because, really, how could the Golden Comic Moment not be the scene with the Doctor and Donna seeing each other through the windows on either side of Ms. Foster's office? From a storytelling standpoint, it is an awesome use of the keep-missing-each-other conceit and an unexpected payoff to all the separate cloak-and-dagger stuff they've been doing. From an acting standpoint, it's brilliantly performed, and shows off the oft-touted, and as of this writing, repeatedly-exploited, chemistry between Tennant and Tate.
And if all of that weren't true, it would just be kind of a silly, funny scene. But with all of that, it becomes funny and also effortlessly pivotal.
Golden Fangirl Moment: "Oh, that's interesting! Seems to be a bioflip digital stitch specifically for..." the Doctor says, just before stopping short, realizing there is no one to talk to. He is examining one of the pill necklaces from the weight-loss firm, and analyzing what it does. He's doing what he does best - sussing out clues and being incredibly clever, but, alas, he has no Companion at the moment.
Internally, we know that this is done so that we can see his loneliness and how badly he really needs someone to come into his life, just as Donna needs someone in hers. It sets up their later meeting. Plus, as a Martha fan, it's a little vindicating thinking that he might be, off the cuff, talking to her, only to realize she's not there. Oh, what's that? Does he miss her? He does talk about her later with fondness and wistfulness, admitting that she did him some real good...
But totally externally there are a couple of cool things as well. First of all, we love when the Tenth Doctor puts on those glasses and talks total nonsense at eight hundred miles per hour. He's capping of the whole sexy-geek-chic thing, while also taking a new hairstyle out for a spin.
Second of all, the silence following his stopping-short is rather long as silences go, and it is very effectively rendered. The camera pulls away from the TARDIS console, revealing a giant room, and one small, lonely man, just standing there with his hands in his pockets. And perhaps we are, once again, projecting, but there might be a touch of regret and apology in that moment.
Cringeworthy Moment: Doctor Who in the twenty-first century definitely has a history of Companions with feisty mums. Both Jackie Tyler and Francine Jones smacked the Doctor around a bit, out of concern for the undue amount of influence the man seemed to hold over their daughters. Jackie just wanted Rose to be safe. Francine just wanted Martha to finish medical school. However, neither of them seemed mean nor hateful.
And then, there was Sylvia Noble. Just about every moment she is on-screen, especially if her gums are flapping, is worthy of a cringe. Her first appearance in season 4 has her delivering this little gem of pure bile to her only child: "You're never gonna find a man, not while you're on the dole! Look at you, sitting there, dressed up, looking like you're job-hunting... you've got to do something. It's not like the 1980's, no-one's unemployed these days, except you. How long did that job with Health and Safety last? Two days, and then you walk out! 'I have other plans!' Well, I've not seen them. It's no good sitting there dreaming. No-one's gonna come along with a magic wand and make your life all better." And the way it is edited, in montage-like fashion, suggests that the rant goes on for much longer than the episode has to spare.
This makes us cringe for two reasons. 1) Donna's a good gal. She's been through a lot. She's a grown woman, granted, living with her mother, but given what we know about the events of the past year or so, we can give her a pass. Her mother just needs to quit acting like Donna's a pot-smoking teen who never comes out of the basement. We can see the look of despair/debasement/depression that falls over Donna's normally lively face, and it hurts us to see it. And, 2) it is an extremely heavy-handed way of showing the audience that Donna's life is rubbish and she really does need, as Sylvia says, someone to come along with a magic wand (or a Police Box) and make her life all better.
One of the reasons why we like, and "buy" Martha Jones as a Companion is, apart from one disastrous family dinner, she didn't seem to need the Doctor to complete her life, or take her away from something. She went for the adventure (and for the handsome man, of course), in spite of the fact that she really did have other things to do. Rose and Donna both had an element of "save me from my drab life," when they ran off with the Doctor. And yeah, it's kind of what makes Martha cool, but we also think that perhaps both Rose and Donna deserve a bit better. And maybe even the Doctor.
Golden Moment: It is not a single Golden Moment, but a series of lovely little ways in which we get glimpses of Donna 2.0.
Donna 1.0, of The Runaway Bride was a loud, superficial, insecure battering-ram. She slapped the Doctor, accused him of possibly murdering his previous Companion. She repeatedly insisted he was a Martian, and had already badgered a man into marrying her (sort of). Oh, and she had effectively had her head in the sand during any previous alien attacks, making her perhaps the only person in the western world unaware of alien life in the universe. She had her softer moments, and she won the Doctor over well enough to get an invite into the TARDIS on a semi-permanent basis, but basically, she was fairly unlikeable in the 2006 Christmas special.
But starting now, we get to see how much she has grown and earned her stripes to be a proper Companion. We see that she has evolved as an intellectual being, as well as a soul. This is the Donna we grow to love, the one who is inquiring, and says things like, "I looked everywhere, you name it. UFO sightings, crop circles, sea monsters... 'cause the thing is, Doctor, I believe it all now! You opened my eyes! All those amazing things out there, I believe 'em all!" and cringes over the fact that she once let the Doctor slip away. She softly and deftly asks whether the Doctor is still on his own, wonders after Rose, and acknowledges that saying one is going to live a life of adventure is not the same as living one.
Remnants of Donna 1.0 always exist, and are usually entertaining, and there is, in fact, a Donna 3.0 as well (a part-Time-Lord incarnation who does not last very long). But it's 2.0, the intelligent, compassionate Companion to the Tenth Doctor that goes down in Doctor Who history.
And these moments make it all the more gut-wrenching to watch when the Doctor leaves the Nobles' house at the end of the season and Donna says, "Yeah, see ya," and continues yammering on the phone with her mates.
Why I Beg To Differ: Doctor Who Magazine cites two Golden Moments. The first is the quiet conversation between Donna and her grandfather, up on the hill. They consider it Golden because it is a nice little slow-down, and a lovely piece of very human drama, summing up a family's life in just three minutes of dialogue. Yet, it still discusses the loftier things the show has to offer, such as space travel and the future of the human race. Also, as the author points out, so much good drama hinges on that simple secret that must not be spoken, namely the Doctor himself. Wilf clearly would like to know more about what happened to Donna and Lance back in The Runaway Bride, but his wistful granddaughter cannot say.
The second is the brilliant moment, mentioned above, when the Doctor and Donna are miming through windows at one another. Should this really even need to be justified?
Honestly, it's pretty hard to argue with that second one - it's the moment most people remember best when considering Catherine Tate's run. But in light of how things go over the course of this season, and for the rest of the Tenth Doctor's life, the "little" moments in which Donna reveals that she has evolved into someone really worth knowing, they serve a greater purpose, and really are Golden, in retrospect.