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| (FROM LEFT TO RIGHT) Elisabeth Sladen as Sarah Jane Smith, Noel Clarke as Mickey Smith, Camille Coduri as Jackie Tyler, Billie Piper as Rose Tyler, David Tennant as The Doctor, Freema Agyeman as Martha Jones, Catherine Tate as Donna Noble, and John Barrowman as Captain Jack Harkness |
"People assume that time is a strict progression of cause to effect, but, actually, from a non-linear, non-subjective viewpoint, it's more like a big ball of wibbly-wobbly... timey-wimey... stuff."
The Tenth Doctor played by David Tennant is probably the most iconic and well-recognized Doctor in the whole series apart from maybe Matt Smith's Eleventh and Tom Baker's Fourth. And there certainly is a reason for that; Tennant's Doctor is charming, witty, and a bit of an action hero. His era brings about the return of the most classic of classic Who villains such as Davros, the Master, the Cybermen, and the Sontarans. We also see the introduction of some great companions, supporting characters, and villains. He also has a lot of great, action-packed episodes and just a whole lot of chemistry with his companions.
As much as I love Christopher Eccleston's the Ninth Doctor, Tennant also deserves a lot of recognition for making the show what it is. He really brought new life to the show and his energy I think did make it accessible to a lot of people, and we can't ignore that.
The Doctor - Tenth Doctor (David Tennant)
David Tennant is just an amazing Doctor. He balances the goofier, light-hearted side of the Doctor and the darker side of the Doctor extremely well. Tennant's appeal I think comes from the fact that he just has a very likeable personality of always being (at least outwardly) positive and friendly to everyone even in dark times. He was also extremely witty and liked to make a lot of really funny one-liners that worked because of how human and casual he felt a lot of time. He has great chemistry with everyone on screen and he feels very much like Patrick Troughton's the Second Doctor in a sense because of how lighthearted and somewhat unassuming he could be at times (although the Second Doctor is much more unassuming in comparison) and his energetic, dashing and "young" energy that he brings to the Doctor is unmistakably very much like Peter Davison's the Fifth Doctor (his favourite Doctor and also his father in law).
Tennant also has really great chemistry with all of his companions, supporting characters, and even the villains and it's really hard not to just really get invested in his character. He's probably the "wide-appealing" Doctor in the sense that he's very much action-focused, charismatic, energetic, and funny, but can also be dark extremely well. He's very versatile and he's a very appealing protagonist to modern viewers (and he's consistently ranked as one of the best Doctors by viewers as well).
Now that I've given an overview of the Tenth Doctor, I will be going over the Doctor's six(-ish) companions.
The Companions
Rose Tyler (Billie Piper) is back again and she has really good chemistry with David Tennant's Doctor. I wasn't overly fond of her romance story with the Doctor, but that being said, I think she was a pretty good companion. The Doctor genuinely enjoys being around her and throughout Tennant's run you can see her go from the classic "damsel in distress" to a bit of an action hero herself. She definitely isn't one of my favourite companions, but I do think she was really great for Tennant and provided a nice bridge from Eccleston.
Martha Jones (Freema Agyeman) is a good companion, even though she's not particularly a favourite of mine. She has great character development of going from a timid med student to a pretty badass soldier. But she spends her entire run being in love with the Doctor and annoyed by the fact that the Doctor's in love with Rose. I mean her lovesick angle was interesting at the start, but it does get pretty annoying after a while. Despite all that, she's a very interesting companion who brings a bit of her medical knowledge to her episodes so that she's not just following the Doctor around completely clueless.
Donna Noble (Catherine Tate) is easily the best companion of the Tenth Doctor and probably one of the best companions of the entire show. She is the only main companion who doesn't have any sort of romantic plot with the Doctor and it really works for her. The Doctor basically treats her as an annoying sister that he cares about, and Donna treats him as an annoying brother that she cares about. Donna is absolutely HILLARIOUS and matches Tennant in the amount of energy and wit she brings to the role. She's extremely outspoken about things she cares about and can be pretty crass at times to get her point across. I think that Tate's acting really shines in this role because she can also be very emotional and act sad scenes extremely well. Donna has a really tragic ending to her character and it was a bit of a shame to see her only for one season.
Wilfred Mott (Bernard Cribbins) is not "officially" a companion since he only was with the Doctor for two episodes, but he still counts as one in my books and is a great one. Wilf is Donna's grandfather, and despite being an old man, he still carries so much energy and joy to the role. Wilf is extremely positive and will attempt to lighten up almost any situation. He can really be described as that crazy but sweet old man who always spouts nonsense about aliens, except in his case he was right. The Doctor and Wilf have a father-son type relationship where Wilf just cares for him greatly. Even though he is a mainly comedic actor, Bernard Cribbins really excels in the darker moments as well, bringing a lot of gravitas to the role when he is needed. I really think they should've made Wilf a regular companion, but I'm happy with what we got too.
Sarah Jane Smith (Elisabeth Sladen) is the first (and to my knowledge only) Classic Who companion to appear in New Who. I've seen Sarah Jane's original run in the Classic Era and Elizabeth Sladen still has NOT lost any of her charm. She's not in Tennant's era for many episodes, but she definitely still has the same energy and interacts with the Doctor almost as she had never left him. Sarah Jane also has really good chemistry with Rose as well, both finding common ground in making fun of the Doctor. Overall, she's just a great companion and I understand why she's such a fan favourite.
K9 (voiced by John Leeson) is another one of the Doctor's companions from Classic Who. K9 is this "futuristic" robot dog who basically moves around like a remote controlled toy. That being said, his very straightforward way of talking was really nice and even though he was only in one episode fully in New Who, he was just a fun character.
Jenny (Georgia Tennant) is not technically a companion since she was only in the episode The Doctor's Daughter, but I really liked her character and thought she had a lot of potential. She's essentially created through the Doctor's DNA and she has two hearts like a Time Lord. Her character really affects the Doctor's character because after all that he lost, she gives him a chance to have a family again, but then that chance taken away from him. She also has a really good dynamic with the Doctor who doesn't really approve of her more aggressive side and the way the two interact does remind you of a bickering father and daughter.
Fun Fact: Jenny's actress Georgia Tennant is not only married to David Tennant (I think they met during this episode) but she is also the daughter of Peter Davison, the Fifth Doctor, which actually does make her the Doctor's Daughter in real life.
And these were the Doctor's companions; now it's time to look at some of the side characters and the Doctor's foes.
Other Characters
The Master (Derek Jacobi & John Simm) is the Doctor's childhood friend and current "frenemy". I liked both of their incarnations but I did like Derek Jacobi's more serious, ruthless version more (even though he wasn't the Master for that long). John Simm's master is a lot like Moriarty from BBCs Sherlock. He's very energetic, witty, and is very much like if the Tenth Doctor was evil. That being said, I still really love the Master because Simm still acts really well and he always keeps you entertained as a villain. There is also a very tragic side to his character where the Master isn't necessarily evil; he's still definitely a chaotic character in general, but his desire to do harm is more out of a part of him that he can't control, and John Simm portrays the "tortured soul" aspect of the character really well. I still much prefer Michelle Gomez's Missy and Roger Delgado's original Master to Simm, but he still gives a really strong performance.
Davros (Julian Bleach) is the creator of the Daleks and one of the BEST Doctor Who villains. He is a megalomaniac who is cruel, ruthless, but extremely intelligent. Even though he is a cruel and sadistic person, Davros is another one of Doctor Who's "tragic" villains in a sense. Even though his goals had become twisted into "eradicate all other races", the underlying goal for him is to ensure the survival of his race and he does seem to actually care about the wellbeing of Daleks. So it does feel a little sad that a brilliant man like him became so twisted, but that's what makes so many Doctor Who villains great; they're evil not necessarily because of any selfish reason but their motivations are firmly rooted in a base desire to either survive or to do what they perceive to be good (except for the space racist in Season 11).
River Song (Alex Kingston) is only in two Tennant episodes, but will become MUCH more significant later and still manages to shine through in those two episodes. She's got a lot of the same charisma that Tennant has; she's witty, smart, and can be really funny. It's hard to write a lot about her in the context of the Tenth Doctor because she's in his seasons so little, but I will just say that she does manage to leave a fairly strong impression even with a fairly limited screen time.
The Weeping Angels are really phenomenal villains. The episode they appear in, Blink is basically a horror story and it's interesting because the Doctor isn't in that episode very much. I thought it was an interesting choice because it really makes the Angels the center of attention. I actually found that by towards the end of the Eleventh Doctor's run they don't become as scary; the episode The Angels Take Manhattan in specific I think kind of cheapened them a little bit. But in this particular episode, they are really scary.
The Sontarans (Dan Starkey) are kind of similar to the Daleks from what I found. They're very interesting in their militaristic ways but I personally don't think they're all that interesting. In the Eleventh Doctor episodes though there's a Sontaran named Strax who is absolutely BRILLIANT though, but I'll hold off on him for later.
The Daleks (voiced by Nicholas Briggs) are once again great. It's hard to write about the Daleks because unlike the Cybermen (whose designs and characterizations often change), the Daleks remain pretty much stationary and they remain consistently good (if a little bit too frequent) villains overall.
The Cybermen (voiced by Nicholas Briggs) are interesting because they aren't the same Cybermen that has appeared on Who or will appear on Who. The Cybermen are originally of humanoid origins whose goal is to upgrade themselves to survive. These Cybermen are actual humans (from a parallel world) who were transformed by a man named John Lumic, who saw them as the "next step in human advancement". It is the same general idea as the original Cybermen, but instead of the fear being "this could be us", it becomes "this IS us" with these real human Cybermen. Weirdly enough, after Matt Smith becomes the Doctor, the Cybermen are aliens again. I honestly think the new robotic designs took a lot away from the Cybermen. The thing that made them scary was that even though they were alien robots, in Classic Who they were still distinctively human; they were humanoid, and in a lot of cases you could still tell a bit of the pragmatic humanity desperate to survive. In New Who, they increasingly become a second-fiddle villain where they're almost always under the command of a non-Cybermen leader, and I think them losing their individuality makes them a weaker villain.
Caecilius (Peter Capaldi) is only being mentioned because he's being played by Peter Capaldi, AKA, the Twelfth (and one of my personal favourite) Doctor. He is in the episode The Fires of Pompeii, and even though I thought the episode itself was decent, but Capaldi does an excellent job and it's really interesting how this episode (and Capaldi's character) not only showcases Donna's personality as someone who wants to be more than what she is and also the beginning of the Doctor's arc in having control over the laws of time. Caecilius is actually stated explicitly be the reason why the Twelfth Doctor looks like Peter Capaldi and I really liked that the writers tied the two together.
Captain Jack Harkness (John Barrowman) is back again in a slightly more prominent role. Now immortal he still retains all of his charm and it was fun seeing him again especially since I think Barrowman and Tennant have really great chemistry together. There's really not too much to write about him that I haven't said before.
Harriet Jones, Prime Minister (Penelope Wilton) first appeared in Season 1 as an MP for Flydale North and by Ten's first episode, she has been elected Prime Minister. She's a very pragmatic figure as Prime Minister who does what she sees as best for England, not necessarily what is morally right. As a result, she clashes heavily with the Doctor in terms of national defense. Although she becomes antagonistic to the Doctor on matters of national security, she sacrifices herself and dies as a hero. I thought she was a really interesting character because her motivations are very grounded in reality. We want to think our leaders make the morally right choices but Jones' pragmatism forces her to make the hard choices for what she perceives to be the wellbeing of the country, which I thought was interesting.
Now that we've covered some of the other characters related to the Tenth Doctor, I'll be talking about some of the Tenth Doctor's stories.
The Stories
The Tenth Doctor has so many great stories, but since I can't cover them all here are just a few:
The Runaway Bride is a 3rd season Christmas Special, and the first episode in which we get introduced to Donna. It's just a really fun episode because Tennant and Tate have really great chemistry and the moment I saw the episode I fell in love with Donna as a companion. There's actually not that much else to add because the episode alone wasn't anything too special but the addition of Donna is really what makes the episode a standout.
Blink is the first episode that we get introduced to one of my favourite Who antagonists, the Weeping Angels. Like I said previously, I thought it was a great idea to not have the Doctor feature too heavily because it puts the focus on the Weeping Angels. The episode introduces the character Sally Sparrow (played by Carey Mulligan) and I really liked her as a character. She's got a strong independent streak to her and she's smart and very capable on her own, and it would've been great to get her as a companion later on. The episode as a whole has a horror vibe (which I really like) and it's just a fun episode for anyone to watch; even if they aren't familiar with Who at all, it works as a standalone episode.
The Sound of Drums & Last of the Time Lords is a two-part story featuring the Master. It is the first time we get to see the Master in action and I thought it was just really interesting. John Simm is generally great as the Master (although I do think he sometimes overdoes it). I also really liked Martha's character development through just these two episodes. Her transformation into a more action hero type does feel believable as there were moments throughout the whole third season where she was getting thrusted into more dangerous situations, and I thought it was one of the better companion arcs and made a good reason for her departure. The ending where everyone believing in the Doctor gave him power again felt a bit forced and I really could've done without seeing wrinkled old man creepy goblin Doctor, but it's a really good two-parter and it's again a great part of the Doctor's story arc.
The Waters of Mars is the first time that we properly see how dark the Doctor can be. At this point, he has lost Donna, Martha, and Rose, and is traveling alone. The Doctor messes with time on purpose because he doesn't want to let any more people die (despite it being the "right" thing to do). When one of the people he saved, Captain Adelaide Brooke told the Doctor he was wrong for him to save her, the Doctor says, "For a long time now, I thought I was just a survivor, but I'm not. I'm the winner! That's who I am. The Time Lord Victorious!" It's a very powerful scene because this is the Doctor at his darkest; the Doctor has lost so much that at this point, that for a split second, he has become a power-hungry egomaniac (and he's always had a bit of an ego) and we see what the Doctor can be like, and it's not pretty. That very short scene at the end is the greatest bit of acting Tennant has done in the show and even if I don't remember the episode well, I remember that single scene.
The End of Time Part 1 & 2 is the final episode with David Tennant as the Doctor. Not only does it feature the return of the Master and the first appearance of other Time Lords including Rassilon (played amazingly by James Bond himself Timothy Dalton), but it also has Wilf as a full-time companion, which is always an added bonus. John Simm I think gives his best performance as the master in Part Two because he really shows a conflicted side and will actually help the Doctor, albeit for his own purposes (a character arc that will eventually become complete with the Twelfth Doctor). It's a very lore-heavy episode and I really liked how much insight this episode gives to all the characters; the Doctor, the Master, and even Wilf gets an extra layer of depth into their characters. It's a really fitting finale for the Tenth Doctor and I think his regeneration scene & the Doctor saying goodbye to everyone was done really well (although I'm not a total fan of how they introduced Matt Smith as the Doctor).
So now that I've covered all parts of Tennant's run as the Doctor, it's time for my summative thoughts.
Overall Thoughts
Something that I find really interesting after writing all of this is the fact that a lot of Tennant's episodes contributes a bit by bit towards his overall character arc. Even seemingly small episodes like Fires of Pompeii help in building Tennant's whole story as being a survivor and leads up to the "Time Lord Victorious" story arc and his fear of regeneration. The overall story is really well crafted out and it's fascinating how showrunner Russell T. Davis is slowly building up the finale with his episodes.
Overall, Tennant is a great Doctor. He balances everything perfectly; he can be fun and goofy but also serious and really dark. He has great chemistry with all of his companions and any side characters and brings a lot of great stories and moments.
His status as one of the most beloved Doctors in Who history is so well-earned and it's impossible to find a flaw with his performance or even his run as the Doctor.
For my next review, I will be talking about one of my all time favourite books that I read every few months. It's a classic about the duality of man. As always, thank you for reading my blog, and I always will enjoy hearing from all of you, so if you have any comments, feedbacks, opinions, suggestions, etc., please feel free to comment, and I WILL respond to ALL comments!
