I'm supposed to be happy because I'm a second-semester senior and it's spring at GMVS, but the only times I'm enjoying myself are when I'm not on campus. And it's not that I don't love the people (because I do love some of the people). I miss Natalie and I want to catch up with Ellie and Eklutna and get coffee with Liezl and I want to laugh until my stomach hurts with Christine. But all the time on campus, I feel like I'm wearing some kind of mask. I want to be normal; I want to not feel pressured to act a certain way. I want to be who I was last year: completely engrossed and unashamed by my adoration of everything. I want so badly to be that girl and I feel like if I show anyone that I'm not her anymore, they'll disown me. But I'm currently slowly eating a donut and wishing that everything would stop. There's all of this static in my brain and everything I write feels like it's been written by somebody else.
I want to throw something but also lie on the floor and turn into dust. I just want to know if this is how everyone else feels.
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| *whispers* I don't have a source. I'm so sorry |
I've always said that the reason I didn't like Martha on Doctor Who was because she was so desperate, always chasing after the Doctor romantically. I never thought she was inferior until she made me think she was so; it's not weak the way she has feelings for the Doctor. The weak part is that she was looking for his approval, that's the only thing she's looking for; her intentions are not pure and she searches only for the Doctor's affection as a route to happiness. Sure, she's excited by time travel (literally everyone is), but once they've settled into the time period, her greatest pleasure comes from impressing the Doctor. Eventually, towards the end of her story arc, she saves the Doctor, something only she can accomplish. She spends less time trying to earn his approval, she has more time and mental capacity to use on actually saving the world. Without him she is stronger. She's not like Rose, who feeds off of the Doctor's intelligence and capabilities; Rose and the Doctor make each other better but the way Martha's invested in making the Doctor better, ends up making her weaker. The Doctor and Rose were symbiotic; the Doctor was Martha's parasite.
Martha has a drive to use her intellect, arguably her strongest trait, to get the Doctor's attention, making her look like a fool. It doesn't work because the Doctor's intellect is a cereal bowl and Martha's intellect is a Cheerio. (That's not meant offensively, because Martha is extremely intelligent and a really good doctor and a great person, but the Doctor is 1500 years old with wisdom, knowledge, and intelligence that can only be gained by an Time Lord of such an age.) Rose wowed the Doctor with her kindness and bravery and helped him become enraptured by the vastness of the universe again (which every companion of his arguably does). Eventually Martha realizes that the Doctor isn't the end-all-be-all and that although her intellect is on a smaller scale than the Doctor's, it's still important; she has value, even if it's not on a cosmic level. She also realizes that her humanity dwarfs the Doctor's.
The way to the Doctor's heart isn't with intelligence or wit or cleverness. It's with humanity. (I mean, being intelligent isn't bad with the Doctor; he's just looking for someone to be that other part of him because he's already intelligent enough. It's like he's missing a limb; that limb is humanity and it can only be implemented by a companion.)
It's not the Doctor's fault that he makes people feel inferior; he's so blinded by his pain and sadness and drive to save as many people as possible. It's just that he's on a million different missions at once and while he helps people all of the time, he needs someone to help him. To help all of the universe, the Doctor needs a crutch. Rose sort of completed him: a pure companion, someone perfect for the job. But when Martha came along, she obviously wasn't Rose, no matter how much she wanted to be. And it was a drain on her personality to be running around, trying to squirm into the same box that Rose easily slid into. It wouldn't have mattered who the next companion was; she wasn't Rose and the Doctor would always be disappointed to look at her face and not see Rose. All he saw was how he let Rose down (AKA stranded her in another dimension). What I mean when I say that I don't like Martha, was that instead of being herself, she tried to be whatever the Doctor wanted, which she thought was the host to his parasite, sacrificing herself in hopes of gaining his love. And the Doctor let her.
Perhaps it's not Martha that I didn't like; it's the Doctor's relationship with her. I didn't like it until Martha told him she was getting out, until she realized the toxicity of their relationship, made up of her hurt and his disappointment, and decided that it had gone on long enough. That's why I like Martha.
Analyzing fictional relationships between fictional characters makes me feel better.
Dr. Martha Jones > You
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