Tag: meta

//this will invariably draw anon hate but i really don’t mean it divisively.

i’ve just been, for days, months (years lol) trying to figure out why exactly simm!master, whom so many people now just…openly despise…is still my favorite master.  

and i think the main reason is still the marked, strong metaphor of chronic invisible illness posed by “the drums.” 

BUT. there’s another reason. 

examining photosets on my dash today, from episodes with other masters, especially in new who, the most marked characteristic about the simm!master is his DEFIANCE. of all things that try to hinder him, but particularly, of the doctor.  which sounds strange coming from a hardcore thoschei shipper, but hear me out. 

from one vantage point, that defiance can read as folly, as self-defeat, as an idiotic determination to despise someone you once loved, as miserly and small-minded, and it is, no doubt.

but shift your perspective, and that defiance reads as a refusal to accept at face value the sometimes equally small-minded, chauvinistic, sanctimonious twaddle of the doctor.  though this post isn’t about missy, she is the one who said it best: “[the doctor’s] version of good is not absolute. it’s vain, arrogant, sentimental.”  

and where even missy has decided it is best to compromise, to choose her battles, to bide her time, with the doctor, simm!master remains the ONLY person in all of new who, except Donna Noble (incidentally my favorite companion), who steps back and says, “oh bullshit. knock off this nonsense. i’ll gladly take you down a few pegs, right here and right now, if you don’t. i will say ‘tough’ when you say sorry; i will say ‘i refuse’ when you order me to do something.”  outright, without censure.  

and as stupid and self defeating as simm!master is, i think that’s something about him that i find perennially refreshing.  there have been periods of doctor who that have suffered from “the doctor is a genius so we pardon everything the doctor says and does unproblematically,” and sometimes even missy is pulled (by specific writers, not by the essence of her character) into that trap of making the entire show about congratulating the doctor’s brilliance, about basking in the doctor’s danger and charisma.  when the core of doctor who has always actually been celebrating the people around the doctor that have ended up teaching the doctor as much as or more than the doctor teaches them. 

and i dunno, somehow, simm!master’s “fuck you” attitude toward the doctor lends itself more to content that says “yeah actually, the doctor is hugely flawed.”  and just. removes absolute power from the doctor and from people writing the doctor’s narrative who want to identify with an unapologetic asshole that nobody checks or tells “hey, that wasn’t cool.” 

this is not to say other masters don’t in their own way defy the doctor–especially in classic who.  but i just. i think it’s interesting that when simm!master was reprised after a decade, during the era that most often falls for the “let’s all masturbate to the doctor’s awesomeness” trope, somehow the simm!master’s “doctor, you’re full of shit and here’s why” tendency was twisted into “i’m such an asshole that nobody should listen to the way i criticize the doctor anyway. i’m such an asshole that my judgment is called into question. pay no attention to the man in black, he’s a moron and a pitiful excuse for a version of the master.”  all to prop up the doctor’s motivations as unquestionably noble. i just kinda go “hmmm” at that. i really do. 

 it was a very clever maneuver that had nothing to do with the master and everything to do with the existing DW staff’s highly self-conscious self-justifications. 

but as for me, the brusque asshole that nobody loves, who screams “NO” in the doctor’s face, is still my favorite, by virtue of his very defiance. 

everyone has “their” doctor. as for me, i have my master. and my master is an impenitent hellraiser. 

audale:

I read again that people got Eleventh Doctor vibes from Jodie in the teaser and I remain wondering……… How? Where? Why? No.

I honestly am not trying to start shit but I don’t get it either.  First of all I wish people would stop comparing her back with other doctors period, because that’s a Thing that sexists always do, make a woman the “female equivalent of” a man in the same position, role, job, whatever.  

But secondly, the comparison, putting favorite Doctors aside, makes little sense to me.  Let’s just look at ALL the New Who Doctors so far.  Ten, like Thirteen, was born out of an act of loving sacrifice (thank you, Nine and Twelve, we love and miss you ❤ ).  But Eleven was born out of Ten literally giving and giving and giving and giving and losing and losing and losing friends and loved ones until he lost himself and literally wailed “Oh, I’ve lived too long!” Eleven was as a result a closed-off and angry Doctor.  Yes, he remained wise and yes he was still capable of loving, but he was probably the darkest Doctor in New Who, always dogged, always chased, by a feeling of insufficiency and rage.  He was the Doctor who adopted Ten’s Waters of Mars quixotic god-complex as a regular justification for sometimes short-sighted and cruel behavior.  

He was the OPPOSITE of Thirteen.  That’s not to say that Eleven is a “bad” Doctor, and it’s not to say that any actors or writers being interviewed are bad people to make the comparison, only that the facets of the Doctor’s personality that he highlights are directly in contrast with Thirteen’s adoption of Twelve’s mandates, her hopefulness, her newness, her silliness and levity.  ALL the Doctors have Eleven’s energy. ALL the Doctor’s have Eleven’s pedantry and rudeness.  But Thirteen lacks his anger and his exhaustion and his bitterness and his regret.  Eleven was a tired, sad Doctor.  Eleven after all preceded Twelve at his bleakest and most rock-bottom.  Both the Moffat Doctors were really sad and dark and jaded and lost, in alignment with the tone of the show at the time.  

I see more of Nine and (early) Ten in Thirteen than any other New Who Doctor, and maybe like, some of Six from Classic Who?  But I dunno.  

Honestly maybe it’d just be best if we all just said Thirteen is like Thirteen.  And waited to see her be her own unprecedented Doctor. 

Especially since all we’ve seen is a handful of clips that the producers and showrunners have calculatedly selected to make the appearance of a certain type of product for our consumption. It’s only mid July and the first episode is in October.   Or maybe I’m just a jaded American who knows that big corporations and big entertainment industries jerk people’s emotional chain for money so I don’t trust anything I see anymore until I see the whole thing, lol.  

masterwhy42:

rundalek:

Simm!Master in The Doctor Falls.

Can we talk about how angry the master was in this episode. I mean he’s always had an angry streak to him but this one seemed like he had delt with something big (maybe even bigger then what when in with the time liars and the time war.) Anyone have any thoughts on this?

@masterwhy42  You should take a gander through my meta tag and also if you like I can give you some headcanon ideas I share with @doctamastacanon @audale and @alez-on-mars 

Like I agree with you 120%, the Master’s conduct and demeanor were a thousand shades bitterer and less enthusiastically delightedly wicked.  He was miserable and furious and embittered, and since that’s an incomprehensible leap from being on the precipice of teaming up with or traveling with the Doctor in End of Time, that leaves two possibilities:

1) the writing is, in parts, poor, and at the Master’s expense for the sake of other characters seeming sympathetic (I still contend this is partly the case, but we can’t do much with or about that aside write fix-it fics, which hey, I am all for)

and/or

2) something severely traumatic was done to the Master after he drove Rassilon and the Time Council back into the timelock.  Because let’s face it, Rassilon saw both the Doctor and the Master as aberrations to be used when it was convenient; tools (hell that’s the reason why the Master had what everyone always thought was an auditory hallucination all his life) which Rassilon referred to openly as “diseased.”  Rassilon wants revenge on both the Doctor and the Master; as we know, he gets revenge in the Confession Dial on the Doctor later, with Twelve, so why wouldn’t he get it on the Master, too?  Right when he was in his clutches? The Doctor assumes the Master was “fixed” by the Time Council, since his unstable resurrection energy has been calmed, but the Master refers to both that time and his time as a leader on Mondas as something the Doctor “wouldn’t understand,” with an unusual grimness and reserve.  To me this suggests the “fixing” on Gallifrey that he eventually escaped with a new TARDIS did not come without catches and conditions.  Perhaps he was used as a weapon once again, as they intended him to be during the earlier stages of the Time War.   My friends and I have hypothesized that he was even kept on Gallifrey for a time equivalent to the Doctor’s Confession Dial punishment, over four billion years, perhaps imprisoned, perhaps not, but fed incessant imagery of the Doctor failing to ever come to save him, and return the favor he paid him in End of Time.  

This combination of factors would explain his incomprehensible rage toward Twelve, when the last time he saw the Doctor, as Ten, they had come as close to a detente as they ever did in New Who, or arguably the entire series, before Missy’s arc.  

Source: crowzley

illusivexemissary:

chuckxalmighty:

image

Someone will have to explain to me why as a person I can’t hate villains for being villains? I mean I do what I like? This doesn’t make sense to me…Should I applaud villains for being douchebags and love them when they are terrible or something?

Depends on the villain.

I write antiheroes typically, but I also write villains, and I write villains who are contrite and change (Loki, the Master, Pitch Black in certain AU’s), and I also write villains who don’t (Jim Moriarty).  

There are villains I genuinely believe deserve to be more deeply examined, and forgiven, even if NEVER condoned, because in some way their backstory and motives reflect Othered or marginalized people, be that because of sexual orientation, race, physical or mental illness, etc.  Especially when there are insidious forces at work in the construction of narrative, such as “queer-coding,” which intentionally pair villainy with social Otherness.  In all these cases, you need to extrapolate what parts about the villain make them villainous, and what parts do but shouldn’t.   

As the famous quote, which we should ALWAYS ask ourselves, goes, “Draw a monster. Now, tell me: WHY is it a monster?” 

Always examine the narratorial motive behind WHY a villain is thought a villain, and separate that out from other personality traits.  Is it fair to cast the character in the role of villain, or is it a symptom of some form of bigotry on the narrator’s part? 

It’s interesting, because the phenomenon goes both ways. So often Purity Culture, for lack of a more accurate term, polices people’s consumption of media by alleging that people who love or identify with villains must ALSO BY EXTENSION BE MORALLY CORRUPT, when often it is precisely the identification with people who are somehow marginalized, who have no advocate and turn bitter and cruel as a result, that draws very good people IRL to sympathize with the “bad guys.”  

Yet there are indubitably cases in which villains are so-called “woobified” (a term I despise, but that’s for another meta) or in other words perceived as “just misunderstood” when they are in reality absolutely irreconciliable with any form of goodness (whether they enjoy being evil, or worse, actually believe THEY are the victim).   THESE villains often identify NOT with the Othered and victims of social slights, but with the UNILATERALLY ENTITLED OR EMPOWERED.  Wealthy white male characters and serial rapists come to mind, and yes, oh yes, I have specific character names, but we won’t go there in here. Feel free to ask in private if you’re curious.  

And of course in either case, even if a villain has a sympathetic, tragic backstory, whether or not they “deserve” a redemption arc is a SEPARATE ISSUE from whether their actions in hurting innocent people are justified (they never are).  

TL;dr look for what the villain identifies as OUTSIDE of his/her/their moral alignment. That’s where you get the rule of thumb for “should I feel sorry for them or not?”  And bear in mind, FEELING PITY FOR A CHARACTER DOES NOT MEAN YOU LIKE THEM OR CONDONE THEIR ACTIONS. Those are two separate things.  

Regardless, if you are getting HATE for liking or disliking a character, with a few extreme exceptions (again, characters who are serial abusers or rapists, for instance), so long as you aren’t invading their tag or space to spread your opinions, then the person hating on you needs to step back and examine the line between reality and fiction. 

chabouillet:

OTP Meme | 4/7 Scenes

#amber will you write a meta #about Simmy’s face in that last gif#because I cannot word #and I feel like you would be able to put into words#the feelings this gifset gives me (via forgediinfire) 

LOL oh GoD okay I’ll try jkhwfg

I think the thing that makes you feel things about this face is the context paired with the expression, and the pretense of a very intimate moment (he leans down, asks him to “whisper in his ear” with that hand gesture in one of the above gifs).  

He gazes into the eyes of his vulnerable, weakened equal and counterpart for a long, meaningful moment, before lofting his eyebrows, and the message there is “I know you already know who they are, I know you already suspect that they’re the self-cannibalized human race, and I don’t need to tell you,” and that weird sort of RESPECT for the Doctor’s intellect combined with the FACETIOUS “CONCERN” for the Doctor’s “hearts breaking” makes it a particularly potent form of cruelty.   And the apex of arch-nemesis and former flame interaction: you respect but also loathe your arch-nemesis. 

Pair with that, the Master is using and therefore mocking the Doctor’s own most prized trait, COMPASSION, masquerading as someone showing “consideration” for the Doctor’s feelings, to deliver the awful killing blow to his hearts.  

And what’s that killing blow?  “The species with whom you replaced me after running away from our friendship and betraying my long-ago trust in you?  They’re more evil than I, the disappointment you ran from, could ever be.  They took advantage of each other’s weaknesses  You DEFINE YOURSELF BY HOW YOU CAN SAVE OTHERS. WELL YOU CAN’T SAVE THEM.  THIS IS THEIR INEVITABLE FUTURE.” 

It’s the execution of his line “human race: greatest monsters of them all.”  

How’s that? :O ❤ 

Source: chabouillet

do you prefer simm’s protrayal in season three or four?

//OHHHHHHHH this is HARD.

If it came down to it, I would have to choose Series Four.  

I love Series Three Master for his expansive, terrifyingly determined ambition, his brilliance, his capacity to subconsciously manipulate an entire planet via a cellular phone network, to establish an entire plausible false persona, to learn enough about an earth-based socio-political system to ascend to its highest ranks, to design and build a literal floating island fortress as well as an armory of black hole converters, travel to the end of the universe and recruit the humans there to his cause, etc etc etc.  He is never more whimsically sadistic than in this series, and he gets arguably the furthest of ALL faces of the Master in actually defeating the Doctor and establishing lasting dominion over his favorite planet.  Series Three Master is a truly impressive “anti-Doctor.”  

BUT.

Series Four Master is a broken, rock-bottom, frightened, tantruming child, and as pathetic as he is, he is my favorite for that very vulnerability.  All of my favorite Thoschei shipper moments come out of the End of Time episodes, and I believe End of Time was a turning point for the character, planting the seed that would become the reformed Master in Missy (I argue, in fact, that without Moffat at the helm, that reform would have come sooner still, but that’s for another meta).  Series Four Master cries. Series Four Master laughs like an idiot. Series Four Master pouts when the Doctor calls Donna his “best friend.”  Series Four Master throws his hands up in jubilation when the Doctor confirms that the Drums are “real.” And in that moment, Series Four Master reminds me of myself when someone I love believes how much a chronic illness is tormenting me.  

Series Three Master is the Master that hooked and impressed me, but the “king of the wasteland” is the Master that convinced me he was capable of being loved and forgiven.  

Also, John Simm looks … peculiarly sexy with bleached blond hair, scruff, and eyeliner.