(to prevent unintentional spoilerage, here's a picture of David Tennant, copyright BBC)
Right....
The title Journey's End resonates in a lot of ways. It of, of course, marks the end of the fourth season of the revised Doctor Who. It also is the end for the current production team, with showrunner Russell T. Davies stepping aside (he will craft several specials over the next year, but this is his last series) and both BBC producers leaving the program. The behind-the-scenes work of Phil Collinson, Julie Gardner and Davies cannot be underestimated. They took a moribund franchise and turned it into a commercial success (Journey's End has an excellent chance of ending the week at the top of the British TV charts -- something that has never happened in the 45-year history of the show) and more importantly, an excellent piece of TV.
The episode is action-packed from the first moments and doesn't let up until it ends and hour later (though that action is of a different nature, but see below for that). Along the way, we have a parcel of companions (basically all of them from the current series, along with cameos from the Torchwood and Sarah Jane Adventures sets), a vast army of Daleks, the return of Davros (an absolutely lovely and barking mad Julian Bleach in the latest incarnation) and absolute peril to the whole of blasted creation. It's more than over the top -- I don't know if words can describe how over the top it all is -- but that's really just the action-y overlay to the story. Inside, there is something darker, heavier and far more human.
At the end of episode 12 (a cliffhanger that caused me to grab the edges of my chair and scream "you fuckers!" at the screen) we left the Doctor in mid-regeneration. Thanks to his ever-bubbling extra hand, he didn't turn into a new actor. Instead, the extra energy went there -- and a few minutes later, we had a second Doctor. And because it was Donna's touch that sparked the regeneration, he's a human/Time Lord hybrid (shades of the Fox movie!) and, now, so is Donna.
Plot-wise, this becomes important, as it takes the efforts of all three (with nifty assists from Torchwood, Mr. Smith and -- good dog -- K-9) to finally (finally? it is Doctor Who) to crush the Dalek threat.
Yet the real moment -- the throbbing heart of the episode -- comes as the Doctor is confronted by his companions, all who have plots to eliminate the Daleks. Martha Jones is on Earth, prepared to destroy the planet, while Sarah Jane, Captain Jack, Mickey and Jackie have their own device, one that would kill all of the principals, but leave the universe intact. At this point, Davros -- you know, the one who created the Daleks and gave them the drive to destroy all that is different and is about to annihilate all of creation -- lectures the Doctor about his influence on people, noting that he takes ordinary folks and turns them into "weapons."
A running theme through all of Davies' series has been how the companions "humanize" the Doctor. In fact, that's a key moment in Turn Left -- because Donna is not there on Christmas Day to shock the Doctor out of his reign of destruction, he gets caught and killed by the flooding Thames. Yet here, we come face to face with the flipside of that equation. What good has the Doctor done, really?
Well, let's look at the people we are talking about. Captain Jack was a liar, thief and coward. Rose and Mickey had little to look forward to than life on a council estate. Jackie was trapped i the same flat she'd lived for decades. Sarah Jane certainly had a life ahead, but her time with the Doctor transformed her existence. The same for Martha, who unlocked the heart of a true bona fide hero who saved the Earth through her own determination and unrequited love for the Doctor.
And let's not forget Donna, a go-nowhere temp who cluelessly glided through life without noticing anything before she met the Doctor. So, weapons, yes, but also heroes; people will to sacrifice themselves for the greater good.
Of course, they're not called on to do this (it would be a nasty, Blake's 7 kind of ending to the series) and instead it is the ingenuity of the three "Doctors" who save the day. It does, however, come at a cost. For the human Doctor (who has one heart and no regenerative abilities), it's a positive cost -- he is left on the alternative Earth with Rose, allowed to finally "spend the rest of his life" with a companion. For Jack, Martha and Mickey (who wisely stays on the main Earth, as he knows he has no chance against two Doctors for Rose's heart) it may be the start of a new friendship (perhaps to be played out in Season 3 of Torchwood). But for Donna and the Doctor (the proper Doctor) there is only heartbreak.
The Time Lord "brain" Donna absorbed is going to kill her and there is only one way the Doctor sees to save her -- by erasing all knowledge of her time on the Tardis. In an instant, Donna is "reset," forgetting the stronger, wiser and heroic soul she has become. Her mother and grandfather know the truth, but cannot say anything; and the Doctor can never again be with his friend. For him, Donna has died as if she had stopped breathing.
The question is left whether or not Donna is better for the experience. Certainly she'll get a good push from Mom and Granddad, and we saw her bravery in Turn Left when she sacrificed herself (there's that theme again) for the greater good. On the other hand, her chatting on the phone at episode's end doesn't portend for good things; just another temp from Chiswick, moving from day to day but not really living.
And that leaves the Doctor. Near the end of the episode, he has a Tardis packed with his friends, all joining together to fly the old beast as it saves the Earth. Yet in a very short time, they are all gone, leaving him alone, drenched in rain and unsure of where to go next with his eternal ramble through space and time. That's the essence for the show for me -- the reason it has lived on in my imagination in the 30 years since I first saw an episode -- of a man, surrounded by humor and love and adventure, but also so, so alone. It cuts into the loneliness we all have to survive with every day.
Doctor Who has always been at its best in these moments, from the beginning the Doctor was an exile, unexplained, accompanied only by his granddaughter and a couple of school teachers who were dragged into the adventure. It doesn't surprise me that I find his interactions with other Time Lords to be the weakest parts of the show. Like any mystery, the more you explain, the less interesting it becomes, and the Doctor is about the darkness that can envelop us all -- and how important it is to fight it at every turn; to not give into loneliness or despair or evil.
So there's an ironic meaning of Journey's End. Sure it marks the close of several eras (though not Tennant's, he'll be around at least for the specials, including the Christmas episode -- which promises Cybermen in Victorian England), but the Doctor's journey never really ends. He'll be out there, rickety Tardis careening around the Universe, looking for adventure and new friends to ease the pain.
