River Stuffs
8 Aug 2011 01:13 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
promethia_tenk1) Vid rec: Land's End by ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
cherryice (River Song, awake in the waiting sea.) OMG, guys, go watch this now. It's . . . a River vid. I mean about River, about her life (and all the rest of their lives, too--I think especially Amy). Anyone struggling with the AGMGTW reveal, I think this might . . . actually . . . help? In a cathartic sense, cause it's not really a pretty picture. At any rate, it's amazing. Go watch many, many times!
2) Question: I've been meaning to ask for awhile, but it seemed very a propos to the vid above ('let the walls cave in'): if I were to write something up comparing River to Echo from Dollhouse, would that be of any interest to anyone but me? It would basically be about both women and their boxes (Echo and the Dollhouse/ River and the TARDIS, the astronaut suit, Stormcage, the Library computer, etc. . . .) and the complicated, push-pull, quasi-symbiotic relationships they have to them. Or is bringing up Dollhouse enough to put everybody off from the get-go?
3) Observation: Watched "The Pandorica Opens" last night for the first time since AGMGTW, and it struck me that that episode makes a lot more sense if you look at it as a systemic attack against River. I mean, obviously the Alliance believes it's all about the Doctor, but I think whoever is pulling the strings is actually after River in some way. Think about it: they locked her husband up in a box so he can't help her, had her father shoot her mother before her mother could even have her, and blew up the time machine that helped make her what she was, on the very date she was conceived. If you put the Doctor in the middle of everything, it doesn't fit together nearly as well, particularly Rory shooting Amy, which always seemed a bit random and 'what was the point in that?' The interesting thing is, though, that if Person Pulling the Strings really was after River, I'm not sure that they were trying to wipe her out so much as unmoor her. If this person knows enough about the TARDIS to be able to remotely control it and cause it to explode, probably they would realize that it would also preserve River inside as she is, even while all the foundations of her life, everything that helped create her, is being destroyed? It's like they wanted River without her context.
cherryice (River Song, awake in the waiting sea.) OMG, guys, go watch this now. It's . . . a River vid. I mean about River, about her life (and all the rest of their lives, too--I think especially Amy). Anyone struggling with the AGMGTW reveal, I think this might . . . actually . . . help? In a cathartic sense, cause it's not really a pretty picture. At any rate, it's amazing. Go watch many, many times!2) Question: I've been meaning to ask for awhile, but it seemed very a propos to the vid above ('let the walls cave in'): if I were to write something up comparing River to Echo from Dollhouse, would that be of any interest to anyone but me? It would basically be about both women and their boxes (Echo and the Dollhouse/ River and the TARDIS, the astronaut suit, Stormcage, the Library computer, etc. . . .) and the complicated, push-pull, quasi-symbiotic relationships they have to them. Or is bringing up Dollhouse enough to put everybody off from the get-go?
3) Observation: Watched "The Pandorica Opens" last night for the first time since AGMGTW, and it struck me that that episode makes a lot more sense if you look at it as a systemic attack against River. I mean, obviously the Alliance believes it's all about the Doctor, but I think whoever is pulling the strings is actually after River in some way. Think about it: they locked her husband up in a box so he can't help her, had her father shoot her mother before her mother could even have her, and blew up the time machine that helped make her what she was, on the very date she was conceived. If you put the Doctor in the middle of everything, it doesn't fit together nearly as well, particularly Rory shooting Amy, which always seemed a bit random and 'what was the point in that?' The interesting thing is, though, that if Person Pulling the Strings really was after River, I'm not sure that they were trying to wipe her out so much as unmoor her. If this person knows enough about the TARDIS to be able to remotely control it and cause it to explode, probably they would realize that it would also preserve River inside as she is, even while all the foundations of her life, everything that helped create her, is being destroyed? It's like they wanted River without her context.
(no subject)
Date: 8 Aug 2011 09:17 pm (UTC)>>Watched "The Pandorica Opens" last night for the first time since AGMGTW, and it struck me that that episode makes a lot more sense if you look at it as a systemic attack against River.
I've actually been contemplating this for a while, but I thought people would go "naaah" if I ever posted about it XD I was thinking the other day, who wants River SO DEAD they tried to kill her mom AND blow up the Universe with her in the center of it? Isn't that OVERKILL? Perhaps since she defected to the Doctor's side, the guys that created her to fight him are scared of their combined power? And perhaps her apology ["I'm sorry, my love..."] is because she realises this is about her and the Doctor has been caught up in it? IDK.
(no subject)
Date: 8 Aug 2011 10:13 pm (UTC)Admittedly my thoughts kinda gloss over some of the icky, exploitative stuff to get to OMG WHAT THE HELL IS ECHO, ANYWAY?!?! I find her totally fascinating--she's like this complete deconstruction of an individual.
I was thinking the other day, who wants River SO DEAD they tried to kill her mom AND blow up the Universe with her in the center of it? Isn't that OVERKILL?
Hahahaha! Seriously. You should have spoken up! I guess I've seen the speculation around a few places that blowing up the TARDIS was really about River, but I hadn't seen anyone bring up Amy being shot or the idea that all of that was orchestrated together. And I think I like the thought that they were trying to keep River but get rid of her antecedents because it makes more sense of the 'destroy everything around her' approach. Otherwise why not just shoot her or something? No need to destroy the universe *and* shoot her mother! Actually, I have this issue with what Kovarian and the Church have planned for the Doctor--if all you wanted to do was shoot him, couldn't you have managed that long ago? I feel like there must be something more substantial that's being orchestrated, you know?
And perhaps her apology ["I'm sorry, my love..."] is because she realises this is about her and the Doctor has been caught up in it? IDK.
Oooo, interesting. I like that.
(no subject)
Date: 8 Aug 2011 10:48 pm (UTC)Perhaps they wanted to destroy everything around River but keep her alive as a kind of punishment, a "you wanna join the good guys? Here's what we can do to you" kind of thing.
>>if all you wanted to do was shoot him, couldn't you have managed that long ago?
Well, with the timey-wimey, from their perspective they could have tried shooting him *before* putting him in the box? I had an idea the whole blowinguptheuniverse thing was a last ditch attempt to stop what the Doctor does in the future ever happening... from their perspective it should be the end, but from the Doctor's its the start... everything is out of order.
It's got me thinking that if their plan had succeeded, the only thing left in the universe would be River and the Doctor, trapped apart forever. Whatever the Big Bad's issue is it is NOT HAPPY with those two.
(no subject)
Date: 9 Aug 2011 03:54 pm (UTC)I had an idea the whole blowinguptheuniverse thing was a last ditch attempt to stop what the Doctor does in the future ever happening...
*nods* I've been feeling for awhile that TPO/TBB is probably in response to something we haven't seen yet--all the whys are just so nebulous and unexplained. Although, when you get right down to it, "why would someone want to destroy the universe?" is a pretty hard thing to justify . . . Hmmm, with this 'why didn't they just try shooting him first?' . . . what if maybe the intent *wasn't* really to end the universe but to get the Doctor to do exactly what he did: wipe himself out of all of space and time in order to bring the universe back? If it weren't for Amy and her freaky memory and the Power of Stories, you might have ended up with a universe more or less as it was but without the Doctor and without River Song . . . I saw a spec that said that River wasn't at Amy and Rory's wedding because that's where she belonged, but that she was "unraveling" in the same way that the Doctor did as he was being unmade, and she had simply followed her timeline all the way back to the day she was conceived so that, essentially, handing over the diary would have been the last thing she did before she disappeared. I don't know if we'd ever get confirmation of that, but I kind of like it as a notion.
It's got me thinking that if their plan had succeeded, the only thing left in the universe would be River and the Doctor, trapped apart forever. Whatever the Big Bad's issue is it is NOT HAPPY with those two.
Wow, that is some impressive spite. You know, I rather love that, no matter what the explanations are for what was going on, the picture will be mind-blowingly epic.
(no subject)
Date: 9 Aug 2011 07:04 pm (UTC)Yeah, that's the only issue I have with all my theories. Why do something to your enemies that causes YOU to not exist, as well? Although enemies in the past have been psychotic enough that not existing was also part of their goal... I like your idea that the *point* was to get the Doctor to disappear, though- that's even more effective than locking him up forever... having him simply never exist would make the Earth easier to subjugate in the past as well as the present and future...
...Whoa. River unravelling through time is kind of genius. Her existance is so dependant on the Doctor that that's plausible, plus she's time travelled extensively. And her giving Amy the diary as an adult is a neat kind of symmetry to the Doctor telling Amelia the bed time story. I like that a lot. But then how does she appear at the wedding afterwards? Does she come back when the Doctor does? (scratches head)
(no subject)
Date: 9 Aug 2011 09:15 pm (UTC)I guess she'd pop back into existence when the Doctor did? IDK, I don't actually expect to get firm answers about what was going on with her there, but I like the thought of it.
(no subject)
Date: 9 Aug 2011 09:29 pm (UTC)