I wonder if it is Russell T. Davies' job to write the campy ones? His Slitheen episodes were similar to this one, lighthearted and campy, goofy and geeky, which, truth be told, is not all bad, if you're expecting it...yet, how about a Shakespearean run? A tragic tale bekindled by a snag joke or two? leaving the fart and ass jokes behind? (no pun intended there, indeed) I don't know why Davies is keen to include this kind of toilet humor, if in fact, he is satisfying himself, or those needs of the general viewing public, but come on! Is it always necessary to resort to toilet humor? Bliss being absorbed into the Absorbaloff, straight to his arse?
Love & Monsters was, well, not extremely difficult to watch, save for the thoughts and ideas that reside behind the campy commentary...it seems to bridge the gap in the understanding of the "common man and woman" perspective, those "joes" which one witnesses running away from that explosion in downtown London, or that other one who was almost "upgraded" by the invading Cybermen...the idea that there are many in this mythos who are directly and indirectly impacted by the Doctor and his (mis)adventures, and the dialogue of this episode seems to address this, to address how and what he leaves behind besides his legend...it also speaks to the viewers who have been along with the Doctor as his "silent companions" for all these years and episodes, traveling to the farthest reaches of the universe, in time and space. There is a feeling of victory and triumph in these tellings, fear, intelligence, the unknown, etc...and the idea of the payment one must render in the experience of such power, that those who come in contact with the Doctor, especially the ones closest to him, get burned in the end, that the adventure, for him at least,always continues on, and yet for all those others, it can stop at any time, in essence, death awaits from this life at any time, so live whilst one can, experience whatever one can, for the ride with the Doctor will surely come to a close at some point in your life, as every one of these characters can attest to...
It also addresses the Doctor being a "god" figure in the Davies/Tennant incarnation, that this character has the ability to bring people together, the power, in fact, to do so, which is portrayed here in a most campy light: the LINDA group and its further activities...starts out as a means to find him this strange "alien", but turns into a self-help, hobby, interest group of friends devoted to being together and spending time together, coming closer to each other in the process...which, i can see now, is an example of this wholesome image that Davies has been criticized for, this almost Disney version of a once terrible man...in fact, the Abosrbaloff rattles off a series of adjectives, including "sweet" which the Doctor cannot attest to (no!) ...
So the campy ELO scenes, the SUPERCAMP Scooby-Doo scene where they are running in and out of the various rooms being chased by the monster...what the hell? Since that one was towards the beginning, it has the effect of setting the tone for the entire episode, which is: oh, be prepared, this ones gonna be campy! And yet there were some nice storytelling ideas that cropped out,including the story of Elton (another camp device btw) when he was young and saw the Doctor in his living room, and as it turns out, the night his mother dies, and the portrayal of how this was affecting him, this was well done...but I mean, come on, LINDA forming a band? and then goofily playing an ELO cover? "Don't Bring Me Down"? I think? CAMP! the thing is, i can't enjoy it! it isn't a delicious camp, that one can savor from a Fulci film or from "Evil Dead II". I suppose for something to be excellent camp, it cannot be forced, that, in truth, it only comes out that way, for camp to be induced on purpose, and with a sizable budget, will not be effective, or at least, I've never seen it pulled off with these qualifications, or even double at least, the guys down at BBC and Davies just don't have the artistic vision, nor the ability to pull off prized camp, if indeed it is what they are trying to accomplish, and, sadly, if not, then all it is reduced to is just poor storytelling and a wholesome Disney portrayal to satisfy the mediocre watching tastes of general Joe and Jane Viewer who do not care to divulge for an instant a shred of a thought or reflection about what they witness on the "telly", and that this episode was for them "pretty good" and "ha-ha" at best...
Makes me wonder if the producers, executive or otherwise, (including Davies), and any higher-ups in BBC entertainment management, have a goal or simplified plan of what is expected from a series such as Doctor Who? And I wonder if, in fact, they have a formula, much like radio stations have formulas for playlists, on how a season is to be arranged, to achieve the highest rating potentials, for, from what I understand, Doctor Who is huge in Britain, and so, to keep things the way they are, if they expect certain things, like "safe" episodes, ones that people are not going to have to think about or trouble themselves to understand, BUT, mix these lighter tropes with the actual "great" episodes that lie therein, a la Dalek, The Impossible Planet, The Satan Pit, Midnight, etc....that these are indeed necessary over the season's story arc to flesh out and balance the season out...I would say "why?" on all the great albums there are no fillers, in fact, fillers are only there to flesh out an album so that they can call it thus, to basically support buying a full album just for the two (maybe three if you're lucky) hits that have driven sales and interest in the first place, I just want to know, does Davies think these episodes are of quality? or does he know, and only follows a formula? And why does it always seem to be Davies that writes them? Lost was guilty of this as well, filler episodes, and I only wonder why? Does it fill up space that couldn't be filled with quality storytelling because of poor scripts from a pool of nothing but? budget and/or time constraints? why can't they all be "mind-breaking" instead of some opting out for the "mind-numbing" category?
But, besides all this complaining, how do these fillers develop the overall story and/or characters? How did Love & Monsters? As mentioned before, it did well in the description of those he leaves behind and their coming together because of him in some way; that the character in essence is great, for he bridges bonds together between disparates, and forges them through his name, (so god-like is it not?) and this is a lighthearted telling of that phenomenon, in fact, the Doctor and Rose are only in this episode for a max of perhaps five minutes...his legacy and memory and effects are what drives this one forward...Elton's monologue at the end pretty much sums up the story: that out of convention, there is unusual strangeness, and out of the norm is unknown darkness, and however maddening this is (to live within it), it is so much for the better, so much more beautiful, than a life lived within a box metaphorically and physically (mentally and emotionally as well)...and this abnormality, this outside the box mentality, is what the Doctor represents, symbolizes for us all, and this fake-camp episode tries its best to get at the heart of this idea, and does in places, but yet falls short in the end, (probably reached at its highest peak and development with Martha Jones' season (perhaps the season finale with her?) where she spreads the "News of the Doctor" in an evangelical style (?) this was one of the first episodes I ever saw of the Doctor, has been a while, will be coming up on that one in the next season!)
It tries to do the trick with a seemingly average Joe, who vlogs his life, or, at least, those times of his life when affected by the Doctor, or, that man who was in my living room that night...for, outside of his dropping out of school, getting a job and liking ELO, which works to hammer in the ideas of "normalcy", there was this experience he had when he was younger...and then jumping to those other times in his life when he directly experienced alien intrusion upon the Earth (specifically London) which, lo and behold, were incidents that the Doctor was involved in...and the tragedy for this normal "Joe" aka Elton, which he has even then worked around and established a new set paradigm, was that his one true love, Ursula (played by Shirley Henderson of Harry Potter Moaning Myrtle fame), was trapped in a squared stone, and yet he was able to retrieve her (thanks to the Doctor), and now lives with her, and has actually a "kind-of-a-love-life" with her, and has, in essence, worked around such a tragedy to become a better person, and this is the wonderful horror of being burned by the Doctor, that living outside the box is indeed beautiful and wondrous, and yet it is indeed dangerous, and that one must be prepared to face these harsh truths when they do indeed come, its the whole "living on the edge" mentality and serves to promote this philosophy as a truer way to live, instead of normalcy and convention and rules and comfort, to just letting go and trying something new and facing the strange and the unknown, the darkness, and you do it with those you care about, that is the metaphor of the Doctor and his companion, and all of us "silent companions": that you go through life to struggle and face the unknowns, not to settle for comforts and routines, but you do it not alone, but only with those you care about, for the experience of life is not in a vacuum, and does not reside forever within your own eyes, for it is through the eyes of another that one may witness true bliss...
