An Hour of Who a Day: July 22: "The Woman Who Lived"

July 22: "The Woman Who Lived"

Stuart Manning's poster for "The Woman
Who Lived" (from Incredible set of retro
Doctor Who series 9 posters)

After 7 years (not since 2008's "The Sontaran Stratagem" / "The Poison Sky" 2-parter, to be precise), we finally get a female writer on Doctor Who proper again (although apparently not, as Steven Moffat stressed, for want of trying). This is Catherine Tregenna's first story for Doctor Who itself, but you might remember her name from some of the better episodes of the first two series of Torchwood.

So, despite the similarities in names between this and the previous episode (and the "TO BE CONTINUED" thing at the end of "The Girl Who Died"), "The Woman Who Lived" doesn't feel like part 2 of a 2-parter so much as a sequel that happens to directly follow the original story. I can't quite decide if that's a good thing or not; on the one hand, it's rather jarring to go from Ashildr's characterization last week to Me's characterization this week, and so perhaps putting a story in between (maybe the "Under the Lake" 2-parter?) might have helped smoothed things over; on the other hand, part of me wonders if this disconcerting feeling isn't in fact the point of the exercise.

Because make no mistake, the intervening 800 years have changed Ashildr/Me, and not for the better. If the person we saw last week was kind and caring, the person she's become is bitter and cruel, seeming to blame the Doctor for her woes and believing him to be a coward. "So you intend to fix me?" she says bitterly to the Doctor. "Make me feel again, then run away? I don't need your help, Doctor; you need mine. Just this once, you can't run off like you usually do." Scenes like this are probably meant to be somewhat accusatory toward the Doctor, to make us question him and his motives, but since we've already had plenty of that up to this point (see just about every episode Toby Whithouse has ever done), this didn't really engage me; instead my primary feeling was one of pity for Me, seeing her brought to this state. She's exhibiting an all-too-human reaction, yes, but it's still sad to see how much pain and anguish she had allowed to enter her heart. Mind you, the script isn't unaware of this, as a later exchange makes clear:

DOCTOR: Oh, Ashildr, daughter of Einarr, what happened to you?
ME: You did, Doctor. You happened. ... You still won't take me with you. You gad about while I trudge through the centuries, day by day, hour by hour. Do you ever think or care what happens after you've flown away? I live in the world you leave behind, because you abandoned me to it.
DOCTOR: Why should I be responsible for you?
ME: You made me immortal.
DOCTOR: I saved your life. I didn't know that your heart would rust because I kept it beating. I didn't think your conscience would need renewing, that the well of human kindness would run dry. I just wanted to save a terrified young woman's life.
ME: You didn't save my life, Doctor. You trapped me inside it.

(from The Doctor Who Transcripts - The Woman Who Lived)

These are obviously some heavy moments; so heavy, in fact, that the comparative lightness of the rest of the story feels slightly unbalanced. It probably doesn't help that the alien plotline with Leandro the Lionman isn't terribly compelling, and in fact doesn't actually take up much screentime, despite its ostensibly driving much of the story.

What does help, though, is Rufus Hound's performance as Sam Swift the outlaw, who gives a fun performance, with a generous dose of gallows humor that intentionally feels slightly desperate, as he knows that once he stops telling jokes they'll hang him. In some ways Sam Swift is the antithesis of Me; Me says she steals for the adventure of it, but she never seems to be having much actual fun doing it, while Sam Swift seems so happy to be alive (both before and after he's pardoned) that it's hard not to get swept up in his spirit a little bit. In fact, I wonder if the story had focused a little more on the contrast between the two, if that might not have sharpened some of the points being made.

So while I can see what they're all trying to do, and I think they do a good job of it, nevertheless it's hard to say I actually liked "The Woman Who Lived". This is, for me at least, an episode that is much easier to appreciate and respect than it is to actually enjoy.