'Doctor Who' Season Three Overview: Part 5 - 'Humanity'

Cult Spy continues its look at the recent Doctor Who season's key themes and issues...

Humanity

The good Doctor has always had an affinity with all things human, spending much of his ten incarnations fending off extra-terrestrial invasions of the Earth. But in the third season of the revived series, the theme of humanity – and what it engenders – really came to the fore.

Before The Doctor actually became ‘human’ – in the aptly titled ‘Human Nature’ – one can trace the theme back to the season’s opening episode ‘Smith and Jones’. Under threat from the Judoon, The Doctor effectively ‘borrows’ Martha’s humanity (via a temporary genetic transfer) from her saliva in order to fool the intergalactic cops about his nature.

‘Gridlock’ features much meditation on the essence of humanity. The sheer human spirit and capacity for survival can be found in the solidarity amongst those trapped in the eternal traffic jam. This is best demonstrated by the epiphanic moment when the humans all sing their daily hymn together, a real moment of hope against the adversity. This pseudo-wartime spirit is later echoed in ‘The Family of Blood’, when the schoolchildren gather their weapons and take arms against the threat.

Unlike races that function on logic a great deal, like Daleks and Cybermen, humanity has many varied emotions at hand to call upon. This can be a curse, as demonstrated by their packaging into ‘mood drugs’ by the high-street vendors in ‘Gridlock’, but can also be a desirable property. Just witness the temporally-shifted Dalek Sec’s desire to get his grubby little protuberances on those distinct human qualities in the ‘Daleks in Manhattan’ two-parter.

Most overtly, The Doctor’s strategic evasion manoeuvre in ‘Human Nature’ means that he is genetically changed to adopt the guise of an Earthling. His unique Time Lord powers are bubbling beneath the surface somewhere, as evidence by the cricket ball incident, but the comparative frailties of his human ‘John Smith’ persona are plain to be seen.

However, whilst this seeming ‘impotence’ may be evident in his abilities to fend off The Family of Blood, The Doctor/John Smith is able to achieve a certain virility by hooking up with Joan and courting her. Images of future marriage, happiness and children can be neatly juxtaposed with the apparent inability of The Doctor to come to terms with his relationship with Martha, who clearly harbours feelings of love for him.

Once back in his Time Lord guise, he still wishes for Joan to be a part of his future but to no avail. Deprived of human status, he reverts back to his previous relationship with Martha, which tends to revolve around an inability to express feelings. This also harks back to The Doctor’s hesitation when telling Rose at the end of the second season that he loves her. He fades before he can. As we’ve seen recently, it was Martha’s turn to fade out of The Doctor’s life, as she seeks to return to a normal human existence.