I want to do a YouTube video “essay” about why the Doctor being an adoptee and foundling not originally from Gallifrey works, from an adoptee’s perspective. I’ve written the script for it, but just need to have the confidence to actually make it and post it on YouTube. Gonna try and get that video released on March 1st, the 5th anniversary of The Timeless Children.
My thoughts about the Timeless Child. I think the issue is with the actual Timeless Child concept, the Doctor being the origin of regeneration, I completely understand why people don’t like that because without the Doctor the Time Lords wouldn’t exist, which makes them an integral part of their existence and really important. But the other concepts revealed or based on past lore in The Timeless Children like incarnations before Hartnell’s Doctor (The Power of the Daleks, The Brain of Morbius Part 4, 7th Doctor’s Era), them playing a part in the creation of Time Lord society as a pioneer (The Daleks Part 7, 7th Doctor’s era), and being an adoptee and foundling not originally from Gallifrey all fits with the Doctor’s character and the canon of the show. I think what would’ve helped is if there were scenes in Series 12 where the Doctor thought back to those previous stories to show fans and the general audience that the reveals are built on established lore, like for example after Fugitive of the Judoon the Doctor has a flashback of her mind-bending battle with Morbius and the Pre-Hartnell faces appearing, and in The Timeless Children when the Doctor discovers that Hartnell was not their first face and they were a Time Lord pioneer, a flashback to The Daleks Part 7 when Hartnell’s Doctor told the Thals that he was a pioneer amongst his own people. I’m definitely gonna write scripts of what this could look like.
This sounds interesting, make sure to leave a link to it, if you possibly do it. As somebody who has been doing Videos (less “essays”, more so review/rambles), I can give you the advice to try to read out loud the script a few times before you actually record it, at least for me, it helped quite a lot before I actually did some recordings for my earlier scripted Videos. Either way it takes a lot, so don’t feel bad if you may have to delay this to a different point in time, I myself sometimes forced myself to hit a certain date despite not feeling it and/or not having the confidence for it, which resulted in a poor video (at least for me, many have different other experiences).
Either way, take your time with it, no need to hit a certain date, while a nice idea and I certainly root for you to hit it, don’t be too harsh on yourself if you don’t.
Hope you didn’t mind me rambling some advices in terms of that Either way I am sure you will do a great Job!
I really liked the reveal that Ruby’s birth parents were humans and not Gods or Time Lords, that it was the power of belief in Ruby’s mind that made her mother’s existence powerful. But I think why and how that happened could’ve been made clearer.
With the face of Ruby’s birth mother Louise being shadowed and glitching past Ruby whenever she tried to see her, what I got from that was that Ruby’s perception of her birth mother became everyone else’s perception and started to affect reality like glitching the time window, because if you think about it, that’s what Ruby’s birth mum has ever been to her, an unknown woman with an unknown face that she can never reach or see.
In 73 Yards I think this perception of her birth mother is used by the fairy circle as her punishment for breaking it, the Woman always at a distance that Ruby can never reach or see.
I think the perception of her birth mother becoming real could’ve been made more clear if there was a scene mid-series where Ruby and the Doctor opened up to each other about being adoptees and foundlings and not knowing where they come from, with Ruby telling the Doctor that all her birth mother has ever been to her is a blank face that she can never see or reach, that foreshadows the reveal in the finale that it was Ruby’s power of belief becoming reality.
This is a lovely take I hadn’t thought of before. It adds something to Ruby’s reaction when she finally sees the real woman and that unknown becomes a known.
And because Ruby’s perception of her birth mother became real and made her invisible, that then scared Gods like Maestro and Sutekh because to them, this Woman was deliberately concealing her identity from everyone for a mystery reason and purpose, even from powerful beings like them. And so Sutekh would naturally come to the conclusion that she was a threat who’d able to over power and defeat him, and so he needed to know who Ruby’s birth mother was so he could defeat her. You’re able to come up with all sorts of conclusions when there’s a gap, an unknown. Knowing this now has made Empire of Death a lot more enjoyable for me.
I think Ruby’s adoption storyline was really important because it showed that it’s okay for adoptees to think about their birth parents and want to reconnect with their birth family if it’s a possibility. There’s a misconception in society that adoptees either thinking about or wanting to connect with their birth family is betraying and being ungrateful to their adoptive family, but that’s far from reality, it’s not an either or situation. An adoptee can have both their adoptive family and birth family in their lives if they want to, it doesn’t mean that they love their adoptive family less. The type of contact with birth family also depends upon the reason for not being in their care.
In the UK for the last several decades, the main reason for adoption starts with a child being placed into foster care by social services because they were unsafe with their birth parents, and if kinship care or special guardianship isn’t a possible option because sometimes problems can run through both the maternal and paternal family, then adoption will be the decided care plan. And so children having contact with their birth parents is difficult in these kinds of situations because they were unsafe people. This was my experience.
I will be sharing some personal and sensitive stuff, so feel free to skip this paragraph.
To share a bit of my experience and where I am now, I’m currently in the process of contacting my birth mum, but all through my adoption social worker because I don’t feel comfortable enough with reaching out to her on my own, and for the foreseeable future will only be letters and meetings between her and my social worker on my behalf. Depending on how that goes, and if I ever feel comfortable enough, I might decide to have face to face contact with her one day, but that would have to be a supervised meeting with my social worker. Unfortunately I can’t have contact with my birth dad because I discovered a few months ago that he died in 2015, which is always a scary possibility for adoptees who are thinking about meeting their birth parents. I think this is one of the reasons why the Doctor hasn’t gone looking for his birth family, because one of the scary possibilities is that they’re dead and will never be able to reconnect with them.
But with Ruby’s experience, she was left by her birth mother Louise out of love so she didn’t grow up in an abusive household, Louise and William (birth father) weren’t unsafe people, and so contact with them is a more realistic possibility with a happier outcome than an adoptee like me who was removed from my birth parents because of safety reasons.
One of the criticisms about Ruby’s parentage story was Louise wearing a cloak to the Church, because it’s quite a dramatic thing to wear out in public. But on further inspection, it’s actually just a hooded cape coat that ends just below the waist like a normal coat, unlike a proper Traitors or Harry Potter style cape that goes down to the ankles. Hooded cape coats are actually quite fashionable, over what could be a black pinafore dress. So it’s quite appropriate clothing for Christmas I’d say, it’s something you’d wear if you were going out into the cold and snow. Also, it makes sense that Louise would want to wear something with a hood, not only because of the snow, but also to conceal her identity so her face wouldn’t be seen by any person or CCTV, so she wouldn’t be traced back to Ruby and because she probably felt a lot of shame for leaving her daughter, it’s really heartbreaking. I think it just unintentionally appears dramatic because at first glance it looks like an actual cape.
Thank you for posting this and giving a real life and personal perspective on adoption. I know people were critical of the way that storyline ended so hopefully this will help them appreciate a different point of view.
To add to this comment, I just wanted to say that I absolutely love my mum, dad, and the rest of my (adoptive) family, they are without a doubt my real family because they have been what a real family is, there for me. And they have all been so supportive with my desire to find out about and meet my birth family. No jealousy or anger at all. I think adoption and adoptive families has always been one of the core themes of the show, with how the Doctor continually adopts companions and has built a gigantic adoptive family on Earth, I’m surprised it’s actually taken this long for the show to acknowledge it. That’s then inspired several companions to look after children who needed care, like Sarah Jane adopting Luke, Tegan adopting a son, Rory and Amy adopting Anthony, and Ben and Polly running an orphanage in India. I’m sure that many other companions have gone onto adopt or foster children too. Jo Grant has seven children, her and Clifford definitely seem like the kind of people who’d adopt children. I really hope the show keeps building on this and continues to highlight how adoption has been and is a core theme. This is one reason why it fits for the Doctor to be an adoptee.
Hey everyone, created this topic page to share and talk about Adoption and Doctor Who so I can put my thoughts on here instead of on my introduction page.
I encourage everyone to read @thegallifreyanrebel’s perspective on this subject. Absolutely fascinating and hugely important in terms of looking at Ruby’s storyline. The post about the cloak has even made me reconsider my position on that (I didn’t think it made sense before now).
After The Angels Take Manhattan, there was an unmade minisode in storyboard form that was released called P.S. where Rory’s Dad Brian is visited by his grandson.
In The Sarah Jane Adventures, Death of the Doctor, Sarah Jane tells Rani and Clyde about the Doctor’s companions she’s researched.
Related to Amy and Rory, what do we think, was the Doctor messing around with a time distortion equalizer thing New York in Mysterio to find a way to fix the time issues with the city to visit Amy and Rory, the parents of his recently lost wife?
Either way I am sure you will do a great Job!
