(no subject)

[retro_eidas]

Ok, this won't be much of a spec unless I find that passage in Hero with a Thousand Faces I'm looking for and I've been nosing through it for the past 10 min and can't find what I'm looking for. In any case, there has been plenty of spec around OG and elsewhere that the explosion we see in the midseason and "The Sound of Drums" promos....

....Is Martha's flat getting blown up.


An explosion in an apartment with a bay window and orange curtains. Considering the danger likely in store for the Doctor and Martha in the finale? I'd probably say it is a fairly safe bet that is indeed Martha's flat going boom.

Why am I bringing up Campbellian metaphor attached to that? In many stories that follow the Hero's Journey, a catalyst is sometimes needed to push the Hero into his/her Departure (usually when the call is rejected or possibly about to be if the Hero is facing a choice) and stepping through the First Threshold. Sometimes painful or symbolic and often in the literal destruction of the home. Luke Skywalker's aunt and uncle were murdered and his home was burned down. In Full Metal Alchemist, the Elric brothers burn down their home before they set off to find the Philosopher's Stone. Harry Potter's parents are murdered and his home demolished. Arthur Dent's home and planet are demolished before he heads off with Ford. Of course, the difference seemingly being between these Heroes and Martha Jones, instead of the destruction of her home happening at the beginning, it's seemingly in the finale of this season, or as some speculate, the end of her travels with the Doctor. However, if Martha's story does follow along the Campbellian archetypes, the destruction of her flat would make me think Martha's journey has only just begun (also tied to what I'm going to assume is an imminent catharsis for the Doctor and his issues, namely with Bad Wolf). Symbolized by the destruction of her flat. That she has yet to actually step through the Threshold and something has been holding her (and possibly the Doctor as well) back.

Now this might mean Martha may go on - due to being forever altered by her time with the Doctor - setting off on a new, perhaps drastically different path in life but not one that necessarily ties directly with the Doctor. However, Martha is something of a late bloomer where her companionship has been concerned. She didn't become "official" companion until "The Lazarus Experiment" and since then she's still often been undermined by the Doctor via the shadow of the companion that came before her. It's like she hasn't yet been able to completely become a proper companion with the Doctor unable to move on from his various issues. Kind of like Martha being Jonah and the Doctor is (or his issues are) the whale or perhaps for Who, Martha is Red Ridinghood and the Doctor is the [bad?] wolf. The Doctor himself consumed by memories of the companion (aka, "Bad Wolf") who came before Martha and thus keeping Martha unintentionally at arm's length. IOW, the Doctor also as Red Ridinghood trapped in the belly of the [Bad] Wolf.

The idea that the passage of the magical threshold is a transit into a sphere of rebirth is symbolized in the worldwide womb image of the belly of the whale. The hero, instead of conquering or conciliating the power of the threshold, is swallowed into the
unknown, and would appear to have died.

The Hero with a Thousand Faces, pg90 (The Belly of the Whale), Joseph Campbell

Allegorically, then, the passage into a temple and the hero-dive through the jaws of the whale are identical adventures, both denoting, in picture language, the life-centering, life-renewing act.

The Hero with a Thousand Faces, pg92 (The Belly of the Whale), Joseph Campbell

That although the Doctor gave her a key and says she was never really just a passenger, at the same time she has been made to feel not entirely full-fledged either. Like this whole season has basically been the Doctor and Martha at the cusp of the Threshold, while Martha has desperately been trying to push him through... but he's been (again, unknowingly) extremely stubborn and resistant. Like he's terrified to take that final step, but until he does, the journey and their lives (and relationship) remain stagnant. They're both trapped in the belly of the beast. One way or another, the Doctor is going to have to breach that Threshold and most likely with Martha's direct assistance/guidance. It's interesting to note that in that same chapter of The Hero with a Thousand Faces, it mentions the Osiris myth (being trapped in a sarcophagus by his brother Set = belly of the whale). Upon return - rescued by Isis - his brother Set tears him into fourteen pieces. We're reminded of the Doctor's loss of his hand in "Utopia" from all the way back in "The Christmas Invasion". Of course, if there is any similar symbolism being used here via the Osiris myth, this would seem to indicate the Doctor possibly not being quite right - "torn to pieces" - all the way back in "The Christmas Invasion" (possibly indicative of the regeneration going not very smoothly at all). Since having the vortex within him in "The Parting of the Ways"? He has - perhaps literally - been consumed by Bad Wolf and he's been in it's belly for almost two whole seasons. A(n emotional and physical) sarcophagus - literal in the case of "The Last of the Time Lords" (as according to the press release he's being held prisoner by Saxon) - from where he's waiting to be released. Who holds the key in releasing him? Probably the one the Doctor gave the TARDIS key to back in "42". Also the one who liberated him from the Sun possession. Who brought him back to life not once (restarted his hearts), but several times. Not unlike how Isis brought Osiris back to life from being sealed in the sarcophagus and put him back together after being torn to pieces by Set.

It does make me think Martha kind of must still be in season 4 and the Doctor's companion and her real Hero's Journey (as his companion) won't start until either "The Last of the Time Lords" or the season 4 premiere. After the Doctor can be liberated of those issues holding him - and his relationship with Martha - back. Then the relationship, the Hero's Journey, can truly start for the both of them.

Comments

[darenothope.livejournal.com]

This is really interesting and in depth and if I wasn't so sleepy and hungry I'd write a lengthier comment.

First off ... I agree that Martha's apartment is blown up. I think Jack and the Doctor stop off at her apartment where she gets a change of clothes. There's a shot in the trailer of the Doctor in front of a green wall which I think is Martha's apartment.

Someone suggested that in the process of her saving the world, possibly by herself, that she could die. She has to sacrifice herself to save the world. I think she's going to have to choose between her family and the Doctor. I think maybe Saxon has them both captive and she has too choose and then in the end she can't choose between them. No matter how distant she feels she is to her family and no matter how much she thinks the Doctor doesn't care for her she won't be able to choose. So she might suggest herself, even though there is that looming threat of death. Although Saxon might be all "Why would I want you??" That might be too fanfic-y. But I think she'll be ready to die.

I think her apartment blowing up and her family being involved with push her to start her journey. She's going to want to step up because before it was only her life on the line and now it's her family as well.

I think she will be in season 4. I don't know what the cliffie for this season will be but I think she'll be in season 4. And season 3 was Martha nd the Doctor's kinda transition period. A long one. And after all they've been through they finally went that one step further and can be proper companion and Doctor.

... hopefully that made sense. I'm half asleep.

Great post.

[juanitadark.livejournal.com]

You know what's interesting here is that Martha is almost a doctor and that doctor's have their Hippocratic Oath and duty to their patients. So given the choice of Doctor or her family. Martha might trump both and opt to save the human race period.

I also think Martha will be in S4 but maybe she might be missing in the Christmas ep and that the first few eps will deal with finding her and then what she's been involved in during the time she's been lost. And then they'll have a few adventures that broaden their growth as characters and their relationship and then they'll maybe have to part ways.

[darenothope.livejournal.com]

Martha might trump both and opt to save the human race period.
Yes, I didn't think of that. I think that's a very likely option. The good of one vs the good of many.

I think she'll be slightly absent in the Christmas ep, what with the apparent stunt casting of Kylie Minogue. Her and the Doctor on the quest to find Martha in the Christmas special, maybe?

[juanitadark.livejournal.com]

Oddly enough, for some random reason, I've always considered the Kylie character to either be a brief cameo, or an oracle figure of some sort. I don't know anything but I always think of her guest appearance like that.

[cedara]

I do hope - if she really is in the Xmas one - that she plays an unrecognizable alien. And doesn't sing.

[juanitadark.livejournal.com]

lolz!

I don't think she'll sing but I don't think she'll be unrecognisable either.

Maybe something like the Green Fairy in Moulin Rouge, then?

However, if she says a line like: "You have lost somebody." I will go to my grave laughing.

[cedara]

I will go to my grave laughing.

Hee.

[eido.livejournal.com]

I probably wouldn't complain to loudly if she chose to sing "Slow" (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eWtaGn9kg2U)
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Stop looking at me like that.

[darenothope.livejournal.com]

Well, apparently she's getting in some acting classes before she does her guest stint. I wouldn't mind it if it was just a cameo but I suppose if they have her on the show they might use her properly.

[juanitadark.livejournal.com]

I think they will. She'll probably be a queen of something who helps the Doctor out.

[darenothope.livejournal.com]

I keep imagining her as an alien queen or something.

[darenothope.livejournal.com]

I keep imagining her as an alien queen or something.

[eido.livejournal.com]

So given the choice of Doctor or her family. Martha might trump both and opt to save the human race period.

Since I've been on a whole Campbell kick lately, I might as well keep the ball rolling, but this strongly reminds me of something I read in The Power of Myth about the Holy Grail:

CAMPBELL: There's a very interesting statement about the origin of the Grail. One early writer says that the Grail was brought from heaven by the neutral angels. You see, during the war in heaven between God and Satan, between good and evil, some angelic hosts sided with Satan and some with God. The Grail was brought down through the middle by the neutral angels. It represents that spiritual path that is between pairs of opposites, between fear and desire, between good and evil.

The theme of the Grail romance is that the land, the country, the whole territory of concern has been laid waste. It is called a wasteland. And what is the nature of the wasteland? It is a land where everybody is living an inauthentic life, doing as other people do, doing as you're told, with no courage for your own life. That is the wasteland. And that is what T. S. Eliot meant in his poem The Waste Land.

In a wasteland the surface does not represent the actuality of what it is supposed to be representing, and people are living inauthentic lives. "I've never done a thing I wanted to in all my life. I've done as I was told." You know?

The Power of Myth, pg 224

Weeping Angels, Archangel, the Doctor as God and the Master as Satan and an Eliot (tying to TLE) reference. Martha as one that seems prone to walk the Middle Path, the middle child trying to be peacemaker and find balance in her own warring family? I could imagine she could fit the bill of those "neutral angels". Through her choice of path, helping the Doctor come to peace within himself, looking at things through a new perspective (for her, humans and maybe the Master too).

[eido.livejournal.com]

Someone suggested that in the process of her saving the world, possibly by herself, that she could die. She has to sacrifice herself to save the world. I think she's going to have to choose between her family and the Doctor. I think maybe Saxon has them both captive and she has too choose and then in the end she can't choose between them. No matter how distant she feels she is to her family and no matter how much she thinks the Doctor doesn't care for her she won't be able to choose. So she might suggest herself, even though there is that looming threat of death.

I could definitely see this happening. The Master, her family and the Doctor pulling at her from these different sides but she chooses none of them. Walks the Middle Path like Buddha and ends up rising higher than all of them, an Apotheosis of the finest order.