Drive-By Rewatch Thoughts: The Vampires of Venice

[radiantbaby]

Rewatching 'Vampires of Venice' and it occurs to me that while part of me really likes when Rory says to the Doctor:

"You know what’s dangerous about you? It’s not that you make people take risks, it’s that you make them want to impress you. You make it so they don’t want to let you down. You have no idea how dangerous you make people to themselves when you’re around."

...I'm not sure it makes sense narratively. I mean, how would Rory know that about the Doctor's past and how things have been with his companions? Yes, he can probably extrapolate that being the case for Amy wanting to impress him, but it sounds bigger than that, like he's dropping some big meta on Eleven about the whole Doctor/Companion dynamic.

Hmm.

(Funny, that leap of logic gets quite over-looked in fandom while people can't seem to let go of the Amy-making-a-Star-Whale-and-Time-Lord-comparison. Both are equally problematic in ways, but then I think more people are out there looking for issues with Amy than they are with Rory. But that's a rant for another time.)

And, by the way, speaking of Rory, while I actually like him, he's quite passive-aggressive about the whole kissing incident and generally controlling of Amy in this episode in a way that makes me uncomfortable. I get that he's a bit upset with her over the kiss (which, considering, feels weird coming from a guy who just had a stripper at his stag-night), but the way he handles it is just a bit squicky. He's better by the end though, so that's good. And I want to like him, I do, and generally -- mostly due to the awesomeness of Arthur Darvill -- I do like him, but sometimes he comes off as a bit whiny and clingy and that's really just no fun. I value independence in relationships, not co-dependence.

Comments

[nostalgia-lj.livejournal.com]

Funny, that leap of logic gets quite over-looked in fandom while people can't seem to let go of the Amy-making-a-Star-Whale-and-Time-Lord-comparison. Both are equally problematic in ways, but then I think more people are out there looking for issues with Amy than they are with Rory.

I think the Amy one was more obvious in that it's a plot-resolution and not just one line? What Rory says is just about passable if it's based on what he personally feels about the Doctor (wanting to impress him), whereas hers is a bit "Wait, hasn't she only known him about five minutes?" If anything I think what gets passed on too easily is Rose and Donna knowing stuff about the Doctor within about two seconds. And there's that constant thing back to the olden days where villains get overly scared of some guy dressed as a charity shop who only just showed up and become obssessed with capturing and/or killing him.


I get that he's a bit upset with her over the kiss (which, considering, feels weird coming from a guy who just had a stripper at his stag-night)

It seemed odd to me when the obvious explanation is that she's a kissagram and the Doctor was one of her customers, but that doesn't occur to Rory at all. He does get over it, though, so that's something. He doesn't annoy me as such I just keep forgetting that he exists. I may have, erm, skipped most of his bits in The Pandorica Opens.

Speaking of, how do they know where the Pandorica is just from a painting of Ur TARDIS Asplode? I never caught that for some reason.

[evilgeniuslady.livejournal.com]

To be fair, Rory has actually seen the Doctor in action, in Eleventh Hour, and he's experienced first-hand the way both Jeff, Amy and Rory himself reacts to the Doctor firing on all cylinders. Jeff in particular was a good example of the way the Doctor gets people to impress him, but you also had the Doctor getting Amy to trick her way into the hospital using her police costume. It's not like Venice is the first time Rory actually sees this particular trait of the Doctor in action.

[stick-poker.livejournal.com]

I know what you mean; that line seems to stick out a bit in context. If I can defend the stripper thing, though, stag dos are where the best man and other friends generally try to inflict all the cliches of stag dos on the stag as much as anything - he looked quite 'oh god, suppose I should grin and get through this' when then cake came in.

Perhaps early Rory had to be shown to be a bit not-quite in order to be more transformatively badass later on, too.

[abstruse-fangrl.livejournal.com]

I think that Rory more or less extrapolated that if the Doctor does this so easily with Amy, he probably does it with just about everyone he meets. And maybe knowing Amy, he can feel/see the difference in her when it comes to the Doctor.

There may be a bit of him feeling as if he also wants to impress the Doctor (because he & the guy w/the laptop whose name escapes me seemed to go through that a bit during the Eleventh hour), but I think it's more so that he just sees how easily the Doctor steers people into that sort of situation/mindset.

As far as the kiss vs. stripper, I think it's more so that it's one thing for Amy to do the kissagram thing as her job, but it's another thing for her to kiss someone else because she wants to. And as far as his stag party, people usually have things thrust upon them by their friends in that situation, so it's probably not like he chose it, whereas he would see Amy choosing to kiss the Doctor which might make him wonder just what's going on in her head/heart when it comes to them (Rory/Amy).

I don't think he was co-dependent so much as he was concerned.

I haven't seen this episode in ages (still trying to breakdown and get the DVDs for a proper re-watch), but from what I remember, I think that's how I read it. ;)

[chloris.livejournal.com]

It may not make much sense since he doesn't know the Doctor well at that point, but I still love it! I think it's supposed to show that Rory is rather insightful. That and his lines when he first goes in the TARDIS. To be fair to him though, he has had A LOT of time to think about the Doctor and he did see the Doctor in action before this episode.