#but that’s not the point here martha

[evermorepeyton]

i love the video, i’ve already rewatched it three times Today what can i say

i’ve seen some people saying there was something “off” or “uncomfortable” about it. i can’t relate like im having a blast.

i honestly don’t know what people expect from them, sure dan’s complimented phil many times unprovoked and that’s lovely, but i understand how it can be a bit too much to just do it on camera so directly.

the camera’s on and it’s hard for them to not be a tiny bit like no homo. when that was all they did for years in front of the public. old habits die hard especially when it’s a habit that probably caused them so much anxiety for so long.

imagine being like this is my friend my buddy my roommate for years and trying to deny anything else but constantly being told that no one believes you, so it becomes even more frustrating, and then all of a sudden you both come out and it’s been a few years and it should be okay now, but it’s still a little bit weird (which if you’ve programmed yourself to act a certain way for years, formative ones too, and you’re now going against it, it should be). how is he supposed to look at this man and be like “phil you are the most beautiful man to have ever walked on planet earth”? or whatever you wanted from him.

and still, despite all of that, they’ve managed to make the gayest videos ever since post hiatus. so how is it uncomfortable if they aren’t like sitting on top of each other or something in front of the camera? (and also like they just might someday but not because a card says it)

like i made jokes about it myself because i found it funny that when people don’t ask it from him he will say something like “you looked lovely phil” or point his way when he hears the phrase “beautiful but dense” or whatever. so he’s not incapable of it, it was just a little uncomfortable because they were playing a couples game which they haven’t done before and he’s probably already hyper aware of everything he’s saying, on top of that he’s supposed to be like omg phil you have the most beautiful blue eyes or whatever???

let him post his little ocean blue eyes story and we can all freak out about it, like we do. it’s honestly more than enough. and this video is fantastic to me, what can i say

[neat-crows]

So I've been re-watching dr who for the first time ever rn, with a friend who's never seen it before, so I'm seeing all these episodes for the first time since I was 13 and picking up on a LOT that I never noticed before, and holy shit the tenth doctor is SO WEIRD to Martha Jones, and nothing exemplifies that more than the sontaran stratagem/the poison sky.... like..... he is SO weird the whole way down.

When they first see each other again their introduction directly mirrors Jack and The Doctor's in Utopia

"Doctor" "martha Jones" laugh and hug

"doctor" "captain Jack" laugh and hug

And then! they have a normal interaction!!! WIN he asks how her family is and how she is, and they're smiling and genuinely seem like friends very happy to see each other!

And then.... donna drops the fiance bomb.

He turns with a look of.... almost anger? disbelief? and asks WHAT MAN?? Then martha explains who he is and the doctor....

he looks? upset? and then like, resigned? AND THEN martha admits that her fiance is kind of similar to the doctor, and then donna asks "Is he skinny?" and his reactions

is to make a face like "yeahh" AND START NODDING????? like he's taken Martha's admission to mean she's with a man that's just like him, and honestly seems a bit smug over it, and then when Martha says no-

he looks so taken off guard and betrayed ??????????? BRO we are less than 5 minutes in..............

He then proceeds to be tetchy with her, and to be fair this is mostly because of her involvement with unit, and his discomfort with how militaristic she's gotten - which I think comes both from anger at himself for how he's changed her, and also discomfort that she's no longer "his" Martha, she's changed, and he doesn't know her as well anymore.

he tells her off, he's snide and judgmental, he won't even look at her until she tells him to, and he's honestly bitchy - Until she explains herself, and tells him off for being so judgmental, i also think his line "oh so it's my fault" is very telling because..... it literally is? like yes, you put her in situations where she had to become harder and more used to violence......... and he KNOWS it. He's doing what he did all through series 3, which is feel guilty or bad and then take it out on Martha (that's for another post though) until she stands up for herself (get his ass!!) and then when she's finished she looks at him

determined, but eyes darting back and forth waiting for his reaction, on some small level hoping for his approval

and only THEN does he start to smile, and he tells her "that sounds more like Martha Jones." she's back to feeling like she's still his (to him, Martha is acting incredibly normal and platonic). The doctor has always had a weird possessiveness with Martha, going all the way back to their first episode where he hand picked her, and in this second of her looking for his approval, he feels that again, and he IMMEDIATELY started flirting again - please go watch the scene it boggles my mind how fast he switches.

I also want to be clear, Martha isn't flirting back, she's acting extremely normally. She's clearly taken the time away from him to get over, not only romantic feelings, but any anger as well. She seems to have come to terms with how she feels with everything that happened, and she loves and cares about him, but she's not naive to his faults - I also don't think she even picks up on him being weird to her in this scene. She's no longer in tune with his every mood swing, she's not here to fix him, or cater to his needs, and so she no longer notices these small moments from him.

AND THEN.... the clone.

He never flirts with the clone. The ONLY time, is the very first time they interact, before he's realized something is wrong.

he calls her over to come with him, and his face is honestly way too close to hers. bro is a menace. but then, maybe 2 minutes later, he immediately clocks that this is not Martha.

he realizes there has to be a spy and only has to consider for half a second before he turns and asks about her family, he's already realized she's acting a little off, and the second she answers he's 100% certain.

and he gets MAD. he tells her Donna went home because she's not like her, she's not "a soldier" clearly a shot at the sontarans, but also another subtle test, the real Martha wouldn't let that slide, and he wouldn't say that to the real Martha. He continues saying Avanti, instead of Allonse-y, which is interesting, because he already knows. He's not doing this to confirm his suspicions, he's doing this as retaliation. To confirm to himself he knows Martha better than this fake, he's toying with her. BUT. He doesn't go to save Martha.

The next episode, the doctor's daughter, he refuses to accept the label of soldier, but Jenny rightfully points out that he strategizes like one And this is one such moment. He knows Martha is a clone, he's mad and upset, he could go save her right away, but he doesn't. He doesn't because it serves him best to allow her to keep shutting down the nuclear launch.

It reminds me a lot of when Cassandra possessed Rose in New Earth, he played a long for a little bit, but that was just to figure out what was happening. He IMMEDIATELY tried to fix it, I just wonder if it was any other companion if he would have done this. If it was Donna would he have left her for so long? even if it was strategic? it's this weird conflict the doctor has now that he's very very protective and a bit possessive, but he also treats her like an equal on the battlefield, and it's a weird... trust? he has in her to take care of herself.

I kind of don't want to call it trust because that sounds too positive, but I don't know another way to phrase it, but it's a forced independence and self sufficiency.

but then, he finally goes to save her

He goes and cradles her face gently, and NOTABLY says "good, still alive" MEANING HE DIDN'T KNOW??? and still left her for that long...

but he holds her gently, and fully ignores the clone. He has his back to her, and then proceeds to taunt her. He tells her he clocked her right away because of the pupil size, thin hair, and he says she smells. but we know this isn't true.

Sure maybe those physical traits are true, but that's not how he figured it out, we saw how he did it, he clocked on because he knows Martha so well, but he can't admit that. He can't admit that he knows her just as much as she knows him, just like he couldn't tell Rose he loved her.

He is so deeply angry at this clone, he makes fun of her, he yells at her, he looks at her likes she's nothing

This is his face when he kills her. He doesn't talk to her, or even TRY to save her. And we know she is alive, she has memories, and her own thoughts and feelings, and the doctor kills her while gloating because of his immense anger for hurting Martha. An anger that is also guilt.

he does not speak to her like a person (which directly leads into his treatment of Jenny in the next ep).

Parallel that to how Martha treats her, they talk about their family and she even calls the clone Martha. She really is a doctor in a way ten tried and often failed at.

And then at the end, Donna asks Martha to come with them, and she says no, and that she's happy at home, but she's better for having traveled and come back.

And the doctor looks at her

With an obvious sadness, but also acceptance. He clearly wants her here, with him, but I think he's finally come to accept that that'll never happen, and he needs to let her go.

Edit: I Like their dynamic(mostly) This is not an anti tenmartha post Him being a freak is compelling

[stewy]

DAVID TENNANT

as The Doctor in 42.

[onewomancitadel]

FRIEDRICH NIETZSCHE, WILL TO POWER.

[allthoseotherworlds]

It's honestly pretty frustrating sometimes how I feel like so many people say they love Martha, but mostly what I actually see people saying about Martha is how much she probably does/should hate the Doctor for not returning her crush, or sometimes how much people hate Blink/Family of Blood/Last of the Time Lords because they were hard for her.

And like, the former of those is frustrating because a) Nobody is obligated to return someone's romantic feelings, b) Being oblivious to someone having a crush on you might suck for the other person but is not actually a moral failing and c) Martha was sad about it but like. She didn't leave because she was furious at the Doctor for not returning her crush? She left because she knew her crush wasn't reciprocated and wasn't going to be, but couldn't get over it on her end while travelling with the Doctor. And also because the past year had been pretty traumatizing for everyone, including her and also the Doctor and also everyone else who was on that ship thing.

Anyways

I just wanted to talk for a bit about the things I like about Martha, or that are interesting, that are unrelated to those points above.

I think she's the first companion in New Who to join Unit, and I think still the only one to be a medical doctor with a strong scientific backing. Which is cool!

I think it's interesting that in the first episode she appears in, her family is shown to be kind of messy and kind of frustrating, and it feels like that's something she's a little glad to be getting away from for a bit when she travels with the Doctor (though it's not the reason she travels with them). And then, at the end of the season when her family is in danger she prioritizes their wellbeing enough to snap at the Doctor about it. If I remember correctly their phones were tapped or something and it wound up making things a bit worse, but I appreciate the nuances of her relationship with them and how important they are to her despite the messiness.

Despite all the ado made about her crush on the Doctor, I really loved how she really seemed to get the point of travelling with the Doctor. I think that she nailed both the joy and excitement of the unknown, and the compassion and sense of care that motivates the Doctor's travels, and which I think is vital to all of my favourite companions.

It also contrasts in interesting ways with how her personality shifts after she stops travelling with the Doctor - she still cares about people's wellbeing and seems to value the things she learned while travelling, but working with Unit and Torchwood does make her more military, and then of course doing freelance alien fighting (? or something?) in the End of Time.

I think Martha and the Doctor are an interesting duo because they contrast each other in interesting ways. They're both compassionate, hopeful but practical, and good at what they do, but they reflect those qualities in ways that almost, but don't quite, fit together nicely. They don't conflict, really, but they're not quite sustainable either.

They work well together and care about each other, but they're too similar in some ways and too different in others to ever quite see eye to eye, which is why they end up going in different directions. And I think that's not anyone's fault, or indicative of any deep flaws in either of them. Or even really a tragedy, because Martha seems to be doing new and interesting things every time we see her, with plenty of options available and a decent rapport with the Doctor whenever they show up.

Anyway this got way longer than I meant it to. Tldr: There are so many more interesting things to say about Martha than just "She must hate the Doctor". Here are some of them.

[variousqueerthings]

I feel like I need to make a little rundown of everything UNIT and Kate Stewart has done since being re-introduced in s7, but I also want to finish watching classic!who so I can make that comparison more effectively. certainly in pertwee-era of doctor who there was some critique and analysis of UNIT's methods as a military group and that the doctor kind of had to work with them to begin with because he didn't have a working tardis (+ already knew the brigadier and UNIT from troughton-era)

liz shaw and jo grant both start with UNIT and both leave UNIT, partially after narratives where they're at odds with what the institution represents and how easy it is for it to abuse power and/or simply make bad choices to begin with (liz taking the doctor's side several times and eventually quitting, although with that slightly lazy--pseudo-feminist "she didn't want to fetch the teas" explanation given post-leaving when there was definitely a lot more going on for her than that, but I think that was the way the actress was feeling so I can see the meta reasonings in it, and jo figuring out that she believes in different ways of protecting the earth joining a radical group and yeah ok straight up getting engaged to that welsh guy after two days, but she was considering leaving before then anyway), and sarah-jane just enters spaces and acts like she belongs there and nobody knows how to tell her to leave, but she's frequently not on UNIT's side so much as the side of Truth (I say, we now enter fourth doctor era so we'll see)

but yeah, the brigadier was there from the beginning, and there's yates and whatshisface, so there's the humanising faces depicting UNIT as essentially for good from the get-go, despite episodes where they're definitely antagonists. but then reintroduced in nu!who s4 as... not quite comfortable to the doctor/partly as that season's narrative of how the doctor affects their companions for worse and inspires them to become soldiers. so they're not the bad guys in the same way torchwood of s2 were, but they aren't comfortable allies either

so now I'm on s9 and... dunno. they're not quite what they were at the beginning, and they're not what they were in s4. more than anything they feel like a get-out-of-jail free card for whatever writer needs to do something that would be easier to solve with a big handy institution with guns, but don't want to analyse the idea of a big handy institution with guns, so we're told that UNIT is "good" but I keep waiting for someone -- osgood and/or bingham -- to become that next liz shaw, and for kate stewart to be confirmed an antagonist based on said rundown I haven't made of her actions, which at best are often ineffectual and at worst some near-villain shit

rtd in the new specials continues writing UNIT the way it has been since s7 -- the same issues and questions about it are at the forefront, with a couple of new ones thrown in (an institution that's very diverse does not make it any less a paramilitary institution and in fact makes one highly suspicious of its propaganda campaign), but I hope he remembers some of the ways they caused problems during three's era, or the way his own original run at least complicated the doctor's feelings about them and I hope he ends up reintroducing those complications with fifteen but x 1000

and. kate stewart needs to become an antagonist. in my opinion. she'd make a very good antagonist, considering how much history there is between her and the doctor. that's another post though, but I want to make a list of every time KS has tried to deal with a situation with extra-judicial violence, because it is practically every episode she's in (if not every episode she's in)

I can buy the doctor feeling some kinda way, because UNIT was the brigadier, was liz, was jo, was yates and whatshisface (sorry I have forgotten his name), was a time where they were stuck and in need of help and UNIT did help them, and then it was also martha and now mel... the doctor built real personal connections with UNIT, but as a structure it is hiiiighly dubious At Best and fully just no-good the majority of the time

[inkblackorchid]

WIP Snippet 4 (Ch. 3)

Martha’s eyes wandered to the twins first, then. “Since I know you two tend to stick together, I have a room on the first floor for you two. It’s unlikely to be as big as what you’re used to, but I think it should do nicely. But the bathroom is in the hall, there’s only one per floor.”

Though their expressions couldn’t exactly be called excited, the twins nodded to this, clearly not about to complain about the for their standards unusual bathroom setup.

“As for the lot of you,” Martha then said, pointing at the older members of the group, “I was expecting to be able to put you boys all together in one room, and give Aki her own. Now, with two girls around, we’re going to have to change the setup a bit.”

“One room? For all four of us?” Jack asked incredulously, “Martha, you can’t be serious.”

His foster-mother raised an eyebrow at him, and if that wasn’t already enough to make Jack look a little smaller, her next words certainly were. “Oh? Are the rooms here suddenly not good enough for you anymore?”

While Crow unsuccessfully tried to hide an undignified snort, Jack grew ever so slightly flustered—something only Martha could achieve in this short a time—before aggressively pointing to Bruno, saying, “That’s not—Bruno snores. I’ll wake up from the noise! And waking him up is no use, because he’ll go right back to snoring the second he falls asleep again! Meaning either he catches no sleep because I don’t want him snoring, or I catch no sleep because he won’t stop it!”

Putting her hands on her hips, Martha countered, “Last I recall, Crow used to snore, too, back when you were children. Yet, you somehow still managed to catch some sleep.”

“Yes, because the keywords are used to,” Jack immediately defended himself, “I trained him out of it by kicking him out of bed every time he got too loud.”

“Yeah, thanks for that, by the way,” Crow muttered, throwing his older foster-brother a glare.

“Oh, you’re welcome,” Jack grumbled back.

Martha, meanwhile, shook her head at both of them, in a way that made Aki realise Yusei had to have gotten this from her. “Really now… You’ve gotten a bit picky, haven’t you?”

Stepping forward a bit from where he stood in the middle of the group, Yusei spoke up for the first time, saying, “Not to play devil’s advocate here, but I think stuffing all four of us in the same room might really be a bad idea. If Jack wakes up because of Bruno’s snoring and starts trying to wake him up in turn to get him to stop for a little bit, Crow’s also gonna wake up because of the commotion and will most likely start arguing with Jack about the noise. And I’m such a light sleeper at this point that I’ll probably also get woken up by Bruno’s snoring and have to listen to the entire back and forth…” His tone was slightly apologetic.

“Yeah, not to speak of the fact that Jack’s insufferable when he hasn’t gotten his ‘beauty sleep’,” Crow added, making air quotes at “beauty sleep” with an amount of sarcasm that was nothing short of gleeful.

Martha gave her three boys a critical look, but ultimately sighed before turning to Crow, “And do you lose sleep because of your friend’s snoring, too?”

“As if Crow would wake up for anything quieter than air raid sirens,” Jack muttered.

[dolokhoded]

also im going to need the orthodox church to decide who witnessed the resurrection it's been 2000 years and y'all still haven't settled okay im gonna need you to CHOOSE

[saintsarefake]

tiktok and tumblr stop stalking the ex victim of a stalker to send him photos of his stalker and re-traumatize him challenge

[thebadtimewolf]

why r u so mad about ppl preferring ten x madame de pompadour to ten x martha like ten/martha will never be a thing. ten don’t want anything to do with martha. he literally said to her face she wouldn’t replace rose… and she never did… isnt canon enough for you

hm.

im glad im only a scorpio on this alone. if martha deserved better than ten then so do all of em but anyway:

this ask is giving 2006/07 i dont want to see tenth doctor in a romantic relationship with a person of color because i can't project myself or relate to them if they arent the very thing being catered to me ever since the silent pictures vibes. u know the same vibe when rtd was told to not regenerate 14 in 13's clothes. just. Ick.

but im not mad. its just interesting for a ship so big as tenrose, it is usually correlated with hating madame de pompadour and/or joan and/or river [though in joan's case they hate her not because shes racist but because shes not rose]

though comics tend to release to combat that in multi doctor stories where they jump through various alternate universes of themselves where the doctor sees themselves settled down with dr. grace holloway (for 8th dr multi doctor stories) and professor melody williams/river song (for 11th dr multi doctor stories) where in those cases, they are frightful of the concept settling down at all. [take note that both times, he settles down in the same house that he owns bc of that unit paycheck on the dl] so i am curious that with this new drs, the equivalent of this would be 13 14 15 being terrified of settling down with rose because they had grown past her as this point.

i prefer the doctor in a polyromantic ace relationship than their umpteenth 🌟tragic heteronormative romance with yt human woman number 23445788764443356743🌟 i want 14 to sweep martha off her feet in pure joy and kiss her passionately while badmouthing tf out of 10 like 9 11 12 13 do with no filter before cradling her like a baby because hes about to crumble under his brand new identity complex and then take her kid to an amusement park and then 14 trips over a brick and dies. hell i rather have nina sosanya play a whole different lady in nod to doctor who recycles their actors trope as a way to introduce a love interest to 14

that amusment park one weirdly sounds like a 8th doctor audio. pls 🙏🏾 dont make it into one i couldnt handle schezro let alone the rest of his content. Empire of the Wolf made me so fucking worried for rose marion tyler like im just she back home 🫣. as for rose tyler from the sea devil universe still out about. whoop his ass. if billie come back as HER? MISS COVER MODEL MISS DICTATOR MISS EMPRESS ROSE?

NOT

i would love for ten to be strictly friends with the new miss empress rose. get that martha karma real quick ehehehehe after all rtd did say they need freema for somethin and im sure seeing 10 get treated the same way he treated martha by no other than empress rose herself -AND THEN EMPRESS ROSE FLIRTS WITH MARTHA??? FINGERS CROSSED??? im just saying that i personally will ride on that for 8 black history months and christmases straight like woo

also real glad it is collectively decided by every one that tentoo is just john smith not corin so yay thanks big finish and titan comics

[hoper-of-farflung-hopes]

It's very strange seeing other people interpret your relationships through the lens of a story, and seeing them do it completely incorrectly

I get why it happens obviously- to them it is just a story, and everything is open for interpretation, and the version of events that I'm from is only one of many possibilities.

Still strange though

[rjalker]

reasons to read The Murderbot Diaries:

Murderbot's gets extremely angry when people misrepresent its favorite characters

it's funny

it's sad

it's suspenseful

in theory it's all for nonhuman rights

[gayspock]

also smileee

i <3 doing bingo cards every few months for all my favourite guys anyway this time round i started doing a 6x6 one and then i was like no thats too much and then i went back and did it all over again from scratch whereas usually i update it as my tastes change and so now i was like ok bc im doing that i need to eliminate recency bias i need to stop putting all the guys in just bc i have been watching their sutff most immediately we need to go back

i wonder sometimes how revealing things like this are. see theres a solid venn diagram here wherein its like does this reveal anything about my personality i do have to wonder but also like

i think the funniest fucking running theme between these guys can be summarised like this

[nxthingmxtters]

‘You have a nice smile.’ Unprompted

"Why, thank you! You know, I made it myself, HaHaHaHaHa!" Martha cackles. Svelt lips pull back into their perpetual grin, one that had been widened haphazardly by self-inflicted wounds. Teeth can be seen going back all the way as the older woman laughs and laughs, her very stitches straining themselves to keep flesh together. As suddenly as she starts laughing, Martha stops, pulling her gaze from the sketchpad up to the girl holding it. "How about you, dearie? You have such lovely writing, but nothing to say! What's the matter? Cat got your tongue? HaHa!"

[rin-may-1103]

Just a Bite.

Master Post | Next

Danny stared out at the busy street from behind his dumpster.

or well, not his dumpster, but it might as well be his considering how many nights he's spent sitting behind it like some rabid raccoon.

Two months ago, he would have been sleeping in his own bed. His glow-in-the-dark stars vaguely lighting up his room in soft luminescent colors. The sound of Jazz snoring in her sleep just a room over, his parents still milling around in the basement.

he would have just finished fighting the box ghost and collapsed onto his bed, the sound of his home lulling him to sleep.

Oh, how things can change in a blink of an eye.

No, instead of sleeping on his bed with his cartoon ghost sheets and NASA poster covered room, he's out here in some random dirty city, sleeping behind dumpsters.

dirty, grimy, rusty dumpsters.

"did you hear?" some lady dressed in a light blue summer dress asked, turning to look at her friend as they started to walk past. "Mr. Wayne donated another lump sum to that charity." she huffed, shaking her head like she had just said the most ridiculous thing she'd ever heard.

her friend stopped in the middle of the alley opening, her graying hair splaying in an ark as she twisted to face the other women. "my word! again? what the hell is that man thinking?"

the woman huffed, then smirked in amusement. "it's like he's shouting for the world to hear how desperate he is for attention. he thinks if he donates enough money to those scoudrails they'll love him or something. With how he's acting lately, it's like he wants all the street rats to barge into his home asking for money, food, and clothes."

her friend clicked her tongue in disgust, "I'd believe it. he has so many kids now, it's like he's running an orphanage. someone, anyone really, with black hair and some tragic story could walk right in and not even be noticed. they'd blend right in with the others."

"I heard it's genetic, his father was the same way before he met Martha. Bruce's blood son, Damian I believe, acts just like his father. the boy's been spotted taking stray cats and dogs inside. It wouldn't surprise me if the paper posted about him convincing his father for another sibling at some point."

the women then turned and started to walk away, their conversation slowly bleeding into the surrounding city ruckus.

Danny leaned back, resting his head against the crumbling brick behind him.

walk right in and not be noticed? wouldn't that be grand. He had heard of Mr. wayne and his gaggle of black-haired children. What were their names again? he could have sworn Sam told him before, in one of her rants about rich society.

Richard Grayson was the first, Danny remembered because Tucker had been making none stop dick jokes for a few hours. Danny didn't understand why the man would willingly go by Dick, but then again, who was he to question someone's name when he fights ghosts like Skulker and Technis on a daily basis?

Next was... Jason? Sam had mentioned there was a whole conspiracy theory of how his death was a cover-up. how all the unsolved crime community swore it was Bruce who killed the kid, that or the kid had some terminal illness that Bruce didn't want the media to know about.

thennnnnn-

Danny glanced around, trying to dig through his memories of Sam's rant. Dick: the orphaned circus act taken in the night his parents died. he's romanie? maybe, Danny wasn't too sure on that one. Jason: taken off the streets, one of his parents was out of the picture and the other one died of a drug overdose.

and then there was..... Tim! Right, Tim, the one who was Mr. Wayne's neighbor before his mother died and his dad went into a coma, then died later on. right, right. he was the known tech genius, the one who took over the company while Mr. Wayne stepped back for a while.

there were others? like, four others? Damian, the lady said he was the blood son sooo, that would imply he was the only bio kid.

who else was there? hmmmm.

well, either way, Danny's tired brain agreed with the women. someone, anyone, who looked vaguely like the other kids could walk right into the house and no one would notice.

it was a bad idea. a terrible one really. but. Danny was hungry.

he's been sleeping behind dumpsters for a few weeks now, he hadn't had anything good to eat in forever, and he was tired. (not as exhausted as he was back home, but still tired. who would have guessed he'd sleep more while homeless?)

he wasn't going to steal from people, his core wouldn't allow him to. and well, he's pretty sure Dan would have stolen already, so there was no way Danny was going to. not unless his life was at risk, and well? it wasn't right now, so no stealing.

but this? walking right into a house and blatantly taking food? right in front of them?

it wouldn't be stealing if he just flat-out didn't try to hide it. they'd be able to stop him and send him away. heck, he doubted he'd even make it past the front gate before they turned him away.

...

was he really going to do this?

...

yes, yes he was.

standing up, Danny started making his way out of the alleyway and over to the tall building with Wayne's name on it. It was a good place to start, maybe he could even find one of the kids and walk with them. or, even better, he could find Mr. Wayne and walk with him. he liked that better than following some kid around.

suddenly, a car honked right next to him, the window rolling down to reveal a tired and disheveled man behind the wheel. glancing up, Danny made eye contact with the taxi driver.

the man yawned and gestured for him to get in, already speaking before Danny could decline. "Mr. Wayne! Your father," yawn, "Father already paid for me to take you home. just hop in."

Danny blinked then glanced around, looking to see if the Wayne the man was talking about was around. nope. turning back, Danny spotted a green sticky note on the back seat.

well, alright then. guess he was getting into the taxi and doing this after all. Clockwork obviously approved if he messed with the timing of things.

Next

[variousqueerthings]

it also does a disservice to martha i feel, it's an easy way to go "and therefore she is the single companion who wouldn't want to see the doctor again or have anything to do with them (which, apart from anything else, ignores her s4 stories)" conveniently therefore we can take her out of the narrative

i think there's an issue with on the one hand the racism that was in the writing and in the fandom (and still is in the fandom) meant that martha was put in a position of "strong black woman" tropes, and her family undoubtedly went through some of the most traumatising narrative in doctor who, and there's a question there of how thoughtful the show was being (or wasn't) in how black characters are "allowed" to be involved in genre like science fiction in ways that are demonstrably different to white characters (i have a spiel here about human nature/family of blood, but i digress...)

-- and then on the other hand balancing out the fact that she's actually a very well-written character and her narrative with the doctor is way more give and take than it's given credit for, and -- in my opinion -- a lot of the issues in the writing weren't actually their relationship at all, that shit was for the most part really powerful and had a clear trajectory, and she ended up with a lot of agency over her choices and the doctor respecting those choices

to try to find the uncomplicated Issue Of Martha, regardless of whether going for racist "she was whiny and held the doctor back and isn't rose," or the ostensibly less racist "her relationship with the doctor was badly written because of the doctor, and she only deserved better," claims either way that there is inherently An Issue With Martha, when it's quite possible to hold the acknowledgement and analysis of the misogynoir in parts of the writing and structure of s3, and also that she's like... objectively really cool and her relationship with the doctor is very interesting and also they canonically think the world of each other

i really do think the desire to paint ten as unambiguously The Worst™️ when it comes to his relationship with martha is out of this desire to uncomplicate their relationship. to decouple them as friends and people who profoundly impacted each other’s lives. it’s just an easier narrative to swallow: that ten was Awful to her and then martha kicked him to the curb when she realized she was too good for him. easier, maybe, then dealing with the troubles of unrequited affection don’t have to be anyone’s fault, or that ten shut martha out in a lot of ways but let her in in others that he wouldn’t let any other companion near, or that they were still friends, they still wanted to see each other and be around each other, even though it was messy and sometimes hurt. you know?