10 Ways Doctor Who Restores Your Faith In Humanity

2. It Makes Heroes Out Of Ordinary People

Doctor Who is not a kind of superhero who does the job for us and then retreats back to his otherworldly existence. He is an inspirational figure, a character whose attraction to our planet is born out of a deep regard for human virtues. He is often envious of these qualities within us, finding them difficult to attain in his own alienness. As such, the Doctor needs humans to be among his travelling companions. In A Town Called Mercy, Amy Pond prevents him from acting without mercy. After all, even €œevery lonely monster need a companion" and time and time again, the stories themselves take a human characteristic and make it the means for victory. Whether it be Rose€™s dexterity in defeating the Nestene Consciousness, Craig€™s love for his baby resisting his Cyber conversion or Danny Pink€™s commitment to Clara overcoming the Master€™s schemes, human powers can be more powerful than the deadliest of weapons. Yet, somehow humans seem to be embarrassed by our powers and are all too quick to criticise such resolutions as smulchy. The Doctor himself is our greatest champion ("What an inventive, invincible species...") and it's no coincidence that the enemy is often presented as a human. Even the Daleks were defeated by the Second Doctor when he implanted the 'human factor' within their ranks and the strength of human love can even withstand full Cyber conversion. What's more, Doctor Who occasionally reaches into the human psyche in such a way which reawakens hope and renews the spirit. In Series 3's Gridlock, for example, there is something tragic in the various races blindly travelling to a non-existent paradise singing the funeral hymn The Old Rugged Cross. The episode still manages to end in hope with faith restored, however, one hymn replaced by another, Abide With Me. The message is that neither the drugs work, nor the quest for an unobtainable paradise. Instead, when you look around at life in the present moment, it is here that you find beauty.