By Owen Quinn author of the Time Warriors and Zombie Blues
A huge thing that Doctor Who fans have thirsted after for years is a true resolution to the fact Donna Noble cannot remember her time with the Doctor.
At the emotional end to the Journey’s End, the Doctor is forced to wipe every trace of Donna’s time with him from her mind to rid her of his Time Lord consciousness. If he doesn’t then she will die. Through her grandfather Wilf and Catherine Tate’s performance; travelling through time had made the once fickle Donna a better person. She was all Love Island and Pringles before she jumped aboard the Tardis. What we experienced was a true character arc which elevated Donna from a shallow person, chained by her life and disparaging mother, to a free spirit who found herself at last. The moment she woke up and thought she had missed yet another planet wide almost disaster, the old Donna is back and it isn’t until you see the transformation that you realise just how subtle and deep it was.
But it didn’t sit well with fans and when Donna returned for the tenth Doctor’s final story, many hoped she would somehow get her memory back. She does briefly but the memory causes an energy release that saves her life from both the memories and the Master. But her time with the Doctor still remained lost to her.
So why does her wedding tug at the heart strings so much?
When we first met Donna in The Runaway Bride, her groom was marrying her to feed her to the Raacnoss who was about to unleash her plague of babies upon the world. Thankfully her new husband, Shaun Temple, has no such intentions. Wilf conveys they are just a normal couple settling for each other. He sees that Donna is just trundling along because she has lost her memories. While happy for his beloved granddaughter, Wilf and her mother Sylvia know this is merely a ghost making the best of things. Donna has tasted the universe and could soar so high but she is destined to be just another statistic. She will be no one special. Every parent and grandparent wants their children to be better than they were and do things they never got to do. While that thinking is common, it also should be recognised that by committing to a family and offspring you are going to be skint and struggle to give them the life you want for them. The cost sadly is you sacrifice your dreams but that is life. It’s also the siurce if untold riches.
Second of all, the Doctor lands at a discreet distance in the graveyard standing like a ghost in the background until Sylvia sees him. He hands Wilf and Sylvie an envelope and tells them he borrowed a quid of a lovely man named Geoffrey Noble, Donna’s late father whom we met in The Runaway Bride. “Have that on me,” was what he said. Sylvia’s face hits the floor. The actor was due to return for series 4 but he sadly was unable to and passed away from cancer. Bernard Cribbins was drafted in as Wilfred Mott and the rest is history.
He is the father figure to protect his granddaughter in her father’s absence. Every girl wants her dad to walk her down the aisle on her wedding day so Geoffrey’s absence would be felt deeply. Having recently lost my younger brother, I can completely empathise with this. I will never see him again. When there is a family gathering his absence will be a huge shadow hanging over it even though he would tell you to get out there and have fun. Grief is not about regrets; grief is the emptiness when families gather and there is one less person at the dinner table for Christmas. It’s about having to tell the kids where their uncle has gone and seeing in their little faces they don’t understand at all. As the 13th Doctor says it is only sad because what came before was so special. But while we laugh and tell tales of him or any loved one who has passed, we feel that loss so keenly because in the end memories are all we have. Donna remembers her father but these memories that lifted her to be better are gone. Ironically Donna will not recall her first wedding as the Doctor was involved so to her Shaub is her one true love.
There is no doubt her late husband was firmly on Sylvia’s mind on Donna’s wedding day so to have the Doctor give her such a gift when all she has done is berate him since they first met, is a stark reminder that though they may be gone, our loved ones are never far away. Indeed the Doctor has bought a lottery ticket for the triple rollover ensuring Donna will never want for anything again. After resetting his friend like a mobile phone, the Doctor is a broken man in the last hours of his life. Donna will forever be the one he lost as sure as he lost Adric, Katarina and Sara Kingdom. His Donna is dead and will never return and with his impending regeneration, the Doctor will get new body and move on never looking back because he dare not. All he can is hope the money and new Husband will make Donna happy. The Doctor thought he could by letting her travel with him but in the end he destroyed her.
The Time Lord leaves without a word and it is Bernard Cribbin’s tearful farewell salute that really kills you. That man could get a tear from a stone but again it is more than that. They say at a wedding you lose a son or daughter but gain one at the same time. This time it is not the case. Wilfred encouraged Donna to travel with the Doctor because he knew she would be a better person for it. But the Dalek invasion and Davros’ plans took all that away. Wilfred is living his life through Donna’s amazing adventures and with her memory compromised, he jumps at the chance to travel in the Tardis and fight alongside the Doctor. In some way this is him and Donna’s legacy and by fate’s hands it is Wilf that ends the tenth Doctor’s life. Yet two people have died; the worst of it is that new Donna is just a ghost of the granddaughter he knew. He cannot even speak to her about her time in the Tardis so the nobles live a life of lies. Wilf also knows that this is the last time he will see the Doctor hence his tearful kiss and salute. Life will never be the same again for the Nobles as just as they feel the loss of Geoffrey, Sylvia and Wilf will miss the Donna that was and the amazing time traveller that saved then took her soul.
However destiny, time and fate are contrary things and as we know Donna’s story is far from over. Maybe, just maybe, the universe decided that it could not continue without the empty Donna we love. Maybe it’s about time something was done about that. Apparently the Doctor regenerated recently and there’s a trailer going about where the Doctor and Donna are back together. As always stay tuned because the fans are about to get a long overdue gift….maybe.
The Time Warriors and Beyond 