Hi there! Christmas break is almost upon me! I’ve got a little spare time, so while I’m at it, I’ll do one of my most anticipated rants of all time.
I’m going to rant about River Song, one of my least favorite characters from Doctor Who.
Oh dear, where to begin?
Let’s just start off with this.
River Song is a Mary Sue character through and through. She can take care of herself, fly the TARDIS, sass anyone, and fight like a boss. What can’t this woman do? (Love the Doctor, but that’s for later) And characters like that are, to be quite honest, boring. They’ll always get what they want, they’ll pull through in the end, etc. because they’re just all that and a bag of chips. And that’s not good enough.
Even when River’s struggling with something, you know how it’ll be in the end. She’ll succeed. She’ll live. Just wait for the next episode or scene, and then everything’s A-OK with her.
But the biggest thing that irritates me about her the most is this: she is the Doctor’s wife. She is his freakin’ wife!
Now I don’t know about anyone else in this fandom, but I think River does not deserve to be the Doctor’s wife. Here are my reasons why.
1. Their personalities do not go well together
I know, I know, sometimes opposite personalities go well together. And I’ve seen cases in which it’s worked in all kinds of books, movies, and TV shows. But I’m here to say that in this show, it does not work at all.
Think of it this way. We have the Doctor, a happy, bouncing puppy who loves everyone. Then we have River Song, a selfish komodo dragon who is not only cold-blooded but also cold-hearted.
What do you get when you pair up a puppy and a komodo dragon?
Nothing pleasant, I can assure you.
You just don’t put a puppy and a komodo dragon together, period.
2.River feels a false sense of entitlement to the Doctor
So River Song and a Dalek walk into a bar. The Dalek says, “Surrender or you will be exterminated!”
And River says, “Just wait ’til my husband comes.”
My husband.
Ugh, I cringe every time she says something like that (along with her famous line “Hello, sweetie”).
River thinks the Doctor belongs to her. That’s why she got so upset when the 10th Doctor didn’t recognize her at all. And then she was a moping mess talking about “her” Doctor afterwards. Would you care to enlighten the Doctor on your future history with him, River? You know, to make the situation less awkward for him? No? Geez Louise…
Another similar situation that made me extra mad was when she and the Ponds met the younger version of the 11th Doctor in S6. At the end of “Day of the Moon”, S6E2, the Doctor is saying goodbye to River outside her cell. She knows that he’s the younger version, so some of their memories together don’t exist. She knows this! And what does she do?
She acts like everything’s the same and she kisses the Doctor!
And then when he acts like they haven’t done that before (which, in this complicated case, they truly haven’t), she gets upset.
Come on, lady! You knew that was going to happen! Don’t get so crushed about it.
Does that sound heartless of me to say?
Maybe. But maybe it doesn’t, especially when I bring up this final point…
3.River doesn’t actually love the Doctor
I believe with all my heart that River doesn’t love the Doctor. I mean, really love the Doctor like she claims to.
At the end of “The Angels Take Manhattan”, River told the Doctor not to travel alone. And guess what happened?
He traveled alone until he bumped into Clara Oswald, the Impossible Girl.
Where the heck was River that whole time?!
If she really loved the Doctor, she would’ve stayed with him all throughout that time of grieving and lonely wandering. She would’ve stayed with him! But she didn’t. Obviously, she must not love him or care that much about him to stay by his side.
She is just a selfish woman who sees the Doctor only as a tool for her plans. And for the supposed tender moments, she knows he will give help and love to those who seek it, so she takes advantage of this without giving anything in return. She has never helped the Doctor in the way that he has helped her. Sure, she shot some bad guys for him and gave her assistance in some of his missions, but that’s not quite the same.
Even when such moments “look” tender, they just aren’t, because it’s not real love. I don’t care what it is, it’s just not real love.
So when she goes all “I absolutely trust him” about the Doctor and whatnot, I don’t buy that BS. Not one bit!
But what do you think? Do you like River Song? Do you think she really loves the Doctor? Do you think she deserves to be the Doctor’s wife? Let me know in the comments! I will not bite your heads off, I promise.
When Christmas break comes, there will be, as promised, the reviews for “The Crimson Horror” and (ugh!) Divergent, the book. Also, there is the possibility of reviews for Supernatural and the first few chapters of the hit manga series Black Butler, which I’ve started getting into.
‘Til next time, laters!
The Passionate Nerd 
Ummmm
OK so A) she gave up her life in “Forest of the Dead” for him
B) It seems obvious that she didn’t realize that he had never kissed her before in “Day of the Moon” she only realized at the end of it that it was his first time and that is when she came to the realization that it would be her last time kissing him. Just because you know something bad is going to happen eventually doesn’t mean that you won’t be sad when it actually happens. If you have a loved one who terminally ill, you’ll still be sad when that person ultimately passes away. I don’t understand why you’re annoyed at her for that
C) I definitely think she loves the doctor. In fact, I am of the opinion that he is the one that is mean to her, not the other way around (I’m not a big fan of him) but I don’t really want to get into that right now. And yeah, you know what, she has an entitlement thing with him but she is his WIFE so why shouldn’t she? I would feel the same way about my husband. I love how you blame the fact that they are married on her, as if it’s her fault that she married the doctor. Ummmm no one forced him to marry her he did it on his own free will. “DOES SHE DESERVE TO BE THE DOCTOR’S WIFE?” what kind of question is that? people don’t deserve to be or not be married. being married is not something that happens through merit. Two people fall in love and they get married lol. you can be the greatest person in the world and not be married.
D) I think the fact that she didn’t end up staying with him in “Angels take Manhattan” was a plot device used by the writers because they wanted to bring in someone to be the new companion because it is very uncharacteristic of her to not stay with him especially since she said several times prior to that that she longs to be with the Doctor as often as she can
In the end, i don’t think a lot of your arguments hold water and the rest is personal preference. I admit that I love river song so i have bias. but yeah, let me know what you think.
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Hey, sorry it took a bit long for a response. I just wanted to have the time to reply to your comment as thoughtfully as I could.
You’re probably right on some things. I didn’t hate River from the get go (since my first introduction to Doctor Who was those first two episodes of season 6), but it’s been something of a gradual dislike, and of course, I have bias with my own opinion.
On the “Does she deserve to be the Doctor’s wife?” thing, I think it’s more of a question of is she worthy. And I just don’t feel, with all I know and intuit from her character, that, in that sense, she deserves to be his wife. Like I said, part of that is she’s too cold a person for him. At least I think she is. And I still struggle with the whole thing of whether she really loves him. Sometimes, in some episodes, I can sense moments when there’s supposed to be such feelings, but I don’t know. For some reason, it just doesn’t feel real or right to me. I don’t really ship him with anyone, so it’s not like I’m coming at this like “Oh, he should’ve been with Amy!” or “He should be with Clara!”. It’s just, were he to be with anyone like that, River just isn’t quite right for him.
As far as her desire to be with the Doctor as often as she can, I believe that. But in that case, then why doesn’t she break out of prison more often to be with him besides the little dates he carves out for them? And why oh why did she not stay with the Doctor after the Ponds died, regardless of whether it was a plot device or no?
The marriage, if I remember correctly, was only to stop that whole disruption thing going on in “The Wedding of River Song” (sorry, I’m kind of rusty on my episodes 😛 ). Please correct me if I’m wrong.
And with that whole thing of “There’s a worse day coming for me”, I got that it was supposed to be something sad for her. And for her, it really is a tragic thing. But when she talked about that “worse day”, I was more like “Boohoo, too bad for you” than sorry for her. Even after watching the other River episodes and fully grasping her relationship with the Doctor, I still feel apathetic towards her in that scene.
I don’t know. She just really annoys me.
And I do like the 11th Doctor. He was my first Doctor, so there’s a bit of bias as well 😛
So yeah, that’s what I think. Like I said, I’m coming at this with bias too, and that is definitely affecting my opinions of River Song. And some points you raise there are definitely things I should think about.
Thanks for your thoughts!
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