Human Nature/The Family of Blood
Story 185, Episodes 732 and 733, Series 3 Episodes 8 and 9
Doctor: The Tenth Doctor
Companions: Martha Jones
An adaptation of a novel from the 90s, Human Nature/The Family of Blood is one of the most devastating stories in show history.
The Review
I first watched this story in 2013, and have held it in reverence ever since. Watching it again, I hoped it would be as good, and it delivered. It makes sense why the Doctor would choose to hide as a schoolteacher in the English countryside, there’s always been something professorial about him. Having made himself into a human, the Doctor is now John Smith, a simple teacher falling in love with Joan Redfern, the academy’s matron. He seems like the Doctor, but he isn’t the Doctor. The first person the Doctor’s choice harms is Martha, who as a black woman has no choice but to be a servant girl for three months while they wait for their pursuers, the Family, to die. There are several chirps about her status and race, and the show isn’t afraid to have even the warm Joan say that it’s impossible for a black woman to become a doctor. They are all people of 1913, for better and for worse. The first episode is really for the viewers to see who John is, an imperfect but caring man who is falling in love. He’s not a Time Lord, and that’s what Joan loves about him. Martha’s continued anguish at why even ‘John Smith’ won’t love her is painful, and she does confess to John that she loves the Doctor. When will she realize the Doctor doesn’t love her back?
The Family of Blood are great villains, their actors completely selling the transformation from human to bizarre alien killers. None is better than the legendary performance of Harry Lloyd as Banes, then becoming ‘Son-of-Mine’, a true devil. The way the family can smell the Time Lord consciousness contained in the fob watch is unnerving, and their army of scarecrows is one the right side of the line between disturbing and campy. The little girl playing Daughter-of-Mine doesn’t say anything, until she does, and it might be the most unsettling of the lot. There is another thing about this school the Doctor wouldn’t love, and it’s that it is a military academy preparing young teenagers for war. With the Family attacking, John Smith rings the alarm bells to have the students prepare to defend the school. Martha cannot abide by this, but John sees no choice, the boys must fulfill their duty. For all their bluster some of the boys are now terrified to actually face combat. The Headmaster, in a great turn by who I’m now learning is Pip freaking Torrens, is told by Banes of World War I’s imminence and mocked that his students will die. Though I’m not sure I agree, the Headmaster’s speech that he saw horrors in the Boer War, but would go back in an instant for King and county sure is powerful.
The last thread is that of a boy, Tim Latimer, who has low-level psychic ability. Scrawny and undersized compared to the rest of the boys, the others use him to do their homework. He happens to pick up the fob watch containing the Doctor’s consciousness, and frequently opens it to draw the Family away. The glimpses that Tim sees of who the Doctor is scare and frighten him, but he knows that only the Doctor, and not John Smith, can save them. John starts to have a mental breakdown as he realizes that his history is a lie, and that he has to die so the Doctor can live. Joan is right, John shows true courage in willingly allowing the Doctor to return, and he lets the Family rot for eternity. When the Doctor returns to talk to Joan, the gulf between him and John is shocking. The Doctor genuinely wants to travel more with Joan, but his arrogance shows through. Joan asks the Doctor if anyone would have died if he didn’t choose this school to hide at, and the Doctor silently leaves her, both knowing the answer. For Joan, her second chance at love is gone, and a being beyond comprehension now has stolen his body. It’s devastating. However, it’s not all bad, the Doctor giving the watch to Tim allows him to survive a bomb in World War I, and him and Martha visit an old Tim at a memorial service. For someone, this story had a happy ending.
Maybe David Tennant’s finest performance of all time, we learn definitively, that the Doctor isn’t one of us, and never can be.
10/10 Part one is a bit slow, but part two elevates this story into the hallowed halls of classics
Reviewing Doctor Who from Start to Finish 