Human

He has three hearts. He is hundreds of years old. When he dies, he regenerates into a new body.  He wasn't even born on Earth.

Yet all the qualities that we love about the Doctor are as foreign to us as love and hate.

A few minutes ago I finished the two-part story written by Paul Cornell for Doctor Who: Human Nature and The Family of Blood. Both of the episodes explored what is, to me, the most fascinating aspect of this series: the Doctor's character. While being chased by a family of shape-shifting aliens who wish to consume his Time Lord essence in order to gain immortality, the Doctor arrives in 1913 England where he uses a device to change his entire physiology - every single cell - to that of a human. The Doctor undergoes the transformation because the Family (the previously mentioned aliens) is able to smell him from a long ways off, due to his own alien nature. Cue David Tennant proving how good of an actor he is.

Over the course of these two episodes, Cornell questions the humanity of the Doctor, the reason for his existence, and what it means to be human itself. A lot of this explicitly occurs as the second episode ends, but every minute beforehand was necessary in order to view the new character that was introduced, that of John Smith, the human the Doctor becomes.

John Smith is quite the opposite of the Doctor, but that does not make him any less of a person. Indeed, he has never had to deal with the impending death of billions of billion of people and losing his entire planet in a devastating war. Smith is slower in speech, but only because he hasn't got thousands of thoughts racing through his head. What he does have is the time to fall in love with someone, which ultimately proves to be the most important event missing from the Doctor's life. Granted, this emotion he felt with his previous companion, Rose, but he wasn't able to let it come to fruition. Now, as a human, he can.

Seeing David Tennant acting his heart out, having to choose between becoming the Doctor or living as John Smith - a man who has as much a right to live, who has emotions and desires - was incredibly moving. It shows that the Doctor, as Martha says, is lonely. He is a being with no home, with no one to call friend, yet must keep on moving. He is unable to stop and form a relationship because of what appears to be a higher calling. He has to keep saving the world (read: universe).

In the final episode, Martha tells Smith that "we need him." Simply put, there is danger out there that he can stop. Yet as she says this, she admits that she herself needs him, a belief that his previous companion held. On the micro scale, the Doctor represents the adventurer we all desire to be. He brings to his companions the opportunity to experience the wonders of the universe. It isn't just a sight-seeing trip; no, it's just like studying abroad. You spend a semester in a foreign country in order to learn from experience, to educate yourself on life. I saw Prague Castle and the Vlatava River, but the point was that I gained new knowledge about what it means to be part of a global community, what it means to be American (or whatever identity I choose to accept). This is what the Doctor is able to provide.

I was especially moved by the scenes narrated by the main villain of the family, who tells us how the Doctor punished them.  Each of the four members of the Family are imprisoned for eternity in separate locations; their immortality is granted, but at a great price. As Brother of Mine narrates, he says that the reason the Doctor hid was to protect them from him. As we have seen in countless episodes before, though the Doctor is a charming person with a huge heart, when push comes to shove he unleashes a fury unlike any other. Every being in the universe can come to fear him. Indeed, as he has admitted he was the destroyer of his own world along with every single Dalek. Genocide goes both ways.

Despite how alien he is, however, the Doctor is the epitome of human nature. He has the capacity for both extreme good and extreme evil. He was just as human before his transformation; all that the procedure did for him was take away the burden on his shoulders. That is what makes him super-human, what makes him the magnificent being he is. That doesn't mean that humans are any less great, however, for as is often seen the Doctor truly longs to find companionship and live a happy life.

The third series has been a bit meh for me; I'm often not paying full attention to the episodes, but these two were quite excellent. They show exactly what sci-fi is best at: using extreme fictional elements in order to relate to our own sense of being. Hopefully, I myself will be doing this at one point. In fact, if Fringe is on the list of spec-able shows in my Intro to One-Hour Television class next semester, then I will be accomplishing this soon...