{"id":17255,"date":"2022-10-24T11:07:29","date_gmt":"2022-10-24T15:07:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/oddpla.net\/modernwizard\/?p=17255"},"modified":"2022-10-25T13:59:24","modified_gmt":"2022-10-25T17:59:24","slug":"i-know-what-the-spymaster-wants","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/oddpla.net\/modernwizard\/2022\/10\/24\/i-know-what-the-spymaster-wants\/","title":{"rendered":"I know what the Spymaster wants."},"content":{"rendered":"

Originally posted on Tumblr, but Tumblr’s search function is shit, so I’m just posting it here in case I ever want to easily find it again.<\/p>\n

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I know what the Spymaster wants, part I<\/strong><\/a><\/h3>\n

I know what the Spymaster wants.<\/p>\n

All Masters have always been defined by their desires for the Doctor. [No, I will not justify my choices of verb, nor will I explain the nuances. If you really want to know, PM me.]<\/p>\n

Delgado wants to BEST the Doctor.<\/p>\n

Pratt\/Beevers wants to DESTROY the Doctor.<\/p>\n

Ainley wants to BEAT the Doctor.<\/p>\n

Roberts wants to POSSESS the Doctor.<\/p>\n

Jacobi wants to FOLLOW the Doctor [before being clocked, that is].<\/p>\n

Simm wants to HURT the Doctor.<\/p>\n

Gomez wants to BEFRIEND the Doctor.<\/p>\n

But what about Dhawan?<\/p>\n

Dhawan seems to want a little bit of what each of his previous selves does. Some besting, some destroying, some possession, some befriending\u2026 His rather incoherent, throwing-spaghetti-against-the-walls-to-see-what-sticks plans seem to do a little bit of everything.<\/p>\n

Ultimately, though, Dhawan wants MUTUAL UNDERSTANDING. <\/p>\n

What\u2019s so special about the Doctor? That\u2019s why the Spymaster wants to know. He spends an indeterminate time pre-Spyfall<\/i> texting with her as O, who seems to be a close friend. He also keeps an extensive library on her in Spyfall.<\/i> In other words, he\u2019s doing primary and secondary research on the Doctor\u2019s compelling, charismatic nature.<\/p>\n

The Spymaster pursues even greater knowledge of the Doctor in The Ascension of the Cybermen\/The Timeless Children.<\/i> His investigation into the Matrix and his discoveries about Tecteun and her experiments give him information about the creation of the Doctor. You could probably say that even his assimilation of the Cyberium, containing the entire knowledge of the Cyber people and therefore quite a bit about the Doctor, one of their greatest annoyances, also furthers his goal to know more about the Doctor.<\/p>\n

But even that is not enough. The Spymaster wants to go further. Knowing about the Doctor from a friend\u2019s point of view [as O] or a researcher\u2019s [from his files] or an enemy\u2019s [from the Cyberium] isn\u2019t enough. Nor is it enough to know the circumstances of the Doctor\u2019s creation. He must also comprehend what it feels like to be the Doctor firsthand\u2026as the Doctor<\/i>.<\/p>\n

Stay tuned for future parts!<\/p>\n

@natalunasans<\/a> @spoonietimelordy<\/a> @sclfmastery<\/a> @thetransgirlwhoneverwas<\/a><\/p>\n

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Tags: the master<\/a> sacha dhawan<\/a> dhawan master<\/a> doctor who<\/a> dw meta<\/a> timeless children<\/a> HELP I WUVS HIM<\/a> why I love Dhawan Master<\/a> the power of the doctor<\/a><\/p>\n

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Why the Spymaster impersonates Rasputin, aka I know what the Spymaster wants, part II<\/a><\/h3>\n

Listen up, everyone! I\u2019m back on my bullshit! And by \u201cbullshit\u201d I mean \u201cheartbroken overinvestment in a certain fictional character known as the Master.\u201d As I said in part I of this essay,<\/a> I know what the Spymaster wants: MUTUAL UNDERSTANDING. Let\u2019s see how this plays out in the culmination of his story\u2026<\/p>\n

The pinnacle of the Spymaster\u2019s attempts at understanding the Doctor occur in The Power of the Doctor. <\/i>Both the Spymaster\u2019s turn as Rasputin and his body swap with the Doctor demonstrate his desperation to understand\u2026well\u2026the peculiar power of the Doctor.<\/p>\n

Look at the Spymaster\u2019s disguise as Rasputin. It\u2019s more than just canon confirmation that the Master has a thing for pretending to be Russian [see Razor and his questionable accent]. It\u2019s a chance for the Spymaster to be a Doctor.<\/p>\n

If you look past Rasputin\u2019s scandalous and sinister reputation, you see that he is best known for his meteoric rise to power and his mysticism. Born to Siberian peasants in 1869, he had little formal education, but he took a pilgrimage in 1897 that caused his religious conversion, teetotalism, and vegetarianism. His religious fervency, charisma, and alleged \u201cstrange manners\u201d fascinated influential religious people in St. Petersburg. These influential people allowed him access to the city\u2019s elite salons and, eventually, with the endorsement of the upper classes, Rasputin became close to Tsar Nicholas and Tsarina Alexandra.<\/p>\n

For a time, Rasputin served as confidant and advisor to the royal family, particularly the tsarina and her kids, who trusted him implicitly. Rasputin lived with the tsarina and her kids, instructed the kids in religion, and apparently healed her hemophiliac son Alexei on several occasions. Eventually objection to Rasputin grew, and there were several assassination attempts. One of them succeeded.<\/p>\n

So, to recap, while Rasputin had a bad reputation, at least for a while, the tsar and the tsarina and family loved him, accepted him, trusted him, and granted him great power. He used that power [supposedly] to alleviate their son\u2019s suffering.<\/p>\n

By assuming Rasputin\u2019s identity, then, the Spymaster temporarily experiences the friendship, loyalty, and affection that the tsar and tsarina gave to Rasputin. In this way, he has the chance to feel the awe, love, and devotion that companions often show to the Doctor.<\/p>\n

Furthermore, being Rasputin allows the Spymaster an opportunity to improve a kid\u2019s health [or at least to take responsibility for alleviating his symptoms]. In his guise as a Russian mystic, the Spymaster thus acts as a helpful provider of health care \u2013 i.e., a doctor\u2026or a Doctor.<\/p>\n

@natalunasans<\/a> @spoonietimelordy<\/a> @queen-of-meows<\/a> @sclfmastery<\/a><\/p>\n

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Tags: the master<\/a> sacha dhawan<\/a> dhawan master<\/a> doctor who<\/a> dw meta<\/a> timeless children<\/a> HELP I WUVS HIM<\/a> why I love Dhawan Master<\/a> the power of the doctor<\/a> rasputin<\/a> grigori rasputin<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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The Spymaster\u2019s desperate pleas for understanding, aka I know what the Spymaster wants, part III<\/a><\/h3>\n

Salutations, fellow pedants! The Spymaster has returned [to much rejoicing], which means that THE ANGSTMASTER has too. The first one, of course, is Sacha Dhawan\u2019s portrayal of the Master, while the second one is me. Specifically, it\u2019s me in my mode as a DW analyst. I\u2019ve already discussed what the Spymaster wants in part I<\/a>\u2014mutual understanding\u2014and how he achieves it as Rasputin in The Power of the Doctor<\/i> in part II.<\/a> We now discuss the body swap in The Power of the Doctor<\/i> and the flip side of mutual understanding.<\/p>\n

The body swap in The Power of the Doctor,<\/i> being more of an appearance swap, nevertheless seems to impart to the Spymaster some profound firsthand knowledge of what it\u2019s like to be the Doctor. After all, he says, \u201cIf I don\u2019t get to be the Doctor, then you don\u2019t either.\u201d He also says, \u201cPlease don\u2019t let me go back to being myself.\u201d [Or something like that.] Both of these lines indicate that his experiences during the body swap aren\u2019t just that of the same old Spymaster in different clothes. He feels during the body swap like someone beside himself\u2014like the Doctor. He finally knows what it\u2019s like to be that person [or he thinks he does], and he doesn\u2019t want to let that go.<\/p>\n

I began this essay with the contention that the Spymaster seeks mutual understanding. However, all I have reviewed so far are the Spymaster\u2019s attempts to understand the Doctor in more and more intimate ways. I have not yet pointed out the Spymaster\u2019s struggle to explain himself to the Doctor.<\/p>\n

The Spymaster\u2019s deepest desire is not only to understand the Doctor, but also to have the Doctor understand him and his feelings. If we think back to his relationship with the Doctor as O, we see very little of it, but we do know that they communicate in secret codes [i.e., the fish] and that the Doctor signs off her text with \u201cKisses!\u201d The fish suggests in jokes and a comfortable camaraderie, while \u201cKisses!\u201d suggests that they are talking about feelings from time to time, even if casually and jokingly. The Spymaster uses his O persona to indirectly test out expressing emotions to the Doctor.<\/p>\n

He escalates his self-expression to the Doctor by using force in The Timeless Children.<\/i> He coerces her into accompanying him to the ruins of Gallifrey in the first place, ties her down with a magic force field [or something], and then subjects her to an infodump about Tecteun and her eugenic experiments on the Timeless Child. This is a fucking gross, racist, and sexist situation in which the scary evil brown guy overpowers the heroic white woman and violates her mind for\u2026uh\u2026basically the whole episode, and I hate it. I\u2019m not excusing it. I\u2019m only saying that the Spymaster does this in part because he wants her to know what he knows. He wants her to learn what he has learned in the same way that he has learned it. He wants her to feel what he feels.<\/p>\n

When the Spymaster and the Doctor have their showdown with his Cyber-Masters and he dares her to release the Death Particle, the Spymaster\u2019s desire to have the Doctor understand him becomes explicit. \u201cYou\u2019ve given me a gift\u2026of myself,\u201d the Doctor tells the Spymaster. \u201cYou want me to be scared of it because you\u2019re scared of everything.\u201d In other words, she correctly states that he wants her to feel afraid in the same way that he does.<\/p>\n

The Spymaster agrees, saying, \u201cYou don\u2019t even know your own life. Look how low I have brought you.\u201d But he\u2019s only projecting his own confusion, despair, and defeat onto the Doctor. He wants her to know what it feels like to be him, but he hasn\u2019t succeeded in transmitting his experience.<\/p>\n

This brings us again to the body swap in The Power of the Doctor.<\/i> The Spymaster has failed at forcing the Doctor to understand him, so now, desperate and out of other ideas, he just flat-out tells her: \u201cPlease don\u2019t let me go back to being myself.\u201d Does he assume and hope that the Doctor\u2019s time in his form has given her a sense of what it is like to be him? Does he really want her to empathize? He seems to be begging for escape here. Well, at the very least, he doesn\u2019t want to be abandoned.<\/p>\n

Sorry, Spymaster \u2013 but we\u2019re a long, long way from the Doctor\u2019s historic compassion for [or at least attachment to] the Master. This isn\u2019t Three petitioning Kronos to spare the Master\u2019s life in The Time Monster<\/i> or Eight begging the Master, \u201cGive me your hand!\u201d as he\u2019s sucked into a vortex of doom. Nor is this Ten, sobbing, \u201cC\u2019mon! Regenerate!\u201d over the perishing Master or Twelve asking Missy, \u201cStand with me.\u201d This is Thirteen, who turns the Kasaavin on the Spymaster, rats him out as a brown guy to the Nazis, and leaves him for dead in The Power of the Doctor.<\/i> Thirteen notoriously avoids feelings. She\u2019s notoriously enraged at the Master for all the racist, sexist, homophobic, ableist bullshit that was the S10 finale. [Hey, so am I!] So she\u2019s constructively dealing with her rage by denying her feelings for the Spymaster and abandoning him so she doesn\u2019t have to deal with all those icky complex emotions.<\/p>\n

I admire Chibnall\u2019s commitment to portraying Thirteen as a ruthless asshole [not just toward the Spymaster, but toward everyone in general], even as my sympathies obviously lie with Bill, Grace, the Spymaster, and all dead\/tortured\/gratuitously suffering non-white characters. It\u2019s just another piece of evidence in my long-running argument that the Doctor is really more of an antihero and much more similar to the Master than they [and the narrative] want to admit.<\/p>\n

@natalunasans<\/a> @spoonietimelordy<\/a> @queen-of-meows<\/a> @sclfmastery<\/a> @aegipanomnicorn-blog<\/a><\/p>\n

P.S. I wrote this essay having only heard about The Power of the Doctor<\/i> secondhand from @natalunasans<\/a> . I will probably have some more pertinent thoughts and better quotes when I actually see it. >:P<\/p>\n

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Tags: the master<\/a> sacha dhawan<\/a> dhawan master<\/a> doctor who<\/a> dw meta<\/a> HELP I WUVS HIM<\/a> why I love Dhawan Master<\/a> the power of the doctor<\/a> why yes I AM pissed off by Bill’s railroading & victimization & demise in S10 finale<\/a> and no I will apparently never be over it<\/a> DO BETTER BBC<\/a> black characters deserve better<\/a> brown characters deserve better<\/a> racism<\/a> sexism<\/a> misogynoir<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Originally posted on Tumblr, but Tumblr’s search function is shit, so I’m just posting it here in case I ever want to easily find it again. I know what the Spymaster wants, part I I know what the Spymaster wants. All Masters have always been defined by their desires for the Doctor. [No, I will… Continue reading I know what the Spymaster wants.<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[812,804],"class_list":["post-17255","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-the-spymaster","tag-thirteenth-doctor"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/oddpla.net\/modernwizard\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17255","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/oddpla.net\/modernwizard\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/oddpla.net\/modernwizard\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/oddpla.net\/modernwizard\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/oddpla.net\/modernwizard\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17255"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/oddpla.net\/modernwizard\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17255\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17259,"href":"http:\/\/oddpla.net\/modernwizard\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17255\/revisions\/17259"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/oddpla.net\/modernwizard\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17255"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/oddpla.net\/modernwizard\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17255"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/oddpla.net\/modernwizard\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17255"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}