in honour of it being 14 years since the fires of pompeii came out i want to talk about what a goddamn FANTASTIC episode it is. like we start off with fun ancient ‘rome’ shenanigans and veni vidi vici and oh look it’s peter capaldi stealing the tardis and then. then the doctor ends up having to make the choice to save pompeii or the whole world.
and you can just see how the time war flashbacks must have come barrelling back. donna’s horror as she realises that while she was trying to save everyone she ends up being a part of their deaths. and she realises that travelling with the doctor is not all it’s cracked up to be.
AND THEN we get to just save someone. and we finally get to the resolution here, where donna and ten finally understand each other. she understands why he keeps himself so distant all the time and all the hard choices he has to make.
and he sees her sheer humanity and realises that just because he couldn’t save his own people doesn’t mean that he can’t do anything at all. there’s always something the doctor can do. and he and donna meet each other in the middle to save that one family.
