"Was their any warning of their arrival? A single event that set this chain into motion?" - Sendhil Ramamurthy, playing Mohinder Suresh, in one of his many insane voiceovers.

 

I do not mean this in a positive way, as in "omfg that was so insane!!!". What I mean is that the scriptwriters must have eaten some of that African bloke's weird hyena-and-tree-root paste to come up with such garbage.

 

Anyway, my mission in this category of blogs is to put Suresh's ridiculous comments into one block and see what the resultant mess looks like. Will it shed any light on the deeper meanings of the universe? Will it reveal plotlines yet to come? Will I strangle myself with my own mouse-cord before completing this epic work? Read on...

 

 

The Book of Suresh

 

Series One, Episodes 1-10

 

Where does it come from? -- this quest? This need to solve life's mysteries, when the simplest of questions can never be answered. Why are we here? What is the soul? Why do we dream? Perhaps we'd be better off not looking at all. Not delving, not yearning. That's not human nature. Not the human heart. That is not why we are here. We all imagine ourselves the agents of our destiny, capable of determining our own fate. But have we truly any choice in when we rise or when we fall? Or does a force larger than ourselves bid us our direction? Is it evolution that takes us by the hand? Does science point our way? Or is it God who intervenes, keeping us safe? For all his bluster, it is the sad province of man that he cannot choose his triumph. He can only choose how he will stand when the call of destiny comes. Hoping that he'll have the courage to answer. When evolution selects its agents, it does so at a cost. It makes demands in exchange for singularity. And you may be asked to do something against your very nature. Suddenly, the change in your life that should have been wonderful comes as a betrayal. It may seem cruel, but the goal is nothing short of self-preservation. Survival. This force, evolution, is not sentimental. Like the earth itself, it knows only the hard facts of life's struggle with death. All you can do it hope and trust. That when you've served its needs faithfully, there may still remain some glimmer of the life you once knew. Sometimes questions are more powerful than answers. How is this happening? What are they? Why them and not others? Why now? What does it all mean? When a change comes, some species feel the urge to migrate. They call it zugunruhe—the pull of the soul to a far-off place, following a scent in the wind, a star in the sky. The ancient message comes, calling the kindred to take flight and to gather together. Only then can they hope to survive the cruel season to come. Evolution is an imperfect and often violent process. A battle between what exists and what is yet to be born. In the midst of these birth pains, morality loses its meaning. The question of good and evil reduced to one simple choice: survive or perish. Evolution is an imperfect and often violent process. Morality loses its meaning. The question of good and evil reduced to one simple choice: survive or perish. They cannot fathom how much you stand to lose in failure. But you are the instrument of a flawless design. And all of life may hang in the balance. A hero learns quickly who can comprehend and who merely stands in your way. The earth is large. Large enough that you think you can hide from anything--from fate, from God. If only you found a place far enough away. So you run. To the edge of the earth. Where all is safe again, quiet and warm. The solace of salt air. The peace of danger left behind. The luxury of grief. And maybe for a moment ... you believe you have escaped. You can run far. You can take your small precautions. But have you really gotten away? Can you ever escape? Or is the truth that you do not have the strength or cunning to hide from destiny? But the world is not small. You are. And fate can find you anywhere. We are, if anything, creatures of habit ... drawn to the safety and comfort of the familiar. But what happens when the familiar becomes unsafe? When the fear that we have been desperately trying to avoid finds us where we live? We are all, at our cores, the sum of our fears. To embrace destiny, we must, inevitably, face those fears and conquer them. Whether they come from the familiar ... Or the unknown. To everything, there is a season, and a time to every purpose. The earth spins at a thousand miles an hour as we desperately try to keep from being thrown off. Like the first blush of winter that signals a great migration. Was there any warning of their arrival? A sign, a single event that set this chain into motion? Was it a whisper in God's ear? Survive. Adapt. Escape. And if we could mark that single moment in time, --that first hint of the prophecy of approaching danger ... Would we have done anything differently? Could it have been stopped? Or was the die long ago cast? And if we could go back, alter its course, stop it from happening ... ... Would we? These people ... Their future is written on their DNA. Just as the past, it seems, is written in stone. Was the die cast from the very beginning? Or is it in our own hands to alter the course of destiny? Of all our abilities, it is free will that truly makes us unique. With it, we have a tiny, but potent, chance to deny fate. And only with it can we find our way back to being human.

Caitlin Moran, the wonderful Times columnist, wrote the other day about the massive speculation surrounding Doctor Who. The nation appears to be wrapped up in gossip about the new Doctor, as the fan-site rumour mill ploughs into overdrive. Who could be stepping out from the Tardis this Christmas?

 

Anyway, Moran lists a vast number of people who have been linked to the role. These include, according to the unreliable Wiki: James Nesbitt, Robert Carlyle, Bill Nighy, David Walliams, Harry Lloyd, David Morrissey, Paterson Joseph and David Mitchell. Doubtless by the time this blog entry is finished, the list will also include Ann Widdecombe, Kim Jong-il, and Barney Harwood from CBBC (a decent actor who has potential for more serious programmes that Bear Behaving Badly). In fact, the whole Kim Jong-il thing sort of makes sense. He hasn't been seen in public for a while, has he?

 

While the world's conspiracy theorists ponder this theory, it might be worth having a glance at the list of actors who have been linked with the role, or auditioned for it, before previous series of Who were launched. Some of these people are still worth considering today:

 

Old Candidates for First Doctor: Most are sadly deceased.

Second Doctor: Ditto.

Third Doctor: Ron Moody (Fagin in Oliver!)

Fourth Doctor: Bernard Cribbins (Donna's grandad in the last Who)

Fifth Doctor: Richard Griffiths (Uncle Vernon in Harry Potter)

Sixth Doctor: ? Section not present. (Basic maths appears not to be Wikians' forte)

Seventh Doctor: Not many notable candidates.

Eighth Doctor: Tim Curry, Eric Idle, Billy Connolly, Michael Palin, Rowan Atkinson, Anthony Head (the creepy headmaster in the Who episode 'School Reunion')

Ninth Doctor: Hugh Grant, Bill Nighy (apparently), Eddie Izzard

Tenth Doctor: Bill Nighy (again, according to the tabloids)

 

I have no doubt that Stephen Moffatt will pick someone unexpected. Moran maintains that the role would never go to (for example) Howard Brown from the Halifax adverts. However, eccentricity has been the mark of some, and arguably all, previous Doctors: Brown is certainly a decent candidate in that respect. In addition, he was axed from the Halifax ads in April due to the credit crunch... who knows?

 

Hello. I thought it was about time I mentioned my brother David. He deserves it.

 

Anyway, I thought I'd start a regular entry, looking at a selection of famous Davids, and what they've been up to, on a bimonthly basis. Here are the five Davids we'll be looking at:

 

David Miliband is in the Democratic Republic of Congo, the African nation torn by yet more tribal infighting and therefore reminiscent of certain areas of Yapton. He hopes to find a solution to the conflict there, but would surely have been best advised to take Gordon Brown with him: Brown could then gurn at the Congolese rebel militia, forcing them into a panicked retreat. 

 

David Bellamy appears to have done very little in the past four months, except opening a new botanic garden in Bristol (July) and teaching schoolchildren (June) how to protect the nation's beaches ("Smack my beach up"? No?)

 

David N'Gog moved to Liverpool FC from Paris St. Germain in the summer; thus disproving the popular urban myth that all French teenagers are signed by Arsene Wenger. He made his debut against Aston Villa in August, and is noted for his excellent goals for the French youth sides. He is Jean-Alain Boumsong's cousin. (It seems almost inevitable that he will be mentioned in a quiz in the distant future about lesser-known Liverpool squad players, so remember his name. He also appears in this list due to the blogger's absolute unwillingness to mention David Beckham... oops.)

 

David Dickinson. He of the Bargain Hunt appeared on Ant & Dec's Saturday Night Takeaway. Following the frantic driving challenge, Ant and Dec's Saturday night takeaway appeared on David Dickinson. [Audience card: LAUGH]

 

David Bowie released an album free with 'The News of the World' in June. This disc contains a selection of obscure album tracks. On 3rd November, some of Bowie's music videos were shown in New York 's Museum of Modern Art. Not that modern, surely?

 

More on our sampling of Davids in January, by which time Bellamy may have jumped into another river.