Art by Elizabeth Buller
I believe Weeping Angels are not evil.
Now, before every Whovian hunts me down in the name of the Ponds, let’s take an honest look at the facts.
I think it is possible the Weeping Angels have been misunderstood. After all, we only know the basics about them: they are quantum-locked aliens who survive on the potential days of a person’s life, they look scary as all get out, they have the ability to turn off lights, and they can only speak through a dead human’s voice-box.
The Doctor said that Weeping Angels, “[Z]ap you into the past and let you live to death.”* But won’t death end our lives even without being touched by an Angel? So, really, all the Weeping Angels could do is move us to a different time. Were I given the choice of my own extinction or the mere displacement of another, I would choose the later. It is not very kind, but it is survival.
What would you do if you and your family were on the brink of starvation? To what lengths would you go to survive? Historically, famines involved numerous crimes, even cannibalism. I think it is fair to say that humans have the potential to do just about anything to stay alive.
I believe that it is just as fair to say that Weeping Angels do what they must to survive. The only way, literally the one-and-only solution, for them to get the necessary energy for life is to move people back in time. If they do not feed on lost years, they will die.
The Doctor may be taking his position as the protector of humanity to the extreme here. The Angels are just trying to survive, but instead of working out a solution, he calls them psychopaths. If it is true that they only exist to kill, why are any of us still alive? Why haven’t the Angels attacked us in our sleep or sabotaged electricity worldwide? Maybe they aren’t as malevolent as the Doctor believes.
For instance, the Doctor said that Weeping Angels have the best defense mechanism in the universe because, “you can’t kill stone.”* But you can blow it up with dynamite or crush it with a bulldozer. An Angel could not unfreeze itself and escape if a group of humans really wanted to obliterate it. It would be trapped. The best it could do is make an ugly face to scare people away.
Humanity is not willing to sacrifice itself anymore than the Weeping Angels are. We cannot ask one race to be crushed for the other, and this sad war cannot continue. There must be a diplomatic solution, and I am sure that the Doctor could find one if he would face the reality of his prejudice against the Angels and his obsession with the human race.
In each case where he met Weeping Angels, the Doctor reverted to his natural state of running away. He never took time to try and help. I am not saying that the Weeping Angels are right to do what they do, but what choice do they really have? They are not kind, but they are desperate. They are dangerous, but they are not evil. I think the Doctor has misjudged “the lonely assassins” and led the rest of us to do the same.
* Season 3, Episode 10; “Blink”
This Author: Cadi Murphy loves reading and writing (but definitely NOT ‘rithmetic). Her favorite Doctor Who character is River Song. You can follow her epic quest for publication at her blog, Storyteller: A Writer’s Journey.
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