http://magic-7-words.livejournal.com/ ([identity profile] magic-7-words.livejournal.com) wrote in [community profile] wintercompanion 2012-03-13 01:26 am (UTC)

Good point about a loyalty on/off switch. I was trying to reconcile Jack's willingness to kill with all the crap he lets his friends get away with--not only the Doctor leaving him for dead, but Torchwood disobeying direct orders, shooting him, hiding Cybermen in the basement, etc.--but he can forgive them while still recognizing that they've screwed up. So it isn't that he doesn't recognize shades of gray, just that he doesn't let them distract him when it comes to decision-making... maybe?

This is off-episode, but now that we're on the subject of Jack's morality, I'm trying to work in his actions at the end of CoE. The Doctor would never have done what he did (in my opinion--though it's a tough comparison, because if CoE had been written as a DW episode, he wouldn't have had to make the choice; there'd have been a third option), and I postulate that this may be because Jack finds it easier than the Doctor to turn off the part of his brain that gets hung up on "this is a horrible thing I'm doing" and listen to the part that says "it's the only way forward, therefore it's the right thing." The ability to pare complicated issues down to binary options, e.g. "The Doctor: friend or foe? Friend. Okay, glad we settled that." Or something.

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