Peeking from Behind the Sofa: Fear and Doctor Who

Last spring my eight year old niece developed a somewhat random and irrational fear of the mannequins at departments stores. She would stare at them with wide eyes and hold my hand in a death grip whenever we walked past one and wouldn't let go until we were out of the store.

And then I made the mistake of introducing her and her sister to Doctor Who with an episode featuring the Autons.

Oops.

Sorry Meli!

Doctor Who has always been great at taking honest to God childhood fears and making them real. From the monster under your bed to questionable cafeteria lunch ladies, the Doctor has faced just about every fear a child can have. Sometimes more than once.

However, the show also takes on adult fears and anxieties about the modern world and gives them its own terrifying twist.

What could happen if you get too attached to your Bluetooth headset? This:

Cybermen

Worry about what could happen if your GPS could control your car?

You can thank the Sontarans for that one.

From diet pills to aliens disguised as politicians bent on taking over the world, the Doctor takes on not just your child's fears but yours as well. Ultimately, that is what this show caters to - fear. Yeah, the writers can go on about about how its a fairy tale dressed up as fun sci-fi; but, just as with Grimm's fairy tales, one can find a horrific Gothic undertone running beneath the Doctor's silliness.

The scariest episodes, the ones that terrify both young and old and stay with you long after its over are not the ones that cater to modern fears about household appliances come to life or literally being stuck in traffic forever (yes, that was an actual episode). No, the scariest ones are the ones that tap into our primal fears. Fear the dark. Fear of losing our faiths. Fear of losing the ones we love. Fears and anxieties explored in many Gothic texts.

In the two-parter "Silence in the Library/Forest of the Dead", the show explores the fear of the dark with the Vashta Nerada.

The Doctor: Almost every species in the universe has an irrational fear of the dark, but they're wrong, because it's not irrational. It's Vashta Nerada.

Donna: What's "Vashta Nerada"?

The Doctor: It's what's in the dark. It's what's always in the dark... Where there's meat, there's Vashta Nerada. You can see them sometimes, if you look. The dust in sunbeams.

The dark is alive and consuming, but it's okay because the Doctor is in. Believe in him and you'll be okay.

Doctor Who takes our fears and anxieties and expands on them, makes them into something tangible and, with the Doctor, something that can be faced.