A Modern-Day Anamoly

The Doctor is amazing for many reasons. But perhaps you are not familiar with the said "Doctor". The Doctor is a Time Lord from the planet Galifrey. Time Lords are an alien race who have mastered the technology needed to travel through time and space (but they can't travel through their own lifetime because pterodactyl looking aliens will come and eat everybody up). Anyway, why is this particular Time Lord so cool? Let me tell you.

This guy, who could spend his time traveling all over the place, decides to spend it with humans, because, according to him, we are an amazingly emotional and adaptable race that, despite the odds set against it, prevails and survives through time. Humans, for the Doctor, are kind of like Hobbits for Gandalf. And if you don't get that analogy, then you probably don't care about anything else in this post.

The Doctor also has this unstoppable determination to remain relatively violence-free. While the Doctor travels through time and space, inevitably saving the human race from other time traveling aliens (and that's where the story gets kind of circular: i.e, is the Doctor saving humans because they always survive, or are humans always surviving because the Doctor saves them?), he always attempts to come to some sort of diplomatic solution. Most of the time, the other aliens are non-compliant, and the dear defender must resort to more extreme measures to ensure the safety of humanity.

Regardless of its underscored British cheesiness, the series that portrays the Doctor's adventures (you know, Doctor Who) does sowith delicacy and charm. And even better, it comes complete with a moral message that is delicately cloaked in the story, so that you come away with a sense of purpose without feeling as if you've been beaten over the head by some morality-driven writer who has no knack for natural storytelling.

If my argument here hasn't been compelling enough for you to tune in to the new season of Doctor Who that premieres on Sci-fi in a couple of weeks, then I'm just going to have to kidnap you and force you to watch it anyway. Trust me, you'll feel better for it.