margflower:perpugilliam:fabricati-diem-pvnc:Favourite Classic Who moments (in no particular order):4
margflower:perpugilliam:fabricati-diem-pvnc:Favourite Classic Who moments (in no particular order):4. Steven’s almost-departure at the end of The Massacre of St Bartholomew’s EveSTEVEN: Surely there was something we could have done?DOCTOR: No, nothing. Nothing. In any case, I cannot change the course of history, you know that. The Massacre continued for several days in Paris and then spread itself to other parts of France. Oh what a senseless waste. What a terrible page of the past.STEVEN: Did they all die?DOCTOR: Yes. Most of them. About ten thousand in Paris alone.STEVEN: The Admiral?DOCTOR: Yes.STEVEN: Nicholas?(The Doctor says nothing.)STEVEN: But you had to leave Anne Chaplette there to die.DOCTOR: Anne Chaplette?STEVEN: The girl! The girl who was with me! If you’d brought her with us she needn’t have died. But no, we had to leave her there to be slaughtered.DOCTOR: Well, it is possible of course she didn’t die, and I was right to leave her.STEVEN: Possible?! Look, how possible?! That girl was already hunted by the Catholic guards. If they killed ten thousand how did they spare her? Well, you don’t know, do you? You can’t say for certain that you weren’t responsible for that girl’s death.DOCTOR: I was not responsible.STEVEN: Oh, no. You just sent her back to her aunt’s house where the guards were waiting to catch her. I tell you this much, Doctor, wherever this machine of yours lands next I’m getting off. If your researches have so little regard for human life then I want no part.***DOCTOR: We’ve landed. Your mind is made up?(The TARDIS doors open.)STEVEN: Goodbye.DOCTOR: My dear Steven, history sometimes gives us a terrible shock, and that is because we don’t quite fully understand. Why should we? After all, we’re all too small to realise its final pattern. Therefore, don’t try and judge it from where you stand. I was right to do as I did. Yes, that I firmly believe.(Steven walks out of the TARDIS.)DOCTOR: Even after all this time he cannot understand. I dare not change the course of history. Well, at least I taught him to take some precautions. He did remember to look at the scanner before he opened the doors. Now they’re all gone. All gone. None of them could understand. Not even my little Susan, or Vicki. Yes. And as for Barbara and Chatterton… Chesterton! They were all too impatient to get back to their own time. And now Steven. Perhaps I should go home, back to my own planet. But I can’t. I can’t.ALWAYS REBLOG THIS SCENE. jfc it’s so perfect.This scene is key to understanding the Doctor in his early years and shapes who he is today. Best scene in one’s era. -- source link