Sonic Screwdriver

With full knowledge that my geek cred is being put at risk, I’ll admit that I only started watching Dr. Who regularly in 2005. That’s when the series was rebooted after a long hiatus with the fantastic Christopher Eccleston in the title role.

He brought an amazing intensity to the reboot and it proved to be a good launch pad for the fantastic run it has had through Doctor’s David Tennant and Matt Smith. Over the past several years the program has done the best it can with its limited FX budget and sometimes sparse set dressing and consistently delivered some amazing stories and concepts, it’s truly great.

But that greatness doesn’t always translate to outsiders. The same limitations in budget can make some episodes look and feel a bit corny and there’s normally a sense of ‘raised stakes’ that may seem overblown to some who aren’t familiar with the rhythm of a serial sci-fi show. The other day I was watching an episode and my wife asked me what I thought was so great about the show, why was it such a ‘big deal’ to me? I thought about it. Was it the smart writing, the sharp character portrayals, the sense of plucky heart?

Then it hit me: What makes Dr. Who so great is the sonic screwdriver.

The sonic screwdriver, for those of you who are unfamiliar, is a tool carried by The Doctor whose general function is to do whatever needs to be done. During an episode of the show he may use it for any variety of things from opening locks to fixing electronics to disabling alarms. It doesn’t work on wood, but it does all kinds of other things. It supposedly works on sound waves or something of that nature, but how it works isn’t really important.

What it does do, at least in the newer series, is act as a deux ex machina, a method for solving unsolvable or complex plot issues quickly and easily. This is something that a lot of writers will tell you is a bad thing, because it leads to a lack of believability and it minimizes the tension in relation to your characters. If The Doctor and one of his perennial companions get into trouble, he can just point the screwdriver at it and the problem gets solved.

But it isn’t as much of a cure-all as it might seem at first glance. While it has saved the characters on the show from many a jam, its primary purpose is to shortcut the technical minutiae that many other shows get bogged down with. If a door needs to be locked logically, but open when our characters need to pass it, just use the sonic screwdriver.

It allows the writers to devote the running time of the show to some of the best conceptual science fiction on television in recent memory.

It never exists to solve any moral quandaries or to define humanity. It doesn’t answer the sticky philosophical debates that arise from how a nearly immortal being with immense power and knowledge is supposed to govern itself without any checks and balances. It just lets the story to flow and removes unnecessary fiddling.

Episodes like Gridlock, about a future earth eternally stuck in traffic; Blink, about quantum locked sentient statues that can only move when you’re not looking; Empty child, an alternate history of World War II. These all present incredibly complex ideas in a dramatic fashion at a brisk clip to fit inside one or two 60-minute blocks.

And a lot of the success of those episodes and other fan favorites is their ability to concentrate on the macro, rather than the micro.

It’s always important to consider the details, to make sure that they’re sound in story. Your viewers (or readers) will sense when they aren’t. But sometimes when you have the details and the logic is sound, its better to discard the maths and just get to the final equation.

The sonic screwdriver has enabled Dr. Who to consistently ask and answer some of the most ambitious questions in television science fiction. Questions that will genuinely make you think.

Not all of us can afford to eschew the details in our writing, but sometimes it can help to focus on the larger scope of things, rather than all of the pedantic bits. Get the details, know them sound, but then know when to omit them in order to make an impact.

That’s what the sonic screwdriver means to me.