The idea of The Doctor coping with a disability was the seed of this story. He is a control freak, frustrated when he isn’t in control. Losing a faculty would be hard for him. That was the original premise. In fact, he cheats almost immediately, by using the TARDIS to see for him. Though it is something of a handicap only to see in magenta and pink. What follows is an almost comic hide and seek through the TARDIS, with, as The Doctor said, two girls and a blind man looking for space pirates locked into various rooms by the TARDIS itself which has gone into defensive mode itself.

The Doctor proves that even blind he is still good. Rose shows that she has learnt a lot from him. Young Brenda proves useful. The space pirates prove to be pushovers, with one exception, the leader of the pack, Ravelon, who they finally corner in the dojo. With The Doctor protecting Brenda, Rose takes him on and kills Ravelon, but is traumatised by the fact that she had killed a Human being as opposed to the monsters they have taken on in the past. The Doctor reminds her that sometimes Humans ARE monsters, citing one of her mum’s old boyfriends.

The idea that some of the men her mother dated might have been a problem to Rose is one I have given some thought to. Jackie as a woman who has seen a LOT of men is something of a running ‘gag’ in the TV series, but the reality of that for a single mother with a teenage daughter is not so funny. The fact that Rose and Jackie can both now count on The Doctor for protection is a comforting thought for them.

But Rose cannot accept that killing Ravelon is no different to killing Arachnoids or any other non-Human enemy, and The Doctor takes extreme measures, wiping her memory of what happened. When this story went online a critical comment was that The Doctor wouldn’t DO that, wiping her memory when it suited him. But I disagree. He loves her and knows that the memory of what happened would hurt her and so he does what he can for her, and when she wakes up later, with no knowledge of what happened, he distracts her from thinking about it too much with his new eyes.

The question of what colour The Doctor’s eyes should be comes from two ideas. First, of course, the fact that they HAVE changed with his regenerations, and secondly from a gentle dispute over what colour exactly Christopher Eccleston’s eyes are. Officially they are blue, but they look more like grey to me. I compromised by making them slate-grey, in other words blue-grey, as opposed to a piercing blue. Brown is the First Doctor’s eye colour, so that would be his ‘default’ and it is also the colour of Rose’s eyes. Green, not him at all. Slate-grey in the end is the only choice.