I like the Doctor better when he’s flying around outer space, visiting distant planets and distant times. Series 10’s premiere episode was a great introduction to Bill, but it was a little too earthbound for my taste. “Smile” took us to a distant planet in the distant future, which made for a much stronger episode.
In “Smile” the Doctor and Bill visit a distant human colony populated by robots that only speak emoji. As someone who used to text a lot of teenagers, I can attest that we might be headed toward a future in which we only use emoji. The Doctor even called this emoji planet the utopia of vacuous teens. That made me literally laugh out loud and it wasn’t even the best part about the episode.
Here are some other thoughts I had while watching “Smile.”
Emotions
Not only did the robots only speak emoji, every person in the colony was equipped with a little badge that constantly communicated its owner’s emotions through emoji. If I were ever confused about how I was feeling then I could just have someone tell me how I was feeling; it would be great. Little badges like that could be useful because not many of us are very good at expressing our emotions. Texting, social media and emoji have stunted our ability to have open and honest conversations. It’s more difficult to talk openly about our feelings because we’re not used to having face-to-face conversations. We have no problem opening up in a text message or baring our souls in a status. However, when the opportunity to do the same presents itself in real life, we withdraw. The emotional badges weren’t great in “Smile” and neither are all the means we have to avoid opening up.
Traps
In “Smile” the Doctor told Bill that traps usually are beautiful. If traps looked skeevy and dangerous, then we wouldn’t be as tempted to walk into them. The same can be said of sin and temptation. If sin wasn’t appealing, then we wouldn’t be tempted by it. I’ve never been tempted by kale because it’s hard to eat and tastes like dirt. You know what does tempt me? Donuts, cheeseburgers, French fries and ice cream. Traps may be beautiful, but they’re dangerous for us in the end. We need to recognize that sin may look good, but in the end it will hurt us. We just need to trust that even though sin may look appealing, God knows what’s best for us.
Grief
Without giving too much away, the robots get it in their little robot heads that grief is the enemy of happiness and needs to be destroyed. We sometimes like to treat grief the same way. No one wants to experience grief and we do our best to avoid it. Sometimes avoiding grief means covering it up or ignoring it when we would be best served embracing it. Grief is an important part of healthy emotional growth. We’re all going to experience heartaches and tragedies in our lives, that’s a given. Grief is an important part of the process in dealing with those heartaches and tragedies. We need to embrace our grief when we experience it, because it’s only by embracing it that we can move beyond it.
“Smile” was a great episode of Doctor Who. It had wonderful sci-fi elements, but also addressed a lot of deeper issues. Science fiction has always been at its best when tackling humanity’s core struggles against a fantastical backdrop. “Smile” accomplished that feat with aplomb.
What did you think of “Smile?”
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