Amy Pond has no characteristics > She never enjoyed being a model (pppft, who would?), or used her modelling to express herself. But then again, it is a silly and vacuous profession requiring no skills whatsoever, so it’s perfect for a character as shallow and weak and uninteresting as Amy.
amy pond has no characteristics
Amy Pond has no characteristics > In her first series, she isn’t largely neutral towards kids, not really getting them and speaking to them like they’re on the same level as her. (This isn’t a complete contrast to Clara, as well, because obviously Clara has no characteristics either). This doesn’t start to change later on as she matures as a person and gets her own childhood back, because Amy has never had the slightest shred of character development ever.
Amy Pond has no characteristics > She doesn’t use insults as terms of affection / is abrasive to those she loves
Amy Pond has no characteristics > We don’t know what she was like at school
[Answer: She was a tomboy when she was little, she was often in trouble, she played hockey violently, she liked History, she picked on Rory and she had lots of attention from boys]
Amy Pond has no characteristics > She doesn’t have a deep, deep fear of abandonment, a fear which leads her to push people away
(Sarcasm mode off, and possible trigger warning for child abuse/neglect)
Amy expects people to leave her, because that’s all they’ve ever done. (Her parents, remember?) So she says to Rory in disbelief, “We’re still together in ten years?”, she tells the Doctor “I understand, you’re got to leave me.” She hates being ‘clingy’- because everything she’s clung to she’s lost. She even makes fun of Rory for being ‘clingy’ when she was terrified too, and probably would have been even more so if their positions were reversed. When their roles are reversed in the worst way possible, and Rory is dead (er yes, this happened twice) she completely goes to pieces. She either folds in on herself and seems dead to the world, or she becomes utterly hysterical. (Remember?) Plus, her relief at not being abandoned to die in Flesh And Stone leads her to try and sleep with the Doctor, even though he protests, which is obviously not healthy behaviour at all.
But of course you can see where all this comes from. At this point in her story she’s never had a childhood with her parents, and Aunt Sharon doesn’t seem to have been the most attentive of carers. (She left 7-year-old Amy alone in the middle of the night! That can lead to prosecution, in Britain, and it’s just one of those things you just don’t do to a kid, no matter how mature they seem. What the hell, Aunt Sharon?) But once Amy gets her parents back and her childhood is restored, this behaviour lessened considerably. No more mocking people for being clingy, and she generally seems happier all round.
However, we still see Amy working through this fear- firstly in The Girl Who Waited, where she is accidentally abandoned and it turns her cold, hateful and hard. Then in The God Complex, Amy’s greatest fear is represented by herself sitting waiting- but it’s not waiting she fears, it’s waiting and no-one coming for her. True, a lot of that scene is about the Doctor, but it’s about Amy too. Lots of people’s worst fears spring from their childhood experiences- “I stole your childhood” -and Amy’s no different.
And of course, when Amy fears that Rory will abandon her for not being able to have children, she abandons him first. Luckily, she and her husband are able to talk it out, albeit in the most painful and stressful way imaginable. Anyway, there you have it. I think we know, beyond all shadow of a doubt, what Amy’s worst fear is.
Amy Pond has no characteristics > She doesn’t despair, panic, and/or have complete breakdowns when in terrible situations.
(Sarcasm mode off)
In comparison to – for example – Rose, who always tried to do something (rip open the TARDIS, jump across dimensions) Amy will give up and hand her agency over to someone else, usually the Doctor (but sometimes Rory) when faced with terror or tragedy. Remember when Rory tells Amy, “I know you’ll never give up on me”? He was wrong, because she did give up…she stopped doing the CPR, she started crying over his body.
Amy Pond isn’t strong in the face of terrible, terrible things. She isn’t strong in the face of death. She isn’t strong in the face of real fear. She definitely, definitely isn’t strong in the face of losing a loved one. Instead she cries, she pleads, she freezes, she goes catatonic, she gives up, she can’t do it. She’s nearly lost Rory a couple of times that way. And her deciding, in Angels Take Manhattan, to go back in time for Rory- this is, I think, the only time where she’s lost him and she’s worked through her fear and panic and decided what she’s going to do. I think Series Five Amy would have reacted very differently to the scenario presented in the graveyard- I think she would have done what the Doctor wanted, gone back to the TARDIS, and never been happy again for a very, very long time. Luckily, she found her agency when she needed it most.
Anyway, the point is, Amy isn’t a strong female character. Not in that way. Not at all. And I love her for it.
Amy Pond has no characteristics> She’s not interested in art, she hasn’t got a favourite artist whom she was delighted to meet, and she isn’t a talented artist herself. (And the Doctor never once had a whole scene where he realised Amy was Amy because she was surrounded by drawings and models.)
Amy Pond has no characteristics > She’s not a natural storyteller with an interest in writing, a skill which she later uses to bring joy to thousands of people
Amy Pond has no characteristics > She doesn’t behave immaturely – whether out of boredom, frustration or withheld emotions – quite a lot, especially throughout the first episodes of Series Five. She doesn’t have an extremely immature (to say the least) attitude to sex, either.
Amy Pond has no characteristics > She’s not got a downright Holmesian ability to notice little details, which she uses to her advantage to save the day/herself more than once
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