Can You Hear Me - 13 and Graham's scene

So 13 can make a heartwarming speeche to a random couple getting married in demons of the Punjab yet can’t say anything that would help Graham
A friend of hers that she has known for longer

And before people use the socially awkward defence need I remind people that socially awkward doctors like 11&12 did their best to comfort their companions so 13’s defence is utterly invalidated

Pretty much cemented my condemnation of the Chris Chibnall/ Jodie Whittaker error

I've a theory. I like Can You Hear Me a lot. It and Praxeus manage to do something rather marvellous with a standalone story that feels uniquely suited to Thirteen. I think the scene itself is fine, but narratively it could've been nudged back a bit earlier.

Yaz's reunion with Anita, the officer who found her as a runaway (and is implied convinced her not to suicide), is this big emotional moment of catharsis for the viewer. Something which fiction is rather lovely for. It's rare to get that sort of closure as the assisting person in real life. People walk off to their own fates and you just have to be optimistic that they, like you, kept going. Had the scene with the Doctor and Graham been slotted in before that, I think it would've resonated better in the emotional journey. To get that in the escalation, rather than the cool down.

"I'm here if you need someone to listen, I'm good at that," is basically the gist of the pair's ambiguous chat in the TARDIS, which is a perfect lead-in for the scene with Yaz. You may not be able to say anything today. Okay. But, you're still there today and, while it may not seem like much now, tomorow...? It could be the difference between the Yaz at the side of the road and the Yaz who showed up on Anita's doorstep.

I'd say its a vital lesson. (Readers, I'm going to put a trigger warning right here for a rather frank talk about mental health issues below. If you feel up to it, have a read. If not, feel free to skip right on by.)

Take it from someone who has talked a stranger out of suicide on the spot: there are moments where you are perfectly well-equipped to handle the situation and there are moments where you're not. That has nothing to do with competency, skill with language or anything else. I was sixteen, barely out of school, and my only experience was a longtime friend with similar impulses. It is blind luck. That's the frightening part of it. It relies on nothing more than not being too tired, too unfocussed, too unobservant. The fact that they had gotten to that point was appalling, in and of itself, but the biggest asset I had in that situation was to listen. Just listen. Nothing more than that. And I was very, very lucky because, like Yaz, whatever dark cloud had come over the top of them, they were not willing to surrender yet.

I'm very fortunate to have the distance enough to talk about something that traumatic (for both parties) from the point of advocacy. There are still prejudices and stigmas around mental health that need to be overturned (I have close friends affected by them so I've strong feelings in that regard), but I also understand from that moment and moments like it that people are imperfect. The Doctor was self-aware enough in that moment aboard the TARDIS (and she knew Graham well enough) that a conversation about those sorts of demons... She wasn't equipped for in that moment. And, given the story's arc, fair enough. She had the extermination of her entire world on her mind. Distinctively, though, I don't think Graham was looking for an answer. Not judging by his reaction after the fact. He was just looking for validation. An acknowledgement that his feelings were real. Sometimes, that's all it takes.

So, a bit more out there, but there was recently a bit of DW Twitter drama with someone who accused the ending of being insincere and, being socially awkward themselves, they would've been more comforting in 13's place. In turn, people argued that they liked the ending and found it was akin to how they would react in that moment (a lot of talk about autism and neurodivergence) and that 13 did nothing wrong here.