The Doctor Who thread

WezV

I'm okay with the choice.   I think they could write some good stories with a female doctor. It doesn't stop the Doctor being male again in a few years time.  It will just be a phase in a long history.  It may work, it may not.


my only fear is that they make a big thing of it.  For example, they might make her a caricature of the doctor just to prove a woman can do the role..  They need to let her be her own version for it to work.  

 Or they might be tempted to make jokes about how the Doctor's behaviour has changed since becoming a woman, wrong toilet door, cooing at babies, time of the month  (might be a bit brave for the beeb), hair, makeup and shoes jokes etc...   I think there are a lot of easy jokes that Moffat wouldn't be able to resist.  Hopefully the new guy has more restraint

WezV

TimmyO said:

Whatever you do definitely don't watch the Battlestar Galactica reboot. 

and that was 13 years ago!

digitalscream

TimmyO said:

I applaud the creativity deployed by those seeking not to admit their own sexism, even to themselves.

Whatever you do definitely don't watch the Battlestar Galactica reboot. 

...and if women are angry or annoyed about it?

Labelling anyone not happy about this as "sexist" seems to me to be a particularly lazy way to think.

digitalscream

WezV said:

TimmyO said:

Whatever you do definitely don't watch the Battlestar Galactica reboot. 

and that was 13 years ago!

...and coupled with amazing writing. I can almost guarantee that this won't be, because of it's recent history. That's my problem with this; it strikes me as a setup for lazy, half-assed scriptwriting, because coming up with gimmicks to distract from crappy scripts seems to be this show's MO. That annoys me, because good writing used to be what the show relied upon.

TimmyO

digitalscream said:

TimmyO said:

I applaud the creativity deployed by those seeking not to admit their own sexism, even to themselves.

Whatever you do definitely don't watch the Battlestar Galactica reboot. 

...and if women are angry or annoyed about it?

Labelling anyone not happy about this as "sexist" seems to me to be a particularly lazy way to think.

Well if you think that a woman can't be sexist this is going to be an even tougher debate.

Out of interest, what would you label a view that something was automatically wrong because of the sex of the person? 

EricTheWeary

WezV said:

I'm okay with the choice.   I think they could write some good stories with a female doctor. It doesn't stop the Doctor being male again in a few years time.  It will just be a phase in a long history.  It may work, it may not.


my only fear is that they make a big thing of it.  For example, they might make her a caricature of the doctor just to prove a woman can do the role..  They need to let her be her own version for it to work.  

 Or they might be tempted to make jokes about how the Doctor's behaviour has changed since becoming a woman, wrong toilet door, cooing at babies, time of the month  (might be a bit brave for the beeb), hair, makeup and shoes jokes etc...   I think there are a lot of easy jokes that Moffat wouldn't be able to resist.  Hopefully the new guy has more restraint

In the past ( at least some times anyway) the new Doctor has overlapped with the old companion so we've had a fair few references to how they've changed ( accent, age, face) but as they've dispensed with the last companions hopefully she can just get on with the job without those kind of jokes. 

Although we've still got the revisit to the William Hartnell era Doctor to go through - have to find out how cool he is with becoming a woman. 

digitalscream

TimmyO said:

digitalscream said:

TimmyO said:

I applaud the creativity deployed by those seeking not to admit their own sexism, even to themselves.

Whatever you do definitely don't watch the Battlestar Galactica reboot. 

...and if women are angry or annoyed about it?

Labelling anyone not happy about this as "sexist" seems to me to be a particularly lazy way to think.

Well if you think that a woman can't be sexist this is going to be an even tougher debate.

Out of interest, what would you label a view that something was automatically wrong because of the sex of the person? 

Off the top of my head...and not just keeping this to gender...what do you think about these?

Idris Elba playing Queen Victoria
Martin Freeman playing BA Baracus
Ooooo...here's a good one...Scarlett Johansson as Major Mira Killian

How sexist or racist are you now?

C'mon, you have to admit, this is about the BBC's "commitment to diversity" (which appears in almost all of the BBC's articles and news reports about this) more than it is about the dramatic impact or writing.

It's not sexist to think certain roles are inappropriate for women, just as certain roles are inappropriate for men. I don't want a bloke playing Miss Marple any more than I relish the prospect of a woman playing ol' Doc. I'm applying the same rule to both genders, so...how does that make me sexist, exactly?

TimmyO

Fretwired

The Ghost Busters reboot went well .... :-)

UnclePsychosis

So how come all the people rage quitting because a time lord is going to be played by a female actress didn't rage quit when Michelle Gomez got on board? 

It's genuinely hilarious seeing all the frothing at the mouth this is causing. 

http://newsthump.com/2017/07/16/fictional-time-travellers-dont-have-vaginas-insist-morons/

The Doctor isn't real. The Doctor isn't even a fictional human. Anyone who can't see why that's ever so slightly different to a portrayal of Queen Victoria needs to have a quiet word with themselves. 

digitalscream

UnclePsychosis said:

The idea that this isn't really a big deal would carry more weight if it wasn't for the Outraged of Tumbridge Wells types currently absolutely losing their shit over it. 

There's a pattern emerging here - your side's argument might carry more weight if you weren't chucking around insults and labelling any other argument as "sexist" regardless of the reasoning, though.

Flanging_Fred

Well I think it's a great appointment. A bold move into the future with an admirable nod to feminism and equality with a strong assured lead character.  The only real question now is whether she'll be wearing the leather Basque or the rubber catsuit and stilettoes.

cj73

TimmyO said:

Starbuck didn't become female, I turned gay

digitalscream

UnclePsychosis said:

So how come all the people rage quitting because a time lord is going to be played by a female actress didn't rage quit when Michelle Gomez got on board? 

Actually, there was plenty of annoyance for that particular appointment. Then again, Michelle Gomez is a much more charismatic and versatile actress than Jodie Whittaker, so that might've had something to do with it.

UnclePsychosis said:

The Doctor isn't real. The Doctor isn't even a fictional human. Anyone who can't see why that's ever so slightly different to a portrayal of Queen Victoria needs to have a quiet word with themselves. 

The Queen Victoria portrayed in most productions is basically fictional too.

That aside...as I said, what about Martin Freeman playing BA Baracus, or the infamous Scarlett Johansson/Ghost in the Shell incident? Perfectly appropriate, do you think?

UnclePsychosis

digitalscream said:

WezV said:

TimmyO said:

Whatever you do definitely don't watch the Battlestar Galactica reboot. 

and that was 13 years ago!

...and coupled with amazing writing. I can almost guarantee that this won't be, because of it's recent history. That's my problem with this; it strikes me as a setup for lazy, half-assed scriptwriting, because coming up with gimmicks to distract from crappy scripts seems to be this show's MO. That annoys me, because good writing used to be what the show relied upon.

I see where you're coming from but I'd argue that first of all Doctor Who hasn't had good writing since about 1986 (and I say that as a fan) and secondly that we should perhaps give the (new) show runner and the (new) Doctor the curtesy of actually seeing their work before decrying it as a load of shit? 

bacchanalian

Surely the FretBoard irony meter has gone into fully saturated overdrive. I cannot believe anyone can get so worked up and also try to read so much into the casting decision.

I have been a life long Sci Fi fan and Doctor Who is a moderately entertaining tea time show. However, if having a female Doctor becomes a gateway for my daughter to become interested in Sci Fi, I will be very happy. 

Fretwired

UnclePsychosis said:

So how come all the people rage quitting because a time lord is going to be played by a female actress didn't rage quit when Michelle Gomez got on board? 

You don't get it. I did rage when Mary Poppins arrived .. great actor wasted with a poor part, woeful lines and dodgy scripts. The Master was supposed to be evil .. she wasn't scarily at all. She looked like she'd walked off the set of Downton Abbey. What next .. Daleks screaming .. "integrate, integrate .. we want to be loved" ..

My complaint isn't directly that a woman got the role. Just a woman whose a member of the Islington luvies .. she's white, young, pretty - she's safe and bland. It's as exciting as a prawn cocktail and totally predictable from the likes of Moffat and co. I expect the stories won't improve and the whole thing will continue as before.

But go on call me sexist ... it would make my day!

Appointing Capaldi was inspired and edgy had he been given material that could have exploited his talents.

Fretwired

bacchanalian said:

Surely the FretBoard irony meter has gone into fully saturated overdrive. I cannot believe anyone can get so worked up and also try to read so much into the casting decision.

I have been a life long Sci Fi fan and Doctor Who is a moderately entertaining tea time show. However, if having a female Doctor becomes a gateway for my daughter to become interested in Sci Fi, I will be very happy. 

Why? Sounds quite sad to me if that's what it takes ... does the same apply to music?

Rabs

 

Martin Freeman playing BA Baracus

UnclePsychosis

digitalscream said:

The Queen Victoria portrayed in most productions is basically fictional too.

That aside...as I said, what about Martin Freeman playing BA Baracus, or the infamous Scarlett Johansson/Ghost in the Shell incident? Perfectly appropriate, do you think?

I can't pretend that I'm particularly knowledgeable of the A-team, but from memory I seem to recall that being of African origin was actually important to the BA character: so no, that wouldn't be cool. As for Ghost In The Shell, I haven't seen the remake and I haven't seen the original for pushing twenty years. I don't seem to recall that the ethnicity of the Ghost was particularly important to the character but it might have made more sense to cast a Japanese actress given that the whole thing is set in Japan. 

The reason that I don't give a shit about a woman playing the Doctor is that gender is literally unimportant to the character. The Doctor should be smart, compassionate but with a dark side, and a little bit quirky. Sexuality or Gender isn't a thing that ever mattered over the first five decades of the character. The Doctor is a shape-shifting alien who travels around in a phone box thats bigger on the inside than the outside. In such a universe shape shifting aliens to whom sexuality and gender don't matter can quite easily be played by a woman without it making my head explode. 

Similarly, a black James Bond would be cool so long as he was British, suave, and bad-ass. Being white isn't important. A female James Bond wouldn't work because James Bond is a womaniser and thats an important part of the character.