Doctor Who

Anyone seen any of the new series (Capaldi's last) yet?

We've had 4 episodes so far here in the UK. I can't say I'm enormously enthusiastic. There's nothing I find objectionable about any of them, they just seem rather lightweight. Maybe they're saving the budget for something really spectacular in the finale
 
Last edited:
Hermit of Archenland said:
Anyone seen any of the new series (Capaldi's last) yet?

We've had 4 episodes so far here in the UK. I can't say I'm enormously enthusiastic. There's nothing I find objectionable about any of them, they just seem rather lightweight. Maybe they're saving the budget for something really spectacular in the finale
Click to expand...

First, greetings fellow Archenlander.

Second, I've been watching it on Amazon Prime, though I am a few weeks behind. It definitely has not been my favorite season, though the episode "Extremis" was excellent.

"Lie of the Land" was pretty good except that there is one glaring plot hole I feel like they left standing open. I won't mention it because it's a "Spolier", but I don't think we would have seen that under the previous administration.

"The Empress of Mars" wasn't bad, but I felt it could have been better.

You know what the problem is with this season? Honestly, in my mind it's Bill. I just don't "buy" her as a companion. I don't know if it's the actress or the writing. But she's just not likeable to me. I think she's the first companion since the show started back up again with Doctor #9 that I just plain haven't liked. I do miss Clara. And Donna Noble. I miss Donna Noble much more than I miss Rose. But the sooner Bill winds up in another universe or gets sent back to 18whatever by a Weeping Angel the better.

Hermit of Archenland said:
And after being a bit ambivalent about Capaldi in his first series I really like him much more so far in his second.
Click to expand...

I don't know if it took me a while to warm up to Capaldi, or if it took him a while to warm up to the role. But now I think I like him even better than I liked Matt Smith. My favorite, though, is still #10 ... David Tennant. He will always be "The Doctor" to me.

However, my favorite episode is a Capaldi episode, "Heaven Sent". That was brilliant.

I don't mind the Daleks being sort of the standard villain the way the Romulans were the standard villain for the Enterprise in ST:TNG. I don't think it really diminishes the Daleks to get beaten up by The Doctor. I mean ... he's The Doctor!!! "The Oncoming Storm". The one about whom monsters have nightmares. Of COURSE they loose. Just like every single other enemy against whom he has gone up.

Even The Master/Missy always loses eventually.
 
Whether you agree or disagree with the BBC's decision to cast Jodie Whittaker, there is no place for hate speech. Genuinely appalled at some of the comments on social media such as "no room for bras in the TARDIS", "Nurse Who", "when Capaldi regenerates, the new Doctor's tits will burst out of the costume", "Doctor Wh*re" and etc.
 
I don't do hate speech. I do truthful speech. Here's a bit of truth.

Many supporters of this change to the Doctor pretend to believe that any objection to it MUST BE a matter of "male chauvinists who can't stand a strong woman." That's their way of claiming to have the high ground. In the real world, however, I and lots of guys like me would have been perfectly okay with the Doctor HAVING BEEN FEMALE FROM THE VERY START. What we dislike is "fooling with Mother Nature."
 
Copperfox said:
I don't do hate speech. I do truthful speech. Here's a bit of truth.

Many supporters of this change to the Doctor pretend to believe that any objection to it MUST BE a matter of "male chauvinists who can't stand a strong woman." That's their way of claiming to have the high ground. In the real world, however, I and lots of guys like me would have been perfectly okay with the Doctor HAVING BEEN FEMALE FROM THE VERY START. What we dislike is "fooling with Mother Nature."
Click to expand...

I agree completely CF.

As a man I really like women in strong roles, I just don't like my heroes, whether male or female, swapping gender. For one thing it's cheating. In effect your saying women can't establish themselves as a female hero in their own right, they need to take over from an already established male one.

What is being presented as a huge step forward for feminism is actually a dozen giant paces backwards
 
I'm not crazy about the new Doctor being female either. I just plain don't think it will work. Not for any sexism on my own part, but for the sexism rampant in human society in the past.

I'm not bothered by the gender swap per se. It's been established that can happen to Time Lords when they regenerate. With Time Lords, everything is different. But I am worried about the PLOT issues this will create.

Think what a hard time Martha Jones had claiming to be a doctor at certain points in Earth's past. When The Doctor does it in a female body in say, 1132, they'll be weighing her to see if she weighs the same as a duck.

And if she does, she's made of wood, and therefore ... (you know the rest).

A woman on her own wondering through Earth's past just isn't going to work. Too many cultures just would not have accepted it. Maybe they'll ditch Bill as the primary companion and bring in a male companion who can pretend to be her protector. Still, it's just going to create too many plot issues.

And of course, if she runs into River Song it just isn't going to be the same. I really hope they don't do that.

Maybe they'll stay primarily in the future, or on other worlds. Still, I don't think this will be one of the more popular doctors.

But the Doctor has endured tough times before. He'll pull through this one.
 
I don't think the issue of how women were treated in the past is an insurmountable problem, although it would require sensitive writing.

I actually have a number of objections to the idea of a female Doctor including the following:

1. As I mentioned before it's basically a cheat. You're not creating an original female hero, just appropriating an already existing male one. In effect you're implying women can't be accepted as heroic figures unless taking over from already established male ones.

2. Within the series' fictional context in opens up disturbing possibilities. We now have a female Doctor who can presumably become pregnant and has the power to travel back in time and meet her male predecessors. I'm sure you can figure out the rest without me going into details. This is a can of worms that should have been left strictly alone.

3. We now have one less positive male role model for boys, a species becoming increasingly rare in modern popular culture. Of course in many respects a woman can be as good a role model as a man. But young boys do tend to identify with male figures more easily and there is one vital area in which a woman simply cannot act as a role model for boys; that is the way men treat women. That there should be male role models appealing to boys who are seen to treat women with respect and courtesy is extremely important, as much for the sake of girls as for boys
 
With regard to some of the more outrageous comments from supposed Dr Who fans (such as 'Nurse Who') I strongly suspect these are actually trolls. The posters are not espousing their real opinions but trying to put Who fans who oppose this decision into a bad light.

On the other side Peter Davison (the 5th Doctor) merely for questioning this in the mildest terms (he regretted the loss of such a positive male role model but encouraged fans to support Jodie) has been subjected to a torrent of online abuse, to such an extent that he has suspended his Twitter account.

So if anything the hate speech seems to be on the pro rather than the anti side. There is clearly a political orthodoxy being imposed here, that people are not allowed to question, on pain of mockery and ridicule, or worse.

I've obviously got the date wrong. I thought it was 2017 but it still seems to be 1984!
 
Reading the letters in the Radio Times this morning I realised that the major flaw in the "but the Doctor was always a positive role model for boys" argument is that a lot of the men who grew up watching Doctor Who seem to be utter scumbags.
 
Princess Frances said:
Reading the letters in the Radio Times this morning I realised that the major flaw in the "but the Doctor was always a positive role model for boys" argument is that a lot of the men who grew up watching Doctor Who seem to be utter scumbags.
Click to expand...

But isn't that on the internet? The internet has an incredibly loud minority of scumbags and a lot of decent people who keep their heads down.

Maybe they should stop keeping their heads down.
 
Princess Frances said:
Reading the letters in the Radio Times this morning I realised that the major flaw in the "but the Doctor was always a positive role model for boys" argument is that a lot of the men who grew up watching Doctor Who seem to be utter scumbags.
Click to expand...

Having read those letters too, I can't really see anything that deserves the appellation 'scumbag.' Of the four letters published one was in favour, one regretted the loss of a male role model for boys, another accused the BBC of bowing to political correctness and the last said he would have preferred a spin off series with a female Time Lord in a role similar to the Doctor's. In no case was the language used extreme or sexist so I really don't know where the 'scumbag' epithet comes from.

But as I have used two of those arguments I suppose you think I'm a scumbag as well? Or does that apply to anyone who doesn't like the idea of a female Doctor, for whatever reason?
 
Last edited:
Think about if it was the opposite way, and the Doctor had always been a woman, and then they turned her into a man, and someone asked "Why can't a man be a role model for girls, too?"
 
Exactly!

One of the main arguments given for a female Doctor is it provides a good role model for girls. When anyone objects that boys are losing a positive role model they claim that boys should be able to equally identify with a woman. This is having your cake and eating it with a vengeance. If boys can identify just as well with the opposite sex as their own, why can't girls?

I'm sure some will respond that girls are inundated with examples in popular culture of women who are weak and passive and they need to see examples of women who defy this stereotype. I would reply that boys are equally exposed to examples of men who are aggressive and violent and who are disrespectful and exploitative towards women and that it's even more important (for the sake of girls as well as boys) that they should have male role models who do not conform to this stereotype.
 
True. One of the reasons i write gender-swap fiction is to explore how boys and men who objectify and sexualise women would fare now *they* are the bikini-clad lovelies.
 
Back
Top