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Should the Next 'Doctor Who' Be a Woman?
Hugh Pickens DOT Com writes "Jennifer Finney Boylan writes in the NYT that for those who did not get beaten up in high school, 'Doctor Who' is a beloved British sci-fi series about a character called the Doctor who is able to regenerate into a new body whenever a mortal would die or whenever an actor grows tired of the gig. The Doctor has been played by 11 different men since the show went on the air in 1963 and with Matt Smith, stepping down this Christmas, many fans had hoped that this time, a dozen cycles in, the Doctorship would finally go to a woman. 'Maybe it was the election of Barack Obama that made it seem, fleetingly, as if there were no more glass ceilings, for offices from president to pontiff,' writes Boylan. 'Whether the 45th president is a woman (Hillary Rodham Clinton?) or a Latino (Marco Rubio?), it still feels, on a good day, as if we've entered a time when there are fewer limits on what men and women can aspire to.' But unlike presidents or popes, we may not get that many more chances at a glass-shattering Doctor. According to long-held Doctor Who mythology, the character's 13th regeneration could be his last. 'As the producers think about whom they want to take on the role next, they should keep in mind the way people's hopes are lifted when they see someone breaking the glass ceiling, even when it's for something as seemingly trivial as a hero on a science-fiction program. Equal opportunity matters — in Doctor Who's universe as well as our own.'"
Why not a vegan tranny black lesbian Muslim in a wheelchair?
That is just absurd !!
It seems there is a subset of people out there who just can never be happy unless they are going against the grain. There will be people out there who make a big deal about who the next Doctor is regardless of who gets it. Not everything has to be groundbreaking or new. Sometimes tried and trusted are the way to go.
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No, because that means Samuel L. Jackson would be out of the running. (Admit it, you'd watch that.)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Do-wDPoC6GM This already happened.
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I think that people who want to see the next Doctor be some sort of handicapped post-op lesbian hermaphrodite never watch the show but just want to push some sort of agenda to get some checkbox filled somewhere. They would never watch a single episode with their politically-corrected Doctor but that's not really the point.
It has already been established in canon that they can.
"See that snake. The mark of The Corsair. Fantastic bloke. He had that snake as a tattoo in every regeneration. Didn't feel like himself unless he had that tattoo. Or herself a couple of times. Oo hoo! She was a bad girl!"
The clue is in the title. Who ever heard of a "Time Lady"?!
Um, everyone who ever watched season 16?
Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean there isn't an invisible demon about to eat your face
So somehow changing an indubitably male character into a woman is a 'victory' for women?
Perhaps we could just work on creating an interesting, engaging, successful female character and celebrate her? Or celebrate one of the many strong female characters already present in media?
Perhaps there's a moral in here for the whole feminist movement.
-Styopa
Surely a science fiction concept with a female lead can be developed outside of the current Dr. Who franchise. Or, a spin-off series featuring a female timelord can be developed in parallel, like Star Trek did with Voyager. The can have separate adventures and then guest star from time to time on each others' shows. Seems like you get more audience that way. Why is there a need to take an established character and turn it into something completely different?
Dr. Who will always be Tom Baker in my imagination anyway.
Also it has no explosions caused by bullets hitting a car tire, no bodybuilders screaming slogans only three words long yet still incomprehensable, no storylines designed to last for 20 seasons only to be cancelled after the second season, nobody trying to be "cool" or "edgy" or "bad-ass". Quite frankly, it's a breath of fresh air amongst so many sci-fi series desperately trying to appease pubescent boys.
I thought Dr. Who would be tacky/cheesy/lame as well until I actually saw a whole episode, now I'm hooked.
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It seems you are not British, so perhaps you see it differently to us. A lot of the Russell T. Davies stuff was cheesy crap, but Moffat's episodes are good. Many of them are quite dark and produce a real sense of drama.
It works both ways of course. A lot of US shows that people rave about seem pretty bad to us too. Many of the good ones have British actors in the major roles.
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In spite of its legendarily low budget in... well, just about all of it prior to the Christopher Ecclestone series, it's been some groundbreaking science fiction. Oh it's had its dud episodes, you might need to suspend disbelief more than you would for most other TV shows, and the special effects should be taken as a symbolic gesture rather than actually looking like something, but it does actually do some pretty interesting stuff.
That said, it's not everyone's cup of tea. Culturally, the show is very British, so Americans don't tend to "get" it as much as the British or Australians.
Jennifer Finney Boylan writes in the NYT that for those who did not get beaten up in high school...
Whining about diversity and coming out with the stereotyping right out of the gate(and yes, it's a quote from TFA, I did check). Maybe she thought that was cute?
I had a nice rant with lots of big words about diversity not about messing with established characters and missing the point and all that, but you know what? Screw it.
Why should we bloody-nosed, inhaler puffing masses give a fuck what this imbecile has to say?
Really depends on what you've seen. A show that's spanned half a century has some good ones and some bad ones.
If you want to check out the best of what the new series can offer, try The Girl in the Fireplace, or Blink.
Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean there isn't an invisible demon about to eat your face
The Doctor should never be a woman. We have seen how that turns out in the spoof "Doctor Who and the Curse of Fatal Death", where the female Doctor notices the sonic screwdriver has "three settings".
Links:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doctor_Who_and_the_Curse_of_Fatal_Death
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p18DKN27IZQ