Doctor Who

[DriftKaiser]

Same reason why Past Doctors don't remember they have an interaction with the Future Doctors. Re-watching the 50th anniversary episode with The War Doctor for the example! If Simm's Master don't remember he had an encounter with Mistress then Mistress won't able to recall the event from Master's point of view but will remember the event she experienced herself. I hope that the finale and Christmas Special won't disappointed us all! 

Edited June 26, 2017 by DriftKaiser

[Helmsly]

Enjoyed last nights episode a lot, especially the Doctors speech to Missy and the Master:

"Winning? Is that what you think it's about? I'm not trying to win. I'm not doing this because I want to beat someone or because I hate someone or because I want to blame someone. It's not because its fun. God knows its not because its easy. It's not even because it works because it hardly ever does. I do what I do because its right! Because it decent. And above all its Kind. Its just that...

Just kind"

and him fighting against regenerating at the end and the original Doctor showing up was great too. I can't wait for the Christmas special.

[The Cape]

I loved this end of the season as well, both episodes were great.

Spoiler

The Master/Missy is not really dead, is she? Must've had anticipated that

On 02/07/2017 at 11:04 AM, Helmsly said:

Enjoyed last nights episode a lot, especially the Doctors speech to Missy and the Master:

"Winning? Is that what you think it's about? I'm not trying to win. I'm not doing this because I want to beat someone or because I hate someone or because I want to blame someone. It's not because its fun. God knows its not because its easy. It's not even because it works because it hardly ever does. I do what I do because its right! Because it decent. And above all its Kind. Its just that...

Just kind"

and him fighting against regenerating at the end and the original Doctor showing up was great too. I can't wait for the Christmas special.

that was the first Doctor!?

[Serebii]

Thirteenth (well technically Fifteenth) Doctor announced

 

 

 

[DriftKaiser]

Unlucky number! Hopefully people will eventually realise the gender/age/colour don't matter if it's the same Doctor always helping other people/lifeforms. 

[Happenstance]

I'm definitely looking forward to a change. I've never seen any of her other work so it should be interesting anyway.

[Serebii]

I admit I have been (and still, am) against the idea of the Doctor changing gender. I felt it a bit unnecessary, because it really is and only recently has become a thing that Time Lords can do, but I'm accepting this.

 

However, she's a good actress and hopefully she gets good material to work with. They just better not hang on the changing of genders as a major plot point for the season. Offhand remark then move on.

Edited July 16, 2017 by Serebii

[flameboy]

Here's one way I've started to think about it over the last couple of hours....I'm a 33 year old man who grew up with the Doctor as my hero kind of, it wasn't superman or batman or spiderman it was always the Doctor. I wanted to grow up to be HIM. I aspired to be like him I'd even argue I learn moral lessons from him.By extension I've always found I could relate to him, now he is a woman it's very strange...where does that leave children who have grown up wanting to be New Who and now suddenly find their hero is a woman? Does a child suddenly question their gender when previous they would never have done so? Again nothing wrong with people questioning their gender/sexuality but is there really a need for Doctor Who some escapist time travel fiction to me the show that is giving that to the audience? Also doesn't the fact that the Doctor can just regenerate into a female somewhat undermine the struggles many transgender people going through in both making the physical changes and the psychological effects? Again they may well cover this but does Doctor Who really need to be that show? To point to @Serebii comment above I think just having an off hand remark is almost more damaging for fear of offending that it's an easy transition to make. (I do feel the same as you though much like Deep Breath had Calpadi questioning if he was a good man, I'd be happy with an episode where she questions things but then becomes her own character and gets on with it)

Just because regeneration exists as a convenience for the show so he can regenerate as anything doesn't mean he has to. It feels weird to take that away from someone and yet somehow because it's been a white male role then that is absolutely fine. If I worked in TV I'd never dream of wanting to take a female role and turn them into a male. I dated a girl once who loved Mulan's depection of a strong female making it in a male world imagine that was recast to  a male just because?

A lot of the difference lays in this being a continuation of the same story, it's not a reboot, I loved the 2016 Ghostbusters movie, it didn't wreck my childhood it just retold the story and sure this doesn't wreck my childhood but it does mean I don't look at this iteration of the doctor in quite the same way.....

Edited July 16, 2017 by flameboy

[Ashley]

Some of my most relateable, and by extension aspirational, characters have been female.  Young girls look up to male roles (my friend's daughter is obsessed with Darth Vader) and young boys can like Wonder Woman et al.  I think we just assume kids only aspire to their own gender, in part because we engender our children way too much when it comes to toys/aspirations.  I don't think young boys are suddenly going to be confused and feel unimportant because the doctor is now female because kids adapt way more than we give them credit.  They don't have the societal baggage and expectations we have.  There's plenty of youtube videos out there of young kids (who have been brought up with no strong beliefs on the topic) who first meet a gay couple and they're basically "oh okay" about it.  Males will still be part of the show and will still do brave and heroic things, like the female assistants have since the relaunch.  

And @flameboy I get where you're coming from with the transexual angle, but this is the same show that this year did a "he's deaf now...and now its fixed!" Yes, deafness can be resolved but it was a plot convenience. It would be great if they did some proper commentary, but I kind of like the idea of it being from the angle of the humans instead to show just how fucked up our beliefs and mentality around gender and sexuality is (and the doctor basically being "pff whatever, what's the deal?"). 

Changing the gender from male to female is a big deal, changing from male to female is less so simply because of this: http://womenandhollywood.com/resources/statistics/ Women are vastly underrepresented in media and this (and others like it such as Starbuck in BSG and some characters in Hannibal) work to rebalance that.  Because of how Hollywood (and extension the media) works it relies on old franchises, some of which originate from before women even had the right to vote.  They're going to be unbalanced (in terms of gender, race, ability etc) and if Hollywood is going to keep relying on those franchises then they either do rebalance or they perpetuate views of the world that are decades old.

And I know it was just an example but Mulan is based on a real person so it would be weird if they made her male  

I think this show is shit personally, but I think this is a good and important thing to do for their young audiences (of both/all genders).  The show has a huge cultural impact and if that can be leveraged for something good, then all the more to it.  After all, I'm not aware of a lot of young girls becoming lesbians due to this season so...

[Grazza]

I just think it's a slice of the continuing gender propaganda that tells boys they're a spare part.

 

One thing I will stress though is that I hope people don't take it out on Jodie Whittaker, who may well be a good actress, just as Michelle Gomez is.  And quite honestly, those two acting out Chris Chibnall's scripts may make for a better programme than Steven Moffat has been writing lately.  This isn't about Doctor Who; it's about an agenda.

 

The Doctor Who finale was a disgrace - a good set-up that limped to a conclusion of sorts; its main aim to promote female superiority.  The male Master was depicted as particularly cruel, unable to understand compassion because he was a man, whereas the female Missy was capable of understanding it because she was a woman.  When asked "Is the future all-female?" the Doctor replied "We can only hope", and along the way we learned that girls can throw apples better than boys.  To finish it off, we learnt same-sex love can save the day in ways even the (male) Doctor couldn't (because of course, Bill preferred girls).

 

I know it's not real; I know it's fantasy, but it's part of the agenda that tells boys masculinity is wrong (such as lusting after Page 3 girls etc) and there's very little place for them.  We are meant to think gender doesn't matter, which I might believe myself when I stop being banned from gym sessions and swimming pools just because I have a Y chromosome, or actually get some funding on the NHS.

 

But hey, the writers of Doctor Who probably want controversy, just so they can shout "sexist!" It's probably better to ignore it.

Edited July 16, 2017 by Grazza

[Mr-Paul]

1 hour ago, Grazza said:

I just think it's a slice of the continuing gender propaganda that tells boys they're a spare part.

 

One thing I will stress though is that I hope people don't take it out on Jodie Whittaker, who may well be a good actress, just as Michelle Gomez is.  And quite honestly, those two acting out Chris Chibnall's scripts may make for a better programme than Steven Moffat has been writing lately.  This isn't about Doctor Who; it's about an agenda.

 

The Doctor Who finale was a disgrace - a good set-up that limped to a conclusion of sorts; its main aim to promote female superiority.  The male Master was depicted as particularly cruel, unable to understand compassion because he was a man, whereas the female Missy was capable of understanding it because she was a woman.  When asked "Is the future all-female?" the Doctor replied "We can only hope", and along the way we learned that girls can throw apples better than boys.  To finish it off, we learnt same-sex love can save the day in ways even the (male) Doctor couldn't (because of course, Bill preferred girls).

 

I know it's not real; I know it's fantasy, but it's part of the agenda that tells boys masculinity is wrong (such as lusting after Page 3 girls etc) and there's very little place for them.  We are meant to think gender doesn't matter, which I might believe myself when I stop being banned from gym sessions and swimming pools just because I have a Y chromosome, or actually get some funding on the NHS.

 

But hey, the writers of Doctor Who probably want controversy, just so they can shout "sexist!" It's probably better to ignore it.

 

This is quite frankly ridiculous and I struggle to see how you came to any of those conclusions from the finale, let alone your thoughts on the "masculinity is wrong". There is no anti-male agenda going on here. There's no female superiority going on here. Just a bit of gender equality.

Yes, the Doctor has always been a man. But is there any reason the Doctor has to be a man? This is one of the only shows with a long running continuity where the main character can be anything or anyone they want, male or female, with it still being the same person. It's not pushing an agenda, it's not an appeal for controversy - it's a progressive step to men and women being equal in our society. It's both a reflection of how society is changing for the better, and a step that will help reinforce the growing equality.

As @Ashley said, it's fine, and normal, for girls to have male role models/heroes, and boys to have female role models/heroes. We've seen recently in another major sci-fi franchise, Star Wars, two lead female protagonists. On a recent trip to Disneyland Paris, I saw little girls dressed up as Rey and Leia but also as Darth Vader, Obi-Wan. Boys were also dressed up as Captain Phasma - a female character. This isn't a reduction in masculinity. This is just liking a character.

Having said that it doesn't matter what gender your role models and heroes are, there's definitely value in there being prominent female heroes for girls to look up to. I've been working on the Women's Cricket World Cup. Women's cricket has always had very minor exposure, but that's changing thanks to increased TV coverage and social media. I've seen first hand how having female role models can help young girls really believe they can do something. Previous generations will have only seen men playing it on TV, and not thought of it as a viable thing for a girl to do. That's changing.

The analogy doesn't perfectly match, and although girls can have male heroes, like female sports players can look up to male sports stars, it will do nothing but help more even girls get into sci-fi if there are female heroes to admire. How is that a bad thing?

I for one am looking forward to seeing how Jodie Whittaker fits into the role! Not sure I've seen her in anything other than Broadchurch, which she was very good in.

Edited July 16, 2017 by Mr-Paul

[Ashley]

@Mr-Paul She was in Attack The Block which is a great film.  Also has John Boyega in it too.

[Mr-Paul]

Just now, Ashley said:

@Mr-Paul She was in Attack The Block which is a great film.  Also has John Boyega in it too.

It's on my watch list! Annoyingly not on Netflix!

[Happenstance]

I, for one, welcome our new female overlords

[Serebii]

I'm more on the line of thought as @flameboy. The Doctor was a character I identified with and for The Doctor to now be female is just a bit, bizarre. I'll get over it though.

 

However, conversely, some what @Grazza has said also has an element of truth but not to the extent stated. In striving for the equal showing of gender, which is great, many facets of media have gone a bit too far the other way, making statements and showcases that, if inverted, would incur so much wrath. That's not equality. I'm sure media will strike the balance soon enough  and hopefully this upcoming season of Doctor Who is evidence to it! I do remember reading that Chibnall wants it to be more ensemble based, and we can tell that's his strength by his writing on Torchwood, Broadchurch and even episodes of Doctor Who he wrote such as Dinosaurs on a Spacehip.

 

@Mr-Paul, you should check out her episode of Black Mirror "Everything About You", as well.

Edited July 17, 2017 by Serebii

[Magnus]

I don't know, I find it hard to agree with a post which includes this gem:

14 hours ago, flameboy said:

Does a child suddenly question their gender when previous they would never have done so?

[somme]

13 hours ago, Grazza said:

I just think it's a slice of the continuing gender propaganda that tells boys they're a spare part.

 

What are you on about? This is one of the most ludicrous things I've read on here in months.

 

Having a female Doctor Who is great, it's science fiction, after all, a genre that has historically been great for female characters. And if you're a man who can;t relate to female characters I think that says more about you than the character.

Not that I'll be watching any of it because I think Dr. Who is awful.

[Grazza]

14 hours ago, Mr-Paul said:

This is quite frankly ridiculous and I struggle to see how you came to any of those conclusions from the finale, let alone your thoughts on the "masculinity is wrong". There is no anti-male agenda going on here. There's no female superiority going on here. Just a bit of gender equality.

You can think it's ridiculous all you want, but it's not incorrect.  The moments I mentioned did happen in the finale.  The male Master was depicted as particularly cruel and the female Missy was depicted as capable of compassion.  In the past he's been amoral, anarchic and nihilistic, but in this he went out of his way to upset Bill.  Plot-wise, he wasn't really there to do anything else.

 

14 hours ago, Mr-Paul said:

As @Ashley said, it's fine, and normal, for girls to have male role models/heroes, and boys to have female role models/heroes. We've seen recently in another major sci-fi franchise, Star Wars, two lead female protagonists. On a recent trip to Disneyland Paris, I saw little girls dressed up as Rey and Leia but also as Darth Vader, Obi-Wan. Boys were also dressed up as Captain Phasma - a female character. This isn't a reduction in masculinity. This is just liking a character.

Having said that it doesn't matter what gender your role models and heroes are, there's definitely value in there being prominent female heroes for girls to look up to. I've been working on the Women's Cricket World Cup. Women's cricket has always had very minor exposure, but that's changing thanks to increased TV coverage and social media. I've seen first hand how having female role models can help young girls really believe they can do something. Previous generations will have only seen men playing it on TV, and not thought of it as a viable thing for a girl to do. That's changing.

The analogy doesn't perfectly match, and although girls can have male heroes, like female sports players can look up to male sports stars, it will do nothing but help more even girls get into sci-fi if there are female heroes to admire. How is that a bad thing?

 

I don't know if this is addressed to me but I feel this is a huge strawman, as I never said anything about men liking female characters.  I like a lot of them myself.  As for boys dressing up as female characters, I never said there was anything wrong with boys being effeminate.

 

2 hours ago, somme said:

What are you on about? This is one of the most ludicrous things I've read on here in months.

 

Having a female Doctor Who is great, it's science fiction, after all, a genre that has historically been great for female characters. And if you're a man who can;t relate to female characters I think that says more about you than the character.

Not that I'll be watching any of it because I think Dr. Who is awful.

 

That's a bit rich.  If you don't like Doctor Who, presumably you don't watch it, therefore you have no idea whether these anti-male lines were in the finale.

[The Cape]

To be honest I never thought about genders in the last episode. What I thought (and think) that they wanted to show is that Missy, after being sentenced to death and being watched over by the Doctor, started to change; that the Doctor's actions and words started getting into her. We've had many different Doctors with many different personalities and attitudes, and the same with the Master. As I see it the Master is highly unstable, and the regeneration before Missy was particularly mad. My point is, nothing led me to think in terms of gender superiority or inferiority. Time Lords regenerate into any gender (even if only recently this has been pointed out) and Missy has been confined and 'taught' by the Doctor for some time, so it seems natural to me that her point of view has changed. Yes, they chose Missy to be female, but I've never felt that is the reason why she has changed, or that the script is about any gender propaganda.

[dwarf]

Not a Whovian but I don't think that should preclude me or others from weighing in on this.

It seems to me that if there was any TV show that could accommodate a radical change in the identity of its protagonist, it would be Doctor Who. I can understand why people adore the show, as I'm not always immune to the absurdity and flamboyance of it myself, but one reason I couldn't connect with it was that I never really felt there were any stakes for the Doctor. The show relies on contrived storylines and deux ex machina so often that I found it hard to buy into any sense of danger, or any sense of frailty in his character, and for me it hardly seems a stretch at all to imagine his regeneration into a woman, given the creative license taken with every other aspect of the story. 

If a different show were to randomly change a male character whose identity was fundamentally male, someone who suffered from guy issues, that would make less sense.

The 'anti-male agenda' angle is ridiculous. You see the biases you wish to see - take the BBC political coverage, which is apparently both communist propaganda and a hard-right neoliberal conspiracy at the same time.

Lots of men see these changes as women taking over, when in reality it's a minor re-balancing act in favour of women from a position of extreme inequality. The feeling of weirdness is because you aren't used to equal representation. We'll see another male Doctor before long anyway.

With all that said, I do see why men want male role models and want to hold onto a distinct masculine identity that isn't constantly derided and abhorred. I generally find it easier to identify with male characters and authors, for example. I also find some forms of feminism treat/dismiss traditionally male traits like competitiveness purely as evil habits of men rather than the sometimes positive traits that they can be, or sometimes feminists fail to see how men are oppressed by these things themselves. To say crises of masculinity are self-imposed by men is to miss the point that individual men have legitimate concerns about their male identity. Heading slightly off topic there but tl;dr: I can see why some men are frustrated at the turning tide in some respects, but throwing a hissy fit over a gender change in a camp TV show is pretty tragic imo. If there are legitimate (show specific) objections to it, I've not read them here.

Quote

The Doctor Who finale was a disgrace - a good set-up that limped to a conclusion of sorts; its main aim to promote female superiority.  The male Master was depicted as particularly cruel, unable to understand compassion because he was a man, whereas the female Missy was capable of understanding it because she was a woman.  When asked "Is the future all-female?" the Doctor replied "We can only hope", and along the way we learned that girls can throw apples better than boys.  To finish it off, we learnt same-sex love can save the day in ways even the (male) Doctor couldn't (because of course, Bill preferred girls).

Are you sure all of this isn't happening inside your head? Why should some characters not say things like that? Are there no girls who can throw apples better than boys? Are all characters mouthpieces for Moffat's politics? Does the show actually make those generalisations about sexuality? 

It's playfully recognising that there are strong women, and strong gay people in real life, and that we haven't heard their voices much in the show until recently. Maybe it's saying men have been a little bit responsible for that, but why take that so personally?

[Agent Gibbs]

8 hours ago, Serebii said:

However, conversely, some what @Grazza has said also has an element of truth but not to the extent stated. In striving for the equal showing of gender, which is great, many facets of media have gone a bit too far the other way, making statements and showcases that, if inverted, would incur so much wrath. That's not equality. I'm sure media will strike the balance soon enough  and hopefully this upcoming season of Doctor Who is evidence to it! I do remember reading that Chibnall wants it to be more ensemble based, and we can tell that's his strength by his writing on Torchwood, Broadchurch and even episodes of Doctor Who he wrote such as Dinosaurs on a Spacehip.

I can understand that, some attempts to promote feminism over the past 5 years (that i've noticed) do seem to stretch too far and again if roles were reversed would be considered wrong, but its a movement that is learning and enjoying the freedom it perhaps didn't use to, i too think the balance will be stuck soon and this sort of complaint will die out

Some roles can be genderbent and i think that Doctor Who is one that seems the most easily done as the role of the Doctor is not intrinsically tied to masculinity/Gender like for example James bond is (which has frequent calls for a gender bend, one i think wouldn't work*)

I had a list of people i'd love the Doctor to be and Jodie wasn't on my radar, top of my list was Hayley Atwell, so i'm disappointed its not her, but i'm strangely excited for this

One thing i don't quite get over the backlash from some chauvinistic men who feel women's place is as an object, is surely they'd like a hot Young Woman to be the Doctor? then they can perv? Or so i'd assume based upon how i'd have thought as a horny stupid teen (which is how i view most people with that sort f view)

 

 

 

 

 

 

*i'll explain more if someone asks

[flameboy]

7 hours ago, Magnus said:

I don't know, I find it hard to agree with a post which includes this gem:

Why though it's a genuine question, having the Doctor simply changing to a female trivializes a very complex transition without the necessary context to our real world, it could leave children questioning things they wouldn't have necessarily done so which can be harmful without the proper education and support networks, you have to look at the high rates of suicide in young trans-gendered people. I also stand by the notion that every child isn't born having to question their sexuality or gender some people seem to think it should just like now we live in a world where everyone isn't forced into their specific straight gender role.

To all the people who are saying it's equality and anyone upset by it is part of the problem I'd suggest going on twitter there are bunch of angry militant feminists with far too much vitriol than is necessary, if it's a moment to celebrate why not do just that than saying you won't rest till every major role is a female, till every white male voice is surpressed, that's not equality that is actual sexism.

[Magnus]

3 minutes ago, flameboy said:

Why though it's a genuine question, having the Doctor simply changing to a female trivializes a very complex transition without the necessary context to our real world

It's a children's TV show about a time-traveling alien. If kids can deal with mutant ninja turtles, they can deal with the Doctor regenerating as a woman.

And I don't think it's a genuine question. I think you're upset about your childhood hero becoming a heroine, and you're hiding behind "what about the kids?!" to try to defend what is really a pretty silly thing to be upset about.

[Sméagol]

I can't believe this has turned into a boring discussion about gender issues and other boring stuff.

I happen to love women. I've wanted a female doctor for years. I'm looking forward to see what she brings to the character. Hopefully the writers and directors know what to do with the her this time.

[Ashley]

Arguably this could help young kids that may be transexual. Yes it's done through magic, but it could show (to someone younger) that it is possible and that someone can live a successful life after having changed. Yes in the real world there's a lot more emotional, psychological and physical toil, but for kids it may be enough as a starting point. Knowing it's possible, it's 'acceptable' (at a very basic level) might be enough to help facilitate conversation and help kids that may be feeling 'odd' have a reason/means to address it. And alternatively, it may help kids that aren't become used to it so it's less stigmatised. I doubt kids will think of it in terms of transsexuality though (as it's unlikely they'll know that that is), but if it plants a positive seed then kudos to the show 

Otherwise, it's going to be an active, strong woman on screen and that is good for all genders.