The 13th Doctor Reveal Thread

[Ursa major]

Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose....

 

[Dave]

I don't get it either. The Doctor has always changed, so for me the change to a women is no more, or no less than the other changes. The biggest change was certainly from an old unlikable crotchety man to a younger bohemian beatnik fool. I'm not sure any of the other changes can even compare with that one.

The only position that I have any sympathy with is that the Doctor was one of the few male role models who achieved success without using violence.

 

[farntfar]

without using violence.

Although I have to admit to a certain sympathy for the Mme Kovarian, Davros etc view that he's quite happy to watch Rose obliterating the entire dalek race (somewhat unsuccessfully in the end), or Nardol blowing up cybermen etc while he tells them off for it. He's even been known to sonic screwdriver the odd individual baddy himself.
And I suspect that as a female she might do the same.

 

[TheDustyZebra]

The only position that I have any sympathy with is that the Doctor was one of the few male role models who achieved success without using violence.

So what this says, then, as a complaint, is that men need to be able to see themselves in a role model, and now they won't be able to relate to this character because it's female? Hmm...

 

[Cathbad]

So what this says, then, as a complaint, is that men need to be able to see themselves in a role model, and now they won't be able to relate to this character because it's female? Hmm...

You sure have the knack for seeing the truth!

 

[Dave]

So what this says, then, as a complaint, is that men need to be able to see themselves in a role model, and now they won't be able to relate to this character because it's female? Hmm...

I'm sure you are aware, but it isn't about men at all. It is a complaint about what is shown to boys, who see their role models only as men who kick-box and use brutal violence. Despite what @farntfar said (which is valid), name another modern male superhero who defeats his enemies armed with only logic and and a screwdriver. Anyway, I only said I had "sympathy" with that position, not that I agreed with it being the end of the world as we now it!

 

[Cathbad]

Your "Role Model" committed genocide.

 

[Ursa major]

I might make a stab at answering who makes "another modern male superhero who defeats his enemies armed with only logic" if I had the slightest idea what boys (of various ages) watch on the TV** in the UK. (Back in my day, I had the many protagonists in Thunderbirds***, who did without a time machine and a magic wandsonic screwdriver, and had nothing but the equipment that a billionaire and his tame genius could knock together. There was some use of guns, if I recall correctly.)


** - Does anyone here know?

*** - There's been a recent remake, I believe.

 

[Dave]

Your "Role Model" committed genocide.

And he agonised over it, and he is plagued by his past decisions, but yes he isn't perfect. Maybe, that fact is something we can all touch upon.

I'm pretty sure that "boys" are not only looking to TV for role models, and I don't want to stray into "World Affairs" territory, but it is a sad fact of life that many boys have no father figures other than those of fiction.

 

[Cathbad]

Think about your own childhood. Did you have a role model? Someone you looked up to and tried to be like?

I didn't. And most of the people I've asked didn't. They became the people they are because of their interactions with the people in their lives - or in spite of those interactions.

Frankly, the whole idea of "Role Models" is ludicrous.

I had a racist, womanizing father. Yet, I never cheated on either of my wives or any of my girlfriends. And anyone who knows me knows I'm not racist.

Television males in my time included the bigot Archie Bunker and the drunkard Hawkeye (M.A.S.H.). Then there was the blood-sucking Barnabus Collins and the obese Captain Kangaroo.

We've never had television role models. Not even Beaver's dad was looked up to by boys. We made fun of Mr. Brady.

Role Models? What a farce. Children grow up to be like they are from experiences - or in spite of them. If the adult isn't dealing directly with the individual child, he/she isn't a model - good or bad.

 

[Danny McG]

What next?
I suppose they'll cast a man in the lead role of "Mrs Brown's boys" or something equally ridiculous.

 

[farntfar]

name another modern male superhero who defeats his enemies armed with only logic and and a screwdriver.

At the beginning Steed, Templar, The Traceys (thank you Ursa) etc. Far less violence on the telly back then, because it wasn't allowed.
And it's true that since the Davros speech in Journey's End DW generally "offers them a choice" before he blows them up, which is nice.

Which doesn't mean that in the playground the following week we didn't have a lot of shootings and explosions.
Boys chose their own role models according to their already existing temperaments. Some choose the Doctor, some the Daleks (Some the little guy on the trolley who made money and gurgled a lot).
(Not quite a role model, but I always wanted to play an ice warrior, but just for the hissy voice and the head swivelling. )

 

[Dave]

Okay, okay, already! I hereby withdraw any small sympathy that I may have once had for that position, namely, that a genocidal, mass-murderer with a god-complex, who dictates his own single agenda on everyone else, could ever be a good role model for boys. I'm still certain that boys need good role models, in a world in which many boys grow up in single parent households, without any influence of a father or any male relatives, and often in schools without male teachers, and for whom criminal gang leaders or violent fictional men could be an influence on their behaviour, but I was certainly never proposing that watching TV somehow indoctrinates children, or that the problems or the solutions could ever be a simple as that.

With that out of the way, do any other arguments against this decision to cast a woman as Doctor Who still remain?

 

[Cathbad]

With that out of the way, do any other arguments against this decision to cast a woman as Doctor Who still remain?

Nope!

 

[TheDustyZebra]

Nope.

 

[TheDustyZebra]

And, I should add, I am on record around here somewhere as being either dubious or against the idea not too long ago. I've been known to change my mind on things in the face of opposing evidence.

 

[Danny McG]

This time next year we can look at our comments in here, and perhaps 'Tsk Tsk' while shaking our heads at how incredibly young and naive we were in our opinions

 

[TheDustyZebra]

Whatchoo mean "we"?

 

[Nick B]

What next?
I suppose they'll cast a man in the lead role of "Mrs Brown's boys" or something equally ridiculous.

I see what you did thar!

 

[thaddeus6th]

As I stopped watching a little while ago, I'm not especially fired up either way on this. I do think it's perfectly legitimate to hold the view the Doctor should be a man, though. If diversity is a good thing, then diversity of opinion must be too.

Personally, I'm not fussed. Demography can matter for characters (I think Bond must always be a man, and British, because those aspects are core to his character, likewise Othello must always be black) but it isn't central to the vast majority of them.