- Joined
- Oct 20, 2019
It's going to come back but this time it will be Gallifreya.
Dr. Who
- Thread starter Null
- Start date
-
Want to keep track of this thread?
Accounts can bookmark posts, watch threads for updates, and jump back to where you stopped reading.
Create account
It's going to come back but this time it will be Gallifreya.
Dr. Henry Armitage
Head librarian at Miskatonic University Mark 8:36
True & Honest Fan
kiwifarms.net
- Joined
- May 9, 2016
Too woke? Nope – Doctor Who is more offensive than ever
Since returning with a female Doctor, the sci-fi smash has been accused of political correctness. But, as recent storylines prove, the truth is far worse
www.theguardian.com
Jack Hudson
Wed 8 Jan 2020 11.28 ESTLast modified on Wed 8 Jan 2020 14.35 EST
Doctor Who returned last week with another first: Sacha Dhawan’s casting as the first person of colour to play the Doctor’s arch nemesis, the Master. The decision was broadly met with praise, but in darker corners of the internet the argument that the show has become too politically correct rages on.
“Too PC” has become a familiar jibe levelled at the sci-fi hit since 2018 when Jodie Whittaker became the Thirteenth Doctor and new showrunner Chris Chibnall took up the mantle. As well as the first woman to play the title role, their first series featured two BAME companions and episodes about Rosa Parks and the partition of India, written by Doctor Who’s first ever BAME writers. The show quickly found itself embroiled in a culture war, with talk of its apparent political correctness becoming commonplace (see the Twitter hashtag #notmydoctor). Whittaker and Chibnall were forced to defend the show against these claims before this series began: Whittaker reminded viewers that there’s “still racism within our current society”, and Chibnall added that “the Doctor and the show are beacons of compassion and empathy”.
Now, though, a different group of fans are railing against Doctor Who. Far from being too liberal, many believe this iteration has actually lost the morality that made the character so unique, and become problematic on social issues – engaging with them to an often offensive degree.
Dhawan’s debut, for example, was soured by a scene in which the Doctor weaponised his race against him. The episode, Spyfall, saw the new Master posing as a Nazi soldier in German-occupied Paris. The improbability of an Asian man being able to do this was explained by a “perception filter” – a device commonly used in the Whovian universe to cause others to see what they want to see, in this case hiding the Master’s ethnicity from the Nazis. The Doctor escaped the Master by framing him as a British double agent, then jammed his filter, leaving him open to both the retribution and the racism of the Nazis.
A storyline too far? ... Vinette Robinson as Rosa Parks in Doctor Who. Photograph: Coco Van Oppens/BBC
It’s not the first time the writing of ethnic minority characters has seemed questionable; Sharon D Clarke’s character Grace O’Brien and the mother of Lenny Henry’s character Daniel Barton, played by Blanche Williams, were both fridged almost immediately after being introduced. Henry has also spoken about the limitations of Doctor Who’s diversity; in a radio interview in December, broadcast prior to his appearance in the New Year special, he said the bosses “would rather have a dog do Doctor Who than a black person”.
Elsewhere, there’s an often apathetic engagement with the political climate. In the finale of Chibnall’s inaugural series, the Doctor’s companion Graham, played by Bradley Walsh, told the Doctor he wanted to kill Tim Shaw, a genocidal alien who had murdered his wife. The Doctor argued that even if done in self-defence, this would make Graham “the same” as Tim Shaw. It was an especially uncomfortable message at a time when those fighting fascism are often condemned as being as bad as the fascists themselves, for example in Donald Trump’s remarks after Charlottesville, when he equated white nationalists with those speaking out against them.
Another episode focused on Kerblam, an Amazon-a-like delivery company. The story reflected real-world mistreatment of workers, but while many viewers expected a satire of exploitative capitalism, the real villain was revealed to be a maintenance man, who was killing in protest at poor working conditions. This led the Doctor to claim that “systems aren’t the problem”, just people who “use and exploit the system” – thus refusing to engage with real-world suffering.
Doctor Who has had a strong history of LGBT+ representation since its return in 2005, including series-long lesbian companion Bill Potts in 2017. Executive producer Matt Strevens promised the show’s LGBT+ representation would continue, with characters from “across the spectrum”. However, representation in Chibnall’s era has been severely lacking so far. Characters have repeatedly been introduced as LGBT+, only to be promptly killed off. In the 2019 New Year special, a security guard referred to his boyfriend in his second line – and was killed by a Dalek just seconds later. The most prominent LGBT+ character in a Chibnall-penned episode, Angstrom, revealed her sexuality by referring to her dead wife. This is an unnerving pattern, and a common trope in media representation of LGBT+ people more widely. An episode featuring an alien man giving birth was criticised as being part of the “PC agenda”, when in reality it felt more like a lazy attempt at trans inclusion.
The fans decrying the show as too PC have been lost – and it’s a loss that should not be mourned. But the show has many loyal progressive fans, too. The Doctor may always have been a beacon of compassion and empathy, but too many of us are wondering where it’s gone.
Last edited:
- Joined
- Aug 30, 2015
I'm starting to miss the tumblrites. Fucking congratulations.
- Joined
- Oct 2, 2018
Something something it's never enough something something.
- Joined
- May 30, 2018
This purity measure of PC will kill off so called woke shows because it's never good enough for the target audience and everyone else has already left. No one I know watched Dr Who over the holidays. A massive tradition event of Christmas telly has taken a nosedive.
You can't have GAY villains and GAY people can't die! (Nevermind all the unnamed presumably straight people who die all the time) Galbrush theory in action.
You can't have GAY villains and GAY people can't die! (Nevermind all the unnamed presumably straight people who die all the time) Galbrush theory in action.
- Joined
- Oct 26, 2018
The only problem I'm seeing is that they put the Asian in a Nazi uniform. Its not like the Japanese and Nazis were allies, and it could've made sense to have a Japanese officer sent to take a look at something. Then they don't even need a wibbly wobbly timey wimey explanation for him being there. Could still keep the British spy thing by tricking the Master into saying something, and then the racism angle isn't even present.
The loss of viewership from any angle should be mourned. Idiots should be able to sit down and watch something that might challenge their beliefs or present them with something they disagree with. The Old Doctor Who did that well. Fuck there were points were David Tennant lost the compassion and showed flaws. His friends had to drag him back to see the situation differently. One of my favorite episodes is the one where he saves the astronaut woman and changes history because he thought he COULD save people. The woman realizes that she's supposed to die and that her death pushes her daughter on to become an even better person and do bigger and better things than her, so she kills herself. After that the Doctor didn't know what to think and had his whole worldview come crashing down. Way better than the nonsense that came after.
Article said:
The loss of viewership from any angle should be mourned. Idiots should be able to sit down and watch something that might challenge their beliefs or present them with something they disagree with. The Old Doctor Who did that well. Fuck there were points were David Tennant lost the compassion and showed flaws. His friends had to drag him back to see the situation differently. One of my favorite episodes is the one where he saves the astronaut woman and changes history because he thought he COULD save people. The woman realizes that she's supposed to die and that her death pushes her daughter on to become an even better person and do bigger and better things than her, so she kills herself. After that the Doctor didn't know what to think and had his whole worldview come crashing down. Way better than the nonsense that came after.
- Joined
- Dec 21, 2018
Funnily enough, I was just talking to my partner about it last night. I had gotten back from shopping and mentioned that even though the 2020 calendars were half off there was still a bunch of unsold Doctor Who calendars and my partner asked me it was even on anymore and I shrugged and said: "I don't think it comes back till later this year." There is zero buzz around this show now. No one on my Facebook talks about it when it used to be second only to Game of Thrones in weekly discussions.
- Joined
- Apr 8, 2017
Dogtor Who! Holy shit, yes! It'd be like Wishbone but with aliens!
- Joined
- Oct 27, 2017
Inb4 Rassilon was a stronk empowered womyn the whole time.
- Joined
- Aug 30, 2015
and his sidekick is a baby!
- Joined
- Mar 17, 2019
"Asian" in British-speak is almost exclusively a euphemism for "Pakistani", if that was unclear for anyone who speaks actual English.
wtfNeedSignUp
kiwifarms.net
- Joined
- Dec 17, 2019
NEVER TRY TO APPEAL TO SJW. They will always find a way to interpret your new shit show as being problematic (a word that is a sign of liberal faggots as much as Gamergate). Though it is always sobering to see that being anti violence is now seen as an offensive message.
Also fuck the term "fridging", it's always brought in cases where plenty of male characters die but only the female/gay ones are mentioned.
Also fuck the term "fridging", it's always brought in cases where plenty of male characters die but only the female/gay ones are mentioned.
- Joined
- Mar 18, 2019
This is literally the meme of "There are DOZENS of us. DOZENS!" They sacked the majority of their fans for the 10 double-dick, alien queer, trannies that wanted the show more PC, but never watched the show.
- Joined
- Sep 17, 2015
In the late 2Ks I remember even Americans couldn't shut the fuck up about Doctor Who and it'd been on the air for nearly half a century by then. I can't imagine how badly you'd have to fuck it up to make it fall off in the eyes of the British public.
- Joined
- Mar 29, 2019
I don't know how much harder you can pander to ethnic minorities than this.
Irrelevant
kiwifarms.net
- Joined
- Apr 5, 2019
They are always stupid and miss historically accurate wins like this. It's a primetime show and they want to show modern diversity. OK, I get it. Let's time travel to the future where this won't be a problem.
But they're fucking lazy and it's always some soap opera set in old London. Now they have the problem that it's meant to be 99.9% white which they don't want. They could get around this with like Arab traders in coffee houses, Chinese sailors in the docks on ships from Hong Kong, etc. But they're too dumb so they just pretend half the regular Londoners on the street were black like it's still 2020.
Last edited:
- Joined
- Apr 30, 2019
I stopped watching Doctor Who the moment The Doctor regenerated into a women, I knew from that point on the show was going to turn to utter shit.
F
F
