to hope that the next Doctor Who is female and not understand why this would be so terrible?

[findingme]

My first AIBU - I have used advanced search and can't see an existing post on this so apologies if there is. I don't want to link to DM so please just google "Female Doctor Who" to look at the recent articles about this in the DM and newspapers.

It seems that it is a possibility and I can't understand why anyone would think this is a bad idea. AIBU?

Wasn't offended at all, I was just copying what you said because I couldn't think of a non-clunky way to say it either.

And I do know lesbians flirt with men, it's not really any different to me flirting with a man I don't find attractive for a favour

I'm just tired and that was the first example of River and men that I could think of.

Hmm, the Doctor fell in love with a man, too. I'd forgotten River swings both ways. Jack Harkness does, too ... I guess all that time & space travel leaves you open to new experiences?!

bigjessie. And there I thought I had it solved! Will get Dh to download the latest and catchup!

HerRoyalNotness do. It's brilliant. It might also tell you the name of the next doctor after Matt Smith. It's open to interpretation...

i asked my H his opinion this morning "do you think the new dr who should be a woman?" and his response was unequivocally yes. as a massive dr who fan his view is that the whole concept is about change and he then said it should be anyone other than a white man...

[hifive] to your DH, skrumle!

YANBU.

It's a hard role to cast, I think, but a woman would be cool.

Arthur I am quite sure the late William Hartnell would have been perfectly able to stand people discussing the certainty that Gallifreyan, like every other language out there, would have had its own linguistic rules rather than being the English language put through an alphabet code generator, and what those possibilities might be. Although he would certainly probably continue to be opposed to the idea of a female Doctor, which is quite a fair enough opinion to have.

And the author of Lungbarrow admits having taken "joyous liberties with Gallifrey"!

I'm not opposed to a female Doctor, I think so many liberties have been taken in the RTD era (last of his kind, wiped out the daleks until we fancy a dalek story line etc) that complaining about cannon at this point is daft. Basically the "doctor is male" cannon, only exists until the doctor is female, at which point it will definately be cannon that the doctor can be either.

The actor I'd most like to see do this part is Mark Williams (Mr Weasley), I think he is brilliant at the enthusiatic geeky interest in muggles humans thing. He'd make a refreshing change too. However other than that preference I'd be happy to see a woman and/or a person of colour in the role.

Some better writing (leave out the deus ex macheina, the extraordinary talents of companions, the ridiculous wiping out of entire species only to have to have more and more implausible reasons for their return) and a focus on storylines would be great, along with companions who don't have a sexual attraction to the doctor (that's pretty boring now) - i know some male companions have been pointed out, but it might be nice to have the doctor travel with a male companion for a while, rather than the rory and mickey situation where they were adjuncts to the female companion. maybe an older person would be good. bascially more variety, what about a child/teen additional companion for a bit?

i'm disappointed that from what you are saying Moffat is reponsible for the dire writing of women, as i didn't get on with RTD and had high hopes when moffat took over as some of the best episodes for monsters/ideas for scary stories during rtd's time were moffat's (Weeping angels, vashta nerada). Apparently you can't have everything.

dh (a fan of the original Dr. who) isn't as keen as i am on having a female doctor as as others on here have stated if he was going to regenerate into a woman, he'd have likely done it by now rather than being a man for so long. But then there are a lot of things he's not keen on with the new series - the one episode stories etc- so i don't think it would be a deal breaker for him. however he would like to see a man of colour in the role, and also likes the idea of a spin off series about a female timelord in the whoniverse with cross over episodes.

Due to john hurt potentially being the Valeyard, I suppose it will be less likely we'll also get an older doctor.

Some better writing (leave out the deus ex macheina, the extraordinary talents of companions, the ridiculous wiping out of entire species only to have to have more and more implausible reasons for their return) and a focus on storylines would be great, along with companions who don't have a sexual attraction to the doctor (that's pretty boring now)

Oh, god yes. Rose was partially plausible- I attributed his apparent return of emotions to the the Time Lord version of PTSD! But Martha throwing herself at him? And the gone again-here again-gone again of the Daleks is... argh! There's an entire universe out there!

A book about characters from a tv show isn't canon. The tv show can contradict the books at any time. It happens all the time in scifi franchises.

Nothing in Doctor Who is canon, because people with authority over the franchise haven't defined one. They can write whatever they feel like writing, contradicting anything that's happened before. It isn't like Star Wars or Buffy where the people who own it have said what is and is not canon. The whole point of canon is that it is defined by somebody in authority, not by a load of people arguing their various opinions on the internet.

You could argue forever about what is and is not canon, but unless the franchise owner makes a statement, it is only ever going to be your opinion.

@ cannon - easy mistake to make but I've now got an image of the Doctor strapped to a Napoleonic cannon and being fired from the deck of a French warship.

Right, after 18 pages I might as well throw in my tuppence-worth

I've watched since the early days of Baker (T) and have to say, I really wouldn't mind a female Doctor. Why not? And as for the arguments about what is and is not canon - well, NuWho accepts Mr "half human on my mother's side" McGann as Doctor 8 and the half-human bobbins a) is nowhere else in Who and b) has never been mentioned again (except by peeved Whovians, obviously). We have just had Doctor 8.5 appear out of nowhere (based upon NOTD, I believe Hurt will be 8.5 rather than the Valeyard or a pre-Doctor Doctor. But then again the script can lie...) So Who lore, just like time sometimes, can be re-written.

That said, I'd rather it was the right actor or actress for the role. I think it was LadyC who mentioned Zawe Ashton earlier on - she would be amazing in the role, imho. If you just know her from Fresh Meat, she's much more versatile and nuanced in other roles, but can do eccentric very well.

I'd love it to be Ben Wishaw or Chiwetel Eijifor but appreciate that is highly unlikely. Ben Daniels is the bookies' favourite, by all accounts, and I think he'd be good. Equally, Sam West has thrown his hat into the ring and I think he'd be good, too. The right actor, with the right script, will make the role his or her own, whatever they have done before.

It's bloody irritating, though, Arthur, because Paul McGann is still with us and wasn't approached about being in the special. John Hurt (squee!) is all very well but McGann seems like obviously better casting as Eight and would have been keen to do it.

I'd rather think that Nine was actually Ten, Ten was actually Eleven, Eleven is actually Twelve, and that Hurt is the original Nine who the Doctor's been trying to hush up. But I doubt they're going to go that way (think of all the merchandising that would need rebranding...)

(I'm assuming for the sake of argument there that the Time War did away with the limitation on regenerations and hence makes the Valeyard more of a shadowy in potentia figure lurking in a possible future for the Doctor rather than something tied to his twelfth incarnation)

(To be fair, if they specifically need a properly old Eighth Doctor John Hurt isn't bad casting as an older Paul McGann. This is Hurt at around the same age McGann was when he played the Doctor and while no one would confuse the two they are vaguely similar enough facially that it's plausible McGann's Doctor could age into Hurt. But if the plot just requires an "older" Eighth Doctor then it's even more plausible that McGann's Doctor could age into mid-50s Paul McGann and it would have been really good to see him back handling that plot line.)