This is interesting - in fact this whole thread I find interesting. I'm a James Bond fan and it's intriguing to see the same kind of discontent and annoyance thrashed out re another subject as you see on a Bond forum. Of course, you can't go back, and there's that suspicion that the makers are trying to make things differently so they can claim it's a success, and all their own. That said, they also seem wedded to the past a bit, or the heritage of the thing, in case that doesn't quite work.
Past adventures had a broadly narcissistic male lead that the audience are meant to get behind so that when he's a success, the individual feels they can claim it as their own! It's the reason for maverick cops - if the crime were solved by team work then the acclaim would have to be shared! That said, there often is a team there, but they're actually enablers, allowing the lead to shine. See Q and his gadgets in the Bond films - they're there to prop Bond up, Q gets no acclaim, usually only disparagement. Even M most likely is just there to explain the mission and hand over the plane tickets.
But times change. Now, if you try to have a female equal to Bond, it doesn't always work because a) It looks contrived and b) Two indestructible heroes in a film upsets the balance, it can look implausible. But c) is that it breaks the formula I outlined in the previous paragraph. It also breaks the yin and yang of an onscreen partnership. Holmes had his Watson, but if Watson were a woman and therefore had to be as smart as Holmes, well, it could work but it breaks the dynamic. I suppose one could be the muscle, the other the brains.
Personally as a middle-aged man I have long gone off the old tradition of the know-all bloke everyone looks up to, and the James Bond series has tried to address that, albeit imo not very happily. Most action films today are about teamwork - to some extent Top Gun: Maverick emphasises that and certainly I think the Avengers films do.
But applying themes of equality and teamwork to something like James Bond and Doctor Who is a tricky business, you run the risk of jeopardising the very qualities that made them a success. That said, I do recall early William Hartnell episodes emphasising his unappealing crochety side, so perhaps audiences were meant to identify with the companions more. Now that seems a bit of a risk, they want the grandstanding look-at-me Doctor.