Doctor Who- this might be the last straw even for me.

[TinselAngel]

For fucks sake

Juno Dawson as a writer.

Keeping to Twelfth Night I saw at the Globe maybe 20 years ago an all male traditional casting /portrayal of it. In Shakespeares time it would have been all male and it did change the dynamics. The actual boy playing a girl pretending to be a boy. Really interesting

I saw that with an all-male touring troupe, and they did Taming of the Shrew too which was also interesting.
'Gender swapped' casting can work in Shakespeare if it's done properly.

Agree - gender swapping allows exploration in other directions

I think there are two main reasons for that - maybe they are really the same thing though.

One is that it's historically accurate, and that adds a layer of interest of its own. It's similar with other types of traditional theater that have that kind of element.

In fact, I might go further and say, people tend to be very forgiving of it any time the reasoning is purely pragmatic - it's a girls school production, or, as in the recent production at my kid's school, there's no boy who can sing the lead. It's not that you don't notice, but you don't make anything of it. (You could extend this to say, a production of Grease in a school in Japan - if they ever did such a thing, all the roles would be filled by Japanese kids, which you wouldn't think anything of at all.)

Also - I think theater has a whole different set of artificiality you accept - in a way like cartoons - that are more abstract. It's not meant to be purely realistic.

On the other hand you get an immersive historical drama, well, a lot of the point of it is realism.

Science fiction requires a fair bit of accepting artificialities, or alternate facts - but it in many cases anchors that in realism. And, when it's film or television, our assumption is that they have the resources to create that realism. It jars when they don't, and people wonder why they are doing it.

Maybe that comes down to - people tend not to object when artificialities are pragmatic. But when they are meant to be significant, or are ideological, or they feel an agenda is being foisted on them, they are much more likely to object.

But when they are meant to be significant, or are ideological, or they feel an agenda is being foisted on them, they are much more likely to object.

A great example is dentistry. If you think about, black people have existed all through human history (indeed even when white people did not!) so it is possible, albeit unlikely, that any historic English person whose race you do not know was black. However, that person having whitened teeth, veneers, perfectly corrected alignment or other benefit of modern dentistry is simply impossible. Yet the former causes anger while the latter is accepted without question.

So yes, people definitely consider some differences more important than others!

Historically though a black person in England would not go with their colour unremarked because it would be so rare. The vast majority of the population would never see a black person. On the other hand poor teeth became a symbol of wealth as only they had access to sugar. Until sugar became accessible to the wealthy teeth were generally in much better condition. Though historic dramas often give poorer characters the worse teeth. However, people do have white teeth that are correctly aligned without needing cosmetic dentistry and historically people did clean their teeth - with sticks rather than brushes.

Yep, there might be some exceptions where individuals had teeth to modern standards, just as there were times when people were black. But a population the size of a historical drama's cast was in reality vanishingly unlikely to have the degree of whiteness and regularity we accept as "normal" (and definitely no veneers!)

My point is not that "actually there were as many black people in historic England as today", it is that there are plenty of anachronisms in casting and it is our choice which we decide are significant.

You yourself have given a great example of this in that you choose to put effort into finding reasons the teeth could be realistic, and into reasons that race could not.

I'm absolutely not suggesting you are deliberately trying to marginalise black actors by the way. I think very little of this is done deliberately. It's just the water in which we fish swim - the things we accept as "normal". Our society puts more meaning on race than dentistry, so that jars more. But there's no concrete reason one is less historically wrong than the other.

(Interestingly, I bet if you asked our imaginary historical figure whether race or dentistry was more significant, she/her would say dentistry without a doubt!)

Circling back to Dr Who.

In the last series, they travelled back in time and met Isaac Newton and they had cast a British Indian actor to play Isaac. This breaks the verisimilitude (even in a time-travelling, sci-fi show) as we know that Isaac was white British. Anyone young who doesn't know who Isaac Newton was, then looks him up, expecting to find an inspiring person of colour, only to find that this is not true and that the programme makers lied.

Why can't they have written an episode where they travelled back in time and meet Srinivasa Ramanujan while he was in England at Cambridge (for example)? Then people who don't know about this amazingly talented Indian mathematician can look him up and it is all true!

I can't help but wonder why they went with Newton and not someone like Ramanujan?

Exactly!! Highlight the actual people who achieved something remarkable for the society of their time. That is infinitely more inspiring for children to watch.

Was it the fact that Dr Who being attracted to Newton was part of the story that they told?

If it was that, it does open up a lot of questions about exactly which historical people they can - as approved by fellow 'progressives' - use as pawns in their promotion of 'the message' (and which they can't).

I can't help but wonder why they went with Newton and not someone like Ramanujan?

I bet it's because the writers and producers don't know Ramanujan existed.

Shallow people who take an idea they've heard of and don't think in depth about it or read around the subject.

You could be right Cher!

I’ve been following this thread from the start and just want to say how stimulating I’ve found it (plus lots of ideas for my next watch). I love sci-fi and fantasy but I’m not an aficionado, loved the reboot up until Matt Smith and gave up. There’s been some really great discussions and a lot to think about. I agree with Cher the reason they didn’t use Ramanujan is because they didn’t know he existed and what’s worse couldn’t conceive he could have existed.

I really hate the fact that RTD introduced the Doctor being attracted to people (especially companions) into DW. It contradicts all previous lore and characterisation.

The Doctor is beyond workplace romances. And when he’s taken a human off on adventures in the TARDIS and (in the old days) couldn’t even guarantee he’d be able to return them home to the right time and place, it feels like the power differential in the relationship, for an ethical Gallifreyan, is highly problematic and the best thing would be to forgo all romantic entanglements.

The fact that there was no sexual tension nonsense in pre RTD DW worked really well for my 6 year old self (yuck, kissing!) and my current much older self (yuck, kissing!). It meant the writers concentrated on plots and couldn’t fill up time with relationship drama.

So does this go back to the fact the Russell T Davies has said that he can only view the world from his own viewpoint and that he cannot imagine a different viewpoint (paraphrased somewhat, but this is discussed in the Critical Drinker video linked earlier in the thread)?

Interestingly, I bet if you asked our imaginary historical figure whether race or dentistry was more significant, she/her would say dentistry without a doubt!

That would depend on the period. The times when historical figures came into contact with different races (eg vikings, romans, Celts, Danes, Spanish, Moors, Barbers) was normally in times of conflict or for trade. Race would not have been considered as it is today.

Everytime the character is made 'more human' it makes the Dr less alien and less captivating. I know that Hartnell's Dr had a granddaughter (Susan) but I have not watched those early episodes so I cannot say how it was handled.

Gallifreyans must reproduce, but as aliens, it shouldn't be quite so human in everyway.

So yes, people definitely consider some differences more important than others!

Hair styles is another one the historical dress people often touch on this.

Hairstyles date the period as much as clothes but some decades have odd styles that just aren’t there in collective conscious of time period so get shied away from.

Always felt ITVAgatha Christie's Poirot with David Suchet probably has more Art Deco around than was likely - but that partly due to audience expectations and possible jusftified by he was dealing with richer individuals.

Denstisty harder - acting population more look focused and wanting recognition beyond current production - historically harder as gentics as well as social economic class play a role and who when watching for entertainment who wants to be reminded about teeth and dentists.

It's the mix of being historically accurate while meeting enough of the audience expectations along side budget constaints and story demands. London and big cities and ports much easier to accept a mix ethic population at earlier times as it seems logical - though TBH I'm often less bothered than many posters as for me depends how it'd done whether it is jarring or has no effect or adds to production.

I can't help but wonder why they went with Newton and not someone like Ramanujan?

Good question.

I really liked the black history weeks BBC did when I was in my 20s - I suddenly heard about these new to me people – Mary Seacole - Chevalier de Saint-Georges Bill Richmond and since then they and others have cropped up in books, TV shows documentaries and sometime films.

Due to BBC know there were two black people in the Tudor court – one a trumpet player and one a lady in waiting both came over with Katherine of Argon – Spain famously having a more ethically diverse population at the time. I think you could add black actors round Katherine of Argon in more historically sympathetic ways than some recent TV shows have managed.

Instead of offending Egypt and ignoring historical sources by trying to re-write history with recent TV program Queen Cleopatra there was a Nubian dynasty of pharaohs less well known that could have been explored.

I hated the Mary Shelley episode of Dr Who as I felt it diminshed what she did - making out she was recounting what she saw rather than it being a leap in imagination that along side Stoker and Poe popularized genre of gothic writing.

Hartnell's portrayal, at least in the early episodes, is quite aloof and grouchy, except for his affection for Susan. He warmed up a bit later. Accounts from other actors suggest he wasn't the easiest man to get along with - he was beginning to suffer from chronic health problems - so that might have been him bringing his own personality into the role.

But the Time Lords weren't introduced until the end of Troughton IIRC, and it took quite a few years for the Doctor to be categorically established as alien. At the start, that wasn't explicitly stated and he could just as easily have been a human from the far future.

The introduction of sexual tension has never really worked for me either. It was good for box office though.

Everytime the character is made 'more human' it makes the Dr less alien and less captivating

The old less is more thing is so true - less focus on Dr past and current love life - more time for adventures - the man and his box. Though I did like the Ponds - Amy and Rory and Doctor dynamic - very good at the comic and serious.

I think it's why I found later season of Mandalorian less satisfying moved away from lone gun man with child dealing with frontier locations to big civilization encompassing changes. The stakes get higher and higher and just start to feel silly.

One of my old favourites is still The Deadly Assassin with Tom Baker, where the Time Lords were portrayed as a decadent court of corrupt bureaucrats, and you're not surprised he wanted to run away. I much prefer that to more recent attempts to turn the Doctor into Space Jesus.

The raising stakes problem is right there in Marvel films - once you've saved the whole universe, where do you go? Well, why not stakes that are meaningful to the characters?

I’m jumping genres to historical fiction. I watched Rouge Heroes on BBC recently. For the unfamiliar, it’s the story of how the SAS was created but not meant to be completely historically accurate.

I enjoyed it, but I did wonder about the implied romantic feelings between Paddy Mayne and Eoin McGonigal and how the families feel about the portrayal. They are both real people. I’m sure that they were probably good friends in real life, but the show while never explicit, seemed to depict them as having more than just a friendship.

Modern writers really struggle with close, platontic male friendship.

Has anyone watched For All Mankind? We're just about to start S4. It's not 'sci-fi' exactly, it's a counterfactual about what might have happened if the 'space race' had continued more strongly. I think it's dealing with issues about sex, sexuality and race pretty well so far. It's got some very strong female characters and definitely passes the Bechedel test. It seems to be roughly set in one decade per series, I think they're planning 7 in total so it'll be interesting to see what they do when it reaches the present more or less.

It occurs to me that part of the problem with Dr Who is that it's not really proper sci-fi - there's very little attempt at any sort of coherent science or engineering is there? The Tardis is just a timey-wimey flying carpet really.

@ErrolTheDragon is that on apple TV? - google say it is but just checking to be sure.

We don't have that apple + currently - I got it last time for Severance series 1 - which I liked but struggled to find anything else I personally liked on there- DH stayed with Foundation I couldn't. I'm debabting wether to get it again to watch series 2 of Severance.