DOCTOR WHO: Counting to 12…
Well folks, we’re just over an hour away from the announcement of Who (pun intended) will be playing the 12th Doctor on the BBC’s DOCTOR WHO, and the lineup of the guests for the live special is looking pretty impressive.
Of course 11th Doctor Matt Smith will be there to pass the torch, but he’ll also be joined by Peter Davidson and Colin Baker, our 5th and 6th Doctors, as well as Bernard Cribbins (Wilfred Mott), Bonnie Langford (Mel), and Janet Fielding (Tegan). Katy Manning, who returned as Jo Grant in The Sarah Jane Adventures alongside Smith will also be there, as well, and, quite nice to see, especially in light of the fast approaching 50th Anniversary, we also have Anneke Wills, who played Polly in both the 1st and 2nd Doctor’s runs. Everything I’m seeing says “including” in regards to those great WHO actors, so there may still be some surprises ahead for us, aside, of course, from the identity of our newest Doctor.
We also know that there will be video clips from Mark Gatiss, Professor Brian Cox and Professor Robert Winston, the former, of course, a writer and actor for the show, and as for the latter two gentlemen, well, you may remember Professor Cox from his appearance in “The Power Of Three” and his many, many BBC specials. A huge fan of science fiction, Cox was science advisor for SUNSHINE and gave the Ninth Douglas Adams Memorial Lecture. Robert Winston also brings a long and stellar history of BBC science specials with him, and if you haven’t seen his The Human Body or Walking With Cavemen, you really should.
For those of you with BBC America, and of course, our UK readers watching on BBC One, you’ll get to watch it all live at 1pm Central time in the US, and 7pm in the UK. For the rest of you… well.
Watch this space, yeah?
The Countdown continues…
It will be *holds envelope to forehead*
Another White Dude.
I’d really hope to be wrong, but I’ve been watching Davis/Moffat for ages. It’s always a white dude. Not because it’s essential to the character, but because they literally can’t do anything THAT CREATIVE. They won’t take the risk of taking the audience outside of a comfort zone. It’s not what they do. Dr Who does not provoke people to think about things outside of their comfort zones.
It’s not a bad show. It’s not horribly racist or horribly sexist, and you’re not horribly racist or sexist if you don’t want to think about things like that. You are being racist or sexist if you tell people to shut up about it in public though.
And I’d really love to be wrong. I’d love for the next doctor to be a woman or person of color. Or even for people to just stop claiming that simply *talking* about the problems with having an all white male doctor all the time needs to be removed from the public sphere.
It does get a lot a wide ranging reactions, doesn’t it? The arguments for and against those kinds of changes certainly can get quite heated. Personally, I have no problem with a person of color playing the part, in fact I’ve long thought Chiwetel Ejiofor would be outstanding in the role, along with several other quite talented actors of various ethnicities. I can see it happening, likely before we’ll see a female Doctor.
I suspect you’re right about it being a white man, but the show has surprised us before.
I’ve not been able to look at Chiwetel Ejiofor the same since Serenity. But maybe that’s because that’s the first role I remember him in well enough to recognize his face again.
I, personally, was hoping the push for Richard Ayoade was more than hype. He’d have been wonderful as well.
Now I’m just hoping he’s a ginger. >.>