CommanderMaxil1983 wrote:I was reading burrunjor's "why a female Doctor Who is anti men bigotry and hate" and he made a very interesting point: They (pro female Doctor group) Haven’t Actually Got A Reason For Wanting A Female Doctor.
What reasons have you heard that made you really consider the decision in a positive light?
The "young girls finally have a role model" reason is bullshit because a)it implies that before the decision there was no women for young girls to taken inspiration from b) also implies that young girls are unable to have a role model unless the character is female and c) is not a valid reason at this time because we've only seen her in a hoodie and crash and fall out of the TARDIS. I predict she'll probably be rude, smug and will be on a mission to put all men in their place. If that's the case then we REALLY should be afraid for the future.
The other reason is "well, why not?" and I don't really even need to answer that one. Why not create a TV show about a cool female time traveller? Just like people that want a female James Bond why not ask for a tv/movie series about a female spy instead? As burrunjor mentioned in his article, nobody is asking for a male Xena. I don't actually remember anyone asking for a female character to be male.
Thanks man for the shout out.
The sad thing is that not only are there no reasons for a female Doctor to happen, but there are actually dozens of great reasons for a Romana spinoff too.
1/ There are so many actresses that would be great for Romana. There are NO actresses that would be great for the Doctor.
Even genuinely quirky talented actresses would never be as good for the role as a guy, because well the character is a a guy, with an established history as a guy, so the woman will always stick out like a sore thumb.
With Romana however she would be their character, and furthermore the actresses would also have more freedom to develop her and establish her persona.
Also Romana could be a role for more unusual, older, character actresses to be leads in tv shows, in much the same way as the Doctor was that for men.
2/ Romana's series could be a totally different type of show to Doctor Who. Yes it would have the same premise of a hero travelling through time and space, but so what, Xena had the same basic premise as Hercules, and Angel as Buffy and they both did something new with it.
Romana could be set on alien planets more. In contrast to the Doctor, she might not have any real affection for humanity, and almost never visit the earth.
You could have her develop affection for a new planet, the way the Doctor does for earth.
You could build up the entire history of this world, its inhabitants, and also you could develop Romana's relationship with this planet in a different way to the Doctors with earth.
Maybe Romana would be more clumsy and reveal herself to them, and it would work out at first with her being a hero, but then it could all turn sour in a lot of ways. Maybe there would be a war where people Romana wouldn't want to take either side, but they would both want her to help them.
Maybe there would be a horrifying incident that she wasn't there to stop, like a plague or an invasion and they blame her.
Or maybe certain members of this race would pretend to be Romana, when they found out she can change her face, and use that for corrupt ends, meaning no one would trust the real Romana when she showed up?
You could also be bolder with stories set on this planet than invasion earth stories in DW. You obviously can't go too far if its an alien invasion as you have to put the toys back in the box at the end.
With Romana's favourite planet however you could have her fail and the planet get really damaged by alien invaders. It would be cool if you had it be humans invading Romana's world in the future!
3/ You can flesh Romana out more than the Doctor. Obviously a big part of the Doctors character is his mystery, so you can't reveal too much about his past. With Romana however that isn't an issue so you can show her past, reveal why she does what she does, maybe even explore more of Gallifrey.
4/ There are big gaps in Romana's story that might be interesting to fill in. Why did she leave E-Space, what happened to her during the Time War? Rassilon who maybe disposed her could have been a great foe for Romana (my choice for Rassilon BRIAN BLESSED!)
5/ Romana could have her own enemies, and she could still meet the Doctors. I also liked the way that characters like Ares and Spike had different dynamics with the Hercules and Angel than they did with Buffy and Xena.
You could do that with Romana. Maybe Romana would take pity on the Cybermen for instance? The Cybermen are after all sick, dying people. They just want to survive, but in order to do that they had to make themselves into machine creatures.
I always liked it the way in the early stories people still saw the Cybermen as people like when Ben is horrified at having killed a Cyberman in The Tenth Planet. So maybe Romana would see it that way and try and help some Cybermen. Obviously she'd have varying results so as not to undermine the Doctor.
As for the Daleks, Romana could have a more hateful relationship with them than even the Doctor. She was captured by the Daleks in Big Finish and tortured by them for decades. Maybe she is at first actually traumatised at the sight of them (maybe this was part of why she was diposed in the Time War.)
You'd then have her overcome her terror of the Daleks. We could see flashbacks of her being tortured in the Dalek camps, and seeing the horrors they inflicted on their prisoners. She would have seen their horrors up close to a greater extent than even the Doctor!
Those are 5 reasons we could have had a Romana spin off series, and on top of that all the bullshit reasons for a female Doctor, MUH representation, I want to see more female led series, (cause I can't be arsed watching the dozens that are out there.) ALL apply for Romana the series?
So question is why the fuck did these people not only not want a Romana spinoff but where actively opposed to it?