The 13th Doctor Reveal Thread

farntfar said:
Or for the sake of a large number of people who have been asking for it for a long time.
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Or, Doctory McDoctorface! I would actually have some sympathy with @Luiglin if that is, in fact, the case; that the BBC just caved in under overwhelming popular public pressure, because popular pressure is not always the best method in which to decide things, i.e. Boaty McBoatface. However, maybe, just maybe, Chris Chibnall thought, "This is a great way to introduce more variety in the writing, and to the character of the Doctor." Plus, the public outcry against the decision would tend to suggest that it isn't very popular.

I honestly can't understand either this interest around the world, or the people who think the world has ended because of this: those who say, "first Ghostbusters, then Doctor Who, where will it all end?" And, to the people trying to pretend that there is some kind of fifty-five year old plan to the regeneration sequence of the Doctor, I just say, "Pf-ft!" I think I read people trying to make an argument that some Regenerations seemed to produce a Doctor that in some way had a quality that the previous Doctor had lacked - so he went from stern to jovial, from old to young - but really, that was never Canon. So, that this doesn't fit any imagined or perceived pattern isn't actually breaking anything.
 
Perpetual Man said:
For me there has to be a logical progression of the story, there has to be a reason for it and at this precise moment there is no reason.
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And there may be one given in the Christmas show or the next series, but we don't know that now. But why do we need a reason at all? We haven't been given a reason why the Master became Missy, and that doesn't bother me at all.
Perpetual Man said:
We don’t really know how regeneration works
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Exactly. It's magic, in the Arthur C. Clarke sense of the word, and so is beyond our understanding. Perhaps, in the absence of the Time Lords having control over it, other rules take over, rules based on goodness knows what.
Perpetual Man said:
Until Missy, the Master regenerated from male to male.
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But it did happen, and that was two series (soon to be three series) ago. (Goodness only knows how many lived years that is for the Doctor or Missy.)
Perpetual Man said:
And when the Time Lords punished the Doctor at the end of the War Games forcefully, he was shown a number of faces to choose from (he rejected them all, so they chose John Pertwee), but not one of them were female.
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Being forced to be a man, regeneration after regeneration was one hell of a punishment (and, possibly, might fit the definition of cruel and unusual punishment...).


What is being missed** here is that old idea about SF: that in spite of its often futuristic settings and pretentions, much of it is strongly bound to the age in which it was written, whether reflecting that age, being a linear extension of that age's mores, or coming over as a reaction to, or criticism of, that age.

So what has changed is us and our society... and Doctor Who, as a product of our society -- as a product of our time -- is changing with us. We had male PM after male PM, and then we had Mrs Thatcher and now Mrs May. Why did that happen? It wasn't because women suddenly got the vote in the 1970s, or were suddenly allowed to stand in the 1960s (giving them time to rise though the ministerial ranks). It just happened and no-one knows why.


** - Missy, the name, being a good pointer to this.
 
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A female Time Lord Inquisitor, and they called her a Time Lord not a Time Lady because their species name is Time Lord
 
Similar to the UK second chamber. If you referred to three members of the House of Lords who happened to be women, you would say "three Lords", not "three Ladies".
 
I don't get why the fact that female ones have been called Time Ladies is an indicator that the genders are static. We don't know that they were never male before, and called Time Lords then. Perhaps the name switched with the gender? Not that I'm suggesting that they ought to call the Doctor a Time Lady now. No. I don't think anyone would have survived calling Missy or River that. But back in our decades of strict differentiation of titles (Chairman/Chairwoman, etc.), it makes sense. Doesn't mean they couldn't switch, just that they were currently female.
 
The Doctor is supposed to have a maximum number of regenerations, what if that only applies to gender ?
You can only regenerate to the same gender 12 times, then the 13th needs to be the opposite. It would also mean the show can carry on indefinitely. 12 male/ 12 female then back to male.
 
When the 12 regenerations idea came up in old Who it was made quite clear that 12 meant 12, the only way the Master got round it was by stealing a body. They also ignored the scene in Brain of Morbius which implied the Doctor had earlier incarnations before Hartnell. However with New Who the 12 rule seems to have been forgotten and anyway including the War Doctor, a character I would love to have seen more of, this New Doctor will be number 14. What's done is done, the new producers have made their decision and the series will continue, of course they have opened up a problem for the next regeneration if 15 is also a woman people will complain so that's it the Doctor is now female, and if they make 15 male people will complain about them backsliding. It will all boil down to viewing figures which I believe have been slipping for awhile. Either the Doctor will carry on or slowly sink. Of course it depends on BBC politics, if there another controller who hates the programme it may well suffer the fate it met before, kicked off Saturday nights and put up against Coronation Street, where it limped along before finally being put out to grass.
 
I'm looking forward to finding out what the outfit is :) (unless it's what she's wearing in the promo but someone pointed out that was Peter's outfit)
 
Even when a series I like takes a turn I don't agree with (not the case here), I go with it and give it a chance. I think we're about to be entertained more than we might expect!

:)
 
Male junior female storylines have been exhausted.
 
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