Poll: Doctor Who: Female and/or Non-White Master, Yay or Nay?

Blood Brain Barrier

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Non-white? I don't know about the new episodes but wasn't the original master non-white? Regardless of the actor's race he didn't seem to be presented as a typical white man, and could easily have been a Moor, Egyptian or Persian. Not to mention this discussion doesn't even make sense since the Master isn't human.
 

Thaluikhain

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BrotherRool said:
I think that's exactly it, a female/non-white Doctor brings as much baggage as the writers and actor choose to bring. The problem is if half the writers think 'okay she's a lady, we've got to do everything differently now.' Moffat would almost certainly be a horrible choice to showrun something like this. But if we end up with soemone who thinks, 'okay I'm going to carry on writing Who episodes and find and replace all my "he's" with "she's", then it's not a problem.
Yeah, in theory it'd be fine, in practice the writers would almost certainly muck it up. Especially Moffat.
 

LittleWings

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I have no issue with a non-white Master. I do have issue with the Timelords swapping gender thing (If nothing else, it doesn't feel right, and doesn't make sense that after all the regenerations we've seen onscreen there's never been a gender swap incident).

Besides, if people so desperately needed to see a female Master, the Rani does exist (and is going to be played by Siobhan Redmond in BFAs, which I feel is an excellent choice)
 

Thaluikhain

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archiebawled said:
Can timelords change their gender? Or is it just something that hasn't been mentioned/alluded to/done yet? Not a huge Dr. Who watcher (nothing against it, just don't tend to watch it), so I'm not sure.
It was mentioned in a one-off that the Corsair did this, in the episode "The Doctor's Wife". This was noted by a lot of people.
 

Anachronism

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thaluikhain said:
OTOH, if you let the villain be black before the hero can be...yeah, careful with that.
This is my thought. I'd definitely be on board with a black or female Master, but when they're up against a white male Doctor you risk loading the story with all sorts of uncomfortable implications. Besides, if the Master does show up again it probably won't be for all that long, so gender or race-swapping the character could just come across as a token effort. If they're going to go down this route, they'd be much better off doing it with the Doctor first.

Before Peter Capaldi was announced, there was that rumour that Idris Elba was going to be the Doctor. Let's face it, that would have been amazing.
 

Colour Scientist

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Anachronism said:
Before Peter Capaldi was announced, there was that rumour that Idris Elba was going to be the Doctor. Let's face it, that would have been amazing.
I don't think that was ever taken seriously.

As much as I love Idris Elba, people do want him to play every role ever. :p
 
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Colour Scientist said:
TheVampwizimp said:
Besides, I know that Twelve's arc is going to be about returning the Timelords and redeeming himself, but Ten made it very clear that the universe is better off without them at this point.
Did they actually hint at that and I missed it or are you just speculating?
No, it's not a known fact or anything. But I would bet the farm that it's what's going to happen. After everything in the 50th anniversary show, it makes perfect sense, right? Now that he knows it's possible to save the Timelords, he finally has a chance for redemption and will be able to forgive himself. It will make for a great series-long character arc, going all the way back to the reboot and the Ninth Doctor.
 

Thaluikhain

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jpz719 said:
I'm inclined to lean towards no since changing a characters sex or race without doing anything else is about as narratively interesting to me as switching to characters lines and voice acting around. Just going "THEY'RE A GIRL NOW!" screams desperation for attention, atleast to me. If someone wants more diverse characters make some new ones, don't change established characters. On a related note after last weeks Moviebob soapbox I've been seeing these kinds of threads turn up more and more. It's worth remebering that CHANGE DOES NOT HAVE TO HAPPEN ALL AT ONCE.
Normally, yeah, but this is a character who has been established to totally change every few years.

And, creating new original characters seems to be against some rules somewhere.
 

Schadrach

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*grumble* Damnit, it's awful to go changing race/gender of characters and throwing canon out the window just for the purpose of making some overly PC folks happy and...wait, Doctor Who? Oh, never mind then. Just keep it to when the character in question regenerates, OK?

Being more serious, this is probably the single best series ever for the folks who want to recast iconic characters as various other genders/races, because of the whole "regeneration" thing. Not violating canon = my not having a problem with it, and I'm pretty sure that so long as the Doctor regenerates generally humanoid, we're not breaking canon.
 

BrotherRool

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thaluikhain said:
BrotherRool said:
I think that's exactly it, a female/non-white Doctor brings as much baggage as the writers and actor choose to bring. The problem is if half the writers think 'okay she's a lady, we've got to do everything differently now.' Moffat would almost certainly be a horrible choice to showrun something like this. But if we end up with soemone who thinks, 'okay I'm going to carry on writing Who episodes and find and replace all my "he's" with "she's", then it's not a problem.
Yeah, in theory it'd be fine, in practice the writers would almost certainly muck it up. Especially Moffat.
I think there's a lot of writers who wouldn't screw it up. Russel T Davis would have been great at it (think of the whole Martha thing), RTD also has a much better history of writing women as people than Moffat and a much better history of making his random characters female, whereas Moffat almost always chooses guys when he needs an extra in his script.

Moffat would be fine with a black or asian guy, but when I want a women Doctor (Which is immediately after Capaldi :p) I want Moffat to stop showrunning. In fact I want Moffat to stop showrunning anyway, but maybe I'm being a bit harsh on the guy.
 

MeChaNiZ3D

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Whatever the lore says. If regeneration is a blank slate, fine, the Doctor probably should have been a female and a black guy and a few other things by now. If there are some kind of continuity rules, which there could be, I'm not into it enough to know, then as long as it sticks to that, cast whomever you like.
 

Thaluikhain

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BrotherRool said:
I think there's a lot of writers who wouldn't screw it up. Russel T Davis would have been great at it (think of the whole Martha thing), RTD also has a much better history of writing women as people than Moffat and a much better history of making his random characters female, whereas Moffat almost always chooses guys when he needs an extra in his script.
True, when RTD got it all wrong, it wouldn't have anything to do with gender or sexuality or race.

BrotherRool said:
Moffat would be fine with a black or asian guy, but when I want a women Doctor (Which is immediately after Capaldi :p) I want Moffat to stop showrunning. In fact I want Moffat to stop showrunning anyway, but maybe I'm being a bit harsh on the guy.
Yeah...he worked well when RTD held the leash, but left to his own devices, he's not nearly as good.

He also likes digging himself into things with interviews and stuff...he's really got some issues with women it seems.
 

BrotherRool

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LittleWings said:
I have no issue with a non-white Master. I do have issue with the Timelords swapping gender thing (If nothing else, it doesn't feel right, and doesn't make sense that after all the regenerations we've seen onscreen there's never been a gender swap incident).

Besides, if people so desperately needed to see a female Master, the Rani does exist (and is going to be played by Siobhan Redmond in BFAs, which I feel is an excellent choice)
We've actually met timelords who've swapped gender. Even recently we had the Corsair who the Doctor has known in both genders. This was canon as early as the fourth Doctor and reconfirmed with Eleven. We've actually had one Timelord who regenerated into a humanoid avian in a radioplay.

And after multiple regenerations we've heard the Doctor say something like 'Oh still a man' which means it's totally possible for him to have swapped gender during regeneration. And in the short The Night of the Doctor which was a prequel to The Day of the Doctor, the eighth Doctor was given the opportunity to control his next regeneration and the possibilities are 'young or old' 'man or women'
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-U3jrS-uhuo

It's definitely canon that he can change gender
 

Riff Moonraker

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Colour Scientist said:
TheVampwizimp said:
Besides, I know that Twelve's arc is going to be about returning the Timelords and redeeming himself, but Ten made it very clear that the universe is better off without them at this point.
Did they actually hint at that and I missed it or are you just speculating?
Tennant's Who pretty much said that... However, in The Day of the Doctor, both Tennant and Matt Smiths versions were all about saving Gallifrey once they figured out a way to do it.. (Thanks to The Moment)... which I suppose takes back that comment? Also, the Time Lords represented in both episodes appear VERY different, too.

Back to the OP, though, I dont care WHO (har har) they pick, just so long as they do a good job. They have a pretty good record of doing that, thus far, as I have really enjoyed pretty much all of their stuff, and absolutely adored most of it. :)
 

LittleWings

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BrotherRool said:
LittleWings said:
I have no issue with a non-white Master. I do have issue with the Timelords swapping gender thing (If nothing else, it doesn't feel right, and doesn't make sense that after all the regenerations we've seen onscreen there's never been a gender swap incident).

Besides, if people so desperately needed to see a female Master, the Rani does exist (and is going to be played by Siobhan Redmond in BFAs, which I feel is an excellent choice)
We've actually met timelords who've swapped gender. Even recently we had the Corsair who the Doctor has known in both genders. This was canon as early as the fourth Doctor and reconfirmed with Eleven. We've actually had one Timelord who regenerated into a humanoid avian in a radioplay.

And after multiple regenerations we've heard the Doctor say something like 'Oh still a man' which means it's totally possible for him to have swapped gender during regeneration. And in the short The Night of the Doctor which was a prequel to The Day of the Doctor, the eighth Doctor was given the opportunity to control his next regeneration and the possibilities are 'young or old' 'man or women'
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-U3jrS-uhuo

It's definitely canon that he can change gender
I never said it wasn't cannon. But tbh, those aren't really compelling arguments anyway- The Corsair was mentioned by two writers, in the Fouth Doctor's era by Douglas Adams (The guy known for throwing in lines for comedy over whether they felt right or not), and anyway IIRC (and correct me if I'm wrong) that was in Shada, and I'm pretty sure the Cannon version of Shada was the recent Webseries/audio, with 8 and Romana. He's only refered to in comical ways. We haven't met any Time Lords that have changed Gender, not to mention we've seen countless Master/Doctor/Romana/Borusa etc regenerations who have not swapped gender.

When the Sisterhood of Karn give him the opportunity to change gender, they make it clear that Time Lord science is elevated on Karn. That doesn't mean that Time Lords can just become Women, it means with the help of the Sisterhood they can.

((Also Remember when the Second Doctor was initially allowed to chose his regeneration, and not one female face came up?))

In any case, it's the feeling, not whether it is cannon that counts for me.
 

Riff Moonraker

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Anachronism said:
thaluikhain said:
OTOH, if you let the villain be black before the hero can be...yeah, careful with that.
This is my thought. I'd definitely be on board with a black or female Master, but when they're up against a white male Doctor you risk loading the story with all sorts of uncomfortable implications. Besides, if the Master does show up again it probably won't be for all that long, so gender or race-swapping the character could just come across as a token effort. If they're going to go down this route, they'd be much better off doing it with the Doctor first.

Before Peter Capaldi was announced, there was that rumour that Idris Elba was going to be the Doctor. Let's face it, that would have been amazing.
This is part and parcel of the problem, though. Folks have got to get over that mess, and just let them pick actors that would be awesome for the role. If Dr Who was white, and the villain was black, but the actors were awesome, then it shouldnt matter.. period. However, I completely get your point, and you are probably 99% spot on, unfortunately. I'm just saying it SHOULDNT be that way.

I am also with you about Idris Elba.... good LORD he would have rocked a Dr. Who!!!!!
 

MrMan999

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It could be pretty cool. I mean its established canon that at least some timelords can regenerate into the opposite sex. And I am sure that there are a ton of women and Non-White actors who would love to be The Doctor. That said, don't just cast a woman or Non-White actor just to have a woman or non-white actor as The Doctor. There has never been a bad actor to play The Doctor and I would for the tradition to be broken on the first woman or Non-white actor to play the role. Also as Anachronism and Riff said, Idris Elba as The Doctor would have been amazing. Also on a side note, they should bring back Romana and The Rani.
 

Thaluikhain

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LittleWings said:
I never said it wasn't cannon. But tbh, those aren't really compelling arguments anyway- The Corsair was mentioned by two writers, in the Fouth Doctor's era by Douglas Adams (The guy known for throwing in lines for comedy over whether they felt right or not), and anyway IIRC (and correct me if I'm wrong) that was in Shada, and I'm pretty sure the Cannon version of Shada was the recent Webseries/audio, with 8 and Romana. He's only refered to in comical ways. We haven't met any Time Lords that have changed Gender, not to mention we've seen countless Master/Doctor/Romana/Borusa etc regenerations who have not swapped gender.
Wait, what? When was the Corsair, or any Time Lord who changed gender, mentioned in Tom Baker's run?