okie-dokie so i’ve had a little rant building inside me for the last couple of days and i think it’s time to vent.
i keep seeing posts and things as i lurk about the doctor who fandom basically saying that only episodes written by moffat/post moffat taking over the show are problematic and i really really disagree with this. although i dearly love doctor who and i DO admit that the show radically changed post-moffat’s ascent to head writer, i don’t think it’s fair to act like moffat is/was the only one writing problematic shit (although again i will admit that moffat did write one of the more blatantly offensive views of women in “silence in the library”/“forest of the dead” where he almost says in as many woods “beautiful woman = stupid, ugly woman = smart” and then goes even further and implies “ugly smart woman = better.” DDDD:).
this is all stuff i noticed PRE-moffat becoming head writer:
- negative asian stereotypes. EVERYWHERE. dress them up as aliens and claim you’re therefore not racist all you want, but when you build a fictional “alien” race on existing negative stereotypes of asian people and then cast out of that demographic to boot (and make the actress use an “asian” accent when she speaks naturally in a british accent), you cannot tell me that’s not sending a very clear and nasty message. then there was the “evil” asian lady with the time beatle who was given no motive outside of being an “evil” asian lady. not cute. as an aside: there was also the “asian” music playing in the background for the dalek emperor’s scenes; that’s an implication and a half, especially right on the heels of “evil” asian lady. the one okay asian representation i’ve seen so far was in “the waters of mars” but that’s arguably because they hardly gave the character lines or character definition so there was literally no chance to be offensive. :/
- uneven representations of the lead female characters. it’s like the writers constantly forget that the leading ladies are CHARACTERS and not just plot devices to be rescued, only occasionally remembering and “allowing” them to do something awesome. this is a problem all across the show and is not isolated to moffat episodes. then there was the blatant and almost in as many words “all these ‘brilliant’ ladies needed a MAN (i.e. the doctor) to properly ~show them~ how brilliant they really are” (yuck) and if i remember rightly that episoide did not come from moffat.
- constant sexualization of the doctor/companion relationship with the brief exception of donna but EVEN THEN they had to throw in a kiss and the characters constantly denying they’re a couple AS IF THERE’S NOTHING ELSE THEY COULD POSSIBLY BE. women are repeatedly made into desirable plot objects and reasons for the doctor’s emotional growth but rarely the other way around (the worst offender possibly being “the idiot’s lantern” which has some of the most blatant “damseling” of rose).
- also series one included a “that’s so gay” aimed at the doctor for not reacting in a properly ~masculine~ way to being slapped. DD:
now i am not trying to say the show is all problems; they do include some lovely things, like the existence of people of color in 1500s England etc. and the handful of times when the female characters get to be people are usually pretty awesome. but i’m losing tolerance for this nostalgic view of pre-moffat doctor who as being perfect and problemless utopia of television. i’m also not denying that moffat’s writing is riddled with PROBLEMS, because it is. but a little more perspective would be nice.