6 Reasons Why Right Now Is The Perfect Time For A Female Doctor

After months and months of speculation, the identity of the thirteenth individual to step into the role of the titular hero in Doctor Who has now been revealed. 35-year-old actress Jodie Whittaker will be taking over from the outgoing Peter Capaldi, who exits the show this Christmas. It hasn't been confirmed, but Whittaker will likely make a cameo in the yuletide special before making her full debut when season 11 airs in 2018. Now, we probably don't need to tell you that the actress is the first woman to play the Time Lord. As you can imagine, the internet has reacted very calmly to this news and social media users have hardly had anything to say on the matter. Wait, no, that's not right. We meant to say that the internet has been torn in two over the subject, with many people loving the decision while others are decreeing that it's the worst thing that's ever happened. So, we thought we'd throw our two cents in and argue the case for why now is exactly the right time for Doctor Who to embrace change and move ahead with a female lead. As always, whether you agree with us or not, feel free to leave your own thoughts in the comments section. Honorable Mention: Doctor Who's Creator Wanted A Female Lead In The 1980s Before we get on to why now is the right time for a female Doctor, let's remind ourselves why it makes total sense for the Time Lord to become a woman at all: the creator of the show called for it to happen decades ago! While Doctor Who's creation was very much a collaborative process (watch the excellent 2013 drama An Adventure in Time and Space for the whole story), it was Canadian TV producer Sydney Newman who came up with the central premise of the show and the character of the Doctor. By 1986, Newman had moved on from the series, and was definitely not a fan of how it had developed. In a bid to fix the show, Newman sent the head of the BBC this colourful letter suggesting that the next Doctor should be a woman: "At a later stage Doctor Who should be metamorphosed into a woman. Don’t you agree that this is considerably more worthy of the BBC than Doctor Who’s presently largely socially valueless, escapist schlock? ... This requires some considerable thought – mainly because I want to avoid a flashy, Hollywood Wonder Woman, because this kind of heroine with no flaws is a bore." While Newman's criticisms of the show at the time are pretty strong, the thing to take away here is that the producer wanted the Doctor to become a woman as it would have social value and present an interesting alternate take on the idea of a female sci-fi/fantasy hero to contrast American superheroes like Wonder Woman. 6) 12 White Male Actors In, It's Time For A Change Let's get the obvious out the way: we've never had a female in the role before. Let's make it clear. The Doctor becoming a woman is nothing like James Bond or Batman being recast with a female in the part. While those characters have also been played by various actors, it's part of Doctor Who's mythology that the Doctor can regenerate into someone of any gender or ethnic background. Regardless of the real-world side of things, it just doesn't make much sense within the world of the show that this complete random process keeps ending up with him being a white man. Over the past fifty two years, we've had fourteen Doctors (yes, we're including John Hurt's one-off War Doctor because he was awesome). All of them have been amazing and each has been their own unique individual, so we're not suggesting they've all been the same. However, for the Doctor to keep being the same type of person for the rest of time would have been reductive in terms of casting the best actor and a betrayal of the core ethos of 'change is good' that has propelled the show forward for so long. This time around, it either had to be a man of a different ethnic grouping or a woman. As it happened, they decided to go for the bigger change by casting the latter. 5) Peter Capaldi Nailed The Classic Version Of The Doctor In all this talk of Jodie Whittaker taking over as the Doctor, let's not forget that Peter Capaldi's tenure as the Twelfth Doctor still continues for another five or so months until Christmas. When he announced that he was leaving back in January, Doctor Who fans were heartbroken to see him go, as he was such an excellent casting choice. The perfect match of a lifelong fan and tremendous actor, Capaldi always seemed like the Doctor distilled. And it's Capaldi's archetypal Doctorishness that makes it so right that the production team have decided to tread new ground by casting a woman as Doctor No. 13. The new Doctor has always been cast to contrast with the previous one. Patrick Troughton was a more playful, clownish Doctor to contrast with William Hartnell's grouchy original. Young, fresh-faced Peter Davison was the opposite of Tom Baker's eccentric uncle Doctor. And let's not forget that Capaldi himself, the oldest Doctor, was deliberately chosen to break away from Matt Smith, the youngest ever. This time around, the Thirteenth Doctor needed to be someone who was the opposite of the classic traits of the Doctor that Capaldi embodied. And seeing as his Doctor developed a lot over his three seasons (from cold and calculating to aging rocker to a wise old hero), that covers a lot of ground. Getting, say, another middle-aged male actor to try and basically replicate what Capaldi did and somehow find a way to match him would have been a tall task. It was a much better idea, then, to go with someone so different that they wouldn't have to live in Capaldi's shadow. 4) A Totally Fresh Direction For A New Era Of The Show It isn't just Peter Capaldi who's leaving after this year's Christmas special. The episode will also be the last one produced under Steven Moffat's era as Doctor Who showrunner. The writer (also known for co-creating Sherlock) doesn't often get the best reception from certain quarters of the fandom, but it shouldn't be forgotten how much he's given the show. Moffat has taken the reins of the TARDIS since 2010 and has seen it through its most successful period ever in terms of global popularity. He's also delivered three terrific Doctors (that's Matt Smith, Peter Capaldi and the late, great John Hurt) and some of the best episodes the show has ever seen. His signature blend of quip-laden dialogue and high-concept storytelling hasn't been to everyone's tastes, but it has defined the show for the best part of a decade. While we appreciate what Moffat has done for the series, then, it's now definitely time for a change. But with the previous showrunner having overseen the tenure of two Doctors, simply getting a new lead wouldn't have necessarily ensured that Chris Chibnall's time in charge felt like a clean slate. By giving us the first ever female Doctor, though, Chibnall has proven that this is the start of a brand new chapter of Doctor Who that will truly be different from what we've seen over the past fifty years. 3) The Show Has Been Building Up To It One of the best things that Moffat has given us - and that he isn't credited enough for doing - is creating the idea that Time Lords can switch genders as part of canon. The idea was first floated in 2011's "The Doctor's Wife," written by Neil Gaiman and then kept gaining traction from there. By the time Peter Capaldi's version came around, it was rising to the forefront of the show. Though he'd cast Capaldi in the lead role, Steven Moffat recognized the call from fans for a female Doctor and decided to test whether the wider audience as a whole would accept the idea of a Time Lord becoming a Time Lady in a different way first. In Capaldi's initial series, he squared the Doctor against Missy, as played by Michelle Gomez. In other words, the Doctor's arch-nemesis the Master in female form. The 'test run' went down a treat and Missy is now one of the most popular incarnations of the Master ever. After that, he had the Doctor hinting that he wouldn't mind being a woman in 2014's "Death in Heaven" and the first on-screen male-to-female regeneration in 2015's "Hell Bent." The recent season 10 finale, "The Doctor Falls" was full of references to Time Lords becoming women, as well, with the Doctor commenting that he doesn't know if he has been a woman in the past and hoping that "the future would be all girl." In short, the introduction of a female Doctor isn't something that has come out of the blue. In fact, the show has been cleverly and quietly building up to a place where we could accept a female lead for some time now. 2) The Rise Of Women-Led Sci-Fi Movies And TV Apart from the fact that the show itself has been hinting at this for a while, a female Doctor feels so right in 2017 because the past couple of years have seen an increase in the number of sci-fi/fantasy movies and TV series that have female leads. For the best examples of this, let's look at the superhero genre. For years, studios believed that superhero movies based around women were guaranteed flops. An assumption purely based, it seems, on a couple of misfires from the early 00s (namely, 2004's Catwoman and 2005's Elektra). This year, though, DC finally made a Wonder Woman movie and - guess what happens? - it becomes one of the most acclaimed and highest-grossing superhero films ever. The same goes for TV, too. For a long time, Buffy the Vampire Slayer seemed to be one of the very few superheroines on television, but recent years have seen the likes of Jessica Jones, Supergirl and Agent Carter join her on that front. While a few years ago, perhaps even when Peter Capaldi was cast in 2013, would have probably been too early to introduce a female Doctor for the first time, now it feels totally right as it makes Doctor Who part of a move in the zeitgeist to equalize the male-to-female ratio of leads in sci-fi/fantasy fiction. 1) They've Cast A Great Actress That's enough talk about "a female Doctor." Surely the best reason why now was the perfect time for a woman to take the role of the Doctor is because they simply found a talented actress who would be brilliant in the part, right? Like Matt Smith and David Tennant before her, Jodie Whittaker isn't a household name and doesn't really have a great deal of leading screen credits on her resume. However, she is well respected in the industry - just check out Twitter for the number of actors congratulating her on getting the part - and has enjoyed an award-winning career on stage. For her most recognizable role, Whittaker played Beth Latimer in hit crime drama Broadchurch. Her performance as a mother whose life falls apart after her son is murdered was rightly acclaimed by critics and viewers alike. As there should be, there's much talk right now about how Doctor Who is making history by casting its first female lead. But let's not let the actress herself get lost in all the hubbub about gender politics. Jodie Whittaker isn't just the first female Doctor - she is the Doctor.