A female Doctor is only a matter of time
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Version 0 of 1. In the latest episode of Doctor Who, the Doctor’s most recent mysterious adversary, the enigmatic Missy (a glorious Michelle Gomez) was revealed to be a regeneration of his most famous foe, the dastardly Master. This was not news to a lot of fans of the show, who had cracked the code that Missy = Mistress = Master. (That one probably wouldn’t have kept Alan Turing up all night.) But this means the Master, who used to be a Time Lord, is a Time Lady; like the Doctor himself, she’s from planet Gallifrey. And if the Master has changed sex, that is the biggest hint yet that we could see a female Doctor very soon. We don’t know how the Master’s sex change happened. If it’s just a 50:50 chance, then it’s pretty odd that The Doctor has been a guy 13 times in a row. Perhaps it’s similar to what happened to the dinosaurs in Jurassic Park, where the all-female dinosaur cast still managed to breed somehow. The last time the Doctor and the Master were together, they thought they were the last Time Lords left in the universe – it seems they were not. In the words of Dr Ian Malcolm, “Life will find a way.” Whatever the mechanics, I’m delighted by this turn of events and the possibility of a female Doctor. I love Doctor Who, but there are limits to how much I can enjoy a show about a 900-year-old man paired with a nubile twentysomething woman. It’s a flagship teatime show, not a wedding on Game of Thrones. At the end of the 50th anniversary special, The Day of the Doctor, the CGI-rendered sausage-fest of all the Doctor’s regenerations looked like an oversized Mock the Week panel. Unless we’re talking the Magic Mike sequel, all-male lineups are never cool. A female Doctor would be a brilliant, thrilling turn for the show. Missy is already so much more fun than the Master, and her sex change is raising interesting questions. Discovering the Master had kissed the Doctor and called him her boyfriend didn’t seem odd, because there has always been sexual tension between the two, but seeing Missy being able to express it made it clear how heteronormative TV can be (the Whoniverse, with Torchwood’s various same-sex relationships, and Madame Vastra and her wife Jenny, are actually bright spots). Fingers crossed the flirting can continue when we get our – surely inevitable – female Doctor. Naturally, some nerdy dudebros of the internet are upset about all this. The nightmarish reveal in the episode that dead people remain conscious was nothing compared to the idea that women might get inside the Tardis and bleed on everything they love. Already the old arguments are being prepared, such as: “What if the Doctor got married, then changed sex?”, as if that isn’t something that happens in real life. As if Time Lords becoming women is baffling in a way that Time Lords becoming Scottish isn’t. But a female Doctor is a-comin’, I’m calling it now. You may begin fan casting. I still, as ever, go for Tilda Swinton – my #TildaDoctorSwintonWho hashtag may yet gain some traction. And yes, if we get a female Doctor we need to get some women in the writers’ room. Matt Smith’s Doctor never spoke a word written by a woman and Capaldi hasn’t yet. It is a problem the show really needs to address. But while we wait for that, the potential for the Doctor to become a woman is something it’s easy to be excited about. So long as you believe that women are people too. And sometimes, just sometimes, centuries-old, time-travelling, lonely gods. |