The Death of Doctor Who (As Engineered by Steven Moffat)

An excellent Doctor in need of a decent producer.

The Death of Doctor Who

(As Engineered by Steven Moffat)

by Cynthianna

After viewing Doctor Who’s final episode of the season, Death in Heaven, my husband said he could write a review of it in two words: Train wreck. I told him I could use only one:

Ugh.

Okay, okay I’ll explain myself: After eight months of anticipation brewing, we, the venerable sci-fi/fantasy show’s fans, eagerly looked forward to spectacularly talented actor Peter Capaldi gracing our television screens in the title role. Alas, many of us found ourselves rather disappointed in the twelfth Doctor’s rather weak presentation to the world in his debut episode (read my I Got the Doctor Who Let Down Blues). We didn’t lay the blame for its failure to inspire on the great actor or our beloved series’ basic premise, however. It was all too obvious the weak script poor Peter and company had been given to work with was to blame. I felt that the actors and craftspersons involved honestly did the best they could do with the material, but you could sense they were struggling at times. 

One of the better episodes not written by Moffat.

Holding our breath (some might say our noses), we, the long-suffering fans, continued watching the remaining episodes of the season hoping the quality of scripts would improve. After a few rare glorious moments, many fans felt we had caught glimpses of the magic from the earlier Doctor Who era—particularly in strongly-written episodes such as Mummy on the Orient Express, Flatline, and In the Forest of the Night. Huzzah! So, you could well imagine the crushing feeling fans like my husband and I experienced when we turned on the series’ two part finale… ugh. Not only had the beauty and strengths of the original source material and cherished characters been denigrated, but our hopes for a long run of the revived Doctor Who series have flagged.

Once again, my husband is right in saying our disappointment can be summed up in only two words: Steven Moffat.

Mr. Moffat is the show’s producer, to put it in American terms, or “show runner” to use the Beeb’s vernacular, and that makes him the person responsible for making editorial decisions. As a published author and editor myself, I know that responsibility for the success or failure of a creative venture rests with the person in charge of its editorial content. It’s up to the editor/producer to put his or her foot down sometimes and say, “We’re not going there.” Intelligently choosing scripts and hiring good scriptwriters to produce story lines is a big part of the job, in other words. It’s not a task to take lightly, especially when producing the fifty-plus year television milestone which is Doctor Who.

Alternate title: Mary Poppins Flies Again!

I’m not really the type of fan who has either the time or inclination to go around the Internet griping about the producers of Doctor Who (I’ve encountered fans who do), but I have to agree with quite a few of my fellow Whovians this year. We’ve been let down by Mr. Moffat. There’s not much positive one can say about the situation. There aren’t words enough to express how sad one feels watching what was promised to be a revival of the series’ special something, that je ne sais quoi, being flushed down the drain. And yes, it’s emboldened me to speak out before it’s too late.

For there is one other word that springs to mind apart from ugh to describe my reaction to Moffat’s Death in Heaven:

Disrespectful.

There’s a niggling sense of fan disrespectfulness in many Moffat-written or co-written episodes of Doctor Who, but perhaps they’re not all fully realized until this season’s finale. The fans’ sensibilities are once again taken for granted as the Cybermen’s genesis and motivations are co-opted in order to do a remake of Marvel’s Iron Man. Throw some very poor science into the science fiction—the part human/part cyborgs can now “grow” out of “pollen” that is “planted” into dead bodies—and one gets the feeling that Mr. Moffat doesn’t take the genre seriously at all. Zombies are all the rage now? Throw them into the mish-mash along with Iron Man!

“Look they can fly like Tony Stark can!”

You can almost hear Mr. Moffat laughing in the background… “Research? Bah humbug! Those silly Doctor Who fans don’t care about well-crafted sci-fi/fantasy. I mean, if they’ll believe a newborn space dragon can lay an egg the size of the moon a few minutes after it hatches (the premise of Kill the Moon) then they’ll believe anything. They’re all thick! They’re adults watching a kid’s show! We can do whatever we want and they’ll buy it.”

It’s a disrespectful attitude and insulting. Yes, another one word review: Insulting.

Whatever the failings of classic era producers and scriptwriters at least fans didn’t feel as if they were being talked down to, belittled or openly scorned for loving a family-friendly, sci-fi/fantasy television show. Yet Death in Heaven goes on to new heights of insulting fan sensibilities by turning the Doctor’s archenemy the Master into childhood icon Mary Poppins complete with the big hat and flying umbrella—because somehow ripping off recent zombie hits and Iron Man wasn’t enough. For the record, I’m not against the Master changing genders at all, but I am against a non-original and sexist interpretation of the beloved villain from the classic series. Which leads me to another one word charge that many, many female fans have leveled at Mr. Moffat:

Sexist.

"Love me--please?" (Or co-dependency is cool.)

There’s a great scholarly article on Sexism in Doctor Who (http://rebeccaamoore.com/2014/05/29/university-study-on-sexism-in-bbcs-doctor-who-infographic/) that I won’t reiterate here, but the author makes a very strong argument that many of the Moffat-written scripts fail the Bechdel Test—and fail it miserably. For the most part women in the classic series (1963 – 1989) were presented as strong, intelligent, reasoning individuals with distinct personalities, equal in ego-integrity to the Doctor. In other words, worthy companions. Sure, some female companions screamed at a monster now and then, but so did quite a few of the Doctor’s male companions. Nasty things jumping out from the shadows or dark alleyways can do that to a person of either gender.

Rest assured, the Moffat era of Doctor Who has put women in sci-fi firmly in their place—right where they belong beneath the men! Young, good-looking females are depicted as simply “girlfriends” who suffer from hormonal fluctuations of emotions which make them constantly fret about whether the Doctor is still their boyfriend or not (if he ever was) and occasionally even slap him. Careers? For women? Get real! It’s not deemed important to show the current crop of female companions as successful career women. The female companion’s career takes a backseat to all the worrying and fretting about the Doctor and her human lovers she is forced to do because of her inferior biology, just like it does for most twenty-first century women, right?

Angst-riddled dialogue and silly arguments abound among the romantic couples in Moffat’s Doctor Who, bringing back memories of the good ol’ days of seventh grade crushes and break-ups in the junior high cafeteria. Female companions need never mature to an emotional age of beyond twelve or thirteen it seems in Moffat’s fictional world. Ditto for their male lovers. The new era of Doctor Who has become an adolescent packed space opera—or is it simply a soap opera? Original Doctor Who producer Verity Lambert had it all wrong! (She was only a woman, you know.) Who needs intelligent characters working on solving problems intelligently using the scientific method?

A spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down...and down...

This is particularly true if you’re a brilliant male scientist and you find yourself regenerated into the body of a woman. The Master, formerly depicted on screen as a capable, dedicated and determined evil genius, once converted over to the female gender gives himself a girlie nickname like “Missy” and dresses up like every little girl’s favorite Edwardian nanny, Mary Poppins. He/she still wants to take over the world, but now she does it while wearing bright red lipstick and trying to stick her tongue down the back of the Doctor’s throat. How grown up!

Moffat seems to be giving a wink and a nudge to all the sexist male fans, intimating that once a mad scientist has lost his masculinity he certainly wouldn’t want to impress people that he was still an evil genius by acting like…well, like an actual genius. A person with a brain and intelligence and a plan...but hey! Once you’re wearing a dress and lipstick you can’t act any smarter than a seventh grader, right? Must be those girlie hormones!

Sarah Jane's bravery and intelligence--awesome to watch.

No wonder fans of the classic series of Doctor Who despair. Where are ace scientist Liz Shaw, investigative journalist Sarah Jane Smith, and master teacher Barbara Wright when you need them? Thank heavens for those of us who can receive the Retro-TV channel in the U.S. Episodes of the classic series are broadcast five nights a week, and you can see these strong feminist role models there, a breath of fresh air compared to the twelve year old antics of Moffat’s female companions.

Thank heaven indeed—which leads me to another word that describes Death in Heaven: Tacky.

Perhaps tasteless would work as well as tacky. At one point in the story, the Doctor tells the U.N.I.T. team that they don’t want Americans involved with dealing with the Cybermen crisis because all Americans do is “drop bombs and pray.” Asking for Divine Guidance is a big no-no apparently since only stupid people (women?) would ever think it was a good idea. And perhaps attracting and maintaining American viewers isn’t at the top of the BBC America’s list of profitable things to do, either? 

Tacky jokes cracked about the vast majority of TV viewers’ faith in a Supreme Being shows rather poor judgement on Moffat’s part. Sure, he can be atheist and anti-American, but he doesn’t have to be mean-spirited about it, does he? Didn’t political rhetoric, which insulted the conservative-minded BBC chairman, get the original series cancelled back in the 1980s? 

R.I.P. Brigadier

My husband found the idea of “resurrecting” the late Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart in the graveyard to be in extremely poor taste. Even if you don’t believe in an afterlife or heaven, why would you condemn a righteous and moral character such as the Brigadier to become a mindless cyborgs puppet for all eternity? There’s that ugh factor creeping in… Tasteless and tacky shouldn’t be words associated with a family-friendly show, but in this day and age of nasty trolling and snarky musings, I guess it was bound to happen to Doctor Who, too. So sad that Mr. Moffat couldn’t rise above it for the good of the series.

Because, in the end, it appears that Mr. Moffat wants out of Doctor Who. Why else would he risk insulting folks with tacky and tasteless quips, repeatedly show female characters in a stereotypically sexist light, and show outright contempt of the classic series and disrespect for the intelligence of the sci-fi fan base as a whole? Why would he do any of these rash and insipid things unless deep-down he wants the program to be canceled? Moffat’s production of Sherlock has done well in the ratings, and perhaps that’s where his heart lies. Certainly writing for a character such as his version of Sherlock Holmes, an autistic, emotionally-stunted savant, seems to fit better with Moffat’s outlook on life. He can express himself creatively there.

Disrespectful, insulting, sexist, tacky… ugh. I won’t even bother to point out plot holes, heavily-telegraphed plot points, and others inconsistencies in Death in Heaven. Nick Frost as Santa Claus—or should I say Father Christmas?--will probably fill them all in in the holiday special and tie things up with a nice big bow in a neat little package, right? For an atheist like Mr. Moffat to put so much faith in a saint (St. Nicholas) to perform such a miracle of scriptwriting during the one the holiest seasons of the Christian calendar is too bizarre to contemplate.

Time to move along, Steven.

Steven Moffat should depart Doctor Who and move on to pastures green, and he should do so now before the show loses any more support from the fans. Peter Capaldi’s portrayal of the Doctor deserves a chance to shine away from the dross of the Moffat era. Doctor Who deserves fresh air, fresh ideas, and maybe even some female writers and producers this next time out?

Are you listening, BBC?

I Got the Doctor Who Let Down Blues

                                                               

I Got the Doctor Who Let Down Blues

by Cynthianna

The tension has been building up for months now—eight months to be precise. The new season of Doctor Who with a new actor in the title role has been touted since last Christmas with only crumbs dropped now and then to feed the fans’ rabid appetite for news and gossip. Big kudos go out to the BBC marketing department for their expert dangling of the carrot in front of the fervent fans and for preventing our attention from ever wandering too far. The Beeb promised us a mind-blowing, landmark-making, scrumpdillyupmptious sci-fi/fantasy event of unbelievable proportions. In the last couple of weeks Whovians were whipped into a frenzy further with the Doctor Who World Tour featuring the main actors and creators of the show. (Once again, kudos to the BBC marketing department.) Doctor Who fans have bemoaned the long wait but they were totally and sincerely psyched when at last the big day, August 23, finally arrived.

I guess it’s only natural after so much whipping up of excitement and expectations, a fan girl might feel a bit let down after actually viewing said long-awaited first episode of the new season. No, you can put the tomatoes away—I adore Peter Capaldi as the Doctor and have no problems with Jenna-Louise Coleman as Clara the companion—but I will say I’d hoped for a stronger vehicle for their debut story together. Once again, I don’t fault the actors or the special effects or even the story idea, but I found some very avoidable faults in the scriptwriting that literally set my teeth on edge. (To quote a fan about what made the Matt Smith era seem less than stellar: “Moffat!”)

Where to begin? I don’t want to give spoilers to those who haven’t seen said episode yet, so I will be general in my comments. Also, I will compare and contrast the classics series of Doctor Who to the new series in hopes this will illustrate where I see the newer episodes have lost their luster. If I had to give a one word quote about what I feel the new series of Doctor Who is missing, that word would be “intelligence.”

“Intelligent what?” you may ask. Don’t worry, I’ll get there. Here’s some background first: My husband and I are very fortunate to be able to receive the Retro-TV channel where we live, and since August 4 we’ve been watching nightly episodes of classic Doctor Who, starting with the very first Doctor as portrayed by William Hartnell. Also, this past summer we’ve been checking out DVDs of classic Doctor Who episodes from our local library, having recently watched a number of the third Doctor’s (Jon Pertwee) stories. 

Okay, BBC marketing department this is where you guys might have made a big mistake by asking us to wait eight months for the new season to begin... Those of us who were big fans since the last century have had ample time to re-watch our favorite moments on DVD and broadcast TV. We can leisurely stop and pause our DVDs and discuss what works and what doesn’t in a particular Doctor Who story. Surprisingly, even if we agree that the special effects could have been better in an episode, we very rarely complain that the writing is weak, the characters aren’t realized well, or anything sets our teeth on edge.

Not bad for a sci-fi show whose entire yearly budget in the 1960s - 1980s was no where near what they spend creating just one episode today—even when adjusted for inflation. So, if a bigger budget and flashier special effects don’t make for a better Doctor Who experience, what does? This is where I posit my thoughts on what is currently missing from the series—intelligence. What do you take away from a Doctor Who story? What lesson(s) did you learn? Did you find out anything new about science or history or humanity or yourself?

I know some of the new series fans will argue, “Doctor Who has never been a family friendly show—it’s not about teaching kids things,” but that’s where they’re wrong. All one has to do is go back to the original 1963 proposal for Doctor Who to see that it was created to be a television show for families with school-aged children, and it was to have “teaching moments” scattered through-out its futuristic tales along with facts and insights tossed into the historical storylines. The point I’m making here is that the writing was strong enough to both entertain and enlighten both adults and children. Viewers never felt as if they were being talked down to or manipulated by catch-phrases and multitudes of explosions. (Plus, they never felt as if being a person of faith was somehow suspect, a common theme in the newer series. It's okay if you don't believe in God, Mr. Moffat, but please don't try to purposely offend those who do. It's just plain rude.)

I celebrate fans--not insult them, Steven!

No doubt, the newer series’ emphasis has drifted away from the educational premise. Alas, sometimes it doesn’t even entertain. One can walk away after viewing a new series’ episode and fifteen minutes later totally forget what the premise or point of the story was. Sure, you might remember the Doctor wore a dressing gown or rode a horse or cracked some funny one-liners (possibly of a sexual nature), but nothing stays in your mind of any importance. You don’t feel like the show helped you to think more intelligently. You may not feel that some of the content was appropriate for your six-year-old. Classic Doctor Who writers probably wouldn’t recognize it as the same show anymore.

To clarify, let’s look at the 1973 story, The Green Death. The Doctor (Jon Pertwee) and his assistant, Jo Grant, along with his friends at UNIT, are fighting against an international chemical company which is bent on polluting the water supply and killing people (through the infected maggots created) so the corporation and its masters can reap mega-profits. Change “Global Chemical” to “Monsanto” or “Dow” or “Bayer” and this story of how important it is for humanity (with help from the Doctor) to rise up and stop this disaster before it’s too late would make for an episode that is both entertaining and educational and very relevant in the year 2014. Added bonus, once viewers watched such an episode they might actually be motivated to become more environmentally aware and take positive action.

The Third Doctor era can also boast of another intelligent environmental awareness storyline—1970’s Inferno. If you’re alarmed about the increasing earthquakes and ground water pollution caused by hydraulic fracturing or fracking, this is a story that bears close viewing. Even more amazing, the 1964 story Planet of Giants starring the first Doctor deals with a businessman who kills a government official in order to make a fortune off his new pesticide that destroys everything it touches... Recent headlines about “bee-killing” pesticides called neonicotinoids are both shocking and frightening. But can one imagine Doctor Who in 2014 touching upon such a burning topic that could affect life on Earth as we know it?

Intelligent television? Yes, even a fictional TV series can work for the good of humanity. At the very least it could make us all more aware of state of the planet and our impact upon it. Wouldn’t it be better to inspire a new generation of ecologists and astronauts and historians simply than create a mad marketing rush to get the kids to haul ass to Hot Topic to purchase millions of dollars in Doctor Who T-shirts, fezes and bow-ties?

I got the Doctor Who Let Down Blues. I was hoping for more intelligent writing for Peter Capaldi in his new incarnation as the Doctor, but producer Steven Moffat didn’t want to disappoint his perceived audience’s tastes—he kept things on the rather silly level. All I know is that I’m too old to care for discussions about “boyfriends” in the Tardis or learning the funny put-downs the Doctor and his companions will use with each other for the next year. Whatever happened to the Doctor and his companions treating each other with respect and kindness? Are women in the Whovian universe to be seen simply as sex objects?

Case in point: Girls kissing lizards? Who needs it? Not my bag, baby, and I don’t believe that scenes of adult sexuality add anything to a show that should be family friendly, even when it outright refuses to be “educational for school aged children” as the original 1963 show premise states. Silly sex talk—that’s what late-night TV and locker rooms in middle schools are for, isn’t it? Rise above it, please.

Perhaps both George Lucas and Steven Moffat should be banned from attempting to write/produce any of their story ideas ever again. Remember The Phantom Menace, another long-awaited event that proved to be disappointing? These two guys should stick to their strengths and recruit strong writers who can craft intelligent, respectful, and moving storylines without all the adolescent fluff. Who knows—some of these writers could even be adult females?
 
I think the Doctor—with his numerous intelligent and strong female sidekicks—would approve.


Addition, 9-1-14:

I enjoyed Peter Capaldi's performance as the Doctor in the latest episode (Into the Dalek) much more than in the first story, but Clara is still not a very defined character. She slaps him hard in the face--wow! What sort of "teacher" would strike a "pupil"? I almost think that was producer Steven Moffat's idea of another "funny gimmick", but to me it turned Clara into a bully. I like the idea of the new Doctor needing a "teacher" to help him--just look at the first Doctor with teacher companions Barbara and Ian. They really helped him to learn a lot about himself and humanity. I just wish the producers could keep a consistent tone and skip the gimmicks of slapstick/adult sexuality that Moffat seems to think fits. Doctor Who is a science fiction/fantasy tale--SF lovers tend to be a bit more sophisticated than fans of The Three Stooges. I still feel that Russell T. Davies wrote and supervised much more intelligent scripts.

Archon Hear a Who!

 In case you didn’t grow up reading Dr. Seuss like I did, Horton Hears a Who is a story about a very large elephant who hears a very, very, very tiny civilization living on a dust mote resting on top of a wildflower. Horton tries to convince his friends that these tiny beings in fact exist, but they don’t believe him because they can’t see or hear the microscopic people who inhabit Whoville. Horton doesn’t give up, and in spite of physical pressure and ridicule to give up his belief and destroy the wildflower, he perseveres until the tiny Whovillians make themselves known to all by shouting, “We are here! We are here! We are here!”

David Tennant as the 10th Doctor with the TARDIS

At a “First Friday” event I attended recently at the St. Louis Science Center’s Omnimax theater, a full-house of over five hundred fans watched a double bill of new series Doctor Who episodes featuring nanotechnology. The line to get into the theater snaked throughout the Science Center and out the door. All five hundred plus tickets were distributed—they even had to turn fans away they said because of the fire code. Many attendees came dressed in Who inspired costumes and T-shirts. Many said this was the first time they had realized there were so many fellow fans in the St. Louis area who enjoyed the same TV show they did. Many stated they had never heard of the St. Louis regional science-fiction convention Archon, but they’d attend Archon if they knew other Doctor Who fans and programming would be there.

Tom Baker as the Fourth Doctor

But what’s a classic children’s tale got to do with being a Doctor Who fan and a regional science fiction convention? Hang in there, and I’ll try to tie in the analogy the best that I can.

Archon isn’t the largest annual sci-fi convention in the US, but it has been around the block for quite a few years now—thirty-six years to be exact. It has hosted literary, artist, performing/filking and media guests. For purposes of this blog I’ll concentrate on Archon’s media guests. The fans have turned out in large numbers to see and hear these media guests give talks and presentations. The fans have waited in long lines for autographs and photographs. The fans have generally had a good time at Archon discussing and sharing their love of a particular media guest and/or the movie/TV series franchise he/she represents. In recent times Archon has hosted media guests such as multi-talented voice actor Billy West (Futurama) as well as the gang of Cinematic Titanic, featuring many of the original cast of the cult favorite Mystery Science Theater 3000.  (This year’s media guest just added to the bottom of the list: Gil Gerard. You remember him from the 1970s TV show Buck Rogers, don’t you?)

Matt Smith as the 11th Doctor with Amy Pond

With so many wonderful media guests in its past, a sci-fi buff might assume that Archon is not against inviting media guests to their convention, right? But it has come to my attention recently that Archon does not seem interested in hosting a media guest connected to the worldwide phenomenon known as Doctor Who. Why is this the case? I haven’t a clue, but perhaps you and your like-minded friends can help us find out why Archon doesn’t jump on this opportunity to cash in on the popularity of the world’s longest running science fiction TV franchise. 

Our wedding cake shaped like a TARDIS

I use the term worldwide phenomenon on purpose, for in spite of its origins at the BBC,the television series now plays on BBC America as well as on various PBS stations throughout the US. Doctor Who and its spin-off series Torchwood and The Sarah Jane Adventures have broken the chains of being cult TV shows from Great Britain to become American sci-fi favorites with regular viewers in the many millions on a weekly basis. The DVDs, audio plays, books, graphic novels and other related products can be found in Best Buy as well as your local comic book stores. You could even say it’s given the Star Trek franchise a run for its money.

Producer and writer Steven Moffat

I’m painting this picture so even if you’re not familiar with the series that you will still see how a media guest from the Doctor Who universe would appeal to many science fiction fans and not just a tiny handful living on a dust mote resting atop of a wildflower. Many Who fans would be willing to travel to the St. Louis area and pay the Archon membership fees to see these Doctor Who media guests. More memberships to the convention sold—more money for Archon to host even bigger and better conventions in the future. A win-win situation.

Here’s where the Horton Hears a Who analogy comes into play: It has come to my attention that several Doctor Who connected media guests have actually expressed an interest in attending Archon. Even better, these actors, producers and writers of the series were willing to come for free if their travel expenses were covered, and they’d be willing to travel from within the United States, since they’d already be in the US working on other projects.

Yes, that’s right. Who media guests expressed a desire to attend Archon and were willing to do so for the price of a domestic airline ticket. Increased sales of Archon memberships to fans who’d love to see a Doctor Who media guest would surely cover the price of an airline ticket, right?

The names of Doctor Who media guests who have voiced an interest in attending Archon? Hold onto your hats, folks: 

John Barrowman as Captain Jack

John Barrowman, Steven Moffat, and Alex Kingston. 

Are you able to peel yourself off the floor now?

Alex Kingston as Riversong

Yes, Captain Jack Harkness of Torchwood fame, the current producer/head writer of Doctor Who, and the vivacious Riversong who played a pivotal role in last season’s story arc all wanted to travel to St. Louis and meet the fans here in the middle of the country. But, somehow, they were turned away or simply ignored by Archon representatives.

Fortunately for fans with lots of money and vacation time, Barrowman and Moffat recently attended Comic-Con in San Diego, and many of the Torchwood crew will be at Dragon Con in Atlanta later this year. These mega-sized sci-fi conventions will benefit from the crowds Who media guests will draw. Alas, those of us who can’t afford to attend far away mega-cons are out of luck.

My novel about Doctor Who fans who meet a mysterious stranger...

Here’s the call to action: If the BBC is  still willing to send a Doctor Who media guest to Archon in the future, would you be interested in attending and supporting the con with your membership? If you are, please consider joining with the local Who fan club, the St Louis CIA, in signing a petition, sending an email, or letter to the Archon committee expressing your support for Doctor Who media guests. This link takes you to Archon's contacts info page. Please be polite and to the point in your communications. If you have any other ideas on how to bring Who media guests to Archon, feel free to leave them in the comments section below.

The original Star Trek fans were able to bring their beloved program back on the air back in the late 60s, so perhaps a letter writing campaign can demonstrate to the Archon powers-that-be that we aren’t invisible, dust-mote-dwelling denizens. We are many, and we have supporters like Horton who aren’t afraid of helping us to make our voices heard.

Let’s shout together as Doctor Who fans, “We are here! We are here! We are here!”