Doctor Who: The Last Christmas Special Ever?

Doctor Who: The Last Christmas Special Ever?

by Cynthianna

Warning: This review contains spoilers.

You sometimes wonder as a fan of a long-running popular television program why it wishes to imitate every other show on the telly. Just because many TV series produce a Christmas special for broadcast every December doesn’t mean your series has to have a Christmas special or even should have a holiday special, does it? Doctor Who from 1963 to 1989 never had a distinctly Christmas special, but since its 2005 reincarnation it somehow sees the necessity of producing one every December 25, featuring killer Christmas trees, homicidal angels or evil Christmas stars. “‘Tis the season to hate Christmas!” it seems to sing.

So, after viewing this season’s special, I have one word of advice to those planning next year’s Christmas special: Don’t.

Okay, maybe it’s two words: Please don’t. Take guidance from the original series—if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. Use the extra money in the budget to produce another regular episode or two, give the cast and crew a pay raise, or go on location big-time. In other words, put the money and resources to good use and produce quality programming instead of a Christmas special that’s not needed or possibly even wanted by some of the fans.

Having said that, the basic premise of this season’s special, Last Christmas, is a good horror tale of dreams nestled within dreams and of face-hugging dream crabs whose shape is directly ripped off from the Alien/Aliens franchise. If the story had been broadcast on or near Halloween, minus the addition of Santa Claus and possibly re-designing the aliens to look less like the popular movie monster, it might have worked. As it is, it’s yet another Christmas special that advertises how its creators don’t quite get the true meaning of the holy day. After all, if you don’t believe in Christ, then you don’t have to celebrate Christmas or add it into your show in any form, do you? Maybe you should just write sci-fi/fantasy episodes with a more generic tone and leave the Christmas specials to others to pen?

One could ask why is Santa Claus in this Doctor Who script at all. We’re told that he’s a universal symbol that all the characters can relate to during their horrific dilemma, but truly, who is Santa Claus? He’s a part of your dreams—nightmares you might not ever wake up from—according to Last Christmas. Not quite a great thing for young children to be told and indicative of how far the show has traveled from its family-friendly origins. If youngsters aren’t terrified of killer Christmas trees, homicidal angels, and evil Christmas stars, they can now be frightened of Nightmare Santa and the face-hugger aliens who can make your happiest dreams deadly. Should parents go ahead and send their children’s psychiatric bills to the BBC?

Perhaps there is some hope in the fact that Santa Claus himself is played quite warmly (despite some of his throw-away lines) by Nick Frost. And perhaps—without even realizing it—Steven Moffat has written a most Christian motif into the ending of Last Christmas. The Doctor says to his companion he doesn’t know who brought them together in their nightmarish adventures of dream states, but the camera pulls back to reveal a tangerine (looks more like an orange really) placed on the windowsill. 

Placing tangerines (oranges) into Christmas stockings is a long-standing tradition from St. Nicholas’ Day, December 6, when children are given gifts in the saint’s honor. The orange globe represents one of the bags of gold that Nicholas tossed into the window of the home of three young women whose father wasn’t able to provide dowries for them, so they weren’t able to marry. Mirroring God’s unconditional love, Nicholas tossed the money into their home—no strings attached—so that the young women could go from a state of hopelessness to hopefulness about their futures. Their lives were changed for the better all because of this beautiful gift that they never asked for or expected, freely given.

 As St. Nicholas stands as a symbol of God’s love and his gift of the gold (tangerine/orange) a symbol of the gift of the Savior promised to all people, perhaps we the audience are being given a hint just Who is actually directing the Doctor’s travels and what special purpose the Doctor serves in helping humanity unconditionally.

With the promise of the true gift of Christmas, Clara and Danny wouldn’t have to suffer through a maudlin scene of this is our “last Christmas,” since we’re never promised another one with those we love, for with Christ at the center of the Christmas celebration we are all promised an eternity of Christmases with those we love. Eternity—it’s a heckuva lot longer than a short life span here on earth. Eternity—we get to spend forever in God’s unconditional love. What a great way to time travel with those we love! 

If only the Doctor, Danny and Clara could accept God’s unconditional love, given as the gift of the Christ-child born on Christmas day, then we’d see more emotionally and spiritually mature characters who wouldn’t have to act maudlin, whiney, childish, or confused. They could act confident in the fact that they have a loving Higher Power watching over them in all the challenges they face, now and in the future. What an uplifting and happy Christmas special that would be!

***

You can read my review of Death in Heaven here:
http://momsday.blogspot.com/2014/11/the-death-of-doctor-who-as-engineered.html

Doctor Who vs. Marvel's Agents of Shield: Creating strong female characters:
http://momsday.blogspot.com/2014/12/doctor-who-vs-agents-of-shield-creating.html

I got the Doctor Who Let Down Blues: http://momsday.blogspot.com/2014/08/i-got-doctor-who-let-down-blues.html

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.

Racism: Not MY Science Fiction!

 

I'm a nerd. Like my earrings?

Some days I have to pinch myself and ask, "What year is this?"

To be clear, I don't drink and I'm not on any medications. It's just that sometimes people and events strike me in such a way that I can't quite believe I'm living in the twenty-first century. For a writer of speculative fiction, it's doubly odd to think that others who love to read, write, and discuss science fiction/fantasy books, TV, and film like I do would hold onto outdated beliefs of racial superiority and want to celebrate these beliefs by honoring a publication that prints such content.

I won't mention the names of the publication,the  sci-fi convention, or the individuals involved because this isn't a rant or tirade to tear down the reputations of these institutions or individuals. (I'm honestly worried about them.) This is just an attempt to come to terms with the horribleness of a situation that fills my heart with fear and dread. And, as a writer, I work through weighty problems in prose.

I think the Twilight Zone moment came for me when I expressed my horror on an online forum at the idea that a beloved sci-fi con would even contemplate honoring  a science fiction-oriented publication that would print racial slurs as "humor". I was told I was on a "witch hunt" and trying to "censor" free speech. When I tried to explain that an editor of an ezine is both legally and morally responsible for the contents of said publication and must take responsibility for the outrage that its content could incur, it seemed to fall on deaf ears. Here's what I said:

A "compiler" (of an ezine) is still considered an "editor"--they are the person or group of persons who put together a magazine or ezine. They put their name(s) on the publication as the person(s) who take responsibility for its contents. If this editor doesn't want to take responsibility for the contents of his ezine, then he should have struck his name off it a while back. I have nothing against the man personally--never met him--but as a professional writer/editor I have to make judgement calls on what is suitable for publication all the time. (I'm paid to do this!) If the writing of a manuscript is substandard--the book doesn't make it out of the slushpile. If the content is offensive to the majority of readers in 2014 (that's 2014 not 1854), I have to tell the publisher that the content is possibly something they wouldn't feel comfortable publishing. It's the way the publishing world works. If you are "self-publishing" you are essentially taking on all the legal responsibility of a publisher upon yourself as "editor/compiler". 

So, once again, does the convention want to "honor" (give credit and glorify) racist jokes? I would think the majority of convention attendees would be adults who wouldn't find racist humor funny. I never said that this editor couldn't attend the con or that he has never helped out at other cons. Good for him! However, if he has taken on the responsibility of publishing racist commentary and his name is on the publication, then he must accept the outrage publishing such racist commentary can incur in the year 2014. 

 That's about it. I grew up loving science fiction in the era of the original series of Star Trek where Mr. Spock talked about "infinite diversity in infinite combinations" and other such nonsense. Thing is, I believed it. Uhuru was an African professional woman who worked alongside an Asian navigator and people from diverse Caucasian backgrounds on the bridge of the starship Enterprise. They didn't make juvenile racist jokes at each other's expense. They reflected Gene Roddenberry's dream that some day soon all of mankind would live in peace and harmony. 

It's a beautiful dream. Why are some folks in the twenty-first century trying to kill it?

Are they afraid it's coming true? You look into any elementary school these days and you won't see what I saw when I entered first grade in the South. You see white kids and black kids and red kids and yellow kids and brown kids and kids who are something altogether unique. We've become a multicultural and diverse society. Star Trek is coming true! My heart soars!

But for others... they're afraid. They don't like change. They want to live in the nineteenth century where slaves and women knew their place and don't speak back to their superiors. And so they lash out through the glorification of demeaning, bigoted humor to put people of color, women, homosexuals, and other minority groups in their place. The worse thing of it for me is that these haters dare to call what they write science fiction.

Oh, Gene! Please come back! We truly need your shining optimism about mankind's diverse and peaceful future!

Do those who espouse racist beliefs have the right to exercise free speech under the U.S. Constitution? Absolutely. Do these same people deserve to have their racist speech honored at a volunteer convention where some of the volunteers aren't white, heterosexual males of a certain age and social status? No, they do not. If the white heterosexual males of a certain age/status can't see why some volunteers might feel nervous and uncomfortable knowing they're not really accepted by the convention's board of directors because of the color of their skin, their gender identity, or other minority protected status, then it might be time to take the board to a first grade class and introduce them to the next generation of science fiction fans.

Because what it comes down to is this: a fan-run sci-fi convention is about the fans. They are a diverse and lively lot, and they live in the year 2014--not 1854. 

Let's not take a step backward. Let's "boldly go where no one has gone before!"

True science fiction fans celebrate diversity. They do not attempt to squash it.

(Feel free to leave a comment below. Please act like adults and use your manners--no profanity,  name-calling, or finger-pointing. In other words, plese refrain from cursing or other nasty words. This is a family-friendly blog. Thank you.)

(P.S. If you like my TARDIS earrings in the photo above, check out my hubby's Etsy store: http://www.etsy.com/shop/TheophilusSaxe )

Doctor Who Middle-Age Madness

At last the BBC announced the next actor to portray the Doctor on science fiction television's longest running series, Doctor Who. It's Peter Capaldi. Yeah!

 I'm thrilled because I think Peter will be excellent in the role. He starred in the David Tennant/Catherine Tate 2008 episode "The Fires of Pompeii". He also played quite a spine-chilling baddie in the spin-off series Torchwood in its "Children of Earth" episodes. I've loved him from the first time I saw him on screen in the wonderfully warm and witty movie comedy Local Hero. What's not to love about an actor who can play heroic, comical and pure evil characters with equal ease?

 

I think the persona of the Doctor needs a good balance of heroic and not-so-heroic traits. After all, he is an alien--he's not human (according to canon). What we puny humans may see as "evil" may not seem that way to him and vice versa. It makes for a very dynamic character, one that is at times unpredictable and at others dependable. It makes for a character that has been extremely popular for a half century now and shows no signs of diminishing in popularity.  

This brings me to the reason behind my blog post title. I really enjoy the idea of watching another "middle-age" Doctor (who, of course, is much older than he looks).  While the current producers may have thought that young people would only watch the show in record numbers with "one of their own" in twenty-something Matt Smith playing the title role, I do believe they've come to realize that it's not the age of the actor that matters but his energy level. I think Peter will have the right energy level in addition to the handsome, distinguished looks that women in  my particular age group will relate to well.

As the old saying goes, "Snow on the roof doesn't mean there isn't a fire in the hearth." ;-)

What does this mean for my ongoing Doctor Who-inspired series Loving Who (and its sequel Leaving Who)? The next title in the series that I'm working on is Losing Who. In a way Peter Capaldi becoming the new Doctor works into the plot outline quite well. Things change. My character Cici Connors experienced an abrupt change in the last installment, so a new face to confront and get to know is just par for the course at this point in her life journey. 

And who knows... Cici might find a good-looking man of a certain age worth getting to know better. ;-)

I'm looking forward to the fiftieth anniversary special coming in November and the Christmas special when Peter's Doctor will make his debut. How about you? Are you excited? Has Doctor Who "middle-age madness" taken hold of you? Or are you still crying about Matt Smith (or David Tennant or Christopher Eccleston or...) leaving the show? What sort of storylines or characters do you envision in the new season episodes? Are there any mortal enemies of the Doctor you'd rather not see?

Let me know your feelings in the comments below. You never know-I might just use one of your ideas in the plot of Losing Who!