Woman’s touch will regenerate this ailing show
Who should next be in charge of Doctor Who? It was certainly a joyous day back in July 2017 when Jodie Whittaker was announced as the 13th Doctor, a long overdue development for this shape-shifting, extraordinary alien who for some reason could only shape-shift into the body of a straight white man.
But fans were disappointed by these latest series of the beloved show. And that’s not the fault of the talented Whittaker. The problem lay with Chris Chibnall, the showrunner whose most recent episode, “Revolution of the Daleks”, which aired on New Year’s Day, was emblematic of all that was wrong with his reign.
The episode introduced a subdued Doctor stuck in space prison, where she’d apparently been languishing for decades. Really, no daring escape attempts? Just hanging about until someone showed up to save her?
That rescuer was John Barrowman’s returning Captain Jack, who swaggered in with charisma, brilliance and dangerous rebel edge.
Such characteristics were in stark contrast to Chibnall’s insecure, needy and po-faced Doctor, too busy trying to bond with her (ugh) “fam” or teach us viewers a valuable lesson. Instead of a daring, allpowerful and ruthless time-traveller, our first female Doctor came across as an ineffectual substitute teacher desperate to be liked.
We know Whittaker is capable of playing far more complex shades than the Chibnall binary of “Bluepeter-presenter chirpy” or “little-girl-who’s-lost-herdoll sad”. But as long as we have a showrunner from the same narrow boys’ club of superfans – of which earlier, admittedly rather more successful chiefs Russell T Davies and Steven Moffat were also members – having a female lead isn’t enough. The series needs a radically new voice – a woman should write it.
The past few years have seen ground-breaking TV work from the likes of Lucy Prebble (I Hate Suzie), Phoebe Waller-bridge
(Fleabag), Michaela Coel
(I May Destroy You) and Emerald Fennell (who succeeded Waller-bridge as the Killing Eve showrunner), any of whom could take over the franchise.
All of these would scoff at the idea of making a woman merely “likeable”, or lessening her role as the series lead by weighing her down with numerous companions, as Chibnall has done. Their Doctor wouldn’t constantly look to others for consensus, or fret about treading on people’s feelings.
It’s time for a showrunner who really invests in a multifaceted Doctor, in a version of the drama that has rounded roles for both men and women, shakes off its recent propensity to preach at us and isn’t afraid to journey to new places (even if the majority are still filmed in Cardiff ). My money’s on Fennell, formerly of Call the Midwife, making a triumphant return to the BBC – just as soon as we can wrestle her back from Andrew Lloyd Webber, whose Cinderella she has just scripted, or from Hollywood.
After all, the pen is mightier than the sonic screwdriver.