“Doctor Who,” the iconic British television show about an alien, will continue barreling down the path of progressivism with a new iteration set to air on the Disney+ platform. The show’s producer has boasted that the lead character will be gay and non-white.
Writer and executive producer Russell T. Davies has ensured the 60-year-old show will only become more progressive and announced that he is looking to “break barriers.”
During an interview with Variety, Davies explained that gender, race, and/or sexuality played a part in the main character’s role right from the audition process.
“We auditioned men, women, Black, white, nonbinary actors and actors whose sexuality was their own private matter,” he recalled. “Exactly the type of barriers I like to break,” he added.
The producer went with actor Ncuti Gatwa and wasted no time shouting out the sexuality of the character before the season had officially began.
In the Christmas special, which aired a full five months before the season premiere, the new Doctor is seen dancing in a kilt and later states that he learned how to escape rope knots after a “long, hot summer with Harry Houdini.”
Gatwa told Variety that it made “perfect sense” to him for the lead character to be black and queer.
“Do you know what? It makes perfect sense to me. … I feel like anyone that has a problem with someone who’s not a straight white man playing this character, you’re not really, truly a fan of the show. You’ve not been watching! Because the show is about regeneration, and the Doctor is an alien — why would they only choose to be this sort of person?”
In regard to his new main character, Davies said that it is “very hard” for anyone at the network to stop his DEI injections. “You’d have to be a pretty brave executive to say, ‘Don’t go there,’ to me. I’m sure there are people thinking that, but I wouldn’t work with them, would I?”
“Doctor Who” has gone above and beyond what most would consider a standard level of diversity, equity, and inclusion in his series.
Davies said in a 2023 interview that he thinks the “visibility thing” is important and that bigotry can be avoided “if you grow up seeing this stuff.”
“Homophobia and transphobia happens when it’s something you’ve never seen before,” he claimed. He then stated that children can be force-fed the belief system more easily.
“You can temper that reaction and change it if you introduce these images to people happily, and normally, and calmly when they’re young.”
Pointing to the show’s many inclusions of DEI, English commentator Lewis Brackpool said that he feels some of the “cultural aspects” of England have “become areas akin to a ‘South Park episode.'”
For example, a 2020 audio series called “Stranded,” a spinoff of the main show, featured a transgender actor and biological male who goes by Rebecca Root.
A 2023 60th anniversary episode featured transgender actor Yasmin Finney, a 20-year-old male purporting to be a woman. This character was written as being born a male before coming out as transgender, nonbinary, and using the name Rose as a teenager.
The new season launches May 10, 2024, on Disney+.
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