Well now the cat is out of the bag so too speak, media will be camped outside the DW studios to try and catch a glimpse on the next Doctor.
If the role is cast, then, yes, the BBC is best served by announcing it sooner rather than later. Stay in front of the story, don't let the media ferret it out, and don't have a panic reaction like Saturday's announcement that Matt Smith is leaving. I don't know if Moffat would try to hold the next Doctor announcement until SDCC or not. I can see arguments both for and against.
Well it would seem rather odd to make the annoucnement outside of the UK. But who knows what will hapen.
And it takes so much time to explain why the space monster is fouling up history. In the latest Destiny of the Doctor Audio.... Spoiler: just buy it already. Christopher Columbus is the most dastardly villain, there's this point where he's about to cut the Doctors hands off if he doesn't let him into the TARDIS immediately. Columbus is an historically evil son of a bitch who did that sort of thing all the time. BUT... Then they shoehorn in time time travelling super intelligent Buffaloes to the story for some reason.
Before I inevitably analyse the concept of female Doctors... Moffat's version of Doctor Who in particular, involves heavy sociological topics. He does, however, have a habit of constructing his allegories so overtly subtle as to appear elitist to the, who I'm afraid is only a fraction of viewers, who end up noticing them at all. Whether you are interested in the current show's sociological side or not, it is undoubtedly a large part of the current show, so I must politely ask everyone here to allow discussion of it on a board with "Doctor Who" in its name, instead of attempting to halt it via social pressure. The casting of the next lead actor, with it's various aspects involved, seems to be the actual main topic of the thread, so that's what I'd like to be able to discuss in a while, at peace. I hope my civilisedness isn't causing too much harm.
So the mystery of the Stephen Mangan photo from Saturday is solved. He was actually hinting that he's going to be playing Bertie Wooster, nothing to do with DW at all.
Ah. Figured it had to be some kind of tease, since the Beeb didn't appear to be all over him for it. And...wouldn't it be funny if there was a Spartacus-style wave of every actor who's ever been suggested for the part tweeting pics of themselves draped in an endless scarf, a la Mr. Mangan, just prior to the Christmas special? It would certainly keep people on their toes...
Do actual women casually hit people, that does happen a lot in tv, are there like regions where it happens all the time, or is it happening here? My IRL social interaction is mostly limited to my class and the one and another before that, all consisting almost entirely of guys, true story. No sense in "going out more" with those existing contacts, when it's just sitting/standing around hour after hour, with a) dimwits who have very little to say or do, or b) several kinds of attention-deficit, infernally loud maniacs. And who'd talk to strangers, when you have computer. Er, was there a similar role model for kids before lately, seems horrible to teach them to hit people, because there's no denying it can actually cause trouble in schools, even if they did eventually grow out of it (sooner or later..). I have hope for an especially non-malicious female Doctor, as the first one carries a heavy message of gender politics, so she'd have to be a particularly balanced person, setting a good example to both girls and guys of various degrees of sexism or lack of empowerment. After a season of two, a few bad traits should be added, to either the same Doctor or the next (female) one, again to not set some messed up example. If it wasn't the next one, but many years after Moffat, or Chibnall I guess had left, there shouldn't be a need to make her overtly nice, she could be just normal, as there wouldn't be other messages piling up into something terrible. "Sometimes you just have to PUNCH your way through!" -Janeway "I'll have to remember that one."
There's no reason whatever that a female Doctor would have to be any more 'normal' than the current incarnation. She could still be an insensitive, self-loathing, solitary creature that needs an external presence to round off the rough edges. It would, however, be interesting to have a female Doctor to counteract all the shrieking in terror that the companions usually get up to.
People, as a rule I just made up from personal observation, are generally more judgmental of such qualities in women and likewise in female characters. Look at the way female politicians are held to a much higher standard of likability than their male counterparts as a perfect example. A female Doctor could be just as quirky, and have her occasional "NOBODY HUMAN HAS ANYTHING TO SAY TO ME TODAY!" moments, but she would probably need to be soft around the edges (in the same way the modern Doctors have been for the most part) for the sake of keeping her likable.
We do not know how Gallifreyans reproduce. If the Timeladies don't menstruate, then they don't approximate any of the human stereotypes for an uneven personality being synced to the lunar cycle. Hmmm? All the Human women didn't seem to go inordinately loony in The Stolen Earth and Journeys End.
Need I point out that there'll never be a female Doctor, leaving all this sophistry moot? Moffat may have turned Doctor Who into rotten bastardised filth that make RTD's atrocities look like all time classics by comparison, but even he's not so cretinous as to break the show entirely. As for this talk about people holding men and women to different behavioural standards, it's because men and women are different. It's unfashionable and even politically incorrect to point out this obvious fact, but there it is. It's because women have the children and so are usually milder and less aggressive.
As I look around at all the pretence and hullabaloo, I have to collect my thoughts and say ... Please, Matt Smith! Don't go! Please, I'm begging you! I just wanted to see you put in a year under one different show runner, I'm begging you! I'll never ask for anything else. I promise! Just ... STAY! And don't mind the blubbering.
Your opinions about RTD and Moffat's eras aside, how exactly would having a female Doctor "break the show entirely"?