The description in the lyrics are way past anything in Hansel & Gretel (who survive in most modern versions) and besides which, functionally, no, those things are not so popular these days.
They also *are not literal babies*.
Which is a clear dividing line, even in the darker areas of children’s fiction, historical or otherwise. It’s also astonishingly obvious.
This is family TV on Christmas Day, not Classical History.
And Dahl, incidentally, including The Witches, is now rightly recognised as being unpleasant and problematic to say the least.
If Marilyn Manson or some other f****** had sung this song, I strongly suspect there would be less leaping to its defence. If it had appeared in… oh, I don’t know, something directed by Zack Snyder, I imagine very different people would misguidedly leap to its defence.
There is none.
It’s misguided and inappropriate, and I would even suggest putting it out early was a way of getting ahead of criticisms that *will* come later in the day.
‘Oh, it had been out for weeks and no one said anything!’
As I say, I shan’t be bothering, I wandered off in the Capaldi era when that became too cold and callous — though not quite as much as this, and often at least addressing that in the text — and there’s still a large chunk of Jodie I can’t be arsed watching. I don’t think I will even give this lot a chance, it’s clear they’ve somewhat lost track of many many things to do with the show and with its audience frankly.
It’s *annoying* because they are ‘effing up the first mainline Black British Doctor basically from the start, and I find that… sad? Insulting? Offensive? I don’t know. But they have done it.
Merry Christmas.
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