Who says there's no place for politics in Doctor Who ? I think the very first political story in the show happened away back in 1963 with The Dead Planet that pointed out racism and nuclear war are fairly bad ideas all the way through to the Pertwee era with the stories by Malcolm Hulke in to the Hinchcliffe era with Genesis Of The Daleks . Stories that mixed strong narrative with metaphor and allegory . It should be remembered that when NuWho did a sequel of sorts to Genesis we know see the Kaled race as a multi-racial tribe. Hmmm. Obviously some people are confused geo-nationalism with racism so when I heard Doctor Who was doing a historical story featuring Rosa Parks I thought we'd be getting a Guardian newspaper type rant . That said I thought Chibnall and a female Doctor was going to destroy the show and I'm being proved wrong
With Rosa we see a brave story about a brave woman. A pity this courage isn't sustained by the production team . Why bother introducing fantasy elements when the reality is more than dramatic enough ? To be fair when Yaz mentions the P word it's shocking but then we're treated to a line about being called a terrorist when she comes back from mosque . Are Muslim woman allowed to attend mosques with men ? I doubt that
And this touchy feely attitude continues through the episode . All the walk on white characters are without exception racist , though not racist enough . Would they really describe black people as "Negroes" and "Coloureds" ? We all know what word they would be using but it never appears . Controversy is something that producers didn't shy away from in the classic show but here the punches are pulled. We also get a cameo from Martin Luther King who is described as a Baptist minister and this struck me as like the earlier line that the audience are to take the ide of the religious. It should be pointed out that the white racists would also be evangelical Protestants . You might also take on board that even today in the Deep South churches are segregated . If you want to get rid of racism getting rid of God would be a good start
This is a story where the production team want to have their cake and eat it and because of the subject matter it's an episode that's received more acclaim than it probably deserves . Maybe if the production team wanted to really make a statement they could have had a story where a time traveller bible basher tries to eliminate Charles Darwin or Karl Marx , the two men from history who have done more than anyone else to disprove the existence of God , but one laments that would be a Tardis trip too far. Still Rosa is much better than the crass political statements we gt under the Moffat regime
With Rosa we see a brave story about a brave woman. A pity this courage isn't sustained by the production team . Why bother introducing fantasy elements when the reality is more than dramatic enough ? To be fair when Yaz mentions the P word it's shocking but then we're treated to a line about being called a terrorist when she comes back from mosque . Are Muslim woman allowed to attend mosques with men ? I doubt that
And this touchy feely attitude continues through the episode . All the walk on white characters are without exception racist , though not racist enough . Would they really describe black people as "Negroes" and "Coloureds" ? We all know what word they would be using but it never appears . Controversy is something that producers didn't shy away from in the classic show but here the punches are pulled. We also get a cameo from Martin Luther King who is described as a Baptist minister and this struck me as like the earlier line that the audience are to take the ide of the religious. It should be pointed out that the white racists would also be evangelical Protestants . You might also take on board that even today in the Deep South churches are segregated . If you want to get rid of racism getting rid of God would be a good start
This is a story where the production team want to have their cake and eat it and because of the subject matter it's an episode that's received more acclaim than it probably deserves . Maybe if the production team wanted to really make a statement they could have had a story where a time traveller bible basher tries to eliminate Charles Darwin or Karl Marx , the two men from history who have done more than anyone else to disprove the existence of God , but one laments that would be a Tardis trip too far. Still Rosa is much better than the crass political statements we gt under the Moffat regime