owl | (no subject)

I am becoming a little tired of the publicity referring to Martha as 'the first black companion'. Wo, look how enlightened casting directors are in 2007. And what about poor Mickey? He was in the TARDIS the same length of time as Jack was, and do people discount Jack as a companion?

And, no, "he doesn't count/is a racist stereotype because he's a bit pathetic" makes me wonder if the speaker ignored Mickey totally after Rose. Mickey had a far better companion's arc than Rose did! He started out a bit pathetic and became amazing; she started out pretty ordinary and became a bit pathetic.

Having said that, I shall be displeased if the TARDIS lands in Prohibition America and Martha is treated exactly as if she were white. New Who isn't big on historical accuracy (note the random French aristocrat extra played by a black actor in Girl in the Fireplace, not to mention the costuming and some of the dialogue; "We are French"? "My lover, the King of France"?? Don't even mention the Scottish ninja monks), nor was it too great at characterising Rose as not white middle-class female, but there you have your audience-identification character, and why bother making all this fuss about her being black if she's going to be levelled off to Everywoman?

What's the betting that the fact she's a medical student gets completely forgotten after the second episode, too? I want to see some science from Martha, and she's intelligent and educated, it would be nice to see her lines written that way.

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If the TARDIS does land in Prohibition America I suspect it'll all be jolly speakeasy-keepers and aliens conducting shootouts in fedoras and black jazzmen who everyone treats with the greatest of respect. They wouldn't want to mess with those American sales.

I wasn't that surprised by the random black aristocrat - there were some rich mixed-race Creoles kicking around France at that time, though they'd probably have got muttered at at Versailles for being parvenus rather than for being black - but the general dumbing-down of that episode did annoy me. They missed a lovely chance to show how the eighteenth century could be much more alien than the fifty-first. Especially since everyone in the future seems to shop at H&M.

I never got over Mme de Pompadour introducing the Doctor to Louis XIV with the words "This is my lover, the King of France." Ah, the breezy informality of the court at Versailles!

Yes, I remember the vivid discussion of that in

clanwilliam's journal at the time.

Possibly it was meant to be a subtle point about a Time Lord's place in the order of things, considering that the only other people I can think of, off-hand, to whom one might introduce the King of France would be God and possibly Saint Denis. Even if the Doctor had at some point in his long career been elected Holy Roman Emperor (and they chose worse) I don't think it'd help.

Then again, you'd have to be a person of appropriate rank to do the introducing - wouldn't you? - and I don't think Mme Poisson's daughter qualifies.

Though that might imply that Sa Majesté wasn't already on the best of terms with God (or Saint Denis) which might get you into even worse trouble than, say, leaping through the Oeil de Boeuf on a horse.

Argh, how did I forget that? And didn't one present people to the King not vice versa? Evidently Reinette took the 'Oh, yeah? Well, I'm the Lord of Time' view.

They missed a lovely chance to show how the eighteenth century could be much more alien than the fifty-first.

Yes, exactly.

They wouldn't want to mess with those American sales.

Oh, I forgot that the bad guys can never be Americans. And not to offend those watchers whose attitudes would fit into the 1920 really well.

Oh, I forgot that the bad guys can never be Americans.

Um. Henry Van Statton in Dalek? And assorted minions? All Americans.

What's more, snark about the current American president in Aliens of London, The Christmas Invasion and Doomsday.

I won't even get into Old Who.

Oh, that's true. There may be hope yet.