Same people in charge now…just sayin’
& it does come across as a bit like gatekeeping if the implication is that people should have a connection with the shows history to be involved. That just closes the door on loads of potential actors, writers etc.
Anyway as Tian said maybe carry this on elsewhere.
Well, perhaps the fact that you started arguing against a faceless majority that you ascribed my personal opinion to instead of the opinion itself might be a bit of our issue in communication here.
The stance I’m arguing from is that Doctor Who is one whole thing, from '63 to 2025. That, in and of itself, may be a controversial opinion, but I’m not one to step down from my ladder because people disagree. My stance, to further on from that, is that in the conception of whatever a new Doctor should be, there shouldn’t be a hard-line either way on “doing homework”, which I think is a ridiculously loaded statement. Homework implies something that a child does not enjoy doing because it serves no purpose and eats into their time. Except Doctor Who isn’t homework. It’s a job. The idea that looking into the past of the show that you’re playing the title character of is something that has to be done begrudgingly through gritted teeth just comes across as strange.
A stance I FULLY agree with. But I don’t think it necessarily leads to the suggestion that Whitaker and Gatwa should have researched old Doctor Who (if you want to avoid using the admittedly loaded term of homework).
And neither am I.
I thought Ncuti Gatwa grew up watching the Tenth Doctor , if I’m not mistaken
He definitely did, if you watch behind the scenes things where they get them to watch clips from NuWho he recognises it all.
God that makes me feel old…
Ok I’m going to take a little tangent because I want to talk about this. I don’t necessarily disagree that 12 is unlikeable in S8, and even I sometimes struggle with his personality when watching it, but I just want to give my 2c on this aspect of him.
12 suddenly being anti solider to me invokes how society went from military worship during and after WW2, to largely scorning the military during and after Vietnam. This is a man when went to a world young and upbeat, then came back from a gruelling 800-year-long war old, bitter, and closed-off. He has grown weary from constant warfare, plagued with doubt over if he’s a good man, and is finding himself slowly becoming isolated for, at that point in time, his only friend. He’s lashing out at all around him, but especially Danny because Danny represents that which haunts him, war. I think this also explains the Doctor’s blatant hypocrisy towards regular military like Danny, and UNIT and especially the Brig, I don’t think the Doctor truly hates all soldiers, he’s just lashing out.
Which is something I don’t think the Doctor should do. I mean, 15 has received enough criticism for lashing out at Kid and yet it’s okay that 12 does it to Danny (a man traumatised by his military experience). Hmm. This is where I think ‘but I like Capaldi because he’s my sort of Doctor’ plays more of a part in accepting or criticising certain elements than some fans like to acknowledge (and I’m just as guilty of that myself before anyone thinks I’m being self-righteous!).
I always forget Ncuti is only a couple years older than me. Wild! Such a young talent
But can’t the Doctor be a much more interesting character if sometimes they are liable to lash out? The whole point of them is that they’re a Time Lord that is far more human than they have any right or reason to be. That’s why we can empathize and why it can touch us so much.
Not to play myself like a broken trombone, but even as far back as The Sensorites, The First Doctor lashes out at Ian and Barbara, the outsiders, when he realizes that he might be losing Susan and to an extent, they’re the reason. There’s nothing sustainable from a dramatic perspective about The Doctor being an unambiguous always nicey nicey good person, except when that impulse, which I entirely agree is a fundamental part of the character (always do good, never fail to be kind is a manifesto, a directive, not an ontological rule of the universe, and aren’t stories supposed to be about how we struggle against our personal directives, not just unilaterally follow them like programming each time) brushes up against a nasty universe.
The Doctor, for me, isn’t an interesting character because they always do the right thing. It’s far more interesting that they always want to do the right thing, and sometimes they fail. Sometimes they don’t even know what the right thing is to do. Sometimes they’re certain they know the right thing, and they’re wrong. Like we are. Like we do.
Oh 100%, I will never deny that I’m super biased towards the Moffat era, although in my defence, my issue with the Kid scene is less to do with the Doctor and Kid, and more to do with the follow-up scene between the Doctor and Belinda.
To me, the Doctor is an incredibly flawed person who always strives to do good, but sometimes stumbles, and I think Doctor Who tackling stories like that is important. However, they do need to be properly addressed otherwise they just come off as limp or edgy.
I felt so shocked when I clocked that yes, he was actually going to regenerate. It didn’t feel earned, if that makes sense. It wasn’t the end of a an arc, he hadn’t developed as a character, it didn’t feel like the Fifteenth Doctor had died. Of course, this is all my opinion, but I love when regeneration is a death and rebirth, rather than a swap or change, from one Doctor to another.
I got spoiled by the Unleashed thumbnail before I saw the episode, and still until the last minute I was like “they’re not actually gonna do it, right?”
Then 13 showed up and I got reassured because surely she was going to use some of her regeneration energy so 15 wouldn’t burn himself out completely, and maybe that would even provide a reason 14 used an old face… but then she didn’t. 
I honestly believe that what the Doctor did to Kid and what the Doctor did to Danny are so fundamentally different with vastly different real world connotations that they just can’t be compared as bedfellows. Apples and oranges don’t do the gulf justice for me. Maybe apples and car tyres or doorbells and oranges.
But on the larger topic being discussed, I couldn’t agree more - neither Ncuti nor Jodie were under any obligation to immerse themselves in Doctor Who’s past. And it didn’t really do them any harm not to.
Admittedly, I do have problems connecting with the Fifteenth Doctor but none of it is down to Ncuti or his work in the show.
I assumed most people in here were fairly young! I was 7 when S1 of modern Who aired, and S2 was the first I watched as it aired. I watched S1 sort of, side by side as I really got into Tennant.
I’m only one year younger, was 6 when Rose aired. Couldn’t look away from the screen even when hiding behind the sofa
