I did say, quite a while back, that I'd blog about what to expect from Russell T Davies (or RTD to his fans) and his return as show runner of Doctor Who – and what not to expect. I guess now, when the Fourteenth Doctor (Ncuti Gatwa) has finally been announced, is a good a time as any. Quite a while ago, I watched Davies's latest TV series Years and Years and It's a Sin in preparation, though I can safely say they're not the kind of TV dramas I would usually plump for (one being seemingly very political and the other destined to end tragically). I'm also almost up-to-speed with the Chibnall era after having watched the thirteenth series aka Flux. So here we go.
I first intended to rattle off a whole list of do-and-don't-expects, but I realise the first item on the list is already going to take up a lot of space, so I'll have to condense. And it so happens that the first item concerns the ticklish issue of politics. Short version: Don't expect Doctor Who to get unpolitical with Russell T Davies at the helm.
When it comes to politics, Russell T Davies and Chris Chibnall are pretty much in the same ballpark. Of course, their politics matter only as much as it affects their writing, and the writings of others under their supervision. I've never thought Doctor Who mixed well with political commentary (and I know even old Who dabbled in this, but that doesn't mean they did it well). However, I'm afraid we're stuck with it for now. There was some politicising around during RTD's first stint as show runner – mostly the odd remark or piece of unsubtle political satire you could roll your eyes over and move on from. But now and again, there were episodes which were riddled with political content. My least favourite one has to be "The Planet of the Ood", as it chucked out a nice ethical dilemma set up earlier – how do you make sure not to exploit someone who genuinely wants to serve? – in favour of a tired Oppressed Species story with one-note villains. Compare it to "Praxeus", one of the better preachy episodes of Chibnall's run, and there's not much to choose between them. In fact, I think I'd prefer "Praxeus".
If there's a difference, it's that Davies is more unpredictable. You can watch something like Years and Years and be impressed by the even-handedness of some of its political content; for instance, the scene where every member of the Lyons family goes to vote and you can see how the events of the past years have sometimes changed their voting patterns in unexpected ways is very well done, and the boo-hiss political threat Vivienne Rook isn't some Nigel Farage knock-off but a sheer populist without any ideological affiliation. And then, suddenly, the Lyons family matriarch launches into an anti-free-market rant. Whoa, where did that come from? Davies's characters are more likely to suddenly turn vitriolic than Chibnall's nice-as-pie ones. I can't be the only one who thought the otherwise likeable Jill's tirade at the end of It's a Sin, where she more or less blames a grieving mother for her son's death in AIDS, both shocking and not a little puzzling. It's true that said mother had been horrible to Jill and denied her to be at the deathbed of her best friend. Still, huh?
For all that, I think I prefer Davies's political volcano to Chibnall's political strait-jacket. No-one of Chibnall's main characters is ever allowed to say anything that could be the least bit controversial to those who share his views – unless they happen to be empty satirical husks like Jack Robertson. In contrast, Davies's characters say and act like people would do in real life, not in some self-censoring alternative reality. The Lyons sisters are allowed to be fed up with their brother Daniel's endless obsessing over his lover Viktor. Jill helps a good friend who has contracted AIDS with shopping and such (this is before the diagnosis becomes a regular occurrence among her mostly gay friends) but she is terrified of contracting the disease, wears rubber gloves in his apartment and showers rigorously when she comes home. In short, Chibnall's characters are often nice but they are also a bit bland, as they adhere to an unwritten code, while Davies's characters are more human.
On the same theme, Davies allows all his characters to be flawed, including the ones who tick some particular minority box. His gay characters aren't in the least bit more admirable than his straight ones. The same goes for characters of different ethnicity. I don't think Chibnall would quite have had the stomach to cast, say, the roles of self-made man Joshua Naismith and his vain daughter in The End of Time with black actors. But if characters that happen to belong to a particular minority aren't compelled to be practically perfect in every way, it makes the story less predictable for the viewers and (in relevant cases) give actors the chance to sink their teeth into a wider variety of parts – not to mention that it enhances their chances of being cast at all.
Years and Years and It's a Sin may not have been exactly my cup of tea, but they show that RTD is still at the top of his game as a script writer. We know from his previous run that he knows his Doctor. We can't, sadly, expect him to bring back Gallifrey, as he was the one who did away with the Time Lords in the first place, until they were rescued by Steven Moffat. We can, possibly, expect him to retcon the Timeless Child Arc, though I'm not so sure of this as I would like to be. I have little doubt that Davies, like so many Whovians, has little time for the Timeless Child idea, but he will probably feel some sort of loyalty towards Chibnall and reluctance to discredit him (let's not forget Chibnall wrote his first Doctor Who adventure during Davies's era). I'm afraid this and a distaste for seeming to cater to "toxic" fans will keep Davies from explicitly retconning the Timeless Child when, in my opinion, it really needs to be done. But at the very least we can expect him to ignore it.
All in all, I'm ready for another RTD run of Doctor Who. I haven't seen Ncuti Gatwa in anything, but if Davies says he absolutely nailed the audition, I'm ready to trust him. He's been a good picker of Doctors this far.
Just go easy on the capitalism-bashing, pretty please.
