Chicks Dig Time Lords

Paul Wiesner, one of the chairs of OddCon, made me feel bad the other day for not reading enough geek-related stuff so I dutifully went home and started in on Chicks Dig Time Lords. The book is a collection of essays that celebrate Doctor Who and are written by "the women who love it".

The authors represent a range of talents. For instance, Helen Kang is feminist cultural studies scholar while Francesca Coppa is an Associate Professor of English. Others are sci-fi and/or fantasy authors like Jody Lynn Nye and K. Tempest Bradford. Actresses who have played roles in the DW universe also contribute here in either the form of an essay or interview. Sophie Aldred (Ace) and Lisa Bowerman (Bernice Summerfield) are among them. And there are plenty of women who have day jobs but find DW the focal point of their avocations.

Many of the essays begin with the author telling the tale of how she first encountered the beloved program. Those from England generally couldn't escape it while older Americans found it on their local PBS station. On a different note, Lynne M. Thomas married a DW fan who got her hooked. Carole Barrowman, who lives in Milwaukee, adds to the pattern by not only chronicling her ascent into fanhood but also describing what it's like to have a brother who is an actor on the show. That would be John Barrowman, a.k.a. – Captain Jack. Such stories make for fun reading because every fan of the show has a story about the time he or she first saw an episode and how they became a fan of whatever magnitude.

After learning how they got into the show, many explain to one degree or another just how DW affected them. Francesca Coppa names Nyssa as her favorite companion and a character with whom she identified. Nyssa provided a role model for her. She was a teenage girl who was a scientific genius and didn't spend all of her time gossiping about men. For Johanna Mead, DW played a big role in becoming addicted to her drug of choice: costuming. In a more prurient vein, Christa Dickson's fandom is driven by smutty fanfic.

In addition to the more personal tales of DW fandom, there are also the more academic which put the show under a lens to examine how it deals with gender, sexuality, and race. The tension between the new and classic series is evident in most of the essays but is especially prevalent in these because there are non-white companions and, well, the topic of sexuality is actually broached in the new series whereas it wasn't in the old.

K. Tempest Bradford (who has linked to this very blog in the past - squee!) writes about Martha in "Martha Jones: Fangirl Blues". She clearly appreciates that a black woman was cast as a (primary) companion for The Doctor and a smart one who had done well for herself at that. Bradford's problem is that, in the end, Martha is in the Mammy role. That is to say that Martha, however strong or capable she may be, is still powerless in many important ways and is there to aid and abet the white male figure.

While I take Bradford's point, I also think that it's like complaining about water being wet. Unless a companion is another Time Lord or the equivalent thereof, any companion, regardless of gender or skin color, will be subordinate to The Doctor. Companions can save The Doctor, console him, be his equal at verbal sparring, etc. but, at the end of the day, The Doctor is The Doctor. He's hundreds of years old, has seen everything and more, and is a member of one of the most powerful species in the whole of the universe. Unless the Rani teams up with The Doctor, no companion can be his equal and there will always be a sense that companions are inferior in certain ways.

Having said all that, I'll swing back to Bradford's side and say that companions can still be written in a way to minimize their subordinate role. In Martha's case a good start would have been to eliminate her unrequited love for The Doctor. Romantic feelings for the smart, charismatic temporal hobo shouldn't be off limits and can certainly lead to some great drama (see Rose and the Ninth Doctor) but, at the end of the day, the companion will lose. At least a human companion. The Doctor lives too long, is too unlike them for an ending that could be anything other than bittersweet. Remove the romance and let Martha do her thing, let her show the universe what she's made of.

An essay by Shoshana Magnet and Robert Smith? examines the new series through the lens of social equality. They make some good observations but they went way off the track with this from the section on Jack:

Jack's pansexuality is allowed on Doctor Who, but only because he's from the (very) distant future. People exactly like him exist in the 21st century – but you'd never know it from Rose's reactions in "The Doctor Dances." Here, the series uses a classic science fiction allegory to examine issues of today…except that it doesn't need to, because these aren't actually issues. Queerness and polyamoury aren't fantastical imaginings from the 51st century, they're something that happens every Friday down at Club Babylon.

Are Magnet and Smith? really that ignorant? Just because something exists in a given time it does not logically follow that any given person is aware of it much less approves. I don't know if the authors have looked around lately but there are plenty of people for whom queerness is most certainly an issue. And how many people even know what polyamoury is? I'll bet not many. So what if queerness and polyamoury happen at a particular club every Friday? How does that prove that everyone else who doesn't go there has a certain knowledge of and disposition towards these things? It doesn't. Magnet and Smith? are in need of reconsidering what "mainstream" means.

Chicks Dig Time Lords hints at the diversity in DW fandom and is especially welcome since it provides a voice for women who are not generally thought of as being fans of science fiction regardless of just how many female sci-fi fans there are out there today. The collection dips its toes into the pool of cultural criticism but doesn't jump in head first. This isn’t a point against the book, however. Most DW fans can read Chicks Dig Time Lords and find themselves nodding with at least one of the authors about a favorite Doctor or companion or sense of excitement at watching the show for the first time. As someone who does not frequent any kind of DW forum or board, I got a kick out of hearing the stories of other fans but this book has something for every fan, whether you lurk at fora or not.