- 5 minutes ago
From casting choices that sparked debates about age to episodes deemed 'too scary' for television, Doctor Who has never been short of controversy. We count down the 10 worst and most overblown outrages in the show's long history.
Category
🎥
Short filmTranscript
00:00A show that's endured as much cultural and societal change as Doctor Who is bound to have
00:05attracted its fair share of controversies over the years. Concerns about the levels of violence
00:09during both the Tom Baker and Colin Baker eras resulted in steps being taken to soften the show.
00:14But unlike the legitimate concerns about the excesses of the deadly assassin or revelation
00:19of the Daleks, not all controversies are created equal, and some of them simply weren't worth all
00:24the fuss they stirred up. I'm Ellie for Who Culture here with the 10 worst Doctor Who controversies
00:30ever. Number 10. Peter Capaldi is too old to play the Doctor. In 2013, it was announced that one of
00:37the UK's greatest actors and major star of the BBC's foul-mouthed comedy hit The Thick of It would be
00:43the next Doctor Who. It was an incredible bit of casting that felt like an extra special 50th
00:48anniversary present. Or at least it was if you weren't one of the ageist trolls scuttling around
00:53in the rocks upturned by the Daily Mail in the wake of Capaldi's casting announcement.
00:57Too old. Same age as the first Doctor in 1908. All the others were more than 10 years younger,
01:03said a user called Shirley1919. Bit rich from somebody born in 1919, Shirley.
01:08Meanwhile, another user was disappointed that the Doctor wouldn't be, quote,
01:12cute anymore. While another claimed that the Doctor, quote, needed to be someone younger and more
01:17attractive to keep Doctor Who relevant.
01:19Oh, right, yeah, you do have a point. Because it's not like the show became a pop culture juggernaut
01:24under a 55-year-old or anything. Oh, wait. It's tempting to ponder if these lunatic responses led
01:29to Stephen Moffat making such a huge deal about the 12th Doctor not being Clara's boyfriend anymore.
01:34Although it does seem quite likely.
01:36Number 9. Scotland Yard vs. The Autons.
01:40Doctor Who's countless bug-eyed monsters have been making families hide behind a sofa for decades.
01:45Everything from the Daleks to the Empress of the Ragnos has been dubbed too scary for kids by the press.
01:51And in the early 1970s, even the authorities were getting involved.
01:55Following the broadcast of Terror of the Autons Part 2 Cliffhanger, in which the third Doctor and
02:00Joe discover that the policemen who saved them are actually Autons, Scotland Yard wrote a letter of
02:05complaint to the BBC lamenting this depiction of policemen as terrifying aliens.
02:10And according to Dominic Sandbrook's retrospective on early 70s Britain in his book State of Emergency,
02:17this issue was even debated in the House of Lords.
02:20It's certainly a spooky moment, but all the fuss seemed a little bit much.
02:23Though it is telling that this was the last we saw of these Auton coppers,
02:27and the Autons themselves for that matter. At least until the revived series.
02:31So maybe Scotland Yard's feedback was taken on board after all.
02:35Number 8. The Unquiet Dead is too scary for kids.
02:39And speaking of hiding behind the sofa, it only took three episodes of Doctor Who's 21st Century
02:45revival to face the wrath of concerned parents.
02:48Written by Mark Gatiss, The Unquiet Dead was singled out for being too scary.
02:53Given the traditional vibe of Gatiss's debut Doctor Who episode, he must have been tickled
02:57by the fact that his 2005 effort was getting under the skin of the 21st Century's Mary Whitehouses.
03:03Ninety-one viewers complained to the BBC after The Unquiet Dead aired, resulting in the corporation
03:09releasing a statement a few days later, which suggested that Doctor Who was aimed at, quote,
03:13children aged eight and above, who should watch the show with their parents.
03:17Commenters highlighted that being scared by Doctor Who is the whole point, with one explaining, quote,
03:22I watched Doctor Who as a child and I loved all the scary bits.
03:25The scare factor was the whole point of the show back in the 70s.
03:28You always knew that the Doctor would win in the end.
03:30I would have thought that children have seen far worse on TV these days.
03:34With its gelfed zombies, The Unquiet Dead is certainly the most horrific of Christopher
03:38Eccleston's first three episodes.
03:40But also, it's a bunch of Welsh extras with pallid complexions and blue contact lenses
03:44milling around a cellar.
03:45The Walking Dead?
03:46This is not.
03:47Number 7, The Daleks in Colour.
03:50When it was announced that 1963's The Daleks would be colourised and edited down to 75 minutes,
03:56Doctor Who fandom was characteristically calm, collected, and open-minded.
04:00Pfft, of course it wasn't!
04:02Benjamin Cook's frenetically edited version of the debut Dalek serial was not without its problems.
04:08Firstly, we already kind of have a 75-minute full-colour version of The Daleks,
04:12it's just that it stars Peter Cushing and Roy Castle instead of William Hartnell and William Russell.
04:17It also had an over-reliance on flashbacks to things we'd just seen several minutes ago
04:21to smooth over difficult transitions.
04:23But ultimately, it's not replacing the original.
04:26If fans still want to watch the broadcast version of The Daleks,
04:29they can do so on physical media or on BBC iPlayer.
04:32And yet, in some of the internet's darker corners,
04:35old-school fans began voicing concerns that these new whiz-bang colourised re-edits
04:40would eventually replace the real deal.
04:42Quite how that would work is anyone's guess,
04:44but needless to say, if you see Russell T. Davis marching up your driveway with a bin liner,
04:49it might be wise to hide your DVDs of The Daleks.
04:52Number 6. The Sonic Sunglasses
04:54With his electric guitar and adoption of the word dude,
04:58the 12th Doctor's midlife crisis was a bit too much for some fans to bear.
05:02However, the biggest concern was with his choice of eyewear,
05:05the Sonic Sunglasses.
05:06Predictably, fans freaked out about this heretical change to the Doctor's accessory of choice.
05:11As one laid-back and easy-going fan put it on Twitter,
05:15quote,
05:15The only thing Doctor Who fans hate more than Moffat is the new Sonic Sunglasses.
05:19Hoo, ouch!
05:20But let's look at the story reasons why the Doctor rejects the screwdriver.
05:24It's become intrinsically linked to his shame at abandoning Davros as a child in the middle of a war zone.
05:29This is at the start of a series that breaks down the Doctor and builds him back up again.
05:34So he has to earn the Sonic Screwdriver at the end of the final episode.
05:38And did we really think that that was going to be it for the Sonic Screwdriver?
05:41Classic example of fans jumping to wild, furious conclusions at the start of a series.
05:45At least he wasn't still calling his new Sonic Shades a Sonic Screwdriver
05:49like the 15th Doctor does with that weird magic remote control that he waves about.
05:53That is not a Sonic Screwdriver,
05:56although to be fair, I also wasn't a massive fan of the sunglasses either.
05:59I mean, what is wrong with just a standard screwdriver, people?
06:03Number five, Ace's Hairy Armpits.
06:05There's a real anti-establishment undercurrent to the latter years of classic Doctor Who,
06:10from script editor Andrew Cartmel reportedly telling producer John Nathan Turner
06:15that he wanted to, quote, overthrow the government,
06:17to Sylvester McCoy's history with the anarchic Ken Campbell Roadshow.
06:21However, the most strangely controversial addition to the McCoy era
06:25was Sophie Aldred's Hairy Armpits.
06:27As Aldred remembered in a 2008 interview with Den of Geek,
06:31her history as a radical feminist while studying at Manchester
06:34initially put her at odds with Nathan Turner.
06:37It's certainly funny to imagine Aldred, who came from working-class Manchester clubs,
06:42replacing theatre darling Bonnie Langford,
06:44which is something that Nathan Turner initially struggled to reconcile,
06:48as Aldred recalled, saying, quote,
06:49At first it was awful. He didn't really understand me,
06:52because he came from the world of Joan Collins-ish type glamour,
06:55the Kate O'Maras of this world, and Bonnie Langford,
06:58and he didn't really understand at all why I didn't want to shave my armpits.
07:02This armpit controversy didn't last long, however,
07:04and she and Nathan Turner soon became great friends.
07:07And if anything, Aldred's decision not to shave her armpits was perfectly on brand
07:12for a write-on feminist action hero like Ace.
07:15Number 4. Dalek's torture scenes
07:17It might not seem like a big deal nowadays,
07:20but the British Board of Film Classifications' decision to award Dalek a 12 rating on DVD
07:26in 2005 made the news.
07:29Previously, the only Doctor Who story to receive a 12 certificate was the TV movie,
07:33mainly due to all that gun violence at the start.
07:35The BBFC stated that Dalek promotes, quote,
07:39violence and cruelty as a way of dealing with problems,
07:41which it absolutely doesn't.
07:43A Dalek ultimately rejects violence by ending its life
07:45and ascends to a higher level of being, for goodness sake.
07:48They were also concerned that the Doctor, a role model for children,
07:51used torture and intimidation tactics towards a,
07:54oh, sorry, let me just check my notes, um, a Dalek.
07:56Writer Robert Shearman said that he was even asked to appear on Breakfast TV
08:00to discuss the violence in the episode,
08:02a request that he rightly turned down.
08:0421 years later, it all feels like a storm in a teacup,
08:07especially when you consider the types of Doctor Who stories
08:10being passed by the BBFC around the same time.
08:12The Deadly Assassin, which includes the fourth Doctor being drowned,
08:15shot at and trapped in some rail tracks,
08:18was given a PG rating upon its DVD release in 2009.
08:22And yet one of the most evil creatures in the universe being roughed up a bit
08:25is somehow the worst thing ever?
08:27Go figure.
08:28Number 3. Vastra and Jenny Kiss Complaints
08:31The funny thing about Doctor Who controversies is that they often generate
08:35some utterly wild headlines, like this one from 2015.
08:39Doctor Who lesbian lizard kiss will not face investigation.
08:43Wow, okay then.
08:44Well, this referred to Ofcom receiving six complaints about
08:48Madame Vastra and Jenny kissing in the 2014 episode Deep Breath.
08:52The six complaints stated that the kiss was, quote,
08:54gratuitous and unnecessary.
08:56In response, Ofcom rightly told them to shut the hell up.
08:59While it's heartening that only six out of 9.1 million viewers watching Deep Breath
09:03felt the need to complain about this,
09:05it's still depressing that it garnered headlines.
09:07Especially when you consider that it wasn't even a kiss,
09:09it was an oxygen transfer to keep Jenny alive, for goodness sake.
09:13It seems a select few were so blinded by needless rage
09:16that they weren't actually paying attention to the plot.
09:18Regardless of whether the six complaints were rooted in a fear of lizards or lesbians,
09:22love is love.
09:23There's nothing gratuitous or unnecessary about a married couple
09:26sharing what might be their last intimate moment during a life-threatening situation.
09:31Thank you for coming to my TED Talk.
09:33Number two, female doctor makes young men criminals.
09:37Hmm.
09:37In 2021, it was claimed that prominent female characters in pop culture,
09:42including Daisy Ridley's role in Star Wars,
09:45along with Jodie Whittaker's casting as the doctor,
09:47had created a dearth of positive male role models,
09:50forcing young men to switch over to Peaky Blinders and take up crime instead.
09:54This was the insane claim made by former Tory MP Nick Fletcher
09:58at a Westminster debate marking International Men's Day.
10:02Fletcher's bizarre statement was apparently met by bafflement from his fellow MPs,
10:06presumably because it's a much more complex situation,
10:09as Labour MP Annalise Dodds,
10:11now serving as Minister of State for Women and Equalities, pointed out.
10:14Jodie Whittaker's doctor didn't oversee a massive rise in child poverty,
10:18nor did she slash funding for initiatives to give young men a better chance in life.
10:22She's an actress, playing a fictional character, I might add.
10:26And what does it say about Fletcher's view of gender politics
10:28that he believes that boys don't have it in them to look up to women as heroes?
10:33The 13th Doctor and the female Ghostbusters didn't turn young men into criminals,
10:37just as much as Ellen Ripley, Sarah Connor, Rose Tyler and Martha Jones didn't.
10:41Number 1. Doctor Who's anti-ginger agenda
10:44The 11th Doctor's post-regenerative disappointment at not being a redhead
10:49was deemed by some to be evidence of an anti-ginger agenda
10:52on the part of the Doctor Who production team.
10:55It's unclear if those complaining had misheard Matt Smith's disappointed delivery as an insult,
10:59or if they were actively upset that, once again,
11:02a brown-haired actor had been cast as the Doctor.
11:04Either way, these 143 hot-headed redheads wrote to the BBC with their concerns,
11:10forcing the corporation to write this hilarious response.
11:14Quote,
11:14We would like to reassure viewers that Doctor Who doesn't have an anti-ginger agenda whatsoever.
11:19This was a reprise of the line in the Christmas Invasion episode in 2005,
11:23when David Tennant discovers he's not ginger.
11:26And here he is, missing out again.
11:28Disappointed he's still not ginger.
11:30The BBC also pointed out that the 10th Doctor's last full-time companion
11:34and the 11th Doctor's future companion were also ginger.
11:37No anti-ginger bias there, then?
11:39That said, five regenerations and two forgotten Doctors later,
11:42and there still isn't a redhead Doctor.
11:45Is Time Lord DNA just unable to replicate ginger hair?
11:48Or maybe there is a subconscious anti-ginger bias after all?
11:52I'll let you debate that one in the comments.
11:54And that concludes our list.
11:55While we're on the subject of the Doctor's regenerations, though,
11:58why not check out every version of The Doctor Explained?
12:01And no, none of them are ginger.
12:03In the meantime, I've been Ellie for WhoCulture,
12:05and in the words of Riversong herself,
12:07goodbye, sweeties.
12:09And no, none of them are missing.
12:09but we're going to be acious boy.
12:09In the meantime, I'll let you see you.
12:09I'll let you know,
12:09And let me know,
Comments