Why this year’s Doctor Who Christmas special was everything fans dislike about the Moffat era
A couple of years ago, disliking showrunner Steven Moffat was a niche interest in Doctor Who fandom, mostly the realm of feminists who objected to seemingly misogynist themes in his writing, and die-hard fans of his predecessor Russell T. Davies. Now, it seems, Moffat’s anti-fans may be in the majority.
Reactions to this week’s Doctor Who Christmas special, “The Time of the Doctor,” have been decidedly mixed. Along with the predictably tearful mourning for the departure of eleventh Doctor Matt Smith, the episode was widely criticized for being incoherent, confusing, and sexist.
There’s a reason why this fake TV listing has been retweeted almost 500 times:
The episode included (spoiler alert!) the Doctor spending 300 years in an isolated village called Christmas, which did not develop culturally or technologically during the entire time he was present. Essentially, the Doctor has now spent about a fifth of his current lifespan inside a Dickensian snowglobe. Another baffling detail was the fact that his companion Clara was touched by one of the previously notorious Weeping Angels but survived unscathed, despite the fact that a Weeping Angel directly caused the final disappearance of beloved companions Amy and Rory last season.
The episode also introduced a new female character who embodied many of the characteristics of a stereotypical “Moffat woman”: a sexy, powerful woman who flirts with the Doctor while he bobs around awkwardly like a confused child, before she is killed off, brought back to life, and then insulted by the Doctor for not being as good “a woman” as Clara—10 seconds after he kissed her without her consent. It was like a Greatest Hits montage of all the bizarre interactions between the Doctor and his various female companions and love-interests since Moffat took over as showrunner. And this was just a few minutes after Clara was forced by the Truth Field to admit that she first began travelling with the Doctor because she “fancied him.” [READ MORE]
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