Posted in: BBC, Doctor Who, Opinion, TV, TV | Tagged: bbc, chris chibnall, doctor who, jodie whittaker, opinion, peter capaldi, steven moffat

Doctor Who S10 Supercut Reminds Us of Time When Show Was Still Good

As the Doctor Who drought continues, we have to rely on the compilation videos posted by the BBC on YouTube. This week, it's a supercut of the 10th series of the new show, the Twelfth Doctor's (Peter Capaldi) final series.

This was the Twelfth Doctor's best season, a "return to basics" approach that showrunner Steven Moffat took after the convoluted and flawed previous two series. Season 8, was a failed experiment where Moffat made the Doctor a prickly, flawed, aloof Doctor trying to define his identity while building up Clara's (Jenna Colman) personal life in ways that were never convincing. Series 9 saw them develop an uncomfortable co-dependent relationship that felt like an allegory for an older man's affair with a younger woman. It also threatened to be "The Clara Show" with the Doctor as a supporting character. Series 10 was where Capaldi was at least allowed to be The Doctor. Gone was the baggage of a complicated backstory and a return to simpler stories. Bill Potts (Pearl Mackie) was a good foil for the Doctor without the dubious romantic tension because she was LGBTQ. They had a purer surrogate grandfather-teacher relationship The show also returned to a multiple-companion format by adding Nardole (Matt Lucas) and even Missy (Michelle Gomez) to the ensemble. Even with Missy's gradual redemption arc from prisoner to dubious companion and eventual end, the focus of the series was sharper and clearer than the previous two.

This being Capaldi's final series, Moffat streamlined the stories to do the last stories he wanted to do, and the emphasis on progressive subtexts – anti-sexism, anti-racism – felt like his apologia for some dubious missteps of the previous seasons. Funny how nobody complained about the show being "woke" here when the Doctor was still a man. He also doubled down on themes of sacrifice and death to foreshadow the Doctor's impending demise and regeneration.

You could say Series 10 was the last "classic" season of Doctor Who before Chris Chibnall took over as showrunner and changed the tone and format of the stories. This had nothing to do with Jodie Whittaker being the first female Doctor- in fact, just the opposite. Time and again, Whittaker rose above the material she was presented and made it stronger. This was more about Chibnall's emphasis on plot over character and his seeming discomfort with the Doctor and spending more time on the banal soap opera subplots of the companions, before the muddled, clichéd mess of Flux. To watch the supercut to Series 10 is to be reminded of when the show was good.

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