It’s just over a week now since Jodie Whittaker was revealed as the 13th Doctor, and the person taking over from Peter Capaldi when he leaves Doctor Who at the end of the year. Her casting generated no shortage of online discussion, although the majority that we saw was positive. However, some remain less keen on the idea of a female Doctor, though.
Steven Moffat, the outgoing Doctor Who showrunner, has hit back at claims there’s been a backlash against Whittaker’s casting, though.
At San Diego Comic-Con over the week, he said that “there has been so many press articles about the backlash among the Doctor Who fandom against the casting of a female Doctor”.
“There has been no backlash at all”, he insisted. “The story of the moment is that the notionally conservative Doctor Who fandom has utterly embraced that change completely — 80 percent approval on social media, not that I check these things obsessively. And yet so many people wanted to pretend there’s a problem. There isn’t”.
Moffat added that fans “are more excited by the fact that there’s going to be a brilliant actress playing the part than the fact that she’s a woman. It’s been incredibly progressive and enlightened and that’s what really happened. I wish every single journalist who is writing the alternative would shut the hell up”.
Steven Moffat’s final Doctor Who episode, Twice Upon A Time, will screen on Christmas day.