The Good Doctor: Four Arguments For Why “Doctor Who” Should Get a Female Doctor

This whole article was so on point, I may have wept while reading it!

I'm so glad you pointed out that the race angle was explored through Martha Jones in "Human Nature" and "The Family Blood", the latter being one of the best, most bone chilling episodes of Doctor Who in the whole series. I think what made Martha Jones stand out more than anything, was she was an actual Doctor, and that title alone put her on somewhat equal footing with the Time Lord. Martha certainly didn't have the comedy of Donna or the daddy issues of Rose (who is still my favorite companion of the re-boot), but just the fact that her education meant she could often finish the Doctor's sentences made her interesting. Plus, she like, saved the world.

I am surprised TPTB have not at least explored the "Lady Who" idea in a one off episode. The Tardis claimed human form in one episode ("The Doctor's Wife") with truly brilliant results. And, they are obviously wonderful at casting; so many guest characters would have made excellent companions (i.e., Sally Sparrow, RIta Connolly). Is seems odd that they haven't taken an episode to explore a female Doctor yet. Or at least the Doctor in a female body.

Just to mention that 'British or Scottish' doesn't make sense: Scottish people are British. English, Welsh, Manx and Scottish people are all British. The latter four might prefer to refer to themselves by their regional rather than national identity, but as the kingdom is named 'The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland' then anyone who is a citizen of that kingdom and isn't Northern Irish is 'British'.

The "logic of the series" argument doesn't even make sense. In New Who (haven't seen much of the older series) the Doctor has mentioned other Time Lords changing genders as they regenerate and Eleven briefly thought he WAS a girl until he checked his adam's apple. It's a thing. Their personalities and appearances change too. Sure, a complete sex/gender switch might be a huge adjustment for a human, but for someone like the Doctor can't you just see them rolling with it? Eleven in particular has never seemed that fussed. Though I would love to seem him getting surprised and frustrated when people start condescending to them about science-y and fight-y type stuff.

I'd be shocked if the BBC actually went through with it, but in a good way.

These aren't four arguments for a female Doctor - they're four counterpoints to four arguments about why the Doctor needs to stay the same. And yes, it's good to reveal the glaring idiocy of these arguments, but I feel that we (ie. those of us massively in favour of a female Doctor) need to highlight the case for rather than reacting to a case against. You touch on this briefly - 'it could make the show a better, more interesting show' - and to me this is the key point. In fact I'd argue that unless something along the lines of a female Doctor comes around, the show is going to grow stale very fast, as the writers are clearly struggling to do anything new or interesting with the Doctor/Companion dynamic - bearing in mind that they know they *must* have a lead female character, and at the moment she will necessarily be the Companion.

The final incarnation of the Doctor has already been revealed in The Trial of a Time Lord. He is called the Valeyard and he's eeeevil.
Now as to whether the show's producers even know about that... The bigger issue is why isn't the Doctor trying to save Gallifrey? It never evens comes up in conversation. That would open up stories of lady Time Lords, including the Doctor's presumed mother we saw a few seasons back.

It has been established that Time Lords can regenerate as male or female, this is evidenced in The Doctors references to the The Corsair. I know the rumors a year or so back were touting Lara Pulver (Irene Adler from Sherlock) for the role. There is nothing in lore stopping it the only problem is will the BBC see it as commercially viable?
If the rumors following the season finale are true and that John Hurt is going to play a forgotten 9th doctor then that would actually make Matt Smiths Doctor the 12th which means the next regeneration will be the intermediate regeneration that produces The Valeyard unless they completely decide to re-write lore. The issue is here that unless they go with the Sarah Jane ret-con that the doctor now has 504 regeneration's then that would leave one more incarnation of The Doctor following The Valeyard, unless again they decide to ignore whats been established previously.

You misspelled your title "4 things in bold: 2 are Counter-arguments against why the doctor shouldn't be female, 1 is non-sequitor, and then me talking about my own experience.".

I'm not against having the next doctor be a woman, but I'm not convinced by this article, nor do I believe this article delivered what it promised. Here are the actual arguments you've listed for "Why "Doctor Who" should get a female doctor:"

"There is a certain amount of heartbreak in change, in watching the characters you love evolve. But Doctor Who is a strong enough franchise to weather the shock of a woman Doctor."

Because it can doesn't mean it should. You can eat a spoon for instance, but I would never suggest that you do that.

Importantly, casting a female Doctor isn’t just "change for the sake of change"—it could make the show a better, more interesting show. The 2007 series was made far more complex and riveting because the show dug into race issues, casting Martha Jones, a Black woman. Imagine the storylines that could be possible with a Doctor who looked like a woman?

This is a good point. Except:
1. You say that this isn't change just for the sake of change, and then say that it's change for the sake of new possibilities for storylines. This sounds to me like a change in character for the sake of change in the story lines. Now these are definitely two different types of changes, so that's not my issue there, I get what you're saying; However you are also clearly saying that storylines focusing on topics only really accessible with a female protagonist would be a boon to Doctor Who. I think that that's a difficult case to make, but it would be good for someone to argue.
2. People may not want to have emphasis on these themes on the show. I watch Game of Thrones for instance to see magic, medieval shit, and watch compelling story arcs unfold. I do not go to Game of Thrones for progressive situations casting females.

Your article is asking for a recipe change. A very good recipe, like chocolate cake, except a failed recipe for Doctor Who might have some pretty big consequences, so we shouldn't just experiment silly-nilly without having good reasons to do so. Hence I'd love to hear any good reasons that people have thought of, because I didn't get a strong one from this article.

Also, wtf is this?

"4. “He’s the constant while everything around him changes.”

<b> This isn’t true, though."

Cmooon... Cmmmmmmooooooooooooooooon! </b>

"Rose Tyler, Martha Jones, and Donna Noble all have their flaws, but they’re tough, smart, and nuanced. They save the Doctor as often as the Doctor saves them. Can we really say the same about Amy Pond or Clara Oswin Oswald, the companions penned by Moffat?"

Yup.

I was a little hesitant about a female Doctor, but after reading many articles, have warmed up to the idea. Here are some possible candidates http://www.modestbombast.com/2013/06/in-search-of-doctor-female-doctor.html

I'm a dude, but also a "person of color" (where I live though, we don't call ourselves that... we just call ourselves people) so I suppose I can pitch in my two cents from my point a view, and something that got me thinking.

<blockquote>But think of the leap women and people of color have to make all of the time in identifying with and loving characters that don’t look like them.</blockquote>

I've never ever once had to make any kind of leap to identify and love a character that wasn't the same skin color as me. I've watched movies from China with an all-Chinese cast (go Jet Li), or India with an all-Indian cast (go Shah Rukh Khan), or Hollywood or BBC where protagonists are mainly white. I don't stop and think "I wish those people were the same ethnicity as me". I just enjoy the story for what it is. I guess this is an issue in America, where people still get hung up about skin color. The next Doctor could look like a brown dude (like me!) and I don't think I'll be thinking "oh this show is so much better now that he's brown just like me". I mean, go ahead and do it if you can get a good actor for a part, I just wonder why people make such a big fuss about race representation in a goofy television show.