‘Doctor Who’ Star Ncuti Gatwa Pushes Disingenuous Narrative That Critics Of Latest Series Are Racists: “It’s Just Really Sad For Them”
According to current series lead Ncuti Gatwa, those fans who found themselves walking away from the latest season of Doctor Who have done so not because they have no interest in showrunner Russel T Davies’ self-admitted decision to trade in genuine storytelling for ham-fisted progressive messaging, but because they are outright racists who cannot stand to see a non-white individual portray the titular hero.
The latest actor to portray the Time Lord offered his take on Doctor Who‘s falling reputation while giving an interview to NPR’s Eric Deggans ahead of the show’s May 10th season premiere.
Speaking to the subject of his existence as the first black actor to be cast as the Doctor proper (actress Jo Martin previously portrayed a future incarnation of the Time Lord known as ‘The Fugitive Doctor’), Gatwa opined, “It’s about time. The character is a shape-shifting alien. It can be anyone.”
“So for there to only have been one representation of the character, I think is just quite limiting,” he added. “Who wouldn’t want to see themselves in the shoes of The Doctor?”
From there, Deggan would turn to press Gatwa for his thoughts on the mountains of criticism fans have leveled towards Davies’ aforementioned decision to focus the series’ narrative on overt sociopolitical messaging – “If you’re not writing that [in 2024], what on Earth are you doing?” the showrunner declared during a previous interview with Rolling Stone – rather than entertainment.
However, instead of earnestly actually engaging with the substance of this very specific and widespread complaint, Gatwa instead moved to paint those fans who have tuned out of Doctor Who as nothing more than anti-black racists.
“I don’t want to diminish racial aggression at all, but for me, personally, I find it fascinating that it matters so much to these people,” said the actor. “You are going to limit yourselves from a show that you love because you don’t like something about someone’s appearance. It’s just, like, really sad for them.”
(Notably, though NPR transcribes the above quote as ending with the assertion that critics have tuned out “because you don’t like something about someone’s appearance or their race”, the actual audio of the interview provided by the outlet does not feature any mention of the line “or their race”.)
Admittedly, there undoubtedly exist some former Doctor Who fans out there who have chosen to abandon the series for genuinely racist reasons – such is the reality of the world.
However, to promote this infinitesimally small sub-section of viewers as representative of the series’ critics as a whole is, to say the least, both disingenuous and ostensibly only being done in order to give the show’s production team a false premise upon which to dismiss any and all complaints towards its narrative direction.
The next new episode of Doctor Who, Boom, is currently on track to make a landing on Disney Plus on May 18th.
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