Hey, I’m a huge Star Trek fan and have seen all of that stuff endlessly.
I love the Star Trek community, and it seems Doctor who has a similar thing.
So, I want to check out this show. Can someone recommend a good place to start?
Can I just pick a series based on the actor? I was considering the series with Matt Smith. Just because I saw a few clips with him.
Women ofte get the short end of the stick in early classic Who, but the same goes for people of colour. This is why I call it my “anthropological studies” when I watch classic episodes…
Rarely do coloured people appear, and even rarer in speaking parts — Toberman, we hardly knew you! There is one or two instances of yellowface in the first couple of decades of the show, and …well, you can imagine how poorly that has aged.
Since OP has watched Star Trek, I’d say the implicit racism is on par with the TNG episode “Code of honor” — that is, skippable for the most part or, if you’re in a forgiving mood, watch them for the picture they paint of the time they were produced.
I guess it bugs me more because I’ve watched ST:TOS and never had such a horrid feeling from those episodes. Someone once told me the early episodes showed how much the Doctor grew over time, from an elitist to someone who truly cared for everyone, but I have to wonder how much of that was simply the writers themselves realizing they could do better?
Oh, there is growth in the Doctor over his first incarnation — but that’s a redemption arc afforded the white hero since before Ebenezer Scrooge.
I don’t want to make Doctor who sound like some misogynist, colonial trope — if it were I doubt we would still be talking about it with any fondness — though I do think it’s fair to judge any age by its popular narratives. Even the nominally more progressive ones like DW.