Saturday, March 20, 2004

...and the new Doctor who is...

...Christopher Ecclestone: Jesus Christ Jr. in The Second Coming, Robbie Coltraine's original boss (before Ricky Tomlinson) in Cracker and the one with the glasses in Shallow Grave.

Not a hugely surprising choice. I'm surprised he's agreed to do it, though. Normally they end up with a mental who's go no career left to lose, give him drugs and write the lines on the walls of the set to get that extra-special "faraway" look (or at any rate, that's how they got Tom Baker).

On a related note, I've been giving some thought to the reason why Doctor Who is so popular amongst gay men. Is it the phallic image of the time rotor (as defined in every story other than The Chase) rising and falling in response to the Doctor's manipulation of the console? Is it the phallic, image of the daleks coupled with their monotonal S&M innuendo? Is it because Doctor Who's last regular producer, the infamous John Nathan-Turner was a screaming queen and filled the show with camp panto idols?

No. It's none of these things.

The real reason, of course, is that there exists within gay male children the instinct to cottage. Doctor Who is all about getting into a confined space with a strange man, shutting the door, and discovering that all sorts of wonderful things go on inside and that the lack of space isn't really a problem.

Probably.

Incidentally, I heard a great quote from JN-T a few years back: "I must admit that, at night, when I was saying my prayers by the side of the bed, I'd sometimes pray that [Mary] Whitehouse had seen the show and thought it was too violent for the kiddies because it automatically added two million to the viewing figures."