Warning: May contain minor spoilers
Despite the Doctor’s best efforts to take her new friends back home, the TARDIS refuses to go there and instead lands in Montgomery, Alabama in 1955. It’s a crucial time, as a woman called Rosa Parks is about to make one of the greatest displays against racism in American history by refusing to give up her seat on a bus. It’s a small event with huge consequences and one that will change the world.
To the Doctor’s surprise, she finds evidence that another time traveller is nearby. Determined to discover more, she and her companions investigate. They soon face the harsh reality of racism at the time, when Ryan is physically assaulted. When the Doctor learns of the criminal time traveller’s plan to alter history by deleting Rosa Parks’ defiance, a desperate plan is needed to ensure that events unfold as they’re meant to. But can they succeed when society itself is against them?
When it comes to a show having good intentions, it’s impossible to fault this episode. It’s a relevant, socially-conscious episode that highlights racism head-on, refusing to hold back on the message it’s conveying. It’s an important topic and one that’s bound to be too sensitive for some, and there are several key moments that so brutally honest they’ll live long in the memories of Doctor Who fans. While the subject is far too big for any TV show to handle, this episode tries and for that it has to be given credit.
Doctor Who is dismissed by some critics as being for children, but this episode proves how wrong that opinion is by covering the topic with some level of maturity. It’s easy to say that it’s just a show, but every viewer knows the awful truth: that the problem is still happening, and honest enough to point out that changes in society take time. More than that, there are some solid performances all around and the episode carries with it a sense of tension and a frustrated feeling of helplessness at witnessing social problems that seemingly can’t be solved.
Beyond all of those good points, however, there are major flaws and most of them stem from the time travelling villain Krasko. Devoid of any personality or memorable moments, his only key trait is that he’s racist just because he is. The man makes beige paint look interesting, and his plan – while an intriguing concept of “nudging” events in history to change the bigger picture – is full of plot holes that become harder to ignore as the episode progresses. Each plot hole leads to more, and the more you think about them the worse the problem gets.
When the Doctor lies about someone winning a raffle to watch Frank Sinatra in Las Vegas and that they don’t have to worry about their job… and then that person is so gullible that they believe it without question… it defies all common sense. Perhaps the scene was meant to be funny but it fails, and destroys the suspension of disbelief. At times like that, you know they’ve gone too far.
In the end it boils down to a similar issue as the previous episode of Doctor Who: there’s a macguffin of a motive and viewers are meant to ignore it; what counts is the point of the episode. In that respect the episode succeeds, despite some occasional clunkiness in the script. If you focus on the message then it works, and it works well. At its best it resembles Star Trek’s City On The Edge Of Forever – an intelligent, poignant tale that works on an emotional level and conveys its message well.
Just… try to not pay attention to the finer details of it.
The Review
Doctor Who Episode 11.3
An emotional episode that doesn’t quite work.
Review Breakdown
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Verdict
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I thought the team had too much influence on events, robbing Rosa of some of the agency and incredible courage possessed by the real life hero. Also the accents were appalling. I doubt Rosa Parks needed inspiration from a foreign police woman. Or an old white guy and an English woman feverishly working behind the scenes to “allow her to succeed”. Yes I’m a middle aged white man. Let the people who made a remarkable change in their own history have something without white-washing, and to subtly suggest that England handled / handles race relations better is drawing a long bow. That’s be like the Australian government telling off South Africa for apartheid when it was based on the White Australia model.
My review of the Dr Who Rosa Parks episode (S11.3):
A British (at least in spirit) white woman saving the world from killer robots (or killer rags) is easy to digest, as it’s just fun science fiction. But even with the best intentions, approaching the topic of the civil rights movement and racism from a fictional perspective is full of landmines, as society continually redefines their understanding of the movement.
First problem: The white saviour. Yes, Dr Who’s crew has a black man and a Pakistani. It doesn’t change the fact that Dr Who is the leader and has the superpowers of immortality, time travel, and making gadgets that can scan for information or open doors, etc. It takes away agency from those who had a lot to lose (including their lives), and risked everything so that others may live free.
Second problem: Rampant individualism, which is the problem for many of the ills in society, including the suppression of disadvantaged races and classes. It’s the “bootstrap” syndrome that ignores systematic ills by believing that just one person can change everything, ignoring the context in which successful and influential individuals rose up. Somehow they play it as if the Rosa Parks thing was a spontaneous event where suddenly she had enough, her feet were tired, she decided not to go to the back of the bus, and then history changed. It was actually a planned boycott, and Rosa Parks was a lifelong activist.
Third problem: Mythology. Societies tend to hang on to mythologies: simplified versions of events that make heroes of one or two people who then become symbols. In fact, the civil rights movement took a coordinated effort and the hard work and sacrifice of many people. Rosa Parks was not arrested the day of the bus boycott; she turned herself in weeks later. The pictures there are of her sitting in the bus were not taken the day of the protest, they were taken later by reporters during a re-creation. So the story was pieced together over a period of time and then given to the public to digest. This was effective in that the story of one “meek” lady latched on to the public’s mind much more than the suffering of many over several centuries. It’s not what happened, and if Dr Who is trying to teach, should they be teaching a myth?
Fourth Problem: The mischaracterization of Rosa Parks. She was not a meek woman, she was a lifelong activist.
Fifth Problem: The random racist greaser from out of space is the main villain. He appears out of nowhere and is easily defeated. In reality, it’s social forces at work that the activists are up against. And these forces are not fought with a single event or with a sonic screwdriver. If our current history shows us anything about Trump supporters, they are hard to change.
Sixth Problem: Weak on plot. I feel like Quantum Leap handles these topics much better, and made them interesting. Teaching morality should never be the prime purpose of any writing, because the audience will feel that they are being preached at. You should really strive to tell a good story first.
“When the Doctor lies about someone winning a raffle to watch Frank Sinatra in Las Vegas and that they don’t have to worry about their job… and then that person is so gullible that they believe it without question… it defies all common sense. Perhaps the scene was meant to be funny but it fails, and destroys the suspension of disbelief. At times like that, you know they’ve gone too far.”
She mentions that she had called Elvis on the mobile phone she had told Graham she’d given Elvis before they even left the TARDIS…So-it probably wasn’t a lie. Elvis probably pulled some strings for her.
As for who would believe it? You have to remember–this was supposed to be NINETEEN FIFTY-FIVE. More people were willing to believe stuff like that if it came to their door then they are today. Scams were not as prevalent as they are today either, so it is perfectly believable that someone would trust in something like that back then.