The problem with the historical stories - if they were of the 'celebrity' kind - was that you knew roughly how things would work out in the end. There was no doubt that history would be kept on course in Rosa - the entertainment was in seeing how the Doctor would ensure that it went the way it should without getting too involved herself. I've known for some time that this story was in the pipeline, as the bus had been seen and photographed on location and it was recognised, as the real vehicle now resides in a museum. My big worry was that the Doctor would take too much of an active role in ensuring Parks made her protest, which would have undermined the real bravery of the real person. Luckily this was not the case, as the Doctor and her companions worked to keep history on course without Parks having any inkling of the plans to stop her.
Let's get the negatives out of the way first. Actually, there was only one real negative for me, and that was the villain, Krasno. It seems his motivation was simply that he was a racist. Having him hail from the 79th Century made this a little hard to swallow. The series has repeatedly told us that the human race will be interbreeding with all manner of aliens long before then, so Krasno's specific problem with black people just didn't sit right. He was also pretty inept, losing his equipment rather easily, and then simply being dismissed from the plot as soon as his usefulness was up. You also have to ask why he didn't simply remove Rosa from her time, or zap her friend Martin Luther King into the past. At least they came up with a reason for why he couldn't kill them.
I was much more impressed with the regulars this week - including the Doctor. I was glad to see that some of her goofiness had been reined in, as befitted the seriousness of the story's subject matter. All three companions had equal weight in the plot, with the younger two having a lovely scene by a dumpster where they discussed how things had changed for the better by their time, but there was still a lot of racism in the world. (If anything, racism is on the rise again in Europe and the USA). I particularly loved Bradley Walsh's performance, as he realised that he had become the white man for whom Parks was asked to relinquish her seat. Parks' protest arose out of inaction, rather than action, and this is what the Doctor and her companions were forced to do. They had to do nothing once they were on that bus.
Younger viewers will have missed a monster this week, but there were monsters on screen - the racist citizens of 1955 Montgomery, Alabama.
As someone who was familiar with Rosa Parks and her story, I didn't need the lecture, but I suspect that a great many people watching will have been educated by this episode. I normally don't like being preached at, but in this instance anything that can make people sit up and take notice of racism and the history of the civil rights movement is fine by me. It is rather shameful to consider that co-writer Malorie Blackman is the first writer of colour to have ever been asked to write for the programme, and still one of only a handful of women writers. Chibnall is certainly shaking things up on the diversity front, both on screen and behind the scenes, and long may he continue to do so.
Unusually, the end titles were run with the song which had accompanied the climactic bus scene, rather than the theme music. This song, Rise Up, is by Andra Day.
Overall, a powerful story which will hopefully prompt some discussion.
Next week, we are back in present day Sheffield with a story about spiders. It promises to focus more on Yas, as we get to meet her family.
I remember some people didn't like how the 13th Doctor didn't seem to prepare Ryan or Yaz for bringing them to the 50s south of all things (did she really think bringing them there was a good idea?) It was in a way that makes you want to shake her and slap the writers. Tongue in cheek, yes. In character? Surely not. And also very unconsiderate.
ReplyDeleteYou be interested to know that some people felt that the racism was too much or tried to point out that Chibnall should have wrote more three dimensional characters (like Joan Redfren who might treat Martha with casual racism but had some "humanzing" qualites) but the simple fact is that many people were cold hardned racists who sometimes went as far as physical violence and even killing.
Interestingly, I have been re-reading various subjects and one can actually realize that the old saying “it was a different time” could sometimes fall flat; if others in the 60s were against others' racist views - why do people excuse the lack of criticism for 60s racism today with 'it was another generation/time'? Nope, there are people who endorse racism (or misogyny, or any other kind of discrimination) and people who don't, everywhere, in every period. And being always critical of it whenever it may appear ensures that the system doesn't uphold any kind of hate speech or discrimination as blatantly as it tends to happen when it becomes commonplace and normalized. I am not saying this applies to EVERYONE (racism, without excusing it, can be complex in itself, as we have things like "genteel racism" or "noble bigot" or "no more racist than the average person", in which the person might be insensitive or casually racist but not to the point of outright cruelty) but many people are so full of hate that they go to the point of violence and death. Perhaps the best example of this is that in recent years, more media attention has been paid to the fact the Dallas Police were corrupt back in the 20th century, especially in regards to race. The legacy of Dallas County District Attorney Henry Wade and Dallas Police Captain Will Fritz (who was alleged to be a KKK member) continue to be associated with wrongful convictions and racial bias, particularly in relation to cases like that of Tommy Lee Walker, a Black man executed in 1956 whose case was later cited as being riddled with racial bias.
that’s why I don’t like when people try to act like this history of racism, police brutality/corruption, downplaying laws, etc. was such a long time ago, when it really wasn’t and continues to happen over and over again.