Jodie Whittakers Doctor Betrays Every Version Of The Character Who Came Before

Jodie Whittaker’s Doctor Betrays Every Version Of The Character Who Came Before

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Doctor Who: Flux concludes with triple genocide against the Daleks, Cybermen and Sontarans, betraying every past regeneration before Whittaker’s.

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Jodie Whittakers Doctor Betrays Every Version Of The Character Who Came Before

The Dalek, Cyberman and Sontaran genocide in Doctor Who: Flux’s finale is a betrayal of core values that defined past regenerations. Despite all the running around and sonic screwdriver pointing, Doctor Who’s lead character is far from a typical action hero. Proudly treading a pacifistic path, The Doctor abhors violence – even against longtime mortal enemies – and wields words (of which she has many) instead of weapons. Indeed, The Doctor’s sonic screwdriver symbolizes her philosophy to “fix” rather than “destroy” in any given situation. This vital trait has followed The Doctor since his unearthly debut in 1963, right through to the modern era.

Doctor Who: Flux’s finale is just another day at the office for Jodie Whittaker’s Time Lord. As the destructive Flux wave approaches Earth (having already decimated most of the universe) the Sontarans hijack the Lupari shield as a means of surviving the decimation. Never ones to let an advantage to go waste, they invite the Daleks and Cybermen to stand under their apocalyptic umbrella. All three classic Doctor Who monsters gather in Earth’s orbit but, predictably, the Sontaran truce is a trap. The warriors from Sontar intend to turn the Flux against their enemies by removing the shield and protecting themselves only.

Meanwhile, The Doctor is fighting doggedly to halt the Flux’s unstoppable rampage, while simultaneously figuring out how to end the Sontaran occupation of Earth. She’s successful on both accounts… but not without racking up a body count that contradicts everything The Doctor should stand for.

How The Doctor Commits Genocide In Doctor Who: Flux’s Finale

Jodie Whittakers Doctor Betrays Every Version Of The Character Who Came Before

Doctor Who: Flux’s climactic act finds the Sontarans ready to execute their brilliant stratagem. The Daleks and Cybermen are both lured behind the Sontaran shield, safe from the coming destruction. At the last second, the rotten potatoes pull away their guard, planning to destroy two major rivals while saving themselves. Instead of the Lupari ships wrapping solely around the Sontarans, however, the shield is removed from all three races, decimating the Daleks, Cybermen and Sontarans in a matter of moments. The Doctor (with a little help from her friends) had already hijacked the shield’s controls, and she condemns the Sontaran fleet to death alongside their Dalek and Cyber foes by whipping away the Flux-proof barrier completely.

Jodie Whittaker’s Thirteenth Doctor might argue she’s choosing “not to save” the villains, rather than killing them herself. Unfortunately, that defense won’t stand up in Time Lord court. For starters, only two races (the Daleks & Cybermen) would’ve been killed without her intervention. The demise of the Sontarans was entirely down to The Doctor’s tampering. Secondly, controlling Earth’s shields all along makes The Doctor party to all three counts of genocide. She held the lives of many thousands in her hands and could have spared everyone. At best, Thirteen willingly allowed them to die; at worst, she outright engineered the mass murder of three separate species.

Yes, it was Karvanista who pressed the big red button, wanting revenge for the destruction of his furry comrades, but the plan itself came from The Doctor’s warped imagination. She also stood by and watched while Karvanista carried out the mission, happy to assist every step of the way without protest. There’s no doubting The Doctor knew the violent effect of her plan, and she demonstrates no reservations to Karvanista, going so far as ordering Bel and Vinder to disable Sontaran communications so their fleet couldn’t flee. Though she didn’t pull the trigger, the Thirteenth Doctor bought the gun, loaded it, told Karvanista where to aim, and then held down the target.

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Flux Isn’t The Doctor’s First Crime (But It Doesn’t Matter)

Jodie Whittakers Doctor Betrays Every Version Of The Character Who Came Before

Despite The Doctor’s universal reputation for pacifism, no regeneration’s hands are truly clean. Plenty of times throughout Doctor Who’s long history, the hero saved the day by blowing up some aliens. In many cases, The Doctor’s opponents were offered an opportunity to retreat or surrender first, softening the blow when the situation turned bloody. In others, The Doctor’s ruthlessness proved difficult to justify – the Second Doctor killing Ice Warriors, Jon Pertwee shooting an Ogron, Seven destroying Skaro, the War Doctor’s entire existence, etc.

Doctor Who: Flux’s triple genocide isn’t the first crime on The Doctor’s rap sheet, then. But does that make Thirteen’s Flux solution any easier to swallow? Whenever The Doctor committed an atrocity during previous regenerations (other than as an unavoidable last resort), this was either the writers’ failure to understand what The Doctor stood for (shooting the Ogron) or an intentionally dark moment where The Doctor’s inner hubris momentarily got the better of him.

Neither excuse applies to Thirteen’s murderous antics. Whereas the trigger happy Third Doctor can be attributed to Pertwee’s era still finding its feet as an action-centric series, Chris Chibnall has, until now, shown a firm understanding of The Doctor’s peaceful nature. And while David Tennant and Matt Smith got away with occasional violence by showing how it affected their Doctors emotionally (see Ten’s Time Lord Victorious downfall), Jodie Whittaker’s regeneration completely glosses over the mass murder of Flux’s finale, with no acknowledgement whatsoever that she was complicit in an act many would find morally challenging.

How Whittaker’s Doctor Betrays Past Regenerations

Jodie Whittakers Doctor Betrays Every Version Of The Character Who Came Before

Every portrayal of The Doctor has at least one episode that made audiences say, “That’s a bit much,” but these moments rarely come to define the Time Lord’s core values. The occasional killing littered across 60 years of existence is the exception to a much more common rule – The Doctor is a hearts-on-sleeve pacifist.

And it’s these pacifistic moments that contribute to the character’s foundations long-term, because Doctor Who audiences remember them more vividly compared to the rough stuff. Fourth Doctor episode “Genesis of the Daleks” contains one of Doctor Who’s greatest ever scenes, where Tom Baker comes perilously close to wiping the Dalek race from history, but shows the better part of valor, asking, “Do I have the right?” He knows erasing the Daleks will save countless millions in the future, but still can’t justify committing premeditated genocide in the present day. No such qualms for Jodie Whittaker’s Doctor in Doctor Who: Flux, as she weighs up the safety of the universe against the genocide of Sontarans, Daleks and Cybermen, then deliberately facilitates the latter… or, more accurately, gets her dog to do it.

Though Fourth’s dilemma is the most obvious example, all past regenerations have enhanced The Doctor’s peace-loving persona. The Third and Tenth Doctors both became enraged at humans for killing aliens who had already surrendered (Silurians for Pertwee, Sycorax for Tennant), and when Whittaker’s Doctor prevents the Sontarans running away, her actions are hardly more ethical. The threat of being hit with the Flux is enough to chase the invaders from Earth, but by disabling their comms, The Doctor makes sure the wave finds its target. Similarly, Capaldi’s Twelfth Doctor believed everyone – even Davros – was capable of being “better,” and ended his reign with the motto “never be cruel or cowardly.” Again, those principles are on shaky ground thanks to Doctor Who: Flux, as Thirteen seems content to let Daleks, Cybermen and Sontarans die purely because they’re Daleks, Cybermen and Sontarans.

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Flux’s Ending Betrays Whittaker’s Thirteenth Doctor Also

Jodie Whittakers Doctor Betrays Every Version Of The Character Who Came Before

The outright weirdness of Doctor Who: Flux’s ending stands out more because Jodie Whittaker has played arguably the kindest, least violent Doctor of all. In “War of the Sontarans,” she and Mary Seacole hatched a non-violent plan to disrupt the Sontaran invasion of Earth. General Logan destroyed the fleet as it left, and The Doctor (quite rightly) gave him a verbal dressing down. Upon reuniting with Tecteun, the Time Lord told her adopted child that morality was a problem, to which Whittaker defiantly replied “Morality is a strength.” Even further back, Thirteen reacted in disgust when Jack Robinson shot a lone alien spider dead before she had chance to try another solution.

These moments have now been completely undermined by Doctor Who: Flux’s finale. There’s no indication of The Doctor seeking a less deadly solution, no attempt to reason or negotiate with her opponents, and not even any remorse after the fact. It’s very hard to reconcile the cold stare of the woman standing next to Karvanista with the righteous character who patronizingly told Logan that “men like him” represent the absolute worst of humanity.

Does Stopping The Flux Justify The Doctor’s Slaughter?

Before The Doctor ruined everything, the Sontarans’ plan was to absorb the Flux’s anti-matter with the matter from their crushed enemies. Essentially, the mass of Dalek and Cyberman ships was required for halting the Flux, and since The Doctor borrowed this strategy, did she face no choice but to sacrifice three enemy races in order to save the remaining universe? Not quite.

If slaughtering the Daleks, Cybermen and Sontarans was absolutely the only way to prevent the Flux, Whittaker’s Thirteenth Doctor would be justified in her actions. Unfortunately for her, at least two other (less volatile) solutions were mentioned. After executing her plan, the combined mass of decimated Doctor Who monsters isn’t enough to absorb all the Flux, so Di (Liverpool’s secret genius, apparently) suggests using Passenger to contain it. As an infinitely expanding spatial realm of endless matter, Passenger is a Flux-proof jar perfect for stopping the end of the universe. The Doctor could’ve allowed the Daleks, Cybermen and Sontarans to escape and still prevented the universe’s end using Passenger.

Alternatively, The Doctor could’ve gone with the plan she originally mentioned to the Ood at Division HQ – decompressing the universe to not only stop the Flux, but restore any galaxies it already destroyed. It’s a win-win scenario that doesn’t spill one drop of blood.

But even if there was no means of ceasing the Flux other than sacrificing three entire species, the way Jodie Whittaker’s Doctor reacts to Flux’s finale slaughter is what truly makes the episode impossible to justify. On the rare occasion The Doctor finds themselves in a situation where genocide is the only possible route, the act should still weigh heavy on the Time Lord’s mind. She should’ve solemnly condemned her enemies to the Flux, while quietly acknowledging there was no other solution and inwardly questioning whether she made the right choice. Instead, Whittaker’s Doctor gets on the radio to the Sontarans’ Commander Stenk and almost gloats as she says, “In seven seconds, you’ll be in the gravitational pull of the Flux.” There’s not even the slightest hint of remorse, sorrow, or moral conflict in this moment – and therein lies the true betrayal of Doctor Who: Flux’s ending.

Link Source : https://screenrant.com/doctor-who-jodie-whittaker-13-version-character-betrayal/

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