New Doctor Who trailer shows first female Doctor is still the boss

Doctor Who is coming back for its 11th season (since the modern reboot) next month, featuring the first-ever female Doctor (Jodie Whittaker). The BBC just released a new trailer, and it's clear from the footage that we've got a delightfully fresh take on the classic series ahead, while still keeping the most iconic elements that have made Doctor Who so enduring.

There were hints here and there over the last few seasons that, while the Doctor might have typically appeared in male form, a female incarnation was certainly possible. Count me among the longtime advocates for a female Doctor, particularly because it opens up an entirely new angle to the storytelling. It's one thing for a white male Time Lord to show up at various points in history. It's quite another for a strange woman to show up in, say, medieval England. So there's an opportunity for new kinds of conflicts and poignant shifts in relationships.

We got a taste of that during David Tennant's tenure as the 10th Doctor. In "Human Nature" and "The Family of Blood," the Doctor takes the guise of a humble schoolteacher in 1913 London to escape detection by the so-called Family of Blood, who are pursuing him across time and space in hopes of draining his life force so they might survive. His companion, Martha, guards his Time Lord essence (in the form of a fob watch), since he will have no recollection of his no-human existence. But Martha is black (and female), which limits her own undercover identity options to that of a lowly maid in the school, scrubbing floors despite her medical degree. And, well, she's treated accordingly.

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