MovieChat Forums > Doctor Who (2006) Discussion > Diverse multicultural Doctor Whoke rejec...

Diverse multicultural Doctor Whoke rejects Joe Hill because... he's american

posted 5 years ago by kuku (3510)
13 replies | jump to latest

Yeap, BBC's Doctor Whoke, these guys that have filled the series with Pakistanis and Africans, they rejected Joe Hill because... he's american.

The rejection letter said literally "We have never let an American write Doctor Who, and if we were going to, we wouldn’t start with you".

The 'we wouldn't start with you' obviously means 'if we give the job to somebody from US, he won't be a white male, as you are'

Joe Hill is the son of Stephen King. But this is not a case of a son wanting to enjoy the benefits of daddy (he even uses his mother's surname). He has been an horror writer for a while, and he has become quite a successful one. Netflix even released recently a series based in a comic book series written by him.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J9HGS47f-WE

https://www.syfy.com/syfywire/joe-hill-shares-smoking-rejection-doctor-who

[–] hurricane (1963) 5 years ago

Chris Chibnall is a white male.

[–] kuku (3510) 5 years ago

Yeap, but for some strange reason those white male knights that love diversity so much never fire themselves or their white male close friends, didn't you notice?

[–] Moonglum9 (11320) 5 years ago

Chris Chinballs? Isn't that a nickname for the older son on Family Guy?

[–] peter_t_2k3 (1053) 5 years ago

I've not listened to the interview but the article seems to suggest it might not be recent. It's a very bad rejection and I don't agree with it but we don't have all the facts and this could be a previous show runner

[–] [deleted] 5 years ago

Shh peter! It gives kuku the chance to write "Doctor Whoke" again and hopefully have someone think he is awfully clever and original and not at all monotonous and boring. Let him have his fun.

[–] peter_t_2k3 (1053) 5 years ago

Ha it sometimes feel like people like him want the show to fail. I mean it's like they look for anything they can criticise

[–] vegan_voorhees (383) 5 years ago

>>The 'we wouldn't start with you' obviously means 'if we give the job to somebody from US, he won't be a white male, as you are'

Oh yeah, obviously. Couldn't possibly be any of a zillion other things.

[–] kuku (3510) 5 years ago

In modern western mainstream media? A rejection with that level of hate and nastiness? It's either because you're a white male, or because you're anti-woke.

Since Joe Hill is not particularly anti-woke or politically incorrect, the only remaining cause is his skin color.

[–] vegan_voorhees (383) 5 years ago

Or perhaps someone involved with DW had a run in with him at an earlier juncture and just didn't like him.
Or perhaps he had a reputation of being difficult to work with in the industry.
Or perhaps they thought he already had a good enough springboard into the industry based on his familial connections and would prefer to give the opportunity to another writer.

If you always leap to the worst possible conclusion without any consideration that perhaps there's more to it than you know, you're always going to be disappointed and jaded. Open your mind a fraction.

[–] kuku (3510) 5 years ago

perhaps he had a reputation of being difficult to work [...] perhaps they thought he already had a good enough springboard into the industry based on his familial connections

That would explain a rejection, but not a nasty and very personal rejection as the one he received.

perhaps someone involved with DW had a run in with him

Not likely. Magazines love stories about feuds. If there was such a feud, we'd know.

If you always leap to the worst possible conclusion without any consideration that perhaps there's more to it than you know

I always leap to the most likely explanation. Occam's blade. And the most likely explanation is the one I said.

[–] vegan_voorhees (383) 5 years ago

Nah, you just pick and choose the ones that prop up your agenda.

[–] Ace_Spade (9616) 5 years ago

I'm not sure that this rejection is conclusively what you think it is.

That said, it's an amazingly vicious rejection and I'm surprised that any professional organisation would send it.

I find it distasteful to say, "...if we were going to, we wouldn't start with you." without explanation; perhaps some reference to something Joe Hill actually did, for instance.

But I find it baffling and distasteful to reject a writer based on their nationality. The only question, really, is: "do they write great material?" Rejecting American writers based on nationality? They'd have rejected Ray Bradbury? This would even be different if they said, "We represent Britain and we want to give these opportunities to local British writers". But worded specifically towards Americans makes it sound like they're saying, "If a guy from Russia or Nepal wants to write for us, that's cool; we just hate Yanks."

[–] kuku (3510) 5 years ago

I think than more than his nationality, it's his ethnic group. At the end of the day, wokeness is a self-hate movement. And from a British woke point of view, the problem with Yanks is not that their different because they're American. It's the opposite: they're too close. Doctor Who has been a show traditionally written by British white dudes. This last season, on the contrary, there's only two British white dudes besides Chibnaill doing the writing. The rest are either female or non-whites.

And that doesn't fit the demographics of the genre. Scifi is a genre that it's generally populated by white dudes. Just check youtube or fanfiction or fan movies: it's all white dudes with very few exceptions (there's a very good youtube channel that started analyzing Game Of Thrones and now has gone general fantasy and scifi, and the youtuber is a black dude, for example. But those cases are rare). However, here you have that they're almost out of modern Doctor Who.

I think the problem with Joe Hill is not really being American, but being too similar to British white dudes. They're trying to get rid of those, not to open the job to similar ones.