Culture:
Who do you think you are?
British TV’s most popular science fiction show is written
by atheists, yet focuses on a compelling central character
whose life has more than a few parallels to Jesus. So is
this modern Christianity’s greatest allegorical resource,
or is Doctor Who a subverted Messiah?
Ten years ago it was a TV relic with
wobbly sets and awful papier-mâché
monsters. Today it’s a BAFTA-grabbing
sci-fi phenomenon. Thanks
to a complete reimagining by some of
broadcasting’s most visionary writers,
Doctor Who has re-established itself
against the odds as the pinnacle of
British television. Now with one eye
on American conquest, the time-travel
show has moved into its sixth season
since the 2005 reboot and, despite often
being written by confirmed atheists,
cannot seem to help creating Christian
allegory at every turn.
I am, rather embarrassingly,
a massive
Who geek. As a child I
amassed a collection of nearly 200
paperback novelisations; I filled my
parents’ house with VHS recordings
of the show’s first 26 series. I once
even forced my dad to queue around a
block for five hours, just so I could get
(Seventh Doctor) Sylvester McCoy’s
autograph. Judge away.
When, aged 11, I heard the BBC
announcement that there would be no
more
Doctor Who, I was devastated.
This was my ‘American Pie’ moment;
the day the music died. During my
teenage years I suffered the disgrace
of being a superfan of a programme
that wasn’t even on any more. Then,
to my utter shock, some 16 years
later, another statement emerged
from the same corporation. Thanks
to highly-regarded writer and noted
‘Whovian’ (yep, I know, it’s not as
cool as ‘Trekkie’), Russell T Davies,
Doctor Who would be making a
long-awaited comeback. And what a
comeback it was.
A mix of clever casting (most
notably including pop star Billie Piper),
great writing and a largely
increased effects budget ensured that
within just a few short weeks,
Doctor
Who was cool again. The show was
successfully marketed to both children
and adults – the former enjoying
the monster-laden capers; the latter
nostalgically mis-remembering how
lukewarm they used to feel about the
original series. The show’s three lead
actors (The Doctor ‘re-generates’ into
a new body whenever the man playing
him has had enough) have all seen their
profile raised considerably; the two
show-runners (Davies handed over
to fellow atheist Steven Moffat after
four series) have become deified as the
UK’s top screenwriters. There is an
almost unfathomable amount of
good will surrounding the show,
much as there was during its golden
age in the 1970s.
Anecdotally,
Doctor Who
appears to be even more popular
among Christians, and for perhaps
understandable reasons. The show
was always about big ideas – alien
life; time-travel and the like –
but when Davies took it on, he
remodelled it on a much more epic
scale. Whereas the Doctor was once
the greatest of his race (The Time
Lords), now he is the last; where
the show was often concerned
with the fate of worlds, now it
repeatedly places the entire universe
in peril. So the Doctor becomes
the one person in the whole of
existence capable of holding back
the darkness, and he frequently
places his own life on the line – and
even loses it – in order to save us
all. Sound familiar?
Christians will claim that
atheist writers cannot help but
write the gospel story because it
is the great story that lives within
us all; atheists would use the
same argument to explain how
the gospel itself was fictionalised.
Whichever way your perception
filter is programmed (that one was
for the nerds), it is undeniably true
that the epic storylines created by
Davies and Moffat continue to lead
a Messiah figure to a metaphorical
cross, save mankind through him,
then give him a resurrection. Each
series so far has culminated in
such a manner, and twice so far
the character has paid the ultimate
price – through a visual effect that
is strikingly cross-like – only to be
‘reborn’ with a different face.
So regardless of whether they’re
intentional, what do we actually do
with these moments of Christian
allegory? Are they simply gift
sermon illustrations? And what of
all the other stories and scenes (
click here for examples) both in
Who and spinoff
series
Torchwood, which raise
questions of faith and existence?
Doctor Who should not be
painted as some great evangelistic
resource. The allegory doesn’t
point toward Jesus, but toward
science. To suggest that viewers
will somehow be inspired by the
redemptive nature of the storylines
to investigate faith, is to overlook
the various anti-Christian elements
in the same series. Humans as a
whole are portrayed as a gloriously
good race with a few bad apples
(who often turn out to be aliens
anyway). The Messiah figure saves
the world, but then has to keep
on going back to the ‘cross’ to
save it again each year. Elements
of the biblical story – such as
God as creator and the existence
of the devil – are explained
away as scientific or paranormal
phenomena. This isn’t the full
gospel then; merely a helpful echo
of part of the story.
What the show does do
however is cause us to think about
big ideas. Sometimes – as in the
first show of the latest series, which
began at the end of April – it’s
an idea about the nature of alien
existence. At other times though,
we are led to consider what it
means to be human; whether we’d
lay down our life for love; the
nature of good and evil, darkness
and light.
As Christians,
Doctor Who
offers us two things: a superblywritten,
often hugely enjoyable
show concerned with ideas which
we find important and interesting,
and a great trigger for discussion.
Most Monday mornings during
Who-season, I find myself next to
the watercooler with my friend
Dave, unpacking events from
Saturday night from a place of
immersion and excitement. Many
of those times, we have found
ourselves in discussion about
the more spiritual themes, the
same thing being true of similar
conversations with the young
people I work with. For preachers
and witnesses to the Christian faith,
the show provides a wealth of story
touchstones with which to connect
the even more fantastic story that
we know.
Let’s just not kid ourselves that
he’s meant to be Jesus.
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