SUMMARY
- Lindy’s racism towards the Doctor is subtly foreshadowed throughout “Dot and Bubble,” culminating in a shocking reveal at the end.
- The Doctor’s unwavering commitment to saving Finetime’s residents despite facing racism sheds light on the Time Lord’s intensely heroic tendencies.
- “Dot and Bubble” explores themes of prejudice and discrimination within a social media-obsessed world, offering a departure from traditional Doctor Who elements.
Doctor Who season 14, episode 5, “Dot and Bubble,” comes with an ending unlike any other in the franchise, and while it’s a shocking conclusion, the installment drops several hints throughout that strongly suggest it was never going to end any other way. “Dot and Bubble” is the second successive episode of Ncuti Gatwa’s reign as the Time Lord to have a different actor leading the Doctor Who season 14 cast. However, he does have a slightly larger role to play than in the previous story.
“Dot and Bubble” follows Callie Cooke’s Lindy Pepper-Bean as she attempts to traverse the social media-obsessed community of Finetime with the remote assistance of Ncuti Gatwa’s Fifteenth Doctor and Millie Gibson’s Ruby Sunday. The story is a vast departure from the fantastical side of the franchise that’s focused on elements such as the powers of Jinkx Monsoon’s Maestro. Instead, it focuses on a frustratingly human theme that it’s clear won’t be ignored by Doctor Who‘s Disney era.
Callie Cooke’s character drops several hints about her views on race
Throughout most of “Dot and Bubble,” Lindy comes across as a naive and privileged influencer, but a character who’s ultimately harmless. However, the episode’s ending all but outwardly proves that Lindy harbors prejudice toward the Doctor because of the color of his skin – despite the fact he guided her to safety and offered to save the lives of her and her friends. The reveal of Lindy’s indiscriminate racism is a slow build, with writer Russell T Davies embedding several clues throughout the episode that become much clearer in retrospect.
Lindy is generally disrespectful to the Doctor throughout the episode and yet doesn’t treat Ruby with the same lack of courtesy.
Lindy is generally disrespectful to the Doctor throughout the episode and yet doesn’t treat Ruby with the same lack of courtesy. One of her more specific instances of racism comes when the Doctor contacts Lindy she’s blocked him, and she becomes angry and confused when she recognizes him, but not before claiming she thought he “Just looked the same.” Lindy goes on to tell her friends the Doctor isn’t, “As stupid as he looks,” and that he’ll be “Disciplined.”
Doctor Who (Potentially) Explains Why Everyone In Finetime Is Racist
It all comes down to “The Great Abrogation”
The Doctor’s immovable desire to rescue the Finetime survivors, despite being spoken down to for being Black, says a lot about his impeccable character. However, there’s some evidence to suggest the community’s residents have already been given their chance at redemption and made a conscious effort to keep people of color away from Finetime. During “Dot and Bubble,” Finetime superstar Ricky September tells Lindy that “During the Great Abrogation, the whole city was sealed off.”
Abrogation is when a law, act, or right is repealed, and so Finetime clearly underwent a huge change in at least one of its laws. One possible theory is that this abrogation is related to some form of equal rights act being repealed, making it so the community either remained as or reverted to a community of Caucasian-only residents. This would explain why access to the city was restricted, and if the event was banished to the history books as implied by Ricky September, it also offers an explanation for the generational, inherited racism of the Doctor Who setting.
