Gender Relations on Gallifrey

[wshaffer]

So...I seem to be on an accidental mission to watch or rewatch all the Doctor Who stories involving Gallifrey. I've rewatched "Arc of Infinity", "The Three Doctors", and "The Deadly Assassin" in the past few months, am currently working my way through "Trial of a Time Lord", and am eagerly anticipating seeing "The War Games" for the very first time ever when it comes out on DVD in November.

Anyway, it occurred to me - maybe I'm misremembering, but I don't think we actually see a female Gallifreyan (barring Susan, whose status is a bit ambiguous) until Rodan in "The Invasion of Time" (and then, of course, Romana in the next story), and we don't see one in an obvious position of power until "Arc of Infinity", with Flavia.

Makes one wonder if Gallifrey went through some serious upheaval about the position of women in Time Lord society starting some time after "The Deadly Assassin". Maybe that's why Borusa kept regenerating? ;-)

Comments

[lizbee.livejournal.com]

*giggles*

The original idea was that there were no women on Gallifrey. Because girls are icky. Then someone thought better of it, and started introducing female Time Lords. (Although it wasn't until Douglas Adams came along that the term "Time Lady" was used.)

I like the idea that there's this lingering thread of gynophobia on Gallifrey, as a result of the Pythian Thing and whatnot.

[wshaffer.livejournal.com]

The Pythian Thing must play a part.

And, of course, knowing the Doctor's predilections, it ought to be entirely clear that he left Gallifrey because there weren't enough girls to hang out with.