Book: Doctor Who: Only Human, by Gareth Roberts.
2.5/5 Goodreads review also here.
This is the fourth book in the Doctor Who New Series Adventures series, featuring the Ninth Doctor and Rose Tyler. A lengthy review (as usual xD) below, including spoilers:
My main qualm with this book is its author, Gareth Roberts, whose icky and problematic ideology (he has an unsavoury penchant for sexism and transphobia 😑) tends to end up reflected to a greater or lesser extent in his work (as is the usual thing with the majority of authors). So that was a qualm about rereading this book, which I did because of my recent project of (re)reading and reviewing all six Nine&Rose New Series Adventures novels (perfectionism ahoy xD). And yeah, in this book we can definitely see some sexist choices and stereotypes which I didn't love (as I will detail below).
As to the more positive, the story and narration wasn't the most engaging of the six novels, in my personal opinion, but it was reasonably well written and the plot did hold my interest overall. The book tackles both history and science fiction, with a human colony from the far future who built a faulty ‘time engine’ and got stuck during the time of the Neanderthals and Homo sapiens. The plot explores interesting themes such as genetic engineering and the ethics of science, as well as the strife between Neanderthals and Homo sapiens, with the latter here portrayed as more violent, territorial and with genocidal intent against all 'lesser' human species, whom they other and regard and 'Them'. Time travel shenanigans aside, the themes of competitive replacement and the dangers of dehumanization, seen through a fully Whovian ethics lens, are the central points of the story, and in that sense I did enjoy the book, even though it has its flaws, and some of them are pretty jarring.
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| Replacement of Neanderthals (yellow) by early modern humans (blue). Source. |
➡️A quick aside on the Neanderthal extinction: There are many hypotheses for the extinction of the Neanderthals, among which we can name inbreeding and a small population size, violent conflict with Homo sapiens and competitive replacement - which is the hypothesis that is most explored in this book -, a change of climate, disease, natural catastrophes, and/or interbreeding and ultimate assimilation with early modern humans. Most likely, it was a combination of several of these factors which caused the extinction of the already low Neanderthal population. In spite of the speculative nature of the dynamics of Neanderthals and early modern humans depicted in this book (violent replacement by Homo sapiens was first proposed in 1912-20 by Marcellin Boule, but other hypotheses as to the demise of the Neanderthals have since appeared), in my reading experience it's not often that Neanderthals are given the spotlight in this way, with the Homo sapiens as the more antagonistic people, so I found that to be a compelling part of the plot.
As to the main characters, Nine and Rose were well characterized overall, and while Jack Harkness did reflect some of the author's sexist ideas at times, his trademark (and creepy) approach to 'harassing everyone on first meeting them is such a good rep of pan(omni)sexuality' 😬 was toned down in this book with respect to the series and other media, which I appreciated. Other characters were more or less compelling regarding their characterization, with Neanderthal Das turning up to be an unexpected favourite with rather wholesome and endearing traits (I did enjoy the portrayal of the Neanderthal people in general), while I found others to be markedly more problematic in their characterization - Especially 'boss lady' Chantal Osterberg ticking off all of the stereotypical traits of the mad and amoral scientist who is also kind of a drop-dead beautiful femme fatale 🙄, and whose characterization I found to be not only rather lazy and two-dimensional, but also leaning on the more overtly sexist side.
More details below, so here be spoilers!
✨Female representation:
Rose Tyler is one again the main female protagonist with her role as Nine's companion (see more about her below), with Chantal Osterberg, the leading scientist of the research colony of humans from the future (also see below), being the leading secondary character. Some other women in the colony appear in the story as well with more minimal roles, with scientist Lene having the most importance (even though her plot is pretty much reduced to being a wife and having to process her terminal illness 😕), and others just appearing very briefly (like the unfortunate Tina with her redshirt role). In late 20th century, a nurse called Weronika makes a brief appearance as a wannabe companion figure (not much more to her), Jackie Tyler in her youth also has a cameo (not in an excellent light), and Neanderthal Das finds her mate in Anna Marie, a 20th century woman who is described as fitting the Neanderthal beauty canon to a T, but who Harkness 'charmingly' describes as ugly, hairy, short and fat (nothing wrong at all with not conforming to limited societal beauty canons, I'm referring to the sexist way Roberts describes her through Harkness 😑).
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| A Neanderthal woman (artist's impression, source). |
Finally, there's the women from the Neanderthal tribe (featuring Ka, who is in a relationship with one of the future human colonists, and Sakka) and the Homo sapiens tribes, featuring the matriarch-like figure of the wise-woman Nan (thus named because she has a grandson xD). Wise-women are mentioned to exist in both types of tribes, and Nan seems to be the leading voice of the tribe. But in spite of this, and her statement that "Wise man! Man! Men in charge, we all know how that ends up!" (that's not what's always exactly portrayed in the book, either, with Rose also being forced to marry some man she doesn't know, see below, and Chantal being demonized in the book as the evil boss lady that wrecks stuff, but OK), well, in spite of that she ends up paired with a creepy middle-aged dude from the future (who harasses Rose continually, see below), and suddenly Nan seems to need a man in her life so much that she defers to him automatically, so it looks like she won't be the leading voice of the tribe for much longer. Sigh. But I guess that Roberts needed to have his performative phrase to assure us that he's not sexist at all 🤦!
➡️A quick aside on Prehistoric gender roles:
The societal structure of both Homo sapiens and Neanderthals would probably still be far from a feminist utopia with a harmonious and egalitarian goddess religion (paternity was probably ignored for a while and Prehistoric fertility goddess art is beautiful and fascinating and I love it, but fertility cults tend to also be more sinister than the 20th century New Age feminism portrayed them as, as I covered on these two posts: 1, 2). But even so, the hunter-gatherer tribes of the Paleolithic and Neolithic (mostly up to the Upper Paleolithic) also did not seem to uphold a gendered division of labour that was as rigid as it has been assumed for a long time, and mainly by male academics, who also consistently fail to identify all the cave paintings depicting huntresses as women (among other things) because of course "all men hunt and all women gather", thus quoth the 1960s academics, and that's it, survival of the tribe be damned 🙃 (more on archaeological sexist biases on my blog here and here). Yes, women did indeed hunt in early human societies 🏹 (and paint, and probably invent technology, and do stuff in general, because they have brains too, what a notion). I love this topic, so I will be making a separate post about it at some time, but here are some more interesting articles on Prehistoric huntresses: 1, 2, 3, 4. These include some pretty recent studies with fascinating updated information on women's active participation in hunting during Prehistoric times, and how we should be reenvisioning how gender roles and the division of labour could actually have been in Prehistoric societies.
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| Artist's rendition of a Prehistoric huntress (Photo: Matthew Verdolivo, Source). |
However, the patriarchal bias remains in academic studies, with this (older) 2006 article stating that Neanderthal tribes had a less rigid gendered division of labour compared to Homo sapiens, with both men and women routinely participating in the hunting of big game (however, we do know with pretty good certainty that Homo sapiens women routinely hunted both big and small game, too), but then concluding that this 'relative lack of labour division' could have been a factor for the Neanderthal extinction (!), claiming that it resulted in 'a less efficient extraction of resources'. To me, and to other academic studies as well (many of them quite recent, like I said), it is rather more logical than better survival be instead achieved when the female part of the (small) population in each group, who is also fully capable of hunting - and even allegedly even having certain advantages for it, such as higher levels of estrogen providing Prehistoric huntresses with more stamina for longer runs - not be relegated to just gathering berries. But hey, academics, you do you 🤷♀️.
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| A depiction of a Paleolithic huntress. Source. |
🌹 More on Rose:
+1 Rose is
characterized fairly well, and, as per usual, shows the positive traits
of agency, resourcefulness, curiosity, assertiveness, open-mindeness and
intelligence she usually displays in the TV series, and also in this
New Series Adventures book series.
-1 However, she also gets the
short end of the stick, often in a very gendered way, in this plot. For
one, Rose is continually sexually harassed by icky (but adorkably
excentric!) lecherous colonist Quilley. This includes him ogling her
constantly (there is a sentence that quite literally reads "he looked her fur-bikinied body up and down and made an indescribable lustful noise"
ewwwww 😫), and also grabbing her at some point. Roberts already showing
us he thinks sexism and harassment are funny, or something. Rose keeps
being assertive and vocalizing how uncomfortable and angry he keeps
making her, warning him to keep his hands off her, not to ogle her and
to step out of her personal space (and then the sentence of "she was used to dealing with older men"
while thinking about her discomfort as something that she has
completely normalized is also just 😫). But this 'gag' drags on whenever this
dude appears in the book, which is fucking exhausting and infuriating,
and the Doctor generally doesn't seem to take this seriously, either,
when he's present, which is also, well, promoting that Quilley's
behaviour is more excentric than just plain wrong. Even when the Doctor
deigns to comment negatively on his behaviour, it's centered more on 'relearn basic
manners' (which OK, that too), rather than 'hello, can you please not harass my companion and women in general, thank
you'.
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| Me reading Quilley's relentless creepy af characterization |
But this isn't the end for Rose having a (not) great time in this
adventure. She then ends up in the Homo sapiens colony forcefully clad
in a painfully stereotypical and anachronistic (and uncomfortable) fur bikini and having to marry the grandson
of the tribe's wise-woman. A companion stuck in a sexualized outfit
and an arranged marriage conundrum, what an incredibly forward and
interesting thing for Roberts to write 🙃! The only way I would have found
this interesting in some way would have involved a clear social
criticism lens of women's societal roles and arranged marriages and so
on, but that is clearly so not the intention here, it's done mostly for
hilarious shenanigans once more. Rose does use her wits and agency to
try to get out of this pickle, but she also ends up having to actually
marry the guy because plot reasons, and said guy is so fit Rose does
actually feel attracted to him and at the end is not that against him kissing her,
so everything is all right, I guess 🙃! The Doctor also seems to think so,
(jealously 😑) rolling his eyes at the 'terrible ordeal' Rose must be
going through, and then relishing having a go at Rose's 'husband' during
their escape (the Doctor a good ally is not in this book). While he is
not the most toxic male character in the book as that is reserved for
Quilley (low bar, though), said husband (name of Tillun) also not the
brightest tool in the box and upholds more than one systemic patriarchal
idea about gender roles and what a wife should be, too.
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| Rose is so NOT having a great time in this book |
And, important note, even if a female character manages to brave through all of the gendered clusterfuck of violence and oppression (that her author wishes her to go through) by displaying all her positive traits, it still says a lot about said author that she's subjected to all of it in the first place, and through a humorous lens more times than not, which is even worse, because the way in which patriarchal violence and oppression is approached in a story makes all the difference in the world (for example, Handmaid's Tale has a very clear aim of denouncing said violence and oppression, and so it is read and viewed very differently). So, male authors, and I'm not even saying 'please': Stop👏 writing👏 unnecessary👏 and👏 unwarranted👏 traumafests👏 for👏 your👏 female👏 characters👏 already!
🌹 More on the female villain 👩🔬:
-1 While Missy is in my view
an excellent example of how an amoral and ruthless female antagonist
can totally work, the character of Chantal Osterberg is not doing
it for me at all. She is much more two-dimensional than Missy and, like
I mentioned before, seems to be constructed out of fairly stereotypical
traits that are seen through a more sexist view (this is even
lampshaded in the book, through the sentence "It was hard to threaten somebody who didn't posses a full personality"
Lol 😅). Chantal is a brilliant scientist and the leading researcher and
boss of her colony. She is also amoral, ruthless, unhinged and femme
fatale-sexy, and that combo with Roberts' way of writing her ticked me
off. Missy seem to conform to but at the same time fully subverts all of
these gendered stereotypes for a female villain, and that is what makes her so complex and compelling, in my opinion, but I feel that
Chantal is just another example of the stereotypical female villain
written by a questionable male author.
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| Missy just does it right |
✨Other problematic issues, from a feminist and queer pov:
+-1 Jack Harkness: John Barrowman problematic real life personhood aside, I'm not the biggest fan of Captain Jack as a character, although I'm at least relieved this book toned down his boisterous persona a bit, especially regarding RTD's questionable choice of portraying a pan/omnisexual character as flirting with (which is often more like harassing) everyone who he passes on his way 😬. He does get the chance to brag about his tight trousers, throw a couple of innuendos around (not so many, small mercies), and provide the Doctor and Rose with a naked diversion (sigh xD).
-1 One thing that really bugged me about Jack in this book is his treatment of Das's girlfriend/fianceé Anna Marie. It's fascinating how Jack is canonically supposed to literally want to jump everything sentient that moves (that is a queerphobic stereotype in itself, too, because pan/omnisexuality does *not* mean wanting to literally sleep with everyone on the face of the Earth), but yet he takes his time to wonder and get scandalized about how anyone can be attracted to Neanderthal Das, who has a 'feminine' high-pitched voice and is short and stocky without a waist, and how any man can be attracted to Anna Marie, who is, in his words, plain and fat and has facial hair and "a face only a mother or a Neanderthal could love" 😐. Aren't you supposed to be canonically attracted to everyone, dude?? I guess that means only canonically attractive people, or? 🙄 Jack Harkness definitely serves as a conduct for Roberts misogyny here. Also, Jack mainly mentions attraction to women in this book (except for a couple of mentions about the Doctor), which is an additional point of weirdness considering that the book was written by a gay author.
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| Definitely choose Bill Potts for Whovian queer rep done *right* |
-1 Another eyebrow-raising thing is that the book is supposedly revolving around the racially-motivated strife between Neanderthals and Homo sapiens, with the story sympathizing with the Neanderthals, portrayed, perhaps in a more idealized way than what have been in real life (I tend to believe that utopia is hard to come by anywhere), as the more pacifist, friendly and harmonious society of the two, while the Homo sapiens tribes are depicted as way more violent and territorial, accepting only new people if they are human and married to someone in their tribe. And yet, Roberts also makes use of 'man/woman' descriptors only for Homo sapiens tribe members, and constantly uses 'male/female' to describe the Neanderthals - a distinction which markedly dehumanizes them and makes them more comparable to animals than actual humans 😬.
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| Neanderthal women. Source. |
✨Ethical issues:
+-1 "'And what about them? They die, and it's history, and no one
cares. Just a little bit of genocide along the way to building a mighty
space empire? And that's just "the way it is here"?'" The book, via
the voices of Rose and the Doctor, generally tackles moral dilemmas with
the usual Whovian ethical messages, such as its anti-war stance and the
belief that the ends don't justify the means. A central ethical theme
is the persecution of the Neanderthals by the Homo sapiens for deeming
them 'inferior', and the Doctor and Rose share a few important conversations about
genocide and the problematic nature of humans in this respect. The
Hy-Bractor 'monster' antagonists are annihilated in their majority in
the end, though, which might have been the only way in the story to
avoid the slaughter of both the Homo sapiens and Neanderthals, but it's still
tackled by the Doctor with more nonchalance that should be expected.
+1
Another interesting topic discussed in the story is the exploration of the human colony, where people are not
only genetically engineered to live longer and be canonically beautiful,
but also supress their emotions with a constant use of chemicals to
avoid any 'wrong-feeling', stripping them not only of empathy and
meaningful inter-dynamics, but also of the capacity for agency and
individual judgment, as they blindly conform to anything their boss and
leader demands.
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| An Homo sapiens woman (artist's impression, source). |
+1 Finally, Neanderthal Das initially faces persecution for being different among modern humans, which is linked to their original persecution and ultimate demise as a cause of the Homo sapiens, according to the book. Das, however, manages to get a happy ending where he not only doesn't miss his original home, but relishes in modern technology and society and thinks that nothing is better than a life where you can buy junk food and watch TV in your sofa after work instead of a life dedicated to hunting to survive 😂. This character is an interesting take, as it strongtly defies the common stereotype of Neanderthals as savage and stupid compared to the way more intelligent Homo sapiens (this is also contested by research on their culture), with Das very quickly acclimating to modern human life with hardly any problems. Fortunately, this character also does not display a stereotypical 'Neanderthal sexist attitude' for humorous kicks (which is a relief, because we do have sexism for humorous kicks in this book otherwise). For example, he manages to understand the concept of consent and healthy relationships much better than Jack Harkness from the 51st Century, for one, which is ironic to say the least.
✨If you want to read more reviews of the Doctor Who New Series Adventures:
-The Clockwise Man (New Series Adventures, #1)
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