Attractiveness in TV on the Other Side of the Pond

I am going to take one thing I know and apply it to a whole group.  Whoops, stereotyping.  So when I say that I like British TV because they tend to cast people who don't conform to cutural beauty, what I really mean is I like Doctor Who because the cast is made up of people who aren't traditionally beautiful.

This is a wonderful thing.  For one, it makes them far more relatable.  This?  Is not what the normal housewife looks like.

And when I went to high school, there were zero people who looked like this.

In summary, American television LIES.  As entertaining as I find both these shows (Modern Family and Vampire Diaries, respectively), they create unrealistic expectations of what people should look like.  Which is stupid.  I want television programs that show what people look like.  The end.  Not what they should look like.

Which brings us to Doctor Who.  Granted, the actors and actresses who star in the show are more attractive than the average person you will see as you wind your way through the aisles at Walmart.  However, they are much closer to the norm than what I've grown accustomed to seeing in the media.

Let's start with the Doctor, versions Nine, Ten, and Eleven.
(I tried to choose pictures that were from the show, not promos, and spefically not pictures of them that make me swoon.  I went for normal.)

Nine is not attractive to me at all, actually.  The show itself mocks his big ears and big nose.  But that makes him no less awesome.  Nine is a powerhouse, driven by rage and regret.  But he also has a massive grin that melts my heart.  By the end of series one, his companion had fallen in love with him, and so had I.  And I'll admit that while my love for him was mostly above-board and selfless, there were some instances where he rocked the sexy.  A certain glance, a sneaky expression. 

So thanks, Nine, for being a love interest and sexy, despite being traditionally "unattractive."

Before watching the show, I knew that Laura's favorite was Ten, and more than that, he was on her list of Freebies as discussed and approved by her boyfriend.  But looking at pictures of him, my reaction was something like, "Sure, he's got fantastic hair, but...eh.  He's marginally attractive, but nothing special."

My word, was I wrong.  Once that 2D face became animated, and he jumped around and had adventures, once he flirted with Rose and saved the world a bunch of times, once he lost everything and nearly cried, well.....I find him very attractive.  Like, probably he is the perfect man.

But once again, the show mocks him, pointing out he is a bean pole several times.  He isn't supposed to be super beautiful.  He's a guy who is handsome because of who he is and what he does.

Oh, Eleven, you had everything working against you.  He replaced the man I loved, he barely has eyebrows, and his hair is floppy in a weird way.  But then I heard his sexy voice, and when he interacted with the TARDIS I fell in love with him. 

He is the ultimate hipster, and probably the Doctor who is dressed and made up to be the most stylish (though as a wannabe hipster I may be seeing positives where the rest of the world sees negatives).  However, despite his killer jaw, the eyebrows!  And as I saw someone comment on tumblr: "his face is a rectangle with hair on". 

Eleven proves that things besides looks can be sexy, and once again, it is the actions and the personality that truly makes him attractive.


On to the companions!

Rose has an overbite and sometimes really awful hair, but she is spunky and compassionate, and the Doctor falls in love with her.  Martha is, okay, pretty freaking gorgeous, and ironically, the Doctor turns her down repeatedly, despite her being in love him; yet still she is intelligent and fierce when everything else seems lost.  Donna is older than the typical female lead and not model skinny, but she is hilarious and unwilling to let anyone take advantage of her or those she loves.  Amy is, once again, crazy beautiful, but it is when she ages 40 years that she really won my heart.  Rory has a big nose and almost no lips, but he is faithful and funny and smart, and I love him so much I named my cat after him.  River is (spoilers) the Doctor's wife (I'm calling it even though it's not for sure), and she rocks at being sexy, using her age and wild head of hair as assets rather than trying to conform to the norm.

The Doctor's companions tend toward the young and female, but overall, they are of different races, different sexes, different ages.  Some are more traditionally attractive than others, but they are all completely gorgeous in my eyes after watching their adventures with the Doctor.

And this says nothing of the one-episode characters or the background people, who range in weight and attractiveness to a very believable degree without that being the point.  The bigger people aren't slapped with the "fat character" label.  The black and Indian people aren't filling the "non-Caucasian" quota.  They simply exist and interact as people do in the real world.  And the show is better for it.

So please, America.  The more you inundate your shows with pretty people, the more bland pretty becomes.  It's not accurate, it's fairly insulting to your audience, and it's unnecessary to create a beloved show watched by millions.



Was this post really just an excuse to post pictures of the characters from Doctor Who?  Kinda feels like it, now that I'm done.