Doctor Who: Lucky Day Review - 7 Ups & 3 Downs
4. DOWN - The Ableism Against Shirley
It's great to see Ruth Madeley back as Shirley Bingham, even if ("You've already got two mums" aside) she's slightly under-served by the script. But can we please stop using Shirley and her wheelchair as a shorthand to demonstrate how some characters are total bastards?
In The Giggle, Kate Stewart turned on Shirley while under the influence of the Giggle, claiming she was lying about her disability. Now, Conrad tries to claim Shirley is a benefits cheat, which is an odd moment on multiple levels. Firstly, we've already seen him be utterly horrible to Ruby, and he's positioned himself as an alien invasion "truther" in opposition to UNIT.
We know that Conrad is an awful person at this point, so him highlighting Shirley's disability and making an inappropriate joke just feels needlessly cruel and more than a bit cheap.
Representation is obviously important, and people with disabilities do face cruelty and abuse in the supposedly enlightened times of the 2020s. However, representation also means that characters like Shirley shouldn't just be onscreen to take the abuse of villains.
After The Giggle and Lucky Day, wouldn't it be great to see Shirley in a Doctor Who episode in which she wasn't verbally abused for being a wheelchair user?