108
Popular Culture Review
variety of alien artifacts. Van Statten’s sole interest is in dissecting and
dismantling these possessions so that he may use them for personal and
financial gain, ripping-off alien technology to slowly sell it to the public.
He even boasts how he has found “[t]he cure for the common cold. Kept
it strictly within the laboratory of course, no need to get people excited.
Why sell one cure when I can sell a thousand palliatives?” {Doctor Who
“Dalek”). Furthermore, Van Statten is not only an overtly cold-blooded
capitalist, but he is also hungry for blood: along with his many items of
extraterrestrial technology, he has also captured a living alien, and,
angered by its unwillingness to talk, he repeatedly tortures the creature,
before eventually subjecting the Doctor himself to these atrocities.
Perhaps a commentary on the United States’ tactics in the War on Terror,
a more blatant rebuke of American government comes as Van Statten
proclaims, “The President is 10 points down. I want him replaced,”
implying that the U.S. government is controlled by those with deep
pockets {Doctor Who “Dalek”).
From an unfavorable depiction of an iconic American building.
Doctor Who next takes aim at an iconic American office—^the
presidency. At the end of the third season, the President of the United
States makes a trip to Great Britain. His immediate attitude and actions
after landing on British soil serve as an obvious statement on America’s
egocentrism in foreign relations, for the fictional President Arthur
Winters promptly commandeers the situation at hand and proceeds to
insult British Prime Minister Harold Saxon:
SAXON: Mr. President, sir.
WINTERS: Mr. Saxon. The British army will stand down. From
now on, UNIT has control of this operation.
SAXON:
You make it sound like an invasion.
SAXON: So America is completely in charge?
WINTERS: Since Britain elected an ass, yes. {Doctor Who
“Sound of Drums”)
Another arrogant and brash portrait of Americans, President Winters
makes apparent his desire to be in complete control and his un
diplomatic, lone-wolf, and somewhat vulgar take-charge attitude mirrors
that which George W. Bush projected around the world during his term
as president. As Earth prepares for its first contact with extraterrestrials.