Matt Smith: Christmas Regeneration?

As you may have seen yesterday, there are regeneration rumours surrpunding the 2013 Christmas special. The rumour is that Matt wants to leave the TARDIS in exchange for a career in Hollywood.
This is the only article I found that makes an attempt at debunking it:

"The last time showrunner Steven Moffat was asked how long incumbent Doctor Matt Smith would remain in the role, he snapped back with a cheerily brisk 'Forever. For the rest of time'. There's the slightest chance you know, that he wasn't telling the truth... 

"Of course he wasn't. If there's one thing more certain than death, taxes, and repetition of the phrase "Doctor Who?" in the new episodes, it's that Matt Smith won't be the Doctor forever. The Sun, amongst others, is keen for us to think that his departure will come sooner rather than later, namely, after the 2013 Christmas special. The newspaper ran a story suggesting that 'Insiders say the festive special will be Matt's last outing as The Doctor', citing Smith's ambition to break into Hollywood as his reason for bowing out after a four year stint. 

"The BBC was quick to respond to the story, and had this to say: 

"'Sorry folks but even we don’t know what’s going to happen at Christmas. It’s not been written yet! But Matt loves the show and is to start filming the unmissable 50th anniversary, and the new series starting on Easter Saturday.'

 "It's not exactly a denial, and neither was Smith's answer to the question posed by Jonathan Ross last week, 'I am very happy doing it. I do the anniversary special, then the Christmas special. At the moment it’s 2013 and we will see what 2014 holds.'”

-Den of Geek, "Doctor Who: BBC Responds to Matt Smith Quitting Rumours"

So there it is. Any allegations about Matt Smith regenerating for the Christmas special are not fact...yet.

While I was searching for that, I did come upon some very interesting "contreversy" over regeneration.
Some are saying that the Doctor's lack of gingerness is condoning anti-gingerism. The Telegraph
When Eleven does regenerate to twelve, will it be a woman? For my own aspirations of playing the Doctor, I hope so...The Huffington Post
Helen Mirren has her eyes on the role. The Huffington Post. 
And for all you worrying that he's run out of regenerations, here's reassurance for you, too. It's even a "fact"now.


What do I think of all of this?

The Impending Regeneration

Good. I'm really not a fan of the Matt Smith interpretation. He's...well, I'm going to be critical here, but before you say I don't know what I'm talking about, I do: I'm an actor, so I know that he can do better.
I do have to hand it to him that David Tennant's performance is a tough act to follow. Tennant, in general, is a phenominal actor. I first saw him in the televised version of RSC's "Hamlet" and loved it. That's a big reason of why I started watching Doctor Who. When you've seen an actor before, there's always a risk of it being that character playing the character. I didn't see Hamlet playing the Doctor. (I watched Casanova, which was done before Tennant started as the Doctor after I watched all of the Tenth Doctor, so I can't say that I saw Casanova playing either.) Of course, David has his trademarks that almost all his characters use--ie, "Welllll....," "Oh yes!," his eyebrows, but all those characters use those attributes differently.

In doing the Doctor so well, David also made it a really easy role to take over. We see so much emotion in Tennat's Doctor, and that lets us in to his personality. What we see him go through are emotions we all go through, but never talk about. I think that that's one of the best things about the Tenth Doctor. It may be that yes, I do have high expectations from any actor playing the role, and it is true that every Doctor is different from the last, but they still have traits from their previous regenerations:

"You know, I loved being you. Back when I first started, at the very beginning, I was always trying to be old and grumpy and important—like you do, when you're young. And then I was you, and it was all dashing about and playing cricket and my voice going all squeaky when I shouted. I still do that, the voice thing, I got that from you. Oh, and the trainers. And... [putting his glasses on] snap! 'Cos you know what, Doctor? You were my Doctor."

 -The Tenth Doctor to the Fifth Doctor, Time Crash

Anti-Gingerism

When the doctor eats beans and pears. It's quite simple: Amy is ginger and if the show had an anti-ginger agenda, then they wouldn't make someone as pivitoal as the Fantastic Amy Pond ginger.

Regenerating as a Female 

and Helen Mirren as the Doctor

Also good. As I mentioned, I really want to play the role. There were some pretty solid hints that Twelve will be female. In The Eleventh Hour, one of the first post-regeneration new-body panics in that he's now a woman. Then, in The Doctor's Wife, he mentions the Time Lord Corsair and his regenerations. He says: "He had that snake as a tattoo in every regeneration. Didn't feel like himself unless he had the tattoo. Or herself, a couple of times. Ooo, she was a bad girl." 

I did edit this photo. This is the original.

There are a couple of things that could prevent it, not "scientiffically," just from a buisness end. Since David played the role, we have the expectation for the Doctor to be a super-sexy man. While I do know females who are super-sexy men, Helen Mirren is not one of them--in fact, she is, sorry Helen, a bit on the older side, currently at age 67, and is a July baby so sould by 68 by the time she'd get the role. At 1200, the doctor is older than ever, but Helen would be the oldest actor at the start of her portrayl of the lonely god by thirteen years (William Hartnell, the First Doctor was 55 when he took on the role in 1963), which would be somewhat ironic as Matt Smith, who started as the Doctor at age 27, is the youngest actor to be the doctor by two years (Peter Davison was 29, and the third youngest was Tennant at 34). Then there is the fact that the Doctor being female would complicate the River Song-Doctor thing. I've got nothing against homosexuality--I'm a big suppourter of the LGBT movement--but I just don't see River as being a lesbian. Of course, the Doctor has now known River for three hundred years of his life, and we might just see River meet the Doctor for the first time before the eleven-twelve regeneration.

All and all, I've no problem with the Doctor being female, I just don't know how good it would be for the longterm continuing of the show...

Running Out of Regenerations

Again, we must remember that Doctor Who is a television show (yes, I know there are novels and comics and all sorts of other media of it, but mainly, it is a show) and show buisness is just that: buisness. Like the Doctor becoming female, it all depends on if the show is turning a profit or not. As long as it is, they'll throw continuity out the TARIS doors and into an event horison and/or find a reason why the Doctor earned extra regenerations.

In Conclusion...

There's a reason you're reading this blog: you like (or at leart are remotely interested) in Doctor Who. It's the longest running televison show on the planet, and thats because its fantastic. And I think it's gonna keep being fantastic for a long, long time.