Television seems to milk drama series for all they are worth, these days, literally capitalising on the success of any given parent show. Just look at “Doctor Who”! Running alongside the mother series, there’s “Doctor Who Confidential”, “Totally Doctor Who” (which seems to have dematerialised this year), “Torchwood”, “Torchwood Declassified” and “The Sarah Jane Adventures”… and all from a show which is itself a remake, not an original idea as it was back in 1963. To me, this burgeoning industry doesn’t suggest imagination is alive and kicking in the new millennium! Storytelling, at least in this visual medium, has become stale.
The “creator” of this “Doctor Who” retread (I’m sure you all know his name by now!) has the audacity to claim there was never any golden age of television! If that’s the case, why have the BBC just celebrated forty years of “Dad’s Army”? Hearty congratulations to the Walmington-On-Sea platoon of the Home Guard! “Little Britain” will, hopefully, be forgotten long before it reaches such a landmark. But, why will the chief writer of the Time Lord’s soap opera adventures have spent the best part of a decade, by the time he moves on from his exalted position as show runner, bringing the series back into the public eye if it doesn’t hail from a much-loved era? It’s not a particularly creative move for a supposedly talented writer. The answer is, of course, money.
The present executive producer of “Doctor Who” has, undoubtedly, made enough cash to ensure he can now go off and write whatever he wants and not have to worry whether or not any new project will recoup its investment. Never mind having destroyed a national institution to arrive at that enviable position. The common view is that he has revived the science fiction series rather than completely bent it out of shape! Other than a fat paycheque, why remodel an old show? What would’ve been wrong in having the self-confidence to invent something dazzlingly new, thus proving his worth beyond any doubt, rather than disastrously distorting a glorious twenty-six year history? “Doctor Who”, with one or two small exceptions, would’ve been better left alone, untarnished.
The “creator” of this “Doctor Who” retread (I’m sure you all know his name by now!) has the audacity to claim there was never any golden age of television! If that’s the case, why have the BBC just celebrated forty years of “Dad’s Army”? Hearty congratulations to the Walmington-On-Sea platoon of the Home Guard! “Little Britain” will, hopefully, be forgotten long before it reaches such a landmark. But, why will the chief writer of the Time Lord’s soap opera adventures have spent the best part of a decade, by the time he moves on from his exalted position as show runner, bringing the series back into the public eye if it doesn’t hail from a much-loved era? It’s not a particularly creative move for a supposedly talented writer. The answer is, of course, money.
The present executive producer of “Doctor Who” has, undoubtedly, made enough cash to ensure he can now go off and write whatever he wants and not have to worry whether or not any new project will recoup its investment. Never mind having destroyed a national institution to arrive at that enviable position. The common view is that he has revived the science fiction series rather than completely bent it out of shape! Other than a fat paycheque, why remodel an old show? What would’ve been wrong in having the self-confidence to invent something dazzlingly new, thus proving his worth beyond any doubt, rather than disastrously distorting a glorious twenty-six year history? “Doctor Who”, with one or two small exceptions, would’ve been better left alone, untarnished.
5 comments:
Strong words indeed, TimeWarden. I guess new writers = new era and new style. Whether that's always a good thing or not is open to some debate!
Oh dear, you sound very down on New Who again. From your comments on Season Four I got the impression you were liking it a lot more?
For better or worse, no programme can remain precisely the same. If you look at Dr Who in 1963 and compare it with its much later incarnation in 1989, you'll see a lot of difference I bet...
I don't think a new show runner will make too many changes to a commercially successful format, Steve. Have to wait and see but the BBC won't want a whole season of esoteric stories! I don't want that either!!
I only reviewed five of the thirteen episodes, Simon, and didn't exactly warm to the last of those! Far from Donna's fate being poignant, it is impossible for the Doctor to completely wipe her memory of him when relatives take photographs at weddings!! The closing, interminably long, fifteen minute slush-fest of "Journey's End" wrecked the entire season.
It's true that "no programme can remain precisely the same" and by 1989 the series was in colour with a different lead but still identifiably "Doctor Who". It produced two classics in its final year, which no fan should be without, featuring none of the soap histrionics which have deeply scarred its return. "Ghost Light" and "The Curse of Fenric" have been matched by nothing since a pretender, using the same title of "Doctor Who", appeared on our screens in 2005!
Billie looks hot in that photo !! :)
That's why I chose it, Andrew! ;)
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