Is this the end?
Jun. 1st, 2026 05:46 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shivverMore news and rumors about Doctor Who. Not exactly excited.
All of this comes from a video by WhoCulture, filtered through my husband as I didn't watch it myself. I'm not entirely fond of WhoCulture because they're often sensationalistic clickbait. Not all the time, but enough that I don't bother with them anymore.
The more concrete news, reported by The Sun (yeah, not necessarily reliable, which is why I said "more concrete"), is that the Christmas special this year may be delayed until Easter. I can't say I'm surprised, as they haven't even begun filming yet -- they've said they were planning to start shooting in September, but three months seems to be a lot shorter of a post-production time than they usually spend on an episode.
The next bit is more on the rumor side of things, and it's that the special won't be written by RTD, and that he and everything that had anything to do with the 2005 revival (Bad Wolf, Julie Gardner, etc.) are being cut. Okay, I'm not surprised by their cutting RTD. While I've loved the last two seasons, I know that others didn't, and the easiest way to change the current trajectory is to change the navigator.
I don't know what to think about the concept of ousting everyone else, though. That seems a bit harsh given that there's still no plan going forward. Keeping the same metaphor, you shouldn't destroy the plane mid-flight if you don't have your parachute on yet.
And then at this point, WhoCulture announced that Moffat was coming back as showrunner, and kept that going for a couple of minutes before admitting it was wishful thinking on their part. This is why I don't bother with them. If your show is reporting on rumors, don't add fake rumors to the mess. Many people can't tell when you're joking, and clips and quotes taken out of context just add to the misinformation out there.
Then, the third rumor is that the show is being ordered to abandon its monster-of-the-week format and move to a single season-long story, because that's what's popular now and no one watches MotW shows anymore. And this is the thing that bothers me the most.
Now, to be fair, I'm not entirely sure what this actually means. Do they want the show to be more like "Flux", which told one long story separated into six individual stories? Each of the stories in "Flux", except probably the last, were self-contained episodes that could be enjoyed without knowledge of the others, though you'd obviously miss some things. Or, do they want the show to be more like A Game of Thrones or Broadchurch, or more recently and in a similar genre, The Umbrella Academy or Stranger Things, which were more like a season-long movie cut up to fit into their time slots? No idea. In my mind, the first would be preferable.
But the thing that bothers me is that either format change alters the point of the show. And yes, I get that not everyone watches DW for the same reason as me. But, this is my journal and therefore my opinion. :)
A season arc show has to have something to focus on. In "Flux", it was the oncoming destruction of the universe and the reasons why (sorry, I really don't understand what ultimately happened so this is the best description you're getting). In both GoT and BC, the focus was on the characters and their interactions and on the politics. In UA (at least season 1), it was the interaction of the dysfunctional "family" and the discovery of what "Dad" had done. In ST (again, season 1), it was the kids trying to figure out how to navigate this adult-limited world while also trying to battle the looming otherworldly force.
(I know, you're going to say, no, BC was a murder mystery, and I continue to maintain that it was not. The show didn't provide clues to help you figure it out and wasn't following the detectives' work closely; Hardy only figured it out minutes before the murderer [not spoiling a decade-old show here] confessed. The thing that made BC stand out was that it explored the effect the murder had on the community, rather than just focusing on the murder.)
DW, or at least the DW that appeals to me, isn't like this. The appeal of DW is that it is monster-of-the-week, that it presents a new situation, a new threat, and delves into that, and how the Doctor and their companions deal with it shows us who they are. The Doctor and the companions are not actually the focus of the show -- the villain and the situation is.
This is one of the reasons why the Twelve and Clara era didn't work for me: the show focused on their squabbles, and the situations they were in were secondary. Twelve even did some rather OOC things for the narrative purpose of giving Clara something to argue about. (I'm talking in specific of his refusal to help the Viking village because it was only one village in danger, not the entire planet, and then justifying it by saying that defeating the Mire might bring others to attack the planet. That's not the Doctor. They don't have a threshold number of people to save, or consider whether they're worth saving.)
I realize that I'm probably in the minority here, but I really don't think that DW as a season-arc show will do it for me. I don't want the show to focus on the Doctor-companion relationship. Neither do I want to spend an entire season on one long convoluted storyline. I can get both of those in other shows. What I want is for the Doctor and their companions to explore the universe, see new things, and champion the oppressed. I want to watch an episode and then go, "Now what are they going to see next?"
But as we always say, the strength of DW is that it changes. I'm sure that if the show goes in the same direction as other shows (wow, that's even hard to type, thinking that DW is just going to go copy everyone else; I love it because it's unique and different), I'll still watch it, but as I did during Twelve's run, I'll just have to live in the past and retreat to the versions of the show that still capture my heart.
All of this comes from a video by WhoCulture, filtered through my husband as I didn't watch it myself. I'm not entirely fond of WhoCulture because they're often sensationalistic clickbait. Not all the time, but enough that I don't bother with them anymore.
The more concrete news, reported by The Sun (yeah, not necessarily reliable, which is why I said "more concrete"), is that the Christmas special this year may be delayed until Easter. I can't say I'm surprised, as they haven't even begun filming yet -- they've said they were planning to start shooting in September, but three months seems to be a lot shorter of a post-production time than they usually spend on an episode.
The next bit is more on the rumor side of things, and it's that the special won't be written by RTD, and that he and everything that had anything to do with the 2005 revival (Bad Wolf, Julie Gardner, etc.) are being cut. Okay, I'm not surprised by their cutting RTD. While I've loved the last two seasons, I know that others didn't, and the easiest way to change the current trajectory is to change the navigator.
I don't know what to think about the concept of ousting everyone else, though. That seems a bit harsh given that there's still no plan going forward. Keeping the same metaphor, you shouldn't destroy the plane mid-flight if you don't have your parachute on yet.
And then at this point, WhoCulture announced that Moffat was coming back as showrunner, and kept that going for a couple of minutes before admitting it was wishful thinking on their part. This is why I don't bother with them. If your show is reporting on rumors, don't add fake rumors to the mess. Many people can't tell when you're joking, and clips and quotes taken out of context just add to the misinformation out there.
Then, the third rumor is that the show is being ordered to abandon its monster-of-the-week format and move to a single season-long story, because that's what's popular now and no one watches MotW shows anymore. And this is the thing that bothers me the most.
Now, to be fair, I'm not entirely sure what this actually means. Do they want the show to be more like "Flux", which told one long story separated into six individual stories? Each of the stories in "Flux", except probably the last, were self-contained episodes that could be enjoyed without knowledge of the others, though you'd obviously miss some things. Or, do they want the show to be more like A Game of Thrones or Broadchurch, or more recently and in a similar genre, The Umbrella Academy or Stranger Things, which were more like a season-long movie cut up to fit into their time slots? No idea. In my mind, the first would be preferable.
But the thing that bothers me is that either format change alters the point of the show. And yes, I get that not everyone watches DW for the same reason as me. But, this is my journal and therefore my opinion. :)
A season arc show has to have something to focus on. In "Flux", it was the oncoming destruction of the universe and the reasons why (sorry, I really don't understand what ultimately happened so this is the best description you're getting). In both GoT and BC, the focus was on the characters and their interactions and on the politics. In UA (at least season 1), it was the interaction of the dysfunctional "family" and the discovery of what "Dad" had done. In ST (again, season 1), it was the kids trying to figure out how to navigate this adult-limited world while also trying to battle the looming otherworldly force.
(I know, you're going to say, no, BC was a murder mystery, and I continue to maintain that it was not. The show didn't provide clues to help you figure it out and wasn't following the detectives' work closely; Hardy only figured it out minutes before the murderer [not spoiling a decade-old show here] confessed. The thing that made BC stand out was that it explored the effect the murder had on the community, rather than just focusing on the murder.)
DW, or at least the DW that appeals to me, isn't like this. The appeal of DW is that it is monster-of-the-week, that it presents a new situation, a new threat, and delves into that, and how the Doctor and their companions deal with it shows us who they are. The Doctor and the companions are not actually the focus of the show -- the villain and the situation is.
This is one of the reasons why the Twelve and Clara era didn't work for me: the show focused on their squabbles, and the situations they were in were secondary. Twelve even did some rather OOC things for the narrative purpose of giving Clara something to argue about. (I'm talking in specific of his refusal to help the Viking village because it was only one village in danger, not the entire planet, and then justifying it by saying that defeating the Mire might bring others to attack the planet. That's not the Doctor. They don't have a threshold number of people to save, or consider whether they're worth saving.)
I realize that I'm probably in the minority here, but I really don't think that DW as a season-arc show will do it for me. I don't want the show to focus on the Doctor-companion relationship. Neither do I want to spend an entire season on one long convoluted storyline. I can get both of those in other shows. What I want is for the Doctor and their companions to explore the universe, see new things, and champion the oppressed. I want to watch an episode and then go, "Now what are they going to see next?"
But as we always say, the strength of DW is that it changes. I'm sure that if the show goes in the same direction as other shows (wow, that's even hard to type, thinking that DW is just going to go copy everyone else; I love it because it's unique and different), I'll still watch it, but as I did during Twelve's run, I'll just have to live in the past and retreat to the versions of the show that still capture my heart.
no subject
Date: 2026-06-01 04:05 pm (UTC)I mean, I saw a post about the Christmas special being delayed but some people were calling it clickbait since the BBC hadn't said anything. And I'm very aware of the people online who think the show needs to be "rebooted" now (why? the last two seasons were fine) or outright cancelled.
no subject
Date: 2026-06-01 05:44 pm (UTC)Of course there are people who think the show needs to be rebooted or axed. Those types of people always exist, who don't like whatever the show is right now and want it either to be changed to be what they want or killed so that no one gets to enjoy anything. They existed back during Chibnall's era, and during Moffat's era. And during RTD's first era, I'm sure there were a bunch of people who were whining that the reboot "destroyed" the classic show and demanded it be killed.
Whatever. They're not important. What's important is if the BBC thinks there's a problem and if so, what should be done about it. BBC officials have already said that they consider DW to be an important British cultural icon and do not plan to cancel it, but that doesn't mean that it won't go on hiatus or that they won't change the staffing or the format. All we can do is wait and see what comes out.
And like I said, if the show changes into something other than what I enjoy, then I'll probably still watch it but retreat back to Nine and Ten and Fifteen and classic and BF, and wish everyone else that they enjoy their new show.
no subject
Date: 2026-06-02 02:46 pm (UTC)The other weird thing is that RTD hardly mentioned Doctor Who at all on The One Show the other night. But then he was on there to promote Tip Toe, so that's to be expected, yet he normally uses any chance he can to talk about it. As I said: weird.
Like you, I've watched The Flux a couple of times and I still couldn't tell you what it was about without a long think. Villains that looked like Mardi Gras porcelain skulls, a dog man, lots of explosions in quarries, the Master as Rasputin, and a couple reunited. Why exactly the universe was being demolished.... couldn't tell you. Oh well. There were bits of it I really liked, people I cared about, and the Doctor came through. That's all I wanted.
Funnily enough, I think I might have seen that WhoCulture video your husband saw too. Lots of waffle, boasting "I know an insider", and left none the wiser. The interview in another video with Sylvester McCoy was a lot more entertaining. It reminded me that DW used to have 4 episode stories, but I can't see that format coming back. I suppose it'll all come down to budget whether we get a monster of the week or the series. *sigh*