Get On, Clip In, Fall Off

UA1: Doctor Why?

Thanks to Nicholas for suggesting this first entry in my new "ten minutes, no references" project, now titled (as you can see) Unreliable Answers. The subject: "Why Dr Who got cancelled. Long term problems, or short-term silliness?", and my ten minutes starts... now.

By the mid-1980s, Doctor Who had been running for over twenty years, and had become as much part of the televisual furniture as the news. John Nathan-Turner had been producer since about 1981, and while pointing the finger at him is a popular hobby for Who historians I don't think he was single-handedly responsible. The reasons were probably twofold.

Firstly, the format was getting tired. While it was a winner, ideas were running thin, and during the Davison years it became alarmingly clear that the series was in a rut. Certainly there were some great stories, but nothing like the outpourings of writerly creativity that marked the Pertwee and Baker years. This rut was mishandled by the producers. Rather than looking at the whole series in a new light (for instance, being stuck on Earth was good for Pertwee's Doctor, as without the TARDIS available most of the time they had to concentrate on writing good stories rather than handwavey science fiction) they tried to get round it with short-term gimmicks and celebrity guest stars. Bonnie Langford's always the person people think of here, but far more harmful were casting decisions such as Ken Dodd in Paradise Towers. When the Happiness Patrol and the Candyman burst onto the scene, you knew things were getting bad.

The series was, in short, taking its continued existence for granted, rather than continuing to justify its production budget and prime teatime scheduling. This was finally realised in Sylvester McCoy's second season as the Doctor, leading to a totally new direction and some fantastic, innovative, thought-provoking stories such as Ghost Light and the Curse of Fenric, but by now it was too late.

Secondly, of course, BBC management was not sympathetic to Doctor Who. Michael Grade made no secret at all of his disdain and dislike for the series, interfering to the extent of insisting on Colin Baker's replacement. Whether Baker was a success or not in the part I'm not going to dwell on here, but when senior management are so openly hostile to a programme it's unlikely to change many minds. The rot had set in - hostile management needed to be appeased with ratings, and ratings were to be acquired.. how? With good stories? No - ultimately with big-name guest stars, as mentioned above.

Ultimately, the series would probably have continued a few years more had radical corrective action been taken by the production team earlier, producing a quality series which would help swing sceptical management minds towards the idea that continuing the series was a good idea. By the end - well, before that epic last season - it simply wasn't very good any more. It wasn't the series it had been, and I think the end of the series was more or less inevitable once Colin Baker got fired. That showed the management wanted an end to a dead-end series, and the producers failed to use the chance to rescue the series before it got canned.

In summary - a bit of both!

Time up! (10 minutes exactly). No time for any editing.

Posted by mpk at December 31, 2006 9:51 PM | TrackBack