Jodie is back for next year.

[Professor Zoom]

I never said that anything was heralding the end. In fact, I said that the number of episodes was not such a concern by itself. It's the number of episodes in conjunction with everything else. And, even then it's not the biggest concern. I actually don't think they need to make huge adjustments. But, it is a little concerning that the episode count is dwindling, gaps remaining long, and now the AI is declining. While the ratings are higher, they haven't stabilized like they had in previous seasons.

Again, though, why do you feel the dwindling episode count means anything other than fewer episodes? I know you are not literally saying it's heralding the end, but, you are including the lowered episode count as meaning something "Not Good." Why is it concerning?

It could be a GOOD thing. Less episodes could mean more money for each. If the overall budget is going done, maybe, less episodes mean maintaining the budget for each episode. It could mean more attention to each episode. It could be a way to make it easier in pre and post production.

When many shows globally are doing less episodes per season, it doesn't necessarily mean anything, even in conjunction with the other things. Especially, when, among all of those other points, ratings have gone UP.

I get what you are saying, it's a part of a larger thing, but, when you say things are trending in the "wrong" direction, that's an opinion. Other shows have 10 episodes, it's not uncommon for shows in the UK to have an irregular release schedule. Are ALL shows in the UK moving in the "wrong direction"?

The issue I'm more concerned with, if I had to pick one, would be the storytelling. Now, YMMV, but this season has been underwhelming for me. Not bad, just sort of there for the most part. The AIs would suggest that others feel the same way. But, they have a strong core cast, so they have a good base to build on.

There's a very interesting conflict of information, ratings have gone UP while AI has gone down. Hopefully, someone smarter than us, can unpack that apparent contradiction. Is it an audience change? Brand new people? How do they collect the information to create the AI score?

 

[Mr Awe]

Again, though, why do you feel the dwindling episode count means anything other than fewer episodes?

Again, I'm not saying that by itself it is a huge deal. It's the entire set of issues taken as a whole that is suggestive of a downward trend. As I mentioned, this is a situation where multiple lines of evidence are suggestive whereas an individual line might not be by itself. I'm not going repeat what I said for a third time, but you can go back and reread it if you wish.

Yeah, I don't pretend to understand the ratings vs AI. Although, the AI score matches my impression of the season, so that makes sense to me. And, it might also explain why the ratings haven't stabilized like in previous years.

And, yes, that is an opinion. Just like you have your own opinion. I'm glad you're happy with the status quo.

 

[Starkers]

There's a very interesting conflict of information, ratings have gone UP while AI has gone down. Hopefully, someone smarter than us, can unpack that apparent contradiction. Is it an audience change? Brand new people? How do they collect the information to create the AI score?

Ratings have gone up but there's been a pronounced drop week by week (mostly) which doesn't tally with any other post 2005 season, usually they kinda even out. It Takes You Away is the first episode to actually be watched by fewer people than in a S10 episode (admitedly Pilot and the season opener always gets more viewrers). There's an odd disparity between better ratings yet more drop off basically.

As for the AIs I don't know, maybe the BBC changed how they're scoring it, maybe it doesn't even matter (Who is the only show where it does seem to matter-to the fans at least) but barring the finale doing gangbusters they're probably the poorest the show's been post 2005. On average S11 score is 81.3, Series 10 the average was 82.8 and for comparison Matt's first season was 86.2 and David's 84.5. With David and MAtt the show regularly scored 86s, 87s even 89s on occasion. The highest AI in series 12 is 83 for The Woman Who Fell to Earth, Rosa and Arachnids. Now to me it doesn't make a lot of sense that Kablam and It Takes You Away are worse episodes than spiders, but the BBC wouldn't collect the info if it didn't have some bearing.

I don't know maybe it is just Who fatigue. Maybe even if David or Matt were still around the figures wouldn't be any different.

Info's here if anyone wants to take a look, obviously this is only my interpretation!

 

[Professor Zoom]

Again, I'm not saying that by itself it is a huge deal. It's the entire set of issues taken as a whole that is suggestive of a downward trend. As I mentioned, this is a situation where multiple lines of evidence are suggestive whereas an individual line might not be by itself. I'm not going repeat what I said for a third time, but you can go back and reread it if you wish.

I'm not asking you to repeat. I'm asking you to expand, to clarify. I'm asking specific questions because I'm trying to understand better why you see the same things that I do, yet you are coming up with a very different result. Why you consider something that, for the most part as normal, as a downward trend.

You don't have to answer, of course.

Yeah, I don't pretend to understand the ratings vs AI. Although, the AI score matches my impression of the season, so that makes sense to me. And, it might also explain why the ratings haven't stabilized like in previous years.

Ratings have also gone up, compared to previous series.

And, yes, that is an opinion. Just like you have your own opinion. I'm glad you're happy with the status quo.

Cool.

 

[Professor Zoom]

Ratings have gone up but there's been a pronounced drop week by week (mostly) which doesn't tally with any other post 2005 season, usually they kinda even out. It Takes You Away is the first episode to actually be watched by fewer people than in a S10 episode (admitedly Pilot and the season opener always gets more viewrers). There's an odd disparity between better ratings yet more drop off basically.

As for the AIs I don't know, maybe the BBC changed how they're scoring it, maybe it doesn't even matter (Who is the only show where it does seem to matter-to the fans at least) but barring the finale doing gangbusters they're probably the poorest the show's been post 2005. On average S11 score is 81.3, Series 10 the average was 82.8 and for comparison Matt's first season was 86.2 and David's 84.5. With David and MAtt the show regularly scored 86s, 87s even 89s on occasion. The highest AI in series 12 is 83 for The Woman Who Fell to Earth, Rosa and Arachnids. Now to me it doesn't make a lot of sense that Kablam and It Takes You Away are worse episodes than spiders, but the BBC wouldn't collect the info if it didn't have some bearing.

I don't know maybe it is just Who fatigue. Maybe even if David or Matt were still around the figures wouldn't be any different.

Info's here if anyone wants to take a look, obviously this is only my interpretation!

Do you know how the AIs are scored? How do they do it? Do they have a sample pool that has to answer questions? Do they make... for lack of a better idea... phone polling?

They don't really collect that information here in the US. Well, maybe they do, but, they don't release that information. Just how many and how many in a certain demographic

EDITED TO ADD: reading about it now on Wiki.

 

[Starkers]

No idea. Someone like @StCoop or @diankra may have a better idea. It will be a representative sample, and I doubt the method has changed much or we'd have heard about it.

Obviously it's a way off but the S12 ratings will be interesting to see.

 

[Professor Zoom]

No idea. Someone like @StCoop or @diankra may have a better idea. It will be a representative sample, and I doubt the method has changed much or we'd have heard about it.

Obviously it's a way off but the S12 ratings will be interesting to see.

looking at Wiki, it's a pool of people with a sort of daily diary, with a scale of 1 to 10 as answers to certain questions.

I wonder if there are other shows in the UK that have similarly high ratings with similar AI scores. While fallen from previous seasons, is this sort of AI score and rating more normal than we know? Or do shows with similar audience ratings generally have HIGHER AI scores?

 

[Mr Awe]

I'm not asking you to repeat. I'm asking you to expand, to clarify. I'm asking specific questions because I'm trying to understand better why you see the same things that I do, yet you are coming up with a very different result. Why you consider something that, for the most part as normal, as a downward trend.

I think it's just a matter of us having a different perspective. I see the number of episodes going down, gaps remaining long, and, ok, that's fine if the quality improves. But, here's where it gets subjective. In my opinion, the long gap and fewer episodes didn't increase the quality. In fact, I felt like this was the weakest season of the new Who. Of course, YMMV. But, I feel like the decline AIs and ratings that didn't really stabilize like other seasons fit in with that perception.

So, I think we just have a different perspective about how the season was. Although, I'd completely agree with you that if I felt that quality of the season was really high I wouldn't mind the other issues. But, the way I perceive it is that we're getting fewer episodes, long gaps, *and* declining quality. And, that's why it feels like the show is declining to a degree. I still enjoyed the season. It just didn't feel as good as the others to me.

 

[Starkers]

I think the show feels like it's been declining for a while but maybe it's inevitable. Irrespective of different show runners and different doctors the format doesn't really change that much. It's only a gut feeling but I suspect there was a big influx at first this season on the wave of excitement about Jodie, but I suspect many casual viewers who'd maybe already drifted away from the show did a kinda "Oh, it's still the shame show, right?" and drifted away again. There are lots of new viewers, I know several people who'd never watched the show before who came on board with Jodie but who knows how many people have left/become floating viewers?

This isn't necessarily a disaster, it doesn't necessarily herald the death of the show, but maybe we need to manage our expectations. It's possible the show will never again have the insane popularity it had during the Tennant/Smith years and that normal is what we had with Capaldi and good is what we have with Jodie. It's still one of the most watched show's of the week, the figures are up on what they were, and maybe with a bit of tinkering they can get the AIs up again.

To be honest the most worrying thing for me is the notion that the BBC bent over backwards to get Chibnall on board, I can't imagine there is a dearth of potential showrunners but it suggests the BBC feel that way and I fear if/when Chibnall leaves the BBC might shrug their shoulders and say "Well there's literally no one else on the planet left who'd want this job, we may as well pack up our Tardis." It makes no sense but it really does feel like it might be true.

 

[Australis]

Again, though, why do you feel the dwindling episode count means anything other than fewer episodes?

We've seen that in US shows often, that prior to a cancellation, fewer eps are ordered. Person of Interest comes to mind, but they were given enough wriggle room to provide a solid sendoff.

 

[BritishSeaPower]

It’s amazing to me that people are reading all these portents of doom for a show that’s still pulling above 25% of the potential viewing audience! For comparison, the episode ratings for Series 11 are on par with - if not better than - The Walking Dead Season 9, one of the most popular cable tv shows in the U.S. And the “viewing audience” in the U.S. is significantly larger so it commands a smaller percentage of the overall market share. To pick an over the airwaves, time travel show for comparison... Legends of the Tomorrow has only one episode above a million viewers, yet is reviewing pretty well.

Series 11 also outperforms the recently cancelled American show Timeless’s first season. Again, did better ratings where the market share is significantly larger.

For example, per the Nielsen company’s website, the week of Nov. 19, Sunday night football commanded only 11% of the total viewing audience in America. There is only a single drama in the to 10 that week, FBI, which had 5.6% of the audience. While the BBC and American TV are different beasts, there is no measure for “failure” or “disappointment” whereby a show is consistently in the top 10 of its air day and commands 25% of its available market for its time slot.

 

[Mr Awe]

I think the show feels like it's been declining for a while but maybe it's inevitable. Irrespective of different show runners and different doctors the format doesn't really change that much.

That's a great point. It's an old show. It's not new and fresh anymore. It has the ability stay newer and fresher than most shows its age, but there might well be a fatigue.

This isn't necessarily a disaster, it doesn't necessarily herald the death of the show, but maybe we need to manage our expectations.

I don't think so either. The core TARDIS team is great in my view. Jodi is an inspired choice for the Doctor. The series looks great. I think it would take just some tweaks to the writing. Less Chibnall. More strong villains, less observation, more agency. I also think there were a number of episodes that had too much exposition to move the story forward.

It's possible the show will never again have the insane popularity it had during the Tennant/Smith years and that normal is what we had with Capaldi and good is what we have with Jodie. It's still one of the most watched show's of the week, the figures are up on what they were, and maybe with a bit of tinkering they can get the AIs up again.

That sounds a bit like ST:TNG which was insanely popular, but its sequels were never able to recreate that popularity. There was a franchise fatigue. Perhaps a similar phenomenon? That might be true for the public at large, but I'm a long time DW fan. And, the current season still feels like the weakest since the show restarted.

To be honest the most worrying thing for me is the notion that the BBC bent over backwards to get Chibnall on board, I can't imagine there is a dearth of potential showrunners but it suggests the BBC feel that way and I fear if/when Chibnall leaves the BBC might shrug their shoulders and say "Well there's literally no one else on the planet left who'd want this job, we may as well pack up our Tardis." It makes no sense but it really does feel like it might be true.

That's my worry as well. And, we've discussed this elsewhere, but I think a big part of the problem is expecting an individual person to be able to master both the production side and the story writing/editing side for a show as complex as DW. That's going to be a rare individual indeed. RTD might have been the only one who truly mastered both of those very specialized skill sets. Ultimately, that's what doomed the Classic series too. So, it might be history repeating itself. I'd only differ in that I think it does make sense that they're running out of potential showrunners.

Oh, and one more point on that. Even if there were people who were interested and qualified, given the age of the show, there might be less appeal in accepting the demands of the position. When DW was shiny and new, at the height of its popularity, you can see how it would be a bigger draw! It's not new and shiny any more. No longer has the sense of trail blazing as before. Potential showrunners might not see the benefits outweighing the demands of the job!

 

[Professor Zoom]

We've seen that in US shows often, that prior to a cancellation, fewer eps are ordered. Person of Interest comes to mind, but they were given enough wriggle room to provide a solid sendoff.

True. But, then the US has a different business model. However many new non network shows in the US are lower episode counts now. Like on the cable channels and the premium.

Even some network, like The Good Place.

 

[Emperor-Tiberius]

The show's not doomed. The ratings are up. The cast is well-liked, regardless of the overall controversial reaction.

So 2020? Fuck you, BBC. Fuck. You!

 

[Timelord79 (he/him)]

The show's not doomed. The ratings are up. The cast is well-liked, regardless of the overall controversial reaction.

So 2020? Fuck you, BBC. Fuck. You!

2020 starts on January, 1st.

Until they announce that the episodes they start filming next month won’t appear until September/October 2020, I won’t be worried.

 

[Gingerbread Demon]

I'm so happy she's back

 

[Gavin70]

Do you know how the AIs are scored? How do they do it? Do they have a sample pool that has to answer questions? Do they make... for lack of a better idea... phone polling?

Looking at the way AIs are counted I noticed that it only applies to those who watch the show live. And it's a pretty small number of people, relative to the numbers who are watching the show. Which, to me, suggests that those rating it are more likely to be hard core fans, who are likely to be less forgiving of anything they perceive as issues. And the fact that the style of the show has changed substantially from what it was under Davies and Moffatt means that those fans might be judging it based on what they liked about the previous style. The fact that the ratings remain high, I think is the more important thing. That means that people are still watching the show in large numbers, which wouldn't be the case if they weren't enjoying it (I know hardcore fans will generally continue to watch regardless of their feelings about the quality, but more casual viewers are likely to give up on a show they're not enjoying).

In any case, I'm definitely enjoying the new series. In fact, having just rewatched series 4-8 (about to start series 9) I found that I enjoyed it significantly more than series 7-8 which I really struggled getting through).

 

[Lonemagpie]

Mandip Gil says she's back as well - though more a let slip than an official announcement.

 

[Seven of Five]

It's strange that we have such a long gap between seasons, but I'm already over. There's plenty more other series to fill the void inbetween these days.

I was a fan of nuBSG back in the day, and that was awful at suffering from being delaying half a season for a year or more. I'm quite used to series sometimes taking a longer gap between seasons. The Leftovers missed a year before the final season, and Fargo has just missed a year. Game of Thrones did it last year, and that was after season 7 was delayed by a few months so they could film scenes with the appropriate weather.

These things happen. We're lucky/spoilt to be living at a time when there is a ridiculous amount of good TV to watch.

 

[Gingerbread Demon]

Well the BBC put out a brief video spoiling that the screeching pepperpots are back.

Why are they spoiling this for everyone?