Next! Your choice for the next Doctor.

[kirk55555]

If they're going to do another year plus break they might as well cancel the damn show. Its ridiculous to have such a long wait. American shows can produce 22 (and used to be 26) episode shows on a yearly basis, but apparently 12-13 episodes every two years is all the BBC can do with Doctor Who. At least stuff like Sherlock has decent excuses for years inbetween seasons, with Doctor Who this all seems like terrible planning. I honestly kind of hope that they come back to garbage ratings if they take another year off from Series 10. I love the show, but if its going to start taking scheduling practices from Sherlock (aka they'll do a season whenever they feel like it), I start to wonder what the point even is of keeping it around. Treat it well or don't bother, basically. Its like they want to kill the show off, but no one at the BBC wants to be known as the modern Michael Grade so they'll just kill the ratings to justify the cancellation.

If the problem is Chibnail, then drop him and get someone willing to do the work in a timely manner. Only producing one series of Doctor Who every other year will be the end of the show.

 

[JRoss]

@zoom, the first sentence of what Kirk said (otherwise TL;DR). If I am producing something I am not hiring someone who needs a break right off. Kinda like the whole Bryan Fuller debacle with Discovery, or the gap a few series back.

 

[Starkers]

Clearly the BBC are wedded to the idea of Chibnall given they were prepared to wait for him to finish up with Broadchurch, coercing Moffat to keep making Who in the meantime/trying to get Whithouse to do a single season to further allow them to get their man. People can whinge all they want but the BBC aren't going to jettison the guy they've gone to such pains to get. Don't get me wrong I'm slightly bemused that they really didn't think there was anyone else, but its their call at the end of the day and what are we Who fans going to do, boycott the show?

Long story short we'll get series 11 when we get series 11

 

[Ar-Pharazon]

Clearly the BBC are wedded to the idea of Chibnall given they were prepared to wait for him to finish up with Broadchurch, coercing Moffat to keep making Who in the meantime/trying to get Whithouse to do a single season to further allow them to get their man. People can whinge all they want but the BBC aren't going to jettison the guy they've gone to such pains to get. Don't get me wrong I'm slightly bemused that they really didn't think there was anyone else, but its their call at the end of the day and what are we Who fans going to do, boycott the show?

Long story short we'll get series 11 when we get series 11

There you go again, being reasonable

I just wonder if the continual drop in viewership has as much to do with the long gaps as it does with overall quality.

 

[marillion]

It certainly could be an explanation for here in the States.. yes.. we have LONG breaks between home grown series like Walking Dead, the Americans, Game of Thrones, etc... But There are other shows to engage us in the mean time.. BBC America has what? Top Gear 2.0 and ummmm... I can't think of another current show on BBCA other than Norton's show and Class..

 

[Professor Zoom]

@zoom, the first sentence of what Kirk said (otherwise TL;DR). If I am producing something I am not hiring someone who needs a break right off. Kinda like the whole Bryan Fuller debacle with Discovery, or the gap a few series back.

1. Do you just want it produced or do you want it produced by a certain person? If you want it produced by a certain person and that person has some demands, you make a choice to agree or not. The BBC wanted Chibnall. Wanted him badly enough to agree to his break.

2. Don't confuse the American system of making TV with the British system. They are different. Different demands of advertisers, different demands of audience, different costs, etc, etc.

 

[Allyn Gibson]

Hayley Atwell has ruled herself out for the role, endorsing Phoebe Waller-Bridge while she was at it.

 

[The Nth Doctor]

Pity, but at least she agrees that Waller-Bridge would be great.

 

[StCoop]

Hayley Atwell has ruled herself out for the role, endorsing Phoebe Waller-Bridge while she was at it.

No offense to her but was she ever in the running? If/when they do go for a woman I expect they'd go for someone more Tilda-esque. (In fact, if you choose to believe rumours coming out today they did just that but she said she'd only do it if the number of episodes each year was reduced.)

 

[marillion]

Eek.. Then we'd NEVER see it again... I already hate that we get so few.. Maybe it wouldn't be so bad if the breaks between weren't so long... I would be very happy with another 5 or 6 episodes per year.

That said.. I'd say no to Tilda... She's "too big" for the role, IMHO... Hayley is well known, but mostly in-genre.. Tilda is world renowned for her body of work.

 

[Allyn Gibson]

The only way I can see Chibnall offering the role to Swinton is if he did it to "kick the tires," so to speak, and see if she's interested but with the expectation that she'd either turn it down outright or make such outrageous demands (like a reduced filming schedule and/or a salary that the BBC couldn't pay) that he'd have to say, "You know, thanks but no thanks." Which I think was essentially the nature of RTD's offer of the role in 2004 to Hugh Grant; Grant turned it down and has since expressed regret at turning it down, but I can't imagine how RTD and Grant would have come to a meeting of the minds on schedule and money.

 

[The Nth Doctor]

Honestly, I don't think a reduced episode request is so out of the question. Sure, it sounds terrible from the perspective of Whovians, but look at other British dramas. Many of them average six to eight episodes and result in high quality productions. Further, Tilda Swinton has a pretty successful film career that she may want to continue to do in addition to a show.

I'm not advocating for such a compromise, I'm just saying it's not unreasonable for her or any other actor to request that.

 

[kirk55555]

Honestly, I don't an actor exists who would be worth dropping the number of episodes to get. Tilda Swinton is an interesting Doctor choice as a "What If" kind of thing, but Britain already does a hilariously pathetic number of episodes for their shows, including Doctor Who. Any less then the 12 we get would be terrible, and possibly a very damaging blow to the show internationally (which I know the BBC isn't allowed to care about, but still).

At the rate shows are losing episodes nowadays, soon US network shows will have 10 episodes a year, HBO/Netflix type stuff will have 5 episodes a year and Britain will produce shows of no more then 2 half hour long episodes every other year

 

[Jax]

American shows can produce 22 (and used to be 26) episode shows on a yearly basis, but apparently 12-13 episodes every two years is all the BBC can do with Doctor Who

The BBC is publicly funded and has to control it's budgets more so than other networks so that could influence them. Also Quality should always come before quantity. I would support 10 episode seasons with the Christmas special making 11 as long as they were good. Doctor Who is a ageing show in less demand today so it doesn't need the 14 episode format we got for much of the 2005+ run and maybe we don't need yearly episodes either.

 

[Mr Awe]

Disagree. We really need to maintain a stable set of 13ish episodes per year. Interest will start to wane with fewer than that--at least outside of the UK where we're just used to more.

 

[Ar-Pharazon]

If those 10 episodes were superbly written like, say, Orphan Black, with not a wasted second, fewer wouldn't be so bad.

But, they would have to know off that long hiatus BS and pretty much start in the same month every year.

Of course, OB is serialized, but DW with better writing all the time, would do OK with 10 episodes.

 

[Professor Zoom]

I'll always be interested in Who, so, 5 or 10 episodes a year, I don't care. Besides, plenty other things to watch and read while I wait.

 

[The Nth Doctor]

I'll always be intered in Who, so, 5 or 10 episodes a year, I don't care. Besides, plenty other things to watch and read while I wait.

Exactly. Not only that, it's not the only new Doctor Who media to consume. I'm rather behind on Big Finish audios, so there's plenty to draw from there for myself. And if less episodes means a greater chance of high-quality episodes for the entire season, I'm all for it.

 

[Starkers]

Disagree. We really need to maintain a stable set of 13ish episodes per year. Interest will start to wane with fewer than that--at least outside of the UK where we're just used to more.

But even outside of the UK fewer episodes is becoming the norm. Game of Thrones, Fargo, Better Call Saul etc. Ok The Walking Dead have 16 but even then given the US mid season break aren't you effectively talking about two seasons of 8? Sure there are still 20+ episode a season shows, but give me 10 quality episodes over 20 substandard ones any day.

Don't get me wrong, I think 13 is a perfect length for Who, and I think if they dropped into single figures I'd be somewhat perturbed, but I'd be ok with 10 episodes a series if it came to that.

 

[Mr Awe]

But even outside of the UK fewer episodes is becoming the norm. Game of Thrones, Fargo, Better Call Saul etc. Ok The Walking Dead have 16 but even then given the US mid season break aren't you effectively talking about two seasons of 8? Sure there are still 20+ episode a season shows, but give me 10 quality episodes over 20 substandard ones any day.

Don't get me wrong, I think 13 is a perfect length for Who, and I think if they dropped into single figures I'd be somewhat perturbed, but I'd be ok with 10 episodes a series if it came to that.

To be clear, most series do have many more episodes per season. 10 is still unusual--at least outside of the UK. There are a few exceptions you can point to but it's not the norm. To say it's becoming the norm is a big stretch.

Ten episodes might be the minimum amount. But, the quality would have to dramatically improve. Game of Thrones has tons of plot developments in each episode and it is highly serialized. If DW went with the notably higher quality level and highly serialized storytelling, it might work. That seems to be the hallmark of the shows with shorter seasons--quality and highly serialized. But, if it's just what we've been getting except fewer episodes, no thanks. The showrunners would need to commit to a substantially higher level before reducing the season.