Then it's time he was kicked off the show and replaced by someone who genuinely does give a damn about everything that made it great in the first place.
Why the lack of Classic characters?
- Thread starter Noddy
- Start date
Then it's time he was kicked off the show and replaced by someone who genuinely does give a damn about everything that made it great in the first place.
If you expect any professional to turn Doctor Who into a nostalgia-fest full of homages and cryptic references about the show's past, you're going to be disappointed. A nod here and there, yes, a couple of references, of course, but you're never going to get the kind of wasn't-it-fun-in-the-good-old-days museum show you're interested in. Anyway, nostalgia is not what made Doctor Who great in the first place, quite the opposite.
There are reasons why I think Moffat has failed as a showrunner and should have been shown the door or had his responsibilities curtailed in the past two years.
What you've said is not one of them. I don't think you can say with a straight face that Moffat doesn't care about Doctor Who. The man is passionate about Doctor Who. He genuinely cares, he genuinely tries, even if his execution falls short of his intentions.
I don't know why Moffat has played such a weak hand this year. I don't know if the BBC dealt him bad cards. I don't know if he was dealt good cards but misplayed them. I think it's probably a little bit of both. I'll say that while he made the best of what he had, what we've seen thus far is not what it could have been.
But I won't say that he doesn't give a damn. He cares about Doctor Who so much that he gave up Hollywood to work on it.
I think I agree. It really should have been so much more for such a momentous occasion, but for whatever reason, it won't be, and a lot of fans will probably be quite disappointed when the special does air.
And I still maintain my firm belief that the long-term fans deserve a lot better by far.
I do now recall reading a comment from Moffat saying "We didn't have enough money." So perhaps he did want to include a lot more, such as things and characters from the classic series, but just couldn't afford it, and was forced to drastically narrow the scope of the special down to the point it wasn't really a true acknowledgment of the last half-century. In that case, it's more the BBC's fault.
I think you're probably right.
The BBC will probably take flack from many corners of fandom because the anniversary didn't match their expectations. Depending on the din, the media may pick up on it and run with it. The BBC may find itself on the defensive. The fallout in November/December would be interesting to watch.
It's probably for the best that Moffat isn't on Twitter anymore.
I can't agree with that at all.
It's true, but the same can be said of almost any kind of television series or genre fiction with a strong following. That some people are disappointed and express their disappointed bitterly and loudly is to be expected in almost any circumstance and ultimately doesn't really mean much.
But you do agree that Moffat hasn't done the best he could have done at this time (which, I do concede, may not have been entirely his fault)?
On that, I am agnostic. We simply don't know all of the factors that led us to this point -- and likely won't for a number of years. Therefore, I don't know if Moffat could have done more but didn't or if he wanted to do more but couldn't.
Yes, but perhaps we should also bear in mind that he later admitted that he'd been lying his ass off for months about what was and wasn't going to be in the special.
I get that the special is going to major on recent stuff and characters. That's what most of the audience know. And I get that budget contraints will stop it being the huge event that some fans seem to thnik they 'deserve' just for being fans. What I don't get is why, with channels they can barely afford to keep on air because they can't make programmes for them, the BBC can't keep classic fans happy with a few repeats. That seems to be deliberate avoidance.
Maybe the BBC themselves are embarrassed by classic material and don't want to risk fans of the new show seeing it?
Maybe the BBC themselves are embarrassed by classic material and don't want to risk fans of the new show seeing it?
They have repeated some on BBC Four in the recent past, in fact I believe we watched some together last year. They're rumoured to be replaying 1 measly serial for the anniversary. But I'm surprised they haven't managed to come up with some idea to fill the schedules, 1, 2, 3, 4, they could have retrospective, cheap but new shows on BBC One, BBC Two with repeats of the new series, 4 with repeats of old, and then the new Anniversary stuff could share between 1, 2 and 3 and they'd have filled 10s or scores of hours for very little money and have pleased the fans.
I'm not saying they should do that, or that we deserve that, or anything like that. But it would make sense and be fitting in the anniversary year to do something special if not expensive.
I'm not saying they should do that, or that we deserve that, or anything like that. But it would make sense and be fitting in the anniversary year to do something special if not expensive.
Yeah, I remember how they aired serials from each Doctor at the time of the 20th anniversary. For me, and probably a lot of people my age, that was the first real chance to see Doctors 1-3 and shorter broadcasting days. And that was when there was only BBC 1 and 2 on air. Surely with all the channels they have now and all the screen time to fill, they'd not only be able to fit some in, but that they'd be actively glad of it?
That's the weird thing. BBC America has done better by Doctor Who this year than the BBC's own stations in the UK. The BFI film series is nice enough for those who can attend, but that's the problem with it -- it's for a very limited audience in a specific place. An "Eleven Faces of Doctor Who" (riffing on JNT's "Five Faces" in the run-up to "Castrovalva") on BBC 3 or BBC 4 should have been a natural. I'm curious if such a thing were ever under consideration and, if it was, who scuttled it and why.
Russell T. Davies provided fantastic nostalgia when he reintroduced Sarah Jane Smith and Davros, characters not seen on TV in many years. Steven Moffat himself brought in the Fifth Doctor for Time Crash. They were great call-backs to Classic Who, and for me anyway, further enriched the experience of the new series.
We're getting Day of the Doctor and An Adventure in Time and Space, which is a hell of a lot more than we should expect.
Sure, I'd have loved to have more. The anniversary year should have had its own full 13 episode season, but we're not exactly being ripped off either.
Using the Fifth Doctor in Time Crash was actually Tennant's idea, Moffat just wrote it.
That about sums up my feelings too.
Similar threads
