The death of Doctor Who (hopefully an exaggeration)

Urgh, I’ve already had to live through two eras of “They aren’t going to be making Doctor Who anymore” and it looks like we are just about to enter a third, with the announcement today that there won’t be a 2026 Christmas special after all, and that the BBC has broken with Russell T Davies and Bad Wolf. They say they will be putting the show out to independent tender in the future, and the CBeebies animated series is going ahead. But the mood music seems pretty bleak at the moment around the fandom and the franchise. Naturally, I have had my tuppence for the Guardian:

“The 2005 revival worked because Davies threw away the continuity baggage, only gradually reintroducing old elements. Assuming a new production company wants a clean slate – a new showrunner, Doctor, companions and a reimagining of the concept – the end of The Reality War and the lingering question of: ‘Is or isn’t Billie Piper the new Doctor?’ feel like a poisoned chalice. Part of the problem remains that the BBC is unclear as to what it wants the show to be.”

You can read the piece in full here: ‘A poisoned chalice’: will Doctor Who survive Russell T Davies’s exit?