Entertainment
Doctor Who Showrunner Tries To Reassure Fans, Makes Everything Worse
By Chris Snellgrove
| Published
Right now, former Doctor Who showrunner Russell T. Davies seems to have a new full-time gig: sticking his foot into his mouth. Previously, he was revered as the man who brought this franchise back in 2005, turning a show that only older nerds cared about into a youth-friendly, worldwide phenomenon. Eventually, Davies left, and other showrunners (including the excellent Steven Moffat) took the reins. But enthusiasm for the franchise waned when Jodie Whittaker played the Doctor under showrunner Chris Chibnall. To help the show get its groove back, the BBC partnered with Disney and brought Davies back for two more seasons, both of which streamed on Disney+.
Unfortunately, it was a disaster. Disney refused to renew their deal with the BBC, meaning that a third season under Davies was more or less dead. Fans still hoped to see a Christmas special, but the showrunner dashed those hopes recently by hopping on Instagram to confirm that 1) the special, which he never even wrote, was canceled and 2) the BBC had parted ways with him and his production company. This led to widespread news that Doctor Who had been canceled over 20 years after its revival. Now, Davies claimed in a recent interview that the show hadn’t actually been canceled, but his phrasing has angry fans wanting to shove a sonic screwdriver into his mouth.
Getting Angry With The Fans
In an appearance on Gaydio, Russell T. Davies expressed anger at those reporting that Doctor Who has been canceled. “It’s extraordinary to see newspapers, who should know better, saying the show has been canceled,” he said. “It’s the opposite.” He went on to explain that the show is “being put out to tender,” meaning that the BBC will try to find an independent company that is willing to produce the show. By way of example, Davies noted that the show Casualty was previously “a BBC show,” but after being “put out to tender last year,” the show will “be made independently by BBC Studios,” which he noted was “separate to BBC Public Service.”
Wrapping up his thoughts on the matter, he speculated that nobody is going to apply for a tender for Doctor Who for at least a year. “You got to lock it in just to make it financially worthwhile,” a move that he thinks “guarantees years of the program.” He then ended this statement with some of the cattiness that has become his recent trademark: “But no, go ahead and call it canceled, everyone. You’re wrong. You’re literally wrong!”
All Of This Has Happened Before, And It Will Happen Again
So, why are fans irked at these words from the Doctor Who showrunner? For one thing, many are still salty about his recent Instagram post, where he claimed that he had never worked on a Christmas special despite previously saying he did and even teasing elements from a presumably completed script. The great writer effectively wrote himself into a corner, having basically admitted that he was either lying before about having worked on the script or lying now about having never worked on the script. Mostly, though, fans were annoyed at Davies’ pedantry here because what he is describing is a cancellation by another other name.
For example, the last episode of the original Doctor Who series aired back in 1989, after which it was effectively canceled. I say “effectively” because, according to the BBC, the show was never officially canceled. They simply stopped commissioning Doctor Who episodes (not counting the weird 1996 made-for-TV movie) for a period of 16 years. Fans now call these “the wilderness years.” We might have been in the wilderness even longer, but the BBC was so impressed by Russell T. Davies’ pitch that they made him showrunner for the celebrated 2005 Doctor Who revival.
More Who When?
On Gaydio, Davies seemed to revel in snarky pedantry, noting that fans who don’t understand what is currently happening with the franchise “are complaining on devices which have a search engine. Go and look it up.” But Davies is acting like this is just a temporary bump in the road and we’ll see new Doctor Who episodes in just a few years. But there’s no guarantee about that, and the last time the franchise was forced into hiatus, it was the better part of two decades before we got new episodes. Furthermore, while many changes were for the best, it’s worth noting the new show was very, very different from what came before.
Accordingly, Davies’ attempt to reassure fans completely backfired. Along with reminding us that we just don’t understand media like him (the guy who recently ran this franchise into the ground), the former Doctor Who showrunner reminded us that the last time the show was not officially canceled, we didn’t have any new episodes for 16 years, and the show came back completely different from what it was before. Because of that, no amount of snark and pedantry about whether it is officially canceled changes the fact that Doctor Who fans have every reason to be worried about a show they might not see more of for literally decades.