Vote for your favourite TV Dr Who! Plus series discussion...

POSTED BY: chrisisall
UPDATED: Wednesday, December 28, 2011 00:51
VIEWED: 14385
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Originally posted by lwaves:
I always think that was a big part of Christopher Ecclestons reasons for leaving so soon. I don't think he knew what he was getting in to and of course when the show relaunched and became successful it hit him. Here was an actor that usually did more serious, quieter roles and suddenly he was this iconic figure.

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I had heard that he agreed to only one year from the very beginning for that reason; he was fine with helping re-launch the show by lending his acting reputation to it, but didn't want to go more than a year. You could be right, though, it could be that he came to that conclusion later on.

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Maybe some US fans could elaborate more on gow big the show is in America? Is it a cult show or does it have a wider audience?

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The audience is getting wider, I think, but it would still be classified as a cult show. A couple million people watch it on BBC America, but that doesn't truly mean success; a show here isn't a huge success until it breaks 20-30 million. Although, that's for network TV, there might be lower numbers for cable success. Still higher than what Who currently gets, though.


What reason had proved best ceased to look absurd to the eye, which shows how idle it is to think anything ridiculous except what is wrong.

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Originally posted by PhoenixRose:
The audience is getting wider, I think, but it would still be classified as a cult show. A couple million people watch it on BBC America, but that doesn't truly mean success; a show here isn't a huge success until it breaks 20-30 million. Although, that's for network TV, there might be lower numbers for cable success. Still higher than what Who currently gets, though.

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That it is. Though I havn't seen how the second, post-hiatus half of the recent season did, the first half back in the spring showed a drop in British viewers, accompanied by an increase in US viewers.

And yeah, for cable, a show is considered a hit with far fewer viewers. The Walking Dead is the biggest cable show ever, and it's peak has been around 8 million.

Who's American peak, ratings wise, has been about a million and a half. So, it's still a ways off from being a huge hit here.

"Goram it kid, let's frak this thing and go home! Engage!"

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Originally posted by Storymark:

That it is. Though I havn't seen how the second, post-hiatus half of the recent season did, the first half back in the spring showed a drop in British viewers, accompanied by an increase in US viewers.

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I think they've taken a slight risk - the last series seemed to be pitched at a more adult/SF-liking audience at the risk of alienating the UK child audience (the other thing about the show in the UK is that it hits the elusive 'ages 7 to 70' demographic). By 'adult' I mean wibbly-wobbly-timey-wimey temporal paradox plots (e.g. River Song's life story). I do like Moffat's mindfrack stories (other writers treat time travel as just a way of getting to interesting places) but I wonder what the kids make of it all. Not sure how many 7-year-olds know who Richard Nixon was, either.

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Originally posted by PhoenixRose:
I had heard that he agreed to only one year from the very beginning for that reason; he was fine with helping re-launch the show by lending his acting reputation to it, but didn't want to go more than a year. You could be right, though, it could be that he came to that conclusion later on.

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Hey PR,
This is my opinion garnered from interviews with Eccleston, Billie Piper and Russell T Davies from before the show started airing to the end of the first season. It's also me reading between the lines a bit with exactly what they said and the way they said it.
I too heard that Eccleston was on board for only a year, I believe they all basically were because nobody really knew how a new Doctor Who would go down with the audience so one year didn't commit anybody long term. The show definitely fitted into the definition of 'taking a gamble' and one interview with RTD just before the first episode aired had him saying that he'd be very happy just to get to a second season. He thought they had something worthy and that he understood the need to please the classic fans and bring in new ones during a primetime Saturday teatime slot. Not exactly a small task especially with all the publicity surrounding the relaunch.
Of course it became a big hit really quickly and I gathered none of them expected it to get so big, so fast. I think this along with the added attention and the fact that he wasn't signed on to a second year aided Eccleston in his decision. Like you said he'd used his 'clout' to relaunch the show, he waited to see what the outcome was and when that had been achieved very successfully he announced he was leaving at the end of the season. Bearing in mind as well that his announcement came very soon after the relaunch (about 2 or 3 episodes in if I remember correctly).

Of course this could all just be my right or wrong interpretation of events. Who knows (pun intended)?
I certainly don't blame him for going, whatever the reasons behind it were. He helped bring back one of my all-time fave shows. Plus if Eccleston had continued we wouldn't of had Tennant replace him and IMO he took the show even further and made it a monster success.

My hope now is that when the 50th Anniversary comes around in 2013 that the they manage to get the three new Doctors together for a special show. It's been done several times before and it will be worth watching in so many ways.


And as a trivia point that US fans may not know (and maybe UK fans) but two big mysteries started on the same day in November in 1963. The very first ever episode of Doctor Who aired on the same day that JFK was assassinated. Leaving us with who killed Kennedy and who is the Doctor?



"The greatest invention ever is not the wheel. It's the second wheel." - Rich Hall

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Originally posted by lwaves:

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My hope now is that when the 50th Anniversary comes around in 2013 that the they manage to get the three new Doctors together for a special show. It's been done several times before and it will be worth watching in so many ways.

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That's what most fans are hoping for, I think.

Though Id like them to include 8th Doctor Paul McGann as well. It wasn't his fault the TV movie was terrible, he was a pretty decent Doctor. And it'd work well title wise. They've done "The Three Doctors" and "The Five Doctors" already. Doing one with four is a natural fit.

"Goram it kid, let's frak this thing and go home! Engage!"

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