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The Gap Year

Monday, September 3rd 2007.

Some not entirely unexpected news about David Tennant and Doctor Who in 2009 and 2010.

Its something I've previously speculated about with friends, and in my mind deferring series five by a year is a pretty shrewd move. Year on year we've had casting speculations conflicting with reassurances that David Tennant was in the show for the long haul. Paranoid fan-fears that the Doctor was going to run out of regenerations (not something we ever heard when the original series was on-air) didn't help, and today's announcement is easily the most reassuring one yet.


The obvious reason for the gap year (with three specials it's not quite a hiatus) - allowing David Tennant and Russell T Davies to continue being involved - is interestingly not why I was expecting this particular piece of news.



If you break Doctor Who down into stories rather than episodes, Tennant will have been in some 47 stories by the end of Series Five: five or six more stories than Tom Baker. So even without being the longest serving Doctor, he sets a new record, even without even half of the air-time that Tom Baker achieved.


So, besides the obvious, why do I think the hiatus makes sense?



1) Familiarity Breeds contempt: Let's face it, by the end of Season 4 Russell's star is in danger of being on the wane. He needs time to pursue personal projects outside of Doctor Who to sustain his current 'midas touch' reputation. If his last stories are 90-minute specials, he'll be more likely to go out on a high than pushing out the four-or-five tone episodes he produces.



2) Absence makes the heart grow fonder: Mainstream event series like Morse and Prime Suspect pull in higher ratings because they are seen as specials. Bigger names can be attracted, more in-depth stories can be produced, and a different budget model can be used. It also provides a test-bed for an alternate format next time the series faces cancellation.

3) Money, money, money: Specials not assigned to a season are more likely to get extras of their own and can be released around the £20-25 mark, which usually generates better sales in the DVD release market. At the moment Who DVD sales are split between those who by stand-alone releases and those who buy full seasons (the overlap may well be marginal). This will make DVD performance look ore impressive, giving Who DVDs the chance to last longer than a week in the number one slot.

4) Change, my dear: The speculation about both Russell and David Tennant leaving isn't going to go away, and I'm not sure that either will last the entire fifth series. This allows for a carefully planned handover and a phased shift in format to accommodate whoever takes over from Davies. It mitigates the introduction of a new team against the press backlash quite nicely, and it gives the show real room to breathe.

5) Going to the movies: This gives Russell the chance to try his hand at the motion picture format before the possibility of a motion picture is explored. Or, it could mean that there are actually plans for a cinematic Doctor Who movie in 2009. If we assume that the stories planned for 2009 are stand-alone stand-alone, then a stand-alone movie with David Tennant becomes a real possibility, and it means that the usual BBC requirement for protecting the license-payers ability to enjoy its serials at no cost is preserved.

6) Merchandising heaven: I expect 2009 will be a big year for merchandising. The more goodies to sustain the show's presence and to fuel fan interest with less on-screen input the better. And if past-Doctor novels haven't been relaunched by 2008, this will be a good time for them to do so.

By day my job includes project management, and there is a term we use for publicly-funded projects: "sustainable exit strategy". Doctor Who is already profitable, but it needs to be as healthy as possible by the end of Russell T Davies' run on the show: the condition he leaves it in is what he will be judged upon, and not the fanfare of the show's return. By outlining the long-term future of the franchise BBC Wales can do the following:

  • Secure long term investment from other funding partners (longer contracts, better deals etc.), independent of US netowrk decisions, for example.
  • Synchronise overseas broadcasts (it may not happen, but launching the show in the US, Canada, Australia and the UK at the same time makes a lot of commercial sense)
  • Book guest stars long in advance, securing better commitments.
  • Review the script commissioning model (more on this below).
My final bullet - script comissioning - is an important one. It's acknowledged that development time is critical, that Russell currently writes far too many episodes of the show, and that there are some big names who'd like to write episodes but don't have the time. We've already seen a Stephen Fry story evaporate. Creating a long lead on stories and perhaps increasing the number of possible commissions vs. the number of actual stories (like the Beeb did on the original series) could have a massive impact on the quality and diersity of stories produced.




Fans and press alike have already spotted the Series by Series formula (the historical character one, the Doctor-lite one, the old friend/enemy one, the two part finale) and by season four these may feel a little tired.

Tis is easily the healthiest long term news the show has had, coming as it does in the midst of a golden age. I'm sure the Pixley Archive will show that this is a strategically self-imposed break-and-review rather than the result of budgetary considerations, and that it will leave the future of Doctor Who stronger and more promising than the BBC-imposed hiatus of the 1980s.



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All text contained within Psychopomp and Circumstance is copyright © Adrian Middleton, 2007. All thoughts and opinions expressed within the confines of this thread are those of the author and do not, in any way, reflect the views or opinions of any other group or individual connected with the newapocrypha site.


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The Gap Year, Part II