BBC Loses Creative Control of Doctor Who

Despite the fact that the BBC are absolutely the owners of the IP, they are having to give up creative control of Doctor Who.

Russel T Davies is being brought back on board to try to… 

I was about to write “save a sinking ship,” but the sad truth of Doctor Who is that the only part of the ship still above the waterline is the top of the smokestack.  It would be more accurate to say that he’s been brought in to try and raise a sunken ship.

Honestly, I don’t see how he can do that without retconning Chibnall’s blunders away.  The Timeless Child and its related materials would need to be flushed.  From a narrative standpoint it wouldn’t be that hard at all.  Chinballs’ Who had so many plot holes and continuity errors that wouldn’t be hard to say the whole thing was a fever dream invented by the Master.

One example.  You are probably aware of this previous and unheard-of Doctor Who (played by Jo Martin) that predated all other Doctors, showing up last season:

But did you know that this was her Tardis?

Normally I’m not “that guy” but this is a major WTF in the show’s old and new lore.  The Tardis only looks like a Police Box and not grandfather clock because it used it’s “chameleon circuit” to use simulate a Police Box as camouflage in early 1960s London.  They were pretty common when William Hartnell’s Doctor first landed there at the very start of the show in 1963.  Also, the show needed a box that was big enough for all of the actors to fit into before they cut to an interior shot.  My point is this, Timelord time machines aren’t all built to look like Police Boxes, this was a one off because it got its “Chameleon Circuit” jammed.  And also, Jo Martin’s Tardis can’t be the same one Jody Whitaker is using because Hartnell’s Doctor stole the show’s Tardis when he first left Gallifrey.

It was clumsy, lazy mystery box storytelling, where the visual impact of one scene mattered more than trying to make it fit into the existing lore.  Or even the lore Chibnall was tying to invent.

The Chibnall years are full of goofs like that. So, yes retconning it all away is easy from a narrative standpoint. 

What would not be easy at all from Russel T. Davies point of view is explaining to outraged SJWs why he did it.  The fact that it’s illogical garbage and there is no way forward with it won’t interest them in the slightest. And they will demand an early commitment from him to follow this trail that leads off a cliff. 

A bigger problem would have been getting the BBC to go along with retconning Diverse Doctor Who out of the picture but that is no longer an issue.

Russel Davies’ Bad Wolf production company is being acquired by Sony. And Sony will NOT let any of its subsidiaries be dictated to by a rinky-dink outfit like the BBC.  Not if they are putting money into it and they are going to have to because the BBC doesn’t have any cash to spare.

Let me be clear, I am not optimistic about Doctor Who’s future, however, I can’t deny that one of Davies’ biggest obstacles has been removed.  From that perspective he can do what he wants. But does he want it badly enough to risk offending the hivemind?

Okay, I’m done here.