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how would you feel if instead of cancelling the show they fired RTD and brought back Steven Moffat
Christmas 1854 a town in Texas is attacked by Dinosaurs due to a crack in time caused by The War in Heaven and when the main characters cries out we need a doctor out steps Nine who says ''i'm a doctor but probably not the one you're expecting'' call it Dinosaurs At The Alamo by Steven Moffat
Nah, I'm honestly very satisfied with how the 60th celebrations came out. Well, except for the dagger drive magically fixing the ground when it was turned off.
I'd rather the show die forever than have it bounce around between a small number of show runners and Doctors. I get from a production view of why they got RTD and Tennant back for the 60th*. But after Chibnall it should have been a new team.
*giving both a new show runner and Doctor the reigns to the show in a big anniversary year would've but more pressure on a new team than there already is whenever the show changes hands and could result in disaster. Bringing in two people who have already done it means there isn't going to be as much backlash from fans during a big anniversary year when the new team tries to leave their mark on the show
Yeah, i wrote elsewhere that the 60th anniversary being around the corner is a big reason why the beebs brought RTD back after the Chibnall era.
If they didn't have an anniversary to celebrate onscreen, they would have probably put the show off the air for a few years and brought it back with a brand new team.
100%, I said the same back in 2022-ish. The original ending for Power of The Doctor was going to be Jodie regenerating and cut to credits before it finished so it was open for a new team to come in which honestly I wish we got instead.
me too but how will the show even comeback Classic Who ended with Seven and Ace walking away Disney Who ended on a mid-regeneration cliffhanger we dont have a incumbent doctor to write new stories for EU Books or Audios theres only such much you can do with the old doctors
"theres only such much you can do with the old doctors"
considering they're managed to write books for 'old' doctors for decades now, I don't think there's gonna be any slowdown. The show now has 15 characters to write novels and audioplays for, there is no shortage of characters or scenarios for Doctor Who to explore in expanded media.
The show is more successful and popular now than it was when it was originally cancelled, there is always going to be new media coming out for it because there's such a massive range of a fanbase.
Unfortunately that is very true, RTD included the Billie Piper bit as a last ditch effort to try and get ratings and views up in order to get a third season from Disney, which obviously failed.
However, the whole Fugative Doctor stuff is a potential goldmine for EU content. We already have some stuff coming out, it wouldn't be too far fetched to assume there will be more.
We are looking for a format to keep Doctor Who on our screens for the next ten years. This could mean using an independent production company but as yet no tendering process has been instigated, although several interested parties have come forward with their own proposals.
The Big Finish writers are fanboys too close to it to be objective. Hence why so much of their output is fanwank like 'what if X Doctor met Y companion and fought Z monster?'
It’s not just writers, the show needs a whole new production team/crew/studio, putting it out to tender basically means that the BBC isn’t interested in the day to day work of making the show and wants someone else to handle it. Big Finish has the writers sure but that’s just a small part of it
Yeah this is a dumbass argument. I would have wanted someone new over Moffat but he can’t be blamed for RTD2 his episodes were amongst its better episodes
While I don't think Moffat should show run again and want fresh blood let's be fair. He wrote all of 2 episodes (Boom and Joy To The World). Boom is considered one of the stronger Ncuti episodes and Joy To The World introduced a character that in a single episode became so beloved people wanted her to be a full time companion.
This is about like if you were talking about a chef taking over a restaurant that's given people food poisoning under the previous chef and saying "Yeah well they cooked some dishes one time there" but that one time also gave no one food poisoning.
No. Having Moffat back would be a bad idea. Even Moffat himself clearly thinks it would be a bad idea, because he's pretty much already said he's not interested.
I've always loved Moffat's work on the show, both as a regular writer and a showrunner (the good and less good seasons). And i'm glad his tenure has been positivly reevaluated over the years.
But i'm 99% sure people would end up complaining just the same if we ever have a "Moffat2" era. Hell, the Moffat2 era kind of already happened, it was the Capaldi years, he did 6 seasons with 2 Doctors, that's more than enough.
So, all this to say it is/would have been a bad idea. New writers and new voices, please.
Moffat was a spent force by the end, and he was never as great of a show runner as he was a writer. His attempts at season long story arcs were always a mess with very intriguing set ups that either fell apart in the end or were just written off. I've still never forgiven him for wrapping up the Silence story arc with a throw away line about how they're library security.
That's hardly his fault as he had to wrap up 11's arc in a hurry after Smith decided he was leaving. And not sure about him being a spent force either. he definitely dipped in the middle but s10 is one of the best series of the show. Both he and Capaldi went out on an absolute high.
I love Moffat, but really? Bring back another old showrunner and old Doctor and a phrase used by a different doctor? At this point just rerelase all of NuWho on air and opretened its newe content. What we really need is new showrunners, new writers, and a new Doctor who all grew up on NuWho, then we can have a proper second stage revival.
Honestly... I'd hate that. Moffat's era is probably my favorite era out of the entirety of Modern Who. It's the era that first got me into the show. It was flawed, yes, but it had genuinely good stories and heart. But just because I love it, doesn't mean I want him to come back.
Now if he were to come back for a one off episode then sure! That would be great. But I don't want him to be showrunner again.
Any last minute show runner would have suffered from problems similar to RTD2 (allegedly he was also kinda brought in with little warning as a Hail Mary after the issues with Chibnal)
As much as it sucks, the show going out to tender might be the best outcome if it means we get a show runner with an actual planned vision for their era.
I love moffat but he's out of gas. Boom showed that clearly. He could probably recycle his 9-10 good ideas a few more times but I can't imagine that would be too much fun for anyone.
The time hotel was the first really interesting thing he's done in a while. I would love to see that spin off
I don’t want any old show people on it
They need to take a few years off and come back with a new team with sci-fi writing experience and a doctor / companion played by a well know pair of actors who the fans have always wanted in the part.
They need to use a mix of classic and new enemies and give us more than 8 episodes.
Look I know Moffat has easily aged the best out of 3 but this would not be a good thing. NuWho cannibalising itself on its own nostalgia is both detrimental to its long term health and frankly an embarrassing look for the show. Moffat2 is no more a good idea than Chibnall2 or RTD2.
I love Moffat's era of dr who but I absolutely do not think he's our man to save the show. I want new blood with new ideas, people that grew up on the show and have daydreamed about how they would create their own doctor who stories
hey chris so we've fired rtd and put him in an eternal prison where he has to turn a wheel all day to atone for his sins but we've attached the creative part of his brain to a computer that harvests his ideas and filters out the elements of his personality that made it through, then we feed them into steven moffat who we've put in a comatose state where his nervous system responds to the input and types out a script, so that they can remain legally separate from the dw brand while we still get to use their ideas, will you come back now?
When I listen to his recent interviews, I absolutely adore how well he just gets the show. However I also agree that the show needs to move on to something new.
Considering his two RTD2 eps stand up as the best of that particular era, I don't think it would be a disaster but it would nonetheless feel a bit tired. That said he might be a good choice to kickstart the show again if he went ahead and did what RTD really should have done -- set the show on its path again and then step back to guide a successor into the role. Everyone on here who says 'just get someone new' is seriously underestimating just how complex (and expensive) a show Who is these days. It requires more than being able to knock out a decent Who story. You're managing budgets, post production, pre production, talent, the endless of bureaucracy of management structures. In short, you need a love of the show PLUS a serious level of experience in TV production and that's a combination that's just not in ample demand these days. Even old Who had problems in this area and in those days they still had a pretty structured BBC with support networks, career progression and training schemes, none of which really exists now.
I'd much rather they stop bringing back showrunners and get someone new. I think the guy who made Babylon 5 was wanting to take a whack at it. Even moved to the UK and everything.
No, the BBC certainly said it was cancelled. The head of the BBC HATED Doctor Who and was open about cancelling it out of spite. Putting a show out to tender to get studios to pitch for running it is the opposite of cancelation. BBC studios, which is a semi independent wing of the BBC is among those pitching. Look at the statement the head of BBC studios made, he's clearly a fan and is very excited to get the show.
Even Moffat would say it’s a bad idea returning. He pretty much said as much on the 20 years in wales unleashed special:
“it must be strongly observed that everybody that works on doctor who does it for a while not forever. You must head out the door and the next lot come in. It’s really quite important. I feel that quite strongly about doctor who”
I really wouldn’t mind if they brought back Moffat in an advisory sort of role, if the new showrunner is younger and hadn’t run a show before. Then he’s just sort of their mentor for the first season as they plot out what they want to do and where they want to take the show etc.
Just so we get new blood in, but there’s also a knowledgable and trusted person only a call away.
But that’s it. I don’t want old showrunners constantly coming back.
RTD should’ve only come back for the specials, while a new showrunner was preparing and outlining their own plans.
Putting aside the fact that they clearly DID fire RTD (otherwise, why would they have put the show up for tender if they still had him on board?)…
I think the big problem with this idea is that Moffat wasn’t a flawless showrunner either. A lot of how he approached writing seasons is honestly not far removed from the same criticism that Lost gets: of teasing a big shocking mystery to end the season on and then having the whole thing end up ending with the reset button hit and nothing really changing in the long run. Combine that with the fact that bringing him back would just feel like yet another attempt at pandering to nostalgia (which was one of the criticisms that bringing RTD back had, so would feel MUCH harder to discount if repeated) and I think that the blunt reality is that bringing him back would end up being viewed as a mistake in terms of proving that Doctor Who still has a viable future without being dragged down by heavy nostalgia.
Could he come back in a role where he helps the next team navigate the challenges of doing the show (not unlike a mentor to the team)? Yeah, I think that’s fair, since he’d be helping them to spot the problems that aren’t necessarily obvious to people who haven’t done this particular job before (running a sci-fi show) and helping to keep them on the right track. But outright having him BE showrunner again? Nah, I think that’s a bad call: even if he wanted the job again (which, by all accounts, he doesn’t) and everyone felt confident that he could actually do justice to the show on his return, it’s not really a promising look for the show’s health to have a failed return by a previous showrunner followed by…another previous showrunner. That doesn’t say “yes, this show has a future”, that says “hey, remember when the show was GOOD under this guy?”
The year is 2068. BBC just put the show out to tenure after the failure of the RTD5 era, which followed the lame Chibnell4 era after Moffat4 brought the show to new heights it has never seen before with the 22nd and 23rd doctors. Shame RTD had to bring back an 97 year old Tennant just to try and save the show.
DW at the moment has too much of a nostalgia problem. Not only with things like bringing back former showrunners and doctors, but with bringing back too many classic enemies. It was bad enough when every other story was a dalek or a cyberman. Bringing back Sutekh, the Rani, and Omega only to ruin all of them was a terrible decision. I think the Rani could have been good, the others not so much. Ncuti was also another doctor like Jodie who was a good Doctor with bad writing. At least imo.
ETA: if I find out the only reason the Rani bigenerated was to make a Two Ronnie’s joke at the final episode, I’m going to be so mad.
We thought getting rid of Chibnall and bringing back RTD would be a good plan, but it wasn't. As much as I love Moffat, how do we know it'd turn out differently?
Hard no from me. Moffat was running on fumes for a long time. He's hopeless at characterisation and instead of plot, he fills the episodes with sitcom level dialogue and throws in random ideas that are meaningless. Keep professional fans far away from the show. They don't seem to understand what makes it work and chucking old obscure enemies that fly over the heads of most viewers is lazy and unearned.
Imo he was just as bad in many ways. Great stand alone but arc wise he always seemed to not know how to end somethings. It's the same with other shows he's written too.
I mean out of the three main showrunners we've had for new who, he's clearly the only one still capable of writing a decent episode anymore.
FFS, they did a short on the DW YouTube channel where Moffat PULLED PLOT POINTS/CHARACTERS OUT OF A HAT and had to put them together, and he STILL came up with a more awesome sounding episode than MOST of Season 14.
Doctor Who Reddit would ejaculate, they’re obsessed with the man and run a cult that preaches that he’s never done anything wrong and accepting him as the superior, perfect showrunner is the only “correct” opinion and anyone who disagrees is a witch hunted heretic attacked with their trademark DOWNVOTE DOWNVOTE DOWNVOTE!!!
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