Cost keeps Doctor Who on Earth

x00 writes, According to a BBC News article, Russell T Davies has said that budget constraints keep Doctor Who on Earth. He also stated “The programmes that do show alien planets are not prime-time programmes”. Personally I happen to disagree with him. And the episodes “The Impossible Planet” and “Satan’s Pit” were possibly the best episodes of the series. Oh, and as they mentioned in Doctor Who Confidential, the Pit was actually filmed in a quarry.

7 replies on “Cost keeps Doctor Who on Earth”

  1. I /tried/ to help.
    I tried to help the show, but they just didn’t listen. I already told them that if they hire ME as the new companion, it’d instantly make the show better since I’m so cool, and my ideas for the show (hacking the TARDIS to run Linux, and giving me a light saber) would naturally add more geek-appeal to the show.

    I even gave them — for free! — the idea of rhaming the show to "Doctor Whom" to give it a much needed air of CLASS.

    But they just flat-out ignored my suggestions. I hope they learned their lesson!

    • Times change

      The older incarnations of the show would never have let budget stand in the way of taking them to another planet….

      • Re: Times change

        The older incarnations of the show would never have let budget stand in the way of taking them to another planet….

        Well that was easy for them, as they didn’t have a budget to blow in the first place…

        But really, they could do with some more imagination over there. The old Doctor Who frequently left Earth, and all was well. Do they think we need Star Wars-quality imaging of other planets?

        • Re: Times change

          The older incarnations of the show would never have let budget stand in the way of taking them to another planet….

          Well that was easy for them, as they didn’t have a budget to blow in the first place…

          But really, they could do with some more imagination over there. The old Doctor Who frequently left Earth, and all was well. Do they think we need Star Wars-quality imaging of other planets?

          No all they need to do is shoot in a forest somewhere in California.

          • Re: Times change

            The older incarnations of the show would never have let budget stand in the way of taking them to another planet….

            Well that was easy for them, as they didn’t have a budget to blow in the first place…

            But really, they could do with some more imagination over there. The old Doctor Who frequently left Earth, and all was well. Do they think we need Star Wars-quality imaging of other planets?

            No all they need to do is shoot in a forest somewhere in California.

            Or shoot in Norway. That would be cheaper than California for a British show…

            Or they could shoot in Vancover with a yellow camera filter. ;-)

  2. Budget Constraints?
    I don’t buy it. For one, they were able to get enough budget to do a third spinoff (besides the two already in production) – that tells me there’s money to be had. For another, the effects that they’ve done so far demonstrate a pretty darned nice budget.

    Then again, maybe budget is the factor in that Davies doesn’t want to do other planets unless he can go "balls to the wall" with huge city-type sets. I would argue, though, that it’s more a lack on the writers’ parts than a lack of cash.

    If Davies and the BBC really need more cash to realize their interplanetary vision, I’m sure companies like NBC/Universal (SciFi Channel) would put up a nice chunk of change for a stake in the series. After all, they’re already featuring The Doctor on their SciFi Friday, their biggest night of original programming…

    • Re: Budget Constraints?
      a theory, but perhaps the bbc gave them some additional money to do multiple series yet didn’t give them enough to do the current quality for each. this would mean they could tell more stories through more shows but at the expense of an even more limited budget as they are spreading their existing budget amongst several shows.

Comments are closed.