Category: Opinions

Ah, David Tennant… With his boyish charm, effortless good looks and talent, he’s a lot of people’s favourite Doctor. Naturally, this legion of fans would have been delighted to hear about David’s return to the role via the recently released Big Finish audio plays. While is it incredibly difficult to be handsome over audio (speaking from experience), this development has the makings of brilliance, from both a business and artistic perspective. But the impact of the Tenth Doctor’s glorious return has the potential to be far more profound than piles of money and amazing stories…

 

The Audios Firmly Enter the NuWho Era

Prior to the 50^th Anniversary, Big Finish had only had the rights to use characters and concepts from the Classic era. While this restriction was loosened in 2013 for their collaboration with AudioGo on Destiny of the Doctor, it wasn’t until 2015 that Big Finish secured the rights to use NuWho (post-2005) properties. These included the Time War and the War Doctor – which are major elements in the period between the Eighth and Ninth Doctors. With War Doctor box sets being produced and Time War stories featuring the Eighth Doctor on the horizon, Big Finish has evolved from an extension of Classic Who into a bridge between the two eras. When the stories of the Eighth and War Doctors are complete, we’ll have a single string of narrative from Hartnell to Capaldi and beyond.

So what does the acquisition of Tennant do? With the two halves of Who already linked, you’d expect Tennant to simply be the icing on the cake, the confirmation of the marriage. Except, Tennant extends the link – it’s no longer between Classic and NuWho, it now inhabits both eras as well as the time in between. Tennant’s new stories will be set during Series 4, between his onscreen appearances. The audios aren’t just a bridge anymore, they can become a collection of story strands running in parallel with the TV show, plugging the gaps between all episodes, not just between Survival and Rose.

 

He’s Stronger Glue Than the Time War

Multi-Doctor stories are a unique feature of Doctor Who, allowing the Doctor to interact with different versions of himself. The Three Doctors served to reinforce the continuity between the first three Doctors’ individual reigns, the Five Doctors did the same for the first five and the Two Doctors was a huge callback from the Sixth Doctor’s era to the Second Doctor’s. This type of story really hammers home the connectedness of this huge saga. However, NuWho and the Classic era feel like distinct entities which makes it difficult to believe in their wholeness at times.

Tennant lending his sultry tones to Big Finish can help with that. Imagine you have two sheets of cloth and you want them to stick them together as securely as you can. One approach would be to sew the end of each sheet to a third piece of cloth, so that this third sheet spans the gap between them. Job done, they’re both attached! But you can do better – you can place the two sheets on top of each other and stitch them together with a piece of thread in a series of running stitches across the area of the sheets. This is stronger, the link is more intimate now. The Time War was the third sheet of cloth while the thread in the running stitches is the timeline of the Doctor, freely dipping his toes in both eras.

How many stories in the NuWho period have crossed over with the Classic era like that running stitch? Two. One was Time Crash in which Peter Davison starred with Tennant. As excellent as it was, it was less than ten minutes long and it wasn’t included in the main run of the programme. The second was The Day of the Doctor in which archive footage was used to fill the roles of previous Doctors. These moments weren’t past Doctors intervening, they were windows through which this particular episode could peek at the show’s history. If the Tenth Doctor can meet the Eleventh and War Doctors, there isn’t an in-universe reason why can’t he properly meet the Fourth or Fifth.

On audio, deceased actors can be impersonated, aged actors needn’t be seen. Tennant can star alongside Tom Baker or Peter Davison without their greying hair distracting the audience. Which is a relief because Tennant’s voice is distracting enough…

The saga can be as interconnected and as mind-bending as the imagination allows; the Doctor can wade through the fourth dimension without being held back by the health or age of his actors. He can be free of the Classic/NuWho divide, straddling it with impunity, able to meet any version of himself as long as the Web of Time can take the strain.

 

Big Finish Becomes the Done Thing

Some fans watching the Ninth and Tenth Doctors on television would have watched their departures hoping for them to join the pantheon of Doctors at Big Finish. This is a recent development – a possible return for these actors after regeneration was once limited to multi-Doctor episodes, but with the rise of Big Finish, there is now a clear future path for these Doctors. Tennant is the first to have met these hopes, establishing in the minds of his fans that when a Doctor regenerates on TV, he may return via audio. Having these hopes met can solidify them into expectations when considering other NuWho Doctors. Consequently, Matt Smith and Peter Capaldi may now be expected to follow in Tennant’s footsteps.

These expectations, with some enviable multitasking ability, could also change the regular experience of a fan. If the Eleventh and Twelfth Doctors follow the Tenth, it may become normal to watch a Doctor on television and then listen to them on audio. In acquiring the Tenth Doctor, Big Finish have made a statement: audios are not just for those who love the Classic era, more casual NuWho fans are welcome too.

 

Final Thoughts

David Tennant’s return to the role of the Doctor can help to tie together the two eras of Who more securely than ever before. By attracting fellow NuWho actors and younger fans to audios, his involvement can be a major step towards keeping Big Finish current. The standard of their storytelling has been so incredibly high that its marriage to fresh ideas and talent can’t fail to excite the fans among us.

 

Late last month, the BBC finally released the air date for the first episode of Class, as well as confirmation of Peter Capaldi’s involvement. While this news is welcome to many, some of us may a tad worried about high expectations being dashed. After all, it’s been five years since the death throes of Torchwood and the Sarah Jane Adventures, while K-9 never really got off the ground. That’s a long time to fantasise about what spinoffs ought to be, whilst also being teased with the superb television offerings of recent years. So how high should our hopes be? What should we expect?
Upon the initial announcement of Class last year, it was established that the series would be set at Coal Hill School, with Patrick Ness hinting at sixth formers being the focus. Later interviews confirm that Ness aims to channel the emotional complexity of young adult fiction, which is refreshing to hear. While the Sarah Jane Adventures dealt with the emotions attached to family themes such as adoption, single-parenthood and divorce, it stopped just short of the angst and conflict that Torchwood handled so well. Obviously, this was symptomatic of the divide between children’s and adult television – the former was kept kid-friendly and safe, while the latter was offensive and risky at times. But Ness appears to be advocating a blend between the two, portraying teenagers with similar emotional depth as adults, which is something we don’t often see in the Whoniverse.

Ness himself is an interesting factor. Class will be his first television series in a career dominated by novels, which makes him a bit of an unknown quantity. However, the film A Monster Calls, for which Ness adapted his novel, holds an 8/10 rating on IMDB and 74% on Rotten Tomatoes. I would watch the film myself so I could tell you what I think, but it’s not in cinemas until January 2017! But if the critics appear to like it, Ness’ inexperience is unlikely to have detracted from their enjoyment of the film. Couple this with his ability to write critically acclaimed novels dealing with morality and fantasy, and Ness looks like a very promising writer for the show.
Moving onto the stories themselves, Ness has promised to introduce new ideas, rather than forever harking back to the rich past of Who. Not much has since been said on the content of the programme, so it’s all been left rather mysterious. The BBC has teased us with words of a fugitive from an alien war; the Doctor charging some teenagers with the defence of the Earth; and some pictures of an alien gun. The rest of the publicity has been playing up the young adult aspect, reassuring us all that these characters do indeed have their own motivations.

From this we can gather that Ness and the BBC are keen to draw attention to the complex characters they claim to have created. This can go one of two ways: it’s all lies or it’s well founded. I find it hard to believe that they’re lying. Ness has a very good reputation and both he and the BBC would lose more than they’d gain from lying. Therefore, we can probably expect some well-written characters, with the logical extension of that being some character-driven stories.
Another scrap of information was released by Ness regarding LGBT representation:

I don’t recall any LGBT characters in The Sarah Jane Adventures, there were a few in Who and even more in Torchwood. So the trend would appear to have been one which pigeonholed LGBT characters as a ‘grown-up’ theme in the Whoniverse. With that in mind, the inclusion of a gay protagonist in a programme targeted at young adults is certainly a step towards fairer representation. And, as reassurance, Ness is also gay, meaning he’s unlikely to propagate harmful stereotypes or make a huge deal out of his characters’ sexualities.
Class might have been conceived with the future in mind. If it’s popular enough, it will continue after Steven Moffat’s imminent departure as Who showrunner. Both Torchwood and The Sarah Jane Adventures petered out soon after Moffat took over from Russell T Davies, sadly resulting in a somewhat insular feel to Who since then, with only one crossover during Matt Smith’s era. With the arrival of Class so close to another handover may imply that the team behind it have plans for its longevity. This may include plans for handling a change of Who showrunner or Doctor. Similarly, the show may have been designed to allow some change in the regular cast so that any unexpected departures, such as the tragic passing of Elizabeth Sladen, won’t necessarily signal the end of the programme. Liz Sladen’s show was built around her character and it was fitting for it to end with her passing. But Class, being based in a school, seems to be constructed differently – sixth formers move on, teachers leave. The show could be robust enough to survive, as long as the audience watches it.
In terms of negatives, Class only has its unknown quantities. The main cast are mostly newcomers; Ness is new to television; and the stories are a secret. While it might worry some that this new programme could simply fail, there are some aspects to Class which aren’t new at all. Steven Moffat is an executive producer; as is Brian Minchin, who has worked on Who, Torchwood, and The Sarah Jane Adventures. Katherine Kelly is also a very good actress and Ness is obviously a good writer. So Class is probably in safe hands.
Further safety precautions may be evident in the use of proven concepts. The premise of Class appears to be similar to that of Torchwood, with temporal damage leading to dangerous happenings at the school, with students charged with fixing them. In addition, Moffat has described the show as ‘dark and sexy’ and, as if to underline the similarities, the show will be first broadcast exactly ten years after Torchwood’s first airing. However, Ness has promised to introduce new ideas instead of recycling old favourites, so there’s little chance he’ll churn out a tired copy of Torchwood.
While we don’t know much about Class, what little we’ve learned looks promising. We can probably expect a fresh, mature series with a cast of compelling new characters, yet set to a familiar tone and setting. This combination of new and old has served Who’s spinoffs well in the past, but whether it will work again cannot be determined with conjecture and speculation. Class may soar or it may fall, but as far as we know, it’s certainly worth getting excited about. A chance to explore a new side of Who during the long wait between series can only be a good thing.