This is a growing trend, pioneered by the likes of Netflix with The excellent House of Cards, as well as HBO and Amazon. Seems to target niche programmes and has proven very successful. It also saved Ripper St.

If and when Dr Who loses its mainstream appeal - and I am sure it will, because the trends in genre tv do ebb and flow, I can foresee a move to subscription based tv - and will probably be a far better programme for it, with the producers working towards a targeted audience, rather than trying to attract mass appeal. What does anybody else think?

Absolutely no chance.

If it was axed, maybe. Right now, no chance. Too much of a cash cow for the BBC.

Well, that's this thread done and dusted!

Doctor Who has always tried to be of 'mass appeal', hasn't it? Quite right too. Still, maybe at some point....but I hope not. Like the fact that it tries to be inclusive to everybody rather than becoming too insular and targetting the diehards. Then you're in trouble, as I sadly remember first time around. It didn't end well.

No. Streaming is for shows that can't get enough of a audience on traditional channels. I don't think Doctor Who has that problem.

considering the fact that the audio's and other merchandise were still going on in 'the wilderness years" it seems that even without it being on screen it is too lucrative a property for the bbc to ever sell the rights.

Perhaps one day, far far away where the popularity was such on the wane that they actually were considering it's future I could see them doing a joint venture deal where they still retain the rights but allow a streaming service licence to actually produce it, where they split the profits, something like that, but they'd never actually not be involved, so presumably any version that was made by a streaming service or other company would end up being shown on the bbc as well, making no difference to an average viewer.

I wouldn't expect any change for a long time, but in the bigger picture of what will eventually happen to the BBC, I expect it will eventually be broken up into pure public services elements and separate subscription/ppv content..

There's a lot to argue about there, regarding what is public service broadcasting. But I don't think there's anything to be too concerned about regarding drama, if anything the opposite. The mixture of the new streaming services and subscription cable has produced a business model that has massively improved the quality of drama coming out of America, they're making the best TV drama they've ever had.

There is an issue about the amount of people who now watch the show on catch up*. The BBC is on record as saying Doctor Who has the highest percentage of 'catch up' viewers of all its shows. It certainly shows in the massive time-shift we get in the viewing figures between the overnights and the final viewing figures.

I know some people on here say it doesn't matter, but Doctor Who is used as the 'gateway to Saturday night TV' on BBC1 (that is to say, its supposed to hook 7m-8m viewers at the beginning of the evening in the hope they will all stick around for the whole night).

If the show gets 7m-8m viewers, but only about 4m on the night, then I do worry the BBC will begin to question the show's broadcast slot.


* Apologies, I'm not sure what the correct phrase is so I am saying 'catch up' i.e. people who don't watch the show when it is broadcast, but later on in the week on BBC iPlayer.

It would certainly raise questions about the viability of the licence fee if Doctor Who were to become a commercial production. For that reason, I can only see streaming being a viable option if the show gets sold or licenced to an independent production company.

Modern television is more fickle, there are so many more options, and programmes do not tend to last much beyond 7 years these days ( soaps being the exception). The money men will ultimately decide the future of dr who, sentimentality won't enter the equation. Viewing figures are holding up well, and it is hard to believe that it was 9 years since the start of the reboot. However, nothing lasts forever, the programme will certainly end at some point - so it is extremely valid to suggest it could become streamed content. The tv licence requirements are being reviewed at the moment in the face of more streaming services, and I do not think that if who went down this route it would be necessarily a backward step. Plenty of excellent programming is already produced in this way, and it could be that the whole series is released in one go. Viewing is so much more sophisticated these days, Dr Who has been ground breaking in the past - why not again?

Totally agree.

It might make sense for the BBC to experiment with a streamed spin off show like the paternoster gang, to test future appetite for their content. Streaming as a business model is quite interesting, I can only assume it is cheaper, less overheads but Im only guessing here. Given they are supposed to be license fee driven and not advertisement driven I wonder if they would ever release a show on an advert driven channel like netflix et al, hmmm.

BBC 3 is to become a streaming channel, though with a much reduced budget for original programming which will probably remove all original drama (shame, it was the only thing that channel occasionally got right).


In the US, streaming has been used to bypass and thus disrupt the cable companies, who are the gateway to the customer.


Netflix isn't advertising supported, it's a subscription channel. The BBC can't provide content on either a subscription or advertising basis to the UK without a change in its charter, which is certainly an ongoing discussion in Gov't

It's certainly easier to get into, as you don't have to set up transmitters, bid for spectrum, etc. Even easier if you're not setting up your own service, and just providing content for other providers. But it's still a smaller market - a bit like taking it off primetime BBC1 and putting it on The History Channel.

Haven't we (sort of) had that already with the Who mini-episodes over the years? It must have given some sort of indication about how much of an audience there would be. I seem to think they went down quite well.

Dear God, No.
Doctor Who tried that before. JNT brought people like uberfan Ian Levine on board so that the show could apparently deliver more of 'what the fans wanted' and the show took an almighty nosedive.
Doctor Who, thankfully, is NOT a niche show, with a targeted audience. It was never meant to be and for most of it's life it hasn't been. And I really hope that this doesn't change.

A while ago, there was talk on Gallifrey Base of the rights to Doctor Who being transferred from the BBC to BBC Worldwide during the 1990s. This would make sense as The Dark Dimension had originally been planned as a direct-to-video production. Also, the TV Movie was very much BBC Worldwide's co-production.

If true, this meant BBC Worldwide licenced Doctor Who to BBC Films (to no avail) in the late 90s and early 00s and then eventually gave BBC Wales the licence in 2003.

Again, if true, could this result in Doctor Who reverting to BBC Worldwide and becoming a commercial production which is sold to the BBC (or whoever wants to show it) in much the same way as Orphan Black?

Can anyone shed any light on BBC Worldwide's ownership of Doctor Who?

I don't know the details regarding this arrangement, but exclusive licensing deals almost always revert to the original owner after a defined amount of time, that's sort of what's mean by licensing.. The rights holder either grants a license or sells rights, and the license may either by exclusive or not, or anything in between the parties can agree upon.

Wouldn't programmes created under a license of that sort generally need to be tagged as such in the credits? I mean, if the characters were owned by Worldwide and only licensed back to the BBC, it would be mentioned somewhere, right?

Other way around, they've always been owned by the BBC and would be credited as such in a Worldwide production.

If the BBC ever cancelled the show, I could see Netflix trying to snap it up tbh.

True, but substitute Hulu (the free portion) and you have a great example of a streaming service which relies on advertising.

If the ratings weren't considered good enough and it was cancelled it could do a Ripper Street, I suppose. It seems so unlikely though.

I wouldn't say great, the amount of original drama that Hulu produces is absolutely tiny. It's the subscription services and premium cable that have the money to finance drama, and given the massive falls in TV advertising revenue there's little sign of that changing.