Well, it looks like I still have some things to rant about in this silly old blog of mine. So I guess I'll keep writing in it. For the time being, at least.
SOFT AND HARD (THAT DOESN'T SOUND RIGHT!)
So we all know what's going on. There's no need to synopsize too heavily. When Disney fulfilled their contract and decided not to embark on anything further with Doctor Who, the Beeb and RTD both assured us there was still more to come. RTD would, at least, write us a Christmas Special in 2026. And then new seasons of the show would be made after that. Whether Davies would still be involved with the new content beyond Christmas was uncertain. But Doctor Who was definitely going to keep on keepin' on.
And then the rug got pulled out from under us. Turns out RTD wasn't going to give us a Christmas Special . And the BBC was putting the show "up for tender". Which, basically, means they don't want to foot the bill for Doctor Who, anymore. They want some other production company to pay for it while they just sell them the rights and, for the most part, step back from it all.
Naturally enough, speculation among fans, casual viewers and the media is running wild. Some believe we're going to get another 16 years of no Doctor Who (which we didn't truly get - there was The 96 Telemovie). On the other end of the spectrum, some individuals are saying we'll be getting new episodes before the end of 2027. Of course, it's hard to say for sure what will actually happen.
But there is an interesting debate that has arisen. Throughout its run, Doctor Who has gone through several "soft reboots". The show's format changes enough that it almost doesn't feel like the same programme anymore. We see this quite a bit during the New Series. But one could even say it happens in Classic Who, too. The Third Doctor Era would be the best example of this. Season Six and Seven barely resemble each other.
The term "soft reboot" gets used because, while the show does seem radically different from its past, it still lines up with its own previously-established Lore. The guilt-ridden ninth incarnation that we see in 2005, for instance, seems very different than the Eight Doctors that existed before him. But he is still that same man.
Many other franchises out there have undergone what is known as "a hard reboot". In this instance, all previous continuity is completely thrown out and we start fresh. Aesthetically, the franchise remains the same. The basic premise it maintains is still present. But all that we've seen in earlier installments is no longer considered "canon". Everything is new again.
Movies that get several sequels often take this route. After a few films that all interlink come out, a decision gets made to make a whole new series that completely disavows itself of whatever went on before it. Batman would be a good example of this. We start with a couple of movies directed by Tim Burton with Michael Keaton playing Batman. Other directors and leads step in during the sequels but it's all meant to still be in the same reality. The franchise goes quiet for quite some time (or, at least, the live action film version of the franchise does). Eventually, Christopher Nolan takes over and makes a trilogy of movies that have no connection with the prior series. We then get several films with Ben Affleck in the lead role that also seem to stand on their own two feet. Things do get reconciled a bit with the whole concept of a multi-verse, but these are still very much hard reboots. The baby gets thrown out with the bathwater every few movies..
THE BIG DEBATE
Now that we've clearly established what a soft and hard reboot is, here's the actual debate:
Many people are thinking that it's time Doctor Who goes through a hard reboot of its own. That it takes its forty-one seasons of continuity, chucks it in the rubbish and begins again. We would get a whole new First Doctor with a whole new set of adventures.
This would also mean, of course, that the show's Core Lore could get re-written. In this new Whoniverse, for instance, maybe Omega never "perished" in the supernovae he engineered. He and Rassilon achieved immortality and rule Gallifrey eternally And maybe the Master actually is the Doctor's brother and they both fight for the approval of their father, Borusa (this sounds crazy but it almost became a real storyline as they debated a hard reboot for the Eighth Doctor's telemovie in the 90s). And maybe the Daleks now use sink plungers instead of toilet plungers.
These are all changes you can make with a hard reboot. Only some of the main elements of the previous iteration remain .The Doctor would still dress eccentrically and regenerate on a regular basis. The TARDIS is still a Police Box. There's always a companion to explain things to. But everything else gets re-interpreted It will resemble its predecessor in many ways, but it would also be radically different when it wants to be.
As stated. there is a whole group of people who firmly believe the show is due for this. But there is also another camp that do not desire this at all. They want Doctor Who to pick up where it left off and continue acknowledging and adhering to its previous forty-one seasons of continuity/
As is always the case with a POINT OF DEBATE essay, we will now examine both sides of the argument and discuss their merits. We will start with the general ideology of those who do not want the hard reboot.
NOT HARD (THAT SOUNDS WRONG AGAIN!)
Admittedly, I find it very easy to agree with this stance.
The biggest reason why they shouldn't do a hard reboot for Doctor Who is really quite simple. It is just extremely cool that, after over sixty years, we're still working with the same continuity. In the last season that aired, Ncuti Gatwa's Doctor was dealing with issues that extend all the way back to William Hartnell's second season (finding out what had become of Susan). Maintaining a storyline from something so far back is a thing of beauty that you just don't see in a whole lot of other franchises out there. I think a lot of us would hate to see that sort of arcing not be able to happen anymore.
Which leads to the other major point against a hard reboot. Suddenly dumping out a bunch of previously-established Lore can be a very disappointing process. There is a certain measure of satisfaction that one gets as you watch a show establish its own mythos. When a production team decides that whole process didn't happen after all, it takes away all the enjoyment you experienced as the show set up its own "rules".
I think, for instance, of how great it was to watch the Mystery of Doctor Who unravel over the course of so many years. How, in An Unearthly Child, we get a vague of mention of the Doctor being an exile, cut off from his own people. How, a season later, we learn in The Time Meddler, he's not the only one of his people who flies around in a TARDIS. How, four seasons after that, we finally get a proper look into his origins in The War Games. Throughout the Third and Fourth Doctor eras, we get more and more glimpses of Time Lord society and learn of how their culture works. As we finally discover the Limit of Regenerations Rule in Deadly Assassin, we realize what an incredible journey we've been on to get the final broad details of the Doctor's origins. The whole process was great to watch.
With a hard reboot, that journey is nullified. Everything now happens in a new way that will, more-than-likely, be a lot less fun.
Which leads to the next argument against a hard reboot. Getting the fans to actually like the new Lore you're creating can be a huge uphill battle. Particularly with something like Doctor Who. There's a good chance fans have gotten pretty heavily attached to the canon that was created in the last forty-one seasons. This isn't like those Batman movies I was describing earlier. Where everything gets re-written after only a few quick movies. This is a show that has been running on the same continuity for over six decades. Chances are we're going to prefer how things were established in that first iteration. If for no other reason than we've had a long time to get attached to it.
The reasons for maintaining Doctor Who's continuity are all very simple - but they are still quite strong. So much so, that a hard reboot seems near-impossible.
SAVAGELY DISAGREE
Okay, before we get into the Pro Hard Reboot Argument, we need to address a few opinions this camp have been stating that I don't think are valid.
"We need a hard reboot," some people are saying, "because RTD has made a giant mess of things."
This mess seems to exist on two levels. Firstly, the Head Writer has been producing such terrible episodes over the last while that the whole show needs to be erased. The dip in the quality of writing is sooo bad and there's just no coming back from it. Best to start all over again.
On a second more specific level, there are individuals out there that feel RTD has left Doctor Who in a mess. The Doctor has regenerated to look like Rose. There's this mysterious figure lurking in the background known only as "the Boss". Our Hero is suddenly receiving telepathic messages from Susan. The Pantheon is making all kinds of trouble with the very nature of reality. There are also several smaller plot threads that are still dangling. Just to make matters worse, RTD has decided that he is not going to give us a resolution to any of these issues. He's leaving it all for someone else to deal with.
Some feel that wrapping up all these hanging threads is an insurmountable task. Not even RTD was capable of doing it and he's the one who created it all. So, rather than try to "put the show back together", it would be better to just shut it all down and start fresh.
I just want to state that I do not agree with either of these sentiments. The show had not become "terrible" as some fans would have you believe. No, I'm not entirely thrilled with an episode like Empire of Death (although, the more I re-watch it, the more it grows on me). But there were still a lot of really awesome stories during this period. Overall, RTD2 was more good than bad.
And I don't think that all the unresolved arcs have become so messy that they can't be tidied up. I do agree that anyone that chooses to tackle them has their work cut out for them. But I don't think it's an impossible mission. The final state of affairs for this era is not so bad that we need to just abandon it all and begin again.
NOT GONNA KEEP MAKING DOUBLE-ENTENDRES
Admittedly, I'm about to sound a bit self-contradictory. I just finished saying in the last section that RTD did not leave the show in a completely unfixable situation. That all these dangling plot threads can, ultimately, be resolved. Having said that, however, I will add that it would be much easier to not pick things up where RTD2 left off and continue maintaining established continuity. A hard reboot is a much more sensible option.
This becomes even more evident when you consider Who's current behind-the-scenes situation. The BBC has put the show up for tender. They want another production company to come in and take over making the show. These new producers are going to be much more interested in giving us something similar to what we got in 2005. They will, essentially, want to make their own version of Series One. They will give us stories that are, once more, a very stripped-down version of Doctor Who: Such a tactic will make it easier to draw in new fans and also satisfy a lot of the old ones who have been complaining that the show has become overcomplicated..
I can see why a production company would want to use RTD's approach in 2005. It really is the best way to go. To simply claim that some time had passed between Doctor Who - The Movie and Rose and not really try to build much of a bridge between the two made a lot of sense. While it was great to see Sylvester McCoy come back and get a regeneration scene in the backdoor pilot of 1996, it did make for some clumsy storytelling. Just giving us a new incarnation and starting with him worked much better.
Such a process wouldn't work well this time, however, if previous canon is not wiped out. Fans that were following the show would find it difficult to let go of all the unanswered questions from the Ncuti Gatwa Era.
To illustrate:
Imagine, for instance, if The Enemy Within had ended differently. Let's say Eight is standing around in the Jules Verne console room completing some minor repairs just like he was in the version we got. This time, however, he is suddenly teleported out of his TARDIS and re-appears in this huge chamber full of Daleks. On the far end of the room is a series of objects that look like high-tech coffins. There are eight of them. The Daleks usher him over to the coffins. As the Time Lord gets closer, he sees they are cryogenic pods. His first seven incarnations are already sealed within them, fast asleep. The eighth one hisses open and the Daleks start to push him into it. The Doctor tries to fight them but his future seems inevitable. The Daleks have won. Cue "the cliffhanger sting" followed by the theme tune. Roll ending credits.
If this is the way McGann's special had ended, there's no chance Rose would have worked. We would need to know how Eight got out of that peril and became Nine. If RTD wanted his revival of the show to happen the way it did, his only option would have been to declare New Who a hard reboot, We would be required to forget everything that had occured prior to this new era of the show.
This is the situation that whatever production company takes over must face. They will, more-than -likely, want to take the same approach that RTD did back in 2005. But, because of all the dangling threads that RTD2 left us with during his second era, they have little choice but to opt for a total re-set.
This, in my opinion, is the only thing that really warrants a hard reboot. If people making the show want another Rose, they're going to have to throw away everything that came before.
There you go. The best reasons, in my opinion, for why Doctor Who should do a soft or hard reboot (or not reboot at all, for that matter). As usual, I won't state which creative choice I'd prefer. That's not the point of this particular style of post.
I may continue with this subject in a second installment that won't be a POINT OF DEBATE essay. I do have a few ideas about what would be the best way to do each style of reboot. Basically, I'll be writing a bit of fan fiction. Don't worry, though. It will just be a plot synopsis or two. I won't subject you to full-on prose!
