January Meme: If JMS ran Doctor Who....

[selenak]

Before the BBC announced RTD2, he repeatedly expressed interest on twitter. Now, my dream British tv show for JMS to do would actually have been Blake's 7 (as in, a reboot - come on, the Excalibur already looks like the Liberator, and Anna Grant says hello to Anna Sheridan, so clearly he likes the original), but undoubtedly it would also be fascinating to watch his take on DW. So, here are my guesses on what it would have been like, based not just on B5 and Crusade but also on his Spider-Man comics, Sense 8 and his most recently published novel::

- at the very least two thirds of a season would take place in space or on non-Earth planets; he might even do a season without any Earth episode (historical or present) whatsover, in direct reverse to the New Who trend so far

- at least one of the Companions (and there would be several) is an Alien (not a human being from the future, an alien who needs daily make-up to look like it)

- the Old Who aliens for JMS to unearth are the Draconians; we'll get multi episode plot of scheming families and/or revolution

- at some point, someone quotes parental advice saying "Never start a fight, but always be the one to finish it"

- Time Lord telepathy gets explored as a major plot element

- one of the Companions has the initials JS

- at least one canon transgender character (possibly the Companion of the present day?)

- either the Doctor mentoring someone or someone mentoring the Doctor (trickier because of the age factor, but not impossible) is an ongoing emotional arc

- monologues which, depending on the casting, are either incredibly moving scenes or get mocked above and beyond (think G'Kar vs Byron)

- one of the big or little bads is a sinister cooperation with research on human experimentation

- one of the characters has traumatic childhood abuse

- there's unforunately one episode where other characters tell the Doctor and their Companion(s) how great they are and/or viliy their critics

- both the Doctor and the Companion(s) have highly significant dreams which we see on screen; despite Amy's Choice already existing, there will be at least one other episode taking place in the mind ouf our hero(s)

- JMS is horrified when the Anti-Vaxxers latch on the plot about the evil cooperation doing secret experiments and gets into so many fiery battles on twitter about it that he has to take a break from social media

- when at least one veteran Star Trek actor guest stars, the annoying B5 vs ST battles get another round and are now B5 vs ST vs DW

- sometihing utterly unpredictable which I can't remotely guess at happens, because the man is very, very creative and has managed to surprise me in all his endeavours I'm familiar with so far

The other days

Comments

[topaz_eyes]

Oooh, thank you for posting this! Lots of possibilities!

JMS might get another chance at running DW depending on how long RTD decides to stay on after the 60th anniversary/S14. There's definitely more possibility now for a non-British showrunner in future seasons, since RTD's negotiated full creative control away from BBC. Do JMS and RTD know each other? Are they friends? (I don't know.) Judging from some of JMS' tweets, he and RTD appear to share many writerly traits.

I am on board with all of these ideas for a JMS!Who. I definitely would love to see the Doctor being mentored, openly transgender canon characters, and more off-Earth episodes. I don't think JMS could entirely move away from Earth because the original DW was also an historical as much as sci-fi. I can see a season open with one historical episode that moves the rest of the season off-world.

I do wonder about JMS' general non-genre popularity and ability to draw the casual audience if he did take over DW, given how DW is BBC's de facto flagship show. The big draw for RTD to return as DW showrunner is his non-genre appeal and relatability to non-SF/F fans. Part of the reason to bring RTD back was to regain the casual audience whose viewership powered his first run. Both Moffat and Chibnall decided to dig deeper into DW lore and I believe their viewership suffered for it, especially for the Twelfth Doctor and S13/Flux for the Thirteenth Doctor. (I think there was a massive expectation mismatch for Chibnall as well, given his success with Broadchurch; Thirteen's premiere episode rivalled Nine's premiere, but then viewership sank like a stone afterwards. Which is a shame, because Chibnall's done some excellent work with DW.) RTD dove into DW lore too, but in an casually-accessible manner. Diehard DW fans might have despised the silliness and romance of RTD's era, but it brought in the ratings and that's what BBC wants/needs.

Either that, or BBC gives up Doctor Who as its flagship show, lets DW settle comfortably into genre TV, and turns to another program with wide audience appeal to be its flagship.

- when at least one veteran Star Trek actor guest stars, the annoying B5 vs ST battles get another round and are now B5 vs ST vs DW

The popcorn potential of this would be through the stratosphere. :-D Now which veteran ST actor in which role, that would be fun to watch.

[queenbookwench]

For some reason, I really like the idea of said veteran ST actor being either Kate Mulgrew or Gates McFadden (or Alexander Siddig!)

[topaz_eyes]

I think they're all good choices!

[selenak]

Dito!

[selenak]

All three would be great!

[jesuswasbatman]

Well, Season 18 of the original show had no stories taking place primarily on Earth (apart from the opening, plot-irrelevant scene of "The Leisure Hive" and the brief opening and closing sections of "Logopolis") and Season 23 had no Earth scenes at all.

[topaz_eyes]

I haven't watched Classic Who so I'll defer to your knowledge there.

[selenak]

I do wonder about JMS' general non-genre popularity and ability to draw the casual audience

I do believe his credit with the audience is sci fi bound for the most part. I mean, his script for Changeling, probably his most high profile non sci fi project, got some critical applause for Eastwood who directed it and Angelina Jolie who played the lead, but few non-sci fi fans noted that JMS wrote the script, and it wasn't a box office hit. In any event, if we're talking seriously about who should head DW, I think the BBC should go with someone like Sally Wainwright, who has proven she can do complex characters and relationships in the past and present and precisely because she doesn't have sci fi experience yet would bring something new to the table. Also, she is an experienced British showrunner who wouldn't have to move continents and knows the local industry.

But in terms of "What if?", it still was fun imagining what JMS might do!

[4thofeleven]

"there's unforunately one episode where other characters tell the Doctor and their Companion(s) how great they are and/or viliy their critics"

I mean, I suppose it'd still be an improvement from episodes where the Doctor themselves tell everyone how great they are?

[watervole]

Now that would be interesting to see...