Posted in: BBC, Disney+, Doctor Who, TV | Tagged: bbc, disney, doctor who, Ncuti Gatwa, patrick troughton, russell t davies, steven moffat, terrance dicks

Doctor Who: A Tale of Two Eras – How The Storytelling Has Changed

Comparing the two eras of Doctor Who (via "The War Games in Colour" and "Joy to the World"), we see just how much storytelling has changed.

This past Christmas has given us all an opportunity to compare the original classic era of Doctor Who with the current one. The edited-down and colourised 1969 story "The War Games" and this year's Christmas special "Joy to the World" premiered within days of each other. Both stories showed how much the show has stayed the same and also how much has changed in the way the series—and television shows are written—between the 1960s and the 21st Century.

Doctor Who and 1960s Storytelling

Let's start with Doctor Who: The War Games. At ten episodes, it's one of the longest serials in the series' history, clocking just a bit over four hours long. "The War Games in Colour" was edited to a ninety-minute version to cut out the filler scenes. Original co-writer Terrance Dicks had admitted there was a lot of filler in the episodes since he and co-writer Malcolm Hulke were briefed with writing ten half-hour serials with cliffhangers to keep audiences hooked.

The new shorter version quickened the rhythm of the story to one more in line with a four-part serial form from the 1970s and 1980s or a two-parter from the modern era of the series. The 90-minute version highlights the most significant parts of the story and even brings out the emotional intensity more since it was already there but was diffused by so much time between those scenes over ten half-hour chapters. The complexity of the Doctor's relationship with the War Chief, who's possibly/probably an early incarnation of the Master, becomes more prominent, and the retcon hints that what happens to the War Chief is what drives him to rename himself The Master in the future stories.

The plot brings out the character's emotional reactions rather than created as a conduit for the characters' emotions like in the modern era. The actors are no less emotional, if in a more restrained manner. Patrick Troughton gives one of his most intense performances as The Doctor when he gets increasingly desperate to save lives in a situation that's rapidly spirally out of control. His muted farewell to his companions Jamie and Victoria is no less sad than any other parting between the Doctor and his companions, but the emphasis feels more on the plot than their emotions. That was always the style of old school genre storytelling until the 21st Century, coupled with the British stiff upper lip.

The Post-Buffy Emotional Writing of the 21st Century

You could say this year's Christmas Special encompasses everything that defines the new Disney+ era of Doctor Who. Steven Moffat is in lockstep with showrunner Russell T. Davies' vision for how 21st-century TV is written, which is a plot that has a greater emphasis on the characters and their emotions. There is virtually no filler in the story because the structure is cut to the bone to fill an hour-long slot, so the plot is breathless, while Moffat is one of the masters of melding plot, emotion, and theme now. The big difference between the classic era of the show and the classic era of television, in general, is the way writers come up with a plot and then throw the characters into it to solve the problem while their emotions are secondary.

"Joy to the World' and the current Doctor Who meld the plot and emotion together as a thematic whole. The sadness and heartbreak of the characters and what happens to them are built in from the start. Detractors of the current era of Doctor Who complain that there is too much emotion and too much crying in it, since Davies really loves seeing Ncuti Gatwa emote with his eyes and cry whenever tragedy happens. Even longtime fans who loved the David Tennant and Matt Smith runs are starting to think Gatwa crying in every episode is getting a bit too much. Maybe the show needs to strike a balance between the Doctor's stoicism and emotional openness.

Doctor Who: Joy to the World is streaming outside the UK on Disney+. Doctor Who: The War Games in Colour is streaming only on the BBC iPlayer in the UK but will be released on physical media in 2025.

Enjoyed this? Please share on social media!

Stay up-to-date and support the site by following Bleeding Cool on Google News today!