WI: Walt Disney's Doctor Who

Klisz

http://tardis.wikia.com/wiki/Doctor_Who_(TV_story)#Earliest_form

the above-linked article said:
After the show had first aired in the United States, American companies had worked hard to purchase the rights for an American version. In the early '80s, when The Walt Disney Company were on their spending sprees, they attempted to buy the rights to the show, meaning the entire franchise would belong to Disney, not just an American version of the show.

Steven Spielberg was their only choice to run the office. Spielberg was more than willing to do it, as he felt that Disney was the only American studio who could do such an amazing British show justice. He lost interest when he was told that the show would be released under their Touchstone Television banner; he felt that such an imaginative show needs to be released under their Disney banner.
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Now, this is on a wiki and without a citation, and I'm no expert on Doctor Who production history, so I have utterly no idea how accurate this is. But if it is true: What if Disney purchased DW? Say, they agreed with Spielberg's complaint about the banner and changed it, or alternatively he sucked it up and did it anyway? What would be the effects on the future of Who and on other Disney and BBC projects?
 

BillyShears

The same Spielberg that wanted to make Harry Potter a cartoon with an American voicing the parts... that gives a bit of insight into his mind :D
 

Orville_third

Banned
Wow...I had a TL idea with Disney distributing Who (and K-9*, Sarah Jane and Torchwood), thanks to a shift in Disney Channel's programming. This promises to be cooler.
I do know Spielberg did have plans for a Doctor Who movie.
 

Klisz

Hm. Would it be too convergent to have Disney also end up acquiring Star Wars, but a few decades earlier than OTL - and then at some point getting ahold of Star Trek as well? It'd be interesting to have several of the biggest SF properties under one roof.
 

caledfwlch

The Horror!!!! :eek:

I seem to recall Spielberg was attached to another attempt to american Who in the late 90's....

The one that had the Tardis not just talk but... Rap. :(

Our fave Timelord has over the years come very close to being americanised in the most horrific ways. The americanised movie we got in 1996 was bad enough as it was. Americanisation is a good way to kill the show dead, it's just one of those things that wont ever work - Red Dwarf was rebooted as a US show and literally died on its feet.

I suspect a Disney Dr Who would have simply flopped, it would have seemed, ironically enough, too "alien" to the British audience, and for the American audience, it would have lost everything that made it special for them, just another disneyfied show.

I am truly thankful that the 1996 movie flopped badly in the US mainstream - though in fairness, this was due to an absolutely insane scheduling decision by Fox - this "british" show, not hugely well known to a mainstream US audience was broadcast opposite the very last episode of Roseanne, no contest :p

But that poor scheduling decision means that I now get to watch Matt Smith being absolutely astonishing, and best of all, that I got to see Ecclestone playing the role he was born for. :D
 

frlmerrin

Banned
I think a Disney Who would have been awesome. Possibly the greatest work of media science fiction since 2001. Who really needs to be placed in the hands of an American company that can do it justice. Disney can provide plotting, character, imagineering and CGI of a standard the BBC could never hope to achieve. Britain is a bit of a dead end for tallest, they never put enough investment into things like Who. They have made it terribly parochial, look how often this all powerful Lord of time and space turns up protecting Britain or London from alien menace. The who idea that he would bother about such a minor nation is risible. America however, a nation with a destiny, a nation gifted to its people by god, that is the sort of nation a time Lord would protect.
 

Orville_third

Banned
I liked the movie- and at least they kept a Brit as the Doctor.
I do like the new BBC series (at least I did until Tennant left), but I don't think Disney would do too poorly- though in the 1980's or 90's Eisner was running things, and while some of his ideas early on were good, a lot of his later ideas weren't.
As for Jack being straight, while Disney may not have as many gay/bi characters as other networks do, the corporation is at least LGBT friendly.
 
Marc Pasquin

Marc Pasquin

Orville_third said:
As for Jack being straight, while Disney may not have as many gay/bi characters as other networks do, the corporation is at least LGBT friendly.
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"as many" ? how many clearly identified LGBT characters are there in major films/series that you know of ? (not trying to put you on the spot, I just can't think of one.)
 
trekchu

trekchu

frlmerrin said:
I think a Disney Who would have been awesome. Possibly the greatest work of media science fiction since 2001. Who really needs to be placed in the hands of an American company that can do it justice. Disney can provide plotting, character, imagineering and CGI of a standard the BBC could never hope to achieve. Britain is a bit of a dead end for tallest, they never put enough investment into things like Who. They have made it terribly parochial, look how often this all powerful Lord of time and space turns up protecting Britain or London from alien menace. The who idea that he would bother about such a minor nation is risible. America however, a nation with a destiny, a nation gifted to its people by god, that is the sort of nation a time Lord would protect.
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American Exceptionalism or downright trolling? I'm too tired to decide myself.
 

Orville_third

Banned
Marc Pasquin said:
"as many" ? how many clearly identified LGBT characters are there in major films/series that you know of ? (not trying to put you on the spot, I just can't think of one.)
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None that I know of- then again, I'm not familiar with most TV shows, Disney/ABC or otherwise.
 

caledfwlch

Marc Pasquin said:
Doctor Who + Disney = very clearly straight captain jack
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The POD is also the eighties.

ISTR they were panicking just a couple of years ago, worried that Captain Jack Sparrow in Pirates might be seen as gay.

This nasty little company is the absolute antithesis of what Who is about.
 

Orville_third

Banned
caledfwlch said:
The POD is also the eighties.

ISTR they were panicking just a couple of years ago, worried that Captain Jack Sparrow in Pirates might be seen as gay.

This nasty little company is the absolute antithesis of what Who is about.
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I think that was more Michael Eisner than Disney. (Then again, Eisner would be running Disney around that time...)
 
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