Part II, Chapter VII: "Onwards and Upwards"
“Of course, I knew how big Doctor Who was in the UK at the time, so I knew just how important this role could be for me. Despite that, playing the Doctor was nothing like what I had expected. There were a great many friends I made on the sets, Denise and Tom most notably. After the first season, I expected to be recognised on the streets a bit more than before. In the UK, many had watched Blackadder, but I couldn’t go an hour outside without being recognised after Doctor Who was released. I don’t think I was prepared for it, and that was the one piece of advice that I gave to my successors: ‘Understand that by taking this role, you are the Doctor, and that people will recognise you as such.’”
- Hugh Laurie on being the Doctor, taken from
The Doctor is Who?, a one-off show in 2014 to announce who would be playing the Doctor. [1]
Doctor Who was, put simply, a hit. NBC’s gamble had paid off, and they now had a serious competitor for
Star Trek. Of course, many people working on
Doctor Who had experience with
Star Trek, not least of all Denise Crosby, who had been a main cast member in
The Next Generation’s first season. In fact, it was not uncommon to see actors guest star in both of the shows, a phenomenon that would only become more pronounced as time went on.
Following the massively successful Season 22, the first American produced
Doctor Who season, NBC ordered two more, and all three main cast members signed on. Between
Doctor Who and
Star Trek: The Next Generation, science fiction fans were getting an episode of a show that many loved every week for the majority of the year. [2]
Production began on Season 23 of
Doctor Who while Season 22 was still airing. As a result, the show was affected by the 1988 Writers’ Guild of America strike, though being a production with many writers based in the UK, the effects of this were much less pronounced than they would prove to be on Season 2 of
The Next Generation.[3]
Season 23 would follow much the same formula as Season 22, small stories with no over-arching plot. There were those writers who were more in favour of creating a larger plot over the course of a season, but the prevalence of syndication in the US resulted in the producers deciding that going for self-contained stories was the way to go. This would mean that channels would not feel pressured to show the stories in order when they gained syndication rights. [4]
Many old villains would be returning in this season, perhaps most notably the Cybermen, who had last been seen in the film
The Cyber Invasion. For their return,
Doctor Who would join forces with Jim Henson once more. The Cybermen would be redesigned once more, to appear more similar to how they had in the Classic series. The original proposal for the redesign would not see fruition until 1993 however, after it was deemed “too scary” for the show. [5]
Of course, the Daleks would return, continuing the story that was set up in
Revelation of the Daleks, which culminated in the outbreak of a Dalek Civil War. This would be one of the few stories of the season to rely on a story from a previous season, though enough context would be left in so as to avoid the alienation of those who had missed that story.
The Master and the Rani would also show up once more. More focus would be given to the Rani, as Anthony Ainley would grow more tired with having to fly trans-Atlantic to be in the show. This did lead to some producers consider re-casting the Master, as had been done following the untimely death of Roger Delgado, though they would decide against it for the time being. Kahn was happy to do more work on the show, having been given plenty of opportunities to embrace her more comedic side in villainy.
The season would also see many more guest stars than the first of the revival run. Few British actors had been interested in being in Season 22 due to the distances involved, and few Americans were very familiar with the franchise outside of the three Amblin films. Given the success of Season 22 however, both of these worried became less of a concern.
Some of the most notable guest stars would be Rowan Atkinson, Emma Thompson and Stephen Fry, all of whom Laurie had worked with in the past. Fry had been the second choice for the Seventh Doctor, and both Fry and Laurie had been part of the Footlights with Thompson. Their partaking in the show would result in both Crosby and Hanks encouraging their colleagues from past endeavours to guest star in future seasons. [6]
The release date for the first episode of Season 23 of
Doctor Who was set as May 14th 1989, to roughly coincide with the conclusion of Season 2 of
Star Trek: The Next Generation. Unlike last season however, the producers now felt that
Doctor Who would likely be able to hold its own against the other major science fiction show of the time.
It was quickly becoming clear to the cast and crew of both shows, in fact, that the two had more in common than they had at first thought. There was a very large overlap in the fan bases for the two shows, which resulted in the rivalry between the two becoming much more friendly. This would set the stage for something of an “exchange program”, where the cast of one show would begin to appear on the other. While this realisation would not come in time for Season 23, plans were made for Season 24 of
Doctor Who and Season 3 of
The Next Generation. [7]
[1] I very nearly revealed the number of this new Doctor, but decided against it. I'm going to start dropping more "future hints" though. Little things to pick up on for the future.
[2] Some might argue that this would gause genre fatigue down the line, but I'm tempted to disagree. The two are vastly different shows. Doctor Who has always been about adventure and action, whereas The Next Generation was more contemplatative. I adore both, which is why I couldn't bring myself to kill either.
[3] Sure I've mentioned this before, but here it is again. Just highlights the differences between the two franchises.
[4] Unlike The Next Generation, Doctor Who isn't in first-run syndication. This is just forward thinking on the executives' part.
[5] A little hint for the future. The first proposal is similar to the plans for The Dark Dimension, which was the initial plan for the 30th, before Dimensions in Time.
[6] There will be more guest stars this season. I'd be tempted to give you a little more information than that, but I'd risk spoiling something down the line.
[7] As much hinted before, there will be more of an actor overlap between the two franchises. There will be plenty more people who appear in all of the "Big Three" of sci-fi than the two(to my knowledge) of OTL.