Dr Who

I tweeted about giving up Dr Who and it seems fair to give you more information, dear Fooyah fans.

I’m (most likely) middle-aged. I grew up believing in The Doctor. The glory days of Tom Baker as the time traveller. I liked Peter Davison as the Doctor and also watched a little of Sylvester McCoy. By this time I was a little older and TV had outgrown its purposes of entertaining me for a while.

I remember looking forward to the Doctor Who film in the mid 90s. I quite liked it but had hoped it would prove to be enough for a new series. The things of wonder from my childhood still provide wonder as long as I don’t return to them because the adult mind is so different to that of a young boy. Things I thought were great don’t always stand the test of time.

When the BBC returned the series in the 2000s I was hooked. It was great. Funny, exciting and what it should be. Ecclestone was good and although I was rather shocked when he left I still enjoyed the story line with Tennant. Personally I found that the series peaked with the discovery of who the Face of Bo really was. It was such a revelation that I can’t wait to watch the first few series with my children when they are older just to see their faces at that point. I think that occurs about 4 seasons into the new imagining of Dr Who.

When Matt Smith took over I had no problem accepting him as the Doctor and I didn’t stop watching because of him. I stopped watching because the plots and solutions to universe ending crises seemed too thin and similar. I don’t need the Doctor to save the existence of the entire universe once a series. I just want intelligent scripts and reasonable effects. The sonic screw driver seemed to have become such a plot device that it could do anything, boring. The Doctor would think for a while, rush off while our companions are in mortal danger and fix everything with a zap from the screwdriver. More boring. Deus Ex Machina. Boring.

I gave up watching it. I only have a certain amount of time I give over to television and Doctor Who dropped of the list of things I like to watch. There, said it for the world to see. I don’t think it’s as good as it used to be. Put that in your screwdriver and smoke it.

So, here’s W.A.S.P. singing “I don’t need no Doctor” [yes, I know that’s a double negative but you know what it means].

 

Unreliable

Some time ago I started writing communications about news failures on the BBC News website. It has been quite clear to me that the quality of journalism on the BBC website has been falling for years (subjective rather than hard data). The headlines and stories have not been presented well. Rather than giving accurate news and reporting important things it seems that the BBC feel they are in competition with sites such as the Huffington Post and the Daily Mail “news” websites. The BBC is not in competition and as a public body should try to maintain high standards of news and programming but they push their content to the lowest denominator of population trying to compete with channels that I couldn’t care about.

I have decided to stop using the BBC News website so much. It has been a gradual decision but was forced through the day I saw the following picture and clip on the front page of the site.

Not really news

This story is not news. It’s not even a new thing. Animals have been given wheeled prosthetics for a long time. I just don’t care!

Goodbye BBC News website. I will still listen to Radio 4. I feel there is still some standard of production there. I guess one day I’ll change my mind. Is it because I’m getting older and therefore more cynical? I think there’s a Phd in looking into these factors.