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From: The Last Doctor <mike@xenocyte.com>
Newsgroups: rec.arts.drwho
Subject: Re: The Lemonade Treatment
Date: Tue, 19 Mar 2024 10:06:22 -0000 (UTC)
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Hi Daniel65 <daniel47@nomail.afraid.org> wrote:
> The Last Doctor wrote on 18/3/24 11:30 pm:
>> Blueshirt <blueshirt@indigo.news> wrote:
>>> The Last Doctor wrote:
>>>> 
>>>> Hindsight is a wonderful thing. We don’t have the pressures that
>>>> the production team were under - especially in those early days.
>>> 
>>> The early episodes were of their time, so I'd leave them as they 
>>> were. If I could go back in time though I'd just tell the BBC not
>>> to wipe or throw away the tins of videotape/film with Doctor Who
>>> episodes on them!
>> 
>> Absolutely agreed on the preservation front.
>> 
>> The 252 episodes of the first four seasons were aired over just 291
>> weeks from 1963-1969 - less than 7 weeks a year without a new episode
>> needed. So no wonder the padding was in there - you’d need 50% more
>> stories otherwise, and with even less time to refine and develop each
>> story.
>> 
>> It was a punishing delivery pace
> 
> Did Coronation St keep up such a punishing pace back then ..... or did 
> they that a couple of months off each year??

Coronation Street ran twice a week without a break from 1963 to 1989 and
actually increased to 3 times in 1989 then 4 from 1996, with occasional
extra events adding additional special episodes - and is now running at 6
episodes a week (this did drop to 3 for a while during the coronavirus
epidemic).

The key differences are a set of static sets and costumes that can be
bought off the peg in shops, far fewer special effects, focus on a regular
cast with few guest stars, long running interwoven plotlines featuring
different groups of cast members and of course a large writers room, which
needs to create engaging interpersonal storylines that blend together
rather than being independently written - but not much truly new or
creative. Due to being able to switch emphasis like that, significant
numbers of cast and crew can take holidays without the show having to take
a break.

A soap is a very different beast from an episodic science fiction show, no
matter what Aggie claims about modern Who. 

-- 
“The timelines and … canon … are rupturing” - the Doctor