...NEW DR WHO TONIGHT, EPISODE 7, THE LONG GAME...

[The Amstor Computer]

It certainly does seem like the show's captured a good, regular audience. There are occasional peaks above the 8 million, but that 7.5-8 million appear to be tuning in every single week.

Hopefully good word-of-mouth, coupled with what seem to be some very strong stories coming down the line will see the regular audience rise to the 10 million mark, but I think at this stage everyone can be very happy with such a sizable chunk of the viewing public.

[wrighty47]

Also, the Sunday night reshow on BBC3 is getting a regular 1/2 million audiance too!

Alan!

[paulvonscott]

I reckon the Christmas special and a new Doctor will give the show a huge boost.

[Dudley]

Another top episode: can't believe I have to choose between Bristol and the Paul Cornell episode.

[Max Kon]

you could just go back to the hotel for 7. I think the hall closes at 6.

[DavidXBrunt]

There's a short piece towards the front of the latest D.W.M. (which is on top form at the moment) which analyses the ratings of the first few episodes.

It makes an interesting point when it says that, debut episode aside, Who got great viewing figures but Ant and Dec didn't heamerage viewers, implying it's bringing a large number of people to Saturday evening telly that otherwise wouldn't have been there instead of just stealing the existing viewers.

[The Amstor Computer]

That is an interesting point, and one I hadn't considered - when the two shows were running together, they were bringing in around 16 million viewers in that one timeslot. Makes the point that people will watch if there's something worth watching - a point rammed home by the catastrophic ratings for Celebrity Wrestling...

[Floyd-the-k]

I won't read this threat any further, lest I spoiler Who for myself, but I saw the Daleks last night in an ad for a call centre.

yours whiling away the time before the new Who arrives by renting old tapes and watching Jon Pertwee go the grope on Sarah-Jane Smith

[Steamboy]

Hey Floyd, see ABC have started to run ads for the new series, like you I cant wait but cant help myself for checking these threads and watching the current Keys of Time/Rommana Baker Dr Who's they're repeating at the mo to get prepared, doesn't the comming soon Ad look(in best Pom voice)"absolutly bwill".

CU Krestel

[GordonR]

"a point rammed home by the catastrophic ratings for Celebrity Wrestling..."

And can I say again how delighted I am that Celebrity Wrestling has died on its arse.  Death to lowest common denominator TV.  The only thing that would have made CW worse would have been Davina McCall - the queen of LCD TV - as presenter, but I guess she wasn't available this time.

I think the overnight ratings have it getting just over 3 million viewers (and dropping every week) and I hear ITV are already thinking about pulling it from the evening slot and moving it to Saturday morning.  

[House of Usher]

Was The Doctor ever as scrupulous about averting time paradoxes before his present incarnation?

I thought he used to just joy ride around meddling wherever he felt like it, trying to be on the side of the good guys and not cause too much damage while he was about it.

Any thoughts?

[Richmond Clements]

They've (almost) all had their moments Usher.
Davidson in Frontios, Baker in Pyramids of Mars both spring to mind as occasions when the Doctor talked about interfering with and effecting history.

Bottom line though, I think it's only important if the story demands it.

[paulvonscott]

Well, I think there's a difference bwteen hias usual adventures, in that he's normally just in time, and presumably his actions are prt of time.  When Adric died, he couldn't go back and change it though.

Or maybe he coudn't be bothered.

[Tiplodocus]

Er... I didn't actually like Simon Pegg in the role.  I just didn't think he conveyed an air of anything approaching menace and that kind of spoiled the "evil genius" thing for me.

And I wasn't sure that they conveyed why all of this was a threat to the world very well either.

It all felt a bit cheap and not very grand in scope - like one of those bottle shows that Star Trek do when the budget is running short. Sometimes that works well - see the Dalek episode which needed a sense of claustrophobia - but an evil alien ruling the world by turning us into celeberity wrestling loving drones needs a bit more epic scope to it.

Still, it was nice that the expectation that Bruno Boy Genius would become a second assistant turned around and also to see the guest stars being given centre stage for this episode - hopefully they'll do it again.

[ARRISARRIS]

...debate, debate, debate...