Patchanka escribió:@[erick] me va a perdonar, pero pongo un post separado para discutir esto.
https://deadline.com/2025/10/why-disney ... 236601181/Deadline ha soltado una columna hablando sobre el acuerdo BBC-Disney. Algunos highlights:
Deadline has spoken with multiple sources in Doctor Who‘s orbit who say the Disney deal fell apart for a variety of reasons, including concerns over the Ncuti Gatwa show’s failure to break out from its established fan base and its big-ticket budget. Others suspect that fears of a “woke” backlash may be a factor, as Doctor Who has embraced diverse storytelling under showrunner Russell T Davies.
“It was pretty apparent from early on that this wasn’t for the long term,” says a former Disney executive. “Everyone got the impression that it wasn’t doing what it needed to do [on Disney+] to be sustained.” Another person close to Doctor Who adds: “The writing has been on the wall for ages. There has been a complete lack of enthusiasm over at Disney.”
The show’s budget was between £6 million ($8.5 million) and £8M per episode, we understand, putting the value of the deal at as much as £168M.
An executive at BBC Studios, which owns Doctor Who and oversees international sales, says “it never felt like Disney were making much of a deal” about the iconic sci-fi series, which has been on British screens for more than 60 years. Disney sources have countered this, with one telling The Times of London that “a lot of marketing muscle” was put behind the show.
Doctor Who‘s performance has been far from stellar in the U.S. This year’s season failed to register in Nielsen and Luminate’s streaming charts. Meanwhile, the Entertainment Strategy Guy blog branded Doctor Who‘s debut on Disney as one of the “flops” of 2024. There was also a serious lack of awards buzz around the series, which only managed one Primetime Emmy nomination (for Outstanding Choreography for Scripted Programming in 2025) during its time on Disney+.
On the BBC, Doctor Who has seen an alarming drop-off in viewing figures. Season 15 averaged 3.8M viewers, according to gold-standard 28-day viewing figures from Barb, the UK’s official ratings agency. This represents a decline of 1M on the prior season, the first starring Gatwa and produced by Jane Tranter’s Bad Wolf. Both Gatwa seasons were down on Jodie Whittaker’s concluding season in 2021 (watched by 5.2M people), a period that was not considered to be vintage Doctor Who. “The ratings were not up to much,” someone involved in the series ruefully acknowledges.
Sources tell us that the BBC and Disney had initially planned to make a statement about Doctor Who‘s future after the premiere of spinoff series The War Between the Land and the Sea, but Disney moved the announcement up.
Gatwa’s experience felt somewhat fraught. He left after two seasons and later blamed burnout, with the 33-year-old saying he was “getting old and my body was tired.” A Doctor Who source says the show suffered because Gatwa never fully embraced the role. “There is more to that role than performing,” this person says. “You have got to be an ambassador for the brand and embrace being that generation’s Doctor. Matt Smith and David Tennant fully understood the responsibility it carried.”
Another well-placed industry source says Doctor Who became “too woke for Trump’s USA,” and this was “a factor in Disney minds” when it came to a renewal.
(...)
Disney is incredibly unlikely to ever admit that politics were a factor in Doctor Who‘s cancellation, but Jimmy Kimmel’s brief suspension was revealing of the company’s desire to minimize MAGA wrath. With Davies yet to commit to showrunning future seasons, it’s possible that Doctor Who could have dialed down diversity under a Disney renewal, but the fact remains that celebrating difference has always been part of the show’s DNA.
The former Disney executive reckons the BBC will be able to spend at most £2.5M-£3M per episode, which could work out at around £1M per episode from the BBC’s own pocket and any additional coming from a BBC Studios distribution advance in what is a tricky market for drama funding. That would see Doctor Who‘s budget slashed by around a half from the Disney days.
“Once you’ve gone up, it’s always difficult to go back down,” the source says. “You can cut budgets to a certain degree but not by so much. Is the BBC really going to stump up even more for something showing decline?”
Others point out that some of Davies’ cheaper episodes were his best, such as Season 14’s “73 Yards,” which was praised by critics and Whovians. “Budget limitations used to help the idiosyncrasies of the show,” adds an executive who used to work on Doctor Who. “Big budgets can cause a problem — a huge variety of voices tend to push towards the mediocre — but then the budget was nowhere near as big as [shows like] The Mandalorian, so they were stuck in the middle. You can have planets, flying cars, and robots, but ultimately you are always going to get better versions elsewhere.”
Finding another American buyer for Doctor Who will be tough going, the ex-Disney source adds, while striking “piecemeal” deals across Europe and Latin America may prove difficult for a show that is ultimately quintessentially British. “How do you suddenly convince a buyer to take Doctor Who when it hasn’t been on their platform for so long?” the source questions.
But it is still possible. We understand that prior to Disney+ and the BBC striking the co-pro deal, an alternative option was presented to then-BBC drama boss Piers Wenger, which would have raised up to £5M an episode without input from a big American player. This plan could yet be revisited.
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