Karen Brooks has written a very good article on Doctor Who:
Who loves wallowing in newstalgia | The Courier-Mail
"Who loves wallowing in newstalgia
Karen Brooks
July 02, 2008 12:00am
FROM a pop culture perspective, the first decade of the millennium appears to be more focused on revisiting the past than envisioning the future.
Just look at all the kitsch television series of yesteryear that are being remade.
There's the bumbling Agent 86, who continues to "miss it by that much", aided by sultry 99; a second version of the mean green fighting machine, the Hulk, as well as a host of bionic and wonder women, angst-ridden superheroes and other jokers as well as domesticated witches on big and small screens everywhere.
It seems that producers are viewing the celluloid hits of the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s as relatively risk-free investments in the pernickety noughties.
The success of a remake, however, is not only contingent on casting or a clever reinvention of a well-known story and beloved personalities.
Nowadays, the "fresh" product must be Janus-faced: that is, look simultaneously backwards and forwards, combining recognition and novelty to create "newstalgia" and thus satisfy the sophisticated appetites of contemporary viewers.
Yet, as those of us who saw the movies Bewitched or Starsky and Hutch will attest, this formula can also breed contempt.
Proving that newstalgia, when it's done correctly, can be ratings gold, is the long-running BBC series Doctor Who.
Surpassing its US genre rival, Star Trek, it is now considered the longest running science-fiction television series in history.
First screened on November 23, 1963, on BBC1, Doctor Who has survived savaging from critics, low budgets, dodgy sets and monsters, and even an attempt to exterminate it in 1989.
Despite its cancellation at the end of the 1980s and absence from television screens (except as reruns, radio shows, books and an ordinary film in 1996), for almost 16 years, the program was successfully resurrected in 2005.
Some credit its unexpected renaissance (with a much bigger budget) to a 1999 British Film Institute poll that ranked Doctor Who as the third most popular program ever.
Others, such as writer and fan Kim Newman, credit its longevity to its ability to be "at once cosily familiar and cosmically terrifying".
How many of us recall curling up in an armchair (or behind one) and watching the Doctor and his various assistants battle everything from Sontarans, Egyptian mummies, the Master, Cybermen and the strange but terrifying Daleks?
Set in a variety of identifiably British landscapes from ordinary quarries, to caves and castles, the Doctor didn't need his time machine, the TARDIS (Time and Relative Dimension(s) in Space), to transport audiences to imaginative spaces galaxies away.
So when season four of the new series begins on Sunday night, Aunty may not destroy the commercial opposition, but she'll certainly give them time and space to ponder what it is about this little show with big ideas that keeps generations tuning in.
Possibly, it's the Doctor himself.
Now into his 1000th year of life, the Time Lord from the destroyed planet of Gallifrey has been played by 10 very different actors, all of whom brought their own brand of quirkiness to the character and, in doing so, redefined the concept of newstalgia.
When the first doctor, crusty William Hartnell, became ill, the notion of having the Time Lord regenerate was born, injecting life and a very original storyline into an already gripping show.
And, like arguments about who is the best James Bond, Who fans debate the merits and flaws of each Doctor; from Patrick Troughton's gruffness to John Pertwee's flounces, Tom Baker's curls, scarf and floppy hat, Sylvester McCoy's questions, Peter Davison's gentleness to the more recent incarnations of Christopher Eccleston with his northern brogue or the latest and, to some, greatest, the sneaker-wearing and daring David Tennant.
Or perhaps it's the sidekicks, who have ranged from school teachers, warrior women, medical students, journalists and even, lately, a bisexual immortal, Captain Jack Harkness.
Then there's also the rich intertextuality; the gesturing to earlier episodes and Doctors, history, literature, philosophy, science and the combination of high drama, camp and comedy that make this series so appealing.
Watching, we vicariously assist the Time Lord, divest ourselves of responsibilities, shed the chrysalis of our mundane lives and emerge as galactic butterflies, spreading our wings in manifold times and spaces.
Yet, at the heart of the Doctor's (and our) quest, lies a very simple premise.
The alien Doctor Who retains an unshakeable faith in and love of humans.
Despite all the flaws and faults his encounters, past and present, have exposed, despite all the wrongs he's had to right, all the evil he's had to counter, he continues to celebrate and believe in humanity's unquenchable goodness and our ability to survive and help each other.
Perhaps that's why we love and continue to watch the Doctor.
It's not because we want to know who he is but because we want to share how he feels about us and, for all its imperfections, our wonderful world."
