A Doctor Who movie is in development, Variety is reporting. That's right -- after decades of rumors, the long-running British sci-fi series is making the jump from the small screen to the big screen. David Yates, who directed the last four Harry Potter films, confirmed to Variety that he is about to start work on the project, along with Jane Tranter, head of BBC Worldwide Productions.
But before you start jumping for joy, Yates has a few words for you: "It needs quite a radical transformation to take it into the bigger arena." And, "Russell T. Davies and then Steven Moffat have done their own transformations, which were fantastic, but we have to put that aside and start from scratch."
That's where I start to have big problems.
It's reasonable to assume that Doctor Who -- the television series -- will still be on air by the time the film is released. This means that, in essence, there will be two versions of the same franchise going on simultaneously. If you think next year's reboot of the Spider-man franchise is too soon, imagine if it had been released simultaneously with Spider-man 2. That's a more confusing premise than any of Steven Moffat's plotlines.
Please don't get me wrong here: I admire David Yates as a director. He crafted the last four Harry Potter films into exceptionally mature (yet still magical) tales. In fact, I would be quite interested to see what he could do with the Doctor Who franchise -- but not now. It simply isn't the time to reboot an already-successful series into a different medium. The franchise doesn't need a film adaptation to be validated. There were plenty of opportunities for a film between 1990 and 2004, when the series was off the air. But for now, I'd prefer one Doctor at a time, please.
This is such a horrible, horrible idea. That sentence "we have to start from scratch" terrifies me. This movie will be an absolute crapfest. There is no way this turns out well.
Agreed – we're on the 11th Doctor right now. They couldn't wait five years? They *have* to capitalize on its growing popularity at this moment? I trust in Yates, but this is a mistake.
Besides, how can ONE movie do any justice to the story? You'll have to completely explain the whole Doctor Who story, and by the time you're done with that, there isn't really any room left for plots. Plus, with our luck, we'll get all the villains in one, and that's a recipe for disaster, if you don't know what they are/why they're scary.
People, the film is just “under development”! There isn’t even a script or anything yet. Yates has only just started looking for writers for this project. To get this just right, it most likely take years for this to become a finished product. By then, we’ll most likely be on the 13th Doctor, and a reboot won’t get in the way too much. So chill, people!