Doctor Who: Season 17 Recap

This was an abysmal season. From star to finish, with only City of Death as an effort worthy of discussion. Had the season ended properly, it might have redeemed itself with Shada. As it stands the show was just bad.

Real bad.

The problem as I see it is that Graham Williams was faced with difficult situation, a problem that truly plagued the show: Budget.

In the beginning, way back to the first Doctor Who serial and up through the early Tom Baker days, Doctor Who was impressive with its innovative use of budgets. The show didn't have a giant budget, a small one, but a workable small one. The producers and creative teams behind the show from 1963-1976 made innovative use of the budgets, figured out where to cut costs and where to spend the money, they created creatures and effects and aliens under constraints, and 95% of the time they did a damn fine job of it. Things for the most part looked pretty good.

But by the time Williams took over the show, the budget stayed the same for the show...and inflation grew. Leaving Williams no choice but to cut costs. The actors hired to play supporting guest roles in the show generally got worse. The effects became very cheap and laughable, and the monster costumes looked ridiculous. This season was especially bad for hilariously bad monster costumes.

I have a theory. Williams became tired. Tired of never getting the money he needed to produce the show properly, and I think he gave it less enthusiasm as a result. The stories turned in were not up to snuff, and he really only got one good season out of his three year stint as Producer of the show, the Key to Time: Season 16.

One minor note about this season that is slightly interesting. This is the only season in which K-9 was not voiced by John Leeson. He was instead voiced by David Brierley. He sounds weird and wrong thoughout. Leeson Returned to the role the following year, and continues to voice him to this day.

NEXT TIME: The 70s Recap