“An Unearthly Child” is the name of the first episode of Doctor Who ever. In those early years they still operated as serials but each episode would have it’s own name. It wasn’t until a few years into the show that all the serial parts would share a name. For example, “An Unearthly Child” is now considered the name of the first four episodes of the first serial, with the other episodes titled “The Cave Of Skulls”, “The Forest Of Fear”, and “The Firemaker” respectively. However, the working name was apparently “The Tribe Of Gum”, named after one of the characters whose name became Kal in the final version of the serial. In modern Doctor Who all you have are one-shot episodes with one multiparter per “series” (what they call seasons in the UK at least now) and a running subplot through the season.
Because we can’t have nice things, the four episodes have entered the crazy world of rights issues. Upset at perceived past wrongs by the BBC toward his late father, the son of the episode’s writer, Anthony Coburn, is keeping the serial from joining the classic Who shows from airing on the BBC’s “iPlayer” website, which they announced they would start doing in November.
Now in the name of full disclosure, I am a fan of the classic show, less so the new show even before the recent shenanigans because it never had the same charm as the original for me. I’m also not in the UK so the only way I can see it as an American is with a VPN, a BritBox subscription, or the various Classic Doctor Who livestream channels that don’t seem to show the same episode. I checked earlier. Two services were showing “The Pirate Planet”, but one had “Snakedance” and the other “The Androids Of Tara”. I could use YouTube, Amazon, or Vudu but all three require you to rent an episode rather than stream free with ads. I do, however, own the episode on DVD so I can watch it whenever I want. My point is my dog in this fight is very small. And considering who my favorite Companion is, robotic.
So where’s the controversy, why and how can Stef Coburn keeps his dad’s episode from being part of the BBC’s new project I can’t see anyway, and who’s in the right? Let’s examine.
First I’m using a video by
The Confused Adipose to get everyone on the same page contextually.
Getting this out of the way now: Don’t care about his complaining about the new Doctor being a gay black man. I still protest casting for messages and stunts rather than the story but we don’t know for sure that Neil Patrick Harris’ statement that this will be the “gayest” Doctor ever is actually coming to pass. Yes, there have been gay characters before and that includes Companions, and Russel T. Davies is a very open gay man with an equally open hatred for Christians and Christmas (the latter he’s shown on his show) but we haven’t seen Ncuti Gatwa’s portrayal yet. He can think what he wants but his anti-progressive stand being tied to why he’s doing this is speculation only.
I honestly do believe his war is with the BBC. Stef has claimed that he doesn’t care about the show, which would shock American Whovians to hear given that we seem to think Doctor Who is THE show in England because we don’t get to see a lot of it. We see more Japanese animation than we do live-action British programing. I know if my relative had worked on The Walking Dead I still wouldn’t be interested in that show. Stef’s issue is with the BBC itself for what he sees as the same stunt DC Comics (then National Comics) did to the creators of Superman. Whether or not that’s accurate I couldn’t tell you. I wasn’t in the writing room when they came up with TARDIS, mostly because I wasn’t born yet. By now I do think it would be wrong of him to try to keep the BBC from using TARDIS, since the damage is done and I don’t know how much they care (again, like DC Comics) plus it would throw the whole show into a mess. I could see demanding a credit, “TARDIS” created by Anthony Coburn or something, but he only created the name. The ship, which bears little internal resemblance to the ship while the Police Box has been altered from not only the original show but actual British police boxes, was not his creation.
The thing is rights issues are even more confusing in the UK than they are in the US. The show can’t use the Daleks without approval given from and compensation given to the estate of Terry Nation. One indie film was able to use the Sontarans legally in their direct-to-video movie but had to redesign them enough to not resemble the BBC’s trademarked design but still looking like a Sontaran. Bob Baker made a K-9 TV series in Australia since he created the character AND designed the original robotic prop and thus has the rights but was only allowed to have the classic design for a few seconds before forcing him to regenerate Time Lord style into a new body. It’s very hard for me to follow so I couldn’t tell you who owns which part of what.
The fans have a point that the four episodes that compose the “An Unearthly Child” serial are very important. It’s the introduction of the Doctor, though thanks to Chris Chibnall he’s no longer actually the first Doctor, and seeing how the character started out. He was not the savior of time and space he’s become today. He just wanted to explore and he wasn’t above messing with his kidnapped Companions to get what he wanted. Over time he softened as events forced him into the role of hero, and eventually he became the champion of good we know him as now. It is fascinating to see that, and I don’t need a colorized version to encourage fans to watch it or the classic shows in general. Step has an answer to that: go ahead and pirate it!
His goal isn’t stopping fans from seeing the serial, but to keep the BBC from profiting off of it as “vengeance” for the wrongs he thinks were done to his father. I’m not saying he’s right or that this contributed to Anthony’s poor health issues that led to his passing because, again, I wasn’t there and haven’t met either man. But some fans have been absolutely vicious to him on X-Twitter for doing this (and possibly the more left-wing critics complaining about his view on Gatwa), calling him all sorts of names, and trying to find solutions to get this on the iPlayer. A few I saw even came out as spiteful as Stef is being. I do not know the extent of his worldviews because this is the first I’ve heard of him so he may well be far-right or just mainstream conservative (the culture war is currently not about playing fair but shutting up anyone who isn’t joining the right hivemind), but that doesn’t mean the BBC didn’t screw over his father or take advantage of his health or anything else he’s accusing them for. Calls for bodily harm over a TV show seems a bit harsh under any circumstance.
Coburn isn’t blameless here. He is totally operating out of spite, even claiming the rights are going to go to the BBC’s “enemies” when he dies. For some reason the fans went with Russia, as if they’d care. I could see maybe ITV or one of their other competitors but Russia? He hasn’t said who those “enemies” are so why jump to Russia? I’ve seen fans call for a reenactment, possibly with the actors from An Adventure In Time In Space, the docudrama about making “An Unearthly Child” and the problems getting it made and aired…but if the rights are about the story itself I don’t see how that can happen. Maybe Big Finish, which isn’t owned by the BBC but does have a licensing agreement with them and the ITV over certain shows, could do something but an audio drama isn’t the same thing and they’d still have to get permission from everyone involved. Someone even went as far as fake being Stef and selling the DVD on eBay for a large sum, which he claims isn’t him. I understand fans being upset and I would like to see everyone have a chance at watching it, given the BBC’s history with destroying copies of old episodes that have now gone missing, but some of the reactions are the kind of thing used to make us geeks look bad to the general audience.
Basically, I’m not on anybody’s side here. Fans have a point but are going too far in their response. Stef Coburn has a point but isn’t playing fair with anyone out of a need for payback. The BBC has a point but their history with Doctor Who and other creators aren’t always squeaky clean. There are still ways to see it, even in the original black and white, and I do encourage fans to check it out and suck up the lack of color. I would like to see everybody work out some deal they’re content with but it seems that’s a tall order in the 2020s so I’m not holding my breath.
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