10 Biggest Doctor Who Criticisms (And Why They're Wrong)

It would appear that, for a lot people, the “too much of a good thing” motto doesn’t apply to Doctor Who. Because something that’s often at the top of the list of fan desires is an increased episode count every year. Which would be pretty nifty apart from one problem: It’s not physically possible.

A full series of Doctor Who and the Christmas Special shoots for just under eight months. That’s two thirds of every year just for principal photography. Each series is probably closer to being a full year’s work, with a lot of crossover between different areas of production just to get everything done in time. When Series 4 was in progress, FX house The Mill were designing the Adipose while the script for Partners In Crime was still being written.

Apart from breaking every labour law going and seriously rushing production, the only real way to cram more Doctor Who into each year would be to make enormous changes to the format to allow for the production of multiple episodes alongside each other. In particular, a larger permanent cast to stop the programme being reliant on two actors (which would mean a reduced focus on the Doctor), and more standing sets that would be used for every episode to trim the budget. And while that decision worked to an extent during the Jon Pertwee years, doing it again probably wouldn’t have positive results.