Ratings, at the time of The Greatest Show in the Galaxy, were everything on TV. Back when Doctor Who started in the 1960s, there had been some sense of a greater good, perhaps. Ratings were important, yes, but Who had originally been designed to incorporate an educational aspect alongside the fantasy element that would soon become its signature. But in the 1980s, the content or cultural value of a show was secondary to how it performed in the ratings war. The soaps were ruling the airwaves and Doctor Who was fast losing viewers who had come to regard the show as a childish throwback, unwilling or unable to change with the times. Thus, the ratings - the numbers 0 were everything to the Gods at the BBC. When the Gods of Ragnarok hold those numbers above their heads, theyre a stand in for ratings and viewing figures. But its interesting and telling that they seem to only ever go from 9,9,9 to 0,0,0. The Gods at the BBC were therefore watching Doctor Who closely. Yes, it was a national treasure, and yes, it had been saved before by a public outcry, but sentimentality was nothing to them. They demanded that Doctor Who perform as well as any other show, despite the constraints being placed on it at the time. Which begs the question if the Doctors simple magic show at the climax of the story might be a meta-commentary again on the series making the best fist it could with extremely limited resources or if, perhaps, some viewers might just be reading too much into a psychadelic story that merely plays on many people's essential fear of the circus... What do you think of this list? Is there more to The Greatest Show in the Galaxy than meets the eye? Share your views on the subject in the comments section below.
