So I come to Doctor Who from a different angle than you: I grew up watching UK Gold reruns of the classic series, which obviously over 26 years had different producer teams with different ideas and different Doctors (much like the new series) but was also made of serials rather than individual episodes (could be as few as two or as many as ten half hour episodes per story) and had changes in format over time. For example, Doctor Who originally started off originating between Sci Fi serials and Historical serials, where there were no aliens running about and it was basically just about time travel to past events (and then of course shamelessly messing with those events), but those tapered off within a few years.
I think with both the Classic and New series, it's always been the case that because there's so much change within cast, ideas etc that most people prefer one part of the show and potentially have other bits that they really dislike. One of the more unique aspects of the show, I think, given the leading actor keeps changing.
I haven't seen the New series in a long time, but I think that first series is probably the strongest altogether as a season, on balance. It's a shame we only got one series with Eccleston. I remember getting quite frustrated with Rose, though I think that partially is me going "ugh, modern series, now we're going to have a love subplot, aren't we?" and being pleasantly surprised in the first series, then when the Tenth Doctor mopes like anything about her in later series, getting rather cross about it. Confirmation bias, I suppose? Though I suppose part of it is, again, that TV has changed, and you're expected to have much more emotional attachment to those main characters nowadays. The problem is when you bring that into a series with as long a history - and as long a space for later episodes - is that it starts to look like you care about some companions more than others, and that bothers me a bit.
A few years ago, Twitch (the video game streaming website, that has now branched out into general streaming... which I find is quite funny given it's back to what JTV was originally like, but that's another story!) got a license to stream nearly all of the Classic series of Doctor Who; it was a 24/7 channel that ran a set of serials 3 times a day to cater for different timezones. It wasn't all of them: there were some rights issues concerning the Daleks, and they skipped any entirely missing serial, or any serial that had missing episodes (including if they'd been DVD released with animated reconstruction of the missing episode(s)). It went on for over a month. It picked up a lot of younger, modern Doctor Who fans who were curious about the original series, and it was really interesting to see a more modern take on some of the companions and storylines. (Also to consider how weird some of the ideas are: The Gunfighters, a 60s Hartnell serial, has this song that is constantly repeated through it about the story, and it was absolutely love it or hate it!) Plus, they ran a trailer for each Doctor before the stream ran, so it created a lot of memes because people who were interested in watching the stream saw those trailers quite a lot. (You can see them here is you're interested, they're only around a minute each: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCVPn-CCocXcscOMvNjp7KlQ/videos). I found it fascinating as it also got people to look at the Hartnell and Troughton eras (some of my favourites); I find that sometimes where people do feel like going back they see that both of those are in black and white and think it's just a step too far. Although of course it goes without saying that with a show like Doctor Who nobody should ever be obliged to watch every single episode/era!
You talk about Rose and the Doctor potentially not being as shipped if it were to air nowadays, maybe that's true. I wonder what fandom would make of the Second Doctor and Jamie relationship these days (I tried to find some clips and only really came up with this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=COFcyo8Qf1c)
There's also a user called Babelcolour who makes some really nice Doctor Who content, including a tribute for each Doctor era in a sort of music video style. They do this for both the New and Classic series, so you might be interested. I quite like them: https://www.youtube.com/c/BabelColour/videos
As for when I stopped watching Doctor Who? Somewhere through Matt Smith's run. I liked his rendition of the Doctor, but didn't like the way the story was going as such and needlessly overcomplicating everything.
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I think with both the Classic and New series, it's always been the case that because there's so much change within cast, ideas etc that most people prefer one part of the show and potentially have other bits that they really dislike. One of the more unique aspects of the show, I think, given the leading actor keeps changing.
I haven't seen the New series in a long time, but I think that first series is probably the strongest altogether as a season, on balance. It's a shame we only got one series with Eccleston. I remember getting quite frustrated with Rose, though I think that partially is me going "ugh, modern series, now we're going to have a love subplot, aren't we?" and being pleasantly surprised in the first series, then when the Tenth Doctor mopes like anything about her in later series, getting rather cross about it. Confirmation bias, I suppose? Though I suppose part of it is, again, that TV has changed, and you're expected to have much more emotional attachment to those main characters nowadays. The problem is when you bring that into a series with as long a history - and as long a space for later episodes - is that it starts to look like you care about some companions more than others, and that bothers me a bit.
A few years ago, Twitch (the video game streaming website, that has now branched out into general streaming... which I find is quite funny given it's back to what JTV was originally like, but that's another story!) got a license to stream nearly all of the Classic series of Doctor Who; it was a 24/7 channel that ran a set of serials 3 times a day to cater for different timezones. It wasn't all of them: there were some rights issues concerning the Daleks, and they skipped any entirely missing serial, or any serial that had missing episodes (including if they'd been DVD released with animated reconstruction of the missing episode(s)). It went on for over a month. It picked up a lot of younger, modern Doctor Who fans who were curious about the original series, and it was really interesting to see a more modern take on some of the companions and storylines. (Also to consider how weird some of the ideas are: The Gunfighters, a 60s Hartnell serial, has this song that is constantly repeated through it about the story, and it was absolutely love it or hate it!) Plus, they ran a trailer for each Doctor before the stream ran, so it created a lot of memes because people who were interested in watching the stream saw those trailers quite a lot. (You can see them here is you're interested, they're only around a minute each: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCVPn-CCocXcscOMvNjp7KlQ/videos). I found it fascinating as it also got people to look at the Hartnell and Troughton eras (some of my favourites); I find that sometimes where people do feel like going back they see that both of those are in black and white and think it's just a step too far. Although of course it goes without saying that with a show like Doctor Who nobody should ever be obliged to watch every single episode/era!
You talk about Rose and the Doctor potentially not being as shipped if it were to air nowadays, maybe that's true. I wonder what fandom would make of the Second Doctor and Jamie relationship these days (I tried to find some clips and only really came up with this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=COFcyo8Qf1c)
There's also a user called Babelcolour who makes some really nice Doctor Who content, including a tribute for each Doctor era in a sort of music video style. They do this for both the New and Classic series, so you might be interested. I quite like them: https://www.youtube.com/c/BabelColour/videos
As for when I stopped watching Doctor Who? Somewhere through Matt Smith's run. I liked his rendition of the Doctor, but didn't like the way the story was going as such and needlessly overcomplicating everything.
-timydamonkey, who is geeking out