Doctor Who: Audience and Industries

 Audience

1) Who is the target audience for Doctor Who? Do you think it has changed since 1963?

Target audience now is 12-40+. I do think it has changed as the Sci-fi genre was probably popular with teenagers at 1960s, so it was probably around 12-30, but as time went on, the people grew up and stayed a fan.

2) What audience pleasures are offered by Doctor Who - An Unearthly Child? Apply Blumler and Katz's Uses and Gratifications theory to the episode. Make sure you provide specific examples from the episode to support your ideas.

Personal Identity: School, people may feel represented as they showed girls being annoyed by the boys which the girls may relate as well as the struggle of school being good at eome subjects and bad at others.

Personal Relationships: the audience may feel bad for the girl as the teachers coupd risk revealing her secret and her not wanting to lose her happiness at being at school and having relationships. They can also build a relationship with the teacgers as they showed that they only cared about the girl and concerned about her grades, even going so far as to wanting to stand up for her and protect her when they beleived she was in danger.

Diversion (Escapism): Science fiction is great for escapism as it allows people to think about the what ifs and what if we could explore more of other worlds and the unknown vast space as well as to awnser the many questions about what we dont know.

Surveillance (Information / Facts): There are a lot of facts and information about space, science and so on. Like about how having a 4th dimention is impossible or something we cant even fathom. They even mention how history books are often not true and had bent the truth to make certain things seem bad.

3) What additional Uses and Gratifications would this episode provide to a modern 2020s audience?

People today can compare the facts back then in the 1960s and the facts now to see how much technology has improved and how much we have discovered now.

4) Thinking of the 3 Vs audience pleasures (Visceral, Vicarious and Voyeuristic pleasures), which of these can be applied to An Unearthly Child?

Viceral pleasure because there are many scenes that build tension like how the teachers were hearing the sounds from the TARDIS and the visual part at the beggining and end where there are shapes being made and so on. This makes people. Back then those images that were created was very cool.

5) What kind of online fan culture does Doctor Who have? Give examples.

Fans are called the Whovians, they make fan-fictions, merch, they buy merch, they cosplay as the characters.


Industries

1) What was the television industry like in 1963? How many channels were there?

There was only 2 channels, people watched TV in the evening because of work ect. They dont broadcast anything until after 10am. People didnt have much options to watch. Coloured TV was introduced.

2) How does An Unearthly Child reflect the level of technology in the TV industry in 1963?

The slow panning, poor camera and lack of colours reflect the technology in 1963, this is because now we can have many types of panning now that we have the technology to do it, the colours and graphics that were improved as time passed.

3) Why is Doctor Who such an important franchise for the BBC? 

The oldest running Sci-fi franchise. They bring in a lot of income, is broadcasted around the world.

4) What other programmes/spin-offs are part of the wider Doctor Who franchise?

K9, Sarah Jane Adventures, Torchwood, Class

These spin-offs allow the BBC to target slightly different audiences while still taking advantage of the huge Doctor Who fanbase. 

5) Why does the Doctor Who franchise have so much merchandise available? Give examples. 

There are a lot of characters, a lot of generations of the Doctor, etc, making figurines, shirts.. This is so that fans can collect merch for collections and also so they can earn more profit.