This fascinating book takes the reader on a rich and varied study of one of the greatest television programmes of all time: Doctor Who. Combining essays from academics in Screen Studies with practitioners who have contributed to the ongoing narrative of Doctor Who, this collection is the first to study the Doctor's adventures in all their forms.

This book is the first study of "Doctor Who" to explore the Doctor's adventures in all their manifestations: on television, audio, in print and beyond. Although focusing on the original series (1963-89), the collection recognizes that Doctor Who is a cultural phenomenon that has been "told" in many ways through a myriad of texts. Combining essays from academics as well as practitioners who have contributed to the ongoing narrative of Doctor Who, the collection encourages debate with contrasting opinions on the strengths (and weaknesses) of the program, offering a multi-perspective view of Doctor Who and the reasons for its endurance.

An exciting new strand in The Television Series, the ‘Moments in Television’ collections celebrate the power and artistry of television, whilst interrogating key critical concepts in television scholarship. Each ‘Moments’ book is organised around a provocative binary theme. Complexity / simplicity addresses the idea of complex TV, examining its potential, limitations and impact upon creative and interpretative practices. It also reassesses simplicity as an alternative criterion for evaluation. Complexity and simplicity persuasively illuminate the book’s chosen programmes in new ways. The book explores an eclectic range of TV fictions, dramatic and comedic. Contributors from diverse perspectives come together to expand and enrich the kind of close analysis most commonly found in television aesthetics. Sustained, detailed programme analyses are sensitively framed within historical, technological, institutional, cultural, creative and art-historical contexts.

Before Saturday March 26th 2005, "Doctor Who" had been off the air as a regular, new TV series for more than fifteen years; until a production team led by Russell T. Davies re-imagined the programme so successfully, so triumphantly, that it's become an instant Christmas tradition, a BAFTA winner, an international 'superbrand' and a number one rated show. It's even been credited with reinventing family TV. This is the first full-length book to explore the 'new Who' phenomenon through to the casting of Matt Smith as the new Doctor. It explores "Doctor Who" through contemporary debates in TV Studies about quality TV and how can we define TV series as both 'cult' and 'mainstream'. Further, the book challenges assumptions in focusing on the importance of breath-taking, dramatic moments along with narrative structures, and in analysing the significance of Murray Gold's music as well as the series' visual representations. Matt Hills is a lifelong "Who" fan and he also considers the role of fandom in the show's return. He investigates too the multi-generic identity, the monster-led format, and the time-travelling brand of BBC Wales' 'Doctor Who'. In the twenty-first century, TV is changing, but the last of the Time Lords has been more than ready: he's been fantastic.

Peregrinations, Ruminations, and Regenerations: A Critical Approach to Doctor Who examines the famous BBC science fiction show as a cultural artifact in dialogue with other science fiction, with politics and religion, and with the culture at large, both in terms of how it reflects and comments upon that culture and in terms of the audience and the peculiarities of its response. This book enables researchers in film and media to make historical, industrial, aesthetic, and ideological connections between and among Doctor Who and other shows and historical events since its inception in 1963. This volume is a new entry in a relatively new area. As the young fans of Doctor Who have matured, and as many have become scholars, they are returning to the show to consider it from a scholarly perspective. It is also of use in the media studies classroom to address directly the issues presented by the longest running science fiction show in the history of the medium. Peregrinations, Ruminations, and Regenerations considers not only cultural ramifications and connections, but audience studies as well.

Through spaceships, aliens, ray guns and other familiar trappings, science fiction uses the future (and sometimes the past) to comment on current social, cultural and political ideologies; the same is true of science fiction in children's film and television. This collection of essays analyzes the confluences of science fiction and children's visual media, covering such cultural icons as Flash Gordon, the Jetsons and Star Wars, as well as more contemporary fare like the films Wall-E, Monsters vs. Aliens and Toy Story. Collectively, the essays discover, applaud and critique the hidden--and not-so-hidden--messages presented on our children's film and TV screens.

Torchwood started its life on television as a spin-off from Doctor Who, bringing Captain Jack to join new colleagues in a television series that quickly established itself as fresh and watchable television. It's fourth series, subtitled 'Miracle Day', continued its move from the niche channel of BBC3 to metamorphose into an international production between the BBC and the US network Starz. Torchwood has continued to entertain, provoke and attract large audiences and an expanding fandom. This is the first critical celebration of Torchwood across it four series, considering issues of representation, the fandom that surrounds the show and its complex, institutional contexts. Focusing in particular on how the meanings and understandings of cult television have shifted and become subject to technological, industry and marketing changes in recent years, Torchwood Declassified explores topics including the show's aesthetics and branding, its use of tropes from the horror genre, vast tie-in merchandise, status as a spin off, the nature of a celebrity that is both cult and mainstream, as well as the use of sound and music and of cult writers, and Torchwood's connection to place and location. The book will appeal to fans of the series, researchers and scholars, and anyone interested in ongoing questions over what cult television is, what it means, and why it continues to be of importance.