History TroubledProduction / DoctorWho

*** However, the story's problems weren't over even after Davis's script had been recorded. After the transmission of "The Dancing Floor", Creator/TheBBC had to field charges from the estate of Charles Hamilton that the character of Cyril was in fact meant to be Literature/BillyBunter. The problem was exacerbated by the fact that actor Peter Stephens had ad-libbed the line "My friends call me Billy" during recording. Thus the BBC were forced to take a step never taken before or since: they had to have a special continuity announcement at the end of "The Final Test" which declared that the character of Cyril was not meant to be Billy Bunter, but merely a character like him.

* [[Recap/DoctorWhoS4E5TheUnderwaterMenace "The Underwater Menace"]] had a very tough shoot due to the animosity between director Julia Smith (who, in an ironic reversal of most directors on the show, had gotten on well with William Hartnell, but clashed heavily with Creator/PatrickTroughton when he took over the role) and the cast, to the point where Creator/AnnekeWills later described it as the only ''Doctor Who'' story whose production she remembered as being wholly unenjoyable. However, what proved even more troublesome was its DVD release. Episode 3, then the only existing episode, was released as part of the ''Lost in Time'' boxset in 2004. After Episode 2 was discovered in 2011, pressure was on to release it on DVD too. The two missing episodes were originally slated to be animated (as other stories' missing episodes had been), but this was cancelled after the animation company went bust, and the DVD was cancelled too. Then, in October 2015, the story was finally released with extremely basic tele-snap reconstructions of the missing episodes, which were significantly worse than both previous official efforts and popular fan-made ones. The story would not receive a proper animated reconstruction until 2023.

* [[Recap/DoctorWhoS4E5TheUnderwaterMenace "The Underwater Menace"]] had a very tough shoot due to the animosity between director Julia Smith (who, in an ironic reversal of most directors on the show, had gotten on well with William Hartnell, but clashed heavily with Creator/PatrickTroughton when he took over the role) and the cast, to the point where Creator/AnnekeWills later described it as the only ''Doctor Who'' story whose production she remembered as being wholly unenjoyable. However, what proved even more troublesome was its DVD release. Episode 3, then the only existing episode, was released as part of the ''Lost in Time'' boxset in 2004. After Episode 2 was discovered in 2011, pressure was on to release it on DVD too. The two missing episodes were originally slated to be animated (as other stories' missing episodes had been), but this was cancelled after the animation company went bust, and the DVD was cancelled too. Then, in October 2015, the story was finally released with extremely basic tele-snap reconstructions of the missing episodes, which were significantly worse than both previous official efforts and popular fan-made ones.

Through these troubles, the episode was completed on time. Davies was able to keep the episode slot as the "budget-saving" one, which allowed for future episodes such as [[Recap/DoctorWhoS29E10Blink "Blink"]], [[Recap/DoctorWhoS30E10Midnight "Midnight"]] and [[Recap/DoctorWhoS30E11TurnLeft "Turn Left"]] to be created.

* Budget problems were a thing that followed into series two, which is what resulted in "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS28E11FearHer Fear Her]]" happening. "Fear Her", incidentally, was a result of lessons Davies learned from shooting on the first series. The eleventh episode of that season was supposed to be a completely different story written by Paul Abbott that had to be dropped without much time to replace it due to budget and scheduling constraints, forcing Davies to step in and hastily assemble "Boom Town". Because of this potentially disastrous production, the series two production team felt that they should probably have some backup scripts if an episode fell through and something needed to be shot quickly and for cheap in its place. "Fear Her" was supposed to be a 1920s period piece written by Creator/StephenFry. Not much has ever really been revealed about the story itself, but Fry's presence at the first table reads makes clear that when the series began shooting, his story was still supposed to be going ahead. However it soon turned out that his script was too expensive to make, and so "Fear Her", written by ''Series/LifeOnMars2006'' showrunner Matthew Graham, was put into production in that shooting block instead. Its role as a backup script, and need to shoot on a limited budget, explains why the action is largely confined to a single street. In addition, Davies asked Graham to make it something more for children, rather than for adults and older fans, since it would be the last episode before the much darker series finale. Given all this, it's not surprising that it fell flat for the older audiences. Davies, Creator/DavidTennant, and episode director Euros Lyn have all admitted that the episode could have been a lot better had it not been for the lack of budget and rushed writing and filming schedules.[[note]]This episode was shot as part of the same production block as "The Idiot's Lantern". Perhaps coincidentally, both episodes have involve stealing someone or a part of someone. This comes to a head in each episode when one or the other member of the TARDIS team is taken: Rose's face in "The Idiot's Lantern", and the Doctor in "Fear Her". This rather conveniently worked with the rushed schedules, since it meant that the writers could write the Doctor out of part of "Fear Her" so Tennant could do his extra "Idiot's Lantern" scenes, and the inverse for Creator/BilliePiper[[/note]] Fry's script, in the meanwhile, slipped to series three (retooled for Martha instead of Rose), and was then abandoned altogether.

* Season 15: Creator/PhilipHinchcliffe had been sacked as producer due to MoralGuardians, and in revenge he boosted the budgets for the final two serials of Season 14, meaning that incoming producer Creator/GrahamWilliams was money-starved just at the time a crippling UK recession and industrial strikes hit -- and for an encore, Williams' own inexperience when it came to producing and budgeting a sci-fi series caused him to blow much of the season's budget on the first story to be produced, "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS15E2TheInvisibleEnemy The Invisible Enemy]]", crippling the rest of the season (and leading to a memorable occasion where the budget was so low they couldn't even afford sets — "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS15E5Underworld Underworld]]" just used (poorly executed) CSO to put the actors into MiniatureEffects). The companion character Leela was originally intended to be added for only three stories in Season 14 but was kept around as a regular due to the incoming team's desire to cause as little upset as possible with everything else going wrong. ExecutiveMeddling forced the writers to remove all of the horror from the scripts of what had at the time been a GothicHorror show — jokes were used to plug the gaps, but with varying degrees of success. Creator/RobertHolmes quit halfway through the season due to a combination of money problems and burnout. The stories were hastily re-edited to insert a toyetic Robot Dog KidAppealCharacter added by executive mandate and shown out of order, spoiling the character development going on. Creator/TomBaker's mental health, which had begun failing him in Season 14, tanked — he loathed both companion characters, wanted to be the sole star, and started threatening to quit in order to WagTheDirector into letting him do whatever he wanted while also bullying his co-star Creator/LouiseJameson due to his dislike of the character she played, who quit after this series due to his treatment of her. Despite all this, the fandom opinion of Season 15 is that it's SoOkayItsAverage — two bad stories, one okayish story, and three good ones (including two all-time classics).
** That season's finale, "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS15E6TheInvasionOfTime The Invasion of Time]]". Firstly the original writer gave the production team a set of scripts that would have been impossible to realize on a ''film'' budget, resulting in the producer and script editor having to come up with a totally new storyline in just a few days. Then the UK's economy imploded due to the Winter of Discontent, rendering the British Pound nearly worthless and leaving NoBudget for the serial. On top of all that, virtually every department of the BBC went on strike at the same time, resulting in a hasty studio session filmed with sets left over from [[Recap/DoctorWhoS14E3TheDeadlyAssassin "The Deadly Assassin"]], followed by location filming at anywhere which would let them shoot, just so that they could get everything in the can. Not to mention the producer didn't believe that Creator/LouiseJameson really wanted to leave, so they delayed writing in her exit in the belief she would change her mind, and had to add a hastily written romance with Andred when they realised too late she wouldn't.

* "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS27E11BoomTown Boom Town]]" ended up being the most rushed episode of the season. Originally meant to be a episode set in Pompeii, the slot was then passed to writer Paul Abbott, who wrote an synopsis for an episode that was not in line with what Davies wanted for the series. Abbott was then made too busy with [[Series/ShamelessUK other commitments]] at the time. Davies was able to produce a replacement idea whilst being on set for "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS27E4AliensOfLondon Aliens of London]]" / "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS27E5WorldWarThree World War Three]]" when he saw how good Annette Badland was. He also had to save money on the episode due to the series budget being blown on previous episodes, meaning that he was able to use Cardiff as a cost-effective way of being able to use a location.

* The "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS28E8TheImpossiblePlanet The Impossible Planet]]" and "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS28E9TheSatanPit The Satan Pit]]" two parter was almost no finished on time. This was due to the two parter being pushed back further into the schedule due to script-issues such as the replacement of The Slitheen to The Ood and what would have been in the pit, with ideas ranging from a little girl to a sphere which would later be used as the Toclafane due to the budget running out. Enough money was saved up to allow for the Beast to appear. According to Creator/DavidTennant, the press were not given the preview discs for "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS28E9TheSatanPit The Satan Pit]]" because the episode was not finished until the day before transmission.

** With the original block schedule badly behind schedule, "New Earth" had some scenes dropped from filming to make sure that the schedule (which at this point was weeks behind) would be finished. "New Earth" also had its share of problems, with cast falling ill, stunts being dropped on the day and a camera malfunction which lost close ups of the final scene on New Earth.
Davies, knowing full well the trouble behind the scenes, almost placed [[Recap/DoctorWhoS28E2ToothAndClaw "Tooth and Claw"]] as the first episode as he was worried that the behind the scenes problems with "New Earth" would discourage viewers from the quality that was associated with the show at the time. However, he was convinced by other members of the production team involved that "New Earth" made more sense as the first episode than "Tooth and Claw". This remained when the series was finally broadcast the next year.

** However, filming for the Doctor/Margaret scene had to be done in a certain time-frame due to Annette Badland's availability during the filming schedule. Christopher Eccleston and Billie Piper also were not available in certain days, meaning the two actors were replaced by doubles in certain scenes to get the shots that were needed.

* "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS27E11BoomTown Boom Town]]" ended up being the most rushed episode of the season. Originally meant to be a episode set in Pompeii, the slot was then passed to writer Paul Abbott, who wrote an synopsis for an episode that was not in line with what Davies wanted for the series. Abbott was then made too busy with [[Main/ShamelessUK other commitments]] at the time. Davies was able to produce a replacement idea whilst being on set for "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS27E4AliensOfLondon Aliens of London]]" / "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS27E5WorldWarThree World War Three]]" when he saw how good Annette Badland was. He also had to save money on the episode due to the series budget being blown on previous episodes, meaning that he was able to use Cardiff as a cost-effective way of being able to use a location.

* The "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS28E8TheImpossiblePlanet The Impossible Planet]]" and "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS28E9TheSatanPit The Satan Pit]]" two parter was almost no finished on time. This was due to the two parter being pushed back further into the schedule due to script-issues such as the replacement of The Slitheen to The Ood and what would have been in the pit, with ideas ranging from a little girl to a sphere which would later be used as the Toclafane due to the budget running out. Enough money was saved up to allow for the Beast to appear. According to Creator/DavidTennant, the press were not given the preview discs for "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS28E9TheSatanPit The Satan Pit]]" because the finished episode was not finished until the day before transmission.

Davies, knowing full well the trouble behind the scenes, almost placed [[Recap/DoctorWhoS28E2ToothAndClaw "Tooth and Claw"]] as the first episode as he was worried that the behind the scenes problems with "New Earth" would discourage viewers from the quality that was assoicated with the show at the time. However, he was convinced by other members of the production team involved that "New Earth" made more sense as the first episode than "Tooth and Claw". This remained when the series was finally broadcast the next year.

*** All four episodes were in fact written three different times. Brian Hayles had delivered all four original scripts, likely in late 1965. Tosh and Wiles had immediately seen that the scripts could not be practically realised, and thus Tosh rewrote them entirely. By the time he was finished, though, he was no longer script editor. Davis, his replacement, now had to deal with the fact that Tosh had inserted the use of the title characters from a play called ''George and Margaret'' by Gerald Savory without obtaining permission. Since Savory was now Head of Serials, and had the power to veto scripts, he quickly rejected Tosh's approach.

** Robert Holmes was scheduled to write the arc's two-part finale, "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS23E4TheUltimateFoe]]", but died with only one of the two episodes completed. Saward took up the writing of the final episode himself, using Holmes' storyline, but Nathan-Turner got cold feet about the planned {{Cliffhanger}} ending, as he felt it would give BBC executives the excuse they were looking for to cancel the show outright. Saward was furious at this, and immediately quit the show, taking his version of Part Fourteen with him. Nathan-Turner had to temporarily take over as script editor himself and bring in Creator/PipAndJaneBaker to write a replacement episode, without telling them any of what the original conclusion contained (as legal reasons made this impossible). The result was a complete GainaxEnding, and the show went through several soft reboots in the final three seasons that followed.[[note]](It could have been even worse; Saward also attempted to withdraw permission to use Holmes' version of Part Thirteen, as he had already performed rewrites on it, but was informed this was work he had done in-house for the BBC in his role as script editor and he could not legally stop the production office from using it.)[[/note]] To add insult to injury, Saward, Levine, and former director Peter Grimwade all made public attacks on Nathan-Turner's running of the series -- and, to a lesser extent, Baker's and Langford's suitability for their respective roles -- as the season was finishing up filming, leaving the final days of production to take place under a ''very'' sour atmosphere

* The "Trial of a Time Lord" arc: Producer Creator/JohnNathanTurner and script editor Creator/EricSaward were desperately trying to keep the show on the television after it had been UnCancelled, seeing the 14-part serial as their "trial" to prove to executives trying to kill the show that it still had value. They also both loathed each other, and their mutual egotism caused them to purposefully derail each other's ideas out of spite. Creator/RobertHolmes was scheduled to write a two-part conclusion to the arc, but died with only one of the two episodes completed. Saward took up the writing of the final episode himself, using Holmes' storyline, but Nathan-Turner got cold feet about the planned {{Cliffhanger}} ending, as he felt it would give BBC executives the excuse they were looking for to cancel the show outright. Saward was furious at this, and immediately quit the show, taking his version of Part Fourteen with him. Nathan-Turner had to temporarily take over as script editor himself and bring in Creator/PipAndJaneBaker to write a replacement episode, without telling them any of what the original conclusion contained (as legal reasons made this impossible). The result was a complete GainaxEnding, and the show went through several soft reboots in the final three seasons that followed. (It could have been even worse; Saward also attempted to withdraw permission to use Holmes' version of Part Thirteen, as he had already performed rewrites on it, but was informed this was work he had done in-house for the BBC in his role as script editor and he could not legally stop the production office from using it.)

!!Classic

* The DVD release of [[Recap/DoctorWhoS4E5TheUnderwaterMenace "The Underwater Menace"]] was also a troubled production. Episode 3, then the only existing episode, was released as part of the ''Lost in Time'' boxset in 2004. After Episode 2 was discovered in 2011, pressure was on to release it on DVD too. The two missing episodes were originally slated to be animated (as other stories' missing episodes had been), but this was cancelled after the animation company went bust, and the DVD was cancelled too. Then, in October 2015, the story was finally released with extremely basic tele-snap reconstructions of the missing episodes, which were significantly worse than both previous official efforts and popular fan-made ones.

!!Revival

* Series 13 fell victim to the UsefulNotes/COVID19Pandemic. The episode count was reduced from eleven to eight, with two of those episodes becoming the New Year and Easter specials. Ed Hime and Peter [=McTighe=] were originally supposed to write episodes but the changing structure of the series meant they had to drop out. Chibnall ended up writing most of the series himself, with Maxine Alderton co-writing a single episode. Filming was then delayed by two months due to safety restrictions and lockdown protocols affecting television production in the UK.