The release schedule for Doctor Who season fourteen (or season one, as the BBC seems to be calling it) has been announced! A two-episode premiere is going to drop simultaneously on the BBC iPlayer and on Disney+. But guess what? Some timey-wimey business is involved.
U.S. viewers will get the episodes at the sensible hour of 7pm ET on May 10, but due to the time difference, UK viewers have to wait until midnight their time—taking them into May 11—to watch the show. And they’re not happy about it. For a start, seeing as episodes 1 and 2 are dropping at once, that means they’ll have to stay up until 2am to take everything in.
Plenty of British Whovians see this as a prioritizing of American fans watching on Disney+ and a bit of a slap in the face to the people who pay the BBC license fee. It’s made all the more complicated by the fact that Doctor Who will still air on primetime BBC after the episodes have already dropped on the BBC iPlayer. On May 11, it’s been timed to air just before the Eurovision final, thus guaranteeing a big night of TV for Brits. But if you’re in Britain and you want to skip the midnight streaming, sleep instead, and tune in before Eurovision … Americans and some hardy Brits will have already seen the episode and spoilers will be everywhere. And this will continue on for the rest of the season, as one episode after the other gets the streaming-first drop. You see the dilemma.
It doesn’t help that for decades now, Doctor Who has aired in the evening on the BBC and that was the first time anyone saw it. Some are upset about Who seemingly no longer being the “event television” it was back in the ‘00s.
Despite this, though, the actual season—Ncuti Gatwa’s first—looks very good indeed. A new, short trailer came out today when the release date was announced, so check it out to get a look at the Fifteenth Doctor in action.
