doctor who is longest running sci-fi tv show

[davidlpf]

guinness book of world records has declared doctor tvs longest running tv series.


http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/5390372.stm

[Van Rijn]

A correction - it is the longest running science fiction TV show.

According to this, (http://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/content_pages/record.asp?recordid=47851&Reg=1) Meet The Press is the longest running show.

NBC's Meet the Press, which was first transmitted on November 6, 1947 and subsequently shown weekly from September 12, 1948, has had 2,649 shows aired as of February 4, 2001.

[davidlpf]

sorry realized the mistake after I posted and did not know how to change the title.

[hhEb09'1]

guinness book of world records has declared doctor tvs longest running tv series.


http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/5390372.stmYour link says it is the longest running TV sci-fi show--and acknowledges it had a sixteen year "break" since it's start in 1963. Some soap operas have been around a long time (since I don't watch 'em, I had to guess, and looked up The Guiding Light on IMDb: it's been going strong since 1952 apparently.)

[hhEb09'1]

Sorry to pile on :)

But the article also points out that Stargate is the longest running consecutive show, only ten years. That must mean that Dr. Who's record must be broken up even more--then would a rivival of some sci-fi program of the fifties break Dr. Who's record?

[davidlpf]

well at 723 episodes it will take alot to break that record and i think there were breaks between Doctors of a season or so.

[hhEb09'1]

How many episodes does Star Trek have?

[Van Rijn]

From Wiki: (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_Trek)

Original Series · 80 episodes
Animated Series · 22 episodes
Next Generation · 178 episodes
Deep Space Nine · 176 episodes
Voyager · 172 episodes
Enterprise · 98 episodes

For 726 episodes total. It's arguable if that's comparable - while Doctor Who has certainly changed during the years, with the new series showing some significant changes, it is much less than the changes between the different ST series.

[davidlpf]

well it is the same ship, same character and in general the same theme music. With guinness I think to get in you actuall apply to them that is doctor was not included before.

[ToSeek]

Sorry to pile on :)

But the article also points out that Stargate is the longest running consecutive show, only ten years. That must mean that Dr. Who's record must be broken up even more--then would a rivival of some sci-fi program of the fifties break Dr. Who's record?

I don't understand what's so special about Stargate - Doctor Who ran for over twenty consecutive seasons before an 18-month break in the early 1980's.

[ToSeek]

well at 723 episodes it will take alot to break that record and i think there were breaks between Doctors of a season or so.

No, there weren't. The only break was in the middle of Colin Baker's era. Again, I don't understand what's so special about Stargate.

[Lord Jubjub]

Doctor Who is a British show. Stargate is an American show. Stargate is the longest running American sci-fi show.

Doctor Who runs in 1/2 hour episodes, though. What is the actual record air time (not including commercials) for a sci-fi show?

[hhEb09'1]

I don't understand what's so special about Stargate - Doctor Who ran for over twenty consecutive seasons before an 18-month break in the early 1980's.Maybe the producers of Dr. Who haven't applied yet for the category of "longest-running science fiction show (consecutive)". :)

[davidlpf]

Doctor Who is a British show. Stargate is an American show. Stargate is the longest running American sci-fi show.

Doctor Who runs in 1/2 hour episodes, though. What is the actual record air time (not including commercials) for a sci-fi show?
On PBS the edit shows with the same storyline together into one episode. The down side some were like 2 1/2 -3 hours long while some were about 45-50 minutes long with no commericials and the newer ones are about 45 minutes long without commercials.. I actually like both series but Doctor Who will always be my favourite.

[Van Rijn]

Doctor Who is a British show. Stargate is an American show. Stargate is the longest running American sci-fi show.

Doctor Who runs in 1/2 hour episodes, though. What is the actual record air time (not including commercials) for a sci-fi show?

You mean the length of a Stargate episode? It appears to be 46 minutes. There are some Doctor Who episodes longer than a half hour, of course.

[davidlpf]

No, there weren't. The only break was in the middle of Colin Baker's era. Again, I don't understand what's so special about Stargate.
on wikipedia there seems to be a break between the second and third doctor of about a year.

[hhEb09'1]

which wiki page are we looking at?

[davidlpf]

Doctor Who is a British show. Stargate is an American show. Stargate is the longest running American sci-fi show.

Doctor Who runs in 1/2 hour episodes, though. What is the actual record air time (not including commercials) for a sci-fi show?
according to wikipedia doctor who(days/hours/minutes) 13:06:05
stargate sg-1 + atlantis +movie (days/hours/minutes) 7:20:26

[davidlpf]

just the regular wikipedia website and type doctor who in search function or http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doctor_who.

[hhEb09'1]

according to wikipedia doctor who(days/hours/minutes) 13:06:05
stargate sg-1 + atlantis +movie (days/hours/minutes) 7:20:26

Star Trek canon is shown (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lengths_of_science_fiction_series) as 22 days.

JOOC, why are Alien and Predator lumped together? I mean, I know there was a movie...and comic...
just the regular wikipedia website and type doctor who in search function.Star Trek Double-Odd (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0796366/)

[davidlpf]

sorry a did add the link latter I am doing this at work and can get busy sometimes.

[parallaxicality]

This is complicated by the fact that a large portion of the earliest Doctor Who episodes were destroyed and, barring a miracle in someone's attic, will never be rebroadcast.

By my count, 111 of 723, or fully 15 percent of all episodes, are gone.

[captain swoop]

I thought that the Sky at Night was the longest running show?

I know that 'I'm Sorry I haven't a Clue' is one of the longest running radio panel games. ( and the funniest along with 'Just a Minute')

[Roy Batty]

This is complicated by the fact that a large portion of the earliest Doctor Who episodes were destroyed and, barring a miracle in someone's attic, will never be rebroadcast.

By my count, 111 of 723, or fully 15 percent of all episodes, are gone.
No complication at all. They were shown & hence remembered. They count :)

I thought that the Sky at Night was the longest running show?
Good one. I reckon it's the longest running sci-fact tv show! :cool:

[ToSeek]

on wikipedia there seems to be a break between the second and third doctor of about a year.

The last Second Doctor episode aired 21 June 1969. The first Third Doctor episode aired 03 January 1970. That's a perfectly reasonable gap for a show with 26-episode seasons.

[Ronald Brak]

Fortunately I believe we have sound recordings of the lost Doctor Who episodes. Is anyone out there good with CGI and want to have a go at filling in the visuals? I wouldn't be surprised if before too long fans have the computing power to do this.

[Jason Thompson]

OK, some details about Doctor Who for you all.

From 1963 to 1969 Doctor Who ran in 25 minute episodes and the seasons were almost a full year long. There were gaps between seasons of around 6 weeks, but there were stories within the seasons that were often longer than that.

Seasons 1-6 ran for 42, 39, 45, 43, 40 and 44 episodes respectively. The gap between seasons 5 and 6 was the longest at nine weeks, but was filled with a repeat of the 7 episode story The Evil Of The Daleks (Doctor Who's first ever repeat, and the only one ever to be incorporated into the fictional narrative of the series, as the Doctor uses the TARDIS telepathic circuits to show new companion Zoe the kind of adventure she might be in for if she joins the TARDIS crew).

Between the first episode of season 1 and the last of season 6 Doctor Who was on for 260 out of 292 weeks, or in other words about five out of five and a half years.

After the final episode of season 6 there was a six month gap until the beginning of season 7 in January 1970. Seasons 7-12 were about six months long (25 episodes for seasons 7 & 8, 26 for seasons 9,10 & 11, and 20 for season 12) and ran from roughly the start of the year to the middle, with a six month gap between each. There was then a three month gap until the start of season 13, and from then until the end of Tom Baker's run in season 18 they ran in the autumn season, starting in August/September with six month gaps between them. All seasons were 26 episodes long except season 17 (which lost its final 6-part story due to strikes at the BBC) and season 18 (which was granted an extra two episodes).

For these 18 seasons Doctor Who had been shown on a Saturday in an early evening slot. Following a 9 month gap, Doctor Who returned in January 1982 but was now shown twice weekly on weekday evenings. Season 19 was still 26 episodes long, but because of the twice weekly showing now lasted only three months. There was a nine month gap until season 20 started, and this ran for 22 episodes over 11 weeks. The production time for the remaining 4 episodes was given to a 20th anniversary special which ran to 90 minutes and was shown in November 1983.

So now Doctor Who has run for 20 years, shown 20 seasons of varying lengths totalling 601 episodes of 25 minutes' duration each and one 90-minute special. There have been no gaps of longer than nine months, which for a series with seasons that ran no shorter than three months is not bad going. Every year from 1963 has seen Doctor Who in production and on air.

Season 21 started in January 1984 and was made as another 26 episode season to be shown over three months with two episodes per week. Due to Olympic coverage that year, one story, Resurrection of The Daleks, was edited into 2 episodes of 45 minutes' duration. This is the cause of some controversy. Is it counted as four episodes or two? The BBC have released it both on VHS and DVD in its original four part format, but many protested because it was never originally seen that way. If we run purely on what was broadcast, we now have a total of 623 25-minute episodes, 2 45-minute episodes and one 90-minute special.

Season 22 started nine months after the end of season 21 and experimented with the 45 minute format, running to 13 episodes shown once a week. The final episode was shown in March 1985, and then the show was put on hold for 18 months. In production terms, this meant one season was dropped.

After 18 months, the show came back (as an aside, the early scheduling of season 22 and the autmun scheduling for season 23 meant that, even though 18 months separated them, there was still Doctor Who on TV in 1985 and 1986). The remaining seasons were 14 episodes long, each episode runnning to 25 minutes' duration and shown once a week. In other words, the familiar three month seasons with nine months between them. After season 26 it was announced that the program was shelved.

So Doctor Who now has run for 26 seasons, totalling 679 episodes of 25 minutes' duration, 15 episodes of 45 minutes' duration and one 90 minute special. In all that time the longest gap between seasons was 18 months, and that was an exception and didn't happen until after the show had been in production and on air every year for 22 years.

The final episode of season 26 was shown in December 1989. For a while there was no new material on TV (except a charity skit that ran to 13 minutes in total) until May 1996, when a 90 minute TV movie starring Paul McGann was shown. It was not a success, and no more TV epsiodes were produced (again except for a charity comedy episode in 1999 called The Curse Of Fatal Death, which was frankly superb) until the series was given new life in April 2005 with a new season containing 13 episodes of 45 minutes' duration. Since then a second season has been shown, along with a special Christmas episode.

The total number of Doctor Who episodes so far shown is therefore:

679 episodes of 25 minutes in length (roughly 283 hours)

41 episodes of 45 minutes in length (roughly 31hrs)

1 60 minute Christmas special (exactly 1 hr)

2 90 minute specials (about 3hrs)

A total running time of 318hrs, or about 13 days and 6 hours.

We also have at least one more 60 minute Christmas episode and another season of 13 45 minute episodes to look forward to....

Doctor Who is, therefore, the longest running sci-fi show in the world, even if you take into account the huge gap before the recent seasons.

[Jason Thompson]

By my count, 111 of 723, or fully 15 percent of all episodes, are gone.

108 episodes are gone, all from the first six seasons. Several episodes from the Jon pertwee years exist only as black and white copies made for overseas sales, though many have been recolourised using off-air video recordings from the US. Many more exist only as NTSC copies made for US/Canada broadcast. There is not one of the first 11 seasons of Doctor Who that is not 'missing' some episodes in some way.

Fortunately I believe we have sound recordings of the lost Doctor Who episodes.

We do indeed, thanks to some enterprising fans in the early years, and now all of them are available on audio CD.

Is anyone out there good with CGI and want to have a go at filling in the visuals?

Funny you should say this. The VHs release of The Tenth Planet included a 'reconstructed' episode that used stills taken from a monitor to fill in the visual aspect of the missing episode 4 (back in those days it was standard practice to hire someone to produce 'telesnaps'/ Literally, this individual would sit in front of a large TV screen and take a series of stills as the episode was shown. This would then be compiled onto a contact sheet, with each picture about an inch high, to provide a ready visual record of the episode from production members to look back on. It saved them having to trawl through and find the tape every time they wanted to check something and provided a handy way for them to show off their handiwork to others).

But perhaps more interesting, later this year the 8-part Cyberman story The Invasion is to be released on DVD. Episodes 1 and 4 of this are missing, and for the DVD release they have been made completely in animated form by Cosgrove Hall, a rather well-known and respected animation company here in the UK, using the original soundtrack. If the technique proves popular we may see other missing episodes and stories given the same treatment.

[Jason Thompson]

I thought that the Sky at Night was the longest running show?

That would be the longest running show presented by one person. Patrick Moore presented every episode of that show from the first in 1956 (I think) until he was forced to miss one episode in 2004 or 2005 by a severe bout of food poisoning.

[Ronald Brak]

Thanks for all the infomation Jason Thompson.

[Van Rijn]

Yes, very informative.

[davidlpf]

I posted because i thought interesting bit of trivia all I know now is not to get Dr. Who trivia contest with jason thompson.

[Roy Batty]

Trivia? TRIVIA? you dare to call Dr. Who trivia!!!

Well, I think you got the full half hour .... :D