I see what you are saying, CSM.
I never liked the fact that he was hand-picked by Moffat. Nor that Moffat had to "convince" Chibnall to take the post over "several large sherrys".
Yet he says he has "a five year plan".
So sounds like he intends to stick around.
Given what seems to be his innate lack of genuine passion, or perhaps even true vision, I wonder if the BBC will end up having different plans to his as time goes on?
I think fan showrunners are a bad idea, in retrospect and, for all my criticisms, as a fan I think I would f*** the show up even more than it has been, despite my best intentions. I am too close to the show to have a sensible perspective.
Perhaps what is needed is someone who is actually not a fan, in any way, shape or form, but who has a bloody good sense of storytelling and respects a good mythos when he sees one. Like Holmes, Mac Hulke, Barry Letts, Terrance Dicks.
Good storyteller first. Good fan unnecessary.
I would love to be there on his first day of this theoretical - non-fan - showrunner, when he called all the fan-hangers on like Gary Russell, Toby Hadoke, Nick Briggs, Clayton Hickman, who have somehow made themselves into quasi-celebrities and mouthpieces, feeding off the show like vampires - and tells them that he has put a restraining order on them to stay away from the show's offices. And announces to the press that the past of New Who is not something that interests him. In the same way that Graham Williams did his own thing, regardless of the show's past.
Twitter would be on fire with bile, but we might get a great show back again.
JNT not a fan, but he knew when to veto the Doctor using a bazooka on a Dalek, that "fan-writer" Ben Aaronovitch wanted to include.
I honestly think that the rot inherent in WHO is a direct result of fans running the asylum.
Maybe time for a change in that regard?
