Why Does Doctor Who Hate Cowboys?
If Kacey Musgraves is to be believed, we are living in the age of the yee-haw. Which I am definitely a fan of.
Yet, looking back on Doctor Whos history with the Western genre, especially the Classic series, why are the stories so disliked by the wider audience?
The two clear “Westerns” in the classic series would be 1966s’ The Gunfighters, and 1969s The Space Pirates. The western genre didn’t return until the new series, with A Town Called Mercy
These stories, didn’t exactly gather up a hootenanny. The Gunfighters received an average AI (Audience Appreciation Index) of 38!
The Space Pirates mozied up an average of 54, which is a bit better in comparison, but still quite a low score.
I’m one of those fans who kind of loves everything. I adore The Gunfighters for its comedy, and high camp attitude. Just watching it, you can tell how much fun Bill Hartnell is getting out of it.
The Space Pirates is a bit harder to get into, purely because 5 out of 6 episodes are missing from the archive, but I enjoy it none the less.
I love The Space Pirates’ ridiculous premise, it’s ambition to be a space opera on a $2.50 budget.
So why does the general audience dislike these stories?
Arguably, one of the draw cards of westerns is its beautiful landscapes, and gun wielding action. Those things don’t really happen in classic Doctor Who.
Maybe the Western genre is a bit too far of a stretch for Doctor Who’s original budget. When the western returned to the new series, the locations were there, and successfully pulled off the style (in my opinion) the AI for this story was 85, which is a bit better than how The Gunfighters did!
See what Wendy Padbury (who played Zoe Heriot) thought of the story here!
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