āThe War Between the Land and the Seaā is probably one of the worst wastes of time Iāve ever seen. Smarter people than I have discussed itās issues, centring on white guilt and exclusively focussing on the human looking āHomo Amphibiaā Salt rather than the already whitened and more human looking āHomo Aqua,ā but the thing Iāve been thinking about about for a while is how itās arbitrarily decided episode count affected āDoctor Whoā itself.
Everyone has criticised 8 episodes per season, itās way too low and itās coming off of the episode count having already been shortened 3 seasons prior from 12 to 10, and that again from 13 to 12. But we couldāve had 10 episode seasons, maintaining that Chibnall era standard (for what itās worth). 10 episodes wouldnāt have fixed any of the big issues people have had, those remain in the writing itself which can be traced back to RTD1, but thatās 4 extra episodes with Ncuti Gatwa, HALF A SEASON AS IS! And RTD would have an extra episode, likely a special of some sort, to write an actual ending to keep āThe Disney+ Eraā self contained to some degree maybe.
But instead of using the Disney Deals 26 episode limit to focus on the big name series everyone will have their eyes on, 2 whole episodes per season that theoretically couldāve given us more time with one of the most charismatic Doctors ever and maybe flesh out the characters more before they leave the TV screen in a month we waste it on a mini-series that pads out its existence. PART 3 IS ENTIRELY SKIPPABLE on top of no notable change coming from the series. āTorchwood: Children of Earthā was the same length and had a notable and impactful ending because Torchwood is over, the team is disbanded. āTWBlaSā ends with Aqua Kind being mostly wiped out, a near genocide, and Kateās secret military boyfriend being murdered feels like it was the bigger event for the Whoniverse as a whole. And I can easily see someone watching DW, skipping TWBlaS because itās been forgotten, and assuming Kateās secret military boyfriend was forgotten by the narrative like Osgood (I miss her)
