Doctor Who has faced many existential threats over the years, often surviving cancellation by the skin of its teeth. So just how many times has it avoided the axe?

1963
Believe it or not, the BBC almost pulled the plug on Doctor Who before it even started. Initially, the series was only commissioned for 13 weeks, and it got off to something of a rocky start. The pilot episode had been negatively received, and the production team (led by Verity Lambert) had been ordered to reshoot it completely. Virtually everything was disliked – even the theme music, and the title sequence.
Moreover, Lambert had been given strict instructions not to include any ‘bug-eyed monsters’ in Doctor Who, and her commissioning of the first Dalek story had been met with fierce resistance. In fact, if any other scripts had been ready to go, ‘The Daleks’ would never have gone into production. At this point, the BBC had serious reservations about the show’s future, and the order was given for the plug to be pulled after the first 13 episodes.

Of course, the Daleks proved to be immensely popular, and not only did Doctor Who continue, but it was propelled to worldwide fame – hence why we’re still talking about it today. History would have been very different if the TARDIS had ended its travels after ‘The Edge of Destruction,’ and we might not even have any surviving episodes to enjoy.
As it turned out, Doctor Who‘s future was secure, but many attempts would be made on the show’s life before the 60s came to an end…
1966
Doctor Who was struggling in the ratings at the beginning of 1966, and the declining health of its star William Hartnell was making it even harder to produce. The show, it seemed, was reaching its natural end.
And yet the BBC was committed to Doctor Who, and wanted to find a way for it to continue. Hartnell had asked for more creative control over the stories, and even suggested that he could make up his own lines to avoid the need of having to learn the script.

Understandably, this wasn’t something the BBC was keen to explore, so it was agreed that Hartnell would step down from the programme at the beginning of his fourth year and pass the torch to a younger actor in the shape of Patrick Troughton. This led to the very first regeneration story, with the Doctor collapsing on the floor of the TARDIS at the end of ‘The Tenth Planet‘ and morphing into a new body.
It was a risk, but a risk that paid off. The public embraced Patrick Troughton completely, and the series enjoyed a new lease of life with the self-proclaimed ‘cosmic hobo’ at the helm. Indeed, Troughton would stay with the series for another three years, until Doctor Who would, once again, face another period of uncertainty…
1969
Doctor Who‘s ratings and popularity took another dip towards the end of the 60s. This was, to some extent, understandable; the seasons were running for some 40+ weeks at a time, and it’s possible that the public was growing fatigued with the Time Lord’s relentless adventures, particularly as some serials were running for eight or even 10 weeks.
At this point, the BBC was seriously considering giving the show a rest. There was a feeling that it had run its course, particularly with the advent of colour TV and the fact that Doctor Who was becoming increasingly expensive to make. As such, the BBC asked its staff to start coming up with ideas for new shows that fill the gap when the plug was ultimately pulled.

As it turned out, the writers couldn’t think of anything, and so it was with great reluctance that the BBC agreed to keep Doctor Who in the schedules. But there were some concessions. They wanted to set all of the stories on Earth in order to bring down the budget, and so it was established at the end of Patrick Troughton’s final story that he would be exiled to Earth and lose all knowledge of how to pilot the TARDIS.
This decision changed Doctor Who‘s format drastically, although one could argue this was exactly what the programme needed. The Time Lord was now the resident scientific advisor at a military outfit known as UNIT, battling all manner of alien threats that fell to Earth. He also had a new face in the shape of comedian and character actor Jon Pertwee.
1985

1985 was perhaps the most turbulent year in Doctor Who‘s history. Despite celebrating the show’s 20th anniversary with panache only two years earlier, by 1985 the show had fallen well out of favour with its senior managers. As such, the decision was taken to cancel the programme with immediate effect, casting the new Doctor Colin Baker adrift in time and space.
By the time the news reached the press, however, there had been some back-peddling. The BBC said that it, instead, wanted to “rest” the programme for 18 months, insisting that it needed a re-think and, primarily, needed less violence and more humour.
And yet, bizarrely, the production team was never given any concrete instructions from the BBC. After a few months had passed, they were simply told to continue and they were given little guidance on what, exactly, was expected. Moreover, the season lengths were curtailed from an average of 26 episodes to a mere 14.
The response to these moves by the BBC was tumultuous, to say the least. The “hiatus” became headline news, and fans threatened to picket the Houses of Parliament with Daleks unless the BBC re-instated the show with immediate effect. And behind the scenes, its producer John Nathan-Turner organised a charity single titled ‘Doctor in Distress’ which campaigned for Doctor Who‘s return, with all of the proceeds going to charity.
Doctor Who did survive this somewhat stormy period, but it never fully recovered. When the Seventh Doctor took over, it was scheduled opposite the popular ITV soap opera Coronation Street, making it impossible for millions of viewers to watch. Inevitably, the ratings declined, and in 1989 it was quietly pulled from the schedules with little fanfare.
It would be some seven years before Doctor Who would return to our screens (save for a brief 30th anniversary skit for Children in Need) but that, as they say, is another story…
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