To Avoid Repeated Doctor Internet Sharing.

If you're in North America and you were pleased to be able to watch The Impossible Astronaut, the premier episode of the new season of Doctor Who, on the same date as its British debut this weekend, do you know who you should thank?

Me.

Yes, me. And thousands of other people like me, people who were unimpressed by the artificial gap between the BBC broadcasts of Doctor Who episodes and their arrival on this side of the Atlantic.  Admittedly, downloading bootleg copies of the episodes might not be the best response to the situation, but where letter writing campaigns had no effect, spikes in online piracy following the broadcast of each of last year's episodes caught the attention of the show's producers.

That's the specific reason cited by the BBC for the changed schedule this year - illegal file sharing - and apparently this simple solution actually works. The 2010 Doctor Who Christmas special was broadcast in North America on Christmas Day, the same as in Great Britain, and the result was a 10% increase in viewership.  Presumably this percentage was at least partially made up of impatient North American fans who for once didn't have to chose between waiting a few weeks or downloading an unlicensed copy. 

So - you're welcome.

- Sid

P.S. I would be remiss were I not to mention the untimely departure of Elisabeth Sladen, who passed away last week at the age of 63 due to cancer. Elisabeth Sladen played the role of Sarah Jane Smith, who was a companion to both the third and fourth Doctors from 1973 to 1976.  Following her departure from the show, she went into semi-retirement, but returned for Doctor Who specials in 1981 and 1983, as well as voicing Sarah Jane in several BBC Radio productions of Doctor Who stories.

Sladen's 2006 appearance in School Reunion with David Tennant signalled her full time return to the universe of the Doctor, with the popularity of that episode resulting in a spinoff series called The Sarah Jane Adventures. The show, aimed at a more youthful audience than Doctor Who, proved to be a remarkable success and had been approved for a fifth season at the time of Sladen's death.

I think that her appearance in School Reunion provided one of the best and most poignant insights into the realities of being a companion to the Doctor.  At one point in the episode, the Doctor says:

You can spend the rest of your life with me. But I can't spend the rest of mine with you. I have to live on, alone. That's the curse of the Timelords. 

In reality, it's more of a curse for the companions like Sarah Jane, who is both saddened and angered by her reunion with the Doctor, and her meeting with a younger companion who is a reminder of her own lost youth.  For her, an entire lifetime has gone by, abandoned and all but forgotten by the Doctor, but unable to forget her experiences at his side or to stop waiting for him to return.

At the end of the episode, offered the opportunity to travel in the TARDIS again, she refuses in favour of finally leading her own life, and demands that the Doctor say the goodbye that had gone unspoken at their last parting, a final goodbye which we all say now.

Goodbye, my Sarah Jane...