Square pegs and round holes. As fans we love em, particularly after weve had a few drinks. We love the chance to give our own ingenuity and imagination some much needed exercise. The most extreme example of this manifests itself in the midnight scrawling of an attempt to explain why the Brigadier was a teacher in 1977, a Brigadier in the 1980s and a lean, mean one man kung fu fighting force in 1990-odd.
Its strange then that such activity is frowned upon so often by the coolest of the movers and shakers within fandom. We all end up silently conversing with our cronies, using subtle gestures to imply the anorak-bound freak weve just encountered is a committed onanist. This is because their presence reminds us of that unpleasant era when we had yet to experience the joy waking up next to someone of indeterminate age, gender and even species. (The fact that most of us still masturbate furiously having renounced the former and thrown ourselves wholeheartedly into the latter is beside the point. *)
Despite this Im fully behind the ideal of continuity. It has a purpose and that purpose is important - a fact which many of the movers and shakers in fandom seem frequently to forget. The purpose of continuity is to create an internal structure and logic to a series. Which in turn provides it with a sense of realism.
I can already hear the complaints: Doctor Who doesnt abide by those conventions - its a fantasy. It doesnt have to be real. Bollocks it doesnt: it wouldnt be an adventure if there wasnt threat and conflict and without realism then there can be no threat. Adventure, by its very nature, requires drama and drama requires an emotional response has to be invoked in the audience. In order for this response to occur the audience must suspend their disbelief and believe totally in what they see. For fantasy, riven as it is with improbabilities, any device introduced must have entirely rational implications if an audience is to buy into it. The audience effectively does half the work anyway: when they switch on the TV they, like Mulder, want to believe.
Continuity makes an important contribution to the way an audience perceives a show, building a relationship between that audience and the text.
Even so, the frequently heard whine is that it is only the fans who watch the series in any detail and with any form of regularity. Thus any references to previous stories will be lost to the real audience. Additionally, the argument against carrying over references from one story to another is that it prevents people from only dropping in on the series occasionally. The new wave of thinking within fandom is that all Doctor Who adventures should be standalones to allow the maximum audience instant access to the show. Now I dont want to seem contrary here but this argument seems horribly flawed.
What is generally regarded as the mainstream audience does watch television avidly. We know this to be true: soap operas and even ordinary sitcoms of the most extraordinary banality are watched religiously by millions every week. Having seen one episode they tune in again (and again, and again...) And they havent forgotten what happened in last weeks Emmerdale. The point is that continuity makes an important contribution to the way an audience perceives a show. Inherent in series very nature is a sequence, a progression. Each episode may be new but the audience carries certain elements over from week to week and year to year; there is a relationship built up between the audience and the text.
Now surely that is precisely what we, as fans ourselves, would like to see? An audience involved in the show on a mass basis, hooked into it and, more importantly for the series survival tuning in next week for another dose? Since continuity is part of that hook, that realism, why would anyone in their right mind ditch such a powerful tool?
Gareth Roberts has said (in Doctor Who Magazine, 279) that anything that happened in Coronation Street over six months ago is ancient history. Well, yes it probably is, both to the characters and to the audience. But that does not mean that it should be ignored. For both audience and character the events have still happened, and is still true. I know from experience that any reference to something that happened ten years ago in Corrie has a fairly sizeable audience going Oh, yeah! and reminiscing about what happened when Ken Barlows wig blew off in Alfs shop and was eaten by the cat. Blatantly contradict something that happened in another memorable story and those in the know will be drawn, if only temporarily, away from the drama.
As an aside, more flawed reasoning lies behind another favourite argument of continuitys opponents: that starting from scratch will recreate the mystery within the Doctors character. Trouble is, guys, that the interest in him does not derive from a lack of background, it is created by the desire to discover it - as with any good character. You need to remember that even in the most mundane who-dunnit the mystery in itself is not interesting, it is the solution we are hooked by. Once again, when the audience knows something about the Doctors past, they believe in him more, enhancing the realism further.
Suspiciously, the fiercest proponents of the start from scratch approach tend to be writers and as we all know, and I can say this because I are one, writers are egotistical sods when it comes to their work - let alone other peoples. All told, the arguments against continuity do echo rather unpleasantly of creative posturing. If desire for unfettered creativity drives a writer then frankly they should shy away from writing series. A blank slate approach may initially give the writer a vast scope for originality, but, as we have seen, in the interests of realism, boundaries must be set up, and writers will, sooner or later, have to operate within them in order to avoid alienating their audience - who, ultimately, are their employers.
The fact is that many writers are perfectly capable of creating texts which reference their own sources, without the audience needing to be aware that it is happening at all. Will Self, a critically acclaimed (if somewhat loopy) writer, frequently resurrects characters from other stories for no readily apparent reason. Whilst this could be construed as an annoying nod towards his many fans, or possibly just a bizarre in-joke for his own amusement, the harm it does is quantifiably zero. The fans know and enjoy it, but for those who have no clue whatsoever, the refernce is passed over with no real incident. The trick of a really good writer, of course, is to leave the new reader wanting more, so that one day said member of target audience will get the joke and their experience of the text will be enriched. That, of course, is what makes continuity such a difficult thing to get right, but ditching it flies in the face of all sense.
Having said all this it is clear that continuity on the level understood by many is basically obsession gone mad - and any over-emphasis on the past would quickly make for dull viewing. Continuity is only really acceptable when its purpose is enhancing realism - or in itself as a springboard for new creativity.
Remembrance of the Daleks is a good example of this latter function of taking events which have occurred in the programmes history and marrying them with new ones. New viewers dont need to know the Doctors past, but enough is hinted at to suggest he has one, enhancing their belief in his character. Those of us who do know whats passed before are able to enhance the texture of the story and revise the history we have already learned:
when someone tells me what they heard or saw I believe them, and I believe their friend who also saw, but not in the same way, and I can put these accounts together and I will not have a seamless wonder but a sandwich laced with mustard of my own. Jeanette Winterson - Oranges are not the Only Fruit.
Thus, the mistake is to view continuity as set in stone rather than being flexible and to regard the audience as incapable of anything requiring a memory span of slightly more than our average goldfish. Continuity does have a place and can be a useful tool to creativity as well as being an essential part of a series appeal to an audience.
Besides which, starting from scratch seems odd since any revival of Doctor Who will always hinge upon the fact that the public are already aware of its existence and have a certain fondness for it. New Doctor Who manages to pull in huge audiences every time, whether for spoofs or TV movies. Scrapping whats gone before is tantamount to a betrayal of both the audience and of the programmes status as a cultural icon. And pointless, as eventually some form of continuity will is essential to drama and audience appreciation.
* By way of self justification Neal Cassidy, muse to Jack Kerouac, apparently indulged several times a day. But then he was a wanker in all senses of the word - as were all leading members of the Beat Generation. Hence, we can assume, the name.
Article Text © 1998/2003 the respective author(s). All other text © Rob Morris / SAD Magazine. Design © Rob Morris 1999/2003. No reproduction of material in whole or in part may be undertaken without permission of the copyright holders.