British television science fiction
Encyclopedia
British television science fiction began when the broadcast medium was in its infancy. Despite an occasionally chequered history, popular programmes in the genre have been produced by both the BBC
and the largest commercial channel, ITV
. Doctor Who
, the most successful, has had a longer run than almost any other drama series on British television.
programme was produced by the BBC
's pre-war television
service. On February 11, 1938 a thirty-five-minute adapted extract of the play R.U.R.
, written by the Czech playwright Karel Čapek
, was broadcast live
from the BBC's Alexandra Palace
studios. Concerning a future world
in which robot
s rise up against their human masters, it was the only piece of science fiction to be produced until the BBC television service resumed after the war. Only a few on-set publicity photographs survive. R.U.R. was produced a second time on 4 March 1948, this time in a full ninety-minute live production, adapted for television by the producer Jan Bussell, who had also been responsible for the screening in 1938. The BBC did begin producing more science fiction, with further literary adaptations such as The Time Machine
(1949) and children's serials like Stranger from Space (1951–1952).
In the summer of 1953 the six-part serial
The Quatermass Experiment
was broadcast live. An adult-themed science-fiction drama specially written for television by BBC staff writer Nigel Kneale
, its budget consumed the majority of the finances reserved for drama that year. This successful serial ultimately led to three further Quatermass
serials and three feature film adaptations from Hammer Film Productions
. The Quatermass Experiment is also the first piece of British television science fiction to partially survive, albeit only in the form of poor-quality telerecordings of its first two episodes.
Kneale could not rely on sophisticated special effects to convey his narratives. Instead, he based his stories around characterisation and characters' reactions to the strange events unfolding around them, using science-fiction themes to tell allegorical stories, most effectively paralleling real life racial tensions with the Martian
"infection" of Quatermass and the Pit
(1958–59).
On 12 December 1954, a live adaptation of George Orwell
's Nineteen Eighty-Four
, produced by the Quatermass team of writer Nigel Kneale and director Rudolph Cartier
, achieved the highest television ratings since the Coronation of Queen Elizabeth II in 1953. It was so controversial that it was debated in Parliament, and campaigners tried to have the second performance the following Thursday banned; 'repeats' were second performances in this era. The BBC's Head of Drama Michael Barry refused to concede.
Science-fiction productions were rare and almost always one-offs. A for Andromeda
(1961) (which starred a young Julie Christie
) and its sequel (The Andromeda Breakthrough, 1962) were exceptions
to explore science fiction for programming purposes in the early 1960s. A proponent for such experimentation was Canadian-born producer Sydney Newman
, who had become Head of Drama at ABC
. At ABC, Newman produced the science-fiction serials Pathfinders In Space (1960) and its sequel Pathfinders to Venus (1961), and oversaw the science-fiction anthology series Out of This World
(1962), the first of its kind in the UK. ITV also made an attempt at children's science fiction, with its short-lived programme Emerald Soup
(1963), which coincidentally aired the same night that Doctor Who
premiered.
Two important events for the future of the British television science fiction occurred in 1962. The first was that the BBC's Head of Light Entertainment, Eric Maschwitz
, commissioned Head of the Script Department Donald Wilson to prepare a report on the viability of producing a new science-fiction series for television. The second was that Sydney Newman was tempted away from the ABC to take up the position of Head of Drama at the BBC, officially joining the Corporation at the beginning of 1963.
The BBC developed an idea of Newman's into Britain's first durable science-fiction television series. Taking advantage of the research Wilson's department had completed, Newman initiated the creation and along with Wilson and BBC staff writer C. E. Webber
oversaw the development of this new series, which Newman named Doctor Who
.
After much development work, the series was launched on 23 November 1963. The importance of Doctor Who
to British television science fiction cannot be overstated. It lasted for twenty-six seasons in its original form, through which first emerged many of the writers who until the 1980s would create most of the genre's successful British shows. One of the few science fiction series to have become part of the popular consciousness, its success led the BBC to produce other efforts in the genre. Of particular note being its own science fiction anthology series Out of the Unknown
(1965–71), which ran for four seasons.
Some of the ITV companies were imitating American styles of production, shooting some of their series on film rather than in the multi-camera electronic studio for lucrative sales in the 'international' market. One producer who was keen to make science fiction for the commercial network was Gerry Anderson
, who initially used puppets for his shows. His science fiction shows in 'Supermarionation
' such as Thunderbirds
(1965–66), Captain Scarlet and the Mysterons
(1967–68) and Stingray
(1964–65) remain popular among followers of archive television.
Their success led his backers ITC
to finance the live-action shows he most wanted to develop. The first of these was UFO
(1970–71), which featured American actor Ed Bishop
as the head of an undercover military organisation with responsibility for combating aliens who came to Earth in the eponymous space craft. A planned second season was delayed and eventually reformatted as a new show, entitled Space: 1999
(1975–77), which ran for two seasons and was a moderate success.
was going through its strongest period with first Jon Pertwee
(1970–1974) and later Tom Baker
(1974–1981) in the leading role, already firmly entrenched in the public consciousness.
Various former Doctor Who
alumni had moved on to produce their own acclaimed genre programmes as well. The series' former scientific adviser Dr Kit Pedler
and former script editor Gerry Davis
collaborated to create Doomwatch
(1970–72), a series which recounted the story of a governmental scientific group formed to investigate and combat ecological and scientific threats to humankind. In the Quatermass tradition of allegorical storytelling (Nigel Kneale
was invited, but declined to contribute scripts to the programme), it used its science-fiction basis to try and convey real warnings about the state of the world, as well as telling tense, dramatic stories and not being afraid of shocking its audience, such as in the killing off of popular lead character Toby Wren (played by Robert Powell
).
Writer Terry Nation
had created the Dalek
race for Doctor Who in 1963, and thus assuring much of its early popularity. For the rest of the 1960s Nation had concentrated on writing for ITV film series, but in the early 1970s he returned to science fiction, contributing Dalek stories to Doctor Who again from 1973 to 1975 and in 1975 creating his own science-fiction show, Survivors
(1975–77).
Survivors
was a post-apocalyptic tale of a small group of people who were the only humans left after a plague caused by biological warfare lab accident has wiped out most of humanity. It ran for three seasons and was generally well-received. Nation followed it by creating Blake's 7
(1978–81).
Pitched by Nation as "the Dirty Dozen
in space", Blake's 7
was originally centred around righteous freedom fighter Roj Blake, his battle with a corrupt Galactic Federation and the rag-tag group of pirates, criminals and smugglers who are reluctantly forced to work with him after an escape from a prison ship. Running for four seasons, the early evening series had a hard edge. The moral ambiguity of the leading characters made them interesting, and as with Doomwatch
it was not afraid of shocking the audience by killing off leading characters, climaxing by wiping out the entire crew in its final episode.
ITV
was continuing to produce science fiction in this era. Keen to catch some of the young audience who followed Doctor Who, some of the ITV companies sought to create their own youth-oriented genre programmes, such as Timeslip
(1970) and The Tomorrow People
(1973–79). Although it presented some intriguing (if bizarre) storylines, it never rivalled Doctor Who, possibly because unlike the BBC
programme it attempted to identify with children by featuring children, thus making the crossover appeal to an adult audience much more difficult.
A much more respected show, produced by ATV
in a similar production manner to Doctor Who (i.e. on videotape using a serial form) was Sapphire & Steel
(1979–82). The tale of two "time detectives" played by David McCallum
and Joanna Lumley
, Sapphire & Steel
was a superbly atmospheric piece of television, although its production run was often hampered by the unavailability of its two leads.
was still running, in terms of audience it was struggling to compete with US imports in the genre which began to re-emerge following the box-office success of contemporary films like the Star Wars
franchise. For the television channel controllers, these had the benefit of transmission rights having a lower cost than any domestic productions. Dr Who' s place in the Saturday schedule was briefly lost when it was moved to a weekday slot.
Nonetheless, in the early part of the decade there were several serials produced, albeit mainly by the BBC; the bought in series mainly aired on ITV. Adaptations of novels such as The Day of the Triffids (1981), The Invisible Man
(1984) and The Nightmare Man (1981, from the novel Child of the Vodyanoi) were produced, and the BBC began an adaptation of The White Mountains novels, under the name The Tripods
(1984–85).
The Tripods
had run for two of its planned three series when it was cancelled by the Controller of BBC1
, Michael Grade
. At the same time Grade abandoned a whole season of Doctor Who
, the series was rested for eighteen months.
It appeared to be generally felt at the BBC that science fiction was more expensive to produce than other types of programme but did not return any higher audiences for the outlay or particular critical acclaim. Some BBC popular and critical successes such as Edge of Darkness
(1985) had science-fiction as a secondary element. The industry's shift in drama productions being entirely mounted on film rather than using the old film/video 'hybrid' form, with increased costs edged out genre's thought marginal.
Perhaps the very last original series of its kind in the multi-camera era of BBC science fiction was Star Cops
(1987), which ran for only nine episodes to poor viewing figures on the corporation's second channel, BBC2
. It was written by Chris Boucher
, who had contributed scripts to Doctor Who
and Blake's 7
, and was script editor for the later series entire run.
The 1980s also saw the arrival on the BBC of two science fiction comedy
series both of which had their origins on radio. The first was The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
(1981) by Douglas Adams
which amalgamated aspects of the original radio series with that of the subsequent novel. The second was Red Dwarf
(1988–99, 2009), created and originally written by Rob Grant
and Doug Naylor
. It parodies most (if not all) of the subgenres of science fiction but is first and foremost an 'odd couple'
type comedy (the couple in question being the characters of Rimmer and Lister). Running for more than eight series, the idea was originally developed from the Dave Hollins: Space Cadet
sketches introduced on Grant and Naylor's 1984 BBC Radio 4
show Son of Cliché.
Perhaps the most high-profile of those behind the movement to return Doctor Who to the screens is writer Russell T Davies, who initially worked in the BBC children's department earlier in his career, and contributed to British TV science fiction there. Davies' first sci-fi serial was the six-part Dark Season
(1991), which co-starred a young Kate Winslet
as well as former Blake's 7
star Jacqueline Pearce
. Two years later Davies wrote a second, much more complex serial called Century Falls
(1993). ITV
contributed a new version of The Tomorrow People
(1992–94) made as an international co-production with US and Australia companies, and there were various other child-oriented sci-fi type series such as ITV's Mike & Angelo (1989–99)and the BBC's Watt on Earth (1991), although these lacked the crossover adult appeal that Davies' shows had possessed.
The interest in making British TV science fiction seemed to return to broadcasters towards the middle of the 1990s in that companies began to see the possibility of lucrative overseas sales and tie-in products that other genres could not match. In the mid-1990s the BBC screened four seasons of the glossy sci-fi action adventure series Bugs (1995–98) made by independent company Carnival. They co-produced the six-part serial Invasion: Earth (1998) with the US Sci Fi Channel
, and ITV began attempting to market British sci-fi again with serials such as The Uninvited (1997) and The Last Train
(1999).
The BBC also produced several children's science fiction shows in the late 1990s to mid 2000's. The most known examples of which being Aquila (TV series)
(1997–1998) based on the novel by Andrew Norriss
and Jeopardy (BBC TV series)
(2002–2004) which won the 2002 BAFTA for Best Children's Drama.
A 'live' remake of The Quatermass Experiment was broadcast on BBC Four
on 2 April 2005. Various series have followed the new success of Doctor Who, including two spin-offs entitled Torchwood
(2006–present) and The Sarah Jane Adventures
(2007–2011), a new time travel drama Life on Mars
(BBC 2006–2007), Eleventh Hour (ITV 2008–2009), Primeval (ITV 2007–present) and in 2009 new story for Red Dwarf
, now shown exclusive on Dave (TV Channel) rather than the BBC.
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
and the largest commercial channel, ITV
ITV
ITV is the major commercial public service TV network in the United Kingdom. Launched in 1955 under the auspices of the Independent Television Authority to provide competition to the BBC, it is also the oldest commercial network in the UK...
. Doctor Who
Doctor Who
Doctor Who is a British science fiction television programme produced by the BBC. The programme depicts the adventures of a time-travelling humanoid alien known as the Doctor who explores the universe in a sentient time machine called the TARDIS that flies through time and space, whose exterior...
, the most successful, has had a longer run than almost any other drama series on British television.
Early years
The first known science fiction televisionScience fiction on television
Science fiction first appeared on a television program during the Golden Age of Science Fiction. Special effects and other production techniques allow creators to present a living visual image of an imaginary world not limited by the constraints of reality; this makes television an excellent medium...
programme was produced by the BBC
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
's pre-war television
BBC Television
BBC Television is a service of the British Broadcasting Corporation. The corporation, which has operated in the United Kingdom under the terms of a Royal Charter since 1927, has produced television programmes from its own studios since 1932, although the start of its regular service of television...
service. On February 11, 1938 a thirty-five-minute adapted extract of the play R.U.R.
R.U.R. (Rossum's Universal Robots)
R.U.R. is a 1920 science fiction play in the Czech language by Karel Čapek. R.U.R. stands for Rossum's Universal Robots, an English phrase used as the subtitle in the Czech original. It premiered in 1921 and introduced the word "robot" to the English language and to science fiction as a whole.The...
, written by the Czech playwright Karel Čapek
Karel Capek
Karel Čapek was Czech writer of the 20th century.-Biography:Born in 1890 in the Bohemian mountain village of Malé Svatoňovice to an overbearing, emotional mother and a distant yet adored father, Čapek was the youngest of three siblings...
, was broadcast live
Live television
Live television refers to a television production broadcast in real-time, as events happen, in the present. From the early days of television until about 1958, live television was used heavily, except for filmed shows such as I Love Lucy and Gunsmoke. Video tape did not exist until 1957...
from the BBC's Alexandra Palace
Alexandra Palace
Alexandra Palace is a building in North London, England. It stands in Alexandra Park, in an area between Hornsey, Muswell Hill and Wood Green...
studios. Concerning a future world
Future of the Earth
The biological and geological future of the Earth can be extrapolated based upon the estimated effects of several long-term influences. These include the chemistry at the Earth's surface, the rate of cooling of the planet's interior, the gravitational interactions with other objects in the Solar...
in which robot
Robot
A robot is a mechanical or virtual intelligent agent that can perform tasks automatically or with guidance, typically by remote control. In practice a robot is usually an electro-mechanical machine that is guided by computer and electronic programming. Robots can be autonomous, semi-autonomous or...
s rise up against their human masters, it was the only piece of science fiction to be produced until the BBC television service resumed after the war. Only a few on-set publicity photographs survive. R.U.R. was produced a second time on 4 March 1948, this time in a full ninety-minute live production, adapted for television by the producer Jan Bussell, who had also been responsible for the screening in 1938. The BBC did begin producing more science fiction, with further literary adaptations such as The Time Machine
The Time Machine
The Time Machine is a science fiction novella by H. G. Wells, published in 1895 for the first time and later adapted into at least two feature films of the same name, as well as two television versions, and a large number of comic book adaptations. It indirectly inspired many more works of fiction...
(1949) and children's serials like Stranger from Space (1951–1952).
In the summer of 1953 the six-part serial
Serial (radio and television)
Serials are series of television programs and radio programs that rely on a continuing plot that unfolds in a sequential episode by episode fashion. Serials typically follow main story arcs that span entire television seasons or even the full run of the series, which distinguishes them from...
The Quatermass Experiment
The Quatermass Experiment
The Quatermass Experiment is a British science-fiction serial broadcast by BBC Television in the summer of 1953 and re-staged by BBC Four in 2005. Set in the near future against the background of a British space programme, it tells the story of the first manned flight into space, overseen by...
was broadcast live. An adult-themed science-fiction drama specially written for television by BBC staff writer Nigel Kneale
Nigel Kneale
Nigel Kneale was a British screenwriter from the Isle of Man. Active in television, film, radio drama and prose fiction, he wrote professionally for over fifty years, was a winner of the Somerset Maugham Award and was twice nominated for the British Film Award for Best Screenplay...
, its budget consumed the majority of the finances reserved for drama that year. This successful serial ultimately led to three further Quatermass
Quatermass
Quatermass may best be known as the surname of the title character of a British science fiction franchise of several television serials and films, and a radio production...
serials and three feature film adaptations from Hammer Film Productions
Hammer Film Productions
Hammer Film Productions is a film production company based in the United Kingdom. Founded in 1934, the company is best known for a series of Gothic "Hammer Horror" films made from the mid-1950s until the 1970s. Hammer also produced science fiction, thrillers, film noir and comedies and in later...
. The Quatermass Experiment is also the first piece of British television science fiction to partially survive, albeit only in the form of poor-quality telerecordings of its first two episodes.
Kneale could not rely on sophisticated special effects to convey his narratives. Instead, he based his stories around characterisation and characters' reactions to the strange events unfolding around them, using science-fiction themes to tell allegorical stories, most effectively paralleling real life racial tensions with the Martian
Martian
As an adjective, the term martian is used to describe anything pertaining to the planet Mars.However, a Martian is more usually a hypothetical or fictional native inhabitant of the planet Mars. Historically, life on Mars has often been hypothesized, although there is currently no solid evidence of...
"infection" of Quatermass and the Pit
Quatermass and the Pit
Quatermass and the Pit is a British television science-fiction serial, originally transmitted live by BBC Television in December 1958 and January 1959. It was the third and last of the BBC's Quatermass serials, although the character would reappear in a 1979 ITV production simply entitled Quatermass...
(1958–59).
On 12 December 1954, a live adaptation of George Orwell
George Orwell
Eric Arthur Blair , better known by his pen name George Orwell, was an English author and journalist...
's Nineteen Eighty-Four
Nineteen Eighty-Four (TV programme)
Nineteen Eighty-Four is a British television adaptation of the novel of the same name by George Orwell, originally broadcast on BBC Television in December 1954. The production proved to be hugely controversial, with questions asked in Parliament and many viewer complaints over its supposed...
, produced by the Quatermass team of writer Nigel Kneale and director Rudolph Cartier
Rudolph Cartier
Rudolph Cartier was an Austrian television director, filmmaker, screenwriter and producer who worked predominantly in British television, exclusively for the BBC...
, achieved the highest television ratings since the Coronation of Queen Elizabeth II in 1953. It was so controversial that it was debated in Parliament, and campaigners tried to have the second performance the following Thursday banned; 'repeats' were second performances in this era. The BBC's Head of Drama Michael Barry refused to concede.
Science-fiction productions were rare and almost always one-offs. A for Andromeda
A for Andromeda
A for Andromeda is a British television science fiction drama serial first made and broadcast by the BBC in seven parts in 1961. Written by the noted cosmologist Fred Hoyle, in conjunction with author and television producer John Elliot, it concerns a group of scientists who detect a radio signal...
(1961) (which starred a young Julie Christie
Julie Christie
Julie Frances Christie is a British actress. Born in British India to English parents, at the age of six Christie moved to England, where she attended boarding school....
) and its sequel (The Andromeda Breakthrough, 1962) were exceptions
Creation of Doctor Who and ITV
Britain's first commercial television network ITVITV
ITV is the major commercial public service TV network in the United Kingdom. Launched in 1955 under the auspices of the Independent Television Authority to provide competition to the BBC, it is also the oldest commercial network in the UK...
to explore science fiction for programming purposes in the early 1960s. A proponent for such experimentation was Canadian-born producer Sydney Newman
Sydney Newman
Sydney Cecil Newman, OC was a Canadian film and television producer, who played a pioneering role in British television drama from the late 1950s to the late 1960s...
, who had become Head of Drama at ABC
Associated British Corporation
Associated British Corporation was one of a number of commercial television companies established in the United Kingdom during the 1950s by cinema chain companies in an attempt to safeguard their business by becoming involved with television which was taking away their cinema audiences.In this...
. At ABC, Newman produced the science-fiction serials Pathfinders In Space (1960) and its sequel Pathfinders to Venus (1961), and oversaw the science-fiction anthology series Out of This World
Out of This World (UK TV series)
Out of This World is a British science fiction anthology television series made by ABC Television and broadcast in 1962. A spin-off from the popular anthology series Armchair Theatre, each episode was introduced by the actor Boris Karloff. Many of the episodes were adaptations of stories by...
(1962), the first of its kind in the UK. ITV also made an attempt at children's science fiction, with its short-lived programme Emerald Soup
Emerald Soup
Emerald Soup is a British children's science fiction television series. Produced by ITV, the series ran for seven episodes from November 9, 1963 to December 21, 1963 on the Associated British Corporation network...
(1963), which coincidentally aired the same night that Doctor Who
Doctor Who
Doctor Who is a British science fiction television programme produced by the BBC. The programme depicts the adventures of a time-travelling humanoid alien known as the Doctor who explores the universe in a sentient time machine called the TARDIS that flies through time and space, whose exterior...
premiered.
Two important events for the future of the British television science fiction occurred in 1962. The first was that the BBC's Head of Light Entertainment, Eric Maschwitz
Eric Maschwitz
Albert Eric Maschwitz OBE , known as Eric Maschwitz and sometimes credited as Holt Marvell, was an English entertainer, writer, broadcaster and broadcasting executive.-Life and work:...
, commissioned Head of the Script Department Donald Wilson to prepare a report on the viability of producing a new science-fiction series for television. The second was that Sydney Newman was tempted away from the ABC to take up the position of Head of Drama at the BBC, officially joining the Corporation at the beginning of 1963.
The BBC developed an idea of Newman's into Britain's first durable science-fiction television series. Taking advantage of the research Wilson's department had completed, Newman initiated the creation and along with Wilson and BBC staff writer C. E. Webber
C. E. Webber
Cecil Edwin Webber was a British television writer and playwright. He is best remembered for his contribution to the creation of the famous science-fiction series Doctor Who while working as a staff writer for the BBC in the early 1960s...
oversaw the development of this new series, which Newman named Doctor Who
Doctor Who
Doctor Who is a British science fiction television programme produced by the BBC. The programme depicts the adventures of a time-travelling humanoid alien known as the Doctor who explores the universe in a sentient time machine called the TARDIS that flies through time and space, whose exterior...
.
After much development work, the series was launched on 23 November 1963. The importance of Doctor Who
Doctor Who
Doctor Who is a British science fiction television programme produced by the BBC. The programme depicts the adventures of a time-travelling humanoid alien known as the Doctor who explores the universe in a sentient time machine called the TARDIS that flies through time and space, whose exterior...
to British television science fiction cannot be overstated. It lasted for twenty-six seasons in its original form, through which first emerged many of the writers who until the 1980s would create most of the genre's successful British shows. One of the few science fiction series to have become part of the popular consciousness, its success led the BBC to produce other efforts in the genre. Of particular note being its own science fiction anthology series Out of the Unknown
Out of the Unknown
Out of the Unknown is a British television science fiction anthology drama series, produced by the BBC and broadcast on BBC2 in four series between 1965 and 1971. Each episode was an independent dramatisation of a separate science fiction short story...
(1965–71), which ran for four seasons.
Some of the ITV companies were imitating American styles of production, shooting some of their series on film rather than in the multi-camera electronic studio for lucrative sales in the 'international' market. One producer who was keen to make science fiction for the commercial network was Gerry Anderson
Gerry Anderson
Gerry Anderson MBE is a British publisher, producer, director and writer, famous for his futuristic television programmes, particularly those involving specially modified marionettes, a process called "Supermarionation"....
, who initially used puppets for his shows. His science fiction shows in 'Supermarionation
Supermarionation
Supermarionation is a puppetry technique devised in the 1960s by British production company AP Films. It was used extensively in the company's numerous Gerry and Sylvia Anderson-produced action-adventure series, the most famous of which was Thunderbirds...
' such as Thunderbirds
Thunderbirds (TV series)
Thunderbirds is a British mid-1960s science fiction television show devised by Gerry and Sylvia Anderson and made by AP Films using a form of marionette puppetry dubbed "Supermarionation"...
(1965–66), Captain Scarlet and the Mysterons
Captain Scarlet and the Mysterons
Captain Scarlet and the Mysterons, often referred to as Captain Scarlet, is a 1960s British science-fiction television series produced by the Century 21 Productions company of Gerry and Sylvia Anderson, John Read and Reg Hill...
(1967–68) and Stingray
Stingray (TV series)
Stingray is a children's marionette television show, created by Gerry and Sylvia Anderson and produced by AP Films for ATV and ITC Entertainment from 1964–65. Its 39 half-hour episodes were originally screened on ITV in the UK and in syndication in the USA. The scriptwriters included Gerry and...
(1964–65) remain popular among followers of archive television.
Their success led his backers ITC
ITC Entertainment
The Incorporated Television Company was a British television company largely involved in production and distribution. It was founded by Lew Grade.-History:...
to finance the live-action shows he most wanted to develop. The first of these was UFO
UFO (TV series)
UFO is a 1970-1971 British television science fiction series about an alien invasion of Earth, created by Gerry Anderson and Sylvia Anderson with Reg Hill, and produced by the Andersons and Lew Grade's Century 21 Productions for Grade's ITC Entertainment company.UFO first aired in the UK and Canada...
(1970–71), which featured American actor Ed Bishop
Ed Bishop
Ed Bishop was an American film, television, stage and radio actor based in Britain.-Early life:Bishop served in the US Army from 8 October 1952 to 24 September 1954, working as a disc jockey with the Armed Forces Radio at St. Johns in Newfoundland...
as the head of an undercover military organisation with responsibility for combating aliens who came to Earth in the eponymous space craft. A planned second season was delayed and eventually reformatted as a new show, entitled Space: 1999
Space: 1999
Space: 1999 is a British science-fiction television series that ran for two seasons and originally aired from 1975 to 1977. In the opening episode, nuclear waste from Earth stored on the Moon's far side explodes in a catastrophic accident on 13 September 1999, knocking the Moon out of orbit and...
(1975–77), which ran for two seasons and was a moderate success.
Television science fiction in the '70s
The 1970s is viewed by fans of the genre as a 'golden age'. Doctor WhoDoctor Who
Doctor Who is a British science fiction television programme produced by the BBC. The programme depicts the adventures of a time-travelling humanoid alien known as the Doctor who explores the universe in a sentient time machine called the TARDIS that flies through time and space, whose exterior...
was going through its strongest period with first Jon Pertwee
Jon Pertwee
John Devon Roland Pertwee , was an English actor. Pertwee is best known for his role in the BBC science fiction television series Doctor Who, in which he played the third incarnation of the Doctor from 1970 to 1974, and as the title character in the series Worzel Gummidge...
(1970–1974) and later Tom Baker
Tom Baker
Thomas Stewart "Tom" Baker is a British actor. He is best known for playing the fourth incarnation of the Doctor in the science fiction television series Doctor Who, a role he played from 1974 to 1981.-Early life:...
(1974–1981) in the leading role, already firmly entrenched in the public consciousness.
Various former Doctor Who
Doctor Who
Doctor Who is a British science fiction television programme produced by the BBC. The programme depicts the adventures of a time-travelling humanoid alien known as the Doctor who explores the universe in a sentient time machine called the TARDIS that flies through time and space, whose exterior...
alumni had moved on to produce their own acclaimed genre programmes as well. The series' former scientific adviser Dr Kit Pedler
Kit Pedler
Dr Christopher Magnus Howard "Kit" Pedler was a British medical scientist, science fiction author and writer on science in general....
and former script editor Gerry Davis
Gerry Davis (screenwriter)
Gerry Davis was a British television writer, best known for his contributions to the science-fiction genre. He also wrote for the soap operas Coronation Street and United!....
collaborated to create Doomwatch
Doomwatch
Doomwatch is a British science fiction television programme produced by the BBC, which ran on BBC One between 1970 and 1972. The series was set in the then present-day, and dealt with a scientific government agency led by Doctor Spencer Quist , responsible for investigating and combating various...
(1970–72), a series which recounted the story of a governmental scientific group formed to investigate and combat ecological and scientific threats to humankind. In the Quatermass tradition of allegorical storytelling (Nigel Kneale
Nigel Kneale
Nigel Kneale was a British screenwriter from the Isle of Man. Active in television, film, radio drama and prose fiction, he wrote professionally for over fifty years, was a winner of the Somerset Maugham Award and was twice nominated for the British Film Award for Best Screenplay...
was invited, but declined to contribute scripts to the programme), it used its science-fiction basis to try and convey real warnings about the state of the world, as well as telling tense, dramatic stories and not being afraid of shocking its audience, such as in the killing off of popular lead character Toby Wren (played by Robert Powell
Robert Powell
Robert Powell is an English television and film actor, probably most famous for his title role in Jesus of Nazareth and as the fictional secret agent Richard Hannay...
).
Writer Terry Nation
Terry Nation
Terry Nation was a Welsh screenwriter and novelist.He is probably best known for creating the villainous Daleks in the long-running science fiction television series Doctor Who...
had created the Dalek
Dalek
The Daleks are a fictional extraterrestrial race of mutants from the British science fiction television series Doctor Who. Within the series, Daleks are cyborgs from the planet Skaro, created by the scientist Davros during the final years of a thousand-year war against the Thals...
race for Doctor Who in 1963, and thus assuring much of its early popularity. For the rest of the 1960s Nation had concentrated on writing for ITV film series, but in the early 1970s he returned to science fiction, contributing Dalek stories to Doctor Who again from 1973 to 1975 and in 1975 creating his own science-fiction show, Survivors
Survivors
Survivors is a British post-apocalyptic fiction television series devised by Terry Nation and produced by Terence Dudley at the BBC from 1975 to 1977...
(1975–77).
Survivors
Survivors
Survivors is a British post-apocalyptic fiction television series devised by Terry Nation and produced by Terence Dudley at the BBC from 1975 to 1977...
was a post-apocalyptic tale of a small group of people who were the only humans left after a plague caused by biological warfare lab accident has wiped out most of humanity. It ran for three seasons and was generally well-received. Nation followed it by creating Blake's 7
Blake's 7
Blake's 7 is a British science fiction television series produced by the BBC for its BBC1 channel. The series was created by Terry Nation, a prolific television writer and creator of the Daleks for the television series Doctor Who. Four series of Blake's 7 were produced and broadcast between 1978...
(1978–81).
Pitched by Nation as "the Dirty Dozen
The Dirty Dozen
The Dirty Dozen is a 1967 film directed by Robert Aldrich and released by MGM. It was filmed in England and features an ensemble cast, including Lee Marvin, Ernest Borgnine, Charles Bronson, Jim Brown, John Cassavetes, Telly Savalas, and Robert Webber. The film is based on E. M...
in space", Blake's 7
Blake's 7
Blake's 7 is a British science fiction television series produced by the BBC for its BBC1 channel. The series was created by Terry Nation, a prolific television writer and creator of the Daleks for the television series Doctor Who. Four series of Blake's 7 were produced and broadcast between 1978...
was originally centred around righteous freedom fighter Roj Blake, his battle with a corrupt Galactic Federation and the rag-tag group of pirates, criminals and smugglers who are reluctantly forced to work with him after an escape from a prison ship. Running for four seasons, the early evening series had a hard edge. The moral ambiguity of the leading characters made them interesting, and as with Doomwatch
Doomwatch
Doomwatch is a British science fiction television programme produced by the BBC, which ran on BBC One between 1970 and 1972. The series was set in the then present-day, and dealt with a scientific government agency led by Doctor Spencer Quist , responsible for investigating and combating various...
it was not afraid of shocking the audience by killing off leading characters, climaxing by wiping out the entire crew in its final episode.
ITV
ITV
ITV is the major commercial public service TV network in the United Kingdom. Launched in 1955 under the auspices of the Independent Television Authority to provide competition to the BBC, it is also the oldest commercial network in the UK...
was continuing to produce science fiction in this era. Keen to catch some of the young audience who followed Doctor Who, some of the ITV companies sought to create their own youth-oriented genre programmes, such as Timeslip
Timeslip
Timeslip is a British children's science fiction television series made by ATV for the ITV network and broadcast between 1970 and 1971. The series centres around two children, Simon Randall and Liz Skinner who discover the existence of a strange anomaly, known as the “Time Barrier”, that enables...
(1970) and The Tomorrow People
The Tomorrow People
The Tomorrow People is a British children's science fiction television series, devised by Roger Price. Produced by Thames Television for the ITV Network, the series first ran between 1973 and 1979. The series was re-imagined in 1992, Roger Price acting as executive producer...
(1973–79). Although it presented some intriguing (if bizarre) storylines, it never rivalled Doctor Who, possibly because unlike the BBC
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
programme it attempted to identify with children by featuring children, thus making the crossover appeal to an adult audience much more difficult.
A much more respected show, produced by ATV
Associated TeleVision
Associated Television, often referred to as ATV, was a British television company, holder of various licences to broadcast on the ITV network from 24 September 1955 until 00:34 on 1 January 1982...
in a similar production manner to Doctor Who (i.e. on videotape using a serial form) was Sapphire & Steel
Sapphire & Steel
Sapphire & Steel is a British television science-fiction fantasy series starring David McCallum as Steel and Joanna Lumley as Sapphire. Produced by ATV, it ran from 1979 to 1982 on the ITV network. The series was created by Peter J. Hammond who conceived the programme under the working title The...
(1979–82). The tale of two "time detectives" played by David McCallum
David McCallum
David Keith McCallum, Jr. is a Scottish actor and musician. He is best known for his roles as Illya Kuryakin, a Russian-born secret agent, in the 1960s television series The Man from U.N.C.L.E., as interdimensional operative Steel in Sapphire & Steel, and Dr...
and Joanna Lumley
Joanna Lumley
Joanna Lamond Lumley, OBE, FRGS is a British actress, voice-over artist, former-model and author, best known for her roles in British television series Absolutely Fabulous portraying Edina Monsoon's best friend, Patsy Stone, as well as parts in The New Avengers, Sapphire & Steel, and Sensitive...
, Sapphire & Steel
Sapphire & Steel
Sapphire & Steel is a British television science-fiction fantasy series starring David McCallum as Steel and Joanna Lumley as Sapphire. Produced by ATV, it ran from 1979 to 1982 on the ITV network. The series was created by Peter J. Hammond who conceived the programme under the working title The...
was a superbly atmospheric piece of television, although its production run was often hampered by the unavailability of its two leads.
1980s
Longer-running science-fiction series became few and far between. Although Doctor WhoDoctor Who
Doctor Who is a British science fiction television programme produced by the BBC. The programme depicts the adventures of a time-travelling humanoid alien known as the Doctor who explores the universe in a sentient time machine called the TARDIS that flies through time and space, whose exterior...
was still running, in terms of audience it was struggling to compete with US imports in the genre which began to re-emerge following the box-office success of contemporary films like the Star Wars
Star Wars
Star Wars is an American epic space opera film series created by George Lucas. The first film in the series was originally released on May 25, 1977, under the title Star Wars, by 20th Century Fox, and became a worldwide pop culture phenomenon, followed by two sequels, released at three-year...
franchise. For the television channel controllers, these had the benefit of transmission rights having a lower cost than any domestic productions. Dr Who
Nonetheless, in the early part of the decade there were several serials produced, albeit mainly by the BBC; the bought in series mainly aired on ITV. Adaptations of novels such as The Day of the Triffids (1981), The Invisible Man
The Invisible Man (TV serial)
The Invisible Man is a six-part television serial based on the science fiction/fantasy novella by H. G. Wells, screened by the BBC in the UK throughout September and October 1984. It was produced as part of the BBC 1 Classic Serial strand, which incorporated numerous television adaptations of...
(1984) and The Nightmare Man (1981, from the novel Child of the Vodyanoi) were produced, and the BBC began an adaptation of The White Mountains novels, under the name The Tripods
The Tripods
The Tripods is a series of young adult novels written by John Christopher, beginning in 1967. The first two were the basis of a science fiction TV-series, produced in the United Kingdom in the 1980s....
(1984–85).
The Tripods
The Tripods
The Tripods is a series of young adult novels written by John Christopher, beginning in 1967. The first two were the basis of a science fiction TV-series, produced in the United Kingdom in the 1980s....
had run for two of its planned three series when it was cancelled by the Controller of BBC1
BBC One
BBC One is the flagship television channel of the British Broadcasting Corporation in the United Kingdom. It was launched on 2 November 1936 as the BBC Television Service, and was the world's first regular television service with a high level of image resolution...
, Michael Grade
Michael Grade
Michael Ian Grade, Baron Grade of Yarmouth CBE is a British broadcast executive and businessman. He was BBC chairman from 2004 to 2006 and executive chairman of ITV plc from 2007 to 2009.-Early life:...
. At the same time Grade abandoned a whole season of Doctor Who
Doctor Who
Doctor Who is a British science fiction television programme produced by the BBC. The programme depicts the adventures of a time-travelling humanoid alien known as the Doctor who explores the universe in a sentient time machine called the TARDIS that flies through time and space, whose exterior...
, the series was rested for eighteen months.
It appeared to be generally felt at the BBC that science fiction was more expensive to produce than other types of programme but did not return any higher audiences for the outlay or particular critical acclaim. Some BBC popular and critical successes such as Edge of Darkness
Edge of Darkness
Edge of Darkness is a British television drama serial, produced by BBC Television in association with Lionheart Television International and originally broadcast in six fifty-five minute episodes in late 1985...
(1985) had science-fiction as a secondary element. The industry's shift in drama productions being entirely mounted on film rather than using the old film/video 'hybrid' form, with increased costs edged out genre's thought marginal.
Perhaps the very last original series of its kind in the multi-camera era of BBC science fiction was Star Cops
Star Cops
Star Cops is a British science fiction television series first broadcast on BBC Two in 1987. It was devised by Chris Boucher, a writer who had previously worked on the science fiction television series Doctor Who and Blake's 7 as well as crime dramas such as Juliet Bravo and Bergerac...
(1987), which ran for only nine episodes to poor viewing figures on the corporation's second channel, BBC2
BBC Two
BBC Two is the second television channel operated by the British Broadcasting Corporation in the United Kingdom. It covers a wide range of subject matter, but tending towards more 'highbrow' programmes than the more mainstream and popular BBC One. Like the BBC's other domestic TV and radio...
. It was written by Chris Boucher
Chris Boucher
Chris Boucher is a British television writer, best known for his frequent contributions to two genres, science fiction and crime dramas.-Biography:...
, who had contributed scripts to Doctor Who
Doctor Who
Doctor Who is a British science fiction television programme produced by the BBC. The programme depicts the adventures of a time-travelling humanoid alien known as the Doctor who explores the universe in a sentient time machine called the TARDIS that flies through time and space, whose exterior...
and Blake's 7
Blake's 7
Blake's 7 is a British science fiction television series produced by the BBC for its BBC1 channel. The series was created by Terry Nation, a prolific television writer and creator of the Daleks for the television series Doctor Who. Four series of Blake's 7 were produced and broadcast between 1978...
, and was script editor for the later series entire run.
The 1980s also saw the arrival on the BBC of two science fiction comedy
Comedy
Comedy , as a popular meaning, is any humorous discourse or work generally intended to amuse by creating laughter, especially in television, film, and stand-up comedy. This must be carefully distinguished from its academic definition, namely the comic theatre, whose Western origins are found in...
series both of which had their origins on radio. The first was The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is a science fiction comedy series created by Douglas Adams. Originally a radio comedy broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in 1978, it was later adapted to other formats, and over several years it gradually became an international multi-media phenomenon...
(1981) by Douglas Adams
Douglas Adams
Douglas Noel Adams was an English writer and dramatist. He is best known as the author of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, which started life in 1978 as a BBC radio comedy before developing into a "trilogy" of five books that sold over 15 million copies in his lifetime, a television...
which amalgamated aspects of the original radio series with that of the subsequent novel. The second was Red Dwarf
Red Dwarf
Red Dwarf is a British comedy franchise which primarily comprises eight series of a television science fiction sitcom that aired on BBC Two between 1988 and 1999 and Dave from 2009–present. It gained cult following. It was created by Rob Grant and Doug Naylor, who also wrote the first six series...
(1988–99, 2009), created and originally written by Rob Grant
Rob Grant
Robert Grant is a British comedy writer and television producer, who was born in Salford and studied Psychology at Liverpool University for two years....
and Doug Naylor
Doug Naylor
Douglas R. Naylor is a British comedy writer, science fiction writer, director and television producer.Naylor was born in Manchester, England and studied at the University of Liverpool. In the mid-1980s, Naylor wrote two regular comedy sketch shows for BBC Radio 4 entitled Cliché and Son of Cliché...
. It parodies most (if not all) of the subgenres of science fiction but is first and foremost an 'odd couple'
The Odd Couple
The Odd Couple is a 1965 Broadway play by Neil Simon, followed by a successful film and television series, as well as other derivative works and spin offs, many featuring one or more of the same actors. The plot concerns two mismatched roommates, one neat and uptight, the other more easygoing and...
type comedy (the couple in question being the characters of Rimmer and Lister). Running for more than eight series, the idea was originally developed from the Dave Hollins: Space Cadet
Dave Hollins: Space Cadet
Dave Hollins: Space Cadet was a series of sketches on the BBC Radio 4 series Son of Cliché, produced by Rob Grant and Doug Naylor. The main characters were Dave Hollins and the computer Hab...
sketches introduced on Grant and Naylor's 1984 BBC Radio 4
BBC Radio 4
BBC Radio 4 is a British domestic radio station, operated and owned by the BBC, that broadcasts a wide variety of spoken-word programmes, including news, drama, comedy, science and history. It replaced the BBC Home Service in 1967. The station controller is currently Gwyneth Williams, and the...
show Son of Cliché.
Doctor Who revival and other developments
The original version of Doctor Who lasted until 1989. Apart from a television movie in 1996, Doctor Who did not re-emerge in a bigger budget version until 2005. Affected by rights issues for some years, many of those behind the new series were fans of the show when they were younger. Doctor Who returned to television screens on 26 March 2005, gaining a profile reminiscent of the earlier series at its peak.Perhaps the most high-profile of those behind the movement to return Doctor Who to the screens is writer Russell T Davies, who initially worked in the BBC children's department earlier in his career, and contributed to British TV science fiction there. Davies' first sci-fi serial was the six-part Dark Season
Dark Season
Dark Season is a British science-fiction television serial for adolescents, screened on BBC1 in late 1991. Comprising six twenty-five minute episodes, the two linked three-part stories tell the adventures of three teenagers and their battle to save their school and their classmates from the actions...
(1991), which co-starred a young Kate Winslet
Kate Winslet
Kate Elizabeth Winslet is an English actress and occasional singer. She has received multiple awards and nominations. She was the youngest person to accrue six Academy Award nominations, and won the Academy Award for Best Actress for The Reader...
as well as former Blake's 7
Blake's 7
Blake's 7 is a British science fiction television series produced by the BBC for its BBC1 channel. The series was created by Terry Nation, a prolific television writer and creator of the Daleks for the television series Doctor Who. Four series of Blake's 7 were produced and broadcast between 1978...
star Jacqueline Pearce
Jacqueline Pearce
Jacqueline Pearce is a British actress.-Career:Jacqueline Pearce trained at the British stage school RADA and at Lee Strasberg's Actors Studio in Los Angeles....
. Two years later Davies wrote a second, much more complex serial called Century Falls
Century Falls
Century Falls is a British cross-genre series broadcast in six twenty-five minute episodes on BBC One in early 1993. Written by Russell T Davies, it tells the story of teenager Tess Hunter and her mother, who move to the seemingly idyllic rural village of Century Falls, only to find that it hides...
(1993). ITV
ITV
ITV is the major commercial public service TV network in the United Kingdom. Launched in 1955 under the auspices of the Independent Television Authority to provide competition to the BBC, it is also the oldest commercial network in the UK...
contributed a new version of The Tomorrow People
The Tomorrow People
The Tomorrow People is a British children's science fiction television series, devised by Roger Price. Produced by Thames Television for the ITV Network, the series first ran between 1973 and 1979. The series was re-imagined in 1992, Roger Price acting as executive producer...
(1992–94) made as an international co-production with US and Australia companies, and there were various other child-oriented sci-fi type series such as ITV's Mike & Angelo (1989–99)and the BBC's Watt on Earth (1991), although these lacked the crossover adult appeal that Davies' shows had possessed.
The interest in making British TV science fiction seemed to return to broadcasters towards the middle of the 1990s in that companies began to see the possibility of lucrative overseas sales and tie-in products that other genres could not match. In the mid-1990s the BBC screened four seasons of the glossy sci-fi action adventure series Bugs (1995–98) made by independent company Carnival. They co-produced the six-part serial Invasion: Earth (1998) with the US Sci Fi Channel
Syfy
Syfy , formerly known as the Sci-Fi Channel and SCI FI, is an American cable television channel featuring science fiction, supernatural, fantasy, reality, paranormal, wrestling, and horror programming. Launched on September 24, 1992, it is part of the entertainment conglomerate NBCUniversal, a...
, and ITV began attempting to market British sci-fi again with serials such as The Uninvited (1997) and The Last Train
The Last Train
The Last Train is a British six-part post-apocalyptic television drama serial first broadcast on the ITV network in 1999. It has since been repeated on ITV2 in 1999/2001 and on numerous occasions on the UK Sci-Fi Channel...
(1999).
The BBC also produced several children's science fiction shows in the late 1990s to mid 2000's. The most known examples of which being Aquila (TV series)
Aquila (TV series)
Aquila is a British children's television show which aired on the BBC from 1997 to 1998. An episode was aired once a week, and was based on the story of two boys, Tom Baxter and Geoff Reynolds, who find a spacecraft when digging in a field...
(1997–1998) based on the novel by Andrew Norriss
Andrew Norriss
Andrew Norriss is a British children's author and a writer for television .- Background :Andrew Norriss was born in 1947, was educated at St John’s School, Leatherhead followed by University at Trinity College Dublin 1966-70. PGCE 1973-4. He taught at Stroud School, Romsey and then Peter Symonds...
and Jeopardy (BBC TV series)
Jeopardy (BBC TV series)
Jeopardy was a BAFTA award-winning Scottish television series which ran for three series, from 2002 to 2004, on BBC One. It was created by Tim O'Mara who also directed, and all three series were produced by Andy Rowley with exec for Wark Clements Richard Langridge. It has aired numerous times on...
(2002–2004) which won the 2002 BAFTA for Best Children's Drama.
A 'live' remake of The Quatermass Experiment was broadcast on BBC Four
BBC Four
BBC Four is a British television network operated by the British Broadcasting Corporation and available to digital television viewers on Freeview, IPTV, satellite and cable....
on 2 April 2005. Various series have followed the new success of Doctor Who, including two spin-offs entitled Torchwood
Torchwood
Torchwood is a British science fiction television programme created by Russell T Davies. The series is a spin-off from Davies's 2005 revival of the long-running science fiction programme Doctor Who. The show has shifted its broadcast channel each series to reflect its growing audience, moving from...
(2006–present) and The Sarah Jane Adventures
The Sarah Jane Adventures
The Sarah Jane Adventures is a British science fiction television series, produced by BBC Cymru Wales for CBBC, created by Russell T Davies and starring Elisabeth Sladen...
(2007–2011), a new time travel drama Life on Mars
Life on Mars (TV series)
Life on Mars is a British television series broadcast on BBC One between January 2006 and April 2007. The series combines elements of science fiction and police procedural....
(BBC 2006–2007), Eleventh Hour (ITV 2008–2009), Primeval (ITV 2007–present) and in 2009 new story for Red Dwarf
Red Dwarf: Back to Earth
Red Dwarf: Back to Earth is a three part TV miniseries continuation of the science fiction sitcom Red Dwarf, broadcast on the British television channel Dave between 10 April and 12 April 2009 and subsequently released on DVD on 15 June 2009 & on Blu-ray on 31 August 2009. It was the first...
, now shown exclusive on Dave (TV Channel) rather than the BBC.