Interestingly, New Who seems to set itself against Classic Who as a way to purport its status as “quality tv.” Rather than four 22 minute episodes to tell a story, a sort of episodic serial where there is narrative continuity but only for a limited number of episodes, the New Who series switched to a season of 13 42-minute episodes more in line with hour-long dramas in the US and UK. Yet it still remains culturally ubiquitous in the UK, and somehow has made itself into “quality tv.” None of the shows or articles mentioned seemed to really discuss shows that have/had the kind of exposure that DW does. (Granted most articles dealt explicitly with US television.)

It seems so nice to try and treat a show, particularly one like DW, in a vacuum; it has so much material and so much internal canon and textuality that it provides its own points of comparison. But it seems like in the grand scheme of things there are three points that has helped DW transcend into “quality tv” since it restarted in 2005.

The first is its departure from a theatrical style of presentation into a cinematic one. Early DW was like watching recorded theater, from the rehearsal style to the lighting and set design down to the editing process. The current run, however, has clearly aligned itself with can be considered cinematic production values. The most noticeable change is the move from the two- to three-camera recording technique and the use of video rather than film. I admit not knowing a whole lot about the differences in number of cameras to different genres and styles, but there is a clear difference between this camera set-up to the newer style of the show. In the new series there is a clear use of film (and now digital) as a recording format, and a departure from the theatrically-staged set-up of the classic series. According to Feuer (“HBO & the Concept of Quality TV,” Quality TV: Contemporary American Television and Beyond), the use of theatrically-styled staging and production values aligned television shows with a higher form of art. However, for Doctor Who to distance itself from its earlier iteration, it had to completely depart from theatrical styling. Fortunately for the show, cinematic styling seems to be the contemporary styling associated with “high art” and “quality,” allowing a show to distance itself from itself while retaining its marker of “quality.”

The second point, and probably the most noticeable change, is the difference in scoring techniques. The classic show relied heavily (and towards the end of its run, entirely) on electronic, avant-garde musical scoring provided by the BBC Radiophonic Workshop. The use of electronic sound was a staple for marking a show or film as “science fiction,” or at least a type of story-telling that could align itself with science fiction. It was also a cheap and easy source of musical material for the show, which continually dealt with a low budget. The modern series, in contrast, is scored in a tradition set by Star Wars and 2001. Rather than relying on electronic sound as a marker of science fiction, these films used orchestral scoring from the Classical and Romantic musical traditions to align themselves with mythology and fantasy rather than strictly science fiction. The new series of DW goes a similar route, relying on bombastic orchestral scoring, character-specific musical cues (not really leitmotifs, but often labeled as such), and maximalist musical use (as opposed to minimalist) to create a sense of action-adventure and fantasy rather than sci-fi “otherness” in its narrative. Relying on a cinematic styling of musical scoring marked the show as one of higher production values, marginalizing genre discourses of science fiction and reinforcing the idea of contemporary story-telling and action-adventure (an argument Matt Hills makes in his Triumph of a Time Lord text). The New series’ use of contemporary popular music is a interesting as well, though that topic deserves its own attention.

The third point is the focus on producer and writer as a marker of “quality.” When the new series began in 2005, Russell T Davies set himself up as the proprietor of the show, labeling himself as “showrunner” and care-taker of a fabled franchise. His writing for Queer as Folk, a highly regarded television show (arguably a “quality” tv show) brought with it the connection to previously existing television work besides just the classic DW series. With him he brought well-know television writers, particularly Steven Moffat (Coupling) to help set the show up as a one with quality writers and producers. Now, with Moffat at the helm, the show has had writers the like of Richard Curtis (Love Actually, Four Weddings and a Funeral) and next season will feature an episode penned by Neil Gaiman (Coraline, Good Omens, The Graveyard Book, The Sandman). Over the past five years, the show has moved from “quality tv” where “quality writers” are pursued to write episodes to a show were “quality writers” want to write episodes. The classic series did have “quality writers,” most noticeably Douglas Adams (The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy), pen episodes; the difference here comes from quality science fiction writers (Classic series) and quality non-science fiction writers (New series).

I find it fascinating that one text (Doctor Who) can operate on different levels of quality and still remain “quality.” Meaning, the Classic series aligned itself with theatricality and the otherness of science fiction as a genre to mark its quality, while the New series aligns itself with cinematic presentation and action-adventure/fantasy to mark its quality. This has created a clear divide between the Classic series and New series while allowing it to be “quality tv.” The break in the series’ transmission in 1989 thus seems critical to the success and over-all longevity of the show from a cultural viewpoint. Its re-invigoration allowed a retention of “quality” even though the attributes of “quality tv” (which are arguable and seem to be always up for debate) seem to have changed since the show’s inception in the 60s.

Before digging into Star Trek it’s important to define what I mean by irony. Here are a few dictionary definitions:
Socratic Irony: a pose of ignorance assumed in order to entice others into making statements that can then be challenged.
Verbal Irony: the expression of one’s meaning by using language that normally signifies the opposite, typically for humorous or emphatic effect.
Dramatic/Tragic Irony: a literary technique, originally used in Greek tragedy, by which the full significance of a character’s words or actions are clear to the audience or reader although unknown to the character.
Situational/Cosmic Irony: the disparity of intention and result: when the result of an action is contrary to the desired or expected effect. Likewise, cosmic irony is disparity between human desires and the harsh realities of the outside world (or the whims of the gods). By some older definitions, situational irony and cosmic irony are not irony at all.
Historical Irony: a subset of cosmic irony, in which the element of time plays a role; irony through retrospection.

Alright, with that out of the way … I’m thinking about looking into these episodes:
- “The Corbomite Maneuver” – Balok being this mysterious, powerful being … but in the end turning out to be a somewhat mischievous, child-like creature. Both sides are using Socratic irony, while the music is hyperbolic in its melodramatic affirmation of a later discovered untruth.
- “Amok Time” – Spock and Vulcan culture are explored in a ritual that seems quite barbaric for a logic-oriented, emotionless race. The ritual of pon farr is one of situational irony, where a part of the Vulcan culture appears to be in direct contradiction to the edict of the race: logic. In the vein of cosmic irony, pon farr and the koon-ut-kal-if-fee show disparity between the Vulcan ideals of logic and suppression of emotion and the barbarism associated with the biological changes and rituals Vulcans go through during pon farr.
- “Mirror, Mirror” – This episode has a clear instance of music acting in a way similar to verbal irony, where it communicates information to the audience that is unclear to the characters. I’ll address this in more detail below.

Before moving on, here are a few more important definitions to know:
Musical topic: short melodic figures, harmonic or rhythmic formulae carrying literal or lexical meaning; meaning can come from literature, social history, and the fine arts.
Musical trope: the combining of two or more topics to create a new meaning, or comment on the meaning of the topics being combined.

To illustrate, think of Marlena’s theme from “Mirror, Mirror.” This is considered a musical trope, a combination of two musical topics: the barbaric/evil/enemy “threat” theme, and the singing/romantic/string “love” theme. The troping of these musical ideas tells us something that Kirk may or may not know about her: she is evil and a threat (if only because of her existence in the Mirror Universe), yet has the capability of being a heroine (which we find is true towards the end of the episode). This musical trope is then considered “ironic,” as we the audience are given a cue that she is a heroine while Kirk does not, nor does he anticipate that she could be.

Musical topics and troping can go across episodes as well. Consider the famous music played during the fight scene in “Amok Time.” It does transform during the course of the episode, starting off as a low, lyrical song while Spock relates his people’s customs, and is transformed into a booming march-like battle song during the episode’s climax. But the theme comes back in later episodes in different contexts, particularly as underscoring for enemies and in other battle situations. The meaning has changed again; rather than being about Spock/Vulcans, it is about anything barbaric or threatening. The element of time does not necessarily make the changes in musical use “cosmic irony,” though it can be argued that the element of time becomes important in the reception of musical topics over the course of the show. Through retrospection, however, the audience member can recall the music from “Amok Time” and wonder if it carried meanings not apparent at the time. (Though, to be honest, the reuse of music was simply an issue of using available resources and saving money. But at the same time, there must have been musical qualities of the theme that carried connotations appropriate for the later reuse, and this in itself brings a new and different meaning to the theme in retrospect.)

This is definitely a complicated subject, but I think you can see (if you read through all of that) that irony is a big part of Star Trek. In fact, irony is a large part of science fiction as a genre. And I admit, I am a bit obsessed with genre studies. So if you read through this and have any other ideas for episodes, or musical uses, or both, that deal with any form of irony let me know. And to be clear, I am focusing specifically on the original series, which ran from 1966–69. Any and all comments and suggestions are welcome!

The Twilight Zone Intro (1959)
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ny7uGEPgoXk]

The Outer Limits Intro (1961)
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8CtjhWhw2I8]

Doctor Who Full Opening Sequence from “An Unearthly Child”
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YLYSfWzKilI]

Doctor Who, Into the TARDIS
Our first look at the interior of the TARDIS
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eRNUpeGu9a4]

And just for fun:
Futurama‘s spoof on The Twilight Zone/The Outer Limits
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ma2Hqq0PVbU]

When the BBC premiered Doctor Who on November 23rd, 1963, they foresaw the program as a low-budget, teatime filler program on Saturday evenings. During the planning stages of this new show, the internal discussions surrounding Doctor Who’s development show that the BBC did not want a categorically science fiction (SF) show. As stated in documents from the BBC’s Script Department:

We are not writing science-fiction. We shall provide scientific explanations too, sometimes, but we will not bend over backwards to do so, if we decide to achieve credibility by other means. (BBC WAC T5/647/1)

The BBC believed that the British public was not ready for a mainstream SF show, nor that the SF writing community was prepared to produce stories that could reach to a wider, mainstream audience.

The highly eclectic, dissonant, and avant-garde sound design of Doctor Who tells a different story. Although the scriptwriters wanted to avoid making a SF show, the musique concrete and electronic techniques developed by Doctor Who’s freelance composers and the BBC Radiophonic Workshop utilized tropes and coded musical idioms associated with SF. This generic tension between the show’s dramatic intent and musical signifiers mirror the tensions found within literary SF, most notably the dialectic between estrangement and cognition. This article will examine the power of music in Doctor Who, and how the show’s sound design provided coherence of narrative and an aural link to established SF music conventions that helped define Doctor Who as SF.