Doctor Who fans are going to have a rough year. With no new episodes until Christmas, Steven Moffat deciding he's going to leave, and Peter Capaldi seeming on the fence about his own tenure, a lot is changing with the legendary television franchise. And now, to add insult to injury, you might not see the show on any streaming platforms again.
This bad news came after some announcements were made that Amazon Prime was picking up Doctor Who for its streaming platform. Of course, as Tech Times pointed out, this news was apparently too good to be true – as Amazon withdrew the press materials that stated the show was going to be coming back. Seeing as the rights for the show's Netflix distribution expired at the beginning of this month, and no other platform has been named in the proceedings, the show's fate in streaming media is in limbo.
People have repeatedly noted that the lack of any major streaming service picking up Doctor Who has been because of the BBC's announcement that the network is forming its own streaming service, and that the show would naturally return home with them. Unfortunately, every time this rumor gets started up, it just forces someone to remind us that both Doctor Who and Sherlock are exempt from said lineup, thus forcing us to check the Amazon listings compulsively to see if there's a sale. Is there no end to this vicious cycle? Well, there might be.
As always with intense negotiations such as these, there's a possibility that Amazon is still in the midst of making a deal, and someone accidentally made the announcement a little too early. It happens to the best of us, and the sooner Amazon Prime can announce Doctor Who will be on their platform, the better. Of course, there's always the other possibility that other services are bidding on those streaming rights, which may see Netflix trying to retain the license they've had for quite some time. Either of these scenarios is possible, as it's highly doubtful that the BBC would just let the streaming rights to The Doctor's adventures lapse without anyone holding the bag.
No matter who gets the rights to Doctor Who, be it Netflix or Amazon Prime, or even Hulu at this point, the company will serve as the oasis to which Whovians will flock to in order to get their fix. 2016's going to seem like a really long year without any new episodes in sight, so revisiting what's already out there is going to become a bit of a pastime for those who can't wait. Let's just hope that someone winds up making the deal soon, or that Amazon takes pity on the fans and runs that sale we were hoping for.
Doctor Who will be back at Christmas on BBC America.
