Bring Doctor Who to BBC America

Doctor Who is the world's longest-running science-fiction television program, having originally aired on the BBC in the United Kingdom from 1963 to 1989 and spawning a movie revival in 1996. Chronicling the adventures of eight Doctors and more than thirty companions against countless foes -- human, alien and otherwise -- throughout time and space, Doctor Who remains the greatest example of the genre.

In the United States, Doctor Who first surfaced in 1973 with the Pertwee stories on PBS in Chicago, Philadelphia and LA to almost total apathy. Then in 1978 the first 4 years of the Tom Baker stories were syndicated to local independent stations. The shows were chopped up by the distributor, Time-Life, with mostly unnecessary opening narration by Howard DaSilva; and occasionally shown out of order, going not by the original BBC air date but by the story number (4A, 4B, etc., which reflected the order in which scripts were assigned, but not necessarily aired).

Subsequently, the series--now including all 7 years of Tom Baker as well as three of his successor, Peter Davison--was turned over to Lionheart and distributed only to PBS stations, where they have proven a popular draw for public TV membership drives, with an inbuilt fan club to man the phones during pledge breaks Doctor Who has also thrived in other media, appearing in print, on stage, on film, on radio, and elsewhere. Even now, Doctor Who survives in two ongoing series of original novels (one chronicling the ongoing adventures of the Eighth Doctor, the other telling original stories about earlier Doctors) and a series of new audio dramas featuring the Fifth, Sixth, Seventh and Eighth Doctors.

Now that era of cable has dawned and PBS moves into the digital age. Doctor Who is being cast aside by many of PBS' channels. While the Doctor grows scarce on PBS. One potential ray of hope lies in the BBC. While cable companies, such as Time Warner Cable, are becoming digital. They are carrying a channel known as BBC America, but to this date, they have no intentions, to date, on airing Doctor Who.