Just thought I'd leave this here before the season finale and the #RIPDoctorWho that will surely take on a life of its own when more people realise the show isn't coming back immediately.
From Disney+'s press package released ahead of this season — my emphasis:
Doctor Who remains one of the most watched programmes on iPlayer and was a top 5 series on Disney+ globally every week it aired, as well as being the BBC’s top drama for under 35’s this year making it one of the biggest programmes for the demographic across all streamers and broadcasters.
Doctor Who has a variety of licensees and partnerships spanning comics and collectibles, audiobooks, podcasts and magazines. Since 2012, over 17 million Sonic Screwdrivers and action figures, 19 million DVDs and over one million tickets for Doctor Who live events have sold globally.
That last paragraph underlines what Steven Moffat has said in the past, that Doctor Who depends less on viewership (much less over-the-air ratings) and more on the cachet it bears in peripherals and cultural capital. The BBC needs the show to go on.
As for the BBC viewership numbers going down — that isn't just Doctor Who. People are simply watching less TV on the broadcast date and time, and more streaming at their convenience. Keeping this in mind, Doctor Who has consistently been in BBC One's top five viewed programs on broadcast.
Since Disney+ rarely disclose their viewing numbers, the fact that the first (or 14th) season earned a consistent top five position on the platform offers some support for a renewed distribution deal. If the platform are less thrilled by the number of viewers who only subscribe when Doctor Who is on — that's another, negative factor. Neither we nor the BBC know what's what until after the finale has aired.
There will still be a production break for at least a year before we see new episodes, but there will be the spinoff The war between the land and the sea in the interim.
We're going to see a bunch of wild rumours and armchair speculation about the show's future over summer, but at this point I take an optimistic view based on the early signals from the BBC as well as the above Disney statement