Netflix Is Dropping Doctor Who And Red Dwarf Soon, Here Are The Details
"I don't want to go."
This article is more than 2 years old
With a new Doctor in Peter Capaldi and one chapter of his adventures with Clara closed in tragic fashion, the long wait for season 9 of Doctor Who has begun. Thankfully, you can revisit most of the Doctor’s “modern” adventures — beginning with Christopher Eccleston and stretching through the David Tennant and Matt Smith years — on Netflix. I would be very surprised if some of you weren’t in the midst of a trip back through those episodes as I write this. Well, I’ve got some bad news for all you Whovians: Netflix will be dropping Doctor Who from its streaming lineup at the end of the month, along with other British favorites such as Who spinoff Torchwood, cult favorite Red Dwarf, and a ton of other British fare.
The list of expiring material includes a good chunk of the BBC series on Netflix, including notable programs such as A Bit of Fry and Laurie, Black Adder, Fawlty Towers, and Coupling (that last one was created by current Who showrunner Steven Moffat, FYI). In addition to losing Who, Torchwood, and Red Dwarf, sci-fi fans have less than a month to watch Primeval and Survivors. The shows will be available for streaming through Saturday, January 31.
Now a bit of calming perspective: stuff comes and goes from Netflix all the time. Hopefully this mass disappearance of popular British series just means it’s time for Netflix to renegotiate its deal with the BBC, and if that’s the case, some or all of it will likely return to the streaming service before too long. All of this has happened before, and all of this will happen again. Wait, that reminds me of Ron Moore’s Battlestar Galactica, which also recently abandoned Netflix, with no news of when or if it might return. There must be some kind of way out of here…
The good news: most of the soon to be de-Netflixed material is currently available for Amazon Prime customers, so if you’re really irked about the impending loss of Who, it might be time to consider changing streaming provider (assuming you don’t already have both). Or you could sign this petition to try and convince Netflix to get the time lord back in their catalog ASAP.
Otherwise, well…you’ve got a little under three weeks to burn through Eccleston, Tennant, and Smith, not to mention the adventures of Captain Jack and the boys from the Dwarf. If only you had a time machine…
