Dr. Who Icon Russell T. Davies Has His Last Story Rejected

Russell T. Davies, the screenwriter and producer best known for revitalizing the Dr. Who franchise in 2005, revealed in a Telegraph interview this week that while he won't be writing anymore Who for television, or participating in next year's fiftieth anniversary in any official way. He also said that he had an idea for a Dr. Who story, which he recently pitched to BBC Books as an original graphic novel--and was turned down flat. "I'm just a happy viewer now," said Davies. "This'll teach me though — I did ask BBC Books if they fancied a graphic novel, and they went, 'No'. I sat here thinking, I could write a graphic novel, I could even draw the graphic novel, that'd be brilliant… No. There we are then, I tried." While the idea that Davies, whose work on the series is revered by fans, might have had his work rejected by BBC has sparked discussion online already, with fans expressing frustration and disbelief at such a thing, one has to wonder whether his story coming to light might persuade somebody like IDW to take him up on his offer--or whether their BBC license would even allow them to do so if they wanted to and Davies was amenable. Of course, this is nothing new for writers and artists working on company-owned characters. Even Gerry Conway, who co-created the character of Firestorm for DC Comics, responded to the Dr. Who news by tweeting, with a link to the Davies interview, "No surprise, happened to me with Firestorm."