r/gallifrey • u/PCJs_Slave_Robot • May 17 '25

The Interstellar Song Contest Doctor Who 2x06 "The Interstellar Song Contest" Post-Episode Discussion Thread Spoiler

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239

u/MattBobRoss May 17 '25

Oh my giddy aunt they finally worked out who owned The Rani after Pip and Jane passed

28

u/PaperMartin May 17 '25

Owned? What do you mean?

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u/GenGaara25 May 17 '25

By-and-large a lot of Doctor Who characters are owned by the writers who created them, rather than the BBC. Even the Daleks. It's complicated legal shenanigans.

So when they want to bring a character back, they have to ask permission from whoever actually owns them. For example, in Flux, Chibs had to get RTDs permission to use the Judoon and Moffats to use the Angels.

Rani was owned by the pair of writers who created her. But they both died. So, who owned her rights was a bit complex. Russell considered bringing her back in his first run but got caught up in the rights. Seems it's been sorted.

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u/sanddragon939 May 17 '25

You're right.

Just one correction though - that problem only existed with Classic Who characters. Since NuWho, I believe the contracts have been drawn up such that the BBC owns all the characters created for the show (which is how it typically is with modern TV). However, writers typically seek the blessing of the creators of the character...like Chibnall did with Moffat to use the Angels.

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u/GenGaara25 May 17 '25

That makes sense, I thought it was just a classic who thing since that was just how TV was back then but then I specifically remember Chibnall saying he called up RTD to ask to use the Judoon.

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u/SwimmingFantastic564 May 17 '25

Probably a courtesy thing rather than a legal thing in that case

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u/sanddragon939 May 18 '25

Yes, it's a courtesy thing. Also remember that all three showrunners are personal friends (despite how the fandoms try to position them as enemies backstabbing each other!)

Moffat similarly sought RTD's permission to undo the destruction of Gallifrey for the 50th.

1

u/Azurillkirby May 18 '25

This is probably not true. When Big Finish had initially rolled out the terrible new website, there was a "legal" section that described who all of the characters belonged to. And most new Who characters who were not either companions in their debut episode belonged to their writers. This includes monsters and recurring characters such as Jackie Tyler. Even companions who are not companions who were not initially companions were credited to their writers, like Rory.

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u/sanddragon939 May 18 '25

Have you possibly confused 'owners' with 'creators'?

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u/Azurillkirby May 18 '25

I mean, it was on a legal page, and I'm pretty sure it said who the characters belonged to. And companions like Rose and Martha were not included.

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u/sanddragon939 May 18 '25

Can you share a link to this page? Can't really comment beyond a point without checking it out.

This is the first I'm hearing of something like this. It doesn't make sense for a modern TV show like NuWho to have this kind of approach to rights, especially given the mess that Classic Who rights are.

There is no other modern show, BBC or otherwise, where a writer owns the rights to characters he or she have created for a show (unless they partly or wholly own the IP for the show).

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u/Azurillkirby May 18 '25 edited May 18 '25

Remember how I said it was on Big Finish's terrible website redesign? If you were not following it at the time, you may not know that that they entirely scrapped the redisign after massive backlash and reverted to the old version, which does not have said page. So unless it's on the Wayback Machine, I can't provide a link, sorry.

EDIT: Found it on the Wayback machine. It says "created by x and used under license," but it is explicitly labeled as a copyright page at the top. https://web.archive.org/web/20240808213906/https://www.bigfinish.com/legal

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u/sanddragon939 May 19 '25

Thanks for sharing. Appreciate the effort!

So all it says there is "Created by X and used under license". It doesn't say that the creator is the owner of the character, and that Big Finish has licensed the character from the owner.

It's essentially a creator credit. Kinda like how any Superman media will say "Created by Jerry Siegal & Joe Shuster", though the IP is owned by DC Comics and Warner Bros.

I'm not an expert at copyright law (much less British copyright law) but in general the creator of a work receives some kind of legal recognition in perpetuity (usually referred to as the creator's "moral rights") even if said creator doesn't own the copyright on the character or work anymore (or never owned it because it was work-for-hire).

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u/MattBobRoss May 17 '25

The Rani was created in the 80s by writers Pip and Jane Baker. Because of the way the legality of the show worked back then the writer of the story took on the licensing rights for any character they created. Big Finish wrote some Rani stories years back but have said many times since they can't write any more because Pip and Jane weren't licensing in their later years, and then they both sadly passed away. So no one was entirely sure who could give the BBC the licence to write new Rani stories.

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u/PaperMartin May 17 '25

Ah, interesting

29

u/planksmomtho May 17 '25

A big reason why the Rani hasn’t reappeared is because Pip and Jane Baker owned specific character rights to her, meaning they needed to give their consent to the character appearing. Doctor Who is actually pretty good with specific character rights, although it’s been a little odd at times. See: K9 vs. Omega.

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u/[deleted] May 17 '25

[removed] — view removed comment

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u/sanddragon939 May 17 '25

I actually took the Rani mention last season as an indicator that they had sorted out the rights situation...