Regeneration of a Brand: The Fan Audience and the 2005 Doctor Who Revival

This chapter is an examination of fan responses to the 2005 revival of the BBC's Doctor Who. Using extratextual materials such as online forum postings and letters in fan magazines, the chapter considers the importance of nostalgia and authenticity in the success of the revival and examines fan social activities using the concept of media events (Dayan and Katz 1992). Bringing in secondary data, in the form of production team discourses, helps to construct a rounded picture of the importance of authenticity and fidelity in the brand of the new Doctor Who. Using Bourdieu's concept of cultural capital, it identifies ways in which the new version's makers positioned themselves discursively as fans in order to construct discourses of quality around the show