With the dawning of a new era in Doctor Who comes the end of Confessions of a Neowhovian.
I will admit that the preceding sentence makes me a little verklempt. I’ve been writing this blog continuously for thirteen years—the first five of them weekly—and it has become a part of my identity. But as I explained elsewhere when asked why I was planning to retire the blog, I am Le Tired.
It takes a lot of mental energy to decide on a topic and write a blog post, and as the years drag on, I feel like I have less and less of interest (or at least new) to say. I find myself most interested, and seem to get the most engagement from readers here, when I can talk about a new episode that has just dropped, but especially these last few years, those have been relatively few and far between.
And I’ve covered all the (surviving) Classic episodes now, in one capacity or another. The only episodes I haven’t touched on are parts of Tennant’s Tenth Doctor era (notably, all of Martha’s run in Series Three; that’s rather an oversight on my part). I could keep limping along another year, finally doing Martha some justice and covering Ncuti Gatwa’s first series, but… it’s all become more of a chore than a joy.
So it’s time for me to stop.
There are other creative pursuits I’d like to give more of my attention (notably, my fiction writing; if you’re interested, I do have one published short (flash) story in Nature: Futures, under my pen name). As I’m sure you can imagine, fiction writing also takes a lot of mental energy. There were times this last year when I would’ve liked to spend what few spell slots I had working on my latest novel instead of on blogging, but I made a commitment to myself and my potential readers thirteen years ago, and I wasn’t going to break that commitment.
As my personal life evolves in 2024, with aging parents needing more care and maturing offspring heading off to college in the fall, I hope that my love for Doctor Who will also continue to evolve and grow. I look forward to continuing to share ideas and opinions with other fans, both in person (I will continue to attend Gallifrey One!) and online (I’ll leave the blog’s Facebook page open, at least for now). I’ll miss this space, where I could dish my own favorite little tidbits of fan theory, but the moment has been prepared for.
Thank you for joining me on this amazing journey over the last thirteen years.
Marcia Franklin
The Neowhovian
I have been an avid reader of your blog for a long time. It first came to my attention through a recommendation for the magazine Cinescape. I have enjoyed posts and critiques, and the nostalgia of remembering past episodes from my childhood.
It took until you went to Gally that I realized the Mr. Franklin was in fact “mr franklin”. But that just caused me to chuckle.
Thanks for all of your writing!
Thank you so much for your support; it means a lot to me!
I think a lot of folks probably read “mrfranklin” as “Mr. Franklin” instead of “M. R. Franklin,” so you’re certainly not alone. 🙂 I hope to see you at Gally again some time! (Though I’m not good at remembering faces or putting names to them. If you do see me, please remind me that you’re a reader/commenter.)
You will be missed. Hopefully a break will refresh you and you will feel the urge to return. Russell T. Davies does appear to have the show ready to return to annual series which should mean a lot of new Who that needs your impression and wit.
Thank you; that’s very kind of you to say! I will probably still offer some thoughts over on the Facebook page, whether I’m formally blogging or not. 🙂 I’m certainly looking forward to more, more frequent new episodes!
What is your Facebook page name?