'Doctor Who' Finale Borrowed A Little From 'Battlestar Galactica'

For those that watched the first minute of the recent "Doctor Who" season finale and thought, "That seems a bit familiar," well, you might be right.

"Last of the Timelords" began with Martha Jones (Freema Agyeman) getting off a boat and running up a beach, with the subtitles informing us that is has been "one year later." While it's not unique to any show to jump ahead like this, executive producer Russell T. Davies admitted in the episode's podcast that the idea to jump the episode a year later was very much inspired by a similar tactic that "Battlestar Galactica" used once the humans landed on New Caprica.

"I saw this plan a couple years ahead," Davies said. "This opening, 'one year later,' is a big bold move not for a science-fiction show as it is for a prime-time Saturday night show. But I was watching the last episode of Season 2 of 'Battlestar Galactica,' and the last episode was like, 'one year later.'"

Of course, BSG didn't go backward after that, and have continued on past that year where "Doctor Who" didn't, but it was something Davies said he felt he could pay a little homage to considering "Doctor Who" gets about 8 million more viewers in the United Kingdom than "Battlestar Galactica" does.

"It's only watched by about 300,000 people [in the United Kingdom], so no one is going to know," Davies joked about "Battlestar Galactica."

The usage of the "one year later" device was very controversial on the show, although some aspects of that lost year were revealed in flashbacks in a later third season episode called "Unfinished Business."

Of course, "Doctor Who" erased that year when the Paradox Machine was destroyed, practically using a reset button, so its use most likely will not come with the same amount of controversy. The question is now, however, if Ronald D. Moore or David Eick are "Doctor Who" fans, and what they will borrow.

It's only fair.

"Doctor Who" begins its third season on the SciFi Channel in the United States on Friday. "Battlestar Galactica" returns to the channel with "Razor" in November, and its fourth and final season in early 2008.

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