User:SOTO/Forum Archive/Inclusion debates/@comment-1272640-20161223201024/@comment-27280472-20161226153708

RingoRoadagain wrote: The issue is that rule 4 is not clear enough for the matter, after this discussion it probably should be rephrased.

It currently states "If a story was intended to be set outside the DWU" but the authorial stance with Shalka changed between the comission and the release dates (november 2003) because of the new series announcement of september 2003.

Although I would try to fit it in my head-canon, to me it is the BBC intention at the time of release that should settle the matter; and very clearly the company was favorising the upcoming TV show. Furthermore Cornell now agrees that it is his "unbound" take on the franchise.

Put shortly: I would like to keep how the articles currently are and to change rule 4 to more precisely states "intended at the time of release" instead of just "intended". Authorial intent was not that it was set outside the DWU. Dr. Who and the Daleks is set outside the DWU. For Scream of the Shalka, the best it can be stretched to is "set outside the universe of the revival." Because regardless of how aware the creators became that their version of the ninth Doctor wasn't going to be continued, Scream of the Shalka is still set in the universe of Terror of the Autons and The Deadly Assassin. What is that universe, if not the DWU? Rose and Shalka take two divergent directions. But they share everything before that point. If either one has to be the "true" DWU, it's Shalka. Because Rose deliberately ignored the current Doctor, thus setting itself outside the DWU.