"Paradise is a little too green for me": Discourses of environmental disaster in Doctor Who 1963-2010

<div>Throughout its history, the British science fiction television programme Doctor Who has engaged with many of the real-life scientific and political issues faced by human beings. Environmental problems have been a staple in the Doctor Who canon from as early as the programme’s second season in 1964 to as recently as 2008. Yet the programme’s representations of these problems – their causes, their effects, and their solutions – have changed significantly over that time. In this paper I examine these changes and find that the programme follows a trajectory of increasing resignation towards chronic environmental problems, and increasing disillusionment with the ability of the West – specifically Western science – to provide solutions.</div