bad wolf

You don’t have to get a tattoo honouring your favourite production company if you want to get into TV… but it might help.

An audience member at RTS Cymru Wales’s event “How to write a TV drama” revealed that he wrote his master’s dissertation on the Bad Wolf theme in Doctor Who. It was his “absolute dream” to work for the production company, also called Bad Wolf, that makes the show, he declared. And to prove it, he said he had a tattoo on his left arm showing the Tardis graffitied with “Bad Wolf”.

Television’s least wholesome drama returned to BBC One early this month, offering more backstabbing, boozing, sex, snorting and frankly incomprehensible financial jargon.

Series 3 of Industry sees Pierpoint, in stark contrast to the behaviour of its employees, repositioning itself as an ethical investment bank when it takes on a new client, the green energy start-up Lumi. This is run by an aristo turned tech-bro, the aptly named Sir Henry Muck, and played with brio by Kit Harington, best known as Game of Thrones’ Jon Snow.

Based on The Warlord Chronicles trilogy by Bernard Cornwell, the 10-part ITVX drama The Winter King is an intense, action-packed series that transports the viewer back to the depths of Britain’s dark ages, where Arthur Pendragon has been banished from his kingdom. In December, the cast and crew spoke at an RTS Cymru Wales event about how they approached this Arthurian retelling.

Doctor Who is back, bigger and arguably better than before. RTS Cymru Wales was first off the mark, hosting a premiere in Cardiff two days before the show returned to BBC One. It was also 60 years to the day since the Time Lord first appeared on TV.

A roar rose from a sold-out audience at the conclusion of The Star Beast, which saw David Tennant and Catherine Tate return as the Doctor and his assistant after almost 15 years. Also back, as showrunner, was a visibly moved Russell T Davies.

I’m at Sony’s Culver City studios for a summit meeting between our film and television senior team and Sony’s music heads, led by the irrepressible Rob Stringer. We are looking at ways of working together to bring more music projects to the screen.

It’s a good group and a good day – a very good day. The most eye-catching presentation comes from Afo Verde, who heads Sony’s Latin American music. Modern Latin pop and rap has gone quickly from regional to mainstream, and Afo’s team is at the heart of it.

Fans of His Dark Materials have been going cold turkey since Philip Pullman’s fantasy drama ended its third and apparently final series on BBC One in February. But, according to executive producer Jane Tranter, who was speaking at a sold-out RTS Futures event last month, further helpings could be served up.

The three-part 'anti-Christmas Christmas Special', written by Prebble, will see child star turned actress Suzie Pickles (Piper) navigate a new agent, new PR and a new job – a Saturday night reality TV competition, dancing for likes on ‘Dance Crazee’. Having lost everyone close to her, Suzie returns to her first love – the public.

Bad Wolf co-founder Jane Tranter shoots back with a rapid reply when asked what her Cardiff-based production company is up to: “Dealing with high-level anxiety all the time, probably emanating from myself.”

If so, Tranter – speaking over Zoom – hides it well. Any stress would be understandable. Against the backdrop of the pandemic, Bad Wolf has brought the second seasons of fantasy epics His Dark Materials and A Discovery of Witches to the screen, and launched two acclaimed contemporary dramas, Industry and I Hate Suzie.

Thank you to RTS Cymru Wales for inviting me to give this year’s lecture. It’s a privilege to be with you all here tonight, particularly as we’re here in this shiny building – the new home for Cardiff University’s prestigious school of journalism, media and cultural studies as well as, of course, BBC Wales.

Opportunities such as this give a rare chance to reflect publicly on what has been an incredible few years - a constant and glorious work in progress that myself and the other Bad Wolves are passionately driven and obsessed by.