Doctor Who - getting younger every day...

"We live in an age now where you would never cast an older Doctor," says Russell T Davies in an interview for the show. "Absolutely never. Never over fifty, I wouldn't say over forty-five actually. So we'll always have young Doctors now, because that's what a hero is these days."

He goes from "never" through "always" to the important bit - "these days". These days won't last forever. Perhaps the targer audience will remain hostile to the idea of an older Doctor for years to come. But perhaps it won't - SF's in a slightly different situation from police procedurals and Doctor Who isn't an ensemble show like West Wing or Six Feet Under...

...but even so, Patrick Stewart seemed to work in ST:TNG and Edward Woodward worked just fine in The Equalizer. Never say never, hmm?