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Wales’ biggest export is back on our screens tonight. Doctor Who, the series which put Cardiff on the world map, is made here, its big boss Russell T Davies is Welsh, and many of our iconic buildings are used in the filming. Catherine Jones goes behind the hype to ask what the series has done for the entire nation
SUCH is the buzz about what Doctor Who is doing for Wales, you’ve got to wonder if a statue of the good Russell T Davies – the creator of the new version of the classic show and its spin-off Torchwood – will one day be erected in the Welsh capital’s main shopping drag.
In years to come, just as it is currently de rigueur for pranksters to scale the monument to Aneurin Bevan, the founder of the National Health Service, will it become a rite of passage for students to place a bollard atop the head of Mr Davies, the creative genius who seems so instrumental in putting Cardiff on the contemporary map?
Might a Russell Road or a Davies Drive be in order to acknowledge the city’s debt to the Swansea-born writer who has boosted the fortunes of the Welsh film and tourism industries?
For this business about Doctor Who – the fourth series starts tonight on BBC One – drawing the right kind of attention to Wales is no media hype based on a couple of desultory mentions in London-based television reviews.
This is real. For those who have been living on another galaxy, Doctor Who – which attracts around 10 million viewers per episode – and Torchwood are filmed in Cardiff and make use of locations including the Millennium Stadium, Queen’s Arcade Shopping Centre and Wales Millennium Centre.
Cardiff Bay is home to the Wales branch of Torchwood, an elite unit who use alien technology to solve both human and alien crime.

icwales.icnetwork.co.uk