"I think maybe their eye was taken off the ball," he complains.
Peter Capaldi is taking the rather unusual step of publicly calling out his employers at the BBC for 'not looking after' worldwide phenomenon Doctor Who.
In recent years, Doctor Who has been shifted between autumn and spring airings - alternating between split series and even a year like 2016 where it won't be on until Christmas.
Doctor Who's chief Time Lord has noticed these drastic shifts - and now he's appealing to the BBC to take a more active hand in Doctor Who's future.
"The BBC is an incredible organisation, but... sometimes people there think, 'That's looking after itself'. And it's not being looked after," Capaldi told Newsweek.
"I think maybe their eye was taken off the ball, or the show was seen as a thing they could just push around. It's not. It's a special thing."
Looking at the programme's fluctuating ratings over its most recent series, Capaldi insisted that Doctor Who must remain "protected" by the BBC because it provides valuable family viewing.
"I have to pay attention to ratings - I'd rather not - but it's the way the business is," he admitted. "I think overnight ratings are a thing of the past.
"You can't really measure the success of the show by its overnight ratings, which is what the papers do. But there's still a place for families to sit down and watch the show - that's still a great, fun thing to do.
"That's what the show's success has been based on. That has to be protected."
His criticism of the BBC comes days after Capaldi revealed that he's been invited to stay once new showrunner Chris Chibnall takes over in 2018.
"To be perfectly honest, it's so far away in the future," he cautioned. "You know, Doctor Who is a very difficult thing to say goodbye to - and I don't want to make that decision right now."
Doctor Who will remain absent from TV screens until the Christmas special this December, which in turn leads into showrunner Steven Moffat's final series next year.
Posted: Thu Mar 10, 2016 10:55 pm