Capaldi's Doctor Who opener mentioned on Twitter 734,000 times
Peter Capaldi’s angry debut as the new Doctor Who on Saturday evening saw almost a year’s worth of anticipation unleashed online with fans posting 734,000 tweets about the episode, according to Twitter.
Doctor Who is one of the BBC's biggest TV exports
Social media was overwhelmingly positive about the Doctor’s latest episode, which accumulated 135,000 mentions during the 80 minute broadcast, with only 14 per cent of users providing negative commentary on Twitter, according to data analysis group Social Bro.
Furthermore, a whole 57 per cent of the evening’s tweets came from female viewers.
Matt Smith’s brief cameo in the episode was mentioned over 40,000 times, with an image of the scene gathering over 5000 retweets.
Hello, again, old friend... #DoctorWho pic.twitter.com/FZoLixjpen — Doctor Who Official (@bbcdoctorwho) August 23, 2014
The show trended worldwide with the hashtags ‘#DoctorWhoSeries8’ and ‘#DoctorWho’.
To build hype for the show, the BBC had Capaldi and co-star Jenna Louise Coleman tease a London dinosaur attack in London’s Parliament Square, complete with a Tardis prop.
On the brand front, Google Maps helped acquaint viewers with the new-look Tardis by offering browsers a tour of the iconic police box.
Make like @bbcdoctorwho and explore the #TARDIS with #StreetView—just head for the police box. http://t.co/iUkDAsklfe pic.twitter.com/Ph4Loa2jUn — Google Maps (@googlemaps) August 23, 2014
Even car manufacturer Kia got in on the action with a tweet advertising its spacious ‘Soul’ car.
Okay it's no Tardis but it is surprisingly roomy inside http://t.co/qZLuHtWCGs pic.twitter.com/tazWkIih2w — Kia UK (@KiaUK) August 22, 2014
Finally, Tesco Food literally put the icing on the cake with a spongy Doctor Who tribute.
It would appear that #DrWho can travel time and space, as well as icing and sponge! pic.twitter.com/zppWudVaOz
— Tesco Food (@TescoFood) August 23, 2014
This comes after the BBC, with the help of YouTube, allowed fans to pilot the Tardis last week for only 24 hours, in a game which explained the opening of the debut episode.