At the BBC they have just announced a new fiction project. A series about the Ministry of Time, a UK government department that recruits agents from different periods in history. It’s called The Ministry of Time. This is supposed to be an original series based on an unpublished novel by Kaliane Bradley, who will debut as a literary author with this book. Of course, she’s raising blisters. The similarities with The Ministry of Time, the series by Pablo and Javier Olivares, are impossible to ignore, starting with the title.
“Without cutting a hair,” declared Javier Olivares upon discovering via social networks that the prestigious channel in the United Kingdom was producing a series with the same starting point without mentioning a purchase of rights to his work, which between 2015 and In 2020, it aired four seasons and a total of 42 episodes. The reaction of the spectators, moreover, has been unanimous.
It is not the first time that it has encountered a reasonable resemblance: in September 2016, after watching the American series Timeless created by Eric Kripke and Shawn Ryan, the production company Onza Partners sued the NBC channel, Sony and the aforementioned scriptwriters for plagiarism. Both parties reached an agreement in May 2017.
In the case of The Ministry of Time, the BBC reports that the idea belongs to Bradley’s unpublished novel that will be adapted by Alice Birch, the sought-after screenwriter behind Normal People or Inseparables, and will be produced by A24, the production company behind Row. “It’s a series that feels absolutely unique, fusing romance, thriller, sci-fi and a state of the nation drama,” said BBC Drama director Lindsay Salt, who also described the series as “ epic and intimate.”
According to the information published by the British channel, among the characters there will be a commander of John Franklin’s Arctic expedition of 1845, rescued from certain death, a captain of the navy from the Battle of the Somme in the First World War, a victim of the plague and a 17th century soldier and a widow from revolutionary France.
This implies that these temporary “expats” find themselves in the 21st century, having to share a flat and having to learn the habits and customs of contemporary life: “from feminism to Spotify.” And, between this adaptation process and romantic tensions, a “conspiracy in the ministry” will develop.
“That NBC (judicial agreement, it is not an opinion) and the BBC (same title and idea) plagiarize you shows how badly we did not do with The Ministry of Time,” Olivares joked on social networks. He has also asked Spanish Television to act in the face of the violation of the rights of an iconic work of the corporation: “I think that since it belongs to TVE and is public property, it would be good for someone to have the pride of acting. I don’t know… I say, eh…”.
At the moment, the BBC, the writer Kaliane Bradley or the screenwriter Alice Birch have not commented on the accusations of plagiarism that are proliferating on social networks and which are echoed by Olivares himself, who receives the support of his colleagues. profession such as Ángela Armero (Ana Tramel), Carlos López (The Body on Fire) or Juan Pedro Gálvez (A Life of Shit).
