Doctor Who memories

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  • #12614
    Whisht @whisht

    Hi @phaseshift – only just stumbled across this memory of yours now!

    Just loved this story!

    Lets just say I have a Chewbacca guarding my Tufte and design books.
    Though I had Chewbacca as well as Hammerhead (and another I can’t remember), it was the Chewie I loved. Weirdly, my mum also took a shine to it, and would fiddle with it on long journeys up to Yorkshire, twirling its arm round and round and round and round…..

    She brought it into hospital one time she was in, and it disappeared. No idea what happened to it.
    I knew she was a bit upset about losing it and for fun, I went searching for one to replace it. This was maybe 15 years ago, and little did I know that they’d changed the design of the figures, and Chewie now looked like some shite He-Man with fur.
    Had to search and search for months (years??) for an old one that wasn’t cripplingly expensive in a still-in-its-box collector’s way.

    Finally found one, and mum chuckled. Now it resides on my shelf along with other more random additions (a ghost?! a tin robot, a tin East German flying-spinner thing).

    #12721
    PhaseShift @phaseshift
    Time Lord

    Thanks @whisht. I sneaked that one in when everyones attention was elsewhere 🙂

    I commend you on your purchases. Those Star Wars figures were absolutely massive when we were young ‘uns.

    #13064
    kk74974 @kk74974

    Hello, well, I am kind of late regarding DW, I just recently started watching the series, I started with the 2006 season, with Rose episode, and this series grew up on me, I never think it will be as amazing as it is. I think Ecclestone was an amazing Doctor and Tennant played it excellent too. And fell in love with Rose. I think she left the show early. I do understand that companion changes are (maybe) necessary (even because of the story itself or even due to budget reasons), but I think Rose could have last more than that.

    Even I do enjoyed all the others companions of the doctor, I will prefer Rose above all of them, maybe because it opened the possibility of a romance between those two. But I do loved Captain Jack, he was so funny.

    I do have a question (if anyone could help me on that would be great), I am currently watching the series over netflix, and I just saw episode “Journey’s End” (last of season 4) and then it jumped into the “11th Hour” episode, when it already is Smith the Doctor, so, my question: is there any “transition” episode where the doctor regenerate from Tennant into Smith? I searched on imdb and it does not show any episodes on 2009, just jumped from 2008 to 2010.

    Were any episodes on 2009? Sorry if this questions seems obvious to all of you the had follow the show for many years, but as I said I am just starting to follow it.

    Thanks a lot,

     

    Konrad

     

    #13068
    Craig @craig
    Emperor

    @kk74974 Welcome.

    There were five specials between ‘Journey’s End’ and ‘The Eleventh Hour’ over 1 year. You can actually find a list of all episodes here:

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Doctor_Who_serials

    These are just my opinions but The Next Doctor (a Christmas special) is okay, Planet of the Dead is disappointing (perhaps even dreadful), Waters of Mars is really rather good, and the two-parter, leading to the regeneration into Smith, The End of Time, has great moments but goes on too long.

    Hope they’re on Netflix

    #13070
    Anonymous @

    @craigPlanet of the Dead is disappointing (perhaps even dreadful)

    Really?  I thought it was quite good, and even more so now that I know that post the 7th Doctor they were looking for ‘a cat burglar’ as a companion.  Eastenders isn’t such a graveyard for BBC talent, and Michelle Ryan went on to Hollywood stardom as Wonder Woman (well, short-lived stardom, assuredly).

    What do you find so disappointing about Planet of the Dead?

    #13071
    Craig @craig
    Emperor

    I just found it dull. It’s a bus stuck in the desert! Midnight, which it has quite a lot in common with, was brilliant but this tries to do the same sort of claustrophobic thing and I think it fails.

    Maybe it was just because we only had four stories in one year, so having waited 3 months after Christmas for a new one I was disappointed. And as lovely as Ryan is to look at she just didn’t do it for me – and I’d never seen her in Eastenders (don’t watch it) so that wasn’t colouring my judgement. The chemistry just didn’t seem to be there between her and Tennant.

    That said, 3 months later – Water of Mars, which riffed off another hit, Impossible Planet/Satan Pit, was a vast improvement even if it went over many of the same ideas.

    #13072
    Bluesqueakpip @bluesqueakpip

    Planet of the Dead is fine for a story which had to be somewhat rewritten at the last second – due to the bus being smashed nearly to bits. Then they had a bit of a sand-storm…

    All in all, Planet of the Dead sounds a bit like The Greatest Show in the Galaxy; the most amazing thing about the episode is that they managed to finish the thing 🙂

    For those who want to watch the Confidential:

     

    #13073
    Anonymous @

    My earliest memories of watching Doctor Who are on an old UHF television set. I must have been a baby. I remember sitting right in front of the television in awe. John Pertwee was my first Doctor and I can recall the opening title sequence in vivid detail. But the first episodes that are emblazoned in my memory are the ones with Tom Baker and the cat-people. It is always nice meeting people who also grew up with Doctor Who as opposed to people who are only just now getting into it.

    Now that I have seen more of the William Hartnell and Patrick Troughton era, The Aztecs is my favorite classic episode since it went into the morality of time travel.

    #13075
    kk74974 @kk74974

    Thanks @craig for the info, I am looking for those episodes on netflix but it seems they do not have them on file…I’ll try to find them to watch them, thanks

    #13076
    Anonymous @

    @kk74974 I watched the David Tennant specials between series four and five on Xfinity OnDemand around New Years during another one of my famous Doctor Who marathons. I do not know if they are still there, but they might be, so it’s worth checking out. My husband has since given me the David Tennant specials on BluRay for my birthday.

    #13077
    kk74974 @kk74974

    thanks @jillybeans for the info, the thing is that we do not have Xfinity OnDemand in Venezuela and on the BBC web page is not available for online viewing, and after a google search, it seems a lot of fake (adds full) pages offer online viewing, I will try on youtube…I  just do not want to spend almost 25$ for those 2009 episodes on iTunes

    #13078
    Anonymous @

    @kk74974 I am sorry to hear that. You might be able to buy the DVD’s used.

    What does everyone think of the recent BBC The Doctor’s Revisited specials? I have watched all of them so far and I have really appreciated them a lot.

    Also, is it true that on a lot of the William Hartnell and Patrick Troughton era DVD’s that on episodes where they could not recover all of the footage that the BBC destroyed that they used still images with “animated heads”? I have read several negative reviews of the DVD’s where people were displeased with the “animated heads”.

    #13081
    Nick @nick

    http://www.thedoctorwhoforum.com/members/jillybeans/   Sorry I haven’t seen those.

    My earliest memories of the series was from 1971 – Terror of the Autons. Its all a bit hazy these days, but I remember being jealous that my best friend of the time had the Radio Times edition [weekly TV listings guide for any non-UK reader] with Roger Delgado on the cover and the article inside (if I remember accurately) more than any particular part of the story itself. For example, I certainly don’t remember any of the things which caused the controversy at the time, which just goes to show you how little impact the scary stuff really has at that age (between 5 and 6). I know I saw some Patrick Troughton episodes according to my parents, but I certainly don’t have any coherent memories.

    Although  Jon Pertwee was clearly my “first” Doctor I recall early Tom Baker episodes more fondly

    #13083
    Anonymous @

    @nick If you live outside of the US, I believe @craig mentioned that these specials are only showing on BBC America. I do not understand why they are only showing in the US, because assumedly there are many newer fans of the show all over the world who did not grow up watching it.

    I saw Spearhead From Space for the first time last year. Although, I might have actually seen it as a child and just did not remember it. I really do enjoy Pertwee’s almost James Bond-esque interpretation of the Doctor. That is one of the things that I really love about Doctor Who, each interpretation of the Doctor is unique. I also recall Tom Baker’s episodes more fondly, due to his interpretation of the Doctor having been more enjoyable and intriguing to me as a child.

    #13084
    Anonymous @

    How did you all react when you found out about the Doctor Who reboot? I did not know about the reboot until 2006, when I first got digital cable. I was surfing through the guide and was ecstatic upon seeing that I had BBC America because I have always been a huge fan of the Beeb. The first episode of the reboot that I saw was The End Of The World.

    #13086
    kk74974 @kk74974

    @jillybeans I started Doctor Who for the first time on the 2005 episode called Rose, with Ecclestone as DW, I imagine that DW before this episode was another actor…and on the Parting of the Ways Tennant took over on a regeneration

    I bought the last episodes of Tennant as DW on iTunes… 😀

    #13088
    Anonymous @

    @kk74974 – I believe what jillybeans was referring to have been posted on our ‘Faces of the Doctor’ thread http://www.thedoctorwhoforum.com/forums/topic/the-faces-of-the-doctor/page/4/ .

    That link will take you to Page 4; scroll down until you see Craig’s comment on 21 June at 2:23pm which has 4 video clips.  These were retrospectives of the early Doctors which acted (on BBC America) as introductions to a classic episode starring that Doctor.  Sadly, we don’t have the episodes, just the intros, but they are very informative all the same.

    Go to Page 5 of that same thread to find where Craig posted the 4th Doctor retrospective.

    #13089
    Anonymous @

    @Shazzbot Thank you! I knew I saw that @craig had posted that somewhere, but I could not find it again. So, the retrospectives are airing in the UK too? I guess I misunderstood @craig‘s post.

    @kk74974 I really loved Eccleston’s take on the Doctor. It is funny, because when anyone asks me which incarnation of the Doctor has been my favorite, it really is hard to pick one. I have loved them all. I love different things about each Doctor. I guess my favorite Doctor, just happens to be whichever one I am watching.

    #13094
    kk74974 @kk74974

    Thanks @shazzbot, I will seeing those videos to somehow catch up with the doctor history.

    Well @jillybeans I just can choose between Ecclestone or Tennant, I haven’t see the last seasons (current) with Smith, as I am trying to see Tenant’s last episodes as the doctor, and, as you said, I think both actor played the Doctor very well and I liked them both so far, when I get to see Smith as the Doctor, I will let you know

    #13326
    Noodles @noodles

    New poster to the site, have to say I’ve enjoyed reading the threads and posts here. I’m looking forward to contributing to discussions in the future.

    Sometime back in the mid-eighties, my local Public Broadcasting station picked up DW and started re-airing the series (Pertwee era forward) on Sunday nights at 11:30 PM. It was quite by accident that I discovered the show…I had fallen asleep watching ‘All Creatures Great and Small’ and woke up to hear the opening chords of the DW theme. I can remember (as a 9 or 10 year old) being riveted by the story of a time traveler arriving at a space station that held the last survivors of the human race…of course, it was ‘The Ark in Space”. I thought it was a movie, TBH…it was the entire serial shown in one broadcast. Imagine my excitement to discover in the local TV Guide that there was another episode the following Sunday night. From that Sunday on, and for many years after, I would sneak downstairs to the TV room to watch Doctor Who. To this day, old ‘Teeth and Curls’ is my favorite Doctor.

    What was really fantastic is that once PBS ran out of episodes to air, they went back to the beginning of episodes they had acquired…so, I was able to see the entire run of Doctor Who from Pertwee to McCoy. Truly epic.

    Cheers,

    N~dles

    #13405
    Anonymous @

    Wondered if anyone can shed some light on this since it’s bugging me, it’s about the Daleks btw.

    The original Skaro Daleks were powered by stacic electricity from the floors of the city hence they could not leave Skaro.

    Then in 1964 the Dalek warriors were fitted with a dish on their backs which powered them and allowed them to travel anywhere. This is how they were powered up until the new Dalek warriors in 1965 which had solar panels fitted around their mid sections to provide them with power and this was the same on every single Dalek up untill the new Dalek Paradigm.
    They have no solar panels, no dish on their backs and are not powered by static electricity. So i’m wondering how are they powered, i’m assuming the creators of Doctor Who have just forgotten about why they had the panels around them in the first place and taken it out without thought of a replacement ^-

    #13419
    Bluesqueakpip @bluesqueakpip

    @daler257 – it would probably help if you watched the 2005 episode ‘Dalek’.

    #13642
    tvstoredude @tvstoredude

    My favorite all time episode of Dr. Who is “The Three Doctors”   While I am a huge Tom Baker fan, I do adore the Jon Pertwee shows a great deal.  Recently I was given the opportunity to interview John Levene about his character on Dr. Who “Sgt. Benton.”   If anyone is interested..  you can read it here:

    http://blog.tvstoreonline.com/2013/07/dr-whos-john-levene-talks-with-tv-store.html

    #16021
    theheadlessmonk @theheadlessmonk

    my first encounter of the doctor was the first ep of 2 series

    #16851
    TwistedGlory @twistedglory

    i started watching Doctor who when i was about 10. I remember thinking what the hell is this and i would come home and put it on even though i didnt officially understand it. But after awhile i got obssessed and thats how my fandom happened.

    #18839
    geoffers @geoffers

    greetings, everyone!

    i have been lurking about for a while, and finally found the courage to sign up a few days ago. i’ve been enjoying all the speculation about the upcoming 50th special, but i will put my thoughts about that in the proper place, as my schedule allows…

    for now, though, i’ll just say a few words about how i have come to be such a raving whovian! i began watching in 2006, but i didn’t realize i was viewing repeats of chris eccleston’s season (on the u.s. sci-fi network, i believe, or perhaps bbc america). i was intrigued by the few i saw, and then suddenly tennant’s first season began showing instead. i was somewhat taken aback, but i carried on watching, till i had figured out what was going on. i have to admit, the lovely rose was the one who, initially, caught (and held) my attention. but eventually i fell for david, once he and martha were well into the next series. i was sure that the role couldn’t be played any better, and then, along came matt! peter capaldi will have an extremely tough job of it, replacing smith…

    but, here’s where it gets weird. i had known about doctor who since school, way back in the 80’s, though i had never watched a single episode. my best friend was a huge fan of the show (and of all the british imports of the day: kate bush, the young ones, monty python, etc.), and i remember he would go on and on (and on!) about it to me, and while i’m sure i was interested (as a fan of sci-fi, in general), i have no idea why i never tuned in. perhaps i was just more into music, and reading (i read ‘the lord of the rings’ about 10 times before i graduated from high school), than i was television? i don’t know, but i just didn’t “get it.” i remember he also tried to get me interested when the mcgann movie was shown here, and i might have even watched the beginning of that movie, but i can’t be sure (not till i get around to finally seeing it, at any rate). anyway, with that in mind, i have recently begun watching peter davison’s run (to try to catch up on some BG episodes), and i knew what was happening for most of the first 5 or 6 serials! it was surreal, to say the least, to know what was going on, while having never seen any of it before. all because he had gone into such great detail, all those years ago…

    the sad part of the story is that my friend, ron, passed away in 2005, (i think) before the series was revived. he and i had drifted apart, as friends sometimes do, but i’m sure he knew it was coming back. i wish that he could have made it through the first series, at least. i can’t watch an episode (nor listen to kate bush) without thinking about him, or wondering what he would have had to say (at length!) about it. i’m sure he would have loved every minute, and all the doctors equally, as i do, now (well, with that slight favouring of matt). his first doctor was tom baker, and i’m sure (once i go further back to view his run) that i will have that feeling of familiarity again, my peculiar “doctor deja vu…”

    and i’m just as certain that he would be a member of this forum, as well!

    but, enough for now. it’s a pleasure to meet everyone (the familiar, and the not so much), and i hope i might contribute fairly regularly. once the 50th has come and gone, the long wait for capaldi’s first season will just have to be filled in with more of the BG episodes (next up, ‘the five doctors’), but i’ll be poking around in the other threads, as well, so… unexpect the expected…

    jeff

    a.k.a. geoffers

    #18858
    ScaryB @scaryb

    Greetings back @geoffers

    That’s a great story and a nice intro.  Dr Who has way of sneaking into people’s lives, even if they resist it intially, haha. The Doctor will find you in the end 🙂   Look forward to reading your next posts

    #19019
    geoffers @geoffers

    @scaryb – haha, you could say he “wormholed” his way into my heart! in the past decade, there have been only three shows i’ve watched religiously, since discovering them: the re-imagined ‘battlestar galactica,’ ‘house,’ and ‘doctor who.’ and once i’ve watched all the (available) BG who, i might pick up a few of the novels, or the audio adventures, and try those too… 🙂

    #19325
    Debs @debs

    Hi everyone!

    I’m new here, so I decided to start from the beginning, telling you how I “met” the Doctor! (maybe this way I can let you know something about me)!

    I got to a hard time for me: everything was going bad from school to family.

    I got curious when I started seeing people posting thing on Facebook about blue police box, travel and space time, a certain Doctor etc etc…
    So, as a modern woman, I googled everything possible about that, and I casually got to the first episode of the new series… And then was LOVE at first sight!

    A “man” who appears from nowhere in a blue box,who can fascinate you just by his HI, who offers you the possibility to travel through time and space, anywhere you’d like to; a “man” who offers you, not to run away from problems, but the opportunity to learn how to fight them, and then, at the end, gives you the perspective of the beautiful,amazing human being you really are… well, something like this gives you the right input to dream again, doesn’t it?

    Cheers

     

    (PS: hope I haven’t made to much mistakes! My english’s got to be improved!!!!)

    #19328
    wolfweed @wolfweed

    Welcome @debs – The new series came at a dark time in my life too. Because of this, I had a deep emotional connection to the show.

    ”…something like this gives you the right input to dream again, doesn’t it?”

    A very poignant point.

    #19330
    Anonymous @

    @wolfweed @debs – same here. DW returned just in time to pick me up following a nervous breakdown.

    Debs, have fun looking at the other threads but try not to be put off by all the talk of nudity in the ‘Rose and Crown’ 🙂

    #19334
    Debs @debs

    @wolfweed 😀

    @FatManInABox don’t worry, I am not easy to be put off!

    Thank you guys for your welcome! I think it’s gonna be a very interesting “trip” here ! 😀

    #20462
    The Krynoid Man @thekrynoidman

    I was born in the 90’s so I would watch repeats on UK TV Gold. My earliest memory was the scene from Dr. Who and the Daleks where Peter Cushing accidentally burns the cakes. Other early memories include The Green Death, Genesis of the Daleks and the Invasion of Time. The first story I saw the whole way through was the Twin Dilemma.

    #21504
    RonPrice @ronprice

    WHO ARE YOU, DR WHO?

    I never got caught-up in the Dr. Who frenzy even though Dr. Who has been the longest running science-fiction television show in the world.  It first screened on 23 November 1963 in the UK, the day after President Kennedy was shot in Dallas.   On 22 November 1963 I re-enrolled at McMaster University in a first year arts course as I was coming out of my first serious depression in my first experience of bipolar disorder, an illness which has had an incapacitating effect on me periodically since that autumn of 1963.

    Dr. Who was not screened in Canada until January 1965, three months before I graduated from that university arts course with a B.A.  This fictional time-traveller has been popping up in my visual field off and on for the last thirty years since my only child, Daniel, was born in 1977 and since I finally bought a television set due to the enthusiasms as well as the gentle and not-so-gentle pressures of my wife and two step-daughters. They would often watch programs at the homes of friends and neighbours since we did not have a TV and were not able to “amuse themselves to death,” as Neil Postman argued in his 1985 book by the same name.

    And so it was that when David Tennant, time-traveller and latest incarnation of Dr. Who, appeared on a BBC program: Who Do You Think You Are? which my wife taped for me here in Tasmania on 12 October 2008 at 7:30 p.m. on SBS TV, I had the funny feeling I had seen this chap before.  And I had as I had wandered through the lounge-room on the way to or from my study in recent months as Dr. Who was being screened on Saturday evenings here in Tasmania Australia.

    This now famous and popular program has provided over the last several decades an experience to millions of viewers that is now part of  “the quintessence of being British,” or so wrote Caitlan Moran the TV reviewer for The Times.  Steven Spielberg even went so far to say that: “the world would be a poorer place without Doctor Who.” –Ron Price with thanks to “Doctor Who,” Wikipedia, 17 October 2008.

    Your story, David,  like mine, like the Baha’i story I have been part of since 1953, is long, so very complex. Fathers, grandfathers, mothers and grandmothers, back and back to the year 1819, 1 mirabile dictu, 2 the birth of the Báb and the beginning of new cycles, ages, epochs, stages, phases, plans and programs that would and did change your world and ours……

    There were several milestones in this story of yours: 1832, 1912, 1916, 1968, 1972 and they were milestones in the story I’ve been writing to figure out who I think I am.  I hope you had some luck, David, figuring out your identity.

    1 David Tennant’s great-great grandfather was Donald McLeod was born in 1819 in rural Scotland where his family had been for centuries.  1819 was the same year as the birth of the Báb, the Forerunner of Baha’u’llah, the Prophet-Founder of the Baha’i Faith.  By 1900 the MacLeod family were based on Scotland’s industrial heartland, cities like Glasgow, and the administrative centre of gravity of the Baha’i Faith was beginning to make its shift to the United States.   David Tennant’s story also became an intimate part of the story of Ireland in the 20th century.

    2 A Latin expression meaning ‘marvellous to relate.’ It is like annus mirabilus meaning ‘wonderful year, year of wonders.’

    Ron Price

    17 October 2008

    #22114
    Anonymous @

    I think it was @bluesqueakpip (apologies if I got that wrong and it was @scaryb instead!)who said she might be interested in reading my memories about Dr Who: this is going to be long…but what attachments grew from my first glimpse of this Doctor: as poised and quick as an exclamation mark; an old face with young eyes; contradictory, fascinating, brilliant and consolatory. Yes, my first doctor was Bill Hartnell, closely followed by John Pertwee. I saw Dr Hartnell only in repeats as I was born in ’67 and I’m sure when Tom Baker was on (my true Doctor!) they slipped in occasional repeats with Pertwee. I just adored it and it’s hard to say why, exactly.

    My mother died in ’74 and I was pretty lonely. A child of Czech immigrants who were nervous of television and indeed frightened of the world outside their door, I had ‘organised’ play time which involved me wearing, at all times, a pinafore/apron. Reading and playing the piano were encouraged, being in the garden and watching television, were not. Like a lot of homes in the ’70s, we had a formal lounge room-artfully decorated in the late 60s style with stripes and cubes of brown and burgundy- where the television was stuffed next to the piano and crystal cabinet. After mum died, I’d sneak in there at 4.00 pm for Dr Who.

    I was attracted to the ‘escape’ nature of this event: everything was different to my organised home with its impassive neatness, Czech goulash and gruff, throaty responses to everything childlike. In show, children (and females) were important! No question was stupid, no-body got whacked on the head with a wooden spoon (unless it was an alien meeting out violence or a doctor’s companion striking a dalek upside its ‘head’) and everything was kind of grubby!  Boy, did I love that the most! Dirty corridors seemed to make up half the episode. In fact I loved the endless, murky, grey on grey corridors that twisted and turned with shadows growing larger as the dalek/cyberman lurked nearer. I was mystified and terrified by what was around that corner. And aren’t we all?

    I loved the running and the creeping, the whispering and then the sudden shrieks from Sarah Jane or Susan. In the end, I loved that everything was going to be alright; that the giddy, wildly grinning and mischievous  doctor would solve everything and save everyone (well, almost). By 4.25 pm, I felt that all was right with the world and I could handle another day of sadness with mum gone.

    On weekends, I would pick out the Dr Who melody on my father’s piano accordion fiddling with the buttons until I had almost mimicked the same chilling reverberation. Unlike other music on our hi-fi which was rich, voluptuous and intoxicating, this was simple, unhesitating and relentless. I’m sure that hours spent composing little sections of score and applying them to scenes in Doctor Who that I’d previously seen, contributed to my career in teaching music and conducting. I would wave my mini baton and imagine I had a whole orchestra in my head with thrusting bows across bass and cello whilst the Doctor crept or thundered down those endless corridors.

    Perhaps I loved Dr Hartnell because he reminded me of my impervious father (minus the twinkle that Hartnell definitely had!). At times, Hartnell possessed a demeanour of almost chill distaste. Other children didn’t like him for that reason and yet I was drawn (quite strangely) to his paternalism, strident voice and the immediate glare of attention that he would give to those he was attempting to convince. I remember this particularly when he spoke to Ian Chesterton when Ian stumbled into the TARDIS that first time and Hartnell said: “Oh yes, I knew you wouldn’t understand, see, Susan?”

    When placed side by side with Pertwee (and those lengthening shadowed corridors), I noticed a distinct similarity: an unfocussed smile, almost impersonal. They seemed very much alike, I felt. Less in lineament than of bearing and class: both calm, intelligent with an unsettling aura that was very alien to me and which made me want to watch them just a little bit more. I think the black and white element of that program (as well as the cheap effects :)) contributed to its archaic and rarefied quality. A mysterious man, dressed in formal morning suit and cravat speaking with an austere High Anglican cadence was absolutely wondrous and I lived for every word and gently raised eyebrow. The fact that it was set in some distant future was not important at all. That I could see arms and legs peeking through the watery Silurian costumes during Pertwee’s run just added to the fun for me and calmed me when things got scary. I loved the fact that they sometimes seemed so very old and even senile (I was only 7!) but then that flash of lucidity which convinced me that rational processes were rumbling about in the blurry depths of their combined 500 year old consciousness.

    Then Tom Baker and his mad scarf, crazed grin and fantastic wibbly wobbly hair! I remember him running, not through corridors, but through the streets of Paris and past every memorable Parisian artefact. When I was nineteen, I deliberately sought out those same places-and they hadn’t changed much.

    With a colour TV, grumpily purchased so that my new (and wonderful) step-mum could watch her Christmas shows in colour, Doctor Who was big and no longer monkish and bare. I adopted this doctor because he had no self conscious formality. He was slightly sloppy in dress with his knee sprung trousers and shapeless jackets and he had a relentlessly cheery and bombastic expression. I loved him because I wanted to be like him: to wear old trousers, mismatched socks instead of the modest, girly skirts and lacy blouses laid out for me even on school holidays (gone was the pinafore and apron, though). I SO wanted to wear ‘slacks’ and not ‘frocks’. Although I’m sure Dr Tom would have happily worn a frock had he been asked!

    I have a definite tendency to gloom and doom (no surprise there being Czech!) and what I particularly loved (apart from sartorial art) was Dr Tom’s total belief in himself and the delicious respect for others and aliens: even when those aliens pointed a pistol at him and locked him up in their basements: Paris and the ‘City of Destruction’?

    When my parents arrived in St Kilda (Melbourne) in 1949, they were treated pretty cruelly. The usual names of ‘reffo’; ‘stinking wog’ etc. were typical and they followed me too: from Adelaide to Brisbane to Sydney and back to Adelaide. Dr Tom gave me confidence in who I was (no matter what awful frock I had to wear) and what I wanted to do (something with music). It was OK to say lame jokes, to be cheerful and grave all at the same time. I loved how the doctor relished a fight with words, that he was euphoric, frank and attentive to his companions allowing them to be flushed with success at moments of their own (or really, his) brilliance. It was OK to BE a companion/assistant and to be slightly weird and imprudent as well.

    I think Dr Who encouraged me to be whatever I wanted and when it hit the TV back in ’05, I was stunned and enthralled. God, I so wanted those dreary corridors and dry, colourless landscapes. But this was a new and expensive age for the Doctor. Whilst I almost bemoaned the fantastic effects and missed the alfoil creatures of 1975, I fell in love all over again when Dr Eccelston said: “just this once, give me this: that everybody lives, Rose, everybody lives.” And there was that wild grin again: a different face but the same software.

    Boy, what epic memories and I’m sorry, such an overly long post-I won’t do that again, I promise!

    Kindest,

    purofilion

     

     

    #22115
    Anonymous @

    @purofilion — well, I for one would welcome a few more long posts from you because I thought that was a wonderful piece of recollection. Some great insights (like the difference between how B&W and colour can affect how we perceive the programme) and some lovely turns of phrase too. Loved it.

    #22121
    ScaryB @scaryb

    @Purofilion yes it was me, but I have absolutely no problem being mistaken for @bluesqueakpip, LOL

    Thanks for sharing your memories – a fellow fan of long corridors and Hartnell 😀  I too had reservations (on principle!) about the reboot in 2005. You may have gathered I’m over that now!

    And frocks! You don’t get frocks any more. (I used to hate frocks 😉 )

    #22123
    Whisht @whisht

    Hi @purofilion – just wanted to agree that that was a wonderful post.

    thank you for sharing, and looking forward to hearing more!

    #22124
    Bluesqueakpip @bluesqueakpip

    @purofilion – I’m so glad I tempted you out of lurking. That was a wonderful post. Amazing the effect Doctor Who had on so many people; teaching kids around the world that it’s okay to be a bit different, to be creative, to solve problems by using your brain rather than by punching someone.

    Thanks for sharing!

    #22202
    Anonymous @

    @purofilion – I will echo the others who have thanked you for your amazing post.  It fits with the ethos of our site so well.

    I’m particularly interested that your initial childhood enjoyment of the show was centred on seeing ‘grubby’, ‘dirty’, ‘murky’, and ‘shadows’.  I especially liked this, too:

    children (and females) were important!

    It sounds like Doctor Who gave you an escape from your ‘organised home with its impassive neatness’ [a truly evocative turn of phrase], and an ability to dream of things different from your reality.  Which is what the impact of Doctor Who should be, and I’m thrilled for you that it indeed was.

    And it’s amazing that this little ol’ British television programme ‘contributed to [your] career in teaching music and conducting’.

    I hope we will see many more of your posts on our forum.

    #23646
    WarDoctor @wardoctor

    Having just rewatched The Doctor’s Wife, I noticed something I hadn’y before. When they’re building a new TARDIS the doctor calls the mirror a retroscope. Is this just him using interesting words to colourfully describe the mundane? I imagine a deadline for a deadly crisis doing verry little to curb his need to sound clever, his love for silly things, or his compulsive fibbing.

    As it is, mirrors are really much cooler when you call them retroscopes, which works as a very clever technically descriptive name for them.

    #23653
    The Krynoid Man @thekrynoidman

    To be honest I don’t really know why I became a fan. It had been off the air for several years when I watched it, and it wasn’t somthing I watched religiously, as I said in my previous post I would watch the odd repeat on UK Gold. It wasn’t the new series either, I was already a fan by that point.

    I suppose it was because my dad used to watch it. He was an alcoholic and could become violent. He never hit me but I was terrified of him. After my parents divorced I told him I would only see him if he gave up drinking, he didn’t and I haven’t seen him since. When he wasn’t drunk (which wasn’t very often) he was great. I have fond memories of watching films and TV shows with him, including Doctor Who. I still enjoy a lot of the things I would watch with him today, either because of them being some of the few happy memories memories I have of him or because he had good taste.

    #23844
    Monochrome Dimension @monochromedimension

    I’m mostly a fan of the Classic Series (though I do like NuWho as well of course), I especially like the black and white serials the most. However I am currently 27, so obviously did not watch them back in the day… now… time to explain how I became a fan…

    Well, I always knew about Doctor Who when I was younger, I don’t recall my first Doctor unfortunately… I usually say its the Third because I can remember him the most back then (must of been re-runs or something). If anybody mentioned Doctor Who, I would usually think of him. I’m pretty sure I must of watched some Fourth Doctor episodes as well back then, as I remember K-9. For quite a while I wasn’t a proper fan of the series, I always liked Doctor Who but wasn’t really into it much. Not to mention it had been cancelled for a long time.

    Then the reboot happened… I didn’t watch it; I didn’t think it would be any good to be honest. But casually one day I decided to watch a few, they were airing some NuWho eps, particularly there was an episode which involved the Daleks. Now I had always liked the Daleks design, and it sparked off me wanting to watch more… but not just NuWho… oh no, I wanted to get the Classic Series Dalek episodes… so I started buying the DVDs… but gradually it became not just Dalek eps, any episodes… with any Doctor. I became a proper Whovian finally.

    I found although I like NuWho, I much prefer Classic Who. I like all the Doctors, at first I thought the Fourth was probably my favourite… but eventually I realized how much I loved the black and white series. My favourite Doctor is the First, he is the Doctor to me; he’s eccentric and stern and brilliant… and very, very mysterious. I also love the Second Doctor; he’s vastly different from the First but he is still amazing. Just love the 60s Doctor Who a lot. But as I said I like all the Doctors anyhow… I am on a ongoing quest to collect the Classic Who DVDs.

    Another thing I want to mention however… my dad (who also likes Doctor Who and watched a lot of the 60s eps when they aired) actually met Hartnell back in the 60s and got his autograph, unfortunately he lost the autograph… I would of loved to of owned it, but alas… its missing. Maybe one day I can get an autograph from one of the Doctors… and not misplace it.

    #23856
    blackthorn @blackthorn

    I can remember the very first episode, and was hooked instantly – and highly annoyed when it was repeated the following week!

    Patrick Troughton was my favourite, mainly because he had a sense of humour which was notably lacking in Hartnell.   After Tom Baker it went downhill rather;   I liked Paul McGann, too (sexiest Doctor.)

    Of the new ones, I have to say that I like Matt Smith the least;  brilliant actor, but too much clowning and running about and generally being Very Silly.   I am very glad to see the last of the bow tie.

    The companions have improved immeasurably, no longer being just young girls who wander off at the wrong moment, but I HATED Rose – I think because she was what my mother would have called “common.”   (Sorry – I was brought up to be a terrible snob, and have been fighting it ever since!)      That said, she was great as the conscience of the ultimate weapon with John Hurt’s Doctor.      (Sorry, can never remember episode titles!)

    River Song I absolutely adore, having been a fan of Alex Kingston for many years.   Captain Jack was fun, and I loved Donna although I was not expecting to.   Her farewell episode was absolutely heartbreaking.    And please, can they NOT all fall in love with the Doctor….

    I have high hopes of Peter Capaldi, an older Doctor at last.    Long time to wait – sigh…

    #23953
    TWhovian @twhovian

    Well i just recently became a Doctor Who fan, i’ve been trying for years. I always had a facination with the concept of time travel, and was looking for time travel related shows/movies back in 2006. I found out about the Doctor Who series back then, and i started watching season 1 of the new series. I’ve been trying for years to complete the first season, but i never managed to sit down and enjoy the stories sadly.
    Untill last December that is..i finaly completed Season 1. And when David Tennant entered as the Doctor, everything changed for me. I was hooked, and i started watching the Original Season 1 (1st Doctor) together with new series season 2. I plowed through season 1-5 of the new series in just 3 weeks. And i’m about to start season 7  so i can catch up with everyone else finaly. I’ve reached the second Doctor of the classic series. So yeah.
    I realized i had become a Whovian when Tennant regenerated into the 11th Doctor. Havent been that sad in years. I found my new favourite series on tv again..finaly

    #24416
    Anonymous @

    My first memories of the show was when the episode ‘Flesh and Stone’ with the Eleventh doctor came on. I was 13 (I think). I was laying on my sofa. Then I forgot got about it till about two year ago. I was in eighth grade and I was watching season one with my sister. It was at night during a tornado warning. I was hooked from then on.

    #24847
    schultze101 @schultze101

    I’m a fairly recent fan of Doctor Who. It was about a year ago, when I was starting my freshman year in college. I watched the first episode of the 2005 reboot season on Netflix Instantview on a whim. I watched a man in leather jacket with a time-traveling police box fight and parlay with living plastic manequins with guns in their hands.

    I got sucked in so hard the series might as well have been a black hole put directly in front of my face. Or maybe a TARDIS leash, considering the thing can tug planets out of alignment.

    Crazy story about me and Who: I’d been watching it for a few months (I forget exactly where I was in terms of seasons around this time (I know I’d reached the Tenth Doctor, but that’s all I remember for certain)) when I went to a small family get-together on my dad’s side. We all met up at a restaurant and just hung, ordered, and talked. My cousin, who I’ve always been very good friends with, brought his girlfriend along who most of us hadn’t met at that point. Eventually, I found myself sitting with them, and in the process of giving them minor college advice (they were still finishing up their senior year of high school at the time) I asked if either of them watched Doctor Who.

    My cousin’s girlfriend turned out to be an incredibly avid fan, and the conversation quickly turned to our love and my cousin’s slight derision of the series. It was a weird, random, awesome moment. That something I had so recently discovered and so enjoyed was shared by someone who I had just met through a family member. My cousin recently remarked that she appropriated his apartment’s TV for The Day of the Doctor special.

     

    Another crazy moment that featured well into my love of the show was a course I took at the end of freshman year. It was a course focused on the study of fantasy and how people define and experience and use fantasy. The professor made a rather impassioned argument that Doctor Who counted as a work of fantasy, rather than strictly science fiction. As such, a lot of references were made to Doctor Who over the course of the class. One of the required books for the class was focused on the show itself (Doctor Who and Philosophy Bigger on the Inside, a book very much worth the time of any fan).

    At one point, we watched one of the between-seasons christmas charity specials in class. It was the one where Ten crosses time streams with Five. ‘Time Crash.’ It was also the episode that made me consider my personal relationship with the series. That special talks about “My Doctor.” Ten describes Four as “My Doctor.” The version of himself that has the most meaning for him. I wondered who my “My Doctor” was.

    Chrsitopher Eccleston’s Nine was the first Doctor I ever saw. His big ears, his leather jacket, the way he could go from being silly to near-murder-serious. I always felt Nine got shortchanged; he got one season to himself, and one alone. I always kind of wished we all could have more than one season of time with Nine. But Nine isn’t My Doctor.

    My Doctor is Ten. I hated him when he first showed up, ironically. I’d gotten used to Nine’s North accent, to Nine’s… everything. I wasn’t used to having to accept that a character I’d grown to love could completely change almost everything about himself and expect me to just be okay with it. Now that I think about it, I still haven’t. But Ten grew on me so very quickly. I loved the guy by the end of his introductory episode.  He was exuberant on a whole new level, he was inquisitive, he was silly, and when he got serious, he got serious. I was torn to pieces when Ten and Rose were pressed against the same side of a wall on parallel worlds. I wondered how he was ever going to stop the Master. I had to marvel at him when he got angry (the racnoss nursery ship at the center of the earth, the family of blood) and marvel even more at his capacity for self-restraint (the Doctor’s Daughter (I still think we all deserve a mini-series about the shenanigans Jenny is undoubtedly getting up to, by the way)). As happy as I was when the Metacrisis Ten could stay with Rose, I was bitter that Proper Ten had to keep moving on alone. Ten’s procession through time to see everyone he’d run into as he held his regeneration back broke me. I watched Nine. I lived with Ten.

    When Ten regenerated into Eleven, I couldn’t keep watching. I fell off the wagon, and I still haven’t gotten back on, though I do intend to try. I feel like that was the final sign that Ten is My Doctor. I loved the guy so much, I couldn’t keep watching after he was gone.

    #24848
    Whisht @whisht

    Hi @shultze101 – welcome and what a marvellous first post!

    Really interesting that you liked Ten as your “My Doctor” even though you loved Nine.

    A long while back, some of the Mods (was it @phaseshift ?) and @craig wondered how a Poll might help or hinder this Forum. Basically thoughtful long-form posts (like yours) are what makes this place special (as well as the civility, agreeable disagreements etc).

    But I wonder if a poll open to all might be interesting – “Is ‘your’ Doctor the Doctor after your first Regeneration?”
    On a thread before, someone mentioned it as a theory and your great post has reminded me of it – a Poll is (possibly) an interesting way to explore it as a theory.

    Anyway, as I say, lovely first post and you really should give Matt Smith a go – personally he really grew into one of my favourite ever Doctors (and similar thoughts held by people here who can remember quite a few!).

    #24858
    Arbutus @arbutus

    @schultze101  @whisht

    Indeed, a wonderfully articulate post. “My Doctor” is definitely Four, and he was my first doctor, so the “post regeneration” theory doesn’t apply in my case. I didn’t have him long the first time round, but later rebroadcasts of the series from the start only cemented my feelings for Tom Baker’s wonderfully giddy, dark, anarchic take on the character. He was very alien, very charming, very frightening, and very much someone I would have liked to travel with!

    But I have enjoyed all the doctors in different ways. There is no one doctor I wouldn’t watch (although some episodes didn’t always shine for me: that still happens!). Interestingly, my close seconds are two very very different doctors: Eight (based on his audio plays, not the rather dire TV movie) and then, at last, Eleven.

    Like you, I enjoyed Nine and loved Ten. But I rarely felt in either of them the sense of being centuries old and from another civilization. I like my doctors to feel a little “out of time”. I didn’t really expect to love Matt Smith’s doctor, mainly because he seemed even younger and more contemporary than the preceding two. But boy, was I wrong. I’d say that the exact moment he won me over was partway into “The Eleventh Hour”, when, after several minutes of playing the fool with food, his voice suddenly darkened and he said to little Amelia, “That must be a hell of a scary crack in your wall.” At that moment, he was the Doctor: young and old, frothy and ominous, and definitely someone you wanted on your side!

    #24860
    Whisht @whisht

    he he – you’re right @arbutus, but then again 4 is a one-of-a-kind Doctor.

    I mean if he’s ‘your’ Doctor, then quite frankly he can trump all theories!

    Baker’s mine as well, though I like Tennant and Smith, but can’t tell if I remember Pertwee properly. (can anyone remember things when you’re only 3 1/2?)

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