Eighth Doctor
The Eighth Doctor was the eighth incarnation of the Time Lord known as the Doctor. He showed a love and respect for all life.
His own life was a temporally complex one, which so frequently involved time paradoxes and parallel universes that it was impossible to know with certainty how the major epochs of his existence fitted together. Complicating the matter even further was his involvement in the Last Great Time War.
Biography
Life, death and amnesia
After his previous incarnation's circulatory system was fatally damaged by Dr. Grace Holloway, this Doctor came into existence three hours later; the anaesthetic nearly destroyed the regenerative process. Suffering amnesia due to the circumstance of his "birth", the Eighth Doctor chose his new outfit, and sought out Grace, whom he believed knew who he was. At the same time, the Master created a new incarnation for himself by possessing a human; he sought to take the Doctor's remaining lives for himself. Bribing Chang Lee, the young man who brought the Doctor to the hospital, the Master opened the Eye of Harmony in the TARDIS to find his nemesis. With the Eye opened, the Doctor regained his memory and recruited Grace in helping him find an atomic clock for a part he needed to fix the critical timing malfunction in the TARDIS console.
However, the Master tracked him down, capturing him. While losing his lives to the Master, the Doctor had Grace set the TARDIS on a temporal orbit back in its timestream to prevent the Earth from being sucked through the Eye; the consequential loss of power to the eye allowed the Doctor to free himself and take back his lives. The Master ended up being sucked into the Eye while Grace and Lee (who had been previously killed by the Master) were revived by the TARDIS with some energy from the Eye. Depositing them in San Francisco on 1 January 2000, the Doctor asked Grace to travel with him. She declined and he rejected her request to live a normal life with her in San Francisco. He kissed her goodbye and left for new adventures in his TARDIS. (TV: Doctor Who)
However, the usage of a temporal orbit to save the Earth resulted in a paradox, which was this Doctor's birth cry, (PROSE: Unnatural History) heralding a life of considerable complexity. Those attempting to view this incarnation's time-stream would find it not a neat line (PROSE: The Gallifrey Chronicles) but rather a chaos of paradoxes (PROSE: Interference - Book One, Interference - Book Two, AUDIO: Storm Warning) and parallel timelines. (AUDIO: Zagreus, PROSE: Time Zero)
Leaving San Francisco, the Doctor was attacked by the Bruce Master, causing yet another case of amnesia. He found himself travelling to different past points in his own timeline, encountering his previous incarnations and, at one point, securing the release of his old teacher Borusa from the Tomb of Rassilon. At the end of this journey, the Doctor regained his memories and acquired a new companion, Sam Jones, a young woman from the same Shoreditch neighbourhood in which he lived in during his first incarnation. (PROSE: The Eight Doctors)
After Sam joined him, the Doctor took her to Silhouette Island in the Seychelles, where they were captured by a Rhiptogan bounty hunter called Ruduse. After Sam was poisoned by an alien plant, the Doctor gained an ally in a fugitive Ladeeth, who sacrificed himself to trap Ruduse in a spaceship before it exploded. Back in the TARDIS, the Doctor successfully cured Sam. (AUDIO: Bounty)
Three year break
The Doctor left Sam Jones at a Greenpeace rally and went adventuring alone for three years. (PROSE: Vampire Science) This extended side trip saw him reunite with Bernice Summerfield to save Britain from the Ice Warriors (PROSE: The Dying Days) and reunite with Joseph Liebermann in Salt Lake City. (PROSE: Matrix)
Visiting the space haulage ship Dreadnought, the Doctor met Stacy Townsend and was hunted down by the Cybermen, who wanted to create a new breed of Cybermen with Time Lord brains. After their defeat, he tried to return Stacy home. (COMIC: Dreadnought)
Ditching the idea to take Stacy home, the Doctor instead took her to Mars to witness an Ice Warrior coronation, where they fought two rival factions of Ice Warriors and the High Lord Uzoxx. During this adventure, the Doctor befriended an Ice Warrior called Ssard, who joined him aboard the TARDIS. (COMIC: Descendance/ Ascendance)
Soon after, the Doctor and his companions defeated P'fer'd and M'rek'd, a shapeshifting married couple in Victorian London who had also taken control of Stacy. (COMIC: Perceptions/Coda)
Stacy and Ssard decided to leave the Doctor to get married. (PROSE: Placebo Effect)
After Stacy and Ssard left him, the Doctor saved two young kings from their uncle Kalem, who wanted to seize the throne. (PROSE: From Little Acorns)
Arriving in Camelot, the Doctor witnessed the birth of legendary king Arthur Pendragon. Remembering his encounter with Morgaine in his seventh life and the destiny that he must fulfil, the Doctor began calling himself "Merlin" and defeated Morgaine and a renegade Time Lord, who wanted to overpower Camelot. However, he was too late to stop the renegade from killing Arthur. The Doctor used Morgaine's spaceship to place Arthur's body at the bottom of the lake, leaving the message for his seventh self, ensuring that both his and Arthur's destinies would be fulfilled. (PROSE: One Fateful Knight)
Feeling remorseful about the crimes he had committed in his previous life, the Doctor began working on a farm owned by Senora Panstedas and helped her to receive closure for her murdered husband. (PROSE: Totem)
During this time, the Doctor searched for a missing Velderon, (PROSE: Far from Home) reunited with Bernice Summerfield during an archaeological dig to recover his TARDIS key, (AUDIO: Benny's Story) nearly died at the hands of the Helios sisters, (PROSE: Suns and Mothers) spent Christmas with his brother Irving and Bernice (PROSE: ...Be Forgot) and saved Earth from an alien tree god called Goomba. (PROSE: The Wickerwork Man)
On a mission for UNIT, the Doctor tracked down an alien gift that had the power to grant people their wishes. He found it in the possession of Sir Clive Reeves and allied with Reeve's secretary, Anne Caisson, to get it back. After his mission was complete, the Doctor spent Christmas with Anna. (PROSE: For the Man Who Has Everything)
Travelling onwards, the Doctor reunited with his fourth incarnation's companions, President Romana and K9, on Gallifrey to undertake a mission to reenact events that should have occurred in Cambridge in 1979, (HOMEVID: Shada) after they were removed from time by Borusa using the Time Scoop. (TV: The Five Doctors) This involved the Doctor re-encountering his old friend, Professor Chronotis, foiling the schemes of a criminal called Skagra, and entering the ancient Time Lord prison planet, Shada. (WC: Shada, AUDIO: Shada) After returning to Gallifrey, they stopped a group of Time Lords from achieving immortality. (PROSE: The Time Lord's Story)
Travels with Samson, Gemma and Mary Shelley
The Doctor returned to Earth and gained two companions: brother and sister, Gemma and Samson Griffin, whom he met in a library. (AUDIO: Terror Firma)
While in the company of Gemma and Samson, the Doctor received a distress signal from another Time Lord and left the two behind in Vienna to investigate. He arrived in 1816 where he found Mary Shelley and a future version of his current incarnation that had been badly hurt and mutated as a result of a temporal storm. After saving his future self, he invited Mary to travel with him. (AUDIO: Mary's Story)
Deciding to take it easy on her first adventure, the Doctor took Mary to Vienna in 1816 hoping to join up with Samson and Gemma, but missed and arrived in 1873. Once there, they met a local entertainer who claimed to have constructed an automaton – the Silver Turk. Upon further inspection, the Doctor discovered it was indeed a Cyberman. The Cyberman escaped and kidnapped Mary. (AUDIO: The Silver Turk)
During his travels with Mary, the Doctor met Axons and King Harold at the Battle of Hastings. (AUDIO: Mary's Story)
After battling the Bone Lord, Mary requested that the Doctor drop her off in her normal time - the Doctor and Mary parted on good terms and were still fond of each other. The Doctor then resumed his travels with Samson and Gemma. (AUDIO: Army of Death, Mary's Story)
Samson and Gemma travelled with the Doctor for a time, until they encountered a Nekkistani time vessel in the vortex. Whilst aboard, Gemma was captured by Davros and forced to do his bidding. Aboard the TARDIS she, under Davros' instruction, altered the Doctor's memories and forced him to take Davros to Earth. (AUDIO: Terror Firma)
Travels with Charley and C'rizz
The Doctor was left within the vortex, without prior memory of those events with Samson and Gemma. He narrowly avoided contact with a Vortisaur and materialised his TARDIS within the ballast tanks of the British airship R101 on 5 October 1930. On board the R101, he met Charley Pollard, a self-described "Edwardian adventuress." (AUDIO: Terror Firma, AUDIO: Storm Warning)
During his travels with Charley, the Doctor was transformed into a ventriloquist's dummy by the Celestial Toymaker. Although he was able to communicate via Charley when she used him as a doll, she was suffering from amnesia at the time, and had to outsmart the Toymaker herself. The Doctor then reverted back to normal as they travelled away from the Celestial Toyroom. (AUDIO: Solitaire)
Saving Charley had unforeseen consequences, and the Doctor and Charley were pursued by the Time Lords until being captured by the Celestial Intervention Agency. (AUDIO: Embrace the Darkness, The Time of the Daleks, Neverland)
It was revealed to the Doctor that Charley's surviving the destruction of the R101 had caused a crack in the Web of Time, but that she was also, because of this, the portal into the world of Anti-Time. The Doctor, along with Lady President Romana, travelled to a universe of anti-time. (AUDIO: Neverland) The Doctor became possessed by the being Zagreus while in the universe of Anti-Time and threatened the existence of the universe. However the Doctor, with the help of some of his previous incarnations, expelled Zagreus from his mind. Romana then exiled the Doctor to another universe in case any trace of Anti-Time and Zagreus still resided within him. The Doctor attempted to leave Charley, but she stowed away on board. (AUDIO: Zagreus)
Upon their arrival in the Divergent Universe, the Doctor and Charley materialised in an evolution accelerator experiment, and the TARDIS disappeared while they were outside. The Doctor and Charley became subject to accelerated evolution, and began to merge together. However, they encountered a sound creature, which attempted to evolve into the dominant being in the accelerator. The Doctor and Charley succeeded, defeated the sound creature and separated from each other, so they could break through the experiment into another location. (AUDIO: Scherzo)
The Doctor encountered a native known as C'rizz, and a being called the Kro'ka. His zone was being enslaved by an insect-like race called the Kromon. They captured and forced the Doctor to build a space-travelling machine while attempting to turn Charley into an insect mutant. C'rizz helped the Doctor rescue Charley from being turned into the Kromon's new queen and shortly afterwards, began travelling with the Doctor in search of his TARDIS. (AUDIO: The Creed of the Kromon)
Shortly afterwards, the Doctor, Charley and C'rizz found themselves in Light City – a place where evolution had stopped and nobody was allowed to ask questions or else face the worst fate imaginable. (AUDIO: The Natural History of Fear)
The Doctor tricked Kro'ka into revealing the Divergence's home base and travelled to Caerdroia in search of his TARDIS. Once there, his essence was split into three selves, all with different aspects of his personality. The group split up and after finding out that they were being tricked into breaking into their own TARDIS, two of the Doctors were transported to a maze while the Kro'ka began attacking the third. The third personality succeeded in saving his other personalities and escaped in his TARDIS. (AUDIO: Caerdroia)
Eventually, the Anti-Time energies were purged from the Doctor by Rassilon, allowing Zagreus to manifest as an independent spirit that could possess the bodies of the dead. The Doctor, C'rizz and Charley crash landed on a strange planet where they were separated. Rassilon and Kro'ka attempted to turn Charley and C'rizz against the Doctor. The Doctor met a strange woman named Perfection whom he escaped with before being hunted down by her husband, Daqar Keep. Rassilon succeeded in stealing the TARDIS, but was reset by Kro'ka. The Doctor discovered that the Keep was the final product of the evolution experiments that he and Charley were subject to when they first arrived, and now he wanted to return to N-Space. He also discovered that the Anti-time energy in himself was purged upon his arrival, and possessed Perfection, who was trying to escape this universe. Zagreus confronted the Doctor and tried to trick him into taking him into the main universe. The Doctor saw through their deception, leaving Zagreus and Keep trapped in the Divergent universe, while the Doctor, C'rizz and Charley returned to the main Universe only to be confronted by Davros and a legion of Daleks. (AUDIO: The Next Life)
Back in the main universe, Davros had laid a trap for the Doctor on Earth. Davros, however, was sharing his mind with the Dalek Emperor and had become mentally unstable; the Doctor managed to exploit this instability and made the Dalek Emperor side of Davros' mind dominant. The Daleks then agreed to leave Earth rather than be defeated by the Doctor. (AUDIO: Terror Firma)
After a chronic energy blast hit the TARDIS, the Doctor and his companions were led to a deep space research centre called the Sanmarus Institute, where they met Zaralon, the director, and some of the finest thinkers in creation. After receiving a vision from his future self, the Doctor pursued a thief called Darrakhaan and stopped him from stealing the secrets of time travel, which led him to a timeless void, where he used a time-space navigator unit to trap Darrakhaan in a time loop. (PROSE: Before Midnight)
The Doctor then took his companions to the Great Exhibition of the Works of Industry of All Nations in 1851 London. The Doctor masqueraded as Georgina Marlow's husband Edward Marlow so that she and her children could keep their home. (AUDIO: Other Lives)
Shortly afterwards, the TARDIS landed in a strange factory called "Industry". The trio discovered that the natives were stranded in time, being guided through subliminal programming by the Clockwork men who hid in the cracks in-between. The Doctor, C'rizz and Charley were successfully able to free Industry and defeat the Clockwork men. (AUDIO: Time Works)
Arriving in what looked like Earth, the Doctor and his friends found themselves in a town where every house looked the same and the same woman lived in each one. They met a man called Tommy, who acted like a child. The TARDIS was then taken away. The environment was revealed to be a prison called "the Cell", built around the memories of Tommy. His prisoners entertained their people by acting out the first time Tommy crash landed on their world. (AUDIO: Memory Lane)
C'rizz faced many challenges in the new universe that challenged his mental state. (AUDIO: Something Inside) This eventually led to C'rizz sacrificing his life to save the Doctor from the Absolver. (AUDIO: Absolution) C'rizz's death had a negative impact on Charley and after a confrontation with the Cybermen, she parted ways with the Doctor. (AUDIO: The Girl Who Never Was)
The War in Heaven
Resuming his travels with Sam Jones after picking her up at the Greenpeace rally, the Doctor came across evidence of the Time Lords' future war with the nameless Enemy in the East Indies, ReVit Zone late in the 21st century where an auction was taking place.
At this auction he met several players who came to play roles both in the Doctor's own timeline and the War with the Enemy. They included the Faction Paradox and the Celestis. This was one of the first, but not the last, paradoxical events in the Doctor's eighth incarnation, as he found out about the war "too early" as Homunculette declared. The Doctor saw more than a glimpse of his own future with the focus of the auction being "The Relic", in reality the Doctor's own corpse. (PROSE: Alien Bodies)
The Doctor's companion Sam Jones also experienced a revelation about herself, though these revelations had a far greater impact on the Doctor when he detected a dimensional scar in 2002 San Francisco. Sam Jones fell into the scar and her history and personality changed back to its original state, before her timeline had been altered. The Doctor placed his TARDIS in the dimensional scar to contain the energies and sort out this changed, or rather, restored Sam Jones. (PROSE: Unnatural History)
The Doctor acquired another companion, Fitz Kreiner, (PROSE: The Taint) and then with the departure of Sam Jones gained another companion, Compassion. Both Sam Jones and Fitz played pivotal roles in the Doctor's battles with various enemies, including the Faction Paradox. It was this such battle which would change both companions and the Doctor. The Doctor then travelled alone for a time, but eventually met up with Fitz and Compassion once again. (PROSE: Interference - Book Two)
Following this battle, the Doctor's TARDIS was destroyed. This changed the Doctor's view of Gallifrey and changed the lives of his companions in ways that would be felt for a long time, as the Doctor was forced to travel inside his companion Compassion, who had evolved into a TARDIS and was now sought by the Time Lords — including his former companion Romana — to be essentially used as a slave to breed other advanced TARDISes, the Doctor refusing to allow his friend to be used in such a manner even to save his people. (PROSE: The Shadows of Avalon)
The Doctor and Fitz escaped in Compassion using a randomiser, in an attempt to escape from the Time Lords. They travelled to Yquatine, (PROSE: The Fall of Yquatine) Eskon, (PROSE: Coldheart) and Banquo Manor, when a Time Lord disguised as Cuthbert Simpson obtained the randomiser seed code for Compassion, and transmitted this information to Gallifrey. This allowed the Time Lords to predict where the Doctor would materialise next. (PROSE: The Banquo Legacy)
The TARDIS was captured by the Time Lords, and they quickly became embroiled in the Time Lords' war. The foreknowledge of the Second War in Heaven obtained by the Doctor and the Time Lords culminated in a destruction of Gallifrey and its system. The shock and pain of launching this attack prompted his friend and companion Compassion to deliver him to Earth with his own TARDIS which she found in the debris of Gallifrey. This allowed the Doctor to recover for a hundred years, his memory apparently lost from the trauma of the event and the TARDIS requiring time to regenerate after its power had been completely depleted in the attack that destroyed Gallifrey and Faction Paradox's invading fleet. When the Doctor awoke on Earth, he found that he could not remember who he was or anything that he had done before waking up. The only things the Doctor could find linking him to his past was a small blue box the size of a matchbox and a note in his pocket from Fitz. (PROSE: The Ancestor Cell)
Exile and amnesia
During his time on Earth, the Doctor battled the Dark Forces (PROSE: Casualties of War) and the Players (PROSE: Endgame) and adopted a daughter, Miranda Dawkins. (PROSE: Father Time)
In 2001, the TARDIS grew back to its full size and the Doctor reunited with Fitz and for a while had both Fitz and Anji Kapoor as new travelling companions. During this time, the Doctor also fought the Kulan when he attempted to invade Earth. (PROSE: Escape Velocity)
During his travels with Fitz and Anji, the Doctor forced the Hitchemus Tigers to co-operate with the human colonists of their planet instead of fighting them. (PROSE: The Year of Intelligent Tigers) While on Earth in the 18th century, the Doctor's heart was removed by Sabbath to allow Sabbath to travel through time. This caused the Doctor to lose many of his Time Lord abilities. (PROSE: The Adventuress of Henrietta Street) After a long series of battles with Sabbath, he was forced to remove the Doctor's heart from his body, which allowed the Doctor to grow a new one. (PROSE: Camera Obscura)
The TARDIS crew began arriving in alternative timelines, and encountered Sabbath more frequently, who hired a con artist called Trix MacMillan. (PROSE: Time Zero, The Domino Effect, Reckless Engineering, The Last Resort) After discovering the source of the sudden increase in alternate timelines, the Doctor, Fitz and Anji managed to solve the problem. However, Anji decided to leave the TARDIS to raise a child called Chloe, while Trix joined the TARDIS crew. (PROSE: Timeless)
The Doctor later found out that Sabbath was hired by an organisation called the Council of Eight, who had the objective of removing as many alternative timelines from existence, so they could have more control over the universe. The Council attempted to engineer the deaths of the Doctor's companions, since they were random, uncontrollable elements. (PROSE: Heritage, Bullet Time, Wolfsbane, Loving the Alien) However, the Doctor managed to destroy the Council and prevent their deaths, with the help of Sabbath and Miranda's daughter, Zezanne. However, this involved them sacrificing their lives. (PROSE: Sometime Never...)
At some point, Fitz and Trix began having a relationship, so they decided to leave the TARDIS and live on Earth. Upon arriving on Earth, the Doctor learned that just prior to the destruction of Gallifrey, the sum total of the Matrix had been placed within his mind with the help of Compassion. The sheer size of the Matrix in the Doctor's mind was enough to compress his own memories. This had caused his amnesia. This provided a means to rebuild Gallifrey and restore the Time Lords. The Doctor set out to do just this with the assistance of the Time Lord Marnal. (PROSE: The Gallifrey Chronicles) The Doctor saw the restoration of the Time Lords and Gallifrey in a vision of his future. (PROSE: The Tomorrow Windows)
Izzy and Destrii
On a trip to Stockbridge, the Doctor encountered his old enemy, the Celestial Toymaker. The Toymaker had brainwashed almost all the residents of Stockbridge into obeying him. However there were two normal people left in Stockbridge to fight back against the Toymaker. Those resistant to the Toymaker were the Doctor's old friend Maxwell Edison and his friend, "comic geek" Izzy. After the Doctor restored the city to normal with the help of Max and Izzy, the Doctor again offered Max the opportunity to travel with him in the TARDIS. Max refused yet again, so the Doctor invited Izzy, and she decided to accept, joining him on his travels. (COMIC: Endgame)
On their first adventure, they went to the distant future of Earth in the 51st century, where they managed to traverse a pirate-infested wasteland and reach the Keep, a mysterious source of power in the middle of nowhere. Within, they found the genius, Crivello, who had solved the problem of the dwindling energy Earth received from the Sun, by creating a second sun capable of providing enough energy. The Doctor helped Crivello launch the device and a secondary sun was created in the Crab Nebula to provide humanity with a new home as Sol went supernova. (COMIC: The Keep)
Leaving Crivello, the Doctor and Izzy awoke in a celestial staircase, apparently having died in their departure. With figures from his past damning the Doctor's exploits, both he and Izzy were sentenced to Hell - only to discover that, in fact, they were in a simulated environment. With the aid of a figure in white, they destroyed the parasite threatening the TARDIS' datascape and recovered, with the Doctor realising the figure was, in fact, the representation of the TARDIS' own soul. (COMIC: A Life of Matter and Death)
The Doctor and Izzy materialised in a small satellite orbiting Crivello's sun, and witnessed an attack on it by Daleks. While attempting to stop the Daleks' plans, they found that another of the Doctor's deadliest enemies, the megacorp known as the Threshold, had been hired to destroy the Daleks, and already had a plan in motion. This plan failed and Izzy escaped with the Threshold's payment and a portal-generating Threshold ring. She warped to the Doctor's location, and he was told of the Threshold's mission, and knew who hired them, since the box containing their payment was embossed with the Seal of Rassilon. The Doctor managed to defeat both the Daleks and the Threshold by making Crivello's sun go supernova. As the Doctor and Izzy escaped in the TARDIS a Threshold agent appeared to remind the Doctor the Threshold was not destroyed yet. (COMIC: Fire and Brimstone)
After that, they appeared on a tourist planet, and the Doctor unwittingly careened into a crime scene and inadvertently framed himself for a series of murders. It took Izzy's yet-to-be-written tourist log to send an anonymous tip to the police to arrest the true culprit and ensure the Doctor's freedom. (COMIC: By Hook or By Crook)
Then the Doctor and Izzy were summoned by Fey Truscott-Sade whom the Doctor had met before. Together with Fey, they defeated Varney but the Doctor was infected with a toxin. (COMIC: Tooth and Claw) The Doctor returned to Gallifrey, where his mind was placed in the Matrix while his body was cured. From there the Doctor was lured into an adventure involving the Elysians, where he met Shayde again and asked him a favour. The Doctor then returned and, apparently, regenerated into his ninth incarnation. (COMIC: The Final Chapter)
The Doctor and Izzy arrived in 17th century Japan and became involved in alien research by the Gaijin. The Gaijin were working with the locals in Japan and had created the secret to immortality, 250 million Nanoforms that would recreate any damaged tissue within seconds. The Doctor managed to stop the Gaijin from giving the locals immortality with the help of Samurai Sato Katsura, who was injured in the conflict. The Doctor used some of the Nanoforms to heal Sato. However, the Doctor poured too many of the Nanoforms on Sato and made him immortal. (COMIC: The Road to Hell)
Later, the Doctor and Izzy had a brief meeting with an old enemy of the Doctor's known as Beep the Meep. This happened in a parallel universe, one where the adventures of the Doctor were nothing more than televised programmes and science fiction. The Doctor defeated Beep and, confused by the oddities of the parallel universe, the Doctor and Izzy departed. (COMIC: TV Action!)
The Doctor, Izzy and new companion Kroton were taken to Paradost to find that Sato Katsura and the Master had joined forces to fight the Doctor and Kroton for the Glory. The protector of the Glory had full powers over space and time. Kroton killed Sato Katsura and the power over the Glory was passed on to him. Kroton used this power to banish the Master from Paradost and restore peace to space and time. Kroton then decided to leave the TARDIS, and the Doctor and Izzy left in search of new adventures. (COMIC: The Glorious Dead)
The Doctor and Izzy met an Oblivioner called Destrii, who swapped bodies with Izzy and then fled before the Doctor could get Izzy's body back. (COMIC: Ophidius) He also helped Izzy settle into her new body. (COMIC: Beautiful Freak)
The Doctor eventually managed to track Destrii down on the planet Oblivion and get Izzy's body back. The stress that Izzy went through being in Destrii's body for so long caused Izzy to leave the Doctor's company. (COMIC: Oblivion)
Shortly after leaving Izzy, the depressed Doctor went to Bish's bar to drown his sorrows, where he was advised to continue his travels by Bish, and he also stopped a drone called Zalda from blowing herself up. After this, he decided to go on holiday, unaware that Bish was actually his old companion, Frobisher. (COMIC: Where Nobody Knows Your Name)
After recovering from Izzy's departure, the Doctor investigated a para-static vortex beam in 1977 London and discovered a vast alien being called the Nukaryote was hiding beneath a football stadium. Assisted by players, Billy Wilkins and Ray "Butch" Stubbs, the Doctor foiled the Nukaryote and the Morg-killer unit's plot to absorb all life on Earth. (COMIC: Doctor Who and the Nightmare Game)
The Doctor next went on holiday with a boatman called Ediphis, and they encountered a Osirian god called Thoueris. After escaping her many attempts on his life, the Doctor stopped Thoueris from seizing control of Eygpt and fed her to crocodiles. (COMIC: The Power of Thoueris!)
Visiting London in 1840, the Doctor met Spring-heeled Jack, a Pyrodine who had become a symbol of hatred after witnessing the slaughter of thousands of worlds at war. Although he had tried to steal his mind, the Doctor helped Jack to stop Morjanus, who was at war with the Pyrodine, from creating an experimental weapon that would wipe out the Pyrodine, and they also stopped the Pyrodine themselves, from attacking London. (COMIC: The Curious Tale of Spring-Heeled Jack)
He then bumped into Destrii again and invited her to join him on his travels. (COMIC: Bad Blood / Sins of the Fathers) The duo then travelled to London in 2004 where they stopped the Cybermen from converting all humans into new Cybermen. The Doctor and Destrii then left for new adventures. (COMIC: The Flood)
Lucie, loneliness and Tamsin
Whilst he was travelling alone, Lucie Miller appeared in his TARDIS suddenly, much to the consternation of the Doctor. Immediately the Doctor tried to return her to her correct era but found he was unable to do so. He accidentally arrived on the planet Red Rocket Rising and gradually, earning Lucie's trust, he eliminated two rival factions of Daleks. (AUDIO: Blood of the Daleks)
Attempting to return Lucie to 21st century Blackpool, the Doctor suffered great turbulence as something was blocking his journey. The TARDIS diverting them to a motorway service station in 1974, where they met Lucie's aunt Pat Ryder and a singing double-act called the Tomorrow Twins. The Doctor discovered the Tomorrow Twins had been brainwashed by super-beings called the Only Ones, who held the Doctor, Lucie and many other people captive the service station. As the Only Ones used music as communcation and transportation, the Doctor trapped them in Lucie's MP3 machine before they could devour humanity. After saving one of the Tomorrow Twins, the Doctor asked Lucie to become his "official" companion, which she accepted. (AUDIO: Horror of Glam Rock)
The Doctor and Lucie next travelled to a planet resembling ancient Greece, where they stopped two young lovers, Prince Kalkin and Sararti, from committing suicide by jumping off a mountain. They were all captured by General Azar and taken to the kingdom, where the Doctor met Zeus, the ruler of the land and Kalkin's father. He was horrified to discover Zeus was using the Chamber of Incarnation, a machine that transferred minds from dead bodies into young minds. The machine was also capable of cloning, and the Doctor discovered Kalkin, his brother and the entire kingdom had been cloned as a way for Zeus to achieve immortality. Disgusted, the Doctor tried to prevent Zeus from using Kalkin's mind. With the population under Zeus' command, the Doctor was blackmailed into repairing the machine, as Zeus had taken Lucie. After Zeus' wife Hera died, the Doctor failed to stop him from transferring her mind into Sararti's body. Sararti had the stronger mind, resisted the transfer and stabbed Zeus. The Doctor was forced to use the chamber to heal Zeus, as he had finally "broken" Kalkin and he had threatened to put Lucie through an endless, agonising death. The Doctor and Kalkin tricked Zeus into using the Chamber and trapped his spirit deep inside the machine. After putting an end to the "Chamber Incarnation reign", the Doctor and Lucie left Kalkin and Sararti to get married and rule the kingdom, now free of Zeus. (AUDIO: Immortal Beloved)
Over the course of his journeys, the Doctor grew fond of Lucie, and the two mellowed to a mildly antagonistic friendship. He learned she was mistakenly made part of a Time Lord witness protection scheme. (AUDIO: Human Resources) The two continued to explore the universe together defeating old foes such as Morbius and Zygons, until a dark secret the Doctor had been keeping regarding Lucie's Auntie Pat forced them apart. (AUDIO: Death in Blackpool)
After leaving Lucie, the Doctor decided to travel to Earth in the 22nd century, after the Dalek invasion, to visit his granddaughter Susan Foreman and check on her progress. When he arrived he found that Susan had given birth to a child named Alex, who was now in his late teens. The Doctor wanted Alex to have an education on Gallifrey where it would be much more beneficial to him than on Earth. Alex didn't want to go to Gallifrey, as he saw Earth as his home. After leaving Alex to continue his life on Earth, the Doctor made an attempt to get Susan to come travelling with him, to which she too declined. (AUDIO: An Earthly Child)
Once again travelling alone, the Doctor landed on Earth and met many humans auditioning to travel with him. He could only take one, so he chose to take a woman named Tamsin. (AUDIO: Situation Vacant) The Doctor didn't leave the advert in the newspaper and discovered that another time traveller had placed the advert; this time-traveller was later revealed to be the Monk, whom the Doctor and Tamsin later met in 1006 Ireland. (AUDIO: The Book of Kells)
The Doctor and Tamsin arrived on Deimos Moonbase, which had become a museum containing Ice Warrior artefacts and the atmospheric re-ioniser that was part of a failed terraforming project to create a breathable atmosphere on Mars for humans. A group of nine Ice Warriors led by Lord Slaadek — noted by one of them as "the last of our race", though as the Doctor pointed out to him, "there [were] some more of you frozen out in the asteroid belt" — (AUDIO: Deimos) had been awakened prematurely by the Monk to change the course of history. (AUDIO: The Resurrection of Mars)
The Doctor tried negotiating with the Ice Warriors on board Tourist Shuttle Number 2, which they had commandeered to reach the moonbase. He was shot, but the spacesuit he wore insulated the impact. When he woke up, the Doctor placed a guard in a the airlock and depressurised it, learning from the guard as it lost consciousness that they were going to use the re-ioniser to return Mars to how it used to be, killing the thousands of human colonists below so that their world would be reclaimed. Returning to the moonbase, Gregson Grenville guided the Doctor to Tamsin after Gregson had mistakenly imprisoned her.
Tamsin helped Gregson set up some mining explosives, while the Doctor helped Professor Boston Schooner, who realised the Ice Warriors didn't live up to his expectations, in sabotaging the re-ioniser. Professor Boston Schooner was killed by the Ice Warriors buying time for the Doctor, so that he could reach the passenger rocket that the base was evacuating staff and visitors in. The Doctor and Tamsin boarded the rocket, but Gregson failed to make it. The rocket took off, killing Gregson and two Ice Warriors. Knowing the sabotage would eventually be reversed, the Doctor was about to use the remote device to detonate the explosives, but had received a "text message" from Lucie, (AUDIO: Deimos) whom the Monk had placed on the base as part of his plans.
The Doctor hesitated to set off the explosives when Lucie was at risk back on Deimos, and the passenger rocket was suddenly pulled back to Deimos by an artificial gravity eddy, stranding it. The Doctor was forced to help repair the re-ioniser by the Ice Warriors, whom had threatened to destroy the rocket. After doing so, the Ice Warriors killed the 600 people on board the rocket anyway by testing the repaired re-ioniser on it.
The Doctor had Lucie increase the ambient temperature of the base to slow down the Ice Warriors while he tried meddling with the controls of the re-ioniser. The Monk arrived to taunt the Doctor, telling him it was pointless to do anything, as the ionisation process had already started. The Doctor, unable to reverse the effects, brought the re-ioniser "to a very sudden halt with a very loud bang" by reducing a critical feedback in the ionisation beam, giving everyone about five minutes to escape. At the last minute, the Doctor also made the process alter Mars into an Earth-like atmosphere rather than that of the Mars of long before.
Tamsin, whom the Monk had shown what the Doctor's meddling had caused, had "had enough" of what she considered only looking out for his friends and the Web of Time, and condemning the fate of Halcyon in the future to the Ice Warriors and left with the Monk. Lucie and the Doctor left in the Doctor's TARDIS. Afterwards, the atmosphere of the moonbase ignited and Deimos lit up, becoming an artificial sun for the human colonists.
Lucie didn't know about continuing her travels with the Doctor, though he offered to give her Christmas back after ruining the last one. (AUDIO: The Resurrection of Mars) The Doctor and Lucie then had Christmas dinner with Susan and Alex Campbell, after which Lucie left the Doctor to travel 22nd century Earth with Alex. (AUDIO: Relative Dimensions)
On one occasion, the Doctor tracked Ulrick to the site of an early Dalek battle between Ulrick’s ancestors and the Daleks. He convinced Ulrick to trust him, turn a roboman under his control and meet him on the roof of the building. There, the Doctor used his TARDIS to transport the Dalek Prime and Ulrick backwards in time. The Doctor joined his fifth, sixth and seventh incarnations briefly before being returned to his own timeline. (AUDIO: The Four Doctors)
After being a prisoner of the Consensus for six years, the Doctor escaped and travelled to Earth after he received a message from Lucie Miller saying that the planet was being invaded by Daleks. (AUDIO: Prisoner of the Sun, Lucie Miller) The Doctor witnessed the deaths of Tamsin and Alex during the fight to defeat the Daleks and helped Lucie Miller in defeating them, which also resulted in her death. Angry with the deaths he ultimately caused with his meddling in time, the Doctor decided to travel alone to try to become a better person. He also became estranged from Susan, as he was convinced that she had betrayed him to his enemies. (AUDIO: To the Death)
Looking for hope
Haunted by Lucie's death, the Doctor became a very angry and broken man. Looking for hope, the Doctor wanted to travel beyond the universe so that he could see the turn of creation itself. However, he was sent on a mission to Earth during the First World War by a Time Lord called Straxus. There, he met a nurse called Molly O'Sullivan who tended to his wounds. Soon after, the Doctor discovered that the Daleks were present and were searching for Molly. (AUDIO: The Great War)
The Doctor and Molly escaped from the Daleks, and travelled around the universe being continuously pursued by the Daleks arriving in places, such as Dunkirk in 1940, Halalka and 107 Baker Street in 1972. (AUDIO: Fugitives)
The Doctor and Molly discovered that the Daleks were being assisted by a former Time Lord called Kotris, who wanted to destroy the Time Lords. It was also revealed that he stole Molly on her second birthday, and did some unknown experimentation upon her, before giving her back to her parents. The Doctor and Molly seemingly arrived on Skaro, were they discovered that the Daleks had become peaceful, after they caused the extinction of the Time Lords. However, it was later revealed that this was a simulation generated on their behalf. They were then retrieved by Straxus, but his TARDIS was time rammed, and it was destroyed. (AUDIO: Tangled Web)
However, the Doctor, Molly and Straxus escaped the TARDIS, and arrived on Srangor, where they discovered a Dalek base. This Dalek base contained a space-time projector, and also contained Kotris and the Dalek time controller, who Kotris saved from his destruction at the hands of the Doctor. It was revealed the Daleks plan was to implant Molly with retro-generator radiation when she was two years old, and use the radiation inside her, to power the space-time projector. They were going to the projector to completely erase the Time Lords' existence from history. Straxus also revealed that Kotris was his own future incarnation, who had became tired of the Time Lords and their interventions, and wished to destroy them for it. Straxus manipulated Kotris to destroy the Daleks with the projector, rather than the Time Lords. However, a friend of the Doctor's, Nadeyan, sacrificed himself to destroy the projector. After the Doctor and Molly escaped, the Dalek time controller exterminated Straxus, meaning Kotris and the events he caused never existed. The Doctor then deposited Molly back in World War I, where he travelled alone again. (AUDIO: X and the Daleks)
Later adventures
The Doctor visited Arklus and saved a dissenter called Ayfai from execution. The Doctor then took Ayfai to Cheldon Bonniface for a safe haven. While in Cheldon Bonniface, the Doctor prevented Earth from being invaded by the Chelbil. (PROSE: Not in My Back Yard)
Towards the end of his life, the Doctor founded the Institute of Time with fellow time travellers. The Doctor then took a trip to the end of the universe to see if the Institute still existed. He found that the Institute was in ruins and all of his friends had commited suicide. He met his first incarnation in the ruins who told him to not give up and to keep on travelling; this renewed the Doctor's spirits and he found a new sense of adventure. (PROSE: The End)
The Last Great Time War
Eventually, the Doctor decided to join the Last Great Time War, a universal war between the Daleks and the Time Lords. Fearful he would have to destroy everything he held dear to end the war, the Doctor ran from the war and ended up at a Velyshaan museam dedicated to Dalek Wars, where he met Kalendorf, an old soldier who had fought in the Dalek Wars. There, he and Kalendorf destroyed a lone Dalek, but not before it had killed a child. Driven into a decision, the Doctor set off to lead the Time Lords into battle. (PROSE: Museum Peace, TV: The Sontaran Stratagem)
During the Last Great Time War, the Doctor fought on the front lines at the Fall of Arcadia, which seemingly left him emotinally scarred, and laughed in the face of the Nightmare Child, whilst also trying to save the Daleks' creator Davros from flying into it's jaws at the Gates of Elysium. (TV: The Stolen Earth, COMIC: The Forgotten, TV: Doomsday) He also attempted to save a group of sentient suns from falling into another universe. (PROSE: Osskah)
The Doctor was held prisoner for over a month on a planet crippled by war. With the help of a Malmooth named Chantir, he managed to overpower the prison guards and escape. He then obtained the Great Key of Rassilon. The Doctor planned to use the key to create a modified De-mat Gun that would lock the Medusa Cascade and bring an end to the war. (COMIC: The Forgotten) This De-mat Gun became the Moment, which the Doctor used to destroy both the Daleks and Time Lords and place a time-lock on the war. In doing so, he also destroyed his homeworld of Gallifrey, which left him as the last Time Lord in existence. (TV: The End of Time, COMIC: Don't Step on the Grass)
Death
The exact circumstances behind the Doctor's eighth regeneration were unknown. However, the Doctor's tenth incarnation stated that his eighth incarnation's demise had been caused by the events of the Last Great Time War, and that he had been alone when he died. (COMIC: The Forgotten) He later stated that his ninth self was "born in battle". (TV: Journey's End)
Undated adventures
- The Doctor visited The Quadrent council estate in 1987, and observed his former incarnation depart from there. (PROSE: Damaged Goods)
- The Eighth Doctor attended the funeral of Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart, as did all of his other incarnations. (PROSE: The Gift)
- River Song met the Eighth Doctor, and apparently liked the way the TARDIS looked during his tenure. As with all the incarnations whom she met before the tenth, River later wiped his memory with mnemosine recall-wipe vapour so the timeline would remain intact. (GAME: The Eternity Clock)
- At an unknown point in his life, the Eighth Doctor had an adventure with the Second Doctor in a park in America, where they both briefly crossed paths with a version of Clara Oswald. (TV: The Name of the Doctor)
Alternative timeline
In an alternative timeline, the Seventh Doctor fled Colditz Castle after his companion Ace was killed by Feldwebel Kurtz in October 1944. Immediately afterwards in his personal timeline, he returned to Germany in 1955. The Nazi soldiers on duty shot him immediately, and took the body into custody. Absconding after his regeneration, he adopted the alias Johann Schmidt and later told Elizabeth Klein that he was a collector of sorts who had stolen the Doctor's body and gained possession of the TARDIS key. (AUDIO: Colditz, Klein's Story)
Personality
This incarnation was more romantic than his predecessors, and much more open in his admiration for humans. While earlier incarnations, especially the first and seventh, were visibly exasperated by human failings and quirks, this Doctor was more likely to be quietly amused.
The eighth incarnation was the first known incarnation to romantically kiss a human, (TV: Doctor Who) and probably the first to have sex with one. (PROSE: The Dying Days) His romanticism extended to his literary preferences, which led him to seek out and have several adventures with Mary Shelley. (AUDIO: Mary's Story, et al.)
On one occasion, this Doctor was described as someone who used flattery to deceive. (AUDIO: The Next Life)
Like his first, third, fourth, fifth and tenth incarnations, this Doctor was both a highly proficient swordsman and skilled in the art of Venusian aikido. He killed a pair of Vampires, decapitating one and impaling the other. He then commented on how melodramatic this was. He decapitated a third vampire with an axe, likening it to golf. However, Romana noted the regret in his eyes. (PROSE: The Eight Doctors)
The Doctor had a fear of hospitals due to his "birth trauma". (PROSE: Kursaal) The Doctor could be deeply defeated by the trauma of long imprisonment. (PROSE: Seeing I)
Like his fifth incarnation, he exhibited an endearing vulnerability, but this was contrasted by a sense of urgency and decisiveness. He also demonstrated a flippant sense of humour reminiscent of, though not identical to, the second and fourth incarnations.
The Doctor became a darker and angrier person with the loss of his TARDIS and home in the dimensional barrier between Earth and Avalon, and his then reliance on Compassion as a means of travel. (PROSE: The Shadows of Avalon)
Following his exile on Earth and particularly the loss of his second heart he became a much darker, though passionate person. (PROSE: The Adventuress of Henrietta Street, History 101) The Doctor often had panic attacks brought on by the single pulse in his body. Though his second heart was returned, its long absence still left a changed Doctor. (PROSE: Camera Obscura) After the death of his adopted daughter Miranda Dawkins, the Doctor became very angry at anything that reminded him of her. (PROSE: Sometime Never..., Halflife)
The Doctor claimed not to understand the idea of gloating. (PROSE: History 101)
This Doctor insisted he was psychologically incapable of experiencing survivor's guilt. (PROSE: The Gallifrey Chronicles)
He came to view his seventh incarnation's manipulative nature with disdain. He compared his immediate predecessor to his fellow renegade Time Lord the Monk, telling his companion Lucie Miller that he used to be "the man with the master plan" who arranged the destruction of his enemies and the toppling of dictatorships in order to serve the greater good to the point where he began to countenance sacrificing the lives of the few to save the many. He eventually began travelling on his own as he was no longer willing to risk the lives of his companions after an incident which he did not want to discuss. Following his seventh regeneration, the Doctor abandoned these tendencies and vowed that he would never travel alone again as he did not want to forget how precious life was. (AUDIO: The Resurrection of Mars)
However, after the deaths of his great-grandson Alex Campbell and his companions Lucie Miller and Tamsin Drew at the hands of the Daleks, the Doctor became very angry and decided to travel on his own to limit the human cost of his actions. (AUDIO: To the Death)
Towards the end of this incarnation, the Doctor's memory began to fail. He also began to reminisce about his adventures with previous companions. (PROSE: The End, AUDIO: Mary's Story)
Habits and quirks
The eighth incarnation exhibited a habit of giving people, even strangers, hints about their future, while not expressing outright the nature of that future, with one exception. (TV: Doctor Who) This incarnation also had a tendency to repeat someone's name when he was trying to make a point, or when he got excited. (PROSE: Vampire Science)
The Doctor also had quite a bit of experience in pick-pocketing. (TV: Doctor Who) The Doctor could pilot a lifeboat with ease. (PROSE: Rip Tide) The Doctor could play the violin, harpsichord, flute, transverse cello, harp, banjo, theremin, wobbleboard and the piano. (PROSE: The Year of Intelligent Tigers, Eater of Wasps)
This Doctor had a soft spot for penguins. (AUDIO: The Next Life)
At one point, the Doctor began to smoke cigarettes, but this was simply because his mind had become temporarily jumbled with the mind of his companion Fitz Kreiner, causing him and Fitz to develop some of each other's habits. (PROSE: Halflife)
Mysteries and discrepancies
At one point, the Doctor remarked that he was half-human on his mother's side. (TV: Doctor Who) He later called his half-human lineage "debatable". (PROSE: Autumn Mist) A later adventure revealed that the eighth incarnation had tricked the Master into believing he was half-human through the use of a Chameleon Arch. (COMIC: The Forgotten) Other adventures suggest that the Doctor was indeed half human, and that his mother was named Penelope Gate, a Victorian human from 1883. (PROSE: The Room With No Doors, The Gallifrey Chronicles, The Infinity Doctors, TV: Doctor Who)
Appearance
Like previous incarnations, the Eighth Doctor wore clothes from the Victorian era. He had long wavy hair. He wore a long green velvet jacket, a waistcoat with a pocket watch, a cravat (TV: Doctor Who) and occasionally a top hat. (COMIC: The Curious Tale of Spring-Heeled Jack, AUDIO: Other Lives)
The Doctor had blue eyes after he regenerated; (PROSE: Vampire Science) however due to Faction Paradox interfering with the Doctor's biodata, his eye colour was changed to green. (PROSE: Alien Bodies) His eye colour was reverted back to blue after the majority of Faction Paradox was erased from the timeline. (PROSE: The Ancestor Cell) When asked about where he came from, the Doctor's eye colour would change between grey and blue. (PROSE: Mad Dogs and Englishmen)
The Doctor also wore a brown cotton duster coat over a high-collared shirt with a grey cravat and grey trousers. While in India he had worn a grey homburg hat with red trousers, stout boots and a linen jacket. (PROSE: The Eye of the Tyger) The Doctor once dressed in a loose cotton shirt and trousers, with a floppy white sun-hat. He later changed into a white shirt and jeans. (PROSE: Rip Tide)
Following the Second War in Heaven, the Doctor began to wear a shirt and trousers, but felt that they did not suit him, and soon changed back into his original clothes. (PROSE: The Burning)
The Doctor grew a beard shortly before his wedding to Scarlette (PROSE: The Adventuress of Henrietta Street) until later shaving it. (PROSE: Hope) He once wore a dark shirt and trousers with a dove grey coat made out of an alien synthetic. He also had a tattoo of a man transforming into a jaguar. (PROSE: The City of the Dead) The Doctor changed into a dark red coat and shorts whilst in Barcelona. (PROSE: History 101) The Doctor and his companion Fitz once wore wide-brimmed hats. (PROSE: Camera Obscura) The Doctor once wore blue eye-shadow. (PROSE: Growing Higher)
After having his clothes ruined in the Slow Empire, the Doctor put on a dark suit and a greatcoat. (PROSE: The Slow Empire) When the Doctor first arrived on Hitchemus, he wore a dark brown frock coat with metallic green highlights, buff flannel trousers, low-heeled boots and a grey silk cravat. He later wore a loose white shirt over hemp trousers and a black waistcoat embroidered with orange designs. (PROSE: The Year of Intelligent Tigers)
Due to his green jacket being destroyed in an explosion, the Doctor replaced it with a blue velvet jacket which was very similar to the original. (COMIC: Beautiful Freak) The blue coat was later destroyed in an exploding Cybership, so the Doctor then bought a new green jacket identical to his original from a costume shop in San Francisco. (COMIC: The Flood, PROSE: Genocide)
When intending to travel to Egypt, the Doctor wore a fez so he could fit in with the locals. (COMIC: Doctor Who and the Nightmare Game) The Doctor once wore long shorts on a holiday in Egypt. (COMIC: The Power of Thoueris!) In America, the Doctor wore a cowboy hat, boots and gloves. He also wore a knee-length leather coat. (COMIC: Bad Blood)
After ruining his clothes in mud during World War I and falling in the ocean at Dunkirk, the Doctor changed into a blue leather jacket with a satchel, jeans and boots. He also cut his hair. (AUDIO: Fugitives) Towards the end of his life, the Doctor's hair started to go grey. (PROSE: Not in My Back Yard)
Behind the scenes
The most prolific Doctor
Although the eighth incarnation appeared on television only once, he has appeared in more stories than any other Doctor as of November 2012[update]. This was due to the fact that he was the de facto "current Doctor" from 1996 to 2005, and naturally became the focus of attention in all non-televised media, including:
- a nine-year tenure as the star of the Doctor Who Magazine comic strip
- an eight-year novel series
- regular releases from Big Finish Productions, beginning in 2001
Indeed, the Big Finish situation was particularly favourable to McGann, as their license with the British Broadcasting Corporation doesn't allow them to use any BBC Wales incarnations of the Doctor. Consequently, McGann was their "current" Doctor, even as late as 2013. They have thus made him effectively the "first amongst equals", and given him his own series. Unlike the other Doctors, most of his Big Finish releases have been deliberately organised into "seasons" and his annual output has typically been greater than that afforded the others. Effectively, he's had two series of narratively-connected seasons — one co-starring Charlotte Pollard and the other with Lucie Miller.
Of the two, his adventures with Lucie Miller were far more prominent than any of Big Finish's other output, due to the fact that they were commissioned by BBC Radio and employed Sheridan Smith, an actor who already had a following from her work in mainstream British comedy. Four series were made in all, with most stories eventually being broadcast on radio and the web. Given that the web broadcasts were not region locked, they had the potential to reach the most people worldwide of any performed Doctor Who adventures ever made.
Continuity contradictions
The eighth incarnation's adventures after the TV movie have taken place in three media: the Big Finish audio stories, the Doctor Who Magazine and Radio Times comic strips, and the BBC Eighth Doctor Adventures and Past Doctor Adventures novels. The continuity between these three separate ranges remains complicated to integrate.
The second BBC Books novel Vampire Science established that the Doctor left his companion, Sam Jones, at one point. While only a few hours passed for Sam, the Doctor apparently travelled for three years without her. It was within this "gap" that it was suggested that many of the Eighth Doctor's adventures could take place. The stories The Dying Days, the Radio Times comic strips and the DWM comic stories are all suggested by some sources[source needed] to take place at this point, however this placement fails to take into account the narrative discontinuity in the worlds presented (such as the Gallifrey of the DWM comics being somewhat incompatible with its presentation in the EDAs that followed).
Big Finish Productions' Eighth Doctor stories, which were published after the start of the EDAs in 2001, began by dropping in subtle continuity with the books. For example, Minuet in Hell references Sam Jones. This approach swiftly changed — even going to far as to muddy the waters on Minuet in Hell by retroactively inserting a new companion called Samson to whom the Minuet reference might apply. A Big Finish short story collection depicted Sam being edited out of history. (PROSE: Repercussions...) At one point, the Doctor was able to look into parallel universes, seeing glimpses which reflected the events of the DWM comics and the EDAs. (AUDIO: Zagreus) However another audio, The Zygon Who Fell to Earth, brought back the association with the EDAs, with the Doctor referring to a previous run-in with the Zygons in the 19th century, as occurred in the BBC novel The Bodysnatchers.
Eventually, a 2009 audio, Mary's Story, offered some level of clarity to the situation. It depicted a "future" Eighth Doctor directly mentioning comic strip and novel companions. He goes through a list of his previous companions in chronological order, and places novel companions before audio ones. However, the comic strip companion Destrii was mentioned later and not with the others, still leaving the placement of the comic strips uncertain. The story contradicts suggestions that the different ranges are set in alternate universes and supports the concept of the novels taking place before the audios.
Casting
Both Fox and Univeral Studios wanted a huge name to play The Eighth Doctor in the movie, to ensure ratings success. The studios three top choices were Tom Hanks, Harrison Ford and Jim Carrey, all three of whom turned it down. Hanks, who was a fan of the classic series, turned down the role as he felt an American playing the role would not do the show's legacy any justice. Ford turned down the role as he didn't want to work in television. Carrey, who has never seen a single episode of Doctor Who, turned down the role as he felt it would cause outrage amongst Doctor Who fans if the role was played by someone who wasn't a fan of the classic series. Christopher Eccleston, who would later play the Ninth Doctor in Doctor Who, was offered the role of the Eighth Doctor but declined. Michael Crawford, Tim Curry, Eric Idle, Billy Connolly, Trevor Eve, Michael Palin, Robert Lindsay and Jonathan Pryce were all considered for the role of the Eighth Doctor. Palin was a strong frontrunner, but he didn't feel that he could do the role justice. Steve Martin, a fan of the series, badly wanted the part. Lindsay actually auditioned for the role, together with Eddie Murphy, Anthony Head, Tim McInnerny, Tony Slattery, Liam Cunningham, Nathaniel Parker and Mark McGann (Paul's brother).
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