The Doctor

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The Doctor was a Time Lord from the planet Gallifrey who, as a renegade, fought injustice where he found it; he only occasionally carried out missions for the Time Lords (DW: Genesis of the Daleks). Later, he was believed (or he believed himself) to be the only Time Lord to survive the Last Great Time War with the Daleks. Throughout his life, he had a particular association and affinity with the planet Earth and its Humans.

Biography

The Doctor is an extremely enigmatic individual; 'The Doctor' is, in fact, not his real name, like The Rani's real name is Ushas, and The Master's is Koschei, and The Monk's Mortimus. He had chosen never to reveal it, except to River Song (DW: Forest of the Dead); although Lady Peinforte claimed that the statue of Nemesis had told her the Doctor's secrets, of who he was (DW: Silver Nemesis). It is possible that his name might be Theta Sigma, but he said this was a nickname. The Doctor has also used a number of titles/honorifics including: President Elect of the High Council of Time Lords, Protector of Gallifrey, Keeper of the Legacy of Rassilon and Defender of the Laws of Time (DW: Remembrance of the Daleks).

The Doctor has had a profound influence on many worlds and been written into their history (Forest of the Dead); as a resulting he has been the recipient of many honours including being made a noble of Draconia (DW: Frontier in Space) and a knight of the British Empire (DW: Tooth and Claw). This caused many on Gallifrey to regard the Doctor as a renegade and he was put on trial a number of times for transgressing the laws of time and Time Lord non interference directives (DW: The War Games), (DW: Trial of a Time Lord). After saving Gallifrey (for the first time) he seems to have been forgiven (DW: The Three Doctors) and allowed freedom (Genesis of the Daleks). He was subsequently offered the presidency of the High Council (DW: The Invasion of Time) (DW: The Five Doctors). The true extent of the Doctor's influence on Gallifrey and the time stream as a whole is as yet unclear but the Doctor has described himself as "so much more than just another Time Lord" (Remembrance of the Daleks).

Understood in Gallifreyian society to be one of the forty-five cousins loomed to the House of Lungbarrow, the Doctor responded to their disownership of him by claiming to have "other families" (NA: Lungbarrow). These would somehow seem to include parents (DW: Doctor Who: The TV Movie), a spouse (DW:Blink), at least two children (DW: Fear Her, The Doctor's Daughter), a granddaughter (DW: An Unearthly Child), and a brother (DW:Smith and Jones, BNA:Tears of the Oracle ). All were (most likely) lost by the conclusion of the Last Great Time War, either killed during that conflict or having died long before it (DW: The Tomb of the Cybermen). As a child the Doctor always wanted to drive a train. (DW: Black Orchid)

The Doctor's stated age has fluctuated wildly, ranging from approximately 450, as stated not long after his first regeneration (DW: The Tomb of the Cybermen), to 1,012 as stated by the Eighth Doctor (EDA: Vampire Science). For reasons unknown, the Ninth Doctor claims to be only 900 years old (DW: Aliens of London) and the Tenth Doctor gives his exact age at one point as 903 (DW: Voyage of the Damned).

Even if the novels are discounted, this would appear to contradict the Sixth Doctor claiming to be 900 years old in Revelation of the Daleks and the Seventh Doctor stating his exact age as 953 in Time and the Rani. The series has yet to explain why the Doctor shaved at least 50 years off his age (though likely more since the complete "lifetimes" of both the Seventh and Eighth Doctors must be taken into account).

The Ten Doctors

The Third Doctor. (DW: The Time Monster)

Despite the fact that the Doctor was essentially the same person, he has through the Time Lord power of regeneration, changed personality and outer form. The Doctor continues to be a heroic figure, fighting the evils of the universe wherever he finds them, even if his values and motives are sometimes alien to Humankind.

  • The First Doctor was a somewhat unreadable, guarded figure, irascible, protective of young women who reminded him of his grand-daughter Susan, a brilliant but often short-tempered scientist and a keen strategist. Though far from invulnerable, he usually ran rings around lesser intellects.
  • The Second Doctor was warm and wise, a sort of "cosmic hobo," often as frightened of the alien menaces he faced as those around him. Often overtaken by events, he improvised his way out of trouble. But he also had a manipulative streak about him, too.
  • The Fourth Doctor was something of a cross between Willy Wonka and the Mad Hatter, rarely without his signature scarf of incredible length. He was perhaps the most eccentric incarnation and progressed from bohemian vagabond to manic scatterbrain to a more mature and sombre figure.
  • The Fifth Doctor had a fondness for cricket. He was somewhat more nervous and less sure of himself than the two previous Doctors, though all the more heroic because of it. Like the Second Doctor, he often found himself backed into a corner and had to figure out way back once more.
  • The Sixth Doctor, grandiose and eloquent, sported a multi-hued wardrobe that looked as if designed by Christian Lacroix, had a manic personality and an acerbic wit which could shade into moral passion. He loved a good quote and rarely got caught off-guard by an enemy.
  • The Seventh Doctor, his voice touched by a Scottish burr, combined the vagabond nature of the Second and Fourth Doctors with the scientific brilliance of the First and Third incarnations. Armed with a keenly tactical mind, his personality deepened and darkened. He seemed, often, a demi-god walking amongst lesser beings, letting his companions know little, an avenging angel driven to eradicate evil at any cost.
  • The Eighth Doctor showed a romantic and sensitive side not evident in the previous Doctors. More morally flexible than his predecessor, this Doctor suffered bouts of amnesia, first after his initial regeneration and again after the first destruction of Gallifrey.
  • The Ninth Doctor displayed much of the playfulness of the Fourth and early Seventh Doctors, but also displayed a pragmatism which could at times appear callous. This Doctor also seemed very conscious of the effects his actions had on those around him. His attire was also considerably more conservative and less conspicuous than those of his predecessors and his accent and attitude more working class.
  • The Tenth Doctor's character is manic, that of an eccentric crackpot, a cross between the Fourth Doctor and the Ninth, with hints of the Seventh with the style of the fifth and a fondness for pop cultural reference. He has a serious side, but quite often his other wins out. He can occasionally appear quite ruthless. He has also been noted to be very good looking and unintentionally rude.

Other Doctors

Due to the fluid nature of the time-stream and the existence of parallel realities, other versions of the Doctor have come to light. Following are descriptions of some of those currently known to exist.

Past Doctors

This contradicts the many times the Doctor has stated that he had no incarnations before the first about which we had knowledge and also the knowledge that the number of a Time Lord's cycle of regenerations generally only runs to twelve.
Much dispute exists as to the reality of these incarnations. Popular theories says that the Doctor lost the match. Another theory explains that these other faces belonged to Morbius rather than the Doctor. and another explains away these as incarnations of incarnations of the Other (see below).

The Watcher

The Valeyard

Merlin

Possibly the same incarnation as Muldwych.
The fourth and fifth incarnations of the Doctor met another Merrlin, a High Evolutionary working with Rassilon in the Matrix. We do not know of a connection, if any, to the other Merlin.

The Other

A Time Lord contemporary with Rassilon and Omega, the Other may have physically died but transferred his essence to the Doctor, living many centuries after him.

This would explain the earlier faces seen while the Doctor mind wrestled Morbius: these belonged to the Other, not the Doctor proper.

Muldwych

A future incarnation of the Doctor, Muldwych spent many hundreds of years stranded on Earth. (NA: Birthright, Happy Endings)

Possibly the same incarnation as Merlin.

Dr. Who (Land of Fiction)

The Doctor encountered Dr. Who in the Land of Fiction (NA: Head Games). The nature of Dr. Who seems somewhat unclear and contradictory except that Dr. Who seems to live in a more juvenile and morally simplistic world than the Doctor with villains to match. As the real Doctor has regenerated, so has his counterpart, Dr. Who.

Alternative Doctors

First Doctor

Third Doctor

  • During his trial the Doctor was shown a series of portraits from which he might choose the form of his next regeneration before the Time Lords exiled him to Earth. None was to his liking, nor did any of them look like his third incarnation. (DW: The War Games)

Fourth Doctor

Eighth Doctor

  • The Doctor's awareness passed through various alternative visions of himself, ranging from Humans to a violent cyborg to talking cartoon cats. (DWM: The Glorious Dead)
Not strictly speaking, a version of the Doctor's eighth incarnation, this version nevertheless looked identical to him, except that he had short-cropped hair.

Ninth Doctor

Other Versions or Incarnations

This association remains speculative. The fact that Grandfather Paradox has only one arm, once suffered exile by the Time Laods now hates them, provides a clue. While exiled on Earth, the Doctor had a serpent tattoo placed there to indicate his exile status. (NA: Christmas on a Rational Planet)
He may have cut off arm and begun a vendetta. Also, a Grandfather Paradox indicates a situation where a person uses time travel to kill one of their ancestors. In the Doctor's case, Faction Paradox saw to it that he would die in his third incarnation and never regenrate.
  • A Doctor who, while not really evil, is nonetheless far from heroic. This Doctor believes that the ends justify the means. (DWU: Full Fathom Five").
  • An Doctor who turns out to be the fantasy world alter ego of a mentally ill writer recollecting his script for a proposed television series about a science fiction television character tentatively called Doctor Who (DWU: Deadline).
The main timeline has a similar fictional television space-time traveller to the character of Doctor Who, known as Professor X.
  • An alcohol-addled female Doctor who has escaped punishment by the Time Lords (a variation of the canonical events of DW: The War Games) This story also features appearances by her past male Unbound incarnation. (DWU: Exile)
Identity heavily implied, but not directly stated.

Similar individuals to the Doctor

Behind the Scenes

Orgins of the Other Doctors

  • Inferno depicted a fascist alternative England as having a nameless leader who never apepars in person, only on posters. The identitification of this leader as the Doctor came much later, in part to explain why the Doctor did not seem to exist in that world.
  • The past incarnations of the Doctor (or the Other) started as a mischevious joke on the part of the production personnel of Doctor Who, to tweak with established continuity. When shooting The Brain of Morbius, dressed up in costumes to represent earlier versions of the Doctor before the supposed first. The character of the Other originated in a (even to this day) document explaining the Doctor's true origins written up by later script editor Andrew Cartmel with input from a few other Doctor Who writers, some of them fans and well aware of the enigmatic Doctors, who should not exist in established continuity. The Other character originated in the document and got a mention in the novelization of Remembrance of the Daleks. The Other remains a popular way to "repair" the contradict of Doctors before the first one.
  • The character of Dr. Who in the series existed as a way to reconicle the more adult world of the Doctor (especially in the novels and other media other than television) with the more lighthearted children's comics versions and with Peter Cushing's Doctor Who.
  • The "future Doctor" and Ria, who met the Seventh Doctor and Ace, both originated from Audio Visuals, fan audio plays produced by Nicholas Briggs and others, in which he played an original version of the Doctor. Later, he returned to Doctor Who Universe as the Doctor's next incarnation in a "stunt" intended to startle and shock fans and to bluff them into thinking they had really replaced the old Doctor for good. They later revealed this Doctor as not the real one. Nicholas Briggs late appeared in BBV audio plays as "Fred", a clear Doctor substitute encountering the "Cyberons" (Cybermen).

Other characters outside the mainstream Doctor Who Universe

  • The BBV character The Stranger, played by Colin Baker, and partnered with "Miss Brown" played by Nicola Bryant and clearly Peri, started off as thinly-veiled version of the Doctor in his sixth incarnation. However, BBV decided with the fourth adventure to explain away the Stranger as a different character with a different past.
  • BBV also featured the adventures of the Professor (later called the Dominie, for legal reasons) played by Sylvester McCoy and Ace (played by Sophie Aldred) (later called Alice), an even more thinly veiled version of the Doctor in his seventh incarnation. Depending on your point of view, you could regard these either as true adventures of the Doctor using an alias or fan fiction using the original actors.

External Links

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