Ninth Doctor
The Ninth Doctor was the ninth incarnation of the Time Lord known as the Doctor. Due to the events of the Last Great Time War, this incarnation was afflicted with melancholy when not distracted by adventures, and often quite callous. Rose Tyler was his most constant companion. Unlike most of his other lives, the adventures he shared with his companions mostly happened on or around Earth. Absolutely definitive statements about the Ninth Doctor were complicated, however, by a lack of knowledge about his precise contributions in the Time War and the circumstances in which he regenerated from his predecessor.
During the Slitheen's attempt to destroy the Earth for profit, he gained temporary allies in Rose's mother Jackie, Rose's ex-boyfriend Mickey, and Harriet Jones. He also had a single adventure with Adam Mitchell, an employee of Henry Van Statten, at Rose's request. However, the Doctor left him behind when he tried to take advantage of future knowledge. During a trip to World War II, the Doctor gained a new companion in Captain Jack Harkness, a conman from the 51st century. He left him behind after the Battle of the Game Station due to him becoming a living fixed point, a mistake done by the Bad Wolf.
The Doctor absorbed the time vortex energy from Rose to save her from its deadly after-effects when she became the Bad Wolf. However, this caused him to suffer damage at a cellular level, forcing the Doctor to regenerate into his next incarnation.
Biography
Foreshadowing
When the Eighth Doctor looked into the Tomorrow Windows, he saw the Ninth Doctor as what he might look like after his next regeneration. (PROSE: The Tomorrow Windows)
Born in battle
The exact circumstances behind the Doctor's eighth death are unknown. The Doctor's tenth incarnation stated that he had been alone when he died, although he may have not meant literally. He stated that his eighth incarnation's demise had been caused by the events of the Last Great Time War. (COMIC: The Forgotten)
The Ninth Doctor was known to have fought in the Time War. (WC: Captain Jack's Monster Files: the Daleks)
The Tenth Doctor later stated that his Ninth self was "born in battle", (TV: Journey's End) which was what led him to creating the Moment and ending the war, killing off two species. (TV: The End of Time)
Post-Regeneration
The "contact Clive" website reported that almost immediately after regenerating, the Doctor arrived at Totters Lane in the early 21st century wearing his previous incarnation's clothes. He muttered to a local named Steven Hudson, "They're all gone. I'm the only one left".
Sometime after this, the Doctor traded most of his clothing at an Oxfam in Sheffield and dumped his other selves' items in a tip. (WEB: whoisdoctorwho.co.uk)
Early adventures
The new Doctor had some adventures on his own. (PROSE: The Eyeless)
In 21st century Istanbul, the Doctor fought Sontarans in a sword fight. "Some sort of spy", called Sally Sparrow, had saved the Doctor from the second one. She gave him her Christmas homework from 2005, and told him to keep it on him at all times.
Landing in a garden shed in Devon on Christmas Eve 1985, the TARDIS "burped", jumping forward in time twenty years. Reading Sally's homework, he found where to leave messages for Sally at the nearby house and garden so her twelve-year-old self could read them in the future. One of these messages included telling her to find a video tape at the back of the living room top shelf. He recorded a message for the tape, and spoke in a conversation with Sally from 2005, explaining where the TARDIS was and that the Christmas essay had the conversation transcript.
The TARDIS arrived and Sally exited. She spoke to the recording that her self from two hours in her past would watch, and told the past Sally to use the TARDIS' reset button next to the phone to return the TARDIS to the Doctor. The Doctor reminded the past Sally to complete her homework before she went to the TARDIS and placed the message on the shelf so she could read it in 2005. (PROSE: What I Did on My Christmas Holidays by Sally Sparrow)
The Doctor delivered letters from his fifth incarnation to Clarrie and his former companions Peri Brown and Erimem at the Kingmaker inn in 1483. (AUDIO: The Kingmaker)
Alone, the Doctor visited Chepstow Castle, became an unsuccesful architect, worked at a planetarium in 1985, battled monks in Tibet, attended the Royal Wedding in 1981, went undercover as a photo journalist in the 1990s and joined a band in the 1960s. All of these adventures would be recorded by Clive Finch. (WEB: whoisdoctorwho.co.uk)
The Doctor tended to Honoré Lechasseur's injuries after a bunker exploded in 1951. He disappeared without a trace. (PROSE: The Albino's Dancer)
Clive Finch had several images of this incarnation at historical events. The Ninth Doctor appeared in Dallas at the assassination of U.S. President John F. Kennedy on 22 November 1963, in Southampton just before the voyage of the RMS Titanic in April 1912 and in Indonesia on the day of Krakatoa's eruption in August 1883. (TV: Rose)
After a visit to Egypt in 2500 BC, a statue of the Doctor was made, which would still be in an Egyptian museam by the 21st century. (WEB: whoisdoctorwho.co.uk)
The Doctor, along with his other twelve incarnations, attended Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart's funeral. (PROSE: The Gift)
Meeting Rose Tyler
In 2005 London, the Doctor rescued Rose Tyler from Autons at her workplace, Henrik's, blowing up the building. Tracing the source of the Nestene Consciousness' signal from an Auton duplicate of Rose's boyfriend, Mickey Smith, they found the controller of the Autons, the Nestene Consciousness. The Doctor tried to persuade the Consciousness to leave Earth and feed on pollutants elsewhere, but it refused and took him prisoner. Rose rescued the Doctor and the kidnapped Mickey and destroyed the Consciousness with the Doctor's anti-plastic. The Doctor invited her to travel with him on his journeys through space and time in his TARDIS. Rose accepted. (TV: Rose)
Adventures with Rose
For her first trip time-travelling, the Doctor took Rose to the distant future, when the Earth was to be destroyed by the sun. He upgraded Rose's phone to allow calls through time to her mother when she felt homesick. The Doctor also saved the other sightseers from Lady Cassandra's plot to burn them alive for insurance money, at the cost of Jabe of the Forest of Cheem, who sacrificed herself to assist him. He let Cassandra's frame of skin dry out and explode as punishment when he foiled her plan, (TV: The End of the World) though her brainmeat survived. (TV: New Earth) He told Rose of the Last Great Time War, and how he was the last of the Time Lords. (TV: The End of the World)
The Doctor and Rose visited a five thousand year old Megalithic tomb in Newgrange and attended a wedding ceremony in Las Vegas. (WEB: Who is Doctor Who?)
He then accidentally took Rose to Cardiff in 1869, where they met Charles Dickens. He found ethereal beings known as Gelth, victims of war who wished to inhabit corpses to gain new bodies. The Doctor used the psychic Gwyneth to speak to them through the Rift to help them, but the Gelth needed many bodies and planned to kill humans to supply their wants. Thanks to Gwyneth's sacrifice, the Gelth were trapped in the Rift. (TV: The Unquiet Dead)
The Ninth Doctor and Rose visited the Christmas truce of World War I, where he got the German and the British armies to play Football on Christmas; leading to a day of peace before they were forced to continue fighting. While there they barely missed meeting Jack Harkness for the first time. (COMIC: The Forgotten)
The Doctor tried to take Rose to her own time, but arrived a year late. To his surprise, a spaceship crashed into the Thames and alerted the world to the presence of aliens. He found the spaceship belonged to the Slitheen, who planned to reduce Earth to radioactive waste to sell as cheap fuel on the intergalactic market. At the cost of Downing Street, Mickey blew up the Slitheen with a Harpoon missile launched from the HMS Taurean. The Doctor invited Mickey to join Rose and him in their travels, but was refused. He gave Mickey a computer virus to wipe out all mentions of him on the internet. (TV: Aliens of London, World War Three)
Their next trip brought the Doctor and Rose to Justicia, 2501. There, he encountered the Blathereen, another Raxacoricofallapatorian family, who were plotting to use the planet's sun to reduce other worlds to cinders to use as fuel. However, the Doctor managed to stop them with the remnants of the Slitheen family, whom he was unable to stop from stealing their rival's technology. (PROSE: The Monsters Inside)
On a return trip to the Powell Estate, the Doctor helped defeat the Quevvil, who were using video games to choose victims for their mind control missions into the bases of their enemies, the Mantodeans. (PROSE: Winner Takes All)
Tracking a distress signal, the Doctor went to the Vault in Utah in 2012. He found a lone Dalek had survived the Time War and was being kept amongst other alien artefacts by Henry van Statten. To the Doctor's shock, the Dalek's personality changed after absorbing Rose's DNA and residual time vortex radiation. After the Dalek had committed suicide to prevent itself from changing completely, the Doctor took along one of the Vault's employees, Adam Mitchell, at Rose's request. Henry's memory was wiped by his staff as punishment for the deaths caused by his refusal to kill the Dalek. (TV: Dalek)
On Adam's first trip, the Doctor took his two companions to the Fourth Great and Bountiful Human Empire to see the human race at its zenith. However, he found it no better than the 21st century, something that confused him along with the absence of aliens. The Doctor's investigation lead him to find a Jagrafess called Max was manipulating the information distributed by Satellite Five to control humanity, even having them develope backwards technology to assist in this matter. Thanks to one of the workers who learned the truth, Max was destroyed when the satellite's heat was rerouted to his control room.
Upon finding out Adam was trying to learn about the future of the 21st century's technology for his own gain (which occurred while the Doctor was busy with Max), the Doctor took Adam home, leaving him with the forehead implant he got at Satellite Five as punishment (and activating it a few times for his own amusement). When Adam questioned him about it, the Doctor told him to live a quiet life to avoid having the implant discovered; scientists would dissect Adam to learn about the implant. (TV: The Long Game)
Taking Rose home once again, the Doctor saved the Powell Estate from Zargath and his invasion force. (COMIC: Death to the Doctor!)
The Doctor next took Rose to the grand opening of the Oriel, a transdimensional art gallery in the 37th century, only to find that everyone in the gallery had been enslaved by an artist called Cazkelf. Cazkelf sent a psycic distress signal to his species. But the signal was diverted. The Doctor took Cazkelf to his homeworld, which had been devastated by a diaster. After this, the Doctor convinced Cazkelf to go on the straight and narrow, putting him in charge of the Oriel so that he could make the gallery a success. (COMIC: Art Attack)
Soon after, the Doctor was asked to be a representive for an alien planet that reminded him of Gallifrey, his lost homeworld. Haunted by the loss of his home and the Time Lords, the Doctor declined, until Rose persuaded him to re-consider. However, the Doctor soon discovered the planet's "spokesperson", Akimus Makassar, had set him up and was planning to take over his mind. The Doctor placed him and Rose in a dreamscape to save them from Makassar and his army of Units. He created a psychic projection of himself and stole a Unit's mask and placed over Makassar, trapped him in a mental feedback. (PROSE: The Masks of Makassar)
At Rose's request, the Doctor took her to when her father died so she could be there for him. However, she saved her father from being hit by the car that would have killed him. Rose's actions caused the TARDIS to be thrown off into the time vortex. After being attacked by a creature from outside time, the Doctor started working on a way to repair the damage to the universe while leaving Pete alive for Rose. However, after Pete accidentally made Rose hold her infant self, the Doctor sacrificed himself to the creature brought by the paradox. He was restored to life when Pete let himself get hit by the car (which was stuck in a time loop, awaiting him). Thanks to these events, the new timeline had Rose be there for her father when he passed. (TV: Father's Day)
The Doctor discovered an alien spaceship was trapped in the vortex, and investigating further led him and Rose to Farthingale Manor House in 1920, where they met Dr Merrivale Carr, one of the finest detectives in England. The Doctor and Merrivale unwillingly worked together when three of Lord Farthingale's house guests were murdered. The Doctor found a way to communciate with the ship using his sonic screwdriver, and he and Rose were teleported aboard. He discovered the crew were dead and that the spaceship's computer, which had been corrupted, was responsible for the deaths that took place at the Manor, so he repaired the computer and sent the ship across time and space. (PROSE: Doctor vs Doctor)
The Doctor and Rose travelled to a Vandosian ship. The Doctor messed with the ship's offensive controls, before saving a ordinary human called Phil Tyson from execution by the Vandos Tribunal. While attempting to return Tyson to Earth, the Doctor was told Tyson was a reincarnation of Shogalath, whom the Vandosians claimed was a "monster" for toppling the Vandos Imperium.
While escaping, Phil saved the Doctor and Rose from the Bailiffs and made it to the TARDIS. The Tribunal threatened to destroy Great Britain if Tyson wasn't handed over to them. They fired, but thanks to the Doctor's earlier efforts, the ship backfired on itself. Returning Phil home, the Doctor explained that Shogalath was in fact the leader of a peaceful revolt against the Imperium and a "hero". (COMIC: Mr Nobody)
On a human colony planet, the Doctor and Rose were under attack by the falling rain, but Jack and Susie saved their life by bringing them into Jack and Susie's shelter. The Doctor discovered the rain was a living creature and it was killing off colonists in their downpour because the lifeform was being killed. He went outside, persuading the rain to stop. With the family the last humans left, the Doctor asked them to hurry to their spaceship and head home, and he also inspired Jack and Susie's son, Andy, to become a space traveller. (PROSE: Pitter-Patter)
New friend, old enemy
The Doctor tracked a Chula ambulance to 1941 London and met the conman Jack Harkness, a 51st century ex-Time Agent who mistook them for members of the Time Agency. The Doctor soon learned that a child in a gasmask had been killed and was half-way resurrected by the nanogenes inside the ambulance. The nanogenes had not seen a human before. They took the gasmask for the child's face and fused it to him, spreading to other people who touched him, also transforming them into gasmask zombies. The Doctor fixed the nanogenes' mistakes by comparing the DNA of the child and his mother Nancy, restoring the infected zombies to normal. The Doctor rescued Jack from his ship just before it exploded, taking him into the TARDIS. (TV: The Empty Child / The Doctor Dances)
They next landed in Bromley in 2005. There, the Doctor encountered a genious named Chantal Osterberg, who wished to wipe out humanity for mindlessly using packs to control their emotions. He was unfortunely forced to stop her from carrying out this plan. (PROSE: Only Human)
While on a refuelling trip in Cardiff, the Doctor and his companions captured Blon, the sole Slitheen survivor of the attack on Downing Street. Though Blon tried fleeing, the Doctor reversed her teleportation device several times until she gave up and was taken prisoner to be returned to Raxacoricofallapatorius for trial. The Doctor confiscated her extrapolator and dined with her as her last request. After Blon was turned into an egg by the heart of the TARDIS, which granted her wish for a fresh start and ended her backup plot to escape Earth, the Doctor decided to drop her off in the hatchery on her homeworld. (TV: Boom Town)
The Doctor next found himself and his companions on a colony world, where the locals had become confused, believing that fiction was true. He undid the mind control the chips they ate to suppress. The Doctor also returned the books to them, having been previously banned. (PROSE: The Stealers of Dreams)
The Battle of the Game Station
After having an adventure in Kyoto, Japan, the Doctor, Rose and Jack were teleported to Satellite 5 a hundred years after their last visit, only to be put in deadly versions of TV game shows. After escaping Big Brother, the Doctor met up with Jack and they raced to save Rose from her version of The Weakest Link; they were unsuccessful in preventing the Anne Droid from seemingly killing Rose. Arrested soon after for breaking out and into games, the Doctor's grief of losing Rose made him determined to put a stop to the Game Station's deadly "intertainment" and broke out.
Taking "hostages" in the control room, the Doctor found the TARDIS awaiting him. Jack then showed him something surprising; the laser that "killed" the games' losers were actually teleporting them. Puzzled, the Doctor discovered that the Game Station was unknowingly broadcasting a secondary signal to an empty location of space, which is where all the losers ended up. Disabling the signal, the Doctor was horrified to discover a Dalek fleet had survived the war. Establishing contact, the Doctor learned Rose was still unharmed, but promised the Daleks that he would stop them. (TV: Bad Wolf)
The Doctor flew the TARDIS straight into the Dalek command ship and rescued Rose. However, he soon discovered the Dalek Emperor had also survived; it had been shaping humanity for many centuries following the Daleks' escape from the Time War, and converted the losers into Daleks for its army. The Doctor decided his fight against the Daleks was suicidal and sent Rose back to the 21st century in the TARDIS while Jack and he prepared for the inevitable extermination. He built a delta wave generator, a device that would "fry the brain stems of every living thing within a thousand miles of the satellite", but was not able to perfect it to work only on Daleks.
When it came time to choose whether he would end his greatest enemies once and for all or let all the humans on Earth be killed out of an act of cowardice, the Doctor proudly told the Emperor that he would choose to be a coward. Much to the Doctor's surprise, Rose opened the heart of the TARDIS and looked upon it; she became the powerful Bad Wolf entity, having absorbed the energy of the Time Vortex into herself. She returned to the future to save the Doctor. She declared the Time War to be over and destroyed the Dalek fleet, with a wave of her hand scattering their atoms into dust. (TV: The Parting of the Ways)
Regeneration
The Doctor knew that Rose would burn up if she kept so much power in her body. He kissed her, drawing the time vortex from her body and into his before sending it back into the Heart of the TARDIS. (TV: The Parting of the Ways)
They returned to the TARDIS, leaving behind Jack, whom Rose had converted into an immortal fixed point in time; the Doctor, as a Time Lord, could not stand being around someone "wrong". (TV: The Parting of the Ways, Utopia) Knowing that his brief possession of the vortex energy had caused cellular damage to his body, the Doctor told Rose about wanting to take her to a new location, but not as himself now, trying his best to explain regeneration. When regeneration energy briefly spiked, he warned Rose away from him for her own safety. Before "going", the Doctor told Rose she had been absolutely fantastic - "And you know what? So was I" - before regenerating into his next incarnation, the Tenth Doctor. (TV: The Parting of the Ways)
Undated adventures
- River Song met the Ninth Doctor. She apparently learned fairly quickly not to mention the Time War around him. She later wiped his memory with mnemosine recall-wipe vapour to keep the timeline intact. (GAME: The Eternity Clock)
Psychological profile
Personality
This incarnation of the Doctor was deeply affected by his actions in the Last Great Time War. He hid his sorrow with a facade of manic energy and a sharp, offbeat wit. Nevertheless the weight of destroying the Time Lords and the Daleks preyed upon him, creating an emotional incarnation of great sorrow and anger. This incarnation was sometimes emotionally exhausted and would break down when faced with pain, suffering, or death. This once resulted in a moment of joy and relief when he realised that he could, for once, reverse the pain and suffering he had encountered, whooping, "Just this once - everybody lives!!" (TV: The Doctor Dances) He possessed a new appreciation for the wonders of the universe and more keenly than ever burned with a desire to keep the universe safe from harm. Despite this, this incarnation of the Doctor was more adept at noticing the flaws of humanity than any of his predecessors.
When asked by the Emperor of the Daleks whether he was a coward or a killer the Doctor struggled with the decision to destroy the Daleks and the Earth or simply allow the Daleks to kill him and take over the universe. In the end he couldn't bring himself to destroy the Earth even to rid the universe of the Daleks, and proclaimed himself a coward. In doing so however, the Doctor had proven that he had become a better man than he was when he last encountered a Dalek, whom he had tortured sadistically. That Dalek had even stated he would have made a good Dalek himself. (TV: Dalek, The Parting of the Ways)
While his previous incarnations were rarely heard uttering curse words, the ninth incarnation tended to use minor curses more freely. He was also more violent, physically coming into contact with guards when arrested although it should be noted he thought Rose had been murdered which probably influenced his actions. (TV: Bad Wolf)
The Doctor cared very deeply about Rose and was willing to let a lethal Dalek loose on Earth to keep her safe. (TV: Dalek) He was also reluctant to use a missile to destroy the Slitheen because he feared he would kill Rose too. (TV: World War Three) When the Daleks invaded Satellite Five, the Doctor lied to Rose about being able to use the TARDIS to stop them and sent her back home to protect her. He deliberately absorbed the time vortex energy in her to save her life knowing full well that he would have to regenerate. (TV: The Parting of the Ways)
Habits and quirks
The ninth incarnation spoke with a distinctive Northern English accent. When Rose questioned this, he replied that "lots of planets have a North." He was critical of his own large ears. (TV: Rose) He had a fondness for saying "fantastic", with emphasis on the second syllable, whenever he saw something of interest or especially dangerous. (TV: Rose, The End of the World, The Unquiet Dead, Dalek)
This incarnation called Mickey Smith "Mickey the idiot", or "Ricky". He called humans "stupid apes", seeing himself above them, often calling them this when angered by their actions. He rarely spoke of his past to others. He did not "do domestic", as he put it, which led to tension in his interactions with Jackie Tyler. (TV: World War Three) He had a fondness for bananas, which continued to his next incarnation. (TV: The Doctor Dances)
He often made dry jokes to those around him to diffuse tension, but usually ended up failing; on one occasion, it was a cynical joke. (TV: Rose, The Unquiet Dead, Aliens of London, World War Three, The Long Game, The Empty Child, The Doctor Dances, Boom Town, The Parting of the Ways)
He often gave speeches about things or lectured those he wished to scold. (TV: Rose, The Unquiet Dead, Aliens of London, Dalek, The Long Game, Father's Day, The Empty Child, The Doctor Dances, Boom Town, Bad Wolf, The Parting of the Ways)
Despite being bad at card tricks, he was a good pickpocket; he swapped Jack's sonic blaster with a banana. (TV: The Doctor Dances)
This Doctor had a tendency to say "what the hell" and often used "oi" to get peoples' attention.(TV: The End of the World, World War Three)
The Ninth Doctor had a habit of folding his arms and frowning when lecturing or listening intently. He would also grin when happy or when he found something funny. He was overconfident about his plans, even if he didn't think they would work. (TV: Rose et al)
This incarnation enjoyed, and was particularly skilled at, video games. (PROSE: Winner Takes All)
Other information
Skills and abilities
This incarnation of the Doctor could be quite violent and sometimes got into physical combat, being able to throw a guard against the wall whilst breaking out of prison. (TV: Bad Wolf) Although he has never been seen firing one, the Doctor has also been seen holding guns on at least two occasions. Unlike his companion Jack Harkness who usually used rather small guns, the Doctor was seen wielding fairly large ones. (TV: Dalek, Bad Wolf)
The Doctor also showed the ability to suck the power of the Time Vortex out of Rose Tyler with a kiss, saving her life at the cost of forcing him to regenerate. (TV: The Parting of the Ways)
The Doctor was skilled at video games. (PROSE: Winner Takes All)
Appearance
In stark contrast to the extravagant dress of most of his predecessors, the ninth incarnation wore a plain leather jacket, identified in World War II as that worn by a German U-boat captain by Jack Harkness. (TV: The Empty Child) He wore a plain red, green, navy blue, or black jumper, which Charles Dickens thought made him look like a navvy, (TV: The Unquiet Dead) dark trousers and a black, strapped wristwatch, in contrast to his previous incarnations, who preferred fob watches.
At one time, he was photographed wearing clothes reminiscent of those worn by his eighth incarnation. (TV: Rose) This photograph might have been taken shortly after his regeneration, before he had gotten around to picking his new outfit.
During an adventure in World War I, the Doctor wore a military trenchcoat to fit in with the British soldiers. (COMIC: The Forgotten)
He wore his hair close-cropped, unlike many of his previous incarnations who had had longer hair. He had large ears and he considered his nose large as well. He claimed they enhanced their respective senses. (TV: The Empty Child)
Behind the scenes
Casting
Originally, Russell T Davies approached Hugh Grant, who previously played the Doctor's alternate twelfth incarnation, to play the Ninth Doctor. He turned down the role, thinking the show would not take off. He expressed deep regret in 2007 after seeing how successful the show had become.[1]
The Brilliant Book 2011
The non-narrative source The Brilliant Book 2011 stated that in 1944, the Ninth Doctor took Winston Churchill on a trip to ancient Rome, where they encountered a creature disguised as one of Emperor Tiberius's reclining benches. Winston then realised why the Second Doctor had taught him how to address a table in Latin back in 1882.
Other matters
- The Ninth Doctor is only one of two incarnations to date to have the same companion throughout his television appearances (Rose Tyler); he shares this distinction with the Eighth Doctor, who had only one companion - Grace Holloway - in the 1996 movie Doctor Who. In spin-off fiction, the only ninth incarnation story to date where he is not depicted travelling with Rose is the 2006 annual short story What I Did on My Christmas Holidays by Sally Sparrow.
- The ninth incarnation was also the first never to face another Time Lord as an opponent on screen. The eleventh incarnation could also be said to have yet to face a Time Lord as an enemy; that however depends on whether the Dream Lord "counts" as one.
- The ninth incarnation's era, due to its short length, stands as the first incarnation's era to be completely released to DVD in Australia, North America and the UK. The single film that made up the eighth incarnation's era was not available in North America and Australia at the point when Series One was released.
Footnotes
External links
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