UNADULTERATED BOORISH OPINION: WHY WE NEEDED THE WAR DOCTOR

Well, we've reached the end of the month and the entry I've been working on still isn't ready. Once more, I'm going to dip into my reserves and post something I wrote that was intended for something else. This was submitted to someone who was doing a retrospective on Day of the Doctor. It's purely an opinion piece - so it doesn't really suit any of the categories that I've established in this blog. 

Which means it's time to create a new category: the UNADULTERATED BOORISH OPINION essay. This category makes its first appearance, here. If the readers enjoy it - I might write other entries of this nature from time-to-time. 

WHY WE NEEDED THE WAR DOCTOR

As unfortunate as it was that Christopher Eccleston chose not to be in Day of the Doctor, Steven Moffat found a most ingenious way of overcoming the obstacle. He created a secret incarnation that the Doctor never speaks of. That he almost seems to hide from even himself (which explains why this particular face never seems to appear in the "past incarnation flashback" sequences that we've been seeing in the New Series). This special version of the Doctor even refuses to be called by the name he has carried throughout his other lives. He is, however, given the title of the War Doctor (or Doctor of War). Which, as you can see, still has the word Doctor in it. So, in many ways, he is still very much the Doctor - but he is an incarnation the Time Lord wants to bury away.

            

This invention Moff came up with to work around the problem of Eccleston's unavailability certainly adds a new dimension to the Doctor's past. But does it actually do anything for the story he was trying to tell in the 50th anniversary celebration? Or is this more like the imprisonment in freak time eddies that the First and Fourth Doctors suffered during past anniversary specials? Just a necessary plot contrivance to compensate for a behind-the-scenes complication?

I say the War Doctor was absolutely necessary to the telling of this tale. That, in fact, the story would not have worked half as well if Doctor Nine had starred in the anniversary special instead of him. And I have three principal reasons to support my ridiculous theory:

1: It Suits the Character

            

The Doctor is, ultimately, a man of peace. He chooses only to resort to violence in extreme circumstances. We really only see him using brute force if it's in self-defense or the need to protect others from a harm he cannot defeat through non-violent means. These "extreme circumstances" are always short-lived. The Doctor will do something aggressive very quickly. He'll plant the Dominators' seeding device aboard their ship to blow them up. Or send Solomon's ship into space with a beacon for the Earth missiles to home in on. Such actions take mere moments. Then he's back to being the Doctor. We see only brief flashes of his more ruthless side. It's never something that endures for long.

            

The Doctor participating in the Time Wars is a feat that is beyond him. He is simply not capable of unleashing his bloodthirsty side for such a protracted period of time without completely losing himself in the process. This is especially true of his Eighth Incarnation. While we witnessed very little onscreen evidence of his behavior, we can see that his value for life is  higher than it is in a lot of other incarnations. The best proof of this is seen as the Master is getting sucked into the Eye of Harmony. Regardless of the personal risk involved, this Doctor extends his hand to save his arch enemy from his horrid fate. Other incarnations might have been more prone to pronounce something to the nature of: "Your just desserts" and let him perish.

            

The Doctor's behavior in Night of the Doctor makes perfect sense - particularly for his extra-compassionate Eighth Incarnation. Knowing it's not in him to fight in an ongoing war, he chooses to stay at its fringes and deal where he can with the fall-out. But when he must, at last, give in to the persuasion of the Sisterhood on Karn - he knows he cannot do it as himself. He must make special compensations that will, somehow, allow him to commit the atrocities that lay ahead for him.

            

The creation of the War Doctor very much supports how human psychology works (which, it seems, is not that different from Time Lord psychology). The War Doctor is a great example of compartmentalization. The idea of how we sometimes almost "become someone else" for a brief time to do things we wouldn't normally do.  The War Doctor is an extension of that idea. A special incarnation that allows the Doctor to be someone he isn't for as long as he needs to be. It's even fitting that he almost seems to forget about this incarnation once he regenerates. Oftentimes, when people compartmentalize, the memory of what they did as this "other person" becomes blurry. It's almost like regenerating into the War Doctor is a sort of dissociative schizophrenia that enables him to keep being the man of peace in his other incarnations.

            

To have Doctor Nine be the one who used the Moment would've made things too complicated for the, overall, character of the Doctor. It's much more in keeping with the Doctor's personality to have created a separate incarnation to commit his darkest deeds and then turn into a new man when it was time to stop being a warrior and go back to being a traveler. From a character standpoint, this just seems to work better.

2: It Works For An Anniversary Special

           

A good anniversary special - whether it be Doctor Who or some other show - should shake up the format of the series. A Major Change of some sort needs to happen. In the Tenth Anniversary, the Doctor is liberated from his exile on Earth. In the Twentieth, he accidentally becomes Lord President of the Time Lords and restores his status as a "man on the run from Gallifrey". In the Fiftieth, he ends up saving his homeworld from destruction.

Moff restoring Gallifrey definitely suits the storyline for Day of the Doctor. But this is the 50th anniversary: an event this gigantic needs to pack a bigger punch. To suddenly claim there's a whole part of continuity that we didn't know about is just the sort of thing the Special needed to really deliver that impact. An incarnation that has been kept secret shook canon to its very foundations. This is the sort of thing you write into an episode that is paying tribute to a show that has survived for an entire half-century.

The numbering of the Doctor's lives has been altered and we now have to look at the whole of the show in a very different way. You can only rock the boat like this on just such an occasion. Moff took advantage of the fact and made the 50th anniversary all-the-more memorable for it.

3. Just Plain Pedantic

In the story Rose, the Doctor stops in front of a mirror for a moment and seems to be noticing his new face for the first time. Which insinuates that the Ninth Doctor has just sprung into existence.

           

Had it been the Ninth Doctor who had done all the fighting in the Time Wars, getting this moment to work would've been difficult. The Time Wars seemed to have lasted several years. Did Doctor Nine never look at himself in a mirror during all that time? It seems pretty unlikely. With the inclusion of the War Doctor, we can now assume that Rose takes place only moments after he departed from the Under-Gallery in Day of the Doctor. The Ninth Doctor switched the desktop theme setting of the console room (perhaps the effect of a memory he didn't totally lose when returning to his proper timestream? He saw the Tenth Doctor's console room and altered his own console room accordingly), changed his outfit a bit and then went off to deal with the Nestene Consciousness that he noticed had just warp-shunted onto 21st Century Earth. This works better than living for quite some time and never bothering to look at yourself.  Although, in Doctor Who, this isn't entirely unheard of. We did see someone wear an eye patch for years and never bother to look under it!

            

Again, it is still sad that Chris Eccleston chose not to be in Day of the Doctor. It would have been great for him to reprise the character. But it is difficult to see how well his inclusion in the Special would've worked. I really do feel that the War Doctor serves the story better. So, even if Eccleston had chosen to come back, it would've probably still been better to have the War Doctor dealing with the Time War - not him. The Ninth Doctor would have fit in best by just running around with Ten and Eleven and dealing with Zygons. Which, ultimately, may have made the story too cluttered. 

            

It is great that the need to compensate for a casting problem gave us something better. The War Doctor, in so many ways, just makes more sense. And now we have a whole new period in the show's past for us to speculate about, too. What was the Doctor like in that particular incarnation? Did he become so dark it would even make the Valeyard blush?! Already, we see spin-off fiction coming out that is exploring this era more deeply. May this new secret aspect of the Doctor's life continue to intrigue us throughout the years...

Well, there you are: the very first UNADULTERATED BOORISH OPINION essay. Did you enjoy it? Feel free to give me some feedback - negative or positive. I do find there are too many blogs out there already that are merely opinion pieces so I never want to go here too often (particularly since my BOOK OF LISTS essays are also, largely, opinion-based). But if you do like hearing me bark at the moon like this - I may re-visit this category now and again. 

Of course, if you check the date that this entry is being posted, you'll know that something very sad just recently happened to our War Doctor. This is my own little way of paying tribute. 

BOOK OF LISTS: DOCTORS - FROM WORST TO BEST - PART 2

And so, the journey continues as we count down to my all-time fave incarnation of the Doctor....

PART 2: BLINK AND YOU'LL MISS THEM (AND A WEEPING ANGEL MIGHT GET YOU)

As we move through this next group, you're probably going to find that my motivation for placing these three Doctors where I have is very silly. These are really good incarnations. But, unfortunately, their reigns ended too quickly. There just wasn't enough time to enjoy them so it's hard to really develop too strong of a fondness for them. So, while they don't belong at the very bottom like our first set of Doctors did, I also can't place them much higher on the list than where they are. For the plain and simple reason that they just weren't around long enough to get to know and truly love them.

Like I said, it's a pretty silly reason. But it's mine!



10. THE WAR DOCTOR

An absolutely brilliant piece of casting. You needed someone with the sort of gravitas that John Hurt possesses to pull off a character like this. There were a lot of layers to the War Doctor that had to come out in a very short period of time. And Hurt did not miss a beat. He recognizes the complexity of the character - a man so tired of the war that he has to wipe out all the combatants - and executes it all with just the right level of subtlety. The War Doctor seems to always be going through several emotions at once. We see each of those multi-faceted feelings expressed clearly and effectively in Hurt's mannerisms and speech. He really is marvelous in the role.

The surprise that gets sprung on us with the introduction of a "secret" incarnation is, of course, part of the appeal of this version of the Doctor. It was the perfect thing to do during an anniversary celebration and it's great that it came about just because Moff's original plans to use Eccleston fell through. I actually think Day of the Doctor wouldn't have worked as well if the original casting choice had happened. The whole mythos of the Time Wars is more appealing with the War Doctor at the center of it.

Sadly, of course, it would be near-impossible to give the War Doctor more stories. We see him near the end of the Time Wars where things have reverted to full-on frontal assault. I would imagine that earlier battles that are more timey-whimey are just too difficult to visualize. Unless we had an actual film budget to work with. But a series of films displaying the Time Wars would probably never happen. Movies need mass-market appeal and the Time Wars are just a bit too fannish to draw in huge audiences.

So we have to be happy with just that one little story and a few cameos to satisfy our curiosity about what the Doctor was like during the darkest period of his life. A pity, really. Cause he seemed really awesome and I would love to see more...


9.  NINTH DOCTOR

Look at that! He's the same number of incarnation as he is his ranking!

Christopher Eccleston is so good as the Doctor that he almost breaks free of the Blink and You'll Miss It (Or A Weeping Angel Might Get You) category. It helps that he did get a whole season and not just one story, of course. But it has just as much to do with strength of his performance and the quality of the stories. To this day, Series One is one of the best seasons New Who has experienced. That brief amount of time we got with Doctor Nine does shine with the most intense of brightness. But, in the end, it really was just one season. If he had gone for a second series, he really would be way higher on this list (you will note that another Doctor that only had two seasons achieved exactly this!).

One of the strongest points to the Ninth Doctor is the growth he goes through. From the deepest pits of survivor guilt to the conscious choice of being a "coward, every time", we love the journey we go on with Doctor Nine (he will, eventually, get featured in my Progressive Doctors Series). Again, this journey works so well because of the strong writing and Eccleston's incredible acting. I'd even go so far to say that there was no better way to re-introduce the series.

Some very brave choices get made in the crafting of Doctor Nine that deserve some applause. On the one hand, the production team took a huge risk by letting Eccleston use his Northern accent and dressing him in a very regular outfit. Generations of Classic Who fans who were accustomed to received pronunciation and Edwardian garb could've been massively turned off. At the same time, they also remembered that William Hartnell (and other "arrogant" Doctors) is lurking about somewhere in the Doctor's soul and remembered to make him tetchy, sometimes. The potential fans that weren't familiar with his past needed a highly accessible Doctor. Having Nine be cranky to people or even downright rude to Rose could've driven them off, too. But the chances that were taken were so carefully engineered that both types of audience were properly satisfied. And the New Series is off to the most beautiful of starts because of it.

It's just a pity Eccleston didn't stay longer. He might be in my Top Five if he had.


8: EIGHTH DOCTOR

Another incarnation that matches his ranking! How wild is this?!

By my own twisted internal logic, Ninth should be beating Eighth in this contest. After all, Nine got a whole season. Surely I should've gotten way more attached to him than I did his predecessor?Particularly since Eight, for many years, didn't even quite get a full story (and still, in many ways, hasn't).

But there is something to McGann's performance that just gets me to love him that bit more. He attacks the role with a sort of wild exuberance that makes it nearly impossible to not to instantly fall in love with him. Between that and his handsome looks - can anyone blame Grace for snogging him so quickly?!

McGann was up against so much pressure, too. His was the first attempt to resurrect a show that had lain dormant for half-a-dozen years or so. So much of our hope was riding on him. And yet, he completely rises to the occasion and delivers a great new version of the Doctor. Yes, Eccleston was under similar pressures. But we had been disappointed once, already. This could just be another false start for the show and we were prepared for that. In my opinion, McGann was under much heavier scrutiny. But he more-than-delivered a quality performance - regardless of the stress he was under to satisfy fans who had been starved of the show for so long.

I love all the hints of past incarnations that he puts into his portrayal. He seems to be totally channeling Troughton when he harasses Gace in the parking lot. And he actually really seems like Old Sixie when Grace won't let him into her home. In many ways, he plays his Doctor very similarly to Peter Davison: very sensitive, gentle and fallible. But even with all those nods to the past - he is also, very much, his own man in the role. There are also lots of new qualities put on display, here. Many of which would influence how New Series Doctors would play the role. The fact that he could pull off all this in less than 90 minutes makes him a total hero.

When he reprises the character many years later in Night of the Doctor, we must marvel even more at McGann's skills. All those traits we see in the 96 Telemovie are brought back but with a slightly more mellow edge to them to show that his Doctor has aged (shorter hair and cooler costume, too!). And it's all accomplished in less than 8 minutes of screen time.

Yes, there were problems with the actual plot of his one and only "true" story, but the backdoor pilot also showed a lot of promise. Doctor Who could have worked in the 90s as a British/American hybrid if we had all been just a bit more patient with it. Unfortunately, that was not to be the case. But I still think we could easily bring back McGann and give him a few seasons while we also enjoy our current Doctor. I know none of the Head Writers that produce the show think this - but even Paul said he would come back and do it. So let's see about two seasons of Doctor Eight before the Time Wars start and then another season where they have begun but he refuses to participate in them.

The man totally deserves a three-season run. At least.





Okay, that's another three incarnations covered. We're up to a total of seven, now. As we hit the mid-rangers, we're going to slow things down a bit and only do two at a time. It will give me an opportunity to say more about them and also keep that reality-show-style suspense going for a little bit longer as you wait to see who makes it to the top...





Missed the Bottom Four? Here's the link: 

http://robtymec.blogspot.ca/2016/11/book-of-lists-doctors-from-worst-to.html



I also mentionned some "Progresssive Doctors" series - what's that all about?! Here are the first two installments (I swear, someday, I'll get around to Part Two of the First Doctor!).

http://robtymec.blogspot.ca/2016/02/analytical-progressive-doctors-part-1.html

http://robtymec.blogspot.ca/2016/04/progressive-doct ors-2-first-doctor-part.html

FIXING CONTINUITY GLITCHES - QUICK FIXES - 3

Beginning the New Year with something light: another exciting episode of Quick Fixes. There are continuity problems that have occurred in the show that can be explained away in a matter of paragraphs rather than needing a full post all on their own. Quick Fixes is meant to address two or three of these issues in one post. 




HOW DID STRAX COME BACK FROM THE DEAD?

I got to thinking about this again because Nardole has been re-introduced into the series during the last Christmas Special. It was nice that we were given a somewhat decent explanation on how he got his body back. Unfortunately, it reminded me of how we never got that with the return of Strax a few Christmas Specials previously. It was most bizarre that a specific mini-sode was even shot that was meant to explain it.  But all we really got was Lady Vashtra waking Strax up from where he'd been laying dead at Demon's Run.

What?!  Strax didn't really die? He'd just been napping?!

My guess is that Jenny and Vashtra had gotten a bit attached to Strax during the brief time that they knew him. Perhaps Vashtra even knew a bit about Sontarans and saw hope in the way Strax was trying to be as much of a healer as a warrior. We do see in Dinosaurs on a Spaceship that homo repitilia were capable of intergalactic travel so it's possible they got to know some of the alien races out there. So Vashtra may have decided that this particular thread of Sontaran philosophy needed to keep going on in some way.

The key, here, is that Strax hails from a clone species. So it wouldn't be too hard at all to take some sort of genetic sample from the corpse and use the advanced technology on Demon's Run to create a new version of him. Perhaps some modifications were introduced to make him even more docile than the original. But those variations only worked so well and Strax 2.0 is a bit of a bumbler. Which would account for how we do seem to be seeing a more comical interpretation of the role now that he's part of the Paternoster Gang.

My guess is that even Strax hasn't been given a full explanation of how he's still alive. But he doesn't really question it much, either (that may have actually been part of his genetic re-programming). He's just happy to be Vashtra's butler. He still has war-like tendencies but they're not strong enough to cause any real friction. Particularly now that he's discovered Glasgow....




WHY DO TIME LORDS NOT RECOGNIZE EACH OTHER, SOMETIMES?

During Classic Series Days, it was a popular fan-theory that Time Lords could recognize each other telepathically. So if one of them regenerated, the other would still know who they are. We first saw it happen in The War Games when the War Chief notices the Doctor at a briefing and, immediately, recognizes him. The two had not seen each other since Gallifrey and the Doctor had regenerated after he left his homeworld. But the War Chief still knows who he is. There is a bit of hasty dialogue written to address the fact that the War Lord recognizes him even though his appearance has changed but it doesn't really explain much of anything.

So Fandom comes up with this ideas that, since Time Lords are mildly telepathic, they detect each other on a mental level just as much as they do on a visual. This way, they will always know each other from incarnation to incarnation. We see hints of this concept being re-enforced in stories like Brain of Morbius where the Doctor does claim that he sensed the mind of the evil Time Lord ever-so-briefly in Solon's lab. The Invisible Enemy also speaks of a special neural link that the Doctor has with the Time Lords. Unfortunately, it also claims that the link has been shut down so this may not be the part of his brain that is specifically employed in this telepathic recognition process. But it still helps a bit to support this concept. Something goes on between Time Lords that enables them to share certain thoughts with each other. Logopolis is another story that hints at this as the Master finds the Doctor on Earth before he even gets there because: "He's a Time Lord. In many ways, we share the same mind." (or words to that effect). The New Series starts to really confirm this theory in stories like Dalek where the Doctor claims he would know if there were still Time Lords alive. He would sense it in his head.

At last, the notion is explicitly stated at the beginning of Sound of Drums when the Doctor explains to Martha and Jack how the whole process works. We even learn that the Master has been using a special satellite signal to jam the Doctor's ability to detect him. As a fan, I was just a bit excited to finally hear this explanation given. Once more, the New Series confirms a silly fan theory that was established in the Classic Series but never fully proven. Just like the way they solidify the concept of Gallifreyan Mean Time in The End of Time.

Everything now seems great. Fan theory has been explicitly stated. But there is still one big problem: there have been moments in the show where the process doesn't seem to be working.

The biggest one is in the much-maligned Twin Dilemma. For several long minutes after they first meet, neither the Doctor nor Azmael seem to know who the other is. The Doctor explains it away with: "Forgive me, my friend. I've regenerated twice since our last meeting."  This is one of those succinct moments that, very much, negates the whole idea of telepathic recognition between Time Lords.

But it's not the only one. If we apply this on a broader level, we begin to see another problem. All those clever disguises that Time Lords like the Master and the Rani love to use - shouldn't they fail miserably? Sure, they look like someone else, but shouldn't their brain pattern or whatever it is that the Time Lords sense about each other give them away? Kalid and Sir Gilles Estram should have never had a chance at fooling the Doctor. And our Time Lord hero should have known immediately that it was the Rani standing outside the bath house in Mark of the Rani - not some old crone. Why doesn't the telepathic recognition work in these cases?

Again, we can go to Brain of Morbius to help explain some of this. The Doctor does claim that Morbius is shielding his mind to avoid detection but that the barrier slipped for just a moment and he sensed him. I would suggest that this is something Time Lords can do. It might even take a bit of training and discipline - but they can put up telepathic blocks of some sort. Even in Invasion of Time, Borusa talks of being "transparent as glass" as the Doctor reveals to him his true intents in the Presidential Office.  But the Cardinal still manages to block out the Vardans well enough once he's out of the lead room. The Vardans never learn of the Doctor's treachery against them by reading Borusa's mind. So it's a trick the Time Lords can learn fairly quickly if they set their minds to it.

So when the Master and the Rani are lurking about in one of their clever disguises (or, in the case of Time and the Rani, downright bizarre disguises) they are also shielding themselves' mentally. This way, the Doctor can sit across the table from the Portreeve or stare intently at a scare crow and not realize that it's his arch rival.

But what of that moment in Twin Dilemma? Were the Doctor and Azmael both shielding their minds from each other even though they had no reason to be?

In this case, I'd chalk it up to a side-effect from regeneration. If it's a difficult one (and the one in Twin Dilemma definitely seemed to have a lot of complications), then certain telepathic capacities might shut down or malfunction for a bit. Including the ability to recognize each other from one incarnation to the next. This problem works both ways, too. Because of the Doctor's difficult regeneration, Azmael couldn't sense who the Doctor was. Nor could the Doctor pick up on Azmael. Of course, during that moment, the Doctor was also having memory problems. His old teacher hadn't even actually regenerated since the last time he'd seen him, but he still didn't recognize him right away. It was only after a few minutes that Azmeal's face finally floated upon his memories.

Rough regenerations temporarily shutting down the telepathic recognition ability might also help to explain why the Doctor doesn't immediately realize it's the Master who's come to pick him up at Grace's place during The 96 Telemovie. Although, it's also likely that the Master is trying to mentally shield himself from the Doctor at the same time.

We shouldn't quite abandon this topic, yet, though. There is still one more idea to be explored regarding this whole Time Lord recognition process.

There is a lot of evidence in the New Series that seems to support the idea that even if Time Lords don't see each other they can sense each other. I briefly touched upon a scene in Dalek where the Doctor mentions this. We see something like this happening between the Doctor and the Master in End of Time, too (although, they seem to insinuate that they're also smelling each other - but I'm gonna say it's more a metaphorical thing. Mainly because Time Lords being able to smell each other from great distances is just silly!). Aside from that bit in Brain of Morbius, we don't seem to see much evidence of this sort of thing in the Classic Series. Or, at least, it's never mentioned that the Doctor is sensing other Time Lords around him even though he's not visually perceiving them.

The Morbius incident can easily be explained away by the fact that his brain was in an extremely altered state so it might make him more easily detectable. Otherwise, the Classic Series seems to always suggest that telepathic communion between Time Lords only seems to happen when they are actually standing in front of each other. If this being able to sense each other without seeing each other ability had existed in the Classic Series, then stories like Colony In Space would have played out quite differently. Neither the Doctor nor the Master seem to know that the other is on Uxarieus until they actually run into each other. Since neither knew the other would be there, neither of them would be attempting to shield themselves' telepathically. So shouldn't they have gotten some sort of "ping" off of each other long before they actually meet up? There are several other stories that work this way. The Doctor and Jo surprising the Master in Atlantis during the later episodes of The Time Monster shouldn't have happened, either. The Master should have known the Doctor was there the moment he landed.  So how have the Time Lords become more sensitive to each other in the New Series?

I'm inclined to believe that the Time Lords put themselves' through a few genetic modifications as they began the Time Wars. I discussed one of them, already, in my Weird Regenerations essay (http://robtymec.blogspot.ca/2015/08/analytical-weird-regenerations-it.html). I suggest that they also turned up their telepathic skills a bit, too. This would give them several advantages. If nothing else, they would always have a good idea of the strength of their forces since they would be able to telepathically sense their fellow soldiers around them. But, in general, such sensitivities would give them all sorts of extra advantages in battle. So the Doctor underwent these modifications, too, as he elected to finally fight in the Time Wars. Which explains this special ability that never seems to have existed in the Classic Series. Naturally enough, during those years when he believes Gallifrey to have been properly destroyed - this ability becomes a curse. He always knows that he's truly alone because he cannot sense any other Time Lords out there...




There you go, a few more Quick Fixes for you. Hope you like my warped little theories...




Want some other Quick Fixes? Here they are: 

Part 1:
http://robtymec.blogspot.ca/2015/08/fixing-continuity-glitches-quick-fixes.html

Part 2:
http://robtymec.blogspot.ca/2016/02/fixing-continuity-glitches-quick-fixes-2.html

BOOK OF LISTS: DOCTORS - FROM WORST TO BEST - PART 5

At last, we're in the Top Three. Not only have I been greatly impressed by the number of views this series has received (700 hits in 30 days!) but I'm even more amazed by the exceedingly low number of death threats I've received by placing David Tennant, Jon Pertwee and Tom Baker so low on the list! Let's see, now, what I have to say about the somewhat unusual choices that made it to the top...


THE TOP THREE:

As a younger lad, I cared more about Popular Fan Consensus and almost tried to fight how much I enjoyed two of three incarnations that I've ranked, here. Really, I did. I, literally, gave extra repeated viewings to Jon Pertwee and Tom Baker in hopes that it would get me to like them better. These were the Doctors that everyone was saying were the best and I wanted to fit in with what Fandom was saying. But, in the end, I just couldn't understand what all the fuss was about. These other less-appreciated Doctors just seemed so much more interesting to me.

The other fellow that's made it into the Top Three is a New Series Doctor that does not fit the mold at all of the two Classic Series Doctors that I love most. But there's just something about the performance he gave that made me fall madly in love with his Doctor. And the fact that he just seemed so unlikely for the role but still ended up being truly magnificent.

All right, let's get on with it....


3: THE FIRST DOCTOR

Yup, he fluffed a tonne of lines, He was also very difficult to get along with. He was even, by some accounts, a bit of a racist. But there is just something about William Hartnell's performance that I completely love.

Many of us already know his background: an actor who had become horrifically tired of the way he was being typecast, he saw the role of the Doctor as a way to finally break free of that. He seized the proverbial Bull by the Horns and gave that part everything he had. And that does translate into the performance he gives on the screen. His failing health and the grueling shooting schedule are the reasons why we see flaws in what he's doing. But the truth of the matter is, he is making every line he delivers count. Every mannerism and inflection is done with the most deliberate of care and precision. Truly, there is no one who throws himself into the role more.

I think what I love the most about this Doctor is the fact that we are watching the character being constructed before our very eyes. Neither Hartnell nor the various writers know exactly what they're doing with the character. There's all kinds of experimentation going on as we, slowly but surely, find out what the Doctor is truly about. No, we won't learn his proper origins til a few years later - but we learn far more important things in this era. We learn what the character stands for and what he believes in and I find all that very exciting to watch.

It's equally interesting watching the actual stories go through much the same process. Just as with Hartnell's performance, there's lots of stumbling going on as the writers are attempting to figure out what constitutes a proper Doctor Who story. Again, we witness all kinds of interesting experimentation. The show even attempts to be a legitimate comedy for a handful of stories. I find the whole evolutionary process fascinating. So much so, that I will often watch what remains of this era in sequential order from beginning to end.

There are so many beautiful firsts that happen during this period. During Episode Two of Dalek Invasion of Earth, for instance, we watch the Doctor get up in the face of a Dalek after it emerges from the Thames. For some reason, the scene feels so much more poignant than it should. And we suddenly realize: "This is the first time we are watching the Doctor confront a recurring foe." It happens so many more times in future stories, of course. And such scenes are handled in all kinds of interesting ways. But we are watching it for the first time, here. Every time I watch that moment, it gives me just a little bit of a shiver. The fact that we would see the first companion leave only a few episodes later makes things even more brilliant. Pivotal cornerstones to the show's foundation appear on a regular basis throughout this period. In my opinion, it makes for fantastic viewing.

As we near the end of the era, a very definite formula seems to be coming together. We know how a basic adventure is going to work. Even more beautiful, though, is the fact that the show remembers on a regular basis to go outside its own mold. And that happens because the production teams during the earliest years loved to take chances. Audiences remembered that and responded well to it. So future producers often kept that tradition in place.

Finally, there are also just so many beautiful nuances that Hartnell brought to the part. His expressiveness with his hands. That sudden ferocity that he could unleash when he got his back up. That air of authority that he always commanded whether speaking dialogue or just standing in the background. I especially love that some of his stumbling was actually intentional. When he portrays the Abbot of Amboise in The Massacre of St. Bartholomew's Eve, all those little dialogue improvisations that seemed like he was grasping for lines actually disappear.

For a sci-fi series that, during its infancy, sometimes resembled Plan 9 From Outer Space, Hartnell brought all kinds of care and attention to the part he played. Which set a precedent for all future casting in the role. William Hartnell's shoes were not easy ones to fill. And that's a huge contribution to what makes the show so great, these days.

It all began with the First Doctor. And it started beautifully....


2. THE ELEVENTH DOCTOR

Oh, the angry protests that resonated through Fandom when it was announced that Matt Smith would be the next Doctor! Pretty Boy David Tennant had been a big hit but we definitely did not want the Doctor to keep being this young, dashing hero who was nice on the eyes. It was okay for one incarnation - but let's bring back an older Doctor, now. Moff was even promising that this was exactly what he wanted to do. But what did we get, instead? Someone who was actually younger than Tennant!

I have to admit, even I was a bit disappointed in the casting choice when I first head about it. But I thought: "Let's give this Matt Smith fellow a chance, at least." And I was so glad I did.

It's as Moff said: he may look young but there is an old soul in those eyes. Which gave us such an interestingly nuanced performance. Yes, Doctor Eleven runs around like some ridiculous man-boy, but we can always sense that ancient being that he really is lurking behind all the shenanigans. We see that dynamic going on right in his first story. For most of Eleventh Hour, he's a pretty big prattling fool. But then we get to that "Basically, run!" moment and we see that he's got all the gravitas than any other actor who has played the role possesses. Age will have no real bearing when the Doctor truly needs to be the Doctor.

Some have remarked that Ten and Eleven are very similar in personality . Both are very over-eager fanboys. Getting excited about all sorts of people and things that most folks don't really give two craps about. Look at how Tennant responds when he snogs Madame De Pompadour. Or how Smith is reacting to the 80s hotel at the beginning of God Complex. They're like young male nerds at a comic con.

But if you've been following this whole series, you'll see that Doctor Ten ranked very low on my list. So why is it that a Doctor who is so similar in character is doing so well?

The answer is quite simple. Where Tenant zigged Smith chose to zag. Both of these Doctors are, quintessentially, young. But where Ten seems to focus on the melodrama or "angstyness" of youth, Eleven delves, instead, into its exuberance. He is naive - but in all the right ways. He has a zest for life and tries to believe in the best in everyone. Like Ten, he must still deal with disappointments. Because he is young, he only deals so well with them. But he doesn't have to go so over-the-top with it. He is petulant for a moment and then moves on. Much of his angst is, in fact, purposely comical. To me, that is such a better approach if you're going to make the Doctor young again.

There is a clear example of this right in his second story. The Doctor has reached that point with Amy where he feels the need to share with her what happened in the Time Wars. There's a bit of a sad speech where he gets a bit down and then he's done and resumes working on some equipment immediately in front of him. His tone actually sounds quite a bit like Troughton when he tells Victoria that his family "mostly sleeps in his mind". Which is a great way to deliver this sort of dialogue. It shows that the Doctor is hurt by what's happened but he's getting on with his life. He's dealing with the present but still letting his past affect him a bit.

Compare that to all the drama that takes place in a similar situation between the Doctor and Martha in Gridlock. It's made into a much bigger deal. So much so, that I find the whole survivor guilt stuff is now becoming counter-productive to the effectiveness of telling a good story. I am so glad that Doctor Eleven, pretty well, jettisons this sort of stuff. He brings the Doctor back to being an adventurer who's recently gone through something very difficult. Rather than someone who seems to need to wallow, forever, in his past. Again and again, we see choices like this being made in the structuring of the character. To me, Smith takes what Tennant was trying to do but gets it right.

In terms of the quality of his stories: much of it is second-to-none. Yeah, we had a Curse of the Black Spot or two - but every era does. In some of my other rantings in this blog, I actually like to compare Moff's period to Hinchcliffe/Holmes era. I know others may not agree with this. But I do think Doctors Eleven and Twelve have gotten some top-notch stories with only the occasional minor dud. Even the weaker episodes still have much to admire.

I think Eleven was the perfect Doctor to have around as the 50th anniversary approached. In so many ways, he nailed exactly what the character was meant to be. A hint of modern sensibilities but also old-fashioned in all the right ways. I love that he's back to being socially-awkward around women, for instance. It just works so much better for the character. The Doctor is the type of person who should get horrifically upset when accused of having a "snog booth". It's great to see him pulling that hissy fit. Most other men, these days, would be agreeing that it was one and would try to get a girl like Clara to try it out with them. But Doctor Eleven, instead, is outraged by the implication. It's nice to see him just a bit traditional in his values, like that. Not too much, but a bit. This is the sort of Doctor we needed to have around when such a huge benchmark was being celebrated. One of my favorite aspects of Day of the Doctor is the way he mocks Ten so much for being the womanizer he was. Or the way he becomes almost apologetic to the War Doctor during Ten's nuptials with Queen Elizabeth the First. The Classic Series Doctor has definitely returned in Smith's interpretation. And that's wonderful to see.

And then, finally, Eleven must depart. I've seen about eight regenerations "in real-time", now. Some of the earliest Doctors I had to watch retrospectively. But, for the most part, I've watched the Doctor pass at the time the actor was actually leaving the show. Which means that I've taken a full journey with that incarnation and am now seeing them off. I find this a far more emotional experience. But watching a Doctor leave, for the most part, hasn't been too brutal for me. A new one is on his way and there will be all kinds of fun with discovering what he'll be like.

But I really felt myself going through some serious grieving when Smith undid that bow tie for the final time. I had gotten so much more attached to this incarnation than I have others. I think this is where I truly felt just how strong my Eleven-Love had become. It really hurt to see him go. As brilliant as Capaldi has been in the role, losing Smith was a truly unsettling experience that took a while for me to overcome. So much so, that I really adore the cameo he does in Deep Breath. We got just a little bit more of Eleven before we had to truly say goodbye.


1. THE SIXTH DOCTOR:

Ironically, the man who hates lists like these makes it to the top of mine.

I still remember the first time I watched Twin Dilemma. I was a teenager living in Canada (for a better idea of my background, read my First anniversary post  http://robtymec.blogspot.ca/2016/03/first-anniversary-special-something.html). New episodes that were being shown in Britain often took, at least, a few months before they made their way to any of the TV stations in my area. I was also plugged in to several fan clubs that printed up and sent out fanzines on a regular basis. Many of those fanzines discussed episodes I had not seen yet - the authors lived in parts of the world that got their Who faster than I did.

The reviews of Twin Dilemma were all the same: worst Doctor Who story in the history of bad Doctor Who stories. To this day, it sits at the bottom of the regular fan polls that Doctor Who Magazine takes. We just haven't stopped maligning it since the day it was broadcast.

When the story finally reached my eyes, I could see a lot of what the critics were saying. It definitely looked horrifically cheap. Even worse, it seemed a bit too light on plot to sustain the four episodes. But, beyond that, I really didn't have much trouble with it. In fact, I rather enjoyed it.

A lot of what makes Twin Dilemma so fun is Colin's performance. All the manic turns he takes throughout the four episodes are portrayed with great relish and gusto. For me, it was an utter delight to watch. He really makes up for some of the problems the tale is having.  I also greatly enjoy the way his character is initially crafted. I know it upset a lot of fans - but I love that we're really not sure about this Doctor when we first meet him. Is this a legitimate regeneration that's gone wrong? Will the Doctor always be this absolutely horrible person? Is he really going to keep wearing that coat?!

I even love that we're not entirely sure by the end of the story that he is actually improving. He is still incredibly tetchy and a bit unstable. After five regenerations, we had gotten pretty used to the whole process. I think it was great that this story really shakes things up again and shows us just how radical the whole change can be.

Of course, if we studied things a bit, we know that this was the beginning of what was meant to be a three-season arch of character progression. The Doctor was meant to be a bit like Thomas Covenant. Very unlikeable at the beginning. But, as things progress, we slowly fall in love with him. This is the reason why I tend to favor "arrogant Doctors" - the character is given somewhere to go. Twelfth, First and even, to some extent, Ninth all start as old cranks who end up having hearts of gold hidden underneath. But it only tends to come out after a while. It adds a very nice extra layer to the story-telling. And there was no greater attention paid to that layer than in the Sixth Doctor's era. I deeply loved that.  I thought it was great that he started as more of an anti-hero than a hero. That we would slowly see him develop his softer side. This is probably the trait I enjoy most about this incarnation.

There seems to be a sort of Bandwagon that Fandom jumped on with poor 'Ole Sixie. It started with a few outspoken fans proclaiming Twin Dilemma to be awful and everyone else just going along with it rather than giving the story a fair try. The yule and cry continued with Season 22. It was all too violent and the Doctor wasn't Doctorish enough. Again, everyone just started regurgitating this ad nauseam. No one seemed to really be looking at the genuine content and forming opinions for themselves. By the time Trial of a Time Lord made it to the screens, Fandom seemed impossible to satisfy, anymore. The Sixth Doctor had been swept up in a tide of a negative opinion that he didn't deserve. It bothers me, to this day, that this period of the show is often discussed as being the show at its all-time lowest point.

There are certain negative points that get made about the Sixth Doctor over and over. Just as I did when I reviewed Vengeance on Varos(http://robtymec.blogspot.ca/2016/01/book-of-lists-top-ten-who-stories-3.html), I'm going to address some of those points head-on:

1. The Stories Are Weak: Well, as we already know, there's one Sixth Doctor story that definitely disagrees with this idea (in my opinion, at least). But is Vengeance on Varos the only masterpiece among a pile of rubbish? Certainly not! Revelation of the Daleks is also quite brilliant and I think Ultimate Foe is legitimately epic. Attack of the Cybermen, Mark of the Rani, The Two Doctors and the other three stories of Trial of a Time Lord are all very solid. They may have a "tree won't hurt you" moment here and there but, overall, they're quite good. You know, like most Doctor Who stories from any era.

Yes, we do end up with stories like Twin Dilemma and Timelash being a bit more problematic. But, again, every era of the show has stories like these. I'm not sure why these common flaws that happened previously suddenly get so over-scrutinized when Colin takes the helm. It's all quite silly. Story-wise, this is as strong  a period as any other in the show. I would even say that I appreciate it better than a lot of other eras. Mainly because it took a lot of chances that Who had seldom or never taken before.

I even hate that back-handed compliments that some fans give: "Colin was a good Doctor - he just had to work with bad stories". Personally, I think these stories were just fine. It's actually great to hear so many new fans who weren't even alive in the 80s going back to watch the Sixth Doctor stories and asking: "What was the problem?!".


2. The Outfit Made it Impossible to Appreciate Him: The costume was meant to represent the Doctor's personality: loud and garish. In that sense, it accomplished the task perfectly. I suppose, in some ways, this is purely a matter of opinion and I can only refute it so much. But other incarnations have made some pretty outrageous fashion choices (I actually know new fans who have a similar sentiment towards Four's scarf - believe it or not!).

Yes, no one made as bold a fashion choice as Six did. But it was the 80s! I felt he got away with it. Hell, who am I kidding? I actually really love the outfit. Particularly the coat. Of all the Doctor's apparel, the Sixth Doctor's coat is the one item of clothing that I would actually love to own, myself. Considering I have actually no desire to ever by a cosplayer of any sorts - that says something!


Those are two of the biggest objections to Doctor Six that I feel hold no real water. There's some minor stuff that I won't bother with.

I will admit, my love for the underdog is part of my motivation, here. It's almost like all this unfounded objection towards Six got me to love him that bit more. But, beyond that, this is an excellently-crafted character who had a very fascinating run of stories. I will even be pretentious enough to say that a lot of people just didn't get this era of the show. It was trying something bold and different. But, perhaps, viewing audiences just weren't quite ready for it at the time.

The ultimate tragedy, of course, is that all the plans that were being made with the Sixth Doctor's character arch never saw their full fruition. He was cut off after only two seasons and all we're left with is: "Carrot juice! Carrot juice! Carrot juice!"

Personally, I would have loved to have seen him beat Tom Baker's record. But, alas, this was not to be...


The other installments: 

The Bottom: 
http://robtymec.blogspot.ca/2016/11/book-of-lists-doctors-from-worst-to.html

Blink and You'll Miss Them: 
http://robtymec.blogspot.ca/2016/11/book-of-lists-doctors-from-worst-to_28.html

Lower Mid-Rangers: 
http://robtymec.blogspot.ca/2016/12/book-of-lists-doctor-from-worst-to-best.html

Upper Mid-Rangers: 
http://robtymec.blogspot.ca/2016/12/book-of-lists-doctors-from-worst-to.html

BOOK OF LISTS: DOCTORS - FROM WORST TO BEST - PART FOUR

Moving into the Upper Mid-Rangers. Again, we'll only tackle two more....

UPPER MID-RANGERS:

Once more, I'll stress that there is very little difference in my levels of appreciation, here. I do think the mid-rangers - upper or lower - are all excellent Doctors. Their eras were all very solid and I don't have a whole lot of problems with them. They don't quite appeal to me as much as they do my Final Top Three but I'm still very impressed with them.



5. THE SECOND DOCTOR

In my last post, I spoke of how difficult it must have been for Peter Davison to take over from Tom Baker. Well, Davison had nothin' on poor Patrick Troughton. Even McGann and Eccleston - who had the weight of the show's revival resting on their shoulders - didn't feel the sort of pressure Troughton must've been under.

The Second Doctor had to introduce the concept of regeneration to the audience for the first time. Up until that fateful moment at the end of Tenth Planet, no one knew that the Doctor could suddenly be played by a new lead. It was an idea the production team had only come up with themselves' in the few months before it was introduced on the show. So, suddenly, a new performer had to be accepted by the fans. If he wasn't, the show would die out by the end of the season.

Just as with Davison, the more marketable move would've been to make the transition as smooth as possible. Have the Second Doctor perform in a similar manner to the First. Perhaps even have him imitate him. So that the audience sees him as the same man with just a different face.

Once more, the production team decides to be artists. The Second Doctor is nothing like his predecessor. He's his own unique character who even goes so far as to play on the doubts of his two companions who are wondering if he's the same person as the man they just saw collapse before them on the TARDIS floor. Truthfully, the show could not have taken a bolder route in the change of its core format. And, once more, I fall in love with Doctor Who all the more for doing this.

Much like the other Upper Mid-Ranger that I will be listing after him, Troughton is off to a rough start. He pushes the comedy a little too hard and has to reign it in a bit before really settling into the role properly. But we are still so glad that he's allowed to play the role in his own way. The interpretation that he gives to the character is wonderful. Hartnell made sure to give layers to his Doctor, but Doctor Two goes even further. Every moment that he's on camera, we can see our new Doctor giving his One-Hundred-and-Ten Percent. Trying to make every line count as a contribution to the overall character he's brought to life. It's quite amazing to watch, really. Not just in those moments where he must appear larger-than-life. But also in those more subtle moments.

The scene where he speaks to Victoria about his family in Tomb of the Cybermen is often cited as an excellent insight into the character's "softer side". And I have to agree with Fandom on this point (a rare occasion, I'll admit). We've seen the Second Doctor running around like a mad lark. We've also seen him command authority, be mysterious and even show a hint of danger now and again. But, suddenly, he becomes delicate. But he does it in a way that is unique to his own character. It's done quite masterfully. And, by the end of the scene, we really do see that the portrayal is as three-dimensional as his predecessor or any other performer who will follow him. Fandom does love to go on about the sheer brilliance of Tom Baker - but they should really be talking about Troughton more (not to say that they don't talk about him at all - just that he should get more attention than he does).

Perhaps my favorite trait of Doctor Two is the way he loves to wrong-foot his enemy. His Cosmic Hobo image causes him to appear very unassuming or even a bit incompetent. In several stories, his foes brush him aside - thinking him completely harmless. Only to be defeated by him a short while later because he was purposely appearing meek so that they would underestimate him. We see, perhaps, one of the best examples of this when he makes his return appearance in The Three Doctors. The whole time the Second Doctor is confronting Omega, he plays the mad Time Lord like a fiddle. Pushing his buttons by babbling on about pipes and other such nonsense. Even his own third incarnation isn't entirely sure what he's up to, sometimes. Only in a brief aside between Two and Three do we see that he's completely in control of the entire situation. He's toying with the stellar engineer to see if there's a weakness to exploit. I love the approach that he uses when combating evil. It's a great image for the character: an impish bumbler who suddenly turns dangerous when you least expect it.

The Second Doctor not only passed the greatest challenge a new Doctor has ever faced. But he brought a radical change to the direction of the character. And he did it amazingly!



4. THE SEVENTH DOCTOR

Another actor who faced a lot of challenges as he first stepped into the role. The Sixth Doctor's final season ended in a behind-the-scenes nightmare which had a tremendous effect on how Doctor Seven entered the world. So much so, that many site Sylvester McCoy's first season as being the worst in the show's history (aside from the abysmal Dragonfire, I don't think it's actually that bad. In fact, I'd take it over Season 17 any day!). This created a very shaky start for what would be the last Doctor of the Classic Series.

But then we hit Season 25. Andrew Cartmel, the new script editor, is through with whatever teething problems he had during his first season and is now firing on all cylinders. He's bringing in great writers who are creating stories so sophisticated that TV still hasn't quite caught up with some of the conventions they used. This continues into Season 26 - causing the show to finish off on such a high note of creative brilliance that it's shameful we never got to see Season 27 (the story notes that have been shared indicated that it would've probably been a pretty awesome season. Still not sure how Ace was going to become a Time Lord but I'm confident it would've been handled well). As sad as it is that Doctor Who is over - it definitely went out with style. And we owe a lot of that to the awesomeness that is Doctor Seven.

His most predominant trait, of course, is his deviousness. In this body, the Doctor seems to be staring into the abyss - and the abyss, of course, is staring back into him. He's using a similar ruse to his second incarnation: a clownish exterior that can become formidable when it needs to. But he's taking the strategy so much further. And becoming so much darker because of it.

We actually see the first hints of this in Season 24. The Doctor seems to almost enjoy being deceptive. We see this, to some extent, in every story. He tricks the Rani into blowing up her own Brainiac. He uses a false rule from the Manual to escape from the guards of Paradise Towers. Gavrok and the Bannermen follow a whole series of false clues that lead them into a bee attack. He even lies to Mel about his real intentions for visiting Svartos. It's all there if you look for it.

But in his second season, all that becomes amplified. Doctor Seven becomes the Cosmic Chess Player and starts luring his greatest foes into massive acts of self-destruction. He is now pro-active. Rarely does he just stumble into misadventures like he used to. Now he's going to places where he knows there are problems and, already, has a plan in place to fix things. But the plan always involves deceit and manipulation. He's turning just a little bit into some of the villains he's berated over the years. He feels his ends are starting to justify his means. It's a great new "edge" to bring to the character that refreshes the whole way we look at our favorite hero.

There's also a lot to be said for some of the beautiful arcs that run through the Seventh Doctor's era. There's the Tutelage of Ace and Fenric's Sinister Plot. And the mysterious Cartmel Masterplan that, sadly, never sees its completion. All great little storylines that weave through the plots of Seasons 25 and 26. Adding extra dimension to some already well-layered adventures. This really is Doctor Who in one of its finest hours. Scenes like Fenric revealing that he's been interfering in the Doctor's journeys since Ace first dropped into his life just make things all the more magnificent. The sort of stuff fans just eat up.

In earlier drafts of the script for the 96 Telemovie, the Seventh Doctor was meant to make only the briefest of appearances. But as the polishing process progressed, the role was expanded. RTD was right in the opinion he expressed when Rose premiered. He had said starting the 96 Telemovie with a different lead in place may have created confusion for people approaching the show for the first time. Nonetheless, it was still nice to see Sylvester McCoy get a good amount of screentime before handing the baton over to McGann.

Doctor Seven, in his last appearance, seems to be a man more at peace with himself. Maybe, during those wilderness years, he has mended his ways and lost his desire to manipulate people and situations to achieve a greater good. He's just a straightforward adventurer, again. We can't say for sure, of course. But we do get that vaguest of impressions that this could be the case. The fact that he plays completely into the Master's plans rather than come up with some complex counterplot that indicates he knew, all along, what his enemy was up to tends to indicate that his scheming days are behind him.

I'd like to think that an arc was completed regarding the Seventh Doctor, himself. And we see but a glimpse of it just before he bows out to his successor.



Okay, if you've done the basic math, you know which three incarnations are still left. But what positions did they rank in? Tune in to find out....


Previous Installments: 

The Bottom:
http://robtymec.blogspot.ca/2016/11/book-of-lists-doctors-from-worst-to.html

Blink And You'll Miss Them:
http://robtymec.blogspot.ca/2016/11/book-of-lists-doctors-from-worst-to_28.html

Lower Mid-Rangers: 
http://robtymec.blogspot.ca/2016/12/book-of-lists-doctor-from-worst-to-best.html

BOOK OF LISTS: DOCTORS - FROM WORST TO BEST - PART 3

All righty, then. We've plowed through 7 incarnations, so far. Time to slow things down a bit. Only two more incarnations will get covered, today. But which ones? 


THE MID-RANGERS

Here is where we will be splitting hairs. The Doctors that sit in the middle of my range of appreciation are sooo close to each other in their rankings. I would even say that they can bump up or down this list depending on my mood for the day. But I committed to a specific placement of them when I decided to do these posts and I'm going to stick to it. But, in all honesty, these guys can easily fluctuate.


THE LOWER MID-RANGERS

While these two sit a bit lower than the other two that I will discuss in my next post, I really don't respect them less. The mid-rangers are all exceptional Doctors and Lower should definitely not be looked down upon in any sort of way.




7. THE TWELFTH DOCTOR

It's almost not fair to be ranking him, yet. His era isn't complete. For all we know, his next season (or more) might have such incredible things happen to him that it bumps him up to first place. But, at this moment, this is where he stands.

The announcement that Peter Capaldi would be playing the next Doctor brought me immediate joy. Two young, handsome Doctors in a row was just a bit distressing. It wasn't upsetting me as much as it was some other fans, but I was starting to think that the Doctor would always be a pretty boy from hereon in. I could live with that and understood that this might be the formula the show would need to stick to in order for it to remain "accessible".

But then, lo and behold, Peter Capaldi gets cast. He's the same age as Hartnell was when he got the role. Immediately, my hopes begin to soar. Doctor Who is going to feel a lot more like it did in the Old Days. Capaldi is even saying he wants to adapt JNT's "no hanky panky on the TARDIS" ideals.

Things are looking up...

I become even happier as I start seeing how the role was going to be played (I'm one of those evil fans that found the five scripts and the raw footage from Deep Breath that leaked on the internet - it gave me a wonderful sneak preview!). The Doctor is definitely tetchy in this new incarnation. Like 'Ole Sixie - he's still a champion for justice and always wants to do the right thing. But he doesn't care whether or not he makes friends along the way. In fact, he's downright rude to just-about everyone that crosses his path.

Now, I know Nine had a bit of a mean streak, too. Even Eleven could get a bit sulky and bad-tempered (but Matt Smith often chose for a more comedic interpretation of those moments), but Twelve is the first incarnation in the New Series that is full-on arrogant. And I adore him for that. To me, it's beautiful to see the show not worrying about "ticking boxes", anymore. We're going to have a fun anti-hero for a bit.

The strength of Twelve's stories has really helped. In the Forest of the Night is about the only one that comes close to being any sort of dud (in my opinion, at least). Everything else has, for the most part, been firing on all cylinders. Twelve's era has been New Who at its peak. The stories have been magnificent and Capaldi and Coleman have turned in amazing performances. I'm looking forward to seeing how the next companion fares. I have a feeling that, in Moffat's skillful hands, she'll do just fine.

In the grand tradition of all "arrogant" Doctors - the character gradually softens. This particular process has happened in a very beautiful and organic way with Twelve. Capaldi created a gentler and more comic portrayal in his second season that has genuinely endeared us to his incarnation. The sonic shades and electric guitar have quickly become iconic. He's shifted very nicely from being a "House" Doctor (referring to the popular American series about the extremely obnoxious-but-brilliant medical doctor) that we saw in the first series to the Rock'n'Roll Doctor that we see in the second. It's great fun the way he's hung on a bit to that Matt Smith interpretation of the part. He still can't quite master being cool. He comes a bit closer than Matt's Doctor does - but he's only so good at it.

Who knows for sure what the future will hold for Twelve. I hope he has more than just one more season left in him. Because I am greatly enjoying the adventure he has taken us on.

I hope we see the cue cards a few more times, too. What's written on some of the cards he hasn't actually read aloud are absolutely hilarious!




6. THE FIFTH DOCTOR

What a challenge poor 'ole Peter Davison had to face when he accepted that fateful offer from John Nathan-Turner. To have to follow up the seven year reign of Tom Baker is a task no one would want. Regardless of how low he is ranked on my list, Tom Baker's Doctor is a legend. A status he achieved even before he decided to leave the series. As he prepares to bow out, Doctor Five must follow an act the audience doesn't want to see end. How do you even take on the role of the Doctor when your predecessor is so dearly loved?

You take it on with boldness and courage. Not just in terms of how Davison plays the role - but the way the production team earns so much of my respect for the changes of direction the show takes as Doctor Five kicks in . The more sensible choice as we transition from Fourth to Fifth would be to keep things as similar as possible so that the audience accepts the new lead. But, instead, everyone chooses to be an artist rather than a marketeer. And the three-years that Davison inhabits the role are all the more beautiful because of it.

After nearly twelve years of Pertwee and Tom Baker dominating every scene they're in, it is so amazing to see a Doctor who is, once more, vulnerable. Or, as fandom prefers to describe him, fallible. Doctor Five (aka "Tristan with guts") cares about peoples' feelings again. So much so, that he frequently walks on eggshells to protect the sensibilities of others. He also gets bullied. Mostly by Tegan - but other supporting characters or even his enemies can sometimes push him around. Our Doctors from the 70s would have never exhibited such behavior. And, if you've read the beefs I had with the Doctors of that decade, you can see why I'm so happy with the changes that are implemented with Davison's arrival.

This, of course, is just a few of the deeply radical changes we see made to the character. And I, for one, loved these changes. It was great to see the Doctor suddenly being so sensitive. Particularly since I was such an overemotional artsy-fartsy youth when I was first introduced to him. But the actual change of emphasis in the story-telling is equally impressive. While Christopher Bidmead made some pretty radical alterations in Season 18, the sheer intellectualism that we see in the writing goes to even greater heights when Davison takes over the role. Particularly with the Mara stories in Seasons 19 and 20. The show is still being very cerebral like it was during the Tales of Bidmead, but Doctor Five's stories also remember to engage in some emotional stakes, too. Look at the way Hindle is sympathetic in Kinda as compared to the way insane characters are usually handled in any other period of the Classic Series (they're usually just very unpredictable antagonists). We don't just see a more delicate Doctor in Five - but the actual content is composed in a more sensitive manner, too. I really love the direction the show takes during this stage. There is some very beautiful television that is made with Davison at the helm. Even if some of it still looks a bit cheap in places (refer to giant snake at the end of Kinda!).

While all this high-browed lovey-dovey sensitive stuff is nice - I like that the production team still remembers to give us some straight action, too. We get stories like Earthshock and Resurrection of the Daleks where we actually see the Doctor toting a gun here and there. It's also nice that they make sure the Doctor really does show some serious backbone now and again. It's best exemplified in the way he stands up to his enemies. Not just the famous confrontation with the Cyberleader - but how about the way he tells off Striker in Ep 2 of Enligthenment? Poignant moments like that get us to remember that the Doctor is still down there, somewhere. Ready to rise to the surface whenever he's truly needed. But for the most part, we can enjoy the mild-mannered antics of a slightly awkward British gentleman who likes to tuck his panama hat into his coat pocket.

As it odd is may sound, Doctor Five is not my all-time favorite, but Peter Davison is my favorite actor to have played the part. After four greatly varied interpretations of the role, it seemed there was nowhere else you could take the character. But Davison made all kinds of fascinating choices that brought out such a beautifully-nuanced performance and made us see the Doctor in a whole new light. After his Doctor, actors did tend to base their performances on previous incarnations but with their own twist on them. Five still feels like his very own man. With a fresh new spin on him when it seemed there was nowhere else for the character to go.

Davison, himself, borrows a bit from the Second Doctor - but he takes the Doctor's humanitarian beliefs to their ultimate height. His desire to never harm anyone drives his interpretation in all kinds of new and interesting directions. Particularly when he fails. There is a sincere underlying pain as he proclaims: "There should have been another way." at the end of Warriors of the Deep. Other actors to have played the role would've nailed the line very nicely, don't get me wrong. But Davison says it like he's genuinely hurt. There are similar moments that are even more subtle. Watch his reaction as the Master gets burnt to a crisp in Planet of Fire. It genuinely pains him that his greatest foe has met such an untimely end. It's done quite beautifully.

As beautiful as a stick of celery on a red-piping lapel. Which you'd think would look odd. But, somehow, Davison gets it to work. Just like all the other odd quirks of Doctor Five.




And thus concludes the Lower Mid-Rangers. Upper will be along shortly. Sit tight...




Missed Part One? Here you go: 
http://robtymec.blogspot.ca/2016/11/book-of-lists-doctors-from-worst-to.html

And here's Part Two: 
http://robtymec.blogspot.ca/2016/11/book-of-lists-doctors-from-worst-to_28.html

BOOK OF LISTS: DOCTORS - FROM WORST TO BEST.... PART 1

As we wrapped up 2015, I decided to list my Ten all-time favorite Doctor Who stories. While I try to concentrate on writing legitimate essays on Doctor Who, this little opinion piece seemed to be one of the most popular things I've done on the site. I still see these entries getting hits on a regular basis. 

So I decided to do something similar at the end of this year. This time, I'm going to list my Doctors in order of preference. But I'm going to start on this a bit earlier than I did in 2015 so that things don't drag on until midway through January. I'm also going to "group" my Doctors a bit so I don't have to do fourteen separate entries! 

Hope this is as much of a hit as the Top Ten Who Stories were. 




PART ONE: THE GUYS AT THE BOTTOM

So we're starting with my least favorite Doctors. Which means there aren't going to be a lot of kind words, here. But I do want you to understand that I don't, necessarily, hate these Doctors. I just find them a bit more flawed than some of the other incarnations. Or less to my liking. Ultimately, however, I hold the same opinion as most fans. There is no such thing as a legitimately "bad" Doctor. They are all wonderful in their own right. In my opinion, there has never been a miscasting.

I'm also going to be a bit unfair. Some fans believe how much you like a Doctor should be based purely on the performance of the actor who played him. The quality of the stories that happened during his period as the lead should not reflect on your enjoyment of his interpretation of the role. But I am going to allow my appreciation of the stories to influence my opinion. Because, in the end, I feel that my enjoyment of a particular incarnation of a Doctor shouldn't be based on the actor's performance, alone. Each Doctor is a proper era of the show. So all aspects of that era should be taken into consideration as I form my final judgement.

Finally, some of you may get downright furious with me for my tastes. Especially since some of the Doctors you will see at the bottom of the list are usually near the top on most other fans' lists (which is part of the reason why I don't like them much - I've never been a fan of "popular" things!). So if you are upset with what I have to say about some of these guys - I apologize, in advance.



14: THE TENTH DOCTOR - B

Yup, I'm gonna be that pedantic and list the weird partial regeneration that the Doctor has at the end of Stolen Earth as an incarnation onto himself. Since the Doctor did claim in Time of the Doctor that the regeneration counted as a life he lost, I believe we should see him as that.

The 2009 Specials are, in my opinion, one of the lowest points in the New Series. And they make up the bulk of Tenth Doctor b's tenure. Add to it the fact that he is born in what I believe to be the worst Season Finale of the entire history of the show and it gets even harder to appreciate him. But it doesn't stop there, his second adventure is what I consider to be the worst story in all of the New Series. So, from a story standpoint, he's already doomed.

Aside from Water of Mars, I'm not particularly fond of any of the stories that feature Tenth Doctor b. If you bother to go back to my Ranking the Regenerations List (http://robtymec.blogspot.ca/2015/03/the-book-of-lists-ranking-regenarations.html) you'll even see that I'm not even all that fond of his final parting. It's difficult to get into a story that runs out of plot and blows fifteen minutes of its running time with farewell scene after farewell scene.

But while I said the quality of the stories would influence my opinion, I should also point out that I have quite a bit of trouble with Tennant's performance during this period. There is just too much angst going on, here. Yes, it is mitigated in some circumstances. Donna getting her memory taken away is brutally depressing and all his sadness at the conclusion of Journey's End is more-than-justified. But then we seem to need a "moment of angst" in every story that follows. Even in Planet of the Dead - what was considered to be the romp of the Specials - the Doctor has to get all moody when the Lady de Souza asks to become a companion.

"Okay, okay - we get it!" I want to say, "You're the Lonely God. You've made that quite clear!"

By the time we reach The End of Time, Doctor Ten b is such a whiny mess that I'm really not that interested in him, anymore. The Doctor is meant to be strong and brave but still have a soft side that stops him from behaving as some square-jawed action hero like Captain Kirk or Rambo. But now, he seems to have nothing but a soft side. I know many fans still get misty-eyed as they think of his departure. But I, for one, was glad to see him go.


13: THE THIRD DOCTOR

This one, I assume, is going to get me in some serious trouble with a certain segment of fandom. Third Doctor fans are fiercely loyal and feel that no criticism should ever be leveled at him. His era is perfect. No one is allowed to say otherwise.

Personally, I think a certain amount of nostalgia clouds their vision. You will find that most Third Doctor fans were kids when he was playing the Doctor. It's not quite so easy to remain objective when you're impressionable. Whereas I was a pretty jaded teenager when I started watching his stories and I did find myself often wondering what all the fuss was about.

Before I get too vicious, Let me say that I actually adored Season 7. One of the best seasons in the history of the whole show. Sure, a few of those Seven-Parters dragged a bit in places, but the stories were still quite awesome (particularly Inferno). The Doctor, in this season, was a cantankerous anti-establishment character. Similar, in many ways, to his first incarnation. But he also showed some interesting layers. Who can forget that moment where he humors General Carrington at the end of Ambassadors of Death?

But then, we enter Season 8. From that point, onward, much of his era is a lot of formula-driven fluff (yes, I know, that's a very harsh thing to say - start mailing your pipe-bombs). The UNIT family now works to the detriment of the show. There are so many "character moments" that come up between the Doctor and the various prominent members of this para-military group that are so similar in tone that they almost bleed into each other and become a blur. This is especially evident in the character of the Brigadier. In Season 7, Alistair Stewart also shows a lot of depth of character. But in later seasons, he's mainly just the butt of the Doctor's jokes. Whenever the Doctor feels the need to denigrate the military mentality, it's done through mocking someone who is meant to be his best friend. It becomes a very tired trope very quickly. Along with so much else that happens in the Doctor's Earth-bound stories. When his exile is finally revoked, things do improve a bit. But he keeps coming back to Earth on a regular basis to annoy us with more paint-by-numbers storytelling.

Then there's those six-parters.... so many of them! And most of them do not have enough plot in them to sustain all six episodes. So there's an endless array of captures-and-escapes and silly car chases to fill in the gaps. I'm not sure why so much praise goes into the writing for this period. Yup, we get some social messages delivered. But they frequently hit you over the head with them - there's little or no subtlety. And no one seems to come up with ideas that can really fill up those six parters. Which, again, causes me to use that nasty "fluff" word.

Again, it can't all be about criticizing the stories. I do have some problems with Pertwee's performance. During Season 7, it's a different story. He's unsure of himself as an actor and takes some interesting risks with the role. But then things spiral downward after Season 8. More and more, I find he gets too comfortable with the role and really starts to walk through his performances, sometimes. He seems to have a certain set of reactions that get used too frequently and he doesn't seem to ever want to add anything new to the part. I do feel that, on occasion, his limitations do show through a bit too much.

There is also a problem I have, in general, with lead actors in 70s Who that I'd like to discuss but I think I've said enough, here. I can rant about this when I get to a certain other actor.



12. THE TENTH DOCTOR

It stands to reason that if Doctor Ten B didn't do well in this than this incarnation will probably get a low rank, too. While the Doctor is less angsty during his three "proper" seasons, the Lonely God still gets a little overplayed and becomes tedious from time-to-time. Especially in Series Three where he takes way more time than any fan could want to get over Rose leaving him.

I also have a hard time with the Doctor being such a casanova in this incarnation (pun completely intended). I'm not one of those super-stringent Classic Series Fan who thinks the Doctor should never be allowed to have a love life, but I still tend to favor a Doctor who is far more interested in science and fighting injustice than he is in girls. Doctor Ten just seemed to be trying too hard to get laid, sometimes.

Like Pertwee, I also just find Tennant a tad too limited as an actor (a very brutal thing to say, I know - particularly since I'm an actor, myself, and would hate to hear someone say that about me). With Pertwee, I found him to be lazy and could have just expanded the role better if he had wanted to. He had the ability. But, sadly, I must be meaner to David. I really just don't think he has the best of ranges. This becomes especially evident as you start seeing him in other roles. He seems to deliver the same performance over and over with only the slightest of variance. In Jessica Jones, for example, he just seems like a more mean-spirited version of the Tenth Doctor.

It didn't help that Doctor Ten was off to the most shaky of starts. I did feel The Christmas Invasion was really well done for an introductory tale but then we go in to Series Two. The quality of some of the stories in this season is very questionable. New Earth does a tonne of damage to him, especially. Not just because the ending is a bit on the implausible side, but some very bad choices are made about how this new Doctor is presented. The super-indulgent opening sequence of the Tenth Doctor approaching the TARDIS console to make his first trip sets a bad tone. The hissy fit he has with the cat nuns also sits very poorly with me. In some ways, it seems like they're trying to imitate the moral outrage the Fifth Doctor has in Earthshock. The big difference, however, is that we have spent almost an entire season with Doctor Five before that scene occurs. That moment sits well because of the time it takes for it to finally happen. It comes way too fast with Doctor Ten and he comes across more as sanctimonious rather than heroic and brave. It really ends up coloring this fresh new Doctor very poorly and makes it difficult for me to genuinely like him (yes, there are plenty of anti-heroic Doctors out there - but it's a deliberate choice. This is a Doctor that becomes unlikeable because of a mistake in the crafting of him - there's a big difference).

With RTD being such a big fan of the Pertwee Era, we also get a number of stories that have a paint-by-numbers feel to them, too. Things are just a bit too formulaic during good chunks of the Tenth Doctor's reign. That always has a big impact on the way I enjoy a Doctor.



11. THE FOURTH DOCTOR

"What?!" Stereotypical Fan is proclaiming, "Tom Baker ranks this low on your list?! How can you?! The man is a genius! A legend! He's the greatest Doctor, ever!" 

I can never deny the contribution the man has made to the show. He is an icon - no doubt, there. He is also, in many ways, one of the most brilliant actors to walk the face of the Earth. I won't argue that, either.

But, as I have said on way-too-many occasions: the Fourth Doctor is over-rated.

My biggest beef is that his character does lack a lot of consistency. Tom is a very instinctual actor - that's part of what makes his performances so charismatic. So much of what he does feels so genuine because it's a choice that he really is making in that very moment. And we, as an audience, see that and appreciate it. But instincts aren't always correct. We do see any number of poor choices make it onto the screen.We still love the spontaneity of that poor choice. But it's a poor choice, nonetheless. It also means that the overall performance of the character is based purely on the mood Tom was in on the day of shooting. Until Season 18 - where the production team fought tooth-and-nail to keep him more consistent - Doctor Four seems to be all over the place. In some ways, that is the actual character. He's very mercurial. I get that. But, in other ways, it just seems like poor planning on the lead actor's part. Like he's just being a little too laissez faire about the whole thing.

He also suffers the same problem as Pertwee in that he stays in the role for a bit longer than he should have. There are definitely stories where he seems to be taking the role for granted a bit too much. Whereas Pertwee seems to walk through the performance during these moments, Baker seems genuinely frustrated with things and just starts taking the piss out of everything. It's uncomfortable to watch, at times.

The other problem that seems to occur with longer-serving Doctors is that the show seems to become too much about them. They get all the best scenes and best dialogue all the time. Oftentimes, at the expense of supporting cast. There are moments where it feels more like I'm watching The Tom Baker Show rather than watching Doctor Who. A lot of fans seem to enjoy this - but I find it a bit too indulgent.

Then, of course, there's that dark period where Tom Baker really does just take the comedy too far. Season 17 seems more like a parody of Doctor Who than the actual thing. Horns of Nimon and Creature From the Pit come across as High Farce rather than any kind of proper science fiction story of any sort. And Tom Baker seems to be at the center of all this - making silly faces wherever he can and re-writing scripts so that they can have as many bad jokes in them, as possible.

"But Season 17 had some of the highest ratings the show ever experienced!" Stereotypical Fan is always quick to point out.

Which just saddens me. So many people saw the show at such a low point and came out with the worst possible impression of it.

And a lot of that was due to Tom's over-indulgence.




Okay then, that gets the ugly stuff out of the way. Again, I want to emphasize that I don't think these Doctors are terrible. I know I didn't say many good things about them but it's because I'm trying to give myself somewhere to go as I start talking about the Doctors I like more. My reviews will become warmer and warmer as we get closer to the top of the list. 

Hope I haven't ruffled too many feathers. 




Oh yeah, here's the first of my Top Ten Fave Who Stories - just in case you've never read them: 

http://robtymec.blogspot.ca/2015/12/book-of-lists-top-ten-who-stories-10.html