Doctor (Doctor Who)

2008/9 Schools Wikipedia Selection. Related subjects: Television

Doctor Who character

The Doctor
Race	Time Lord
Home planet	Gallifrey
First appearance	An Unearthly Child
Portrayed by	William Hartnell Patrick Troughton Jon Pertwee Tom Baker Peter Davison Colin Baker Sylvester McCoy Paul McGann Christopher Eccleston David Tennant ( And others)

The Doctor is the central character in the long-running BBC television science-fiction series Doctor Who, and also features in a vast range of spin-off novels, audio dramas and comic strips connected to the series.

To date, ten actors have officially played the role in the television series (including the 1996 television film), with these changes being explained by his ability to regenerate. Several other actors have played the character on stage and film, in audio dramas, and in occasional special episodes of the series. David Tennant currently portrays the tenth incarnation of the Doctor.

Background

The Doctor is a Time Lord, an extraterrestrial scientist from the planet Gallifrey, who wanders time and space in an internally vast time machine called the TARDIS — Time And Relative Dimension(s) In Space - an acronym the Doctor's granddaughter, Susan, claims to have invented. Although the TARDIS once had the ability to disguise itself according to its environment, after landing in 1963 London its facade became stuck in the form of a British police box because of a malfunctioning chameleon circuit. It has remained in that shape ever since. Over the course of the series the Doctor occasionally attempts to fix the circuit, most notably in Logopolis and Attack of the Cybermen (in the latter turning the TARDIS exterior into a pipe organ, among other incongruous shapes), but eventually gives up the effort out of fondness for the police box shape. The discrepancy between the small exterior of the ship and its vast interior is explained by its dimensionally transcendental nature, whereby the ship's interior and exterior dimensions exist independently of each other.

Little is known about the Doctor's childhood. In " The Empty Child" the Doctor claimed he knows "what it is like to be the only child left out in the cold". Later, during " The Girl in the Fireplace", Madame de Pompadour "saw" memories of his childhood during a telepathic session between the two and commented that it was "so lonely". However, when asked if he has a brother in " Smith and Jones", the Doctor simply replied "not any more". In the same episode, he mentioned "playing with Röntgen blocks in the nursery." In The Time Monster, the Doctor says he grew up in a house on the side of a mountain, and talks about a hermit who lived under a tree behind the house and inspired the Doctor when he was depressed. In " The Sound of Drums" (2007), the Doctor describes a Time Lord Academy initiation ceremony where, at the age of eight, Time Lord children are made to look into the Untempered Schism, a gap in space and time where they could view the time vortex. Some are inspired, some go mad (as he suggests happened to his nemesis the Master), and some run away. When asked what he did, he replies, "Oh, one of the ones that ran away - I've never stopped!"

References to the Doctor's family are rare in the series. During the first two seasons he travelled with his granddaughter, Susan Foreman, and as noted above he apparently once had a brother. During his second incarnation when asked about his family, the Doctor says his memories of them are still alive ( The Tomb of the Cybermen) but whether that means they are deceased is unknown. In The Curse of Fenric, when asked if he has any family, the Seventh Doctor replies that he doesn't know, indirectly hinting that an unspecified fate may have befallen them. In " Fear Her" the Tenth Doctor mentions to Rose that he was once a father, but then quickly changes the subject. He mentions his father in the 1996 Doctor Who telefilm, where he also indicates his mother was human (see "Continuity curiosities" below).

The Doctor explores the universe at random, using his extensive knowledge of science, technology and history (from his perspective) to avert whatever crises he encounters. The imprecise nature of his travels is initially attributed to the age and unreliability of the TARDIS's navigation system. However, after his trial and restriction to late twentieth century Earth, he demonstrates the ability to reach a destination of his own choosing more often than not. The Doctor generally travels with one or more companions. Most of these make a conscious decision to travel with him, but others, especially early in the series, are accidental passengers.

Although Time Lords resemble humans, their physiology differs in some key respects. For example, like other members of his race, the Doctor has two hearts (binary vascular system), a "respiratory bypass system" that allows him to go without air for some while, an internal body temperature of 15–16 degrees Celsius (60 degrees Fahrenheit) and he occasionally exhibits a super-human level of stamina. Additionally, he has shown a resistance to temporal effects and has demonstrated a telepathic ability, albeit to a limited degree. The Doctor also exhibits some weaknesses uncommon to humans. For example, in The Mind of Evil (1971) he claimed that a tablet of aspirin could kill him.

In his final serial, the Second Doctor states that Time Lords can live forever, "barring accidents." When "accidents" do occur, Time Lords can usually regenerate into new bodies, resulting in extremely long life-spans.

In the beginning

The character of the Doctor was created by the BBC's Head of Drama Sydney Newman, the driving force behind the creation of Doctor Who itself. The first format document for the series that was to become Doctor Who — then provisionally titled The Troubleshooters — was written up in March 1963 by C. E. Webber, a BBC staff writer who had been brought in to help develop the project. Webber's document contained a main character described as "The maturer man, 35–40, with some 'character twist'." However, Newman was not keen on this idea and — along with several other changes to Webber's initial format — created an alternative lead character named "Dr Who": a crotchety older man piloting a stolen time machine, on the run from his own far future world. No written record of Newman's conveyance of these ideas — believed to have taken place in April 1963 — exists, and the character of "Dr Who" first begins appearing in existing documentation from May of that year.

The character was first portrayed by William Hartnell in 1963, who played him as the irascible, grandfatherly figure originally conceived by Newman. When, after three years, Hartnell left the series due to ill health, the role was handed over to respected character actor Patrick Troughton. To date, official television productions have depicted ten distinct incarnations of the Doctor (due to Hartnell's death in 1975, actor Richard Hurndall substituted in his role as the First Doctor in 1983's The Five Doctors, resulting in a technical total of eleven actors). Of those, the longest-lasting and perhaps the most recognisable incarnation is the Fourth Doctor, as played by Tom Baker. Currently, the Tenth Doctor is portrayed by David Tennant.

At the series' beginning, nothing at all is known of the Doctor: not even his name (the actual form of which remains a mystery). In the very first serial, An Unearthly Child, two teachers from Coal Hill School in London, Barbara Wright and Ian Chesterton, become intrigued by one of their students, Susan Foreman, who exhibits high intelligence and unusually advanced knowledge. Trailing her to a junkyard at 76 Totter's Lane, they encounter a strange old man and hear Susan's voice coming from inside what appears to be a police box. Pushing their way inside, the two find that the exterior is actually camouflage for the dimensionally transcendental interior of the TARDIS. The old man, whom Susan calls "Grandfather" but who identifies himself as "the Doctor", subsequently kidnaps Barbara and Ian to prevent them from telling anyone about the existence of the ship, taking them on an adventure in time and space.

Becoming "involved"

The Doctor is an adventurer and scientist with a strong moral sense. He usually solves problems with his wits rather than with force, and is more likely to wield a sonic screwdriver than a gun; although he has been seen to use weapons as a last resort.

As a time traveller, the Doctor has been present at or directly involved in countless major historical events on the planet Earth and elsewhere — sometimes more than once. In the 2005 series premiere, " Rose", it is revealed that the Ninth Doctor was instrumental in preventing a family from boarding the Titanic prior to her fateful voyage. In " The End of the World", the Doctor claimed to have been on board and survived the Titanic's sinking to find himself 'clinging to an iceberg.' The Fourth Doctor also mentioned this event in Robot and The Invasion of Time, where he claims the sinking was not his fault.

Many historical figures on Earth have also encountered the Doctor. In City of Death it is revealed that the Doctor has met Leonardo da Vinci and William Shakespeare (whom he re-met in " The Shakespeare Code"), and that the first folio of the latter's Hamlet was transcribed by the Doctor himself (City of Death). He has also met a young H. G. Wells ( Timelash), Albert Einstein ( Time and the Rani), Mao Zedong ( The Mind of Evil), Richard the Lionheart ( The Crusade), Wyatt Earp ( The Gunfighters) and Marco Polo ( Marco Polo). More recently, the Doctor has shared adventures with Charles Dickens (" The Unquiet Dead"), Queen Victoria (" Tooth and Claw"), and Madame de Pompadour (" The Girl in the Fireplace"). A photograph seen in the 2005 series shows that the Ninth Doctor witnessed the death of US president John F. Kennedy. A deleted scene from the episode " The Lazarus Experiment", included on the Series 3 DVD set, reveals that the Doctor helped in the writing of the United States Declaration of Independence, taking credit for the reference to "the pursuit of happiness". According to the scene, the Doctor possesses a first draft copy of the document tucked away in the pocket of a rarely-worn tuxedo.

It is this penchant for becoming "involved" with the universe — in direct violation of official Time Lord policy — that has caused the Doctor to be labelled a renegade by the Time Lords. Most of the time, however, his actions are tolerated, especially given that he has saved not just Gallifrey but also the universe several times over. The Time Lords are also partial to sending him on missions when deniability or expendability is needed. The Doctor's standing in Time Lord society has waxed and waned over the years, from being a hunted man to being appointed Lord President of the High Council (he does not assume the office for very long, and is eventually removed from it in his absence). However, some Time Lords respect him to some degree for his heroic deeds. In the end, though, the Doctor has always seemed quite content to remain a renegade and an exile.

By the time of his ninth incarnation, the Doctor believes himself to be the last surviving Time Lord following the Last Great Time War, although he learns in his tenth incarnation that the Master also survived (" Utopia"). Despite the Doctor's desperate attempts to save the Master from his evil ways, the Master is shot by his wife and refuses to regenerate, seemingly leaving the Doctor alone once more (" Last of the Time Lords"). However, the final scenes involving the Master's body leave the possibility of future regeneration open.

"Doctor who?"

In the first episode, Barbara addresses the Doctor as "Doctor Foreman", as this is the surname the Doctor's granddaughter Susan goes by, and the junkyard in which they find him bears the sign "I.M. Foreman". When addressed by Ian with this name in the next episode, the Doctor responds, "Eh? Doctor who? What's he talking about?" Later, when he realises that "Foreman" is not the Doctor's name, Ian asks Barbara, "Who is he? Doctor who?" (In an ultimately-unused idea from documents written at the series' inception, Barbara and Ian would have subsequently referred to the Doctor as 'Dr. Who', given their not knowing his real given name.)

Similarly, in the 2005 series premiere, "Rose", when asked his name, the Doctor replies, "Just 'The Doctor'." New companion Rose Tyler later finds a website devoted to the Doctor on the Internet, run by a conspiracy theorist who has been tracking the Ninth Doctor's appearances throughout history, carrying the title "DOCTOR WHO?" (see Doctor Who tie-in websites). The BBC launched a "real" version of this website at "WHO IS DOCTOR WHO?", with the idea that it is run by Mickey Smith, Rose's boyfriend (having taken over the site following the death of its originator).

In " The Empty Child" (2005), for want of a better name, Rose introduces the Doctor to Jack Harkness as " Mr. Spock". (According to the DVD commentary for this episode, the Doctor was originally to have responded "I'd rather have 'Doctor Who' than Star Trek".)

Although listed in the on-screen credits for nearly twenty years as "Doctor Who" or "Dr Who", the Doctor is never really called by that name in the series, except in that same tongue-in-cheek manner (for example, in The Five Doctors when one character refers to him as "the Doctor", another character asks, "Who?"). The only real exception is the computer WOTAN in the serial The War Machines, which commands that "Doctor Who is required." The Third Doctor's automobile, dubbed "Bessie", carried the licence plate WHO 1, the only ongoing reference to the "Doctor Who" enigma in the original series. The Third Doctor also later drove an outlandish vehicle called the " Whomobile". However, this name was only applied to it in publicity and it is never referred to as such in the series, being simply known as "the Doctor's car". The name "Doctor Who" is also used in the title of the serial Doctor Who and the Silurians, but this was a captioning mistake and not an in-story mention. The only other time this occurs is in the title of Episode 5 of The Chase: "The Death of Doctor Who".

In the Third Doctor serial The Dæmons the Doctor is briefly given the alias of the Great Wizard Qui Quae Quod. This is actually the masculine, feminine and neuter forms of the interrogative "who" in the Latin language.

In " The Girl in the Fireplace" (2006), Madame de Pompadour reads the Doctor's mind and remarks about his name, "Doctor who? It's more than just a secret, isn't it?" In the podcast commentary on the BBC website, writer Steven Moffat suggests that, as the Doctor does not tell even his closest companions his name, there must be a "dreadful secret" about it. Within the same commentary, Moffat and actor Noel Clarke jokingly suggest his name to be "Curtis". Ironically, according to the in-vision commentary on the DVD release, David Tennant had to inform actress Sophia Myles (who played Madame de Pompadour) that she was not, in fact, revealing the Doctor's surname as she believed was the intent of the dialogue. In " The Shakespeare Code" the Carrionite Lilith remarks, "Why would a man hide his title in such despair?"

Doctor Who spin-off media, which are of uncertain canonicity, have suggested that the character uses the name "the Doctor" because his actual name is impossible for humans to pronounce. This is also repeated by companion Peri Brown in the radio serial Slipback.

Peter Cushing, in the films Dr. Who and the Daleks and Daleks — Invasion Earth 2150 AD referred to himself as "Dr. Who". However, these films are not considered canon with the rest of the series, even though they were based on the first two Dalek adventures with William Hartnell.

Alias the Doctor

Quite apart from his name, why the Doctor uses the title of "the Doctor" has never been explained on screen. The Doctor, at first, said that he was not a medical doctor, often referring to himself as a scientist or an engineer. However he does occasionally show medical knowledge and has stated that he studied under Joseph Lister and Joseph Bell on separate occasions. In The Moonbase, the Second Doctor mentions that he studied for a medical degree in Glasgow during the 19th Century. He has also been mocked by his fellow Time Lords for adhering to such a "lowly" title as "Doctor", although in The Armageddon Factor he tells Drax that he achieved his doctorate, indicating it was at least a somewhat respectable title. In " The Girl in the Fireplace", he draws an analogy between the title and Madame de Pompadour's. In " The Sound Of Drums", the Master remarks to the Doctor that they both chose their names, and that it was sanctimonious of the Doctor to identify himself as "the man who makes people better", as well as the fact that one of the Master's assistants calls him a doctor of "everything".

The Telos novella Frayed by Tara Samms (which takes place prior to "An Unearthly Child") has the First Doctor being given that title by the staff of a besieged human medical facility on the planet Iwa, suggesting at the end that the Doctor liked the official title so much that he adopted it. However, this does not quite explain why the Time Lords use the same title in addressing him. The same story also has Jill, a young girl living in the facility, naming the Doctor's granddaughter "Susan" after Jill's mother. The canonicity of all non-television sources is uncertain.

To make up for his lack of a practical name, the Doctor often relies upon convenient pseudonyms. In The Gunfighters, the First Doctor uses the alias Dr. Caligari. In The Highlanders the Second Doctor assumes the name of "Doctor von Wer" (a German approximation of "Doctor Who"), and signs himself as "Dr. W" in The Underwater Menace. In The Wheel in Space, his companion Jamie McCrimmon, reading the name off some medical equipment, tells the crew of the Wheel that the Doctor's name is "John Smith". The Doctor subsequently adopts this alias several times over the course of the series, often prefixing the title "Doctor" to it. This name is particularly prominent during his third incarnation when, as scientific advisor to UNIT, he gives it to Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart to be put on his official credentials. The Eighth Doctor's companion Grace briefly refers to him by the alias "Dr Bowman" in the 1996 Doctor Who television movie.

In " New Earth", it is implied that the Doctor is part of the prophecy of the Face of Boe and is referred to as "The Lonely God". In "Tooth and Claw", having landed in Scotland, the Tenth Doctor introduces himself as "Dr James McCrimmon" from the township of Balamory. James Robert McCrimmon is in fact the full name of the Second Doctor's companion more commonly known as Jamie. Later in that episode, the Doctor is knighted by Queen Victoria as "Sir Doctor of TARDIS."

To his greatest enemies, the Daleks, the Doctor is known as the Ka Faraq Gatri, the "Bringer of Darkness" or "Destroyer of Worlds". This is first mentioned in the novelisation of Remembrance of the Daleks by Ben Aaronovitch and subsequently taken up in the spin-off media, particularly the Virgin New Adventures books and the Doctor Who Magazine comic strip. In " The Parting of the Ways", the Doctor claims that the Daleks call him "The Oncoming Storm" — this name is used by the Draconians (whose word for it is "Karshtakavaar") to refer to the Doctor in the Virgin New Adventures novel Love and War by Paul Cornell.

The series has also occasionally toyed with the Doctor's identity (or lack thereof). In the first part of The Mysterious Planet, the Doctor suggests writing a thesis on "Ancient Life on Ravolox, by Doctor...", but is interrupted by Peri. In The Armageddon Factor, the Time Lord Drax addresses the Fourth Doctor as "Thete", short for "Theta Sigma"; later, in The Happiness Patrol, this was clarified as a nickname from the Doctor's University days. In Remembrance of the Daleks the Seventh Doctor produces a calling card with a series of pseudo-Greek letters inscribed on it (as well as a stylised question mark). This may be a reference to Terrance Dicks' and Malcolm Hulke's book The Making of Doctor Who (1972), which claims that the Doctor's true name is a string of Greek and mathematical symbols.

The question mark motif was common throughout the eighties, in part as a branding attempt. Beginning with season eighteen, the Fourth through Seventh Doctors all sported costumes with a question mark motif (usually on the lapels, except in the Seventh Doctor's case on his pullover and the shape of his umbrella handle). In the 1988 serial Remembrance of the Daleks, the Seventh Doctor is asked to sign a document; although the signature itself is not directly seen on screen, his hand movements clearly indicate that he signs it with a question mark.

It was mentioned by Tom Baker, the Fourth Doctor, during an interview with The Age in 2003, that the Doctor is called so because he is "a doctor of time and relative dimension in space". Apart from being called a doctor of the TARDIS, the Doctor has also been referred to as just a "doctor of time travel".

On-screen credits

In the early years of the spin-off comic strips, books, films and other media, the character was initially called "Doctor Who" (or just "Dr Who") in the stories as a matter of course. This usage declined as the years went by.

Perhaps complicating the matter is that, from the first television serial through to Logopolis (the last story of Season 18 and also of the Tom Baker era), the lead character was credited as "Doctor Who" (or sometimes "Dr Who"). Starting from Peter Davison's first story, Castrovalva (the first story of the series' Season 19) to the end of Season 26, he is credited simply as "The Doctor".

This format is continued in the 1996 television movie for Paul McGann's credit, while Sylvester McCoy's incarnation is credited as "The Old Doctor". For the 2005 revival starring Christopher Eccleston, the credit reverted to "Doctor Who". However, in " The Christmas Invasion", and subsequent stories featuring David Tennant, the character is once again referred to in the closing credits as "The Doctor". According to Doctor Who Magazine #367 this reversion was specifically requested by Tennant.

Changing faces

The changing of actors playing the part of the Doctor is explained within the series by the Time Lords' ability to regenerate after suffering illness, mortal injury or old age ("wearing a bit thin"). The process repairs and rejuvenates all damage, but as a side-effect it changes his physical appearance and personality. This ability was not introduced until producers had to find a way to replace the ailing William Hartnell with Patrick Troughton and was not explicitly called "regeneration" until Jon Pertwee's transformation to Tom Baker at the climax of Planet of the Spiders (1974). On screen, the transformation from Hartnell to Troughton was called a "renewal" and from Troughton to Pertwee a "change of appearance".

The original concept of regeneration or renewal was that the Doctor's body would rebuild itself in a younger, healthier form. The Second Doctor was intended to be a literally younger version of the First; biological time would turn back, and several hundred years would get taken off the Doctor's age, rejuvenating him. In practice, however, after the Doctor stated his age in the Second Doctor serial The Tomb of the Cybermen (1967), the Doctor's age has been recorded progressively, however many regenerations the Doctor goes through (but see below). Coincidentally or otherwise, the general trend has been toward increasingly younger actors for the role, with only Jon Pertwee and Colin Baker being older than their predecessors.

The actors who have played the Doctor in the series, and the dates of their first and last regular television appearances in the role, are:

First Doctor - William Hartnell: ( 23 November 1963 – 29 October 1966), Richard Hurndall ( 25 November 1983)
Second Doctor - Patrick Troughton: ( 29 October 1966 – 21 June 1969)
Third Doctor - Jon Pertwee: ( 3 January 1970 – 8 June 1974)
Fourth Doctor - Tom Baker: ( 8 June 1974 – 21 March 1981)
Fifth Doctor - Peter Davison: ( 21 March 1981 – 16 March 1984)
Sixth Doctor - Colin Baker: ( 16 March 1984 – 6 December 1986)
Seventh Doctor - Sylvester McCoy: ( 7 September 1987 – 6 December 1989 in the series, and 27 May 1996 in the Doctor Who film)
Eighth Doctor - Paul McGann: ( 27 May 1996, in the Doctor Who film).
Ninth Doctor - Christopher Eccleston: ( 26 March 2005 – 18 June 2005)
Tenth Doctor - David Tennant: ( 18 June 2005 – present)

Actors who have played the Doctor in the Dr. Who cinema films:

Dr. Who and the Daleks - Peter Cushing: 1965
Daleks - Invasion Earth 2150 AD - Peter Cushing: 1966

Personality

Throughout his regenerations, the Doctor's personality has retained a number of consistent traits. Its most notable aspect is an unpredictable, affable, clownish exterior concealing a well of great age, wisdom, seriousness and even darkness. While the Doctor can appear childlike and jocular, when the stakes rise, as, for example, in Pyramids of Mars, he will often become cold, driven and even callous. Another aspect of the Doctor's persona, which, though always present, has been emphasised or downplayed from incarnation to incarnation, is compassion. The Doctor is a fervent pacifist and is dedicated to the preservation of sentient life, human or otherwise, over violence and war, even going so far as to doubt the morality of destroying his worst enemies, the Daleks, when he has the chance to do so in Genesis of the Daleks, and again in " Evolution of the Daleks". He also, in The Time Monster, begs Kronos to spare the Master torment or death, unintentionally winning the evil Time Lord's freedom, which he tells Jo Grant was preferable anyway, and forgives the Master for his actions in " The Sound of Drums" and " Last of the Time Lords", vowing to take responsibility for his former friend. Nonetheless, the Doctor will kill when given no other option and occasionally in self-defence; examples of this can be seen in Spearhead from Space, The Three Doctors, The Brain of Morbius, The Talons of Weng-Chiang, The Invasion of Time, Earthshock, The Two Doctors, " The Christmas Invasion", " The Runaway Bride" and most notably in Remembrance of the Daleks when he arranges for the planet Skaro to be destroyed; it is also suggested he may have been responsible for destroying both the Dalek and Time Lord races in order to end the Time War referenced numerous times in the series beginning in 2005. Another example of the Doctor purposely taking a life is The Sontaran Experiment, where he tells Harry Sullivan to remove a device from the Sontaran ship, an act which results in the death of the Sontaran. In the 2005 episode " The End of the World", the Doctor teleports Cassandra back onto the ship and does nothing to prevent her death, even ignoring her cries for help and pity. On other occasions he is seen to be critical of others who use deadly force, such as his companions Leela in The Face of Evil and Talons of Weng-Chiang, or Jack Harkness in " Utopia".

The Doctor has a deep sense of right and wrong, and a conviction that it is right to intervene when injustice occurs, which sets him apart from his own people, the Time Lords, and their strict ethic of non-intervention.

Although throughout his regenerations the Doctor remains essentially the same person, each actor has purposely imbued his incarnation of the role with distinct quirks and characteristics and the production teams purposefully dictate new personality traits for each actor to portray.

To contrast with the First Doctor's impish, occasionally standoffish, upstanding grandfatherly figure, the Second Doctor was played as a superficially warm and bumbling character hiding a deeply calculating mind. He was occasionally capable of panicking but always recognised and relished his role as a champion of the oppressed.

The Third Doctor made the best of his Earth exile - forced on him by the Time Lords - as a cantankerous, swashbuckling dandy who was continually frustrated by his inability to repair his TARDIS, which the Time Lords had disabled and additionally blocked the parts of his memory that allowed him to effect repairs. Unlike most other Doctors, he was also a formidable hand-to-hand combatant and was also the most obvious about his love of gadgetry, machinery and the finer things in life.

The Fourth Doctor basked in freedom with his more bohemian manner and off-kilter behaviours, charisma and humour but was also perhaps the most brooding, adventurous, authoritative and aloof incarnation of all, appearing to be particularly aware of his capabilities and his Time Lord roots. He also seemed to possess the most alien personality of all the regenerations, with almost casual displays of intelligence, interpersonal skill and situational awareness mixed in with and/or buried under a mixture of exuberance, indifference, sombreness and seeming addle-mindedness. As an adventurer and a space-time traveller, he was supremely confident in his abilities, having hundreds of years of experience to draw from and was able to now both directly and indirectly turn almost any situation into one he would win.

The sensitive, vulnerable, peaceful and less commanding Fifth Doctor was very much a long-lived soul in spite of his youthful body. These aspects somewhat belied his dashing manner, self-awareness and playful sarcasm. He emphasised a more open, diplomatic and pacifistic approach to life that was ultimately at severe odds with the vagaries and violence of the universal evils he encountered, leading indecision to affect this particular Doctor greatly.

The Sixth Doctor asserted himself as a flamboyant, pretentious blowhard whose arrogance belied his core traits and strong desire to carry out justice across time. His sense of superiority and prickly temperament initially made for a difficult relationship with his companion and he could be considered the most unpredictable (or outright unstable) persona thus far. Eventually, his self-importance gave way somewhat to his heroism and he became a somewhat more agreeable and openly upstanding, though no less bombastic being.

The Seventh Doctor was a natural performer who at first seemed clownish and whimsical, then later also darker, calculating, more driven and manipulative. He was a gameplayer with anyone and everyone he came across, deliberately shrouding himself in mystique, carrying the weight of the universe on his shoulders and was prepared to go to ruthless extremes for the greater good, even destroying the planet of his greatest enemies and playing with the emotions and history of his companion to root out and defeat evil. He was driven by a near all-consuming desire to tie up loose ends and rid the universe of threats, waging his campaigns against his enemies with meticulous and complicated plans and traps. Yet he was also strongly against direct violence and possessed a unique ability to simply defeat his enemies by talking them down or outdebating them. More than any other Doctor, he utilised his intellect as his greatest weapon and even though he kept his love of science, he would rarely use an invention - if so, not usually one of his own design - to win the day. He was still capable of empathy and compassion but now adhered more and more to a different moral code.

The Eighth was more of a Byronesque figure, possessed of an infectious enthusiasm about the universe.

The Ninth Doctor was an enigmatic figure, impulsive, witty and almost manic on the surface yet hiding a deep anger, sadness and loneliness that, as with some previous Doctors, his outer behaviour seemed almost designed to obscure. Although somewhat outgoing, he openly disliked certain interpersonal situations, for example stating "I don't do domestic" when refusing to have dinner with his companion and her mother. He was also much more streetwise in his appearance and speech patterns than his previous selves, being quicker to forthrightness and favouring a more direct and blunt approach as he saw fit. He had a colder, less forgiving personality, perhaps hardened by the Time War that destroyed Gallifrey and left him the last of the Time Lords sometime prior to his first screen appearance. He was haunted by his actions during the War, in which he was responsible for the destruction of ten million Dalek warships, an action that apparently also destroyed the Time Lords. His guilt and resultant lack of caution would often have consequences for his effectiveness in the face of danger and he often won his victories by enabling others to realise their own heroic impulses.

The Tenth Doctor is flippant, energetic, talkative and is gregarious and friendly with new people, yet with a self-assuredness that sometimes verges on hubris. His loneliness as an immortal and the apparent last member of his race has also become one of his defining characteristics and he repeatedly acknowledges it more than his previous incarnation ever did, occasionally leading to flashes of sombreness. He is still quick to anger and on several occasions shows a hard quality, offering no second chances or warnings to foes. His exuberance sometimes overcomes his sensitivity - for example, his flippancy in the face of the werewolf in " Tooth and Claw" so horrifies Queen Victoria that, shortly after knighting him, she exiles him from the British Empire. His chosen role when responding to threats is more akin to policing.

Despite his personality changes, however, the Doctor remains at his core a heroic figure, fighting the evils of the universe as he encounters them, even if his values and motives are sometimes alien.

Accent

Different actors have used different regional accents in the role. The first six Doctors spoke in Received Pronunciation or "BBC English", as was standard on British television at the time. Sylvester McCoy used a very mild version of his own Scottish accent in the role, and Paul McGann spoke with a faint Liverpudlian lilt. Only rarely, as in the case of the Eighth Doctor, who was identified by American characters as "British", or the Ninth, whose accent was clearly described as " Northern", was this even addressed in the series (in the latter case with the line, "lots of planets have a North"). Another example is in The Tomb of the Cybermen when the Doctor is identified as "English" and, dissembling, plays along. Though David Tennant speaks with a natural Scottish accent, he plays the Doctor with an Estuary accent (Except in " Tooth and Claw" when, in the Highlands, the character is pretending to be a local). According to producer Russell T. Davies, this was intended as a consequence of spending so much time with Rose. "The Christmas Invasion" would have alluded to this, but the line was cut. The audio series which aired on BBC7 in 2007 starred Paul McGann as the Eighth Doctor and Sheridan Smith as Lucie Miller, who speaks with the actress' own strong Northern accent, so it is possible that he obtains the Ninth Doctor's Northern accent from Lucie in a similar way to Rose's 'rubbing off' on him. However, like all spin-off media, the canonicity is unclear. Davies also said that after Eccleston's accent, he did not want Tennant "touring the regions" with a Scottish one, and so asked Tennant to affect the same accent he used for the earlier BBC period drama Casanova.

Changing fashions

The Doctor's clothing has been equally distinctive, from the distinguished Edwardian suits of the First Doctor to the Second Doctor's rumpled, Chaplinesque attire to the frills and velvet of the Third Doctor's era. The Fourth Doctor's long frock coat, loose fitting trousers, occasionally worn wide-brimmed hat and trailing, multistriped scarf added to his somewhat shambolic and bohemian image; the Fifth's Edwardian cricketer's outfit suited his youthful, aristocratic air as well as his love of the sport (with a stick of celery on the lapel for an eccentric touch); and the Sixth's multicoloured jacket, with its cat-shaped lapel pins, reflected the excesses of 1980s fashion. The Seventh Doctor's outfit — a straw hat, a coat with two scarves, a tie, checked trousers and brogues/wingtips — was more subdued and suggestive of a showman, reflecting his whimsical approach to life. In later seasons, as his personality grew more mysterious, his jacket, tie, and hatband all grew darker.

Throughout the 1980s, question marks formed a constant motif, usually on the shirt collars or, in the case of the Seventh Doctor, on his sleeveless jumper and the handle to his umbrella. The idea was grounded in branding considerations, as was the movement starting in Tom Baker's final season toward an unchanging costume for each Doctor, rather than the variants on a theme employed over the first seventeen years of the programme. When the Eighth Doctor regenerated, he clad himself in a 19th century frock coat and shirt based around a Wild Bill Hickok costume, reminiscent of the out-of-time quality of earlier Doctors and emphasising the Eighth Doctor's more Romantic persona.

In contrast to the more flamboyant outfits of his predecessors, the Ninth Doctor wore a nondescript, worn black leather jacket, V-neck jumper and dark trousers. Eccleston stated that he felt that such definitive "costumes" were passé and that the character's trademark eccentricities should show through their actions and clever dialogue, not through gimmicky costumes. Despite this, there is a running joke about his character that the only piece of clothing he changes is his jumper, even when trying to "blend into" an historical era. The one exception, a photograph of him taken in 1912, wearing period gentleman's clothing, resembles the style of the Eighth Doctor; some speculate that this may have been immediately after his regeneration, when he was still wearing the outfit of his previous incarnation.

The Tenth Doctor sports either a blue or a brown pinstripe suit - usually worn with ties - a tan ankle-length coat and trainers, the latter recalling the plimsolls worn by his fifth incarnation. Also like that incarnation (and his first one), he occasionally wears spectacles: a pair with brown, thick-rimmed frames. It is revealed in the 2007 Children in Need Special that he doesn't actually need the glasses to see, but rather wears them to look clever. In interviews, Tennant has referred to his Doctor's attire as geek chic. According to Tennant he had always wanted to wear the trainers, however, the overall costume was influenced by an outfit worn by Jamie Oliver in a TV interview on the talk show Parkinson.

The Tenth Doctor says in " The Runaway Bride" that, like the TARDIS, his pockets are bigger on the inside. The Second, Fourth and Seventh Doctors routinely carried numerous items in their coats without this being conspicuous.

Transitions

Save for the off-screen transition between the Eighth and Ninth Doctors, to date each regeneration has been worked into the continuing story. Also, most regenerations (save the Second-to-Third and Eighth-to-Ninth transitions) have been portrayed on-screen, in a symbolic handing over of the role. The following list details the manner of each regeneration:

First Doctor (Hartnell): apparently succumbed to old age, steadily growing weaker throughout The Tenth Planet and collapsing at the serial's end. Although the writer's intent was that this was due to the energy drain from the planet Mondas, this was not made clear in the transmitted story.
Second Doctor (Troughton): a forced "change in appearance" and exile to Earth by the Time Lords in the closing moments of The War Games.
Third Doctor (Pertwee): radiation poisoning from the Great One's cave of crystals at the end of Planet of the Spiders.
Fourth Doctor (Baker, T): fell from the Pharos Project radio telescope in Logopolis.
Fifth Doctor (Davison): spectrox toxaemia, contracted near the start of The Caves of Androzani.
Sixth Doctor (Baker, C): suffered unspecified injuries when the Rani attacked the TARDIS and caused it to crash land at the start of Time and the Rani.
Seventh Doctor (McCoy): died in San Francisco during exploratory heart surgery by a doctor unfamiliar with Time Lord physiology, after being hospitalised for non-life threatening gunshot wounds in the 1996 television movie.
Eighth Doctor (McGann): not yet revealed. Implied to be a result of the Time War.
Ninth Doctor (Eccleston): cellular degeneration caused by absorbing the energies of the space-time vortex from Rose, which she in turn had absorbed through the heart of the TARDIS in " The Parting of the Ways".

In the original series, with the exception of the change from Troughton to Pertwee, regeneration usually occurred when the previous Doctor was near "death". The changeover from McCoy to McGann was handled differently, with the Doctor actually dying and being dead for quite some time before regeneration occurred. The Eighth Doctor comments at one point in the television movie that the anesthesia interfered with the regenerative process, and that he had been "dead too long", accounting for his initial amnesia.

The 2005 series began with the Ninth Doctor already regenerated and fully stabilized, with no explanation given. In his first appearance in "Rose", the Doctor looked in a mirror and commented on the size of his ears, suggesting that the regeneration may have happened shortly prior to the episode, or that he has not examined himself in the mirror recently. However, the Ninth Doctor's appearances in old photographs, without being accompanied by Rose, may also suggest that he had been regenerated for some time. Russell T. Davies, writer/producer of the new series, stated in Doctor Who Magazine that he has no intention of showing the regeneration in the series, and that he believed the story of how the Eighth Doctor became the Ninth is best told in other media. In Doctor Who Confidential Davies revealed his reasoning that, after such a long hiatus, a regeneration in the first episode would not just be confusing for new viewers but also lack dramatic impact, as there would be no emotional investment in the character before he was replaced.

Eccleston stepped down from the role at the end of the 2005 series, and the Ninth Doctor regenerated into the Tenth in "The Parting of the Ways". It remains to be seen whether the Ninth Doctor will appear again, although Russell T. Davies has stated that he does not intend to bring back former Doctors. (Despite this, Peter Davison did briefly reprise the role of the Fifth Doctor in the 2007 Children in Need charity special alongside Tenth Doctor David Tennant.)

Regenerations

It was established in The Deadly Assassin (1976) that a Time Lord can regenerate twelve times before permanently dying - a total of thirteen incarnations. In the 1996 television movie the Eighth Doctor explicitly said that a Time Lord has "thirteen lives". (The Doctor's enemy, The Master has, however, been shown circumventing this limit on several occasions.) In "The Christmas Invasion" it was stated the regenerative cycle creates a large amount of energy that suffuses the Time Lord's body. As demonstrated by the Tenth Doctor for the first time in that story, in the first fifteen hours of regeneration this energy is enough to even rapidly regrow a severed hand.

The Doctor's regenerations are usually as a result of his previous incarnation sustaining mortal injury or (in one case) having a change forced on him by the Time Lords. Other Time Lord regenerations, like Romana's, have not been as dramatic or painful.

The Doctor frequently experiences a period of instability and partial amnesia following regeneration. Some post-regeneration experiences have been more difficult than others. In particular, the Fifth Doctor began reverting to his previous personalities and required the healing powers of the TARDIS's "Zero Room" to recuperate ( Castrovalva). The Sixth Doctor experienced extreme paranoia and flew into a murderous rage, nearly killing his companion ( The Twin Dilemma). The Eighth Doctor not only experienced amnesia, but some fans attribute his romantic actions towards his companion to post-regeneration trauma (1996 Doctor Who television movie).

The regeneration from the Ninth to the Tenth Doctor at first seemed smooth, with the Doctor regenerating standing up for the first time (" The Parting of the Ways"). However, shortly afterwards he began to experience spasms and became somewhat manic, frightening his companion as he pushed the TARDIS to dangerous extremes ( Children in Need mini-episode). After crash-landing the TARDIS, the Doctor collapsed and remained unconscious for most of the next fifteen hours (" The Christmas Invasion"). The experience was traumatic enough to cause one of his hearts to temporarily stop beating.

As noted above, the newly regenerated Tenth Doctor was able to regrow his hand when it was severed at the wrist during a swordfight with the Sycorax leader. This ability had never been exhibited before, but no previous Doctor had ever suffered an injury of this nature so soon after regeneration (although Romana did exhibit some degree of control over her regenerative process). The Tenth Doctor's lack of reaction to the injury may also point to increased pain tolerance during this period.

The TARDIS also appears to aid in the regenerative process. Of the four occasions the Doctor regenerates outside the TARDIS, one was forced on him by the Time Lords (The War Games), one required a Time Lord to give the Doctor's cells a "little push" to start the process (Planet of the Spiders), one needed the TARDIS Zero Room to help him recover (Castrovalva) and the last apparently occurred a few hours after he had actually "died", leaving him with temporary amnesia (the 1996 television movie).

Continuity curiosities

Over the years, different writers and production teams have introduced their own twists to the Doctor's character, sometimes as part of a grand creative reinvention; others, out of narrative convenience or outside pressures. Without one driving vision to maintain continuity, newer details may occasionally seem to contradict earlier ones. Other details — sometimes significant ones — are later ignored, sometimes leading to argument amongst series fans as to how, or whether, these details apply in a broader context.

In the early serials The Edge of Destruction and The Sensorites, it appeared that the First Doctor had only a single heart. To rectify the apparent inconsistency, a commonly held piece of fan continuity (referenced in the novel The Man in the Velvet Mask by Daniel O'Mahony) is that Time Lords only grow their second heart during their first regeneration. In The Mind of Evil, " The Christmas Invasion" and " The Shakespeare Code" one of the Doctor's hearts temporarily stops beating due to intense trauma; this may or may not explain the First Doctor's situation.

Also during his first regeneration, and for similarly unclear reasons, the Doctor's clothes (save for his cloak and ring, both of which quickly thereafter fall off) changed along with his body ( The Power of the Daleks); on all subsequent regenerations, the new Doctor generally continues to wear the clothing he regenerated in (albeit changed enough to fit the new body) until he selects a new outfit (though due to a continuity error, the regeneration from the Fourth to the Fifth Doctors included a change of footwear).

In The Brain of Morbius (produced shortly before The Deadly Assassin), visual images displayed during a mental battle between the Fourth Doctor and Morbius can be taken as implying that the Doctor had at least eight incarnations prior to the First Doctor. However, multiple dialogue references throughout the series (particularly in The Three Doctors, Mawdryn Undead and The Five Doctors) contradict this, as well as the fact that the Doctor has regenerated six times since then (as stated in "School Reunion"). Explanations have included theories that the images we