Doctor Who is a British science fiction television programme produced by the BBC. The programme depicts the adventures of a mysterious and eccentric Time Lord known as the Doctor who travels through time and space in his time machine, the TARDIS (an acronym for Time And Relative Dimension(s) In Space), which normally appears from the exterior to be a blue 1950s British police box. With his companions, he explores time and space, faces a variety of foes and saves civilizations, helping people and righting wrongs.
The programme is listed in Guinness World Records as the longest-running science fiction television show in the world,[1]
and as the "most successful" science fiction series of all time, in
terms of its overall broadcast ratings, DVD and book sales, iTunes
traffic, and "illegal downloads".[2] It has been recognised for its imaginative stories, creative low-budget special effects during its original run, and pioneering use of electronic music (originally produced by the BBC Radiophonic Workshop). The show is a significant part of British popular culture[3][4] in the United Kingdom and elsewhere it has become a cult television
favourite. The show has influenced generations of British television
professionals, many of whom grew up watching the series. It has
received recognition from critics and the public as one of the finest British television programmes, including the BAFTA Award for Best Drama Series in 2006, and five consecutive wins at the National Television Awards from 2005 to 2010, in the Drama category.[5][6]
The Doctor has been principally played by eleven actors. The transition from one actor to another is written into the plot of the show as regeneration,
whereby the character of the Doctor takes on a new body and, to some
extent, new personality. Although each portrayal is different, and on
occasion the various incarnations have even encountered one another,
they are all meant to be aspects of the same character. The Doctor is
currently portrayed by Matt Smith, who took up the role after David Tennant's final appearance in an episode broadcast on 1 January 2010.[8]A fifth series of the relaunched programme began on 3 April 2010,[9][10][11] in which the Eleventh Doctor is accompanied by Amy Pond, portrayed by Karen Gillan;[12] later in the season, the Doctor gained a second companion in Rory Williams, portrayed by Arthur Darvill.
The show's sixth series is due for broadcast in spring 2011, in which
it will run for seven weeks weekly before returning in the autumn for
the rest of the series.
Doctor Who first appeared on BBC television at 17:15 GMT on 23 November 1963,[13][14] following discussions and plans that had been in progress for a year. The Head of Drama, Sydney Newman,
was mainly responsible for developing the programme, with the first
format document for the series being written by Newman along with the
Head of the Script Department (later Head of Serials) Donald Wilson and staff writer C. E. Webber. Writer Anthony Coburn, story editorDavid Whitaker and initial producer Verity Lambert also heavily contributed to the development of the series.[15] The series' title theme was composed by Ron Grainer and realised by Delia Derbyshire of the BBC Radiophonic Workshop.[16] The programme was originally intended to appeal to a family audience.[17] The BBC drama department's Serials division produced the programme for 26 series, broadcast on BBC One.
Viewing numbers that had fallen (though comparably increased at some
points), a decline in the public perception of the show and a less
prominent transmission slot saw production suspended in 1989 by Jonathan Powell, Controller of BBC One.[18] Although (as series co-star Sophie Aldred reported in the documentary Doctor Who: More Than 30 Years in the TARDIS) it was effectively, if not formally, cancelled
with the decision not to commission a planned 27th series of the show
for transmission in 1990, the BBC repeatedly affirmed that the series
would return.[19]
While in-house production had ceased, the BBC was hopeful of finding an independent production company to relaunch the show. Philip Segal, a British expatriate who worked for Columbia Pictures'
television arm in the United States, had approached the BBC about such
a venture as early as July 1989, while the 26th series was still in
production.[19] Segal's negotiations eventually led to a television film. The Doctor Who television film was broadcast on the Fox Network in 1996 as a co-production between Fox, Universal Pictures, the BBC and BBC Worldwide.
Although the film was successful in the UK (with 9.1 million viewers),
it was less so in the United States and did not lead to a series.
Licensed media such as novels and audio plays provided new stories, but as a television programme Doctor Who remained dormant until 2003. In September of that year, BBC Television
announced the in-house production of a new series after several years
of unsuccessful attempts by BBC Worldwide to find backing for a feature
film version. The executive producers of the new incarnation of the
series were writer Russell T Davies and BBC Cymru Wales Head of Drama Julie Gardner. It has been sold to many other countries worldwide (see Viewership).
Doctor Who finally returned with the episode "Rose"
on BBC One on 26 March 2005. There have been four further series in
2006, 2007, 2008, and 2010 and Christmas Day specials every year from
2005 to 2010 inclusive. The fourth series began on BBC One on 5 April
2008. No full series was filmed in 2009 although four additional
specials starring David Tennant were made. A fifth full-length series began in Spring 2010,[20] with Steven Moffat replacing Davies as head writer and executive producer.[21]
The 2005 version of Doctor Who is a direct continuation of
the 1963–1989 series, as is the 1996 telefilm. This differs from other
series relaunches that have either been reimaginings or reboots (e.g., Battlestar Galactica and Bionic Woman)
or series taking place in the same universe as the original but in a
different time period and with different characters (e.g. Star Trek: The Next Generation and spin-offs).[22]
The programme rapidly became a national institution in the United
Kingdom, with a large following among the general viewing audience.[23] Many renowned actors asked for or were offered and accepted guest starring roles in various stories.
With popularity came controversy over the show's suitability for children. Morality campaigner Mary Whitehouse repeatedly complained to the BBC in the 1970s over what she saw as the show's frightening or gory content;[24] however, the programme became even more popular—especially with children. John Nathan-Turner,
who produced the series during the 1980s, was heard to say that he
looked forward to Whitehouse's comments, as the show's ratings would
increase soon after she had made them.[25] During the 1970s, the Radio Times announced that a child's mother said the theme music terrified her son. The Radio Times was apologetic, but the theme music remained.[citation needed]
There were more complaints about the programme's content than its music.[citation needed] During Jon Pertwee's second season as the Doctor, in the serial Terror of the Autons
(1971), images of murderous plastic dolls, daffodils killing
unsuspecting victims and blank-featured policemen marked the apex of
the show's ability to frighten children. Other notable moments in that
decade included the Doctor apparently being drowned by Chancellor Goth
in The Deadly Assassin (1976) and the allegedly negative portrayal of Chinese people in The Talons of Weng-Chiang (1977).
It has been said that watching Doctor Who from a position of safety "behind the sofa" (as the Doctor Who exhibition at the Museum of the Moving Image
in London was titled) and peering cautiously out to see if the
frightening part was over is one of the great shared experiences of
British childhood. The phrase has become commonly used in association
with the programme and occasionally elsewhere.[citation needed]
The Mark II fibreglass TARDIS used between 1980 and 1989
A BBC audience research survey conducted in 1972 found that by their
own definition of "any act(s) which may cause physical and / or
psychological injury, hurt or death to persons, animals or property,
whether intentional or accidental," Doctor Who was the most violent of all the drama programmes the corporation then produced.[26] The same report found that 3% of the surveyed audience regarded the show as "very unsuitable" for family viewing.[27] However, responding to the findings of the survey in The Times newspaper, journalist Philip Howard maintained that: "to compare the violence of Dr Who,
sired by a horse-laugh out of a nightmare, with the more realistic
violence of other television series, where actors who look like human
beings bleed paint that looks like blood, is like comparing Monopoly with the property market in London: both are fantasies, but one is meant to be taken seriously."[26]
The image of the TARDIS has become firmly linked to the show in the public's consciousness. In 1996, the BBC applied for a trademark to use the TARDIS' blue police box design in merchandising associated with Doctor Who.[28] In 1998, the Metropolitan Police Authority filed an objection to the trademark claim; but in 2002, the Patent Office ruled in favour of the BBC.[29]
The programme's broad appeal attracts audiences of children and families as well as science fiction fans.[30]
The 21st century revival of the programme has become the centrepiece
of BBC One's Saturday schedule, and has "defined the channel."[31] Since its return, Doctor Who has consistently received high ratings, both in number of viewers and as measured by the Appreciation Index.[32] In 2007, Caitlin Moran, television reviewer for The Times, wrote that Doctor Who is "quintessential to being British."[4] Director Steven Spielberg has commented that "the world would be a poorer place without Doctor Who."[33]
Doctor Who originally ran for 26 series
on BBC One, from 23 November 1963 until 6 December 1989. During the
original run, each weekly episode formed part of a story (or
"serial")—usually of four to six parts in earlier years and three to
four in later years. Notable exceptions were the epic The Daleks' Master Plan, which aired in twelve episodes (plus an earlier one-episode teaser, "Mission to the Unknown", featuring none of the regular cast),[34] almost an entire series of 7-episode serials (series 7), the 10-episode serial The War Games,[35] and The Trial of a Time Lord, which ran for 14 episodes (albeit divided into three production codes and four narrative segments) during Series 23.[36] Occasionally serials were loosely connected by a storyline, such as Series 8 being devoted to the Doctor battling a rogue Time Lord called The Master, Series 16's quest for The Key to Time, and Series 18's journey through E-Space and the theme of entropy.
The programme was intended to be educational and for family viewing
on the early Saturday evening schedule. Initially, it alternated
stories set in the past, which taught younger audience members about
history, with stories set either in the future or in outer space to
teach them about science. This was also reflected in the Doctor's
original companions, one of whom was a science teacher and another a
history teacher.
However, science fiction stories came to dominate the programme and
the "historicals", which were not popular with the production team,
were dropped after The Highlanders
(1967). While the show continued to use historical settings, they were
generally used as a backdrop for science fiction tales, with one
exception: Black Orchid set in 1920s England.[37]
The early stories were serial-like in nature, with the narrative of
one story flowing into the next, and each episode having its own title,
although produced as distinct stories with their own production codes.
Following The Gunfighters
(1966), however, each serial was given its own title, with the
individual parts simply being assigned episode numbers. What to name
these earlier stories is often a subject of fan debate.
The serial format changed for the 2005 revival,
with each series usually consisting of thirteen 45-minute,
self-contained episodes (60 minutes with adverts, on overseas
commercial channels), and an extended episode broadcast on Christmas
Day. Each series includes several standalone and multi-part stories,
linked with a loose story arc that resolves in the series finale. As in
the early "classic" era, each episode—whether standalone or part of a
larger story—has its own title. Occasionally, regular-season episodes
will exceed the 45-minute run time; examples have included the episodes
Journey's End from 2008 and The Eleventh Hour from 2010, both of which exceeded an hour in length.
770 Doctor Who instalments have been televised since 1963,
ranging between 25-minute episodes (the most common format), 45-minute
episodes (for Resurrection of the Daleks in the 1984 series, a single season in 1985, and the revival), two feature-length productions (1983's "The Five Doctors" and the 1996 television film), five 60-minute Christmas specials,
60-minute Easter and Autumn specials in 2009, a 72-minute Christmas
special in 2007, and a 75-minute New Year's special in 2009. Two
mini-episodes, running about eight minutes each, were also produced for
the 2005 and 2007 Children in Need charity appeals, while another mini episode was produced in 2008 for a Doctor Who-themed edition of The Proms.
The revived series was filmed in PAL576iDigiBeta wide-screen format and then filmised to give a 25p image in post-production using a Snell & Wilcox Alchemist Platinum. Starting from the 2009 special "Planet of the Dead", the series is filmed in 1080i for HDTV,[38] and broadcast simultaneously on BBC One and BBC HD.
Between about 1964 and 1973, large amounts of older material stored
in the BBC's various video tape and film libraries were either
destroyed,[39]wiped or suffered from poor storage which led to severe deterioration from broadcast quality. This included many old episodes of Doctor Who, mostly stories featuring the first three Doctors—William Hartnell, Patrick Troughton, and Jon Pertwee.
Following consolidations and recoveries the archives are complete from
the programme's move to colour television (starting from Jon Pertwee's
time as the Doctor), although a few Pertwee episodes have required
substantial restoration; a handful have been recovered only as black
and white films, and several survive in colour only as NTSC copies recovered from North America (a few of which are domestic, off-air Betamax tape recordings, not transmission quality). In all, 108
of 253 episodes produced during the first six years (most notably
series 3, 4, & 5, from which 90 episodes are missing) of the
programme are not held in the BBC's archives. It has been reported that
in 1972 almost all episodes then made were known to exist at the BBC,[40] whilst by 1978 the practice of wiping tapes and destroying 'spare' film copies had ended.[41]
No 1960s episodes exist on their original videotapes (all surviving
copies being film copies), though some were transferred to film for
editing before transmission, and these hence exist as originally
transmitted.
Some episodes have been returned to the BBC from the archives of
other countries who bought copies for broadcast, or by private
individuals who got them by various means. Early colour videotape
recordings made off-air by fans have also been retrieved, as well as
excerpts filmed from the television screen onto 8 mm cine film
and clips that were shown on other programmes. Audio versions of all of
the lost episodes exist from home viewers who made tape recordings of
the show.
In addition to these, there are off-screen photographs made by photographer John Cura, who was hired by various production personnel to document many of their programmes during the 1950s and 1960s, including Doctor Who. These have been used in fan reconstructions
of the serials. These amateur reconstructions have been tolerated by
the BBC, provided they are not sold for profit and are distributed as
low quality VHS copies.
One of the most sought-after lost episodes is Part Four of the last William Hartnell serial, The Tenth Planet (1966), which ends with the First Doctor transforming into the Second.
The only portion of this in existence, barring a few poor quality
silent 8 mm clips, is the few seconds of the regeneration scene, as it
was shown on the children's magazine show Blue Peter.
With the approval of the BBC, efforts are now under way to restore as
many of the episodes as possible from the extant material. Starting in
the early 1990s, the BBC began to release audio recordings of missing
serials on cassette and compact disc, with linking narration provided
by former series actors.
"Official" reconstructions have also been released by the BBC on VHS, on MP3CD-ROM and as a special feature on a DVD. The BBC, in conjunction with animation studio Cosgrove Hall has reconstructed the missing Episodes 1 and 4 of The Invasion
(1968), using remastered audio tracks and the comprehensive stage notes
for the original filming, for the serial's DVD release in November
2006. Although no similar reconstructions have been announced as of
2010, Cosgrove Hall has expressed an interest in animating more lost
episodes in the future.[42]
In April 2006, Blue Peter launched a challenge to find these missing episodes with the promise of a full scale Dalek model as a reward.[43]
The character of the Doctor was initially shrouded in mystery. All
that was known about him in the programme's early days was that he was
an eccentric alien traveller of great intelligence who battled
injustice while exploring time and space in an unreliable old time
machine called the "TARDIS", whose name is an acronym for "Time And Relative Dimension(s) In Space." As it appears much larger on the inside than on the outside, the TARDIS has been described by the Third Doctor
as "dimensionally transcendental," and the TARDIS embodies "Time Lord
Physics: 'It's bigger on the inside than the outside,'" as gleefully
explained in unison by the tenth Doctor and his companion Rose and by
the Doctor and the bride in "The Runaway Bride" episode.[44] Because of a malfunction of its chameleon circuit,
which normally allows it to disguise itself in a form befitting its
surroundings, it is stuck in the shape of a 1960s-style British police box after having disguised itself as one in 1963 London.
However, not only did the initially irascible and slightly sinister
Doctor quickly mellow into a more compassionate figure, it was
eventually revealed that he had been on the run from his own people,
the Time Lords of the planet Gallifrey.
As a Time Lord, the Doctor has the ability to regenerate
his body when near death. Introduced into the storyline as a way of
continuing the series when the writers were faced with the departure of
lead actor William Hartnell
in 1966, it has continued to be a major element of the series, allowing
for the recasting of the lead actor when the need arises. The serials The Deadly Assassin and Mawdryn Undead suggest that a Time Lord can regenerate twelve times, for a total of thirteen incarnations. However at least one Time Lord - the Master - managed to circumvent this (in The Keeper of Traken), albeit not imbued with the same immortality that Rassilon reputedly possessed.[45]
To date, the Doctor has fully gone through this process and its
resulting after-effects on ten occasions, with each of his incarnations
having their own quirks and abilities but otherwise sharing the
consciousness, memories, experience and basic personality of the
previous incarnations.
On other occasions the Doctor has been played by various other
actors which are considered to be alternate incarnations of the Doctor.
In October 2010, the Sunday Telegraph revealed that the series'
co-creator, Sydney Newman, had urged the BBC to recast the role of the
Doctor as a female "Time Lady" during the ratings crisis of the late
1980s.[49]
There have been instances of actors returning at later dates to
reprise the role of their specific doctor, despite this action often
going against the Time Lords' rules about how to travel in time and
space safely—for a Time Lord to meet his other selves, in particular,
would ordinarily contravene the "First Law Of Time," which prohibits
distortions of history. In 1973's The Three Doctors, William Hartnell and Patrick Troughton returned alongside Jon Pertwee. For 1983's The Five Doctors,
Troughton and Pertwee returned to star with Peter Davison, and Tom
Baker appeared in previously unseen footage from the uncompleted Shada episode. Patrick Troughton again returned in 1985's The Two Doctors with Colin Baker. Finally, Peter Davison returned in 2007's Children in Need short "Time Crash" alongside David Tennant.
There has also been an instance of another actor replacing the original actor. This has occurred on two occasions. In The Five Doctors,Richard Hurndall played the First Doctor due to William Hartnell's death. And in Time and the Rani,
Sylvester McCoy briefly played the Sixth Doctor during the regeneration
sequence, with McCoy carrying on as the Seventh. For more information,
see the list of actors who have played the Doctor.
Throughout the programme's long history, there have been revelations
about the Doctor that have resulted in controversies primarily due to
plot inconsistencies. In The Brain of Morbius
(1976), it was hinted that the First Doctor may not have been the first
incarnation (although the other faces depicted may have been
incarnations of the Time Lord Morbius). In subsequent stories the First
Doctor was depicted as the earliest incarnation of the Doctor. In Mawdryn Undead (1983) the Fifth Doctor explicitly confirmed that he was currently in his fifth incarnation.
During the Seventh Doctor's era it was hinted that the Doctor was more than just an ordinary Time Lord. In the 1996 television movie, he describes himself as being "half human."[50]
The revelation has become controversial amongst series fans, given that
there have been no references to the concept during the original or
revived television series.[51]
The very first episode, An Unearthly Child, shows that the Doctor has a granddaughter, Susan Foreman.
The 2005 series reveals that the Ninth Doctor thought he was the last
surviving Time Lord, and that his home planet had been destroyed; in "The Empty Child"
(2005), Constantine makes a statement that "before this war began, I
was a father and a grandfather. Now I am neither;" the Doctor remarks
in response, "Yeah, I know the feeling." In both "Fear Her" (2006) and "The Doctor's Daughter"
(2008), he states that he had, in the past, been a father. Also in the
latter, his cells are used to produce a daughter, played by Georgia Moffett, the real-life daughter of Fifth Doctor actor Peter Davison, who is subsequently named Jenny by Donna as a result of his describing her as "a generated anomaly."
The Doctor almost always shares his adventures with up to three
companions, and since 1963 more than 35 actors have been featured in
these roles. The First Doctor's original companions were his
granddaughter Susan Foreman (Carole Ann Ford) and school teachers Barbara Wright (Jacqueline Hill) and Ian Chesterton (William Russell). The only story from the original series in which the Doctor travels alone is The Deadly Assassin.
Dramatically, the companions' characters provide a surrogate
with whom the audience can identify, and serve to further the story by
requesting exposition from the Doctor and manufacturing peril for the
Doctor to resolve. The Doctor regularly gains new companions and loses
old ones; sometimes they return home or find new causes — or loves — on
worlds they have visited. Some have even died during the course of the
series.
Although the majority of the Doctor's companions have been young,
attractive women, the production team for the 1963–1989 series
maintained a long-standing taboo against any overt romantic involvement
in the TARDIS. The taboo was controversially broken in the 1996
television film when the Eighth Doctor was shown kissing companion Grace Holloway. See The Doctor and romance.
Previous companions reappeared in the series, usually for anniversary specials. One former companion, Sarah Jane Smith (played by Elisabeth Sladen), together with the robotic dog K-9, appeared in an episode of the 2006 series nearly 13 years after their last appearances in the 30th-anniversary story Dimensions in Time (1993). Sladen also starred as the character in an independent film spin-off, Downtime, in 1995. Afterward, the character was featured in the spin-off series The Sarah Jane Adventures. Sladen once again appeared as Sarah Jane in the final two episodes of the fourth series of the new Doctor Who, with K-9 appearing briefly in the final episode, "Journey's End".
Though not always considered a companion, Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart
was a recurring character in the original series, making his first
appearance alongside the Second Doctor and his final alongside the
Seventh. The actor Nicholas Courtney,
who portrayed the Brigadier, had previously also starred as Bret Vyon
alongside first Doctor, William Hartnell, in the 12-part The Daleks' Master Plan.
He appeared on television with every Doctor of the classic series
except Sixth Doctor Colin Baker, but appears with him in the charity
crossover special Dimensions in Time and in audio adventures from Big Finish Productions. Lethbridge-Stewart, still played by Courtney, appeared in Enemy of the Bane, a two-part episode of The Sarah Jane Adventures
spin-off in 2008, more than 40 years after the character was first
introduced, making him the longest-serving ongoing character in the
franchise beyond the Doctor himself. He and UNIT
appeared regularly during the Third Doctor's tenure, and UNIT has
continued to appear or to be referred to in the revival of the show and
its spin-offs.
When Sydney Newman commissioned the series, he specifically did not
want to perpetuate the cliché of the "bug-eyed monster" of science
fiction.[54] However, monsters were popular with audiences and so became a staple of Doctor Who almost from the beginning. Over the series' initial 26-year run, notable adversaries include the Autons, the Sontarans, the Cybermen, the Silurians and Sea Devils, the Ice Warriors, the Yeti, the Rani, and Davros, creator of the Daleks.
With the show's 2005 revival, executive producer Russell T Davies stated his intention to reintroduce classic icons of Doctor Who
one step at a time: the Autons and Daleks in series 1, Cybermen in
series 2, the Macra and the Master in series 3, the Sontarans and
Davros in series 4, and the Time Lords in the 2009-10 Specials. Davies'
successor, Steven Moffat, has continued the trend by reviving the
Silurians. Since its 2005 return, the series has also introduced new
recurring aliens, such as the Slitheen, Ood, Judoon, and Weeping Angels.
Over the years, several adversaries have become particularly iconic:
The Dalek race, which first appeared in the show's second serial in 1963, are Doctor Who's oldest antagonists. The Daleks are Kaled mutants from the planet Skaro,
who utilise tank-like mechanical armour shells for mobility. Their
chief role in the plot of the series, as they frequently remark in
their instantly recognisable metallic voices, is to "exterminate" all
beings inferior to themselves, even attacking the Time Lords in the often referred to but never shown Time War. The Daleks' most recent appearance was in the 2010 episode The Big Bang.
The Daleks were created by writer Terry Nation (who intended them to be an allegory to the Nazis)[55] and BBC designer Raymond Cusick. The Daleks' début in the programme's second serial, The Daleks (1963–64), caused a tremendous reaction in the viewing figures and the public, putting Doctor Who on the cultural map. A Dalek appeared on a postage stamp celebrating British popular culture in 1999, photographed by Lord Snowdon.
Cybermen were originally a wholly organic species of humanoids originating on Earth's twin planet
Mondas that began to implant more and more artificial parts into their
bodies. This led to the race becoming coldly logical and calculating,
with emotions usually only shown when naked aggression was called for.
The 2006 series introduced a totally new variation of Cybermen. These Cybus
Cybermen were created in a parallel universe by the mad inventor 'John
Lumic', he was attempting to preserve the life of a human by
transplanting their brains into powerful metal bodies, sending them
orders using a mobile phone network and inhibiting their emotions with
an electronic chip. Their most recent appearance was in "The Pandorica Opens".
The Master is a renegade Time Lord, and the Doctor's arch-nemesis. Conceived as "Professor Moriarty to the Doctor's Sherlock Holmes",[56]
the character first appeared in 1971. As with the Doctor, the role has
been portrayed by several actors, since the Master is a Time Lord as
well and able to regenerate; the first of these actors was Roger Delgado, who continued in the role until his death in 1973. The Master was briefly played by Peter Pratt and Geoffrey Beevers until Anthony Ainley
took over and continued to play the character until Doctor Who's hiatus
in 1989. The Master returned in the 1996 television movie of Doctor Who, and was played by American actor Eric Roberts.
The Master was also featured in the 2007 series, portrayed briefly by Derek Jacobi and then John Simm. Simm reprised his role as The Master in the 2009–2010 specials, The End of Time where he is last seen fighting the Time Lords into the void.[57]
Davros is a science genius and megalomaniac from the planet Skaro.
He is the creator of the Daleks and became a recurring villain after he
was introduced in Genesis of the Daleks,
in which the Time Lords send the Doctor back to either destroy the
Daleks or avert their creation or tamper with their genetic structure
to make them less warlike. Davros has been played by Michael Wisher (first introduced in Genesis of the Daleks), David Gooderson (Destiny of the Daleks) and Terry Molloy. Davros returned to Doctor Who during the 2008 series, portrayed by Julian Bleach.
The original 1963 radiophonic arrangement of the Doctor Who theme is widely regarded as a significant and innovative piece of electronic music, and Doctor Who was the first television series in the world to have a theme entirely realised through electronic means.[citation needed]
The original theme was composed by Ron Grainer and realised by Delia Derbyshire at the BBC Radiophonic Workshop, with assistance from Dick Mills. The various parts were built up by creating tape loops of an individually struck piano string and individual test oscillators and filters. The Derbyshire arrangement served, with minor edits, as the theme tune up to the end of Season 17 (1979–80).
A more modern and dynamic arrangement was composed by Peter Howell for Season 18 (1980), which was in turn replaced by Dominic Glynn's arrangement for the episode The Trial of a Time Lord in series 23 (1986). Keff McCulloch provided the new arrangement for the Seventh Doctor's era which lasted from Season 24 (1987) until the series' suspension in 1989. For the return of the series in 2005, Murray Gold
provided a new arrangement which featured samples from the 1963
original with further elements added; in the 2005 Christmas episode "The Christmas Invasion", Gold introduced a modified closing credits arrangement that was used up until the conclusion of the 2007 series.
A new arrangement of the theme, once again by Gold, was introduced in the 2007 Christmas special episode, "Voyage of the Damned". Gold returned as composer for the 2010 season.[58] He was responsible for a new version of the theme which was reported to have had a hostile reception from some viewers.[59]
Versions of the "Doctor Who Theme" have also been released in a pop
music venue over the years. In the early 1970s, Jon Pertwee, who had
played the Third Doctor, recorded a version of the Doctor Who theme
with spoken lyrics, titled, "Who Is the Doctor". In 1978 a disco
version of the theme was released in the UK, Denmark and Australia by
the group Mankind. It charted as high as 24 in the UK charts. In 1988
the band The Justified Ancients of Mu Mu (later known as The KLF) released the single "Doctorin' the Tardis"
under the name The Timelords, which reached No. 1 in the UK and No. 2
in Australia; this version incorporated several other songs, including
"Rock and Roll Part 2" by Gary Glitter (who recorded vocals for some of the CD-single remix versions of "Doctorin' the Tardis").[60] Others who have covered or reinterpreted the theme include Orbital,[60]Pink Floyd,[60] the Australian string ensemble Fourplay, New Zealand punk band Blam Blam Blam, The Pogues, and the comedians Bill Bailey and Mitch Benn, and it and obsessive fans were satirised on The Chaser's War on Everything. A reggae/ska version of the Doctor Who theme tune was released on the Explosion label in 1969 by Bongo Herman
and Les. The theme tune has also appeared on many compilation CDs and
has made its way into mobile phone ring tones. Fans have also produced
and distributed their own remixes of the theme. in January 2011 the
Mankind version was released as a digital download for the first time
on an album titled 'Gallifrey And Beyond'.
Most of the innovative incidental music for Doctor Who has been specially commissioned from freelance composers, although in the early years some episodes also used stock music, as well as occasional excerpts from original recordings or cover versions of songs by popular music acts such as The Beatles and The Beach Boys.
Since its 2005 return, the series has featured occasional use of
excerpts of pop music from the 1970s, 1980s, 1990s and early 2000s.
The most frequent musical contributor during the first fifteen years was Dudley Simpson, who is also well known for his theme and incidental music for Blake's 7, and for his haunting theme music and score for the original 1970s version of The Tomorrow People. Simpson's first Doctor Who score was Planet of Giants
(1964) and he went on to write music for many adventures of the 1960s
and 1970s, including most of the stories of the Jon Pertwee/Tom Baker
periods, ending with The Horns of Nimon (1979). He also made a cameo appearance in The Talons of Weng-Chiang (as a Music hall conductor).
All the incidental music for the 2005 revived series has been composed by Murray Gold and Ben Foster and has been performed by the BBC National Orchestra of Wales from the 2005 Christmas episode The Christmas Invasion
onwards. A concert featuring the orchestra performing music from the
first two series took place on 19 November 2006 to raise money for Children in Need. David Tennant hosted the event, introducing the different sections of the concert. Murray Gold and Russell T Davies answered questions during the interval and Daleks and Cybermen menaced the audience whilst music from their stories was played. The concert aired on BBCi on Christmas Day 2006. A Doctor Who Prom was celebrated on 27 July 2008 in the Royal Albert Hall as part of the annual BBC Proms. The BBC Philharmonic and the London Philharmonic Choir
performed Murray Gold's compositions for the series, conducted by Ben
Foster, as well as a selection of classics based on the theme of space
and time. The event was presented by Freema Agyeman
and guest-presented by various other stars of the show with numerous
monsters participating in the proceedings. It also featured the
specially filmed mini-episode "Music of the Spheres", written by Russell T Davies and starring David Tennant.[61]
Five soundtrack releases have been released since 2005. The first featured tracks from the first two series,[62] the second and third featured music from the third and fourth series respectively. The fourth was released on the 4th of October 2010 as a two disc special edition and contained music from the 2008-2010 specials (The Next Doctor to End of Time Part 2). The soundtrack for Series 5 was released on the 8th of November 2010. See List of Doctor Who music releases
for other soundtrack releases. In February 2011, a soundtrack will be
released for the 2010 Christmas Special: "A Christmas Carol" by Silva
Screen Records.
Doctor Who's
science-fiction themes and settings meant that many sound effects had
to be specially created for the series, although some common sound
effects (such as crowds, horses and jungle noises) were sourced from
stock recordings. Because Doctor Who began several years before
the advent of the first mass-produced synthesisers, much of the
equipment used to create electronic sound effects in the early days was
custom-built by the BBC Radiophonic Workshop and until the early 1970s
audio effects were produced using a combination of electronic and radiophonic techniques.
Almost all of the original sound effects and audio backgrounds during the 1960s were overseen by the Radiophonic Workshop's Brian Hodgson, who worked on Doctor Who from its inception until the middle of Jon Pertwee's tenure in the early 1970s, when he was succeeded by Dick Mills.
Hodgson created hundreds of pieces of "special sound" ranging from
ray-gun blasts to dinosaurs, but without doubt his best known sound
effects are the sound of the TARDIS as it de-materialises and
re-appears, and the voices of the Daleks.
The basic audio source Hodgson used for the TARDIS effect was the
sound of his house keys being scraped up and down along the strings of
an old gutted piano, and played backwards. The famous Dalek voice
effect was obtained by passing the actors' voices through a device
called a ring modulator,
and it was further enhanced by exploiting the distortion inherent in
the microphones and amplifiers then in use. However, the precise sonic
character of the Daleks' voices varied somewhat over time because the
original frequency settings used on the ring modulator were never noted
down.
The image of the TARDIS is iconic in British popular culture.
Premiering the day after the assassination of President of the United States John F. Kennedy, the first episode of Doctor Who was repeated with the second episode the following week. Doctor Who
has always appeared initially on the BBC's mainstream BBC One channel,
where it is regarded as a family show, drawing audiences of many
millions of viewers; episodes are now repeated on BBC Three. The programme's popularity has waxed and waned over the decades, with three notable periods of high ratings.[63] The first of these was the "Dalekmania" period (circa 1964–1965), when the popularity of the Daleks regularly brought Doctor Who ratings of between 9 and 14 million, even for stories which did not feature them.[63][64] The second was the late 1970s, when Tom Baker occasionally drew audiences of over 12 million.[63] During the ITV
network strike of 1979, viewership peaked at 16 million. Figures
remained respectable into the 1980s, but fell noticeably after the
programme's 23rd series was postponed in 1985 and the show was off the
air for 18 months. Its late 1980s performance of three to five million
viewers was seen as poor at the time and was, according to the BBC
Board of Control, a leading cause of the programme's 1989 suspension.
Some fans considered this disingenuous, since the programme was
scheduled against the soap opera Coronation Street,
the most popular show at the time. After the series' revival in 2005
(the third notable period of high ratings), it has consistently had
high viewership levels for the evening on which the episode is
broadcast.[63] The BBC One broadcast of "Rose",
the first episode of the 2005 revival, drew an average audience of
10.81 million, third highest for BBC One that week and seventh across
all channels.[63][65] The current revival also garners the highest audience Appreciation Index of any non-soap drama on television.[66]
The series also has a fan base in the United States, where it was shown in syndication from the 1970s to the 1990s, particularly on PBS stations (see Doctor Who in Canada and the United States). New Zealand was the first country outside the UK to screen Doctor Who
beginning in September 1964, and continued to screen the series for
many years, including the new series from 2005. In Canada, the series
debuted in January 1965, but the CBC only aired the first twenty-six
episodes. TVOntario picked up the show in 1976 beginning with The Three Doctors
and aired it through to series 24 in 1991. TVO's schedule ran several
years behind the BBC's throughout this period. From 1979 to 1981, TVO
airings were bookended by science-fiction writer Judith Merril
who would introduce the episode and then, after the episode concluded,
try to place it in an educational context in keeping with TVO's status
as an educational channel. The airing of The Talons of Weng-Chiang resulted in controversy for TVOntario as a result of accusations that the story was racist.
Consequently the story was not rebroadcast. CBC began showing the
series again in 2005. The series moved to the Canadian cable channel Space in 2009.
A fan base exists in Australia, where it has been exclusively first run since 1966 on the Australian Broadcasting Corporation's ABC1,
and periodically repeated—including screening all available episodes
for the show's 40th anniversary in 2003. Repeats have also been shown
on the subscription television channel UK.TV. The ABC also broadcasts the first run of the revived series, on ABC1, with repeats on ABC2. UK.TV
also shows repeats of the revived series. The ABC also provided partial
funding for the 20th anniversary special episode "The Five Doctors".
Only four episodes have ever had their premiere showings on channels
other than BBC One. The 1983 twentieth anniversary special "The Five Doctors"
had its début on 23 November (the actual date of the anniversary) on a
few PBS stations two days prior to its BBC One broadcast. The 1988
story Silver Nemesis was broadcast with all three episodes edited together in compilation form on TVNZ
in New Zealand in November, after the first episode had been shown in
the UK but before the final two instalments had aired there. Finally,
the 1996 television film premièred on 12 May 1996 on CITV in Edmonton, Canada, fifteen days before the BBC One showing, and two days before it aired on Fox in the United States.
A wide selection of serials is available from BBC Video on VHS and
DVD, on sale in the United Kingdom, Australia and the United States.
Every fully extant serial has been released on VHS, and BBC Worldwide
continues to regularly release serials on DVD. The 2005 series is also
available in its entirety on UMD for the PlayStation Portable.
As of June 2010, the revived series has been, or is currently, broadcast weekly in about 50 countries,[67] including the following:
Doctor Who is one of the five top grossing titles for BBC Worldwide, the BBC's commercial arm.[68] BBC Worldwide CEO John Smith has said that Doctor Who is one of a small number of "Superbrands" which Worldwide will promote heavily.[69]
A special logo has been designed for the Japanese broadcast with the katakana "ドクター・フー" (romanised as Dokutaa Fuu).[70]
The series has apparently "mystified" viewers in Japan where it has
been broadcast in a late evening time slot, leading to some not
realising it is a family show.[71]
The series one episodes aired in Canada a couple of weeks after their UK broadcast, a situation made possible by the 2004–05 NHL lockout
which left vast gaps in CBC's schedule. For the Canadian broadcast,
Christopher Eccleston recorded special video introductions for each
episode (including a trivia question as part of a viewer contest) and
excerpts from the Doctor Who Confidential documentary were played over the closing credits; for the broadcast of "The Christmas Invasion" on 26 December 2005, Billie Piper
recorded a special video introduction. CBC began airing series two on 9
October 2006 at 20:00 E/P (20:30 in Newfoundland and Labrador), shortly
after that day's CFL double header on Thanksgiving in most of the country.
Series three began broadcasting on BBC One in the United Kingdom on
31 March 2007. It began broadcasting on CBC on 18 June 2007 followed by
the second Christmas special, "The Runaway Bride" at midnight,[72]
and the Sci Fi Channel began on 6 July 2007 starting with the second
Christmas special at 8:00 pm E/P followed by the first episode.[73]
Series four aired in the United States on the Sci Fi Channel (now known as Syfy), beginning in April 2008.[74] It aired on CBC beginning 19 September 2008, although the CBC did not air the Voyage of the Damned special.[75] The Canadian cable network Space broadcast "The Next Doctor" in March 2009, has broadcast the subsequent specials, and will broadcast series five.[76]
In these films, Peter Cushing
plays a human scientist named "Dr. Who", who travels with his two
granddaughters and other companions in a time machine he has invented.
The Cushing version
of the character reappears in both comic strip and literary form, the
latter attempting to reconcile the film continuity with that of the
series.
In addition, several planned films were proposed, including a sequel, The Chase, loosely based on the original series story
(the third to feature the Daleks), for the Cushing Doctor, plus many
attempted television movie and big screen productions to revive the
original Doctor Who, after the original series was cancelled (see List of proposed Doctor Who films).
In 2009, it was reported that BBC Films had a script for a new Doctor Who film in development,[77] although both David Tennant[78] and Russell T Davies[79] have subsequently denied this.
Doctor Who has appeared on stage numerous times. In the early 1970s, Trevor Martin played the role in Doctor Who and the Daleks in the Seven Keys to Doomsday which also featured former companion actress Wendy Padbury
(Pertwee's Doctor made a cameo appearance via film ). In the late
1980s, Jon Pertwee and Colin Baker both played the Doctor at different
times during the run of a play titled Doctor Who – The Ultimate Adventure. For two performances while Pertwee was ill, David Banks (best known for playing various Cybermen) played the Doctor. Other original plays have been staged as amateur productions, with other actors playing the Doctor, while Terry Nation wrote The Curse of the Daleks, a stage play mounted in the late 1960s, but without the Doctor.
Concept art for an animated Doctor Who series was produced by animation company Nelvana in the 1980s, but the series was not produced.[80]
The Doctor has also appeared in webcasts and in audio plays; prominent among the latter were those produced by Big Finish Productions from 1999 onwards, who were responsible for a range of audio plays released on CD, as well as 2006's eight-part BBC 7 series starring Paul McGann.
Following the success of the 2005 series produced by Russell T
Davies, the BBC commissioned Davies to produce a 13-part spin-off
series titled Torchwood (an anagram of "Doctor Who"), set in modern-day Cardiff and investigating alien activities and crime. The series debuted on BBC Three on 22 October 2006.[81]John Barrowman reprised his role of Jack Harkness from the 2005 series of Doctor Who.[82] Two other actresses who appeared in Doctor Who also star in the series; Eve Myles as Gwen Cooper, who also played the similarly named servant girl Gwyneth in the 2005 Doctor Who episode "The Unquiet Dead",[83] and Naoko Mori who reprised her role as Toshiko Sato first seen in "Aliens of London". A second series of Torchwood aired in 2008; for three episodes, the cast was joined by Freema Agyeman reprising her Doctor Who role of Martha Jones. A third series was broadcast from 6 to 10 July 2009, and consisted of a single five-part story called Children of Earth.
A fourth series, jointly produced by BBC Wales, BBC Worldwide and the
American entertainment company Starz will begin filming in early 2011,
and will leave the conventional Cardiff setting for the first time.
The Sarah Jane Adventures, starring Elisabeth Sladen who reprises her role as Sarah Jane Smith, has been developed by CBBC; a special aired on New Year's Day 2007 and a full series began on 24 September 2007.[84]
A second series followed in 2008, notable for (as noted above)
featuring the return of Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart. A third and
fourth series aired in the autumn of 2009 and 2010 respectively.
An animated serial, The Infinite Quest, aired alongside the 2007 series of Doctor Who as part of the children's television series Totally Doctor Who. The serial featured the voices of series regulars David Tennant and Freema Agyeman but is not considered part of the 2007 series.[85] A second animated serial, Dreamland, aired in six parts on the BBC Red Button service, and the official Doctor Who website in 2009.[86]
Numerous other spin-off series have been created not by the BBC but
by the respected owners of the characters and concepts. Such spin-offs
include the Faction Paradox, Iris Wildthyme, Bernice Summerfield and P.R.O.B.E. series plus others including the current K-9 television series, currently airing on Disney XD.[87]
In 1983, coinciding with the series' 20th anniversary, a charity special titled The Five Doctors was produced in aid of Children in Need,
featuring three of the first five Doctors, a new actor to replace the
deceased William Hartnell, and unused footage to represent Tom Baker.
This was a full-length, 90-minute film, the longest single episode of Doctor Who produced to date (except the 1996 made-for-TV film, which ran a few minutes shorter at just under 1 hour 25 minutes, excluding commercial breaks).
In 1993, for the franchise's 30th anniversary, another charity special, titled Dimensions in Time
was produced for Children in Need, featuring all of the surviving
actors who played the Doctor and a number of previous companions. Not
taken seriously by many, the story featured the Rani
opening a hole in time, cycling the Doctor and his companions through
his previous incarnations and menacing them with monsters from the
show's past. It also featured a crossover with the soap opera EastEnders, the action taking place in the latter's Albert Square location and around Greenwich, including the Cutty Sark. The special was one of several special 3D programmes the BBC produced at the time, using a 3D system that made use of the Pulfrich effect
requiring glasses with one darkened lens; the picture would look
perfectly normal to those viewers who watched without the glasses.
In 1999, another special, Doctor Who and the Curse of Fatal Death, was made for Comic Relief and later released on VHS. An affectionate parody of the television series, it was split into four segments, mimicking the traditional serial format, complete with cliffhangers,
and running down the same corridor several times when being chased (the
version released on video was split into only two episodes). In the
story, the Doctor (Rowan Atkinson) encounters both the Master (Jonathan Pryce) and the Daleks. During the special the Doctor is forced to regenerate several times, with his subsequent incarnations played by, in order, Richard E. Grant, Jim Broadbent, Hugh Grant and Joanna Lumley. The script was written by Steven Moffat, later to be head writer and executive producer to the revived series.[21]
Since the return of Doctor Who in 2005, the franchise has produced two original "mini-episodes" to support Children in Need. The first, aired in November 2005, was an untitled 7-minute scene (see Doctor Who: Children in Need) which introduced David Tennant as the Tenth Doctor directly after his regeneration from the previous episode. It was followed in November 2007 by Time Crash, a 7-minute scene which featured the Tenth Doctor meeting the Fifth Doctor (played once again by Peter Davison). The Doctor Who
production team did not produce a new Children in Need mini-episode for
the 2008 and 2009 events; instead, for the 2008 event, the opening
scene from the 2008 Christmas special, The Next Doctor was broadcast and for the 2009 event, a scene from the 2009 Christmas Special The End of Time was broadcast.
Jon Culshaw frequently impersonates the Fourth Doctor in the BBC Dead Ringers
series. Culshaw's "Doctor" has telephoned four of the "real"
Doctors—Tom Baker, Peter Davison, Colin Baker and Sylvester McCoy—in
character as the Fourth Doctor. In the 2005 Dead Ringers Christmas special, broadcast shortly before "The Christmas Invasion", Culshaw impersonated both the Fourth and Tenth Doctors, while the Second, Seventh and Ninth Doctors were impersonated by Mark Perry, Kevin Connelly and Phil Cornwell, respectively.
There have also been many references to Doctor Who in popular culture and other science fiction franchises, including Star Trek: The Next Generation ("The Neutral Zone", among others). In the Channel 4 series Queer As Folk (created by later Doctor Who executive producer Russell T Davies), the character of Vince was portrayed as an avid Doctor Who
fan, with references appearing many times throughout in the form of
clips from the programme. In a similar manner, the character of Oliver
on Coupling (created and written by current show runner Steven Moffat) is portrayed as a Doctor Who collector and enthusiast. References to Doctor Who have also appeared in the young adult fantasy novels Brisingr[89][90] and High Wizardry,[91] the video game Rock Band,[92] the soap opera EastEnders,[93] the Adult Swim comedy show Robot Chicken and the Family Guy episodes "Blue Harvest" and "420".
There is also a small reference in the popular online game: Runescape
where the words: 'doctor who' are used in a 'knock-knock' joke.
Doctor Who has long been a referent for political cartoonists, from a 1964 cartoon in the Daily Mail depicting Charles de Gaulle as a Dalek[94] to a 2008 edition of This Modern World by Tom Tomorrow in which the Tenth Doctor informs an incredulous character from 2003 that the Democratic Party will nominate an African-American (Barack Obama, who eventually won the presidency) as its presidential candidate.[95]
The word "TARDIS" is an entry in the Shorter Oxford English Dictionary.[96]
One of the most noticeable "tip of the hat" to the whole Doctor Who
series, was evident for all to view in the popular late-'80s
cult-classic (in its own right) film Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure,
where the aforementioned protagonists travel through time in a public
phone booth. Originally, the time machine was to be a 1969 Chevrolet
van, but the idea was nixed as being too close in concept to the DeLorean used in the Back to the Future
trilogy. Instead, the time machine was styled after a 1960s American
telephone booth. Its similarity to the time-travelling British police
box-shaped TARDIS of the BBC's television programme Doctor Who is
reflected in the Cracked parody in which the Doctor threatens to sue Rufus.
There is one permanent Doctor Who exhibition museum in the United Kingdom,[97] at Red Dragon Centre, Cardiff, the city where the series is filmed (opened in 2005). A previous exhibition at Blackpool permanently closed on 8 November 2009.[98]
From 2009 to 2010, Doctor Who exhibitions will also be open in the following locations:
Since its beginnings, Doctor Who has generated hundreds of
products related to the show, from toys and games to collectible
picture cards and postage stamps. These include board games, card
games, gamebooks, computer games, roleplaying games, action figures and
a pinball game. Many games have been released that feature the Daleks,
including Dalek computer games.
Doctor Who books have been published from the mid-sixties
through to the present day. From 1965 to 1991 the books published were
primarily novelised adaptations of broadcast episodes; beginning in
1991 an extensive line of original fiction was launched, the Virgin New Adventures and Virgin Missing Adventures. Since the relaunch of the programme in 2005, a new range of novels have been published by BBC Books,
featuring the adventures of the Ninth, Tenth and Eleventh Doctors.
Numerous non-fiction books about the series, including guidebooks and
critical studies, have also been published, and a dedicated Doctor Who Magazine with newsstand circulation has been published regularly since 1979. There is also a Doctor Who Adventures magazine published by the BBC. In April 2010 Hub Magazine released a Doctor Who Special (Issue 116) which collected new articles and pieces from various writers associated with both Classic and New Series Doctor Who,
including Andrew Cartmel, Paul Magrs, Joseph Lidster, Mark Morris,
Simon Clarke and Scott Harrison (who also guest-edited the issue)
In 2007, Doctor Who and a number of his enemies were portrayed in illuminated road features for Blackpool Illuminations. More pictures of the Doctor with his new companion Donna were added in 2008, along with new monsters such as the Ood plus some three dimensional models of the TARDIS and Daleks.[99] Only two actors playing the Doctor have switched on the Illuminations: Tom Baker, in 1975 and David Tennant in 2007.
In 2010, Matt Smith switched on the Cardiff Christmas Lights as part
of the 10th anniversary of Winter Wonderland, an event in which an open
air ice-rink and fair are opened in Cardiff's civic centre. Matt used
the Doctor's Sonic Screwdriver to switch on the lights, and was accompanied by Karen Gillan and Arthur Darvill.[100]
Although Doctor Who was fondly regarded during its original 1963–1989 run, it received little critical recognition at the time. In 1975, Season 11
of the series won a Writers' Guild of Great Britain award for Best
Writing in a Children's Serial. In 1996, BBC television held the
"Auntie Awards" as the culmination of their "TV60" series, celebrating
sixty years of BBC television broadcasting, where Doctor Who was voted as the "Best Popular Drama" the corporation had ever produced, ahead of such ratings heavyweights as EastEnders and Casualty.[101] In 2000, Doctor Who was ranked third in a list of the 100 Greatest British Television Programmes of the 20th century, produced by the British Film Institute and voted on by industry professionals.[102] In 2005, the series came first in a survey by SFX magazine of "The Greatest UK Science Fiction and Fantasy Television Series Ever". Also, in the 100 Greatest Kids' TV shows (a Channel 4 countdown in 2001), the 1963–1989 run was placed at number eight.
The revived series has received particular recognition from critics
and the public, across various different awards ceremonies. These
include:
The British Academy Television Awards (BAFTA) nominations, released on 27 March 2006, revealed that Doctor Who
had been shortlisted in the "Drama Series" category. This is the
highest-profile and most prestigious British television award for which
the series has ever been nominated. Doctor Who was also nominated in several other categories in the BAFTA Craft Awards, including Writer (Russell T Davies), Director (Joe Ahearne),
and Break-through Talent (production designer Edward Thomas). However,
it did not win any of its categories at the Craft Awards.
On 22 April 2006, the programme won five categories (out of fourteen nominations) at the lower-profile BAFTA Cymru awards, given to programmes made in Wales. It won Best Drama Series, Drama Director (James Hawes), Costume, Make-up and Photography Direction. Russell T Davies also won the Siân Phillips Award for Outstanding Contribution to Network Television.[103]
The programme enjoyed further success at the BAFTA Cymru awards the
following year, winning eight of the thirteen categories in which it
was nominated, including Best Actor for David Tennant and Best Drama Director for Graeme Harper.[104]
On 7 May 2006, the winners of the British Academy Television Awards were announced, and Doctor Who won both of the categories it was nominated for, the Best Drama Series and audience-voted Pioneer Award. Russell T Davies also won the Dennis Potter Award for Outstanding Writing for Television.[105] Writer Steven Moffat won the Writer category at the 2008 BAFTA Craft Awards for his 2007 Doctor Who episode "Blink".[106]
The series also won awards at the BAFTA Cymru ceremony on 27 April
2008, including "Best Screenwriter" for Steven Moffat, "Best Director:
Drama" for James Strong, "Best Director Of Photography: Drama" for Ernie Vincze, "Best Sound" for the BBC Cymru Wales Sound Team and "Best Make-Up" for Barbara Southcott and Neill Gorton (of Millennium FX).[107]
In March 2009, it was announced that Doctor Who had again been nominated in the "Drama Series" category for the British Academy Television Awards; however, it lost out to the BBC series Wallander at the Awards on Sunday 26 April.[108]
The series picked up two BAFTAs at the British Academy Television Craft
Awards on Sunday 17 May. Visual Effects company The Mill won the
"Visual Effects" award for the episode "The Fires of Pompeii" and Philip Kloss won in the "Editing Fiction/Entertainment" category.[109]
In 2005, at the National Television Awards (voted on by members of the British public), Doctor Who
won "Most Popular Drama", Christopher Eccleston won "Most Popular
Actor" and Billie Piper won "Most Popular Actress". The series and
Piper repeated their wins at the 2006 National Television Awards, and
David Tennant won "Most Popular Actor" in 2006 and 2007, with the
series again taking the Most Popular Drama award in 2007.[110] At the 2008 National Television Awards Tennant won "Outstanding Drama Performance" and the series again won the Drama category;[111] they repeated these victories the next time the awards were held, in 2010.[112]
A scene from "The Doctor Dances" won "Golden Moment" in the BBC's "2005 TV Moments" awards,[113] and Doctor Who swept all the categories in BBC.co.uk's online "Best of Drama" poll in both 2005[114] and 2006.[115] The programme also won the Broadcast Magazine Award for Best Drama.[116]
Eccleston was awarded the TV Quick and TV Choice award for Best Actor
in 2005; in the same 2006 awards, Tennant won Best Actor, Piper won
Best Actress and Doctor Who won Best-Loved Drama.[117][118]
Doctor Who also received several nominations for the 2006 Broadcasting Press Guild Awards: the programme for Best Drama, Eccleston for Best Actor (David Tennant was also nominated for Secret Smile), Piper for Best Actress and Davies for Best Writer. However, it did not win any of these categories.[121]
A panel of journalists and television executives for the annual awards given out at the Edinburgh Television Festival voted Doctor Who as the best programme of the year in 2007 and 2008.[122][123]
The episode "Vincent and the Doctor"
has been nominated for a Mind Award at the 2010 Mind Mental Health
Media Awards for its portrayal of mental distress and reporting of
mental health in broadcast media.[125]
Several episodes of the 2005 series of Doctor Who were nominated for the Hugo Award for Best Dramatic Presentation, Short Form: "Dalek", "Father's Day" and the double episode "The Empty Child"/"The Doctor Dances". At a ceremony at the Worldcon (L.A. Con IV) in Los Angeles on 27 August 2006, the Hugo was awarded to "The Empty Child"/"The Doctor Dances".[126] "Dalek" and "Father's Day" came in second and third places respectively.[127]
The 2006 series episodes "School Reunion", "Army of Ghosts"/"Doomsday"
and "The Girl in the Fireplace" were nominated for the same category of
the 2007 Hugo Awards, with "The Girl in the Fireplace" winning.[128]
The 2007 series episodes "Blink" and "Human Nature"/"The Family of
Blood" also secured nominations in this category in the 2008 Hugo
Awards,[129] with "Blink" winning the award.[130]
The 2008 series episodes "Silence in the Library"/"Forest of the Dead"
and "Turn Left" secured nominations in this category in the 2009 Hugo
awards.[131]
The 2009 series episodes "The Waters of Mars", "The Next Doctor", and
"Planet of the Dead" secured nominations in this category in the 2010
Hugo awards,[132] with "The Waters of Mars" winning the award.[133]
On 7 July 2007, the series won three Constellation Awards: David Tennant won "Best Male Performance in a 2006 Science Fiction Television Episode" for the episode "The Girl in the Fireplace",
and the series itself won "Best Science Fiction Television Series of
2006" and "Outstanding Canadian Contribution to Science Fiction Film or
Television in 2006". It was eligible for the latter award because of
the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation's involvement as co-producer of the series.[134]
On 12 July 2008, the series won three Constellation Awards: David
Tennant won "Best Male Performance in a 2007 Science Fiction Television
Episode" for the episodes "Human Nature" and "The Family of Blood", Carey Mulligan won "Best Female Performance in a 2007 Science Fiction Television Episode" for the episode "Blink" and the series itself won "Best Science Fiction Television Series of 2007".[135]
On 19 September 2009, the series was the first winner of the British Fantasy Award for "Best Television Programme".[136]
On 8 November 2007, Doctor Who received its first mainstream American award nomination when it was nominated for the 34th Annual People's Choice Awards in the category of "Favorite Sci-Fi Show". The awards, broadcast on CBS on 8 January 2008 are voted on by the people via an Internet poll. The series faced competition from American-produced series Battlestar Galactica (itself a revival of an older series), and Stargate Atlantis.[137] It was defeated by Stargate Atlantis.[138] In June 2008, the series won the inaugural Best International Series category at the 34th Saturn Awards, defeating its spin-off, Torchwood, which was also nominated.[139] The Seoul International Drama Awards 2009 honoured it with an award as The Most Popular Foreign Drama of the Year.[140]
^ Howe, Stammers, Walker (1994), p. 157-230 ("Production Diary")
Newman is often given sole creator credit for the series. Some reference works such as The Complete Encyclopedia of Television Programs 1947–1979 by Vincent Terrace erroneously credit Terry Nation with creating Doctor Who, because of the way his name is credited in the two Peter Cushing films.
Newman and Lambert's role in originating the series was recognised in the 2007 episode "Human Nature", in which the Doctor, in disguise as a human named John Smith, gives his parents' names as Sydney and Verity.
^ The tapes, based on a 405-line broadcast standard, were rendered obsolete when UK television changed to a 625-line signal in preparation for the soon-to-begin colour transmissions.
^ abcde
Earlier incarnations of the Doctor have occasionally appeared with the
then incarnation in later plots. The First and Second Doctors appeared
in the 1973 Third Doctor story, The Three Doctors; The First, Second, Third and Fourth appeared in the 1983 Fifth Doctor story, The Five Doctors; the Second appeared with the Sixth in the 1985 story, The Two Doctors; and the Fifth appeared with the Tenth in the 2007 mini-episode, "Time Crash".
^Paolini, Christopher (20 September 2008). "Shadows of the Past" (Hardcover). Brisingr (1st ed.). New York: Alfred A. Knopf. p. 204. ISBN0375826726. "Bending over, Eragon read, Adrift upon the sea of time, the lonely god wanders from shore to distant shore, upholding the laws of the stars above."
^Paolini, Christopher (20 September 2008). "Acknowledgments" (Hardcover). Brisingr (1st ed.). New York: Alfred A. Knopf. p. 761. ISBN0375826726.
"Also, for those who understood the reference to a 'lonely god' when
Eragon and Arya are sitting around the campfire, my only excuse is that
the Doctor can travel everywhere, even alternate realities. Hey, I'm a
fan too!"
^Culf,
Andrew (4 November 1996). "Viewers spurn TV's golden age in poll of
small screen classics as the BBC fetes its 60th birthday". The Guardian: p. 4.
