History Fridge / DoctorWhoClassicSeries

* The single most brilliant line ever uttered in DW as a throwaway joke has insane levels within it, and was unsurprisingly written by Creator/DouglasAdams. When the Doctor explains the TARDIS being "bigger on the inside than the outside" as "dimensionally transcendental". From a canonical viewpoint, this is true, as the inner portions of the TARDIS exist in a different dimension (as he attempts to explain to Leela). Therefore she transcends (overlaps) dimensions. On another note, however... the word "transcendental" also refers to something being beyond its properties. Her internal size transcends that of her outer plasmic shell: literally "Bigger on the inside than the outside".

** With that said, it would make sense why The Second Doctor was executed during The War Games, when one considers the events of Twice Upon a Time. The First Doctor crossed time-streams with the Twelfth Doctor. While the Twelfth Doctor was not bound by the laws of Gallifrey from his point of view, the First Doctor was. And as such, the Doctor was put on a brief trial and found guilty of interference and so was sentenced to exile on Earth throughout the 70s. If the First Doctor had not regenerated during the Tenth Planet, then there would have been a good chance he would have been forced to regenerate as an aftermath to The War Games.

** There's also nothing saying she has to stay on Earth after David dies. Assuming he dies of old age, by the late 22nd/early 23rd century, humanity will have begun spreading out to the stars. She could easily head off Earth and start wandering like her grandfather.

* Grun, in "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS9E2TheCurseOfPeladon The Curse of Peladon]]," does an awful lot of {{Flynning}} during his duel with the Doctor. The Doylist explanation is that the actor probably doesn't have a lot of staff training. However, the Watsonian reason may be that Peladon, being a technologically advanced society, probably doesn't have a lot of staff training for its warriors! Most likely, the post of King's Champion is an old-fashioned one, and there aren't a lot of duels to the death nowadays, with him being kept on out of tradition. Indeed, it's implied that the trial by combat is an archaic practice.

* In "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS11E1TheTimeWarrior The Time Warrior]]", the Third Doctor states that he has met Sontarans before. Given that this was the first time we viewers saw a Sontaran onscreen, we might naturally wonder when the Doctor met them. But watch "The Two Doctors", and you may have your answer — if you believe in the 'Season 6B theory', then the Second Doctor may have been the one who first encountered Sontarans.

** wibbly wobbly timey wimey - it was actually the rise in bionic limbs and first theoretical explorations into artificial replacement organs at inspired Kit Pedler - how much could you replace before the human was lost?

* "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS6E7TheWarGames The War Games]]" contains a mix of both FridgeBrilliance and FridgeHorror at the tail end of the serial. During the Doctor's trial, he's presented a slideshow of pre-determined future incarnations. Except that said future incarnations are presented as [[Main/FacialCompositeFailure hand-drawn sketches made by a dodgy sketch artist]]. One can chalk it up to SpecialEffectFailure on the behalf of Doctor Who not having the budget to hire better artists. But it works really well in-universe to describe Time Lord society. [[AdvancedCivilizationHollowImagination Despite creating]] [[BiggerOnTheInside time machines that are bigger on the inside]] [[ReallySevenHundredYearsOld expanded longevity where physical features have no meaning]] [[TheNthDoctor due to the ability to cheat death via regeneration]] [[AdvancedCivilizationHollowImagination Time Lords lack social creativity, being content to live their lives within their glass domes but not doing anything worthwhile with it. This shows up later on in the show, where despite having advanced technology and elongated lives, the Time Lords can't create anything new and look down on renegades like The Doctor and The Master, individuals who want to explore the universe and have the opportunity to do so]]. The Time Lords are so socially stagnant that their artistic abilities are [[LeaningOnTheFourthWall on par with the special effects of a 1960s Earth television science-fiction programme]].

* In "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS9E5TheTimeMonster The Time Monster]]", Stu retains his 25 year-old consciousness when he gets superaged into an Octogenerian. Which means that Sgt. Benton ''also'' retains his adult consciousness when he gets de-aged into a baby! No wonder he won't eat the marmalade sandwiches mashed up in cold tea.

* "Remembrance of the Daleks":
** The little girl who was hooked up to the Dalek battle computer. There is ''no way'' that was good for her sanity. There's also the concerns of your child either going missing entirely for a matter of days or weeks, or else returning home every day and suddenly acting in an incredibly cold, robotic manner. That's assuming the Daleks didn't just murder her family outright, that is...
** Even more FridgeHorror from that same serial — [[spoiler:both factions of]] Daleks have been in the area for quite some time — how many people were made slaves to the Daleks, like the little girl and the teacher from the school? How many people were simply killed outright because they were unlucky enough to cross paths with a Dalek? Also? The area wasn't evacuated until AFTER the first skirmish in the serial, and there are people standing around looking at the commotion when the dead soldiers are discovered. How many civilians got killed when the Daleks started throwing around energy beams? One of the onlookers is a woman with a baby!
*** Although in the example of the first skirmish where the Dalek is revealed, most of these onlookers are moved well out of the way of danger by police and soldiers before the shooting starts, so chances are they're okay at least.
** Even worse still — if the Dalek factions had been in the area for some time, waging war on each other, then they were there when the First Doctor left with Susan, Ian, and Barbara in tow way back in "An Unearthly Child". Perhaps the First Doctor was watching their civil war and about to intervene, but got sidetracked by the two teachers intruding into his TARDIS, and completely forgot to go back and take care of the situation... for 6 regenerations. Of course, when he first left the junkyard he hadn't learned to become a hero yet either, so maybe the First Doctor wasn't bothered by the Dalek civil war, just... curious.
*** It's pretty clear that [[Recap/DoctorWhoS1E2TheDaleks "The Daleks"]] was the first time the Doctor encountered the Daleks. He certainly started off callous, but not to the point of standing by while a Dalek civil war took place on his adopted planet of residence. It ''is'' his fault that the Daleks came to Earth to get the Hand, however. Notably, he mentions more than once that the civil war caught him offguard--he seemed to have been expecting one faction of Daleks to simply come in, grab the Hand, and go.
* Here's one from the ''Doctor Who'' movie ("The Enemy Within"): remember how the Seventh Doctor was begging Grace not to operate? Remember how he "woke up" during surgery? Well, because they have two hearts, Time Lords also have a respiratory bypass system; in other words, any anaesthetic you give them isn't going to last very long — [[spoiler: and neither are any painkillers...]]
** Even under the best of circumstances, heart surgery after being shot is going to require massive amounts of transfused blood. Transfused ''human'' blood. Which would explain the ''very'' delayed and glitchy regeneration into Eight, but also why he was at peace with dying entirely at the end of that life, and why major intervention was required to regenerate him into War.
** The above leads to possible FridgeBrilliance. Why does the Doctor claim he's half-human? Why does the TARDIS seem to confirm this? Because he's still got human DNA swimming around in his system due to blood transfusions and his regeneration — and link to the TARDIS — is still glitching up in an attempt to cope with it.
*** Except that he didn't just claim to be half-human, but half-human ''on his mother's side''. That can't be explained away by a botched blood transfusion. His human heritage is only admitted surreptitiously to someone who wouldn't believe him, and while in the throes of a new body with a much more open personality than the previous one- he was ''revelling'' in telling people about his past, a past that he must have suddenly realized wasn't really secret for any good reason. He still knew not to tell anyone who'd actually believe him about his human mother though. In light of "Hell Bent", his secrecy makes a lot more sense — the Doctor ''is'' a HalfHumanHybrid, but it's his ultimate secret. Fewer people know he's half human than know his real name! Presumably, the reason why he's kept it so secret all this time has something to do with all those prophecies.
* "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS2E3TheRescue The Rescue]]": Just why '''did''' Bennett keep Vicki alive and go through his over-complicated masquerade as Koquillion? Fanon has some {{Squick}}y [[WifeHusbandry answers]].
* It has been stated many times that the Doctor's interference in "Genesis of the Daleks" started the Time War. But when you think about it, the Doctor is not only to blame for the Time War itself, but also for every other appearance of Daleks not set on Skaro. Remember, before meeting him, the Kaleds believed Skaro to be the only inhabited planet in the universe.

* The Meddling Monk's plan to alter English history would have created HUGE ripples. It is even doubtful that Vicki would have existed — and she's Cressida. Furthermore, genetic analysis has revealed that the Anglo-Saxons actually assimilated the Celts and Romans of Britain into their culture, so some of these villagers might be ''descended'' from Vicki. Ware [[ClockRoaches Reapers]].
** From the same story, we learn that the Monk did a CompoundInterestTimeTravelGambit that goes right through the time of [[Recap/DoctorWhoS2E2TheDalekInvasionOfEarth the Second Dalek Conquest of Earth]], implying that a later change to the timeline ''brought it about''!
*** Or that the banking system infrastructure survived the invasion--if it was all electronic by that point, possibly they could just reboot some old computers after the Daleks are gone.

* Here's one from the very first story, "An Unearthly Child". The junkyard the Doctor and Susan are staying at is owned by I.M. Foreman, which is presumably why Susan goes by the name Foreman. Here's where the horror starts — Susan doesn't seem to have realised that she is posing as I.M. Foreman's granddaughter and has dragged this poor junkyard merchant into her life. But this is the reason why it's so awful: one night Susan, along with two of her teachers, disappear from their lives, having last been seen at the junkyard. Which means I.M. Foreman has the disappearance of these three people, one of whom claims to be his granddaughter, placed at his doorstep. It can't have ended well for I.M. Foreman — every time the Doctor, Susan, Ian and Barbara have fun on their travels, spare a thought for this man that they all threw under a bus when they left.
** Not necessarily; just because some weird kid committed indirect identity-theft by posing as I.M. Foreman's granddaughter doesn't mean the person (who might not even be male!) who has that name will be blamed for murdering her or whatever. The only thing Foreman could be considered "guilty" of would be of posting his/her name on a sign where said weird kid could see it.
* In "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS4E2TheTenthPlanet The Tenth Planet]]", the Cybermen state that the reason they started replacing their body parts with machinery was that their lifespans were getting shorter with each generation. They also said that they were "''exactly'' like [us]" once. That could mean that, at some time in the future, human beings' lifespans will start getting shorter as well, from whatever caused the phenomenon in the Cybermen, and we could go down the same path as them!
** wibbly wobbly timey wimey - it was actually the rise in bionic limbs and first theoretical explorations into artificial replacement organs at inspired Kit Pedler - how much could you replace before the human was lost?
* At the end of "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS19E4TheVisitation The Visitation]]", the Doctor and his companions stop to toss all the boxes on the Terileptils' wagon into the Pudding Lane fire, to get rid of their dangerous contents. Said contents are ''live rats'': animals which, while they had to be eliminated to avert the Terileptils' unstoppable plague, had never asked to be used as vectors and hardly deserved to be ''burned alive'' as a method of disposal.
* The Zygons' plan to alter the Earth would have caused the Krynoid pods to germinate with Thete not knowing about it until far too late. And it's the same author — and director — for both stories.
* Barbara's lucky she never faced [[Recap/DoctorWhoS16E3TheStonesOfBlood the Megara]]. If they were to learn about [[Recap/DoctorWhoS1E6TheAztecs the incident in Tenochtitlán]], where Barbara impersonated Yetaxa...

* "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS18E4StateOfDecay State of Decay]]" seems silly at first, with the vampires that look so much like something out of a Film/HammerHorror film. However, it makes perfect sense - they were originally astronauts from ''Earth'', and had ''deliberately'' modeled themselves (and the whole set-up of the village and the tower) on their own perception of vampires.
* Physiognomy is the belief that you can determine someone's personality by looking at their facial features. The Fourth Doctor in "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS12E1Robot Robot]]", when he looked in the mirror just after regenerating and said, "As for the physiognomy..." At first you think, "He used the wrong word! He should have said ''physiology!''" But he didn't make a mistake. He said exactly what he meant to say. ''He was looking at his new facial features to try to figure out who he was.''
** Or, perhaps, what ''other people'' who adhere to such a belief might think of him at first glance. Even if the Doctor doesn't judge by appearances, he knows that plenty of others do.
* "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS26E2GhostLight Ghost Light]]". Really, [[spoiler: the entire serial is a commentary upon evolution in general, as well as a massive tribute to the era that brought up the theory - the Victorian Era. And if this wasn't enough, the entire story is disguised as a freaking ''alien invasion'' told with the tropes of a ''Victorian-era horror story''... and finally, we have a story that also has the companion Ace dealing with her past and moving on with her life, as ''the entire theme of the story is also about change in general'']]! It's just such a shame that this serial almost doesn't make sense without multiple viewings or [[AllThereInTheManual seeing the documentary and commentary attached to the DVD release...]]
* "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS25E1RemembranceOfTheDaleks Remembrance of the Daleks]]":
** There are a crapload of blatant InternalHomage elements in the serial — the presence of the Coal Hill School and Foreman junkyard, Ace finding Susan's book on the French Revolution, and so forth — but there's a marvelously subtle one when Ace, talking to a new friend, expresses confusion over the monetary system because she's in 1963 so it's pre-decimalisation. Susan, in "An Unearthly Child", gives a wrong answer in class because she's forgotten decimalisation hasn't happened yet.
** At one point Mike Smith is right in the sights of a Dalek that has a direct shot aimed at him — and it misses. Obviously, we can chalk this up to simply a moment of extreme good luck on Mike's part or the Dalek being a very poor shot — except the story later reveals that Mike is a traitor informing on the military's actions to the neo-Nazi group affiliated with one of the Dalek factions. It's possible that the Dalek was under orders to 'make it look convincing' but that Mike, being a valuable source of intelligence, wasn't to be harmed — at least, not until he had outlived his usefulness.
** According to supplementary materials and WordOfGod, "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS25E1RemembranceOfTheDaleks Remembrance of the Daleks]]" is considered the first official shot in the Time War. Why, when the Time Lords and Daleks have been engaged in taking shots at each other as early as [[Recap/DoctorWhoS12E4GenesisOfTheDaleks "Genesis of the Daleks"]]? Well, in this story, the Doctor identifies himself as "President-Elect of the High Council of Time Lords"[[note]] conveniently forgetting to mention he's been deposed ''in absentia'' twice[[/note]] before manipulating Davros into unleashing the Hand, and as such, this isn't just shadowy warfare any more: It's an official action by the leader of the Time Lords!
** Sylvester [=McCoy=]'s Doctor playing an active role in the Time War explains his actions in other stories as well. Why is this Doctor, more than any other, taking an active role in defeating ancients enemies like Fenric and the Gods of Ragnarok? Because he's frantically trying to deal with any powerful enemies that could conceivably ally with The Daleks against Gallifrey. He's also responsible for sending the Hand of Omega and the Nemesis statue back to Gallifrey--defeating potential enemies and stocking their own armories at the same time.
* The Third Doctor. When he's trapped on Earth he comes across as far more of an aristocrat than the grumpy, conniving old man or the genial hobo who preceded him. When the freedom of "Time" is taken away from him, what's left is the "Lord". He even fits the mould of the cash-poor, eccentric British aristocrat forced to work for a living.
* In "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS11E1TheTimeWarrior The Time Warrior]]", the Third Doctor states that he has met Sontarans before. Given that this was the first time we viewers saw a Sontaran onscreen, we might naturally wonder when the Doctor met them. But watch "The Two Doctors", and you may have your answer — if you believe in the 'Season 6B theory', then the Second Doctor may have been the one who first encountered Sontarans.
* A small but weird point... when one of his companions pointed out that Time Lords look human, he replied by saying that Time Lords came billions of years earlier, so really humans look Time Lord. But is there more to it than that? Before Rassilon, there were all kinds of uber-powerful non-anthropomorphic aliens running around. Then Rassilon shows up and there's all these wars against the Nimon, the Nestene Consciousness, the Great Vampires, etc. Over the course of the series, that's a lot of SealedEvilInACan that the Time Lords locked away. Now suddenly most aliens are human-looking, and the Time Lords are in charge but suddenly have a Prime Directive. But they're ''time travellers''. So during their rise to power they fight all these time wars with their rivals. Then once they win, they re-arrange time to suit themselves, making themselves undisputed masters of reality, and making sure that most aliens are basically inferior Time Lord look-alikes. Even the Daleks started out human-looking. Then, once they have history the way they like it, they make it illegal for anyone to meddle in history so that they can keep themselves Number One for eternity. NiceJobBreakingItHero. This is canon in the Creator/BigFinish ExpandedUniverse.
* In "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS25E2TheHappinessPatrol The Happiness Patrol]]", the Doctor defeats a ColdSniper [[TalkingTheMonsterToDeath by talking to him]]. At first, this seems like he used some kind of psychic powers. However, it was not, it was reverse psychology. The gunman was used to killing from a distance; to picking off abstract forms through his scope without ever thinking of them as people. He'd never had to look someone in the eye while he was killing them, and the Doctor knew it and used that against him. When he was confronted with the fact that he was killing people, he could no longer bring himself to do it, and thus stood down.
* In the [[Recap/DoctorWhoTVMTheTVMovie TV movie]], the Seventh Doctor is forced to land when the escaped Master sabotages his TARDIS. When he steps out of the TARDIS, he ends up in the middle of a gang war and is gunned down on the spot. Remember what was wrong with the TARDIS? The screen said "critical timing malfunction". In other words, ''bad timing''. The reason the Doctor isn't killed every time he first sets his foot on a new planet is because his ship is ''programmed to have good timing''.
* Also from the [=McGann=] movie, when Grace and the Doctor walk into the TARDIS, within moments she understands the concept of the interior and the exterior being in separate dimensions. The Doctor seems surprised by this. But, just before Grace says this, she's rubbing her wrist where she was burned by the Master's... discharge. Conclusion: this was the first sign that the Master was controlling her. And, about a minute later, she's got black eyes and is bashing the Doctor with the neutron ram.
* The end of "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS14E2TheHandOfFear The Hand of Fear]]", where the Fourth Doctor leaves Sarah back on Earth rather than taking her to Gallifrey, makes a lot more sense when you remember that the last time the Doctor introduced humans to his fellow Time Lords (albeit unwillingly), their response was to wipe their minds of all the adventures they'd had together after their first and dump them back home. Upon having to return to Gallifrey, the Doctor didn't want Sarah to suffer the same fate as Jamie and Zoë, and so decided to leave her behind. Which adds increased poignancy to their final conversation:
-->'''Sarah:''' Don't forget me.\\
'''The Doctor:''' Oh, Sarah. Don't ''you'' forget ''me.''
* The character of Zoë Heriot seems like human {{Zeerust}} — who would bother [[{{Franchise/Dune}} training a human to be a walking computer?]] But when you consider how often advanced computers [[AIIsACrapshoot go insane and attempt to destroy humanity]], it makes sense that [[{{Franchise/Dune}} people would want a human backup,]] just in case. Judging by what she does to the computer in "The Invasion", it's possible she was engineered as a weapon ''against'' advanced computers.
* The single most brilliant line ever uttered in DW as a throwaway joke has insane levels within it, and was unsurprisingly written by Creator/DouglasAdams. When the Doctor explains the TARDIS being "bigger on the inside than the outside" as "dimensionally transcendental". From a canonical viewpoint, this is true, as the inner portions of the TARDIS exist in a different dimension (as he attempts to explain to Leela). Therefore she transcends (overlaps) dimensions. On another note, however... the word "transcendental" also refers to something being beyond its properties. Her internal size transcends that of her outer plasmic shell: literally "Bigger on the inside than the outside".
* In "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS14E3TheDeadlyAssassin The Deadly Assassin]]", we learn that the emaciated Master was found by Chancellor Goth on the planet Terserus, and then brought back to Gallifrey. In the parody episode 'The Curse of Fatal Death', the alternate Ninth Doctor (Rowan Atkinson) explains that the Terserans were a flatulent race who were wiped out when they discovered fire. Given his record for causing as much trouble as he can in the cosmos, it would be completely in character for the Master to have been the one who introduced the Terserans to fire, whereupon he was also engulfed in flames, leading him to the freakish burnt zombie state in which Goth found him.
* In "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS13E3PyramidsOfMars Pyramids of Mars]]", when Sarah sees the vision of Sutekh in the TARDIS it is assumed that this is of the imprisoned Sutekh. But consider that Sutekh is supposed to have lost his powers to influence the outside world while imprisoned. Then consider that in the vision, Sutekh is not wearing his mask, and the TARDIS is going back through time when it occurs: perhaps the vision is of Sutekh *after* he escaped.
* In "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS12E4GenesisOfTheDaleks Genesis of the Daleks]]", the Doctor starts the Time War. He also travels to Skaro's past to do so via a "time ring" provided by the Time Lords rather than by using the TARDIS, which is brilliant because Sexy can see the consequences of the Doctor's actions and would ''not'' have willingly brought him there.
** While it appears at the end of "Genesis" that the Doctor has only delayed the rise of the Daleks by a thousand years, which he says isn’t much on the cosmic scale, it is worth noting that their next few televised appearances placed particular focus on the Daleks’ lack of initiative and imagination; while the Daleks prior to this were aware that they lacked a proper understanding of humanity, they were still able to take the initiative, such as their attempts to manipulate the Doctor into helping them isolate the Dalek Factor (“[[Recap/DoctorWhoS4E9TheEvilOfTheDaleks The Evil of the Daleks]]”) or their efforts to master the power of invisibility (“[[Recap/DoctorWhoS10E4PlanetOfTheDaleks Planet of the Daleks]]”). With this in mind, it is tempting to consider that the Doctor’s efforts here did have a deeper impact on Dalek development; since his presence indirectly provoked Davros into activating the Daleks before Davros had finished preparing them, the ‘new’ Daleks lacked the initiative they had possessed before, requiring them to resort to other measures to overcome their reliance on brute force and raw power as combat strategies, such as reviving Davros (“[[Recap/DoctorWhoS17E1DestinyOfTheDaleks Destiny of the Daleks]]”) or ‘recruiting’ the creativity of a little girl to utilise human ingenuity for their battle strategies (“[[Recap/DoctorWhoS25E1RemembranceOfTheDaleks Remembrance of the Daleks]]”).
** Additional Fridge Heartwarming: The Doctor's line about "out of the evil of the Daleks must come something good" may seem a little cheap, but given how Caan pulled a HeelFaceTurn in "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS30E13JourneysEnd Journey's End]]" and Rusty helps the Doctor in "[[Recap/DoctorWho2017CSTwiceUponATime Twice Upon A Time]]," not to mention the other good Dalek in "[[Recap/DoctorWho2022CENThePowerOfTheDoctor The Power of the Doctor]]," it looks like the Doctor was ''actually right.''

* Steven and the Doctor are both eager to take Dodo with them in "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS3E5TheMassacre The Massacre of St Bartholomew's Eve]]", the Doctor remarking that she reminds him of Susan and Steven remarking that she has the same last name as the girl he befriended in Renaissance France — Anne Chaplet — and could possibly be a descendent of her. Surnames at that time were exclusively passed down patrilinearly, meaning that if Anne had descendants, they would take her husband's name... unless Anne had mothered children out of wedlock. This is something that would be very, very rare, unless Steven [[GirlOfTheWeek had some reason]] [[BoldlyComing to believe it had happened]]...
** Alternately, she could have wound up marrying a second or third cousin from another branch of the Chaplet family, which wasn't all that unusual if an extended family wanted to keep its property to itself.
* The First Doctor's character was originally intended to be a grumpy old man, stubborn and set-in his-ways, but very wise. However, in hindsight, it makes more sense to view him a young man who acts impulsively without thinking, but is very clever. In this light, many of his actions (stealing an antiquated TARDIS that he didn't know how to operate, running away from Gallifrey with his granddaughter, abducting two humans, nearly killing an innocent man with a rock to save himself, nearly getting himself, his granddaughter, and his companions killed from radiation poisoning because he wanted to go exploring, drugging his companions and accusing them of sabotage, threatening to abandon his companions during the French Revolution, and leaving his granddaughter on post-Dalek invasion Earth, to name a few) make more sense: He wasn't a foolish old man; he was acting without thinking. Similarly, he's not wise, but very clever: In both of his multi-Doctor stories, he constantly insults his future incarnations without thinking that he would someday be receiving those insults. Yet in both cases he comes up with the plan to save the day, showing his cleverness.
* The change in delegates in "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS3E4TheDaleksMasterPlan The Daleks' Master Plan]]" seems odd, with Zephon turning up late despite apparently having convinced Beaus to join. Considering Mavic Chen claims there have recently been attempts to displace him it makes sense he couldn't leave the Fifth Galaxy for the first meeting.
* THE ENTIRE SERIES, every adventure, every single incident, the universe, time itself, and the freaking MULTIVERSE being saved. All because Ian and Barbara were suspicious of Susan. If they didn't follow her to the TARDIS, in turn accidentally triggering the Doctor's series of adventures, the Doctor and Susan would probably "still" be in that junkyard having done nothing for the last 50 years. Since the Time War would have likely never happened since the Daleks first discovered the Time Lords through the Doctor.
* The presence of the Watcher in "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS18E7Logopolis Logopolis]]" makes a lot more sense if you consider how, in "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS11E5PlanetOfTheSpiders Planet of the Spiders]]", Cho-Je turned out to be a mental projection from the Doctor's onetime guru, the Time Lord hermit who'd inspired him as a boy. When the Hermit regenerated in the Third Doctor's final episode, his projected self Cho-Je merged with him to assist the process; by the time the next Doctor died, Four had advanced in his own mental skills to the point where he could use the same technique to facilitate a difficult regeneration, albeit with a lot less artistry (hence, the Watcher ''not'' looking much like Creator/PeterDavison).
* It's quite easy to notice that the Fifth Doctor's celery isn't a real piece of celery. But here's the interesting thing - it was ''never'' real! He got it in Castrovalva, which turned out to be entirely artificial. The stick of celery is the last little trace of the imaginary city of Castrovalva. And later he replaces it in "Enlightenment", in another place that's not quite real, or at least on his level of reality.
* A one-off joke in "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS3E10TheWarMachines The War Machines]]" becomes a bit of Fridge Brilliance thanks to modern ''Doctor Who''. At the start of that serial, the TARDIS arrives in the sixties and the Doctor places an Out of Order sign on the TARDIS to, as he explains to Dodo, prevent anyone from trying to use it as an actual police box. Indeed, exactly that happens as a FunnyBackgroundEvent as the Doctor is saying this. What turns this into Fridge Brilliance is modern ''Who's'' introduction of the Perception Filter, which makes people not notice an object's presence. They've consistently been shown to stop working once someone is aware of it, and to rely on the fact that no one is actively looking for the filtered object in the first place. Obviously, it doesn't come up here because this is decades before the idea ever came about, but at the same time, would a perception filter have even ''worked'' in this instance? Police boxes were a fact of life in 1960's London. Were they needed, people such as that policeman ''would'' be actively looking for it, possibly allowing them to spot the TARDIS, filter or not. The Out of Order sign suddenly becomes more than just a simple gag.

* The Daleks from "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS11E3DeathToTheDaleks Death to the Daleks]]" seem bound and determined to live out ContrivedStupidityTropes, gliding obliviously into traps and falling prey to some really obvious trickery. In the wake of "Into the Dalek", where it's confirmed that Daleks' brains are interlinked with computers programmed to edit their memories and thoughts, it seems more plausible: while the City couldn't drain all of a Dalek's power, it may have drained enough to inhibit that linkage and cut the Daleks off from the computers they'd usually depend upon to make tactically-advantageous decisions. Not used to thinking without such enhancements, they started making mistakes they normally wouldn't have.
* Fans have been poking fun at the ungainly frill-and-shoulderpad collars used as formal dress by Time Lord officials ever since they were introduced. WordOfGod asserts that these costume parts were originally ''designed'' to make Creator/TomBaker look ridiculous when he wore one. However, if this style of dress is especially ancient by even Gallifreyan standards, there could be a logical reason for it: those ornate collars would, if trimmed back a bit and hardened, provide a great deal of protection for someone's neck. So it's plausible that they're an elaboration of neck-armor that was worn by Ancient Gallifreyans during their war with the Great Vampires and their throat-chomping minions.

* Most rank-and-file Ice Warriors were awfully clumsy and plodding in the Classic era, owing to the bulky costumes' ungainliness and lack of flexibility, as well as how they impaired the wearers' eyesight. Although that's the ''out''-of-Verse explanation, there's an ''in-Verse'' one that actually justifies their awkward, cautious way of moving: as natives of Mars, they're adapted to conditions of much lower gravity than Earth's! So any time we see one of them cautiously shuffling along on Earth, Peladon, or any human-occupied facility with artificial Earth-level gravity, they're just trying to cope with (to them) a {{Heavyworlder}} environment.
* It most definitely was coincidence, but the final serial "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS26E4Survival Survival]]" does have a solid Bookend for the Doctor and his journey since the beginning of the show. In his very first story, he was willing to bash a caveman's head in to survive, but was shamed by Ian into showing mercy. Here, he's about to bash the Master's head in the same way, but this time he stops himself and comes to his senses. If we fight like animals, we die like animals. One way or another, humans helped the Doctor find... well, his humanity, or rather his compassion for living things.
** Ace's arc also ties into the Doctor's as well. She felt such a thrill from the animal planet all she wanted to do is run, just like the Doctor did from Gallifrey. At the end, he tells her the best of the animal planet will never leave her. Thanks to his fondness for humans, the best of the Earth is always carried with the Doctor even when the planet is no more (see "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS27E2TheEndOfTheWorld The End of the World]]"). And in the end, they carry on as only they could: going back to the TARDIS for more adventure, just like we hoped.
* In [[Recap/DoctorWhoS24E3DeltaAndTheBannermen "Delta and the Bannermen"]], Goronwy is implied to have knowledge a normal human shouldn't, such as giving a smile and a wink when the TARDIS disappears right in front of his eyes, and in general his DissonantSerenity throughout the story. But then [[Recap/DoctorWhoS30E12TheStolenEarth "The Stolen Earth"]] has the Doctor reveal that some bees are actually alien, and very intelligent at that. Presumably, the bees have told Goronwy everything he needs to know! Indeed, he indicates this himself:
-->'''Goronwy:''' I shall ask my bees. They know everything, you see.

* In "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS26E1Battlefield Battlefield]]", the Brigadier surviving what's set up as a HeroicSacrifice is actually quite a clever subversion of the trope. The whole serial has been about a conflict between Warriors, but the Brig's not a [[ProudWarriorRace Warrior]], he's an OldSoldier. At the end of the serial, [[SoldierVsWarrior it's the Soldier who sets things right]]. The Brig doesn't want to be a capital-H Hero who makes a HeroicSacrifice, he just wants to do the best he can, and go home to his flowerbeds. And he does.
* In the famous 7-part epic "Inferno", the Doctor travels to an alternate world which he sees consumed by fire, returning to his own world just in time to prevent it from suffering the same terrible fate. This story works well enough on its own, but it got a little nod in the subsequent story "The Mind of Evil", where a computer can project your worst fear in front of you. For the Doctor, it's fire. At first it seems like a nice little reference, that the story "Inferno" was so traumatising for the Doctor he isn't able to forget about what happened... until you realise that being afraid of fire is a little too simple for someone like the Doctor, isn't it? By this point he had already encountered Autons, Daleks, Cybermen, Ice Warriors, Silurians, robot Yeti, and even THREE rogue Time Lords in the Monk, Master, and the War Chief and yet, out of all of those, the thing that scares him the most is FIRE. And why would that be? Because everything else is sentient to some degree. The Doctor is most famous for talking his way out of danger, no matter how difficult it may seem to do. In "Midnight", we saw what happened when this ability was removed from the Doctor entirely, and turned against him as a weapon. In "The Mind of Evil", we see that's what he's most afraid of, facing an enemy he can't talk to, can't reason with, can't argue with, can't manipulate. Fire is an unrelenting force of total destruction and chaos, it doesn't pick enemies, it just destroys everything. That's why the Doctor is afraid of fire, because it's more dangerous and unpredictable than any of his other foes.
** It's also not improbable that Time Lords, being as time-sensitive as they are, may have some kind of foresight/future sight, even if not conscious (In [[Recap/DoctorWhoS30E2TheFiresOfPompeii "The Fires of Pompeii,"]] he tells Donna that he can see "everything that was, everything that could be, everything that must never be"). Maybe it's subconscious foreshadowing of Gallifrey burning?

* The Master's Khalid disguise is ridiculous and over the top, and people have complained that there's no real reason for him to keep it up while alone. That being said, it is ''very'' in character for him; look at the fun he has with being Rev. Magister, Professor Thascales, Harold Saxon, Razer...
** Also, while the "Arabian magician" disguise is rather racist, again, this is the Master we're talking about. He probably ''enjoys'' being politically incorrect.
* Practically confirmed by WordOfGod, but why is the Master constantly coming up with these ridiculous plans that backfire and force him to work with the Doctor? Because it's the closest he can get to working with his best and oldest friend again.
* The Doctor seems unusually unwilling to get involved in overthrowing Salamander in "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS5E4TheEnemyOfTheWorld The Enemy of the World]]." However, given how many Second Doctor stories involve characters and factions out-gambiting each other left, right, and center, with heroes often being revealed to be working for the villains and vice versa, it's understandable he doesn't want to throw his weight in until he's sure he's on the right side.

** Additional Fridge Heartwarming: The Doctor's line about "out of the evil of the Daleks must come something good" may seem a little cheap, but given how Caan pulled a HeelFaceTurn in "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS30E13JourneysEnd Journey's End]]" and Rusty helps the Doctor in "[[Recap/DoctorWho2017CSTwiceUponATime Twice Upon A Time]]," it looks like the Doctor was ''actually right.''

* The Third Doctor's distaste for his prior incarnation, especially in [[Recap/DoctorWhoS10E1TheThreeDoctors "The Three Doctors,"]] makes a lot of sense when one realizes that due to the actions of his predecessor, he's been imprisoned on Earth and watched Jamie and Zoe lose almost all their memories of him. No wonder he's bitter! Notably, when they meet again in [[Recap/DoctorWho20thASTheFiveDoctors "The Five Doctors,"]] their relationship has improved somewhat (they're still VitriolicBestBuds, but without quite so much sting), presumably since this is a Third Doctor who's now free of his exile.

* It took me a while to understand why Trial of a Timelord was initiated from a Watsonian point of view. While the Sixth Doctor was held on trial for the crime of genocide against the Vervoids even though the Sixth Doctor didn't commit said genocide at the moment of said trial. However, the Sixth Doctor did run into his past self as the Second Doctor during the events of The Two Doctors. The past two on-screen multi-Doctor stories "The Three Doctors" and "The Five Doctors" were exceptions to the first law of time, given that the Doctor was given explicit permission to cross into his own time stream. However, "The Two Doctors" was not a multi-Doctor event authorized by the Time Lords. So the Sixth Doctor is summoned to be on trial because he unofficially crossed over into his own time stream. But given that sentence alone wouldn't be good television drama, the charge was changed to genocide of the Vervoids. And given that the Time Lords are self-serving bastards, it would not be out of character for them to fix the trial against the Doctor.

** The little girl who was hooked up to the Dalek battle computer. There is ''no way'' that was good for her sanity. There's also the AdultFear of your child either going missing entirely for a matter of days or weeks, or else returning home every day and suddenly acting in an incredibly cold, robotic manner. That's assuming the Daleks didn't just murder her family outright, that is...

* In "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS8E1TerrorOfTheAutons Terror of the Autons]]", the Master plans to use living plastic to take over the Earth. Although plastic bottles weren't common ''yet'' in that era, plastic cups ''were'' common, esp. as sippy cups and baby bottles! Crosses with FridgeBrilliance when you realize that attacking Earth by killing children was his plan all along, as he did take over a ''toy factory"! (And NightmareFuel for any kids watching the episode!) Crosses over into AdultFear of the NightmareFuel sort when you remember the Master talking about "450,000 people" dying as a result of his plans.

* The Doctor seems unusually unwilling to get involved in overthrowing Salamander in "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS5E4TheEnemyOfTheWorld The Enemy of the World]]." However, given how many Second Doctor stories involved characters and factions out-gambiting each other left, right, and center, it's understandable he doesn't want to throw his weight in until he's sure he's on the right side.

* Grun, in "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS9E2TheCurseOfPeladon The Curse of Peladon]]," does an awful lot of {{Flynning}} during his duel with the Doctor. The Doylist explanation is that the actor probably doesn't have a lot of staff training. However, the Watsonian reason may be that Peladon, being a technologically advanced society, probably doesn't have a lot of staff training. Most likely, the post of King's Champion is an old-fashioned one, and there aren't a lot of duels to the death nowadays, with him being kept on out of tradition. Indeed, it's implied that the trial by combat is an ancient practice.

* In the famous 7-part epic "Inferno", the Doctor travels to an alternate world which he sees consumed by fire, returning to his own world just in time to prevent it from suffering the same terrible fate. This story works well enough on its own, but it got a little nod in the subsequent story "The Mind of Evil", where a computer can project your worst fear in front of you. For the Doctor, it's fire. At first it seems like a nice little reference, that the story "Inferno" was so traumatising for the Doctor he isn't able to forget about what happened... until you realise that being afraid of fire is a little too simple for someone like the Doctor, isn't it? By this point he had already encountered Autons, Daleks, Cybermen, Ice Warriors, Silurians, robot Yeti, and even THREE rogue Time Lords in the Monk, Master, and the War Chief and yet, out of all of those, the thing that scares him the most is FIRE. And why would that be? Because everything else is sentient to some degree. The Doctor is most famous for talking his way out of danger, no matter how difficult it may seem to do. In "Midnight", we saw what happened when this ability was removed from the Doctor entirely, and turned against him as a weapon. In "The Mind of Evil", we see that's what he's most afraid of, facing an enemy he can't talk to, can't reason with, can't argue with. Fire is an unrelenting force of total destruction and chaos, it doesn't pick enemies, it just destroys everything. That's why the Doctor is afraid of fire, because it's more dangerous and unpredictable than any of his other foes.