Doctor Who

She learned she got the job at a tanning salon

They seem to have good chemistry, it will be interesting to see what kind of partnership they have. Personally I'm hoping for a bit of a Twelve/Bill vibe but we shall see.

A re-post since it was page bottomed:

Incoming Doctor Ncuti Gatwa interviews Millie Gibson, the actress who will be playing his companion. I haven't watched the video for myself in full yet so I can't comment on what's in it beyond a bit where Millie says she watched DW with her dad.

I just noticed something rather humorous about the revival series.

9th Doctor was played by an actor who kept his hair insanely short for the role (Christopher Eccelston), only to regenerate into David Tennant's 10th Doctor (who has longer hair).

We are about to get a reversal of said scene once the 2nd Tennant Doctor regenerates (as Gatwa's hairstyle is very similar to the 9th Doctor's.)

On regenerations, 2-3 and War-9 are the only regenerations we don't see a full transition. The former along with later plot holes helped fuel the Season 6B theory, though the latter is the most interesting. The Doctor's always out of it post-regeneration so adding on 9 having the immediate baggage of the end of the Time War would've been some interesting drama

I've always felt despite the comment about his appearance (in some EU he refuses to look at his face) 9 when we first saw him had some significant time pass since his regeneration. If it was too recent he would still be too open about his trauma over the memory of committing genocide on the Time Lords to even be a Stepford Smiler

Refuses to look at his own face is an interesting idea, but is kind of in conflict with how casually he comments on it in Rose. I imagine he's more like Eleven and just never thought to check what he looks like until someone pointed it out to him.

Though I could imagine a refusing-to only to later forget-to pipeline.

From what it's worth, Russell T. Davies had this to say in the May 2015 issue of Doctor Who Magazine:

No, I don't think he'd just regenerated. If you have certain physical features like big ears or buck teeth, you look at them and sigh every time you look in the mirror. And I think if you'd had eight different faces, even if you'd been in the current form for a hundred years, you'd still mutter at them. So it was meant as a nod to the fact he'd once had other faces. But I wrote the Titanic stuff and Krakatoa assuming that the Ninth Doctor had been around for a while. He doesn't act very post-regeneration, does he? He appears in command, waving a bomb. This is a man who knows himself, and has known himself for a while.

That is fair enough I guess. Still I liked the theory that he did all those other pre-Rose adventures in between going and coming back to day 'oh and did i mention it travels in time too?'

The very first episode has Rose learn of how old the Doctor is by finding old photos with him in the crowd, meaning him bouncing straight from regeneration to Rose is straight-up impractical.

And yeah, Ninth works a lot better in general assuming he's had that form for a while and has spent a lot of time stewing in his own grief. All that's really changed is that neither Ninth nor Eighth were the ones who fought in the war.

I know most extended universe stuff, to avoid touching any Time War elements while it was still super poorly defined, went with the Doctor having adventures on his own in the like three seconds Rose experienced when he vworped off in the first episode.

I think the comic strip implied his photo tour was done during that time.

It's kind of interesting though, 9's tenure on the show has the first five episodes all needing to be right next to each other, then the next two need to be next to each other, and then the last five basically all need to be concurrent (with Boom Town giving a bunch of leeway surrounding it). It's not as bad as 5 basically having no room to travel solo beyond like...one bit in the middle of Arc of Infinity, but it's still pretty unusual.

Edited by Zendervai on Nov 21st 2022 at 1:12:56 PM

The War Master, Sir Derick Jacobi, will be retiring from the role after 2024, his successor will be Rob Valentine

Couldn't they make a new Master instead?

Yeah weird to replace a performer for and a character who's original actor is still living.

The use of the word retiring makes me think Jacobi is voluntarily stopping not being replaced by the company. Dude is in his 80s and may just want to not work for a while.

And since it's Big Finish there's no requirement to make the character regenerate if you've got an acceptable soundalike.

Um, maybe I'm reading that press release wrong, but I believe Rob Valentine is replacing the War Master producer Scott Hancock, not Jacobi.

Speaking of BF, Big Finish is doing a 7 part series all throughout next year (with a coda in November 2024) featuring Doctors 4-10 with the all the actors involved.

Wouldn't surprise me to see the recast versions of 1, 2, 3, & War pop up as well.

You couldn't regenerate Jacobi's Master anyway (assuming his War Master and Yana appearances are the same) since we see him regenerate into Simm on screen. After greatly underusing Jacobi presumably why Big Finish tapped him to start with.

eta: Huh, given if you click his name it bring up stuff he's Written/Scripted edited that sounds right.

Edited by dcutter2 on Nov 23rd 2022 at 12:14:05 PM

I feel they should take advantage of the big blank of what the Master was up to between his first and Delgado incarnation. By revealing the Crispy Master has run out of his regenerations and that Time Lords can regenerate 12 times, you have at minimum 10 unseen Masters you can use for EU purposes. Hell, why doesn't the main series use a Master that's out of order?

But mah NuWho!

Edited by kkhohoho on Nov 23rd 2022 at 6:40:55 AM

I mean, we got the Harold Saxon incarnation butting heads with the Twelfth Doctor and his own future self in "World Enough and Time"/"The Doctor Falls" if that counts as "out of order."

Something I'd like to see with that BF Anniversary release is the main seven parts are based around the Doctors involved, but the large focus is with them interacting with other versions not mentioned in the press release, possibly the recast Doctors.

1-3, War, & Unbound crossovers with the others is five stories right there and there's probably other options as far as characters go with the other two, maybe even something out of left field like an appearance by Grant as the Shalka Doctor or maybe even the Valeyard potentially. Basically something like this:

Past Lives (Fifth Doctor & the Second Doctor)

The Artist at the End of Time (Eighth Doctor & the ?/Shalka Doctor)

A Genius for War (Seventh Doctor & the War Doctor)

Two's Company (Fourth Doctor & the Third Doctor)

The Martian Invasion of Planetoid 50 (Sixth Doctor & the First Doctor)

Time Lord Immemorial (Tenth Doctor & the Valeyard)

The Union (Ninth Doctor & the Unbound Doctor)

Then have some combination of 13, Fugitive, or 14 for the Coda story and its good to go.

Edited by BorneAgain on Nov 24th 2022 at 9:14:03 AM

Ian Levine has confirmed on Gallifrey Base forums that UK Channel 5 has filmed a "Secrets and Scandals" Doctor Who special that includes interviews with him and Warris Hussein (who directed the first story), but has no idea of when it will air.

Considering that Ian Levine is well known for making uncorroborated and sometimes openly disputed claims about his involvement with Doctor Who, I'm taking that with a grain of salt.

I have no idea who that is

British record producer and former Doctor Who fan who claims to have served as an unofficial "continuity advisor" for the show in the '80s. Well-known for his less-than-pleasant behavior, to the point where the Abzorbaloff in "Love and Monsters" was mockingly modeled after him.