The Which Doctor

My two year old loves loves loves Doctor Who. When the theme starts, he forms an ‘o’ with his lips and sings “Ooooh-oooh-OOOOH” along with the music.

So we were watching Doctor Who today, because he tricked us once again into turning it on, and we got to the 4th season finale (Davros and the Daleks create the reality bomb; the Doctor and the other Doctor and the Doctor-Donna pool their considerable wits and defeat the scheme).

And the copy of the Doctor goes one step further: he doesn’t just defeat the evil scheme, he blows up all the Daleks.

The entire race. Complete genocide.

(Well, ok, somehow they come back of course because Daleks are adorable balls of hate and you can’t have the series without them.)

The actual Doctor is super angry. And in the end, that’s the justification for leaving the copy of the Doctor behind. Of course it ties loose ends, puts a copy of David Tennant Doctor with Rose Tyler – a long overdue happy ending of sorts. And due to the way he was copied, he is part human, with one heart, and with the ability to age normally. In other words, Rose and the Doctor can have their life and grow old together.

But the actual Doctor says he’s leaving this one behind why? Because he’s dangerous. And the hope is that Rose can help change him into the jolly good fellow we all love.

So what happens when the copy-Doctor grows old? What if Rose dies? How will the Doctor cope with being a human and suffering that loss, along with the effects of aging in a way he’s never experienced before?

This copy-Tennant, he’s already the one who broke the promise of the name Doctor, isn’t he? Genocide is not in line with being the Doctor. But he’s also still a part of “the Doctor” and thus a part of his timeline.

I know there are plenty of good possibilities out there. Is John Hurt a future incarnation of the Time Lord we know as the Doctor? Is he maybe an incarnation between the already-mysterious 8th and the surprisingly edgy and dark 9th Doctor? Maybe that would explain the edge that Christopher Eccleston brings to the character. Or perhaps there’s something completely different going on.

But one of my crazy theories is:

What if John Hurt is playing the copy Doctor all growed up?

8 thoughts on “The Which Doctor”

  1. Another interesting comment is the line the little girl (simply titled ‘The Girl’ in the credits) uses in the Library when River Song is “saved” by the 10th Doctor. “Aren’t I a clever girl?” she says with a smirk. What IS the connection to the Library that they hinted at in that final episode?

  2. David Tennant’s Doctor is the best since Joh Pertwee; although Peter Davison wasn’t bad either. However, after seeing Colin Baker playing Bayban the Butcher on Blake’s 7, he just didn’t gel with me as The Doctor 🙂

    1. Sadly all I really know is Eccleston through Smith. We have been trying to catch some of the older ones on Netflix, but it’s difficult and there’s not a lot of them there.

    1. I was excited to find Classic Dr. Who on Netflix, but it turned out to be only a few episodes of a given season. I may indeed have to go looking for the rest. Thanks for your comment!

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