Heads up! Dr Who starts Saturday....

[Wascally Weasel]

As you said - far too obvious! He'll be some previously unseen incarnation, I reckon.

I think somoene alluded to that here (or on twitter) that there was a throwaway line about Matt Smith's incarnation being the twelth Doctor so Hurt might fit in somewhere between.

[citoyen]

It was me - see comment hidden by spoiler tags above.

[Dibdib]

It was me - see comment hidden by spoiler tags above.

That was my interpretation too:

(spoilers for last episode of current series)

(click to show/hide)

Especially with the (current) Doctor knowing who he is and what he's done - so "past" in at least as much as the Doctor's timeline. My guess is that Trenzalore, as well as being the burial place of the Doctor, is also some kind of prison for the John Hurt incarnation. What River knows, of course, will remain to be seen.... Spoilers, sweetie!

[Cunobelin]

In the Paul McGann film, the Master has used all of his 12 lives and plans to steal the Doctor's. THe film is quite explicit about the 12

Forgetting the fact that there have been incarnations of the Master since...

Having two Doctors, including a possible earlier Doctor could lead to a workaround of the 12 incarnations problem.

Otherwise the next one is the last, or if John Hurt is in fact an incarnation of the doctor, we aready have the full set of 12

Should be interesting to see how they protect the franchise

[Dibdib]

The usual Moffatt excuse. Wibbly Wobbly, Timey Wimey.

[citoyen]

I heard on the radio this morning that Matt Smith appeared in a Sarah Jane Adventure and one of the kids asked him how many times he could regenerate. His answer, apparently, was 507.

Moffat & co have no qualms about rewriting the canon on this one!

[TimC]

Let's see; give up Dr Who as a profitable franchise because the Doctor (a fictional character) has reached some arbitrary 'limit' of 'regenerations', or ignore such crap and carry on with the next guy, if necessary inventing some random excuse to get round an earlier plot device.


Difficult one, isn't it?

[TimO]

From a biological viewpoint, it doesn't seem to make a lot of sense anyway.  Some things in the human body do age and become unworkable, we see this ourselves, and at a fundamental level it's possibly a reflection of increasing damage to telemores.

However, generally those aren't hard limits, we don't have a fixed number of days or years before we suffer from a heart attack, or thrombosis.

There are numerical limitations on life, we have ten fingers and toes, two arms, and so forth, but I'm not sure there's anything chronologically speaking that is limited to a certain number, and that number being the same for all of us.  Someone with a background in biology feel free to contradict me, but I can't think of a similar circumstance in humans.

On the face of it, there's no reason why he should be hard limited to 12 regenerations, unless it's something utterly unnatural that they did to themselves, with this artificial limitation built in, but the implication seems to have been that this was a natural feature of Time Lords.

[red marley]

Maybe the should just recycle the old ones. If they can do it for Les Dawson they could do it for all the old doctors (skipping Colin Baker natch).

[mattc]

However, generally those aren't hard limits, we don't have a fixed number of days or years before we suffer from a heart attack, or thrombosis.

There are numerical limitations on life, we have ten fingers and toes, two arms, and so forth, but I'm not sure there's anything chronologically speaking that is limited to a certain number, and that number being the same for all of us.  Someone with a background in biology feel free to contradict me,

Teeth - baby teeth and whatever the later ones are called.

Here's my question - as the Doctor's name never changes, how would characters refer to the different incarnations. They can't refer to "Tom Baker" etc.

[pcolbeck]

In order:

The old one
The one with eyebrows
Worzel Gummage
The mad one
The soppy one
The one everyone forgets played the doctor
The "what were they thinking of" one
The one that was only in the film
The method acting Northern one
The Scottish one
The overacting one

[mattc]

 

[LEE]

In order:

The old one
The one with eyebrows
Worzel Gummage
The mad one
The soppy one
The one everyone forgets played the doctor
The "what were they thinking of" one
The one that was only in the film
The method acting Northern one
The Scottish one
The overacting one

The overacting one ?

Care to narrow it down?

[padbeat]

Tom Baker chewed his fair share of scenery in his time IIRC.

I have been winding up a couple of female friends of mine with hints that Benedict Cucumberpatch might be willing to take it on, and when they worked out that wasn't happening they got very excited at the idea of Richard Armitage. Interesting rumours that I've quite liked were Idris Elba and Olivia Coleman, but neither of them are going to happen. The role tends to go to someone with a much lower profile (the method acting Northern one excepted).

[Bluebottle]

I reckon Matt Smith's replacement should be Mark E. Smith. Would be ideal. A TARDIS control console with all those buttons to twiddle.

[citoyen]

I have been winding up a couple of female friends of mine with hints that Benedict Cucumberpatch might be willing to take it on, and when they worked out that wasn't happening they got very excited at the idea of Richard Armitage.

The thing that makes Cucumberpatch sound plausible is that he's worked with Moffat before. And if I were a betting man, I'd put money on it being someone who's worked with Moffat before.

I love the idea of Stringer Bell/Luther as the Doctor.

I don't believe it will be either of those though.

[mrcharly-YHT]

Just wait for it.

I know who they'll get (well, actually, one of two).

You sure you want to click on this?

(click to show/hide)

James Corden

(click to show/hide)

Nah, I'm kidding.

Simon Pegg

[clarion]

Ahem:

In order:

The old one
The one that was only in the films
The one with eyebrows
Worzel Gummage
The mad one
The soppy one
The one everyone forgets played the doctor
The "what were they thinking of" one
The one that was only in the film and on the radio
The method acting Northern one
The Scottish one
The overacting one

[Cunobelin]

Interesting thoughts from one of the girls at work

The film established that the Master was trying to steal the Doctor's remaining regenerations.

This establishes the fact that they can be transferred

River SOng can regenerate an used two (one as a small girl and one to her present existence) then saved the Doctor transferring her remaining regeneratio energy to him.

So in theory she could have given him at least 8 regenerations.

Now comes the clever bit.

Would River Song's regeneration energy be gender specific?

If so does that mean that the rumours of a female Doctor are in fact true and also that all future Doctors would have to be female as well?

Bring back Joanna Lumley?

[TimO]

The gender of time lords, post regeneration doesn't seem to be clearly defined.  Whilst it appears that they mostly regenerate as the same gender when we consider The Doctor, The Master, Romanadvoratrelundar, and to an extent River Song, this isn't always true.  River is a bit of an anomaly, since she's not actually a Time Lord, but seems to have picked up some degree of their characteristics through being conceived within a Tardis, so pretty much anything about Time Lords and her may or may not be transferable, ie all bets are off as regardless these elements of the storyline.

We know that Time Lords can be regenerated as a differing gender, most recently from the Doctor's Wife, where we had this conversation:

The Doctor: ... There's a living Time Lord still out there! And it's one of the good ones.
Rory: You said there weren't any other Time Lords left.
The Doctor: There aren't.  No Time Lords left anywhere in the Universe.  But the Universe isn't where we're going.  See that snake, the mark of The Corsair.  Fantastic bloke.  He had that snake as a tattoo in every regeneration.  Didn't feel like himself unless he had that tattoo.  Or herself a couple of times.  Oo hoo, she was a bad girl! ...

[red marley]

Kathy Burke 4 Doctor!

[mattc]

I've suddenly come to see that a Lady Doctor is almost inevitable (and probably before the next lady PM!). There's never been a good reason NOT to (in terms of mythos 'facts' - see Tim's post), and the current creative team seem to have the right sort of inclination.

I'd say it's just about finding the right actor. Dawn French was a funny idea but wouldn't have worked! Jo Lumley? she's great, but not in this sort of role ... I think ...

There must be someone out there, but women don't generally get these sort of parts, so she'll be hard to spot in an existing role. Come on Moffat, work your magic!

[Sorry jo: Kathy Burke would be the new Colin Baker - noone wants that! ]


EDIT: This is the sort of actress who might fit: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eve_Best
Anyone want to give me 1000:1 odds?

[TimO]

Does this mean that we'd need more Eye Candy for the Mums?

(Was Rory Eye Candy?  I can't say my proclivities go that way, so I'm unsure how desirable he is to the female of the species, or suitably inclined males).

[mrcharly-YHT]

Does this mean that we'd need more Eye Candy for the Mums?

Dear Tim,

Mums can ogle Amy too.

Yours,
Husband of Woman-Ogler

[TimO]

True enough, I probably should have explicitly allowed for all possible mixtures in my previous post (although at some point it would probably become overly complex!)

I'm still curious over what members of the cast of the male persuasion are considered ogleable (by women or men).  Presumably the Doctor himself is (almost by definition) when a male, but what about other companions/assistants?