Someone pointed out to me a little while ago that Davison's Doctor does get darker and darker as time goes on. He's always trying to do the right thing but bad shit just keeps happening to him. Adric's death, of course is one of them but also the fact that he has to kill Kamelion and then watch the Master burn to death (or so he thought) when he could've saved him and his era ends with him and his companion being poisoned and the Doctor isn't even sure if he'll make it to the next body. Despite all that, I think the biggest one however is when the Doctor meets up with Davros in Resurrection of the Daleks and he feels like he has to kill Davros to stop him. It's not really something you'd expect from his Doctor but he feels like it's something he has to do. Of course he doesn't go through with it and then we get the biggest blood bath in Doctor Who history which results in Tegan being scared off and leaving.
"I'm not here as your prisoner Davros , i'm here as your executioner" a great line spoke with a mix of weariness and resolve. Which i think would get higher praise now. Thank you for the 5th Doctor love.
Peter Davison is my favorite as I could connect with him more than with any other doctor. He's kind and loving and caring but lots of bad stuff happens to him, so he has to make a lot of difficult decisions and grow among his companions more than any doctor ever. His regeneration coming from sacrifising himself to save Peri after all he had lost (like Adric) is the perfect ending to his doctor. Forever MY doctor❤
If you want to see Davison's full potential watch the charity special Time Crash. Davison slips right back into his Doctor effortlessly and you can feel Tennant's admiration flowing the entire time they played off each other.
I think he's one of the funniest doctors, he has a lot of sassy cutting lines especially with the companions and Adric but he downplays them and it works so well. Whereas other actors would emphasise it, he lets them slip under the radar and it's so much more shady because of it and humourous in an intelligent way like he's entertaining just himself with it instead of performing.
@@julieeverett7442 TBH I actually really hate that story and the speech feels really preachy and like The Doctor is talking down to the audience, which is very out of character in my opinion
Ah, my favourite doctor. He's so different to Tom out of necessity whereas every doctor since seems to be playing the 4th doctor sometimes (especially in new who). 5 is very serious but still has fun (I love black orchid for showing this). His TV stuff is excellent, I genuinely like every story, but his audios are very underrated too. The Peterloo Massacre is my favourite story ever and well worth a listen for any mancunions/historical lovers.
5 is my favorite. I got the old man in a young man’s body and the subtle shade. Loved that he cared about Turlough and Turlough’s plight & development. Tegan was annoying but fiercely loyal. His companions were the first to really have family members in stories, developed from their adventures, and tested as having more to do than just ask the Doctor questions. Nyssa dealing with the Master was a very wasted opportunity. The 5th was more human & warm while still being alien. The Hartnell connection was definitely demonstrated by the number of companions and the disposition.
Totally agree with most of your comments. Davison always been my favourite Doctor. He tends to get overlooked in most polls etc. Also agree with you on Arc Of Infinity. Never understood the hate for it.
Just wanted to say your on fire with the content right now. Loving it. Also I'd say 7 also comes out as underrated. As for 5 audio wise, really liked the trio of him, peri and erimem
My biggest pet peeve with Doctor Who is people describing the Fifth Doctor as “the nice one” He was a grumpy bastard! He couldn’t go a full story without rolling his eyes at something and he’s the only Doctor that I can remember literally SHOVING his companions through the TARDIS doors. It really does seem like a lot of people assume his entire personality based on the first google image result of him.
That's because he's companions were stubborn and didn't always listen to him and one of them ended up getting killed because of it so you can't really blame him for sometimes getting irritated with them because if he was surrounded by better companions like Perri for example his companion chemistry would have been better but he is still a great Doctor and by far one of the most heroic Doctors of the classic series
Love Davison, was a huge fan as a kid. I consider Pertwee, T Baker and Davison as the Holy Trinity of Who. To have them back to back is remarkable. All very different but all genius.
vislor turlough is actually one of my favorite companions (i cant decide my actual favorite between him, jamie mccrimmon, ace and amy pond. if u want to help decide by all means)
100% he's a great doctor, he's been my favourite since before 2005. I think if it wasn't him playing the doctor after Tom Baker it would have been cancelled along time before it was
Davison is my favourite Doctor tied with Pertwee and Capaldi, he just has so much charm and the dynamic he had with his companions was brilliant. Such an underrated era and it's a fucking crime that he got chased off twitter by a lynch mob a couple years back. The only downside to his era is the shoddy effects but that's just a problem with all of classic Who in general and the BBC not giving them any budget. Absolutely love Davison's era.
I'm so glad you said that Adric was better with Tom, I've always thought that. You can really see where they were going with Adric but I think he just got lost.
Davison is my Doctor, so I’m biased, but I really enjoy season 20, the Black Guardian trilogy, particularly Enlightenment. Also Snakedance is a favourite of mine.
Davison was the best in my opinion, he slid into the role effortlessly which was a hard task considering who was before him. A gem of an actor and his chemistry with Turlough was perfect. Wish he stayed on as the Doctor for longer.
@Wingy Media Did you just list the black Guardian trilogy as one of the bad stories? (Tho I'll give you Terminus) 6:18 Thank you! That really would have benefited the Ainsley Master, but instead he's a monster of the week.
I agree Peter Davison is one of the most underrated doctors he is often overshadowed by other actors like jon pertwee and Tom baker and David tenant but I think he was great he has one of the best arcs for a doctor and has some of the best stories like kinda, earthshock, enlighten, the five doctors, resurrection of The Daleks and the caves of androzani, he was the best choice for the role, he helped brought the ratings back up with season 19 being the 6th most highest rated season of the show and still remaining to this date the 6th highest rated season in the show’s 59 year history and it is the highest rated season of the 80s the highest show had ever had been during the 1980s and he kept the ratings steady even during seasons 20 and 21 I don’t think C baker and McCoy would of not of manged alone if it was not for Davison
Davison is my favorite doctor I think his doctor is the most heroic, kind and selfless. The caves of Androzani is the best story of who story ever and I’m gonna be controversial and say there is not a bad story in his era and yes worriers of the deep is a understated classic . Obviously this is my opinion and everyone is entitled to their own but I wish people would respect him a bit more
Peter was actually the first proper era I decided to watch so he will always have a special place in my heart, he's not kind as people make him out to be And gun straight pointed at Davros, it's the incarnation where his morals really began to change
Love this insight. Davison is my fave… even though a few of his stories sometimes let him down as wasted opportunity One thing I feel you almost touched on… you said he doesn’t seem that alien. I see him as a Doctor who really wants to be human, but the alien side creeps up on him. He surrounds himself with a family. He is (superficially) well natured, but ultimately his alien/time lord ness prevents him being that human , because he is actually doing things humans can’t becuase there’s a bigger picture he tries to hide from - the way Adric is trapped and used in castrovalva, the outcome of Warriors of the Deep, Tegan’s Mara Possesion, Adric’s death, the unwanted execution of Davros, having to rescue Peri from an alien drug poisoning… the list is long! In 5 Doctors alone he is just trying to take them on a flipping Holiday to North Wales/Eye of Orion and look what happens 😂 Tennant and Whitaker are absolutely both in this mould. They want to be human with the “fun” of time travel but ultimately it goes wrong and the nature of it all catches up with them. 5, 10 and 13 all all in my top 5 Doctors for exactly this .
I'll start with my bias - Peter is my Doctor. I have dim memories of some late period Tom Baker from the original run, but I properly started watching when Peter started. There's a few things going on that affect how his run is viewed. Here are my entirely unapologetic apologetics for the Fifth Doctor. (1) As mentioned in the video, Peter faced a challenge in terms of who he followed. Not on the level of Troughton - Patrick had to carry the burden of selling the entire concept that it was possible for the Doctor to change, but after that Peter was following the longest running, and to this day probably still most popular Doctor Who of all time. The closest we've seen since is probably when Smith took over from Tenant given the incredible popularity of the Tenth Doctor at that time (I feel there's been a bit of backlash against that popularity since). (2) He was weighed down by too many companions, a Producer whose understanding of the show was deeply flawed and a Script Editor that was more interested in writing mercenary stories than he was sci-fi / Doctor Who. It is well-documented that Davison wanted the Doctor to solve complex problems with really low-tech solutions and JNT's objection to that demonstrates to me that he didn't get the character or the show. His knee-jerk reaction to the sonic screwdriver is another example of JNT's flaws. He knew enough to recognise that it would be easy to get lazy and use it as the fix-all solution, but the solution to that problem is disciplined writing, not blowing the damn thing up. (3) He might be the first Doctor who is really playing a character. To differing degrees, all the previous Doctors - even Hartnell in the end - were extensions of their actor's personality. Certainly, Jon and Tom were playing exaggerated versions of themselves. Peter Davison is a lovely guy, he's great to listen to, but there's not much of the Fifth Doctor in him apart from them sharing physical appearance and voice. (4) Moving on from (3), I love the performance. This sounds like an odd thing to like, but there's something about when the Fifth Doctor is disappointed - his face collapses and he physically deflates and there's a childish vulnerability that is just adorable. Moffat once said about Davison that regardless of what was going on around him, there isn't an inauthentic moment from him and I entirely agree. Even confronted by Anthony Ainley's "racist even for 1981" performance in Time Flight Davison is in the moment the whole time. (5) He gets hurt by a slow start - Castrovalva gets bogged down in the hard sci-fi that the show mysteriously seemed to think is what people wanted back then and Four to Doomsday is tedious to the nth power, but the general feeling that his time was weak doesn't really stand up. Maybe he didn't get as many stone-cold classics as his predecessors, but let's take a quick look. His first season starts with two slow (but not terrible) stories, but then it gets pretty good. The Visitation, Kinda and Earthshock all stand up fairly well. OK, there's also Black Orchid and Time Flight... well, moving on.... Davison has consistently said in interviews that although he always felt he'd move on after three seasons, if his second had been as good as his third he'd probably have done another year. It's not great, but probably only Terminus and The King's Demons are really bad and Enlightenment is fantastic and definitely in that "not talked about enough" category. It concludes with The Five Doctors which is more or less Terrence Dicks's love letter to the show and I'm going to be honest - I don't care about any of the perceived flaws. My love for The Five Doctors is unconditional. And then you get his third season starting off rocky - Warriors of the Deep is pretty bad, but I'd argue it has possibly the best final line in all of classic Who, and once you get over that we're in good / great / classic territory to the end. Put that all together and I'd say half of his stories are good or better than good. Maybe not the ratio we'd ideally like, but better than people seem to think. (6) Not sure this entirely goes down as a check in the pro column, but for better or worse, Davison set the precedent that allowed New Who to cast attractive young actors as the Doctor. He showed it could be done and it would work. It doesn't have to be done - Capaldi puts that to bed forever - but it showed that it could be. Without Davision's Doctor, I'm not sure the show has the confidence to cast Matt Smith and possibly not even Tenant, maybe not even McGann. In short, the Fifth Doctor is indeed criminally under-rated, and that's coming from someone fortunate enough to (so far) have never met a Doctor he didn't like. I could write at length about the virtues of each and every one of them, but I'll always come back to the Fifth as the one that is closest to my heart.
3rd 4th and 5th were my doctors growing up and I loved all three. Tom is THE doctor, the most alien and inhuman of them all. Then we had the gently human 5th - um are you kidding me? This man was a psychopath, the 2nd most ruthless of them all (only 7th beat him, though 12th in a fury comes close!!) there was no emotion at Adrics death, he has no problem shooting people, he forced gold into a cybermans chest, effectively suffocating them, he snipes at his companions, shows little regards for their feeling, and I loved it! He was so much fun. And I enjoyed the guardian trilogy. especially enlightenment. His big finish is fun too, I have about a dozen of them, including a few multi doctor ones, having 4th to 8th together in the same place is amazing!!!
I'm in total agreement. Davison was a terrific Doctor! After 7 wonderful years of Tom Baker's invincible, bombastic Doctor, we get Davison's vulnerable, old manish Doctor, which was a breath of fresh air. I also agree with your assessment of this era's companions. I've always thought Adric worked better with 4 and he, Nyssa and Turlough were such wasted opportunities to create interesting characters.
Peter Davison is one of my favourite doctors. I didn’t like Tom Baker as the Doctor. He replaced Jon Pertwee, who was “my” Doctor and for me the template on how he should be. So Davison was for me more like what I thought he should be, so I’ve always liked him. Similar to Paul McGann, who’s another favourite and probably now my favourite of all. I agree Davison is under-rated. But I recommend you listen to his recent Big Finish “The Peterloo Massacre”, which is terrific and “Ghost Walk”, also terrific. Great review as usual...🥰
Castrovalva and four to doomsday are awesome. In fact the whole first season is awesome. He's in my ever evolving top 3 Davidson, Tom baker, ??? Probably eccleston
He really is. Not because he's particularly disliked, he's not from what I've seen, but he is simply very overlooked compared to most others. I find his performance in The Caves of Androzani to be one of the best of any Doctor.
Hartnell is SO different from the others that it’s difficult to place him within ratings. It was a totally different show at first - it took 2 seasons to really establish that he’s a good guy and it was mostly the companions doing all the heavy lifting. It only really became the show it is now when Troughton took over. Dont get me wrong, I like a lot of his stories - the Dalek Invasion of Earth really holds up. It is just that it feels like a different show.
I’ve found Hartnell really hard to place as well! I really like him, but he is straight up a different character. When I try to rank Doctors, he feels too good to put in the bottom half, but too un-Doctory to put in the top half. His performance is outstanding, but it feels wrong to praise a Doctor who literally says “this is no time for morality” to his companions at one point.
because Hartnell is the prototype doctor, we get the basics, he is NOT human he is a time travelling alien and it takes him quite a while to warm up to humans, which is quite proper as he is already hundreds of years old, and the original show was created as "edutainment" to teach while enjoying yourself. Which is why the first two companions were teachers. As it went along it became more fantasy less science, so I guess in a way it is slightly different
@@jacobcurle8964 because he doesn’t start of as a good guy that’s why I like him he was arrogant and thought he was better then humans but the more he saved and helped them or people in general he started to love humans and become a more emotional character that’s why I find his doctor underatted goes from somewhat being unrecognisable as the doctor we all know and then slowly becoming the doctor we all know and love
When I was very young Tom was Dr who but I had a younger brother who was mad into Buck Rogers and we only had one TV so for the key to time series I couldn't watch it. BBC switched for 5th doctor to Monday and Tuesday I think so at the age of 9 I could watch it again. Yes the TARDIS was crowded and some of the stories were poor but watching Earthshock without the Adric baggage was something I'll never forget. That's my era when I got to watch Dr who again tho all the problems you've highlighted are correct. The Big Finish Adric boxset is outstanding and kick started a couple of years when the fifth doctor releases were top of the tree. Love your work man
5 is one of my favorites. Really up there with 3 in ones I rewatch. Annoyed 5 is the best 5. Nyssa in Big Finish was better as she got to do stories with just her and Davison so got to shine.
I personally disagree but I respect your opinion and you make valid points. Personally the most underrated doctors would be Colin Baker, Sylvester McCoy and Peter Capaldi.
FINALLY someone who doesn't have a negative (overall) feeling about Arc of Infinity!!! (I am a bit of a sucker for Galifrey, especially after Davison's audio 'Time in Office') Davison is my favourite Doctor, along with Paul McGann and David Tennant (though I only really liked him with Donna XD)
I think Peter Davison is superb. His performance as you say is less quirky and eccentric but he does have more subtle moments of eccentricity and humour. I quite like the Black Guardian trilogy especially Enlightenment which has a surreal beautiful dreamlike quality and a wonderful score especially when the boats are floating in space and that as a child fascinated me. I do like Turlough I thought he was interesting and trapped in a pact with the Black Guardian made for some dramatic moments. For a younger Doctor Peter has a very mature voice and can project anger or panic when needed. He also has the greatest regeneration story The Caves of Androzani and his performance in that is so impressive. He can be underappreciated but so can William Hartnell's Doctor. Great video.
what would have been super is a Davison story that really concentrated on his character as the Doctor, made him the real focus (I'm sure the actor would have loved it) and what he was truly capable of. No idea what it would have been though.
I agree with you 100%, that he gets a bad rap. I love him as a Doctor. And I'm not going to lie as much as everyone hates on warriors of the deep I actually liked it. all the hate that it gets I think it's well deserved but for some reason I still like the story. Mostly because I loved the concept. And I loved the one scene that sells that story for me is when the doctor gets mad at his friends when they're going to use the gas and wipe out the Silaurians and the Sea devils as both races are about to start world War 3 and destroy humanity. And he makes the speech about how they have been on the Earth millions of years before humanity had come about and they have knowledge and talents well beyond anything human beings can imagine. And Turlough just coldly responds with but that doesn't change what they're about to do..... The look on Peter Davidson's face the realization that he will have to do something horrific to save humanity is priceless. It was writing like that and acting like that under bad conditions that makes Doctor Who stand out. For me it's a classic example of Doctor Who being so incredibly bad production wise but so incredibly good story-wise that I can get past all the bad production values.
Exactly 💯 you nailed it with Warriors. Its production values aside, It was a good "story" as you accurately described, the dire circumstances 5 had to deal with, and an ending that summed up his era... he stops the nuclear war, but at the cost of many dead Silurians, Sea Devils, & humans all around him, & he says "There should have been another way." In Davison's era, there weren't always happy endings, but instead grim consequences.
@@sasesq4000 thanks and I just watched it again cuz I have it on an old VHS tape. I like the real world consequences for people's actions. And it was events like this that totally made me buy why Keegan left at the end of resurrection of the daleks. I thought the fifth doctor had some of the best writing and Doctor Who history because they didn't shy away from the deeper moral dilemma the doctor had to face. I agree with you 100%
Agree that Davison is underrated. A great doctor that is undermined by baffling creative decisions, a few weak stories & the following doctor’s era exacerbating some of the problems. I think you can make a case that 10’s Doctor is underrated. Not in the general consensus but with how vocal people who don’t like his era are.
I agree, he's a very grumpy, Brash doctor, my friend goes by the summary the he the kind, human doctor and i do not see that. He had near no patience with Adric, little with Tegan and treats Nyssa like a component if computer at times, like he's preoccupied with getting things done before taking the welfare for his companions into consideration over the goal of the pure evil of each story, hence the companions end up in quite dire situations, it is quite an alien quality that he can't really empathise with them
“Underrated” we always get into a discussion with lots of people who don’t seem to understand what “underrated” means. For example, take critical favourite musician Jeff Buckley. He was NEVER underrated by anyone without selling a ton of records. Thankfully this channel does seem to get it and for that I am thankful.
I agree, an eclectic mix of great, medium and dire stories (Timeflight, The Awakening, Warriors from the Deep). I really like the Black Guardian trilogy, esp Mawdryn Undead. Doctor and Nyssa best pairing. Whatever is said, the Fifth Dr was mine, so essentially I accept all issues and still love it, and can watch it countless times.
He's definitely underrated. They needed to make the Doctor more human after Tom Baker , and Davison was ideal. Unfortunately he had more than his fair share of turkeys among his stories, but he always gave a good performance.
Davison is my favourite along side Pertwee. He is so underrated, one of my first ever who stories was the 5 Doctor, love him then, love him now. Earthshock has got to be my favourite story and to me the best who story of all time, best to Caves. Personally I like Adric and wish he had had more solo time with Davison, and Nyssa was such a waisted potential. They should have stuck with just adric and Nyssa as I love the keeper of Traken, where they work brilliant. I do like Tegan though and Season 19 is one of my favourite seasons, just after season 7.
I was always underestimating this Doctor and his actor a little... until one River Song audio where he torments madame Kovarian in such a horrifying, creepy way... Something awesome.
I'm currently working through his era, in terms of both TV and Audio - I watched Enlightenment last night (which was amazing), and there were some superb audios with him and Nyssa that I totally didn't expect because no-one ever talks about them - Castle of Fear, The Eternal Summer and The Haunting of Thomas Brewster are examples of this (Definitely check them out - Castle of Fear is a precursor to Eternal Summer, and Plague of the Dalek follows this, but that is trash).
'Enlightment' is so underrated. I wish more stories from the Fifth Doctor era took more chances on bonkers concepts like that story. Instead we get shit like 'Black Orchid'.
@@timelordrock2954 Fer sure -- but that's how i feel about that era: uneventful. When the BEST story is the last one -- it doesn't speak well fer his tenure.
Davison recently got voted the least favourite Doctor in a Radio Times poll. I suspect it's mainly because Davison's the actor who's most vocally against a female Doctor, but he's still totally undeserving of last place. Then again, Whittaker was voted second place, so I suppose that tells you how worthless those results ultimately were.
@@matthewduncan4318Yes but less than McCoy, C. Baker, and McGann even? Traditionally, Davison is not only placed above them in polls, but apart from McCoy in recent years, usually WELL above them. I can't seriously believe that more fans voted for the two Doctors who are usually regarded as having killed the show (not that I agree), AND the guy who only helmed a TV movie, a comic-relief special and an audio series. Something's weird there.
@LoneWolf 9520 Beyond being righteous and of strong moral fibre, there's no fixed method of acting the part. As for 'looking like the Doctor', what on Earth does that even mean? It's a stupid criticism that doesn't hold any substance to it. And I'm sorry, but calling him too human is the most lame and tired argument ever put against him. He's far more inhuman seeming than the likes of Tennant, Smith or Eccleston for example. They have a clear emotional investment in their companions. The Fifth Doctor, while not uncaring, is very emotionally distant and guarded in his interactions with his companions. In fact in some ways I'd argue he's easily one of the more alien and inhuman seeming Doctors, with only Tom Baker and McCoy rivalling him. So in short, I disagree. ;)
I remember reading that after Davison asked how should approach the role, he was told to play the doctor just like he played Triston in All Creatures Great and Small, I can’t remember who told him etc but I thought it was a nice story! I also think he’s hugely underrated as to how he played the Doctor, he was channeling Hartnel a lot ✌️
I really like him. His stories were hit and miss but Davison and Tom were my Doctors when I was a kid. Completely agree about Adric and Nysa too. Tegan grates on me when I watch the 5th Doc DVD’s
I think Davison is underrated. When I was very young, he was my favourite Doctor purely because he dressed in cricket whites. Now, he's probably my fourth favourite Doctor (behind Tom, Pertwee and Troughton)
80's Who is generally underrated; JNT was a good guy in the wrong place, and the show like many things and people, suffered under Boomer dirt bags in the Thatcher era.
I think I'm pretty certain that I read somewhere years ago (but I can't find the source now) that Margaret Thatcher was ironically actually a huge Doctor Who fan, back in the day.
Tom Baker was, is, and always will be MY doctor, BUT I really liked Peter Davison and his mix of youthful frenetic energy and easy charm. The transition was ok for my ten year old self. The same cannot be said for his successor with whom I completely failed to bond at the time.
I'd have to disagree. I think it's Hartnell, McGann or Hurt. I think Davison has become like Colin at this point. He was underrated but now so many people think he is that he's not anymore.
The Fifth Doctor I've never had a problem with. I think he's a very misunderstood incarnation. He's the nice personable Doctor with the hint of being older than he looks, Davison played the part like a protective, caring elder brother, especially with Peri.
@@julieeverett7442 Thank you for potentially adding that info to my campaigning list from TARDIS Fandom below. I'm trying to list only the TV mentioned ages, as they are the minimum anyone has to deal with. My biggest disappointment about the entire DW scene is that folks take the Doctor's ages seriously: including Tom Baker himself, who said in an interview that his style of lofty distance from human emotions was about acting what it's like to be 700. An approach that certainly does not work for me, his Doctor hard to feel connected with, in contrast to PD. Until sources like that showed me otherwise, I had always assumed by common sense the Doctor's ages were an egotistical joke. I find it impossible to feel any human companion's connection to, or emotionally compatible bond with, a being with an unequally longer lifespan on such a scale. It could never be a bond that felt fair. It's not the same as ourselves having longer lifespans than our pet animals, because they don't know. In a human v Time Lord relationship both are intelligent lives and do know. wth makes folks like the idea of longer lived aliens who we can't fantasise ourselves as being? Luckily, the Doctor's ages are a howlingly inconsistent mess, and for it they can only be a joke, logically. Sourced from "TARDIS fandom", p+ge found under "age" and "Second Doctor", it valuably itemises all the TV references to his age. According to which - as Second he was only half as old as the time since he left Gallifrey, as Third, claiming an age of several thousand, he was much older than he was ever again until Thirteenth, he was 750 as Fourth and Fifth but 900 as Sixth and still 903 as Tenth, he stayed c900 for over 400 years, he was younger as Tenth than as Seventh, he aged 300 years while he knew Amy (!) and he was 3000 over 900 years before he was 2000. In summary, if anyone buys that as a canon, his real name is Doctor Gordon Bennett.
Well I think his era had the best multi doctor stoty ever! I absolutely love the five Doctors. And can even watch warriors of the deep on more than 1 ocassoon:) I have never underated him!
My Favourite Doctor too! I think his Big Finish stories don’t stand out so much is because in terms of character he has nothing to prove whereas CB did in terms of character and McCoy in terms of good stories. I also lurrrvve every story in Season 19.
i think if 5 had known what he was doing with the role (as he is in caves) from season 19 and got on more with his companions he would be a lot more highly regarded. for example, season 21 is soo underrated and i love the tardis team as they are great characters and they have a good relationship. also my head canon is that time-flight doesnt happen. he just drops Tegan off but Nyssa insists on staying with him.
I really liked Peter Davison's Doctor. I didn't like Tom Baker in the role (though I've liked him in other roles - he was superb in the Chronicles of Narnia) and I stopped watching the series around 1976 because of him. So I was so pleased when Davison took over. Tegan is my favourite Who companion of all time (well, maybe equal first with Sarah Jane Smith). I also think the regeneration sequence from Tom Baker to Peter Davison is the best ever in all Doctor Who.
He had a tough road following Tom Baker. I like Davison, but rarely hear about him. I vote for underrated. I find his series compelling and comforting to watch. I haven't got into the Big Finish, just the televised episode.
Tom Baker was such a force that it seemed they wanted to go the other direction with 5 and have a toned-down Doctor. they probably should have leaned into that with 5 and have him suffer a crisis of confidence in some way. i think it would be scary to change the Doctor that much but the show needed it.
I definitely loved 4th and Adric duo a lot more better. Was recently rewatching season 18 and 19 and it feels a lot more smoother and more fun with them as a duo over 5th and Adric. 5th is in my unumbered top 3 underated doctors.
Favourite stories : Earthshocks, The Visitation, Enlightenment, Ressurection, Planet of Fire is always overlooked due to what follows, Caves of Andro Castrovalva, ( I think is a great preview of how his doctor would be = vulnerable) ... but then there's timeflight, warriors of the deep, timeflight .... going against the grain the 5 doctors never liked it due to Tom not being in it
The fifth doctor is my favourite doctor and thankyou for defending him.
@@caleb7551 thankyou! Your era I think needs to be given a second chsnce
Someone pointed out to me a little while ago that Davison's Doctor does get darker and darker as time goes on. He's always trying to do the right thing but bad shit just keeps happening to him. Adric's death, of course is one of them but also the fact that he has to kill Kamelion and then watch the Master burn to death (or so he thought) when he could've saved him and his era ends with him and his companion being poisoned and the Doctor isn't even sure if he'll make it to the next body. Despite all that, I think the biggest one however is when the Doctor meets up with Davros in Resurrection of the Daleks and he feels like he has to kill Davros to stop him. It's not really something you'd expect from his Doctor but he feels like it's something he has to do. Of course he doesn't go through with it and then we get the biggest blood bath in Doctor Who history which results in Tegan being scared off and leaving.
it is an incredibly unhappy era in the show you're right
@@sibionic Colin baker's era is more unhappy because most of his stories were weak and not developed well
"I'm not here as your prisoner Davros , i'm here as your executioner" a great line spoke with a mix of weariness and resolve.
Which i think would get higher praise now.
Thank you for the 5th Doctor love.
Peter Davison is my favorite as I could connect with him more than with any other doctor. He's kind and loving and caring but lots of bad stuff happens to him, so he has to make a lot of difficult decisions and grow among his companions more than any doctor ever. His regeneration coming from sacrifising himself to save Peri after all he had lost (like Adric) is the perfect ending to his doctor. Forever MY doctor❤
If you want to see Davison's full potential watch the charity special Time Crash. Davison slips right back into his Doctor effortlessly and you can feel Tennant's admiration flowing the entire time they played off each other.
I think he's one of the funniest doctors, he has a lot of sassy cutting lines especially with the companions and Adric but he downplays them and it works so well. Whereas other actors would emphasise it, he lets them slip under the radar and it's so much more shady because of it and humourous in an intelligent way like he's entertaining just himself with it instead of performing.
“Compared to some this one is positively flippant.”
I love the fifth Doctor's sarcasm a bit similar to David Tennant's but different
I love Peter davison first he is a really nice man in really life and he is my favourite of classic who and it is nice to see someone defending him
Peter Davison was the first Doctor i can remember. he is my doctor
Hugely underrated Doctor Caves of Androzani is arguably the best performance of the Doctor ever in that episode
agree
I'd argue Heaven Sent is the best performance, but Caves is the 2nd best performance
@@rockotarsoldaccount the zygon antiwar speech is up there too!
@@julieeverett7442 TBH I actually really hate that story and the speech feels really preachy and like The Doctor is talking down to the audience, which is very out of character in my opinion
@@rockotarsoldaccount then you totally dont understand the doctor at all, but ok ,thats your opinion!!
"Peter Davison Is The Most Underrated Doctor!" - Yes, yes he is!
Favorite fallout game
Ah, my favourite doctor. He's so different to Tom out of necessity whereas every doctor since seems to be playing the 4th doctor sometimes (especially in new who). 5 is very serious but still has fun (I love black orchid for showing this). His TV stuff is excellent, I genuinely like every story, but his audios are very underrated too. The Peterloo Massacre is my favourite story ever and well worth a listen for any mancunions/historical lovers.
I like cradle of the snake, the follow up to the Mara sequence
5 is my favorite. I got the old man in a young man’s body and the subtle shade. Loved that he cared about Turlough and Turlough’s plight & development. Tegan was annoying but fiercely loyal. His companions were the first to really have family members in stories, developed from their adventures, and tested as having more to do than just ask the Doctor questions. Nyssa dealing with the Master was a very wasted opportunity. The 5th was more human & warm while still being alien. The Hartnell connection was definitely demonstrated by the number of companions and the disposition.
Davison is my favorite classic Doctor. Always will be.
Agree 100%. The only classic Doctor with a complete character arc.
Totally agree with most of your comments. Davison always been my favourite Doctor. He tends to get overlooked in most polls etc. Also agree with you on Arc Of Infinity. Never understood the hate for it.
Thank you for making this video because I think Peter Davison deserves more credit for his performance as the Doctor
Just wanted to say your on fire with the content right now. Loving it. Also I'd say 7 also comes out as underrated. As for 5 audio wise, really liked the trio of him, peri and erimem
My biggest pet peeve with Doctor Who is people describing the Fifth Doctor as “the nice one”
He was a grumpy bastard! He couldn’t go a full story without rolling his eyes at something and he’s the only Doctor that I can remember literally SHOVING his companions through the TARDIS doors. It really does seem like a lot of people assume his entire personality based on the first google image result of him.
3rd shoved Sarah Jane in Time Warrior
That's because he's companions were stubborn and didn't always listen to him and one of them ended up getting killed because of it so you can't really blame him for sometimes getting irritated with them because if he was surrounded by better companions like Perri for example his companion chemistry would have been better but he is still a great Doctor and by far one of the most heroic Doctors of the classic series
Love Davison, was a huge fan as a kid. I consider Pertwee, T Baker and Davison as the Holy Trinity of Who. To have them back to back is remarkable. All very different but all genius.
they were the three I grew up with!
Agree 100%!! I really wish he’d had more time with Peri as well! Great video, keep up the content 👌
My first and favourite Doctor! Heavily underrated :)
It's definitely our generation that underrate him.
Very interesting. The fifth doctor was the doctor I remember most fondly from back in the day
vislor turlough is actually one of my favorite companions (i cant decide my actual favorite between him, jamie mccrimmon, ace and amy pond. if u want to help decide by all means)
favourite of mine too
100% he's a great doctor, he's been my favourite since before 2005. I think if it wasn't him playing the doctor after Tom Baker it would have been cancelled along time before it was
The 5th Doctor is one of my favourites Kinda always freaks me out
Davison is my favourite Doctor tied with Pertwee and Capaldi, he just has so much charm and the dynamic he had with his companions was brilliant. Such an underrated era and it's a fucking crime that he got chased off twitter by a lynch mob a couple years back. The only downside to his era is the shoddy effects but that's just a problem with all of classic Who in general and the BBC not giving them any budget. Absolutely love Davison's era.
I'm so glad you said that Adric was better with Tom, I've always thought that. You can really see where they were going with Adric but I think he just got lost.
Davison is my Doctor, so I’m biased, but I really enjoy season 20, the Black Guardian trilogy, particularly Enlightenment. Also Snakedance is a favourite of mine.
I liked him when I was watching in college.
The celery on his lapel was for detecting poison gases (at least according to WPSX)
Without a doubt he is the most underrated of all the Doctors.
The King has returned
Davison was the best in my opinion, he slid into the role effortlessly which was a hard task considering who was before him. A gem of an actor and his chemistry with Turlough was perfect. Wish he stayed on as the Doctor for longer.
@Wingy Media Did you just list the black Guardian trilogy as one of the bad stories? (Tho I'll give you Terminus)
6:18 Thank you! That really would have benefited the Ainsley Master, but instead he's a monster of the week.
I thought this! Enlightenment is a banger.
I agree Peter Davison is one of the most underrated doctors he is often overshadowed by other actors like jon pertwee and Tom baker and David tenant but I think he was great he has one of the best arcs for a doctor and has some of the best stories like kinda, earthshock, enlighten, the five doctors, resurrection of The Daleks and the caves of androzani, he was the best choice for the role, he helped brought the ratings back up with season 19 being the 6th most highest rated season of the show and still remaining to this date the 6th highest rated season in the show’s 59 year history and it is the highest rated season of the 80s the highest show had ever had been during the 1980s and he kept the ratings steady even during seasons 20 and 21 I don’t think C baker and McCoy would of not of manged alone if it was not for Davison
Davison is my favorite doctor I think his doctor is the most heroic, kind and selfless. The caves of Androzani is the best story of who story ever and I’m gonna be controversial and say there is not a bad story in his era and yes worriers of the deep is a understated classic . Obviously this is my opinion and everyone is entitled to their own but I wish people would respect him a bit more
Yes I agree I love warriors
Peter was actually the first proper era I decided to watch so he will always have a special place in my heart, he's not kind as people make him out to be
And gun straight pointed at Davros, it's the incarnation where his morals really began to change
Love this insight.
Davison is my fave… even though a few of his stories sometimes let him down as wasted opportunity
One thing I feel you almost touched on… you said he doesn’t seem that alien.
I see him as a Doctor who really wants to be human, but the alien side creeps up on him.
He surrounds himself with a family.
He is (superficially) well natured, but ultimately his alien/time lord ness prevents him being that human , because he is actually doing things humans can’t becuase there’s a bigger picture he tries to hide from - the way Adric is trapped and used in castrovalva, the outcome of Warriors of the Deep, Tegan’s Mara Possesion, Adric’s death, the unwanted execution of Davros, having to rescue Peri from an alien drug poisoning… the list is long!
In 5 Doctors alone he is just trying to take them on a flipping Holiday to North Wales/Eye of Orion and look what happens 😂
Tennant and Whitaker are absolutely both in this mould. They want to be human with the “fun” of time travel but ultimately it goes wrong and the nature of it all catches up with them.
5, 10 and 13 all all in my top 5 Doctors for exactly this .
I'll start with my bias - Peter is my Doctor. I have dim memories of some late period Tom Baker from the original run, but I properly started watching when Peter started. There's a few things going on that affect how his run is viewed. Here are my entirely unapologetic apologetics for the Fifth Doctor.
(1) As mentioned in the video, Peter faced a challenge in terms of who he followed. Not on the level of Troughton - Patrick had to carry the burden of selling the entire concept that it was possible for the Doctor to change, but after that Peter was following the longest running, and to this day probably still most popular Doctor Who of all time. The closest we've seen since is probably when Smith took over from Tenant given the incredible popularity of the Tenth Doctor at that time (I feel there's been a bit of backlash against that popularity since).
(2) He was weighed down by too many companions, a Producer whose understanding of the show was deeply flawed and a Script Editor that was more interested in writing mercenary stories than he was sci-fi / Doctor Who. It is well-documented that Davison wanted the Doctor to solve complex problems with really low-tech solutions and JNT's objection to that demonstrates to me that he didn't get the character or the show. His knee-jerk reaction to the sonic screwdriver is another example of JNT's flaws. He knew enough to recognise that it would be easy to get lazy and use it as the fix-all solution, but the solution to that problem is disciplined writing, not blowing the damn thing up.
(3) He might be the first Doctor who is really playing a character. To differing degrees, all the previous Doctors - even Hartnell in the end - were extensions of their actor's personality. Certainly, Jon and Tom were playing exaggerated versions of themselves. Peter Davison is a lovely guy, he's great to listen to, but there's not much of the Fifth Doctor in him apart from them sharing physical appearance and voice.
(4) Moving on from (3), I love the performance. This sounds like an odd thing to like, but there's something about when the Fifth Doctor is disappointed - his face collapses and he physically deflates and there's a childish vulnerability that is just adorable. Moffat once said about Davison that regardless of what was going on around him, there isn't an inauthentic moment from him and I entirely agree. Even confronted by Anthony Ainley's "racist even for 1981" performance in Time Flight Davison is in the moment the whole time.
(5) He gets hurt by a slow start - Castrovalva gets bogged down in the hard sci-fi that the show mysteriously seemed to think is what people wanted back then and Four to Doomsday is tedious to the nth power, but the general feeling that his time was weak doesn't really stand up. Maybe he didn't get as many stone-cold classics as his predecessors, but let's take a quick look.
His first season starts with two slow (but not terrible) stories, but then it gets pretty good. The Visitation, Kinda and Earthshock all stand up fairly well. OK, there's also Black Orchid and Time Flight... well, moving on....
Davison has consistently said in interviews that although he always felt he'd move on after three seasons, if his second had been as good as his third he'd probably have done another year. It's not great, but probably only Terminus and The King's Demons are really bad and Enlightenment is fantastic and definitely in that "not talked about enough" category. It concludes with The Five Doctors which is more or less Terrence Dicks's love letter to the show and I'm going to be honest - I don't care about any of the perceived flaws. My love for The Five Doctors is unconditional.
And then you get his third season starting off rocky - Warriors of the Deep is pretty bad, but I'd argue it has possibly the best final line in all of classic Who, and once you get over that we're in good / great / classic territory to the end. Put that all together and I'd say half of his stories are good or better than good. Maybe not the ratio we'd ideally like, but better than people seem to think.
(6) Not sure this entirely goes down as a check in the pro column, but for better or worse, Davison set the precedent that allowed New Who to cast attractive young actors as the Doctor. He showed it could be done and it would work. It doesn't have to be done - Capaldi puts that to bed forever - but it showed that it could be. Without Davision's Doctor, I'm not sure the show has the confidence to cast Matt Smith and possibly not even Tenant, maybe not even McGann.
In short, the Fifth Doctor is indeed criminally under-rated, and that's coming from someone fortunate enough to (so far) have never met a Doctor he didn't like. I could write at length about the virtues of each and every one of them, but I'll always come back to the Fifth as the one that is closest to my heart.
3rd 4th and 5th were my doctors growing up and I loved all three. Tom is THE doctor, the most alien and inhuman of them all. Then we had the gently human 5th - um are you kidding me? This man was a psychopath, the 2nd most ruthless of them all (only 7th beat him, though 12th in a fury comes close!!) there was no emotion at Adrics death, he has no problem shooting people, he forced gold into a cybermans chest, effectively suffocating them, he snipes at his companions, shows little regards for their feeling, and I loved it! He was so much fun. And I enjoyed the guardian trilogy. especially enlightenment. His big finish is fun too, I have about a dozen of them, including a few multi doctor ones, having 4th to 8th together in the same place is amazing!!!
I'm in total agreement. Davison was a terrific Doctor! After 7 wonderful years of Tom Baker's invincible, bombastic Doctor, we get Davison's vulnerable, old manish Doctor, which was a breath of fresh air. I also agree with your assessment of this era's companions. I've always thought Adric worked better with 4 and he, Nyssa and Turlough were such wasted opportunities to create interesting characters.
Great vid! please can you do an 80’s classic season ranking (5,6&7) like how you reviewed all the fourth doctor seasons
Yeah no worries if not but that is a pretty cool idea
Peter Davison is one of my favourite doctors. I didn’t like Tom Baker as the Doctor. He replaced Jon Pertwee, who was “my” Doctor and for me the template on how he should be. So Davison was for me more like what I thought he should be, so I’ve always liked him. Similar to Paul McGann, who’s another favourite and probably now my favourite of all. I agree Davison is under-rated. But I recommend you listen to his recent Big Finish “The Peterloo Massacre”, which is terrific and “Ghost Walk”, also terrific. Great review as usual...🥰
Castrovalva and four to doomsday are awesome.
In fact the whole first season is awesome.
He's in my ever evolving top 3 Davidson, Tom baker, ??? Probably eccleston
He really is. Not because he's particularly disliked, he's not from what I've seen, but he is simply very overlooked compared to most others.
I find his performance in The Caves of Androzani to be one of the best of any Doctor.
Hartnell is SO different from the others that it’s difficult to place him within ratings. It was a totally different show at first - it took 2 seasons to really establish that he’s a good guy and it was mostly the companions doing all the heavy lifting. It only really became the show it is now when Troughton took over.
Dont get me wrong, I like a lot of his stories - the Dalek Invasion of Earth really holds up. It is just that it feels like a different show.
I’ve found Hartnell really hard to place as well! I really like him, but he is straight up a different character. When I try to rank Doctors, he feels too good to put in the bottom half, but too un-Doctory to put in the top half. His performance is outstanding, but it feels wrong to praise a Doctor who literally says “this is no time for morality” to his companions at one point.
because Hartnell is the prototype doctor, we get the basics, he is NOT human he is a time travelling alien and it takes him quite a while to warm up to humans, which is quite proper as he is already hundreds of years old, and the original show was created as "edutainment" to teach while enjoying yourself. Which is why the first two companions were teachers. As it went along it became more fantasy less science, so I guess in a way it is slightly different
@@jacobcurle8964 because he doesn’t start of as a good guy that’s why I like him he was arrogant and thought he was better then humans but the more he saved and helped them or people in general he started to love humans and become a more emotional character that’s why I find his doctor underatted goes from somewhat being unrecognisable as the doctor we all know and then slowly becoming the doctor we all know and love
@@ljllob4740 that why he is my 3rd favorite doctor
@@jadenbryant9283 completely agree he is my 3rd favourite to 💯
When I was very young Tom was Dr who but I had a younger brother who was mad into Buck Rogers and we only had one TV so for the key to time series I couldn't watch it.
BBC switched for 5th doctor to Monday and Tuesday I think so at the age of 9 I could watch it again. Yes the TARDIS was crowded and some of the stories were poor but watching Earthshock without the Adric baggage was something I'll never forget.
That's my era when I got to watch Dr who again tho all the problems you've highlighted are correct.
The Big Finish Adric boxset is outstanding and kick started a couple of years when the fifth doctor releases were top of the tree.
Love your work man
I think Davison also works better in Big Finish. Him, Erimen and Peri are my favourite TARDIS team
5 is one of my favorites. Really up there with 3 in ones I rewatch.
Annoyed 5 is the best 5.
Nyssa in Big Finish was better as she got to do stories with just her and Davison so got to shine.
I personally disagree but I respect your opinion and you make valid points. Personally the most underrated doctors would be Colin Baker, Sylvester McCoy and Peter Capaldi.
@Clacka The Geek I would go with The Ninth Doctor
FINALLY someone who doesn't have a negative (overall) feeling about Arc of Infinity!!!
(I am a bit of a sucker for Galifrey, especially after Davison's audio 'Time in Office')
Davison is my favourite Doctor, along with Paul McGann and David Tennant (though I only really liked him with Donna XD)
I’ve never got the hate for Arc of Infinity, I’ve always thought it was pretty good.
I absolutely love Davidson, my favourite classic doctor in my opinion and Ik that’s an unpopular one!
DaviSON
I find season 20 to be one of the best 😅
I think Peter Davison is superb. His performance as you say is less quirky and eccentric but he does have more subtle moments of eccentricity and humour. I quite like the Black Guardian trilogy especially Enlightenment which has a surreal beautiful dreamlike quality and a wonderful score especially when the boats are floating in space and that as a child fascinated me. I do like Turlough I thought he was interesting and trapped in a pact with the Black Guardian made for some dramatic moments. For a younger Doctor Peter has a very mature voice and can project anger or panic when needed. He also has the greatest regeneration story The Caves of Androzani and his performance in that is so impressive. He can be underappreciated but so can William Hartnell's Doctor. Great video.
I completely agree with everything you said about the companions
Yeah he really is. He's got some of my all-time favourite DW stories.
He's got my favourite episode of doctor who, The Caves of Androzani
People accuse him of being bland and just being the nice Sweet Doctor but there is more to him then that
what would have been super is a Davison story that really concentrated on his character as the Doctor, made him the real focus (I'm sure the actor would have loved it) and what he was truly capable of. No idea what it would have been though.
I agree with you 100%, that he gets a bad rap. I love him as a Doctor. And I'm not going to lie as much as everyone hates on warriors of the deep I actually liked it. all the hate that it gets I think it's well deserved but for some reason I still like the story. Mostly because I loved the concept. And I loved the one scene that sells that story for me is when the doctor gets mad at his friends when they're going to use the gas and wipe out the Silaurians and the Sea devils as both races are about to start world War 3 and destroy humanity. And he makes the speech about how they have been on the Earth millions of years before humanity had come about and they have knowledge and talents well beyond anything human beings can imagine. And Turlough just coldly responds with but that doesn't change what they're about to do.....
The look on Peter Davidson's face the realization that he will have to do something horrific to save humanity is priceless. It was writing like that and acting like that under bad conditions that makes Doctor Who stand out. For me it's a classic example of Doctor Who being so incredibly bad production wise but so incredibly good story-wise that I can get past all the bad production values.
Exactly 💯 you nailed it with Warriors. Its production values aside, It was a good "story" as you accurately described, the dire circumstances 5 had to deal with, and an ending that summed up his era... he stops the nuclear war, but at the cost of many dead Silurians, Sea Devils, & humans all around him, & he says "There should have been another way." In Davison's era, there weren't always happy endings, but instead grim consequences.
@@sasesq4000 thanks and I just watched it again cuz I have it on an old VHS tape. I like the real world consequences for people's actions. And it was events like this that totally made me buy why Keegan left at the end of resurrection of the daleks. I thought the fifth doctor had some of the best writing and Doctor Who history because they didn't shy away from the deeper moral dilemma the doctor had to face. I agree with you 100%
Agree that Davison is underrated. A great doctor that is undermined by baffling creative decisions, a few weak stories & the following doctor’s era exacerbating some of the problems.
I think you can make a case that 10’s Doctor is underrated. Not in the general consensus but with how vocal people who don’t like his era are.
He was my Doctor. Yes like Capaldi, he didn't have the best stories.
Capaldi did have the best stories tbf
Completely Agree!
I have to agree with this!
I agree, he's a very grumpy, Brash doctor, my friend goes by the summary the he the kind, human doctor and i do not see that. He had near no patience with Adric, little with Tegan and treats
Nyssa like a component if computer at times, like he's preoccupied with getting things done before taking the welfare for his companions into consideration over the goal of the pure evil of each story, hence the companions end up in quite dire situations, it is quite an alien quality that he can't really empathise with them
“Underrated” we always get into a discussion with lots of people who don’t seem to understand what “underrated” means. For example, take critical favourite musician Jeff Buckley. He was NEVER underrated by anyone without selling a ton of records.
Thankfully this channel does seem to get it and for that I am thankful.
I love Peter Davison. I feel that David Tennant has taken quite a few attributes from Davison which improved Dr Who in the modern era
I agree, an eclectic mix of great, medium and dire stories (Timeflight, The Awakening, Warriors from the Deep). I really like the Black Guardian trilogy, esp Mawdryn Undead. Doctor and Nyssa best pairing. Whatever is said, the Fifth Dr was mine, so essentially I accept all issues and still love it, and can watch it countless times.
He's definitely underrated. They needed to make the Doctor more human after Tom Baker , and Davison was ideal. Unfortunately he had more than his fair share of turkeys among his stories, but he always gave a good performance.
Davison is my favourite along side Pertwee. He is so underrated, one of my first ever who stories was the 5 Doctor, love him then, love him now. Earthshock has got to be my favourite story and to me the best who story of all time, best to Caves. Personally I like Adric and wish he had had more solo time with Davison, and Nyssa was such a waisted potential. They should have stuck with just adric and Nyssa as I love the keeper of Traken, where they work brilliant. I do like Tegan though and Season 19 is one of my favourite seasons, just after season 7.
Davidson's 5th Doctor is one of my all-time favourites, along with Pertwee's 3rd and McCoy's 7th - McCoy being MY Doctor.
I was always underestimating this Doctor and his actor a little... until one River Song audio where he torments madame Kovarian in such a horrifying, creepy way... Something awesome.
I'm currently working through his era, in terms of both TV and Audio - I watched Enlightenment last night (which was amazing), and there were some superb audios with him and Nyssa that I totally didn't expect because no-one ever talks about them - Castle of Fear, The Eternal Summer and The Haunting of Thomas Brewster are examples of this (Definitely check them out - Castle of Fear is a precursor to Eternal Summer, and Plague of the Dalek follows this, but that is trash).
'Enlightment' is so underrated. I wish more stories from the Fifth Doctor era took more chances on bonkers concepts like that story.
Instead we get shit like 'Black Orchid'.
@@elgroucho I didn’t mind Black Orchid - it wasn’t bad, quite fun - just uneventful
@@timelordrock2954 Fer sure -- but that's how i feel about that era: uneventful. When the BEST story is the last one -- it doesn't speak well fer his tenure.
@@elgroucho haven’t got to that one yet - like I say, still working through Season 20. There are so. many. audios.
@@timelordrock2954 God bless Big Finish.
Not underrated, he just came after the man who was born to play him.
I would say it’s Slyvester but Peter Davison would be 2nd.
Davison recently got voted the least favourite Doctor in a Radio Times poll. I suspect it's mainly because Davison's the actor who's most vocally against a female Doctor, but he's still totally undeserving of last place. Then again, Whittaker was voted second place, so I suppose that tells you how worthless those results ultimately were.
@@zufgh more likely because Radio Times is full of new who fans. Most classic doctors got no more than 3%
@@matthewduncan4318Yes but less than McCoy, C. Baker, and McGann even? Traditionally, Davison is not only placed above them in polls, but apart from McCoy in recent years, usually WELL above them. I can't seriously believe that more fans voted for the two Doctors who are usually regarded as having killed the show (not that I agree), AND the guy who only helmed a TV movie, a comic-relief special and an audio series. Something's weird there.
@LoneWolf 9520 Beyond being righteous and of strong moral fibre, there's no fixed method of acting the part. As for 'looking like the Doctor', what on Earth does that even mean? It's a stupid criticism that doesn't hold any substance to it. And I'm sorry, but calling him too human is the most lame and tired argument ever put against him. He's far more inhuman seeming than the likes of Tennant, Smith or Eccleston for example. They have a clear emotional investment in their companions. The Fifth Doctor, while not uncaring, is very emotionally distant and guarded in his interactions with his companions. In fact in some ways I'd argue he's easily one of the more alien and inhuman seeming Doctors, with only Tom Baker and McCoy rivalling him. So in short, I disagree. ;)
He's the best.
I remember reading that after Davison asked how should approach the role, he was told to play the doctor just like he played Triston in All Creatures Great and Small, I can’t remember who told him etc but I thought it was a nice story! I also think he’s hugely underrated as to how he played the Doctor, he was channeling Hartnel a lot ✌️
He's hardly anything at all like Tristan from 'All Creatures'
@@normandavidtidiman9918 I’m just quoting what Davison said mate!
Five just felt very real to me.
I agree about Arc of Infinity, it's not a great story, but I think it's a pretty solid one.
I really like him. His stories were hit and miss but Davison and Tom were my Doctors when I was a kid. Completely agree about Adric and Nysa too. Tegan grates on me when I watch the 5th Doc DVD’s
You should listen to creatures of beauty for some good 5th doctor big finish stories
YES Tegan was annoying 😂 thanks for the validation!
I think Davison is underrated. When I was very young, he was my favourite Doctor purely because he dressed in cricket whites. Now, he's probably my fourth favourite Doctor (behind Tom, Pertwee and Troughton)
80's Who is generally underrated; JNT was a good guy in the wrong place, and the show like many things and people, suffered under Boomer dirt bags in the Thatcher era.
I think I'm pretty certain that I read somewhere years ago (but I can't find the source now) that Margaret Thatcher was ironically actually a huge Doctor Who fan, back in the day.
VERY underrated!!
My favourite Doctor!
Tom Baker was, is, and always will be MY doctor, BUT I really liked Peter Davison and his mix of youthful frenetic energy and easy charm.
The transition was ok for my ten year old self. The same cannot be said for his successor with whom I completely failed to bond at the time.
I'd have to disagree. I think it's Hartnell, McGann or Hurt. I think Davison has become like Colin at this point. He was underrated but now so many people think he is that he's not anymore.
until people stop saying that the 5th doctor is bland he will always be underrated
I would also say eccleston
The Fifth Doctor I've never had a problem with. I think he's a very misunderstood incarnation. He's the nice personable Doctor with the hint of being older than he looks, Davison played the part like a protective, caring elder brother, especially with Peri.
well this doctor was around 800 years old, so yes he was MUCH older than he looked
@@julieeverett7442 750 I think
@@Benji568 no 4th went from 748- 780 within his run, 5th is around 800
@@julieeverett7442 Oh right. Sorry. I've never kept up with the Doctor's age. I just knew that the Ninth Doctor was 900 years and so on.
@@julieeverett7442 Thank you for potentially adding that info to my campaigning list from TARDIS Fandom below. I'm trying to list only the TV mentioned ages, as they are the minimum anyone has to deal with.
My biggest disappointment about the entire DW scene is that folks take the Doctor's ages seriously: including Tom Baker himself, who said in an interview that his style of lofty distance from human emotions was about acting what it's like to be 700. An approach that certainly does not work for me, his Doctor hard to feel connected with, in contrast to PD.
Until sources like that showed me otherwise, I had always assumed by common sense the Doctor's ages were an egotistical joke. I find it impossible to feel any human companion's connection to, or emotionally compatible bond with, a being with an unequally longer lifespan on such a scale. It could never be a bond that felt fair. It's not the same as ourselves having longer lifespans than our pet animals, because they don't know. In a human v Time Lord relationship both are intelligent lives and do know. wth makes folks like the idea of longer lived aliens who we can't fantasise ourselves as being?
Luckily, the Doctor's ages are a howlingly inconsistent mess, and for it they can only be a joke, logically. Sourced from "TARDIS fandom", p+ge found under "age" and "Second Doctor", it valuably itemises all the TV references to his age. According to which -
as Second he was only half as old as the time since he left Gallifrey,
as Third, claiming an age of several thousand, he was much older than he was ever again until Thirteenth,
he was 750 as Fourth and Fifth but 900 as Sixth and still 903 as Tenth,
he stayed c900 for over 400 years,
he was younger as Tenth than as Seventh,
he aged 300 years while he knew Amy (!)
and he was 3000 over 900 years before he was 2000.
In summary, if anyone buys that as a canon, his real name is Doctor Gordon Bennett.
Well I think his era had the best multi doctor stoty ever! I absolutely love the five Doctors. And can even watch warriors of the deep on more than 1 ocassoon:)
I have never underated him!
My Favourite Doctor too! I think his Big Finish stories don’t stand out so much is because in terms of character he has nothing to prove whereas CB did in terms of character and McCoy in terms of good stories. I also lurrrvve every story in Season 19.
'Enlightenment' is a really good story, it's Doctor Who at its best. You should definitely revisit it without thinking about the Guardians... 😌
i think if 5 had known what he was doing with the role (as he is in caves) from season 19 and got on more with his companions he would be a lot more highly regarded. for example, season 21 is soo underrated and i love the tardis team as they are great characters and they have a good relationship. also my head canon is that time-flight doesnt happen. he just drops Tegan off but Nyssa insists on staying with him.
I really liked Peter Davison's Doctor. I didn't like Tom Baker in the role (though I've liked him in other roles - he was superb in the Chronicles of Narnia) and I stopped watching the series around 1976 because of him. So I was so pleased when Davison took over. Tegan is my favourite Who companion of all time (well, maybe equal first with Sarah Jane Smith). I also think the regeneration sequence from Tom Baker to Peter Davison is the best ever in all Doctor Who.
How kind!
He had a tough road following Tom Baker. I like Davison, but rarely hear about him. I vote for underrated. I find his series compelling and comforting to watch. I haven't got into the Big Finish, just the televised episode.
Tom Baker was such a force that it seemed they wanted to go the other direction with 5 and have a toned-down Doctor. they probably should have leaned into that with 5 and have him suffer a crisis of confidence in some way. i think it would be scary to change the Doctor that much but the show needed it.
I definitely loved 4th and Adric duo a lot more better. Was recently rewatching season 18 and 19 and it feels a lot more smoother and more fun with them as a duo over 5th and Adric. 5th is in my unumbered top 3 underated doctors.
Love the fifth! Very underrated and could have had better stories
Favourite stories : Earthshocks, The Visitation, Enlightenment, Ressurection, Planet of Fire is always overlooked due to what follows, Caves of Andro Castrovalva, ( I think is a great preview of how his doctor would be = vulnerable) ... but then there's timeflight, warriors of the deep, timeflight .... going against the grain the 5 doctors never liked it due to Tom not being in it