I wonder if the modern series head writers have homed in on the "become a completely new man" line in Jon Pertwee's finale, framed as it was in producer Barry Letts' study of Buddhism---the ego of the old man dies, the cells regenerate and he literally becomes a new man. My own personal bugbear is that in classic series, regeneration appears to be an automatic process that kicks in to save the Doctor from death---whereas in the modern show, it is equated *with* death ("I was dead too long this time" - The Eighth Doctor in the TV movie). I am also irritated by how the Doctor seems to be able to regenerate at will and subconsciously choose what he will become next. In the classic series, the Fifth Doctor lamented, "You never quite know what you're going to get." I prefer that.
If the Doctor really could choose what comes next, he'd be ginger by now. You still never quite know what you're going to get. The obvious exception is Capaldi's subconscious homing in on that face, but that happened after gaining a new set of regenerations, so things could be a little messed up with him.
@@jeffcarey3045 That's a very good point about being ginger! I read an interview with Steven Moffat in Radio Times promoting Twice Upon a Time where he said the Doctor subconsciously chooses to become a woman at the end, having observed the First Doctor's attitude towards women (and don't get me started on that!). So this is the only time it is explicitly stated. As for "all bets are off" regarding the new cycle, I love that.
My headcanon was that there are different types of regeneration for different situations. There are some which can be forced or triggered by some outside influence (the Time Lords forcing a regeneration in the War Games, or the potions the Sisters of Karn can brew), which allows for precision selection of characteristics and traits to engineer the outcome of the regeneration. I would imagine that this allows for some form of Time Lord cosmetic surgery where a patient hand picks their next incarnation, an alchemist or surgeon is then able to induce regeneration and mold it towards the desired outcome as they go. There are also voluntary regenerations, where the Time Lord decides to regenerate, and has more control over the result (Romana in Destiny of the Daleks). This could be a trait found in female Time Lords, where they can exert more influence over their regeneration than male Time Lords (River Song focusing on a dress size to influence her body type). The one the Doctor has experienced the most is involuntary, or emergency regeneration, which is triggered to prevent the Time Lord from dying. It can often need to occur quickly to keep the Time Lord alive, even without fully committing to the regeneration, and the Time Lord has little to no control over these, yielding more random results. This could also go towards explaining why some of the Doctor's emergency regenerations have been more violent, as they recently have a habit of holding them back, like shaking up a bottle of Coke - building up pressure until it's eventually released.
I prefer Classic Who's way of the regeneration happening too - in Classic Who, the Doctor is unconscious when the change actually happens, he appears dead. His last words are like a real person's last words. However in NuWho, he's conscious, he knows he's about to change, and he can make some poetic speech right before changing. It doesn't work as well for me.
There are 2 times I really think it works. Eccleston delivers an amazing performance trying to comfort Rose in his dying moments, and Smith has a nice monologue about accepting change(brought down a bit by his hallucination of Amy though). I also like Whittaker's, but that's because she doesn't have a dramatic speech. She just says a few words in this beautifully shot moment and lets it happen.
Same time you can see it as over time the Doctor is becoming more afraid of regenerating and going through the pain of dying every time, so they regenerate earlier now, they don’t wait until the actual death part, we know they can use their energy at will to heal themselves or others when not dying as seen with Smith, we also know they can put off regeneration even when their body has declared it’s time as seen with Capaldi, and he didn’t die right away, he held it off for AGES before finally deciding to regenerate. The Doctor doesn’t want to wait so long until the death to regenerate (especially since some of these fatal injuries are probably really painful to go through, heart of the Tardis energy burning you up, radiation, getting shot with a laser 😭) so they just skip to the change
The modern regenerations are pretty much all the same. In 'Classic Who' they were big landmark events. In 'New Who', we've seen so many that the impact has largely gone.
They make it a biological process but that eliminates any multidimensional aspect of Time Lords. It should be more like Gandalf's transformation. His avatar changes but the spirit (dimensions outside the usual 3) remains the same.
I think one could headcanon that the Tenth Doctor chooses to suffer the pain of believing that Eleven will be a completely different person because it's still less painful than the alternative of believing that he is still the same person as the War Doctor. Eleven and Twelve seem to really try to hammer in that they are the same person to Clara during Deep Breath, and I think he's able to do that because of how he learned that the War Doctor was never guilty of genocide. Obviously this wasn't RTD's original intention while writing The End of Time, given the War Doctor hadn't been conceived of at the time, but in hindsight it can work.
To me, the Fourth to the Fifth made the most sense: the dying Doctor goes into a sort of cocoon state, which gradually fades as the new Doctor's form appears.
The 11th to 12th regeneration atleast made a point of it being the same man. I think it's only the RTD eras that treated it as death. The 12th was more a case of "how long can I go on" rather than "I don't want to be someone else"
Nine to Ten expected to be the same person. And I could hear Nine saying Ten's lines for a while. Ten acted like it was death, but maybe that was vanity because he thought he was pretty. (To be fair, Tennant is pretty.) I look on it as different stages of a life. Moffat has explicitly stated that it is the same man, always (later woman, but he didn't say that since it hadn't been that before that he knew of). But even returning to Ten's face (but older, hey) because "he" liked that face suggests it is one person.
The bluish and Highlander electrical effect was used to regenerate seven to eight. Remember the electrical plasma globe-style effect? Although they played up the Frankenstein element in the film it was more like Highlander "the quickening".
@@MSHarvey_Lyricsmith love the original three Highlander movies. I have a strong affection for the first two especially. Two is underrated fun, especially the renegade edition.
I agree 💯. I love the way the 6th doctor regenerate into the 7th doctor. I love that effect. And in modern doctor who if the doctor dies and regenerate why are they not on the floor like classic doctor who.
@@unclekarl5219 Colin Baker's era is unfairly maligned. He has some strong stories in his first season, and his second season is almost perfect until the end (which was really no-one's fault). I'd argue that Davison actually has some of the weaker stories overall, but people remember his era more fondly because his character was more agreeable. If Colin Baker had been allowed to do what he wanted with the part, and Michael Grade hadn't been a slimeball about the whole thing, then we might have ended up with one of the best eras of the show.
@@TranscendentLion Eric Saward was the principal villain in making Colin Baker's era less than it could've been. JNT may have saddled Colin with the terrible costume, but it was Saward's script editing that undermined the Doctor's character at every opportunity.
I think the golden explosion was just 9 expelling the time vortex, it's the same colour and visual texture, but they kept the same effect for visual consistency.
Perhaps we should canon that he couldn't expel all of it, so it remains an element in all his further regens ever after. It changes the posture from lying down to standing. In Smith to Capaldi it was expended on the "reset" stage, not the physical change, which we already know from Classic does not require it. The new cycle that the Time Lords so implausibly sent him as sparkly energy floating to him from the space crack, becomes explained as a piece of time vortex. In Twice Upon a Time, the vortex was seen to feature a little in First's regen too, though not in the explosive way of later as he had not yet absorbed it. That must have to do with how in Tenth Planet he is seen to use the tardis to help himself do it.
I wonder if it would help for the writers to strip back the concept of regeneration and think about what it really is. To us, it looks like a death, but to a Time Lord, it's an event that will (probably) happen twelve times in their life, so it is more comparable to moving house or changing job. It can therefore be treated as a loss, and can come with sadness (the same way we would treat a change of address or employment), but to the Doctor, it isn't this devastating thing, and certainly not a death (from his perspective). There is still the potential struggle with identity, as you alluded to with 'regeneration fatigue', and we saw this a bit in Capaldi's first episode with his broom analogy (or Trigger's Broom analogy, to give due credit), and then of course in his last episode (as you mentioned). I think the misunderstanding set in with Tennant's departure - because of his popularity, the show wanted to reflect the fans' sadness when he left, but unfortunately, it did so at the expense of established lore. Weirdly, by bringing him back under the same showrunner, it then undermined its own message, so that this 'end of an era' turned out not to be the end after all, and old faces could come and go as they pleased. Perhaps that is where the solution lies: to the Doctor, a new face is ultimately of little consequence, but a change is still a change. Regeneration is perhaps an opportunity, a period of chaos and potential from which almost anything new can rise.
Not a fan of The End of Time, but the scene in the café where the Doctor explains to Wilf there's no guarantee he will regenerate, and even if he does it still feels like death, is incredibly powerful. I get annoyed in the latter part of the classic era and towards the end of Matt Smith's tenure how the concept of regeneration is bandied around like just another quirky gimmick. It takes the mystery and tension out of the concept. On a related note, on the night Eccleston regenerated I was working in the gift shop at an arts venue (got to start somewhere) when a fairly well-known actress who was appearing in a stage production came in before the evening performance. We got talking, whereupon she got a phone call from her young son. After the call she told me he was upset because Doctor Who had changed into somebody else and she'd had to explain to him that's what he does. As much as I enjoyed the 2005 season, and followed the positive buzz in the press, that's when I knew it had really made its mark.
@@richardenglish2195 yen’s speech tonsillitis great in a bubble but a bit irksome when looked at as a while about regeneration. And that’s a cool story.
Totally agree. Everything in modern Who is too consistent with the regenerations, incidental music, Dalek designs, etc. By the time of the Timeless Children with all those regenerations, I’m beat and yes the Doctor lost himself but found himself again in the classic series. Ah, recons lol
Another good video. Out of all the modern regenerations I would have to say that I enjoyed Smith to Capaldi most. Some of Karen Gillan's lines in that scene was a bit soppy but wasn't it a similar idea to the Davison to Baker regeneration? What I really liked was when Matt Smith turned his head away then Peter Capaldi immediately snapped his head back and it was all over in the blink of an eye. Then asking if Clara knew how to fly the TARDIS. Brilliant. Although I didn't like the talk of kidneys
I completely agree. Modern Doctor who regenerations took away the idea of the single being the Doctor who changes body out of necessity. In fact there is a deliberate effort in some stories to avoid The Doctor referring to his previous incarnations. We had Ruby Sunday directly asking the Doctor Who the guy with the curly hair. The Doctor just answers “Just people who traveled in the Tardis.” Whereas in the sixth Doctor Story Time lash. After an explosion a picture of the third Doctor appears and Peri asked “Who is that?” The Doctor simply says “me, funny you forget what you used to look like.” Classic regeneration was very matter of fact and was a consequence usually of the Doctor being heroic or sometimes punished or old age. It was more about the story than the actual changeover. The Doctor is dying so he’s changing is body to survive. Whereas in the modern show it’s the Doctor has died and we got a new one who has the same memories. That does make a difference. FYI, I don’t always buy this different personality idea. He behaves differently but personality wise he’s essentially much the same. I think if you focus on what’s actually the same you’ll probably find he’s pretty consistent. Still doesn’t shoot people, still solves problems via intelligence. Still favors human companions. Still loves earth. Still has the same moral compass. For me growing up the I always liked the three Doctors, because they acknowledge that they are all the same person. I think modern who wanted to make people cry and turned a renewal into a death.
I always hated the ongoing yellow light. It really creates the division between new and old who. I think it only worked with 10 burning the Tardis. It feels boring and in creative. Have the Doctor be liquified and solidified in a new body. Do a 1970s and have the doctor’s nose change then hair, then fingers, then eyes, then legs etc.
I currently just started the 2nd Doctor era just he’s first episode I think both 9 and 10 have the same let’s say “taste of smell” where they can tell everything by just the air. In the timeless children episode 13 reminds you of both 9 and 10. When she couldn’t use the bomb, which is strikingly similar to 9 in the Episode Bad Wolf. 13 in that episode after getting arrested by the Judoon she does 10’s “what, what, what”
Yeah. Pretty much agree on all of that. My biggest "No Like" is how regen has become the Highlander Quickening! Everything seeming to BLOW UP when it happens now. it made Sense when Eccelston did it because of the Big Energy He'd absorbed at the end of the story, but after that its just Awe and Wow Factor. That is now old. I can't see the Time Lords not fixing that. It would make a horrible mess everytime someone did regen.
Perhaps we should canon that he couldn't expel all of it, so it remains an element in all his further regens ever after. Just his, not every Time Lord's. It changes the posture from lying down to standing, too. In Smith to Capaldi it was expended on the "reset" stage, not the physical change, which we already know from Classic does not require it. The new cycle that the Time Lords so implausibly sent him as sparkly energy floating to him from the space crack, becomes explained as a piece of time vortex. In Twice Upon a Time, the vortex was seen to feature a little in First's regen too, though not in the explosive way of later as he had not yet absorbed it. That must have to do with how in Tenth Planet he is seen to use the tardis to help himself do it.
Like you, I’ve always wanted to see a regeneration effect in the vein of what it looked like in Quantum Leap when Sam would leap with the blue electricity shooting out everywhere…
It annoys me that the process is shown to be the same in new who. I know that was the point, but I never thought it WASN'T the same process in the classic series where it was always somewhat different. I don't like they a Time Lord is conscious throughout the process now and standing up through it. He would even fight to stand up to do it. That didn't sit well with me. And I despise the fact that they now consider each Doctor a different entity. Mel asking "How many Doctors are there?" In Power of the Doctor just pissed me off. There is ONE Doctor. The different outward appearances are the SAME person.
@@CamMcGinn1981 well said. I thought it was cool when Chris regenerated standing up as that was a neat new take, but it’s been done to death in new who now.
Absolutely right. It's one of the differences that I always point to when I say the reboot series *is* a reboot, and not a continuation. Whenever the Doctor talked about an earlier incarnation he always referred to it as "I" or "me", never as someone else. For example in Frontier in Space when he describes his trial on Gallifrey " *I* made a complete fool of that prosecuting counsel", and " They found *me* guilty, changed *my* appearance and exiled *me* to Earth". Also, the Doctor's core personality never changes, it's just expressed differently in different bodies. When Peri accuses the Doctor of trying to strangle her, he immediately refutes it, saying he's never violent except in self defense. The Doctor always knows who he is. This contrasts wildly with modern regenerations, especially Tennant and Capaldi's. It's also worth noting that The Master, Romana, Borusa and K'anpo Rimpoche all retained the same core personalities through regenerations. Romana is always good, Borusa is always an autocrat, and The Master is always evil. Unlikely - to say the least - if regeneration means you become a different person. And yes, a big part of the fun of a regeneration story was not only what would cause it to happen, but how it would look. The modern series has been phenomenally boring in that respect. I think the last word should go to Doctor Who's premier writer, Robert Holmes: " I wrote the fifth Doctor in very much the same way as his predecessors. After all, the Doctor is always the same character. His body changes, his manners and idiosyncracies alter, but at the bottom he remains the same person".
"Also, the Doctor's core personality never changes, it's just expressed differently in different bodies." Going to do the internet thing and argue a bit here, all for fun and just opinions though. Tbf I don't think regeneration is actually developed enough as a concept for there to not be some amount of individual perspective impacting this topic. Not really though. There's precious few similarities in character between the Troughton Doctor and the Pertwee one, or the Hartnell one. Some Doctors are much more similar, sure (the 5th Doctor and the 1st do have remarkably similar personalities), but the 7th Doctor and the 5th just flatly aren't the same character, just as the 6th is nothing like the 2nd. Whenever a writer says they wrote The Doctor as "basically the same" (which btw, is exactly what New Who does every single time), it just comes off as "I can write it this way so I might as well". In the same way that arguing The Doctor was one continuous, consistent character across several wildly differing reinventions of the basic idea for the character, is really just lip service. Arguing The Doctor always knows who he is, that's a stretch as well imo. The 6th Doctor has absolutely no in universe reason whatsoever (outside of regeneration changing his personality/impacting his perception of himself and others) for being so much more angry and moody than the 5th Doctor. Who was grouchy sure, but nothing like the 6th at all. "Romana is good" "Borusa is an autocrat" etc. Rose is good, so I guess they're the same personality, at their core? I'm being an arse but you can see my point. I don't think The Doctor ever lost that basic foundation of what the character was supposed to be, but if talking about the incarnations as people not as reboots of a comic book style character idea, they do not share a personality nor do they have continuous development. And I say all this as someone who agrees that New Who is essentially a totally different show and is absolutely a soft reboot.
@@dommoore6180 The (Classic) Doctors have more similarities than they do differences. The same respect for life, the scientific curiosity, the need to see and experience the universe. Those are always at the heart of the Doctor's personality. Let me put it this way: I don't know you, but you seem like a calm and reasonable guy. But I'd bet you have days where something's made you angry, or you've just got out of the wrong side of the bed and the least little thing irritates you, and other days where life is great and you're on a real high, and so on. But whatever your mood, you're not going to go out and suddenly start murdering people, or commit genocide, or kick blind kittens, or become a Blake's 7 fan. You're still you. That's the Doctor to me. Different moods dominate his different forms. In some he's tetchy and irritable, in some humerous, in some he angers quicker, in others he angers slower. But he's always a good man. Always on the side of right. Never cruel or cowardly. His core values remain the same. To become 'somebody else' strongly implies to me (And the Capaldi 'Am I a good man' dialogue seems to back it up), that he *could* regenerate into a genocidal maniac, or a r**ist or, indeed, a Blake's 7 fan. But I'm glad we agree on the reboot at least. :)
@ancientonezero comparing hugely differing personalities to temporary moods is ridiculous though. Just because he has a generally decent morality and likes to travel doesn't somehow negate all the differences in personalities between clearly defined incarnations. This just doesn't make sense! I appreciate we all have differing perspectives here I'm not trying to negate yours but if you ask me this comes off as mental gymnastics to justify an idea (that they're all the same man) that clearly doesn't reflect the reality of what's on screen. I mean really, consider comparing totally distinct personalities which last the full duration of an incarnations life to mood swings... I just don't think you can boil these character down to "they're good guys" and say that makes them essentially the same despite everything else.
Parting of the Ways and Time of the Doctor get it right (not so much talking about the whole episode's quality but just the element of regeneration in it.) Power of the Doctor almost gets it right. I don't know how they messed it up so bad with the other ones, it's not really a very difficult concept that needs deconstructing or etc
I disagree. How does the Doctor scream at Rose for absorbing lethal vortex energy for a few minutes, wipes out a million Daleks and beings back to life one person only because she has the hots for him, followed by his French kissing it out of her, he then gives some rubbish speeches for a few seconds, then lights up like a fireplace, turns into a younger guy and yet she's unscathed. Remember, she's the fragile mortal and he is a robust alien. That's dumber than Time and the Rani's explanation.
@@ShamrockParticle even when you're trying to make it sound bad parting of the ways is so damn epic and the ninth doctors exit so touching. The little speech also perfectly sets up the concept, especially compared to end of time which seems to go completely against it for some reason. Time and the Rani is dumb though I will agree
@@dwfan91- eh, time and Rani turn outed decent when you consider all of the behind the scenes problems it had going on. I find bad wolf has aged poorly due to all of the 2000s references that are so dated now, but parting do the ways is great.
@@AnotherScifiGuy well they're not really dated to me because I remember everything its referencing, maybe if you're a kid nowadays you might not know what Big Brother is or the Weakest Link but to me its perfect. If anything those references elevate it because the truth is its one of the most compelling episode of New Who ever in my opinion. Also if you want to talk about behind the scenes drama then Series 1 takes the cake, personally I consider that finale very highly
@@dwfan91- yeah lots of behind the scenes drama for series 1 for sure, would love an honest documentary about that one day. I find the series 1 finale to be one of the good ones overall from modern who. And oddly enough I think of big brother as a 1984 reference first and a tv show second myself (I enjoy the novel and the lessons it teaches)
Plenty of things I miss from old Who to new. But the new Who producers want to put their stamp on it so they add more to the mythos which is fine. After a while you can add too much.
See I know I'm in the minority on this one. I also know that lots of Who fans love the idea of The Doctor/s all being one continuous character. But this topic always makes me feel like I'm living in a crazy land. To me, the whole "it's the same man" thing, that's just blatant lip service because they had to lose their lead cast member and wrote a new character in his place. There is so very, very little in common between the 1st and 2nd Doctors. Not on a surface level, not on a core level. Beyond the super basic concept for the character (mysterious traveller in space/time with some loose Edwardian/Victorian outfit elements). Beyond that, there's nothing in common. And there's certainly no development leading into the 2nd Doctor's character. And many parts of what many would consider the basic concept for The Doctor aren't even consistent in the classic series! The 3rd Doctor isn't a traveller in time and space for a majority of the time. He's also increasingly not mysterious at all. And he's more of an action character than the sort of opportunist/manipulative visitor that the 1st or 2nd Doctors were. Some Doctors are much more similar than others. The 5th Doctor and the 1st, the 7th and the 2nd. But that's basically where it ends and there's no continuous development or consistency there as they're separated by Doctors that don't remotely resemble them. Each incarnation is approached basically the same way as a comic book character reboot/alternate version. The basic core idea is there, everything else is fair game for huge change. The show hardly ignores this either. They treat The Doctors very much as their own characters in multi Doctor stories (developing dynamics between them which continue into further appearances, highlighting their differences in lining them up, calling back to their individual stories and relationships). Even when they do say they're all one person and have them talk as if they were. Which makes sense, they are one entity or whatever you'd want to call it, they all have the same memories. So "I" in past tense makes total sense. But that doesn't suddenly remove all the ways that they are functionally individual characters. And that's just on a character level. If you wanted to look at it in universe and treat them as people, it'd be incredibly messed up to deny any individuality for the totally individual personalities who have their own bodies, their own unique relationships, opinions, personalities and so on, just because they happen to be "born" in place of a predecessor they happen to share memories and some surface level traits with. I understand the argument of "well people change all the time irl" and sure, they do, but that's not remotely equivalent to everything about you changing physically and mentally upon a literal death. Essentially being replaced by a new person. I know that's what's being bashed here, people hate that read of it, I get it Tennant cried about it a lot. But it's absolutely how it'd be seen if The Doctor were real because it's functionally what happens. This idea that it's just the face that changes totally ignores the personality totally changing, to say nothing of all the above. Ironically I'd argue the modern Doctors all basically share a personality, with much less difference in actual character between them all vs the classic Doctors. So if anything, it's New Who placing more importance on the face whereas classic totally changed the actual character. You don't get a 2nd doctor vs 1 or 3 in New Who. You get various reboots of Tennant's characterisation which itself was already quite similar to the 9th's. None of which have anything to do with the 1st Doctor's personality. Just makes no sense to me whatsoever that so many fans genuinely think The Doctors were all one continuous character, it's no big deal, but it seriously makes no sense to me. Nerd rambles over. I totally agree that the regenerations being different and unique was great and I miss that. It's also pretty ridiculous that what was obviously the Time Vortex energy being expelled as The Doctor dies, has now been retconned into just how regenerations look for some reason.
@@dommoore6180 it’s certainly true that most classic doctors are vastly different from their predecessors, almost like a reaction to them really, but I like the in universe dialogue from the doctor that he is still the same man (yes man), and it’s just a new body he is in (mentioned in things like robot and Shada.) but we can’t deny that doctors 1, 2, and 3 are so different from each other, amusingly so.
@AnotherScifiGuy yeah I know fans tend to like the idea they're all 1 guy, I just don't think that stands up to any scrutiny at all. But it's all personal perspective (and I suspect preference). It's certainly no big deal.
It's not a literal death. The only one of the classic era Doctors who even appears to die is the third Doctor, but K'Anpo very clearly refutes that. On multi-Doctor stories: In his novelisation of The Three Doctors, Terrance Dicks gives the President some dialogue which isn't in the finished programme (Nor the camera scripts, but may well have been in earlier drafts). On seeing the second and third Doctors arguing, he says... "I suppose it's natural enough. *Two* *opposing* *parts* *of* *the* *same* *personality* . They're too alike to agree. We need someone to keep them in order". I don't think Uncle Terrance could have made it more clear.
You say you get a different feeling, and so do I. You admit that it isn't any of the obvious reasons. Before Chibnall, all the Doctors seemed about the same in terms of central character with different personalities. I don't see that you have addressed why you feel this way or how the makers caused it. I'm going to take a stab at it as a cognitive semioticist, which includes linguistics. (A punning linguist is a cunning linguist.) This is why I talk funny. First, the Classic Who regenerations seem just to happen, a cross fade with maybe some lighting, or not even that. The new ones are spectacular, with a lot of orange light and noise and screaming. Cognitive science shows that we understand concepts in terms of basic concepts and basic concepts in terms of embodiment. A crude example is that we experience anger as heat, internal pressure, and the color red, because blood pressure goes sky-high. This affects our semiotics; we say "blew his stack," "boiling," "flipped his lid," and so on. The basic embodied metaphor of how the Classic Who showed regeneration is _healing,_ though faster than usual. The basic embodied metaphor of NuWho is _death._ There's rebirth to follow, of course, but still. So a Classic regeneration seems like healing, while a Nu on seems like death. Second, Eccleston says something like "You won't see me again..... Not with this daft old face, anyway. In cognitive linguistics, the dots are significant. There needs to be some delay for a though sustained only by feedback mechanisms to start to be remembered. This is why saying something to yourself over and over again makes a memory. The longer the pause, the deeper it sinks in. So the idea that Eccleston is about to die for real sinks well in and is still remembered. It may not be consciously remembered, but it affects a lot of the ideas the limbic system presents to the neocortex. The neocortex can only choose from a few (probably Miller's Magic Number, between 5 and 9), and it has to throw away hundreds. (From my computational experiments in cognitive linguistics, my simulation has to throw away either 40,000 or 200. The difference ranges over various hypotheses of the details in the brain, but in any event, it's a bunch of them.) The population of ideas it does present are filtered with pre-conscious means. So the stronger the impression the Doctor is about to die is in a Hebbian sense, *even when the dominant idea is regeneration,* the more the population will be filtered in the direction of the idea that the Doctor dies. Of course, stuff like The Impossible Astronaut arc and Tranzalore reinforces this, embedding the idea into the era. Thus, when one thinks of one's experience of one era versus another, this is enough to provide the impression of a distinct difference, even when the difference in patterns of characterization, upon examination, seems very small. (I still think the most important difference is B.C.E. versus C.E., where the C is for Chibnall, not Common.)
Classic Who had no consistency in appearance. NuWho where the Doctor fries everything in the room just got dumber and dumber when trying to one-up its destructive effect. It's not even camp, unintentionally or otherwise. That's the problem, which Classic never had because Classic wasn't generally trying to out-epic itself. It was just itself. (Spiders, Logopolis and Caves trying to make the trend , but even then...)
I will pre qualify ive only seen all new who n new new who. My exp og series is books. My theory. Theyve a timeline for an ending. But 9 is like 15. 10 is like 13. I think whos rewinding.
But regeneration or not every one of the doctors were Men or Woman. Now, apparently the woke society decided to go LBQT+. Personally, seeing a Doctor Who kissing another man did not sit well with me. After all we are truly in a woke society. Good for them for being acknowledged. But there goes Doctor Who for me! I have been following his/her adventures for years but no more. All the best for the new queer Doctor Who. Based on what I saw on the Olympics you will have a lot of spectators who will enjoys your antics. You won't miss me but I will miss you🙂Please do not hate me for it. I live and let live. I do not want to impress my thinking on anyone. I am just expressing my honest opinion freely and candidly.
Women are allowed to kiss each other and don't get called gay. There is kissing in greetings between powered men in Russian and Asia-Pacific traditions. No society has any right to more authoritarian values than another society has been shown to have, the duty to defending liberty is that in every value clash, every time, liberty wins, allowing wins, not allowing gets discredited.
If the doctor was sad about regeneration then that would have happened near the beginning of his life, by his tenth incarnation he should be used to it by now. Again they treat modern who like its not a continuation of classic who, even though they say it is, would have made sooooo much sense just to start from scratch and have eccelston be the 1st doctor ,who survived a war on his planet and is now exploring the galaxy and trying to make a difference. Then any retcons or continuity changes will ONLY affect new who, not classic who. All this nonsense of having the characters last line being not the doctors but the actors makes zero sense and takes you out of the moment, plus when the doctor is dying he stands up ans runs around for ages before he changes which doesn't sell the doctor's injuries well at all
I know this is sort of retconned, but with ten it does make sense he'd be afraid. This is the last time he'll regenerate (that he's aware of), and he knows that his death is just a matter of time.
I wonder if the modern series head writers have homed in on the "become a completely new man" line in Jon Pertwee's finale, framed as it was in producer Barry Letts' study of Buddhism---the ego of the old man dies, the cells regenerate and he literally becomes a new man. My own personal bugbear is that in classic series, regeneration appears to be an automatic process that kicks in to save the Doctor from death---whereas in the modern show, it is equated *with* death ("I was dead too long this time" - The Eighth Doctor in the TV movie). I am also irritated by how the Doctor seems to be able to regenerate at will and subconsciously choose what he will become next. In the classic series, the Fifth Doctor lamented, "You never quite know what you're going to get." I prefer that.
If the Doctor really could choose what comes next, he'd be ginger by now. You still never quite know what you're going to get. The obvious exception is Capaldi's subconscious homing in on that face, but that happened after gaining a new set of regenerations, so things could be a little messed up with him.
@@jeffcarey3045 That's a very good point about being ginger! I read an interview with Steven Moffat in Radio Times promoting Twice Upon a Time where he said the Doctor subconsciously chooses to become a woman at the end, having observed the First Doctor's attitude towards women (and don't get me started on that!). So this is the only time it is explicitly stated. As for "all bets are off" regarding the new cycle, I love that.
My headcanon was that there are different types of regeneration for different situations.
There are some which can be forced or triggered by some outside influence (the Time Lords forcing a regeneration in the War Games, or the potions the Sisters of Karn can brew), which allows for precision selection of characteristics and traits to engineer the outcome of the regeneration. I would imagine that this allows for some form of Time Lord cosmetic surgery where a patient hand picks their next incarnation, an alchemist or surgeon is then able to induce regeneration and mold it towards the desired outcome as they go.
There are also voluntary regenerations, where the Time Lord decides to regenerate, and has more control over the result (Romana in Destiny of the Daleks). This could be a trait found in female Time Lords, where they can exert more influence over their regeneration than male Time Lords (River Song focusing on a dress size to influence her body type).
The one the Doctor has experienced the most is involuntary, or emergency regeneration, which is triggered to prevent the Time Lord from dying. It can often need to occur quickly to keep the Time Lord alive, even without fully committing to the regeneration, and the Time Lord has little to no control over these, yielding more random results. This could also go towards explaining why some of the Doctor's emergency regenerations have been more violent, as they recently have a habit of holding them back, like shaking up a bottle of Coke - building up pressure until it's eventually released.
I prefer Classic Who's way of the regeneration happening too - in Classic Who, the Doctor is unconscious when the change actually happens, he appears dead. His last words are like a real person's last words.
However in NuWho, he's conscious, he knows he's about to change, and he can make some poetic speech right before changing. It doesn't work as well for me.
@@LiveHedgehog agreed
There are 2 times I really think it works. Eccleston delivers an amazing performance trying to comfort Rose in his dying moments, and Smith has a nice monologue about accepting change(brought down a bit by his hallucination of Amy though). I also like Whittaker's, but that's because she doesn't have a dramatic speech. She just says a few words in this beautifully shot moment and lets it happen.
@@idle_speculation I do like how 13’s is quick and not self indulgent.
Same time you can see it as over time the Doctor is becoming more afraid of regenerating and going through the pain of dying every time, so they regenerate earlier now, they don’t wait until the actual death part, we know they can use their energy at will to heal themselves or others when not dying as seen with Smith, we also know they can put off regeneration even when their body has declared it’s time as seen with Capaldi, and he didn’t die right away, he held it off for AGES before finally deciding to regenerate. The Doctor doesn’t want to wait so long until the death to regenerate (especially since some of these fatal injuries are probably really painful to go through, heart of the Tardis energy burning you up, radiation, getting shot with a laser 😭) so they just skip to the change
The modern regenerations are pretty much all the same. In 'Classic Who' they were big landmark events. In 'New Who', we've seen so many that the impact has largely gone.
They make it a biological process but that eliminates any multidimensional aspect of Time Lords.
It should be more like Gandalf's transformation. His avatar changes but the spirit (dimensions outside the usual 3) remains the same.
I think one could headcanon that the Tenth Doctor chooses to suffer the pain of believing that Eleven will be a completely different person because it's still less painful than the alternative of believing that he is still the same person as the War Doctor. Eleven and Twelve seem to really try to hammer in that they are the same person to Clara during Deep Breath, and I think he's able to do that because of how he learned that the War Doctor was never guilty of genocide.
Obviously this wasn't RTD's original intention while writing The End of Time, given the War Doctor hadn't been conceived of at the time, but in hindsight it can work.
To me, the Fourth to the Fifth made the most sense: the dying Doctor goes into a sort of cocoon state, which gradually fades as the new Doctor's form appears.
@@mikenash7049 I do like that one a lot.
He kinda looked like the ghost of George Washington for a few seconds.
The 11th to 12th regeneration atleast made a point of it being the same man. I think it's only the RTD eras that treated it as death. The 12th was more a case of "how long can I go on" rather than "I don't want to be someone else"
Nine to Ten expected to be the same person. And I could hear Nine saying Ten's lines for a while. Ten acted like it was death, but maybe that was vanity because he thought he was pretty. (To be fair, Tennant is pretty.) I look on it as different stages of a life. Moffat has explicitly stated that it is the same man, always (later woman, but he didn't say that since it hadn't been that before that he knew of). But even returning to Ten's face (but older, hey) because "he" liked that face suggests it is one person.
Purely from an aesthetic standpoint, 7 into 8 looks best.
The bluish and Highlander electrical effect was used to regenerate seven to eight. Remember the electrical plasma globe-style effect? Although they played up the Frankenstein element in the film it was more like Highlander "the quickening".
@@MSHarvey_Lyricsmith love the original three Highlander movies. I have a strong affection for the first two especially. Two is underrated fun, especially the renegade edition.
I agree 💯. I love the way the 6th doctor regenerate into the 7th doctor. I love that effect. And in modern doctor who if the doctor dies and regenerate why are they not on the floor like classic doctor who.
What’s this new trend of trying to redeem Colin baker’s era just because the actor is a nice guy
@@unclekarl5219 It's not redeemed, it's forgiven.
@@unclekarl5219 Colin Baker's era is unfairly maligned. He has some strong stories in his first season, and his second season is almost perfect until the end (which was really no-one's fault). I'd argue that Davison actually has some of the weaker stories overall, but people remember his era more fondly because his character was more agreeable. If Colin Baker had been allowed to do what he wanted with the part, and Michael Grade hadn't been a slimeball about the whole thing, then we might have ended up with one of the best eras of the show.
@@TranscendentLion Eric Saward was the principal villain in making Colin Baker's era less than it could've been. JNT may have saddled Colin with the terrible costume, but it was Saward's script editing that undermined the Doctor's character at every opportunity.
I think the golden explosion was just 9 expelling the time vortex, it's the same colour and visual texture, but they kept the same effect for visual consistency.
Perhaps we should canon that he couldn't expel all of it, so it remains an element in all his further regens ever after. It changes the posture from lying down to standing.
In Smith to Capaldi it was expended on the "reset" stage, not the physical change, which we already know from Classic does not require it. The new cycle that the Time Lords so implausibly sent him as sparkly energy floating to him from the space crack, becomes explained as a piece of time vortex.
In Twice Upon a Time, the vortex was seen to feature a little in First's regen too, though not in the explosive way of later as he had not yet absorbed it. That must have to do with how in Tenth Planet he is seen to use the tardis to help himself do it.
I wonder if it would help for the writers to strip back the concept of regeneration and think about what it really is. To us, it looks like a death, but to a Time Lord, it's an event that will (probably) happen twelve times in their life, so it is more comparable to moving house or changing job. It can therefore be treated as a loss, and can come with sadness (the same way we would treat a change of address or employment), but to the Doctor, it isn't this devastating thing, and certainly not a death (from his perspective). There is still the potential struggle with identity, as you alluded to with 'regeneration fatigue', and we saw this a bit in Capaldi's first episode with his broom analogy (or Trigger's Broom analogy, to give due credit), and then of course in his last episode (as you mentioned).
I think the misunderstanding set in with Tennant's departure - because of his popularity, the show wanted to reflect the fans' sadness when he left, but unfortunately, it did so at the expense of established lore. Weirdly, by bringing him back under the same showrunner, it then undermined its own message, so that this 'end of an era' turned out not to be the end after all, and old faces could come and go as they pleased. Perhaps that is where the solution lies: to the Doctor, a new face is ultimately of little consequence, but a change is still a change. Regeneration is perhaps an opportunity, a period of chaos and potential from which almost anything new can rise.
@@TranscendentLion regeneration fatigue is a great term for it, I will remember that.
Not a fan of The End of Time, but the scene in the café where the Doctor explains to Wilf there's no guarantee he will regenerate, and even if he does it still feels like death, is incredibly powerful. I get annoyed in the latter part of the classic era and towards the end of Matt Smith's tenure how the concept of regeneration is bandied around like just another quirky gimmick. It takes the mystery and tension out of the concept.
On a related note, on the night Eccleston regenerated I was working in the gift shop at an arts venue (got to start somewhere) when a fairly well-known actress who was appearing in a stage production came in before the evening performance. We got talking, whereupon she got a phone call from her young son. After the call she told me he was upset because Doctor Who had changed into somebody else and she'd had to explain to him that's what he does. As much as I enjoyed the 2005 season, and followed the positive buzz in the press, that's when I knew it had really made its mark.
@@richardenglish2195 yen’s speech tonsillitis great in a bubble but a bit irksome when looked at as a while about regeneration. And that’s a cool story.
@@AnotherScifiGuy I don't understand that first sentence, sorry.
@@richardenglish2195 lol autocorrect got me. Yeah in a bubble that scene is great.
Totally agree. Everything in modern Who is too consistent with the regenerations, incidental music, Dalek designs, etc. By the time of the Timeless Children with all those regenerations, I’m beat and yes the Doctor lost himself but found himself again in the classic series. Ah, recons lol
Another good video. Out of all the modern regenerations I would have to say that I enjoyed Smith to Capaldi most. Some of Karen Gillan's lines in that scene was a bit soppy but wasn't it a similar idea to the Davison to Baker regeneration? What I really liked was when Matt Smith turned his head away then Peter Capaldi immediately snapped his head back and it was all over in the blink of an eye. Then asking if Clara knew how to fly the TARDIS. Brilliant. Although I didn't like the talk of kidneys
@@AaronOfYell we call that one “the sneeze” regeneration
I completely agree. Modern Doctor who regenerations took away the idea of the single being the Doctor who changes body out of necessity. In fact there is a deliberate effort in some stories to avoid The Doctor referring to his previous incarnations. We had Ruby Sunday directly asking the Doctor Who the guy with the curly hair. The Doctor just answers “Just people who traveled in the Tardis.” Whereas in the sixth Doctor Story Time lash. After an explosion a picture of the third Doctor appears and Peri asked “Who is that?” The Doctor simply says “me, funny you forget what you used to look like.” Classic regeneration was very matter of fact and was a consequence usually of the Doctor being heroic or sometimes punished or old age. It was more about the story than the actual changeover. The Doctor is dying so he’s changing is body to survive. Whereas in the modern show it’s the Doctor has died and we got a new one who has the same memories. That does make a difference. FYI, I don’t always buy this different personality idea. He behaves differently but personality wise he’s essentially much the same. I think if you focus on what’s actually the same you’ll probably find he’s pretty consistent. Still doesn’t shoot people, still solves problems via intelligence. Still favors human companions. Still loves earth. Still has the same moral compass. For me growing up the I always liked the three Doctors, because they acknowledge that they are all the same person. I think modern who wanted to make people cry and turned a renewal into a death.
@@thevirgologychannel6215 three doctors is my favorite multi Doctor story.
I always hated the ongoing yellow light. It really creates the division between new and old who. I think it only worked with 10 burning the Tardis. It feels boring and in creative. Have the Doctor be liquified and solidified in a new body. Do a 1970s and have the doctor’s nose change then hair, then fingers, then eyes, then legs etc.
Sorry, did I say in creative I meant uncreative.
I currently just started the 2nd Doctor era just he’s first episode I think both 9 and 10 have the same let’s say “taste of smell” where they can tell everything by just the air. In the timeless children episode 13 reminds you of both 9 and 10. When she couldn’t use the bomb, which is strikingly similar to 9 in the Episode Bad Wolf. 13 in that episode after getting arrested by the Judoon she does 10’s “what, what, what”
Yeah. Pretty much agree on all of that. My biggest "No Like" is how regen has become the Highlander Quickening! Everything seeming to BLOW UP when it happens now. it made Sense when Eccelston did it because of the Big Energy He'd absorbed at the end of the story, but after that its just Awe and Wow Factor. That is now old. I can't see the Time Lords not fixing that. It would make a horrible mess everytime someone did regen.
Perhaps we should canon that he couldn't expel all of it, so it remains an element in all his further regens ever after. Just his, not every Time Lord's. It changes the posture from lying down to standing, too.
In Smith to Capaldi it was expended on the "reset" stage, not the physical change, which we already know from Classic does not require it. The new cycle that the Time Lords so implausibly sent him as sparkly energy floating to him from the space crack, becomes explained as a piece of time vortex.
In Twice Upon a Time, the vortex was seen to feature a little in First's regen too, though not in the explosive way of later as he had not yet absorbed it. That must have to do with how in Tenth Planet he is seen to use the tardis to help himself do it.
Like you, I’ve always wanted to see a regeneration effect in the vein of what it looked like in Quantum Leap when Sam would leap with the blue electricity shooting out everywhere…
Yes! That would be great.
I love ❤️ old doctor who 😊
me too
Why did Jodie's CLOTHING regenerate into David's???
clothing changed quite a lot in classic who during regenerations
@@danpriest53166 hsrtnells cloths changed to troughtons as well.
Because it's a reset into a form already had in the past. The clothes are part of the outer form in the time echo of previous Tennant
Actually, Russell Didn’t want a man in women’s clothing. It was conscious decision
@@thevirgologychannel6215 yeah I saw his explanation for it.
It annoys me that the process is shown to be the same in new who. I know that was the point, but I never thought it WASN'T the same process in the classic series where it was always somewhat different. I don't like they a Time Lord is conscious throughout the process now and standing up through it. He would even fight to stand up to do it. That didn't sit well with me.
And I despise the fact that they now consider each Doctor a different entity. Mel asking "How many Doctors are there?" In Power of the Doctor just pissed me off. There is ONE Doctor. The different outward appearances are the SAME person.
@@CamMcGinn1981 well said.
I thought it was cool when Chris regenerated standing up as that was a neat new take, but it’s been done to death in new who now.
Absolutely right. It's one of the differences that I always point to when I say the reboot series *is* a reboot, and not a continuation.
Whenever the Doctor talked about an earlier incarnation he always referred to it as "I" or "me", never as someone else. For example in Frontier in Space when he describes his trial on Gallifrey " *I* made a complete fool of that prosecuting counsel", and " They found *me* guilty, changed *my* appearance and exiled *me* to Earth".
Also, the Doctor's core personality never changes, it's just expressed differently in different bodies. When Peri accuses the Doctor of trying to strangle her, he immediately refutes it, saying he's never violent except in self defense. The Doctor always knows who he is. This contrasts wildly with modern regenerations, especially Tennant and Capaldi's.
It's also worth noting that The Master, Romana, Borusa and K'anpo Rimpoche all retained the same core personalities through regenerations. Romana is always good, Borusa is always an autocrat, and The Master is always evil. Unlikely - to say the least - if regeneration means you become a different person.
And yes, a big part of the fun of a regeneration story was not only what would cause it to happen, but how it would look. The modern series has been phenomenally boring in that respect.
I think the last word should go to Doctor Who's premier writer, Robert Holmes: " I wrote the fifth Doctor in very much the same way as his predecessors. After all, the Doctor is always the same character. His body changes, his manners and idiosyncracies alter, but at the bottom he remains the same person".
"Also, the Doctor's core personality never changes, it's just expressed differently in different bodies."
Going to do the internet thing and argue a bit here, all for fun and just opinions though. Tbf I don't think regeneration is actually developed enough as a concept for there to not be some amount of individual perspective impacting this topic.
Not really though. There's precious few similarities in character between the Troughton Doctor and the Pertwee one, or the Hartnell one.
Some Doctors are much more similar, sure (the 5th Doctor and the 1st do have remarkably similar personalities), but the 7th Doctor and the 5th just flatly aren't the same character, just as the 6th is nothing like the 2nd.
Whenever a writer says they wrote The Doctor as "basically the same" (which btw, is exactly what New Who does every single time), it just comes off as "I can write it this way so I might as well". In the same way that arguing The Doctor was one continuous, consistent character across several wildly differing reinventions of the basic idea for the character, is really just lip service.
Arguing The Doctor always knows who he is, that's a stretch as well imo. The 6th Doctor has absolutely no in universe reason whatsoever (outside of regeneration changing his personality/impacting his perception of himself and others) for being so much more angry and moody than the 5th Doctor. Who was grouchy sure, but nothing like the 6th at all.
"Romana is good" "Borusa is an autocrat" etc. Rose is good, so I guess they're the same personality, at their core? I'm being an arse but you can see my point. I don't think The Doctor ever lost that basic foundation of what the character was supposed to be, but if talking about the incarnations as people not as reboots of a comic book style character idea, they do not share a personality nor do they have continuous development.
And I say all this as someone who agrees that New Who is essentially a totally different show and is absolutely a soft reboot.
@@ancientonezero Holmes knew his doctor who stuff.
@@dommoore6180 The (Classic) Doctors have more similarities than they do differences. The same respect for life, the scientific curiosity, the need to see and experience the universe. Those are always at the heart of the Doctor's personality.
Let me put it this way: I don't know you, but you seem like a calm and reasonable guy. But I'd bet you have days where something's made you angry, or you've just got out of the wrong side of the bed and the least little thing irritates you, and other days where life is great and you're on a real high, and so on. But whatever your mood, you're not going to go out and suddenly start murdering people, or commit genocide, or kick blind kittens, or become a Blake's 7 fan. You're still you.
That's the Doctor to me. Different moods dominate his different forms. In some he's tetchy and irritable, in some humerous, in some he angers quicker, in others he angers slower. But he's always a good man. Always on the side of right. Never cruel or cowardly. His core values remain the same.
To become 'somebody else' strongly implies to me (And the Capaldi 'Am I a good man' dialogue seems to back it up), that he *could* regenerate into a genocidal maniac, or a r**ist or, indeed, a Blake's 7 fan.
But I'm glad we agree on the reboot at least. :)
@@AnotherScifiGuy Most of the time, yes. :)
@ancientonezero comparing hugely differing personalities to temporary moods is ridiculous though. Just because he has a generally decent morality and likes to travel doesn't somehow negate all the differences in personalities between clearly defined incarnations.
This just doesn't make sense! I appreciate we all have differing perspectives here I'm not trying to negate yours but if you ask me this comes off as mental gymnastics to justify an idea (that they're all the same man) that clearly doesn't reflect the reality of what's on screen.
I mean really, consider comparing totally distinct personalities which last the full duration of an incarnations life to mood swings... I just don't think you can boil these character down to "they're good guys" and say that makes them essentially the same despite everything else.
Parting of the Ways and Time of the Doctor get it right (not so much talking about the whole episode's quality but just the element of regeneration in it.) Power of the Doctor almost gets it right. I don't know how they messed it up so bad with the other ones, it's not really a very difficult concept that needs deconstructing or etc
I disagree. How does the Doctor scream at Rose for absorbing lethal vortex energy for a few minutes, wipes out a million Daleks and beings back to life one person only because she has the hots for him, followed by his French kissing it out of her, he then gives some rubbish speeches for a few seconds, then lights up like a fireplace, turns into a younger guy and yet she's unscathed. Remember, she's the fragile mortal and he is a robust alien. That's dumber than Time and the Rani's explanation.
@@ShamrockParticle even when you're trying to make it sound bad parting of the ways is so damn epic and the ninth doctors exit so touching. The little speech also perfectly sets up the concept, especially compared to end of time which seems to go completely against it for some reason. Time and the Rani is dumb though I will agree
@@dwfan91- eh, time and Rani turn outed decent when you consider all of the behind the scenes problems it had going on. I find bad wolf has aged poorly due to all of the 2000s references that are so dated now, but parting do the ways is great.
@@AnotherScifiGuy well they're not really dated to me because I remember everything its referencing, maybe if you're a kid nowadays you might not know what Big Brother is or the Weakest Link but to me its perfect. If anything those references elevate it because the truth is its one of the most compelling episode of New Who ever in my opinion. Also if you want to talk about behind the scenes drama then Series 1 takes the cake, personally I consider that finale very highly
@@dwfan91- yeah lots of behind the scenes drama for series 1 for sure, would love an honest documentary about that one day. I find the series 1 finale to be one of the good ones overall from modern who. And oddly enough I think of big brother as a 1984 reference first and a tv show second myself (I enjoy the novel and the lessons it teaches)
Plenty of things I miss from old Who to new. But the new Who producers want to put their stamp on it so they add more to the mythos which is fine. After a while you can add too much.
See I know I'm in the minority on this one. I also know that lots of Who fans love the idea of The Doctor/s all being one continuous character. But this topic always makes me feel like I'm living in a crazy land.
To me, the whole "it's the same man" thing, that's just blatant lip service because they had to lose their lead cast member and wrote a new character in his place. There is so very, very little in common between the 1st and 2nd Doctors. Not on a surface level, not on a core level. Beyond the super basic concept for the character (mysterious traveller in space/time with some loose Edwardian/Victorian outfit elements). Beyond that, there's nothing in common. And there's certainly no development leading into the 2nd Doctor's character.
And many parts of what many would consider the basic concept for The Doctor aren't even consistent in the classic series! The 3rd Doctor isn't a traveller in time and space for a majority of the time. He's also increasingly not mysterious at all. And he's more of an action character than the sort of opportunist/manipulative visitor that the 1st or 2nd Doctors were.
Some Doctors are much more similar than others. The 5th Doctor and the 1st, the 7th and the 2nd. But that's basically where it ends and there's no continuous development or consistency there as they're separated by Doctors that don't remotely resemble them.
Each incarnation is approached basically the same way as a comic book character reboot/alternate version. The basic core idea is there, everything else is fair game for huge change. The show hardly ignores this either. They treat The Doctors very much as their own characters in multi Doctor stories (developing dynamics between them which continue into further appearances, highlighting their differences in lining them up, calling back to their individual stories and relationships). Even when they do say they're all one person and have them talk as if they were. Which makes sense, they are one entity or whatever you'd want to call it, they all have the same memories. So "I" in past tense makes total sense. But that doesn't suddenly remove all the ways that they are functionally individual characters.
And that's just on a character level. If you wanted to look at it in universe and treat them as people, it'd be incredibly messed up to deny any individuality for the totally individual personalities who have their own bodies, their own unique relationships, opinions, personalities and so on, just because they happen to be "born" in place of a predecessor they happen to share memories and some surface level traits with. I understand the argument of "well people change all the time irl" and sure, they do, but that's not remotely equivalent to everything about you changing physically and mentally upon a literal death. Essentially being replaced by a new person. I know that's what's being bashed here, people hate that read of it, I get it Tennant cried about it a lot. But it's absolutely how it'd be seen if The Doctor were real because it's functionally what happens.
This idea that it's just the face that changes totally ignores the personality totally changing, to say nothing of all the above. Ironically I'd argue the modern Doctors all basically share a personality, with much less difference in actual character between them all vs the classic Doctors. So if anything, it's New Who placing more importance on the face whereas classic totally changed the actual character. You don't get a 2nd doctor vs 1 or 3 in New Who. You get various reboots of Tennant's characterisation which itself was already quite similar to the 9th's. None of which have anything to do with the 1st Doctor's personality.
Just makes no sense to me whatsoever that so many fans genuinely think The Doctors were all one continuous character, it's no big deal, but it seriously makes no sense to me. Nerd rambles over.
I totally agree that the regenerations being different and unique was great and I miss that. It's also pretty ridiculous that what was obviously the Time Vortex energy being expelled as The Doctor dies, has now been retconned into just how regenerations look for some reason.
@@dommoore6180 it’s certainly true that most classic doctors are vastly different from their predecessors, almost like a reaction to them really, but I like the in universe dialogue from the doctor that he is still the same man (yes man), and it’s just a new body he is in (mentioned in things like robot and Shada.) but we can’t deny that doctors 1, 2, and 3 are so different from each other, amusingly so.
@AnotherScifiGuy yeah I know fans tend to like the idea they're all 1 guy, I just don't think that stands up to any scrutiny at all. But it's all personal perspective (and I suspect preference). It's certainly no big deal.
@@dommoore6180 agreed
It's not a literal death. The only one of the classic era Doctors who even appears to die is the third Doctor, but K'Anpo very clearly refutes that.
On multi-Doctor stories: In his novelisation of The Three Doctors, Terrance Dicks gives the President some dialogue which isn't in the finished programme (Nor the camera scripts, but may well have been in earlier drafts). On seeing the second and third Doctors arguing, he says...
"I suppose it's natural enough. *Two* *opposing* *parts* *of* *the* *same* *personality* . They're too alike to agree. We need someone to keep them in order".
I don't think Uncle Terrance could have made it more clear.
@@dommoore6180 In the tv movie the seventh doctor was literally dead.
You say you get a different feeling, and so do I. You admit that it isn't any of the obvious reasons. Before Chibnall, all the Doctors seemed about the same in terms of central character with different personalities. I don't see that you have addressed why you feel this way or how the makers caused it. I'm going to take a stab at it as a cognitive semioticist, which includes linguistics. (A punning linguist is a cunning linguist.) This is why I talk funny.
First, the Classic Who regenerations seem just to happen, a cross fade with maybe some lighting, or not even that. The new ones are spectacular, with a lot of orange light and noise and screaming.
Cognitive science shows that we understand concepts in terms of basic concepts and basic concepts in terms of embodiment. A crude example is that we experience anger as heat, internal pressure, and the color red, because blood pressure goes sky-high. This affects our semiotics; we say "blew his stack," "boiling," "flipped his lid," and so on.
The basic embodied metaphor of how the Classic Who showed regeneration is _healing,_ though faster than usual. The basic embodied metaphor of NuWho is _death._ There's rebirth to follow, of course, but still. So a Classic regeneration seems like healing, while a Nu on seems like death.
Second, Eccleston says something like "You won't see me again..... Not with this daft old face, anyway. In cognitive linguistics, the dots are significant. There needs to be some delay for a though sustained only by feedback mechanisms to start to be remembered. This is why saying something to yourself over and over again makes a memory. The longer the pause, the deeper it sinks in. So the idea that Eccleston is about to die for real sinks well in and is still remembered. It may not be consciously remembered, but it affects a lot of the ideas the limbic system presents to the neocortex. The neocortex can only choose from a few (probably Miller's Magic Number, between 5 and 9), and it has to throw away hundreds. (From my computational experiments in cognitive linguistics, my simulation has to throw away either 40,000 or 200. The difference ranges over various hypotheses of the details in the brain, but in any event, it's a bunch of them.) The population of ideas it does present are filtered with pre-conscious means. So the stronger the impression the Doctor is about to die is in a Hebbian sense, *even when the dominant idea is regeneration,* the more the population will be filtered in the direction of the idea that the Doctor dies. Of course, stuff like The Impossible Astronaut arc and Tranzalore reinforces this, embedding the idea into the era.
Thus, when one thinks of one's experience of one era versus another, this is enough to provide the impression of a distinct difference, even when the difference in patterns of characterization, upon examination, seems very small.
(I still think the most important difference is B.C.E. versus C.E., where the C is for Chibnall, not Common.)
Classic Who had no consistency in appearance. NuWho where the Doctor fries everything in the room just got dumber and dumber when trying to one-up its destructive effect. It's not even camp, unintentionally or otherwise. That's the problem, which Classic never had because Classic wasn't generally trying to out-epic itself. It was just itself. (Spiders, Logopolis and Caves trying to make the trend , but even then...)
The doctor only fries everything twice. But yeah regeneration is treated as dramatic in classic who.
I will pre qualify ive only seen all new who n new new who. My exp og series is books. My theory. Theyve a timeline for an ending. But 9 is like 15. 10 is like 13. I think whos rewinding.
It's now become an excuse for protracted sentimental send-offs and an excuse to ignore the essence of the Doctor when it comes to casting.
What part of the Doctor's essence do you think they are ignoring with their casting choices?
@@stark_harshly In most respects. It's not the same character as 60 years ago at all. So why pretend it's the same person?
But regeneration or not every one of the doctors were Men or Woman. Now, apparently the woke society decided to go LBQT+. Personally, seeing a Doctor Who kissing another man did not sit well with me. After all we are truly in a woke society. Good for them for being acknowledged. But there goes Doctor Who for me! I have been following his/her adventures for years but no more. All the best for the new queer Doctor Who. Based on what I saw on the Olympics you will have a lot of spectators who will enjoys your antics. You won't miss me but I will miss you🙂Please do not hate me for it. I live and let live. I do not want to impress my thinking on anyone. I am just expressing my honest opinion freely and candidly.
Women are allowed to kiss each other and don't get called gay. There is kissing in greetings between powered men in Russian and Asia-Pacific traditions. No society has any right to more authoritarian values than another society has been shown to have, the duty to defending liberty is that in every value clash, every time, liberty wins, allowing wins, not allowing gets discredited.
"Modern" or modern "modern"?
@@TSO01 modern
Its all too rushed now..
If the doctor was sad about regeneration then that would have happened near the beginning of his life, by his tenth incarnation he should be used to it by now. Again they treat modern who like its not a continuation of classic who, even though they say it is, would have made sooooo much sense just to start from scratch and have eccelston be the 1st doctor ,who survived a war on his planet and is now exploring the galaxy and trying to make a difference. Then any retcons or continuity changes will ONLY affect new who, not classic who. All this nonsense of having the characters last line being not the doctors but the actors makes zero sense and takes you out of the moment, plus when the doctor is dying he stands up ans runs around for ages before he changes which doesn't sell the doctor's injuries well at all
I know this is sort of retconned, but with ten it does make sense he'd be afraid. This is the last time he'll regenerate (that he's aware of), and he knows that his death is just a matter of time.
@@brewster_4 wasn't the case when it was filmed though that's the thing...