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229-726: The Eighth Doctor is an incarnation of the Doctor , the protagonist of the British science fiction television series Doctor Who . He is portrayed by Paul McGann . The character was introduced in the 1996 TV film Doctor Who , a back-door pilot produced in an unsuccessful attempt to relaunch the series following its 1989 cancellation. While the Eighth Doctor initially had only one on-screen appearance, his adventures were portrayed extensively in subsequent spin-off media , including more than 70 audio dramas starring McGann. In 2013,

458-510: A new "Paradigm" of Daleks that destroy the previous Daleks and escap through time, forming a new race of Daleks. After the Time War, the Doctor is convinced that he is the only surviving Time Lord, saying that he would know of any others if they had survived. The Doctor later encounters a man named Professor Yana who is revealed to be the Master . The Master had been hiding in human form at

687-586: A scientist or an engineer . However, he does occasionally show medical knowledge and has stated on separate occasions that he studied under Joseph Lister and Joseph Bell . In The Moonbase (1967), the Second Doctor mentions that he studied for a medical degree in Glasgow during the 19th century. The Fourth Doctor was awarded an honorary degree from St. Cedd's College, Cambridge, in 1960. He has been mocked by his fellow Time Lords for adhering to such

916-555: A "doctor of time travel". The revived programme establishes that Time Lords invent their own names. In " The Sound of Drums " (2007), the Tenth Doctor remarks to the Master that they both chose their names, with the Master calling him sanctimonious for identifying himself as "the man who makes people better". The Eleventh Doctor , in " The Name of the Doctor ", elaborates that the name is a promise to be: "Never cruel or cowardly. Never giving up and never giving in." This statement

1145-631: A "lowly" title as "Doctor", although in The Armageddon Factor (1979), Drax congratulates him on achieving his doctorate, indicating it was at least a somewhat respectable title. In " The Girl in the Fireplace " (2006), he draws an analogy between the title and Madame de Pompadour 's. In The Mutants (1972), an official asks the Third Doctor if he is, in fact, a doctor, to which the Doctor replies "I am, yes"; when asked what he

1374-682: A "time splinter" of future companion Clara Oswald using the name Oswin wipes all knowledge of the Doctor from the Daleks' collective memory. This knowledge is regained when the Daleks conquer the Church of the Silence in " The Time of the Doctor " (2013). The Doctor is not present on Solomon's database in " Dinosaurs on a Spaceship " and holds a conversation about his newfound anonymity in " The Angels Take Manhattan " with River Song. In " Nightmare in Silver ",

1603-471: A PhD in cheesemaking (" The God Complex "). In the first episode, the Doctor's granddaughter Susan goes by the surname "Foreman", and the junkyard in which Barbara and Ian find him bears the sign "I.M. Foreman". When addressed by Ian with this name, the Doctor responds, "Eh? Doctor who? What's he talking about?" Ian realises that "Foreman" is not the Doctor's name, when Barbara addresses the Doctor as "Doctor Foreman"; Ian asks Barbara, "That's not his name. Who

1832-670: A Time ", it is revealed that the Doctor also left to investigate the mystery of why good prevails in a universe where evil would seem to have so many advantages. It would be after his encounter with the Twelfth Doctor that the First Doctor realised that his actions made the difference in the balance between good and evil, with the Twelfth Doctor stating "The universe generally fails to be a fairy tale, but that's where we come in." In other media, more has been revealed of

2061-541: A Time Lord lady named Patience who was the widow of Omega , one of the founding-fathers of Gallifreyan society who fell into an anti-matter universe. Patience later met and married the Doctor and together they had thirteen children. Once their first-born son announced the arrival of a baby, the family was targeted by the Lord President, as the child was to be conceived naturally and only the Loom-born could inherit

2290-610: A World War I navy peacoat after his Victorian clothing is ruined. After the success of the first Dark Eyes box set, Big Finish released three more sets continuing Molly's story and introducing Liv Chenka (played by Nicola Walker ), as a new companion; Liv had met the Seventh Doctor in the audio drama Robophobia . The Eighth Doctor appeared in Doom Coalition , a four-CD, four-part miniseries. He, Liv and new companion Helen Sinclair (played by Hattie Morahan ) hunt for

2519-571: A brother in " Smith and Jones ", and sisters in " Arachnids in the UK ". In " It Takes You Away ", the Thirteenth Doctor claims that she had seven grandmothers. Later in the same scene, she mentions that her favourite grandmother, Granny 5, alleged Granny 2 was "a secret agent for the Zygons ". Throughout the revival, the Doctor routinely attempts to change the topic when questioned about being

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2748-520: A closed book. The Big Finish Productions website describes the Eighth Doctor as "an enthusiastic figure who explores the universe for the sheer love of it", always surviving on the strength of his excellent improvisational skills rather than preparing elaborate plans. The site states that he is "passionate, direct, sympathetic and emotionally accessible", but notes that these traits are "balanced by occasional feelings of self-doubt and weariness of his endless battles against evil." Discussing "The Night of

2977-456: A conflict with the wraith-like Never People: individuals who were erased from history for crimes against reality, and now seek to unleash anti-time on the universe. The Doctor sacrifices himself and the TARDIS by absorbing anti-time energy, which seals the rift and preserves Charley's life but transforms him into the bogeyman Zagreus. Later restored to sanity but still infected with anti-time due to

3206-633: A convenient in-story explanation for any contradictions in series continuity: for example, writer Paul Cornell has suggested that Earth's destruction by an expanding sun in "The End of the World" five billion years hence, as opposed to the original depiction of its demise around the year 10,000,000 AD in The Ark (1966), can be attributed to changes in history due to the war. Steven Moffat , writer and later executive producer for Doctor Who , has gone further, arguing that "a television series which embraces both

3435-425: A day in a death-like state even after sustaining normally regeneration-inducing injuries such as getting his chest crushed by sandbags (though any injury sustained by the Doctor would weaken Sabbath). Eventually, after a woman Sabbath loved sacrificed herself to save the Doctor from a malfunctioning time machine, Sabbath tore out the Doctor's second heart, allowing the Doctor to begin growing a new one. Shortly after

3664-431: A demon in the 13th century, the residents of a convent called the Doctor the "sainted physician". This was proposed by Moffat on Usenet 16 years before "A Good Man Goes to War": Here's a particularly stupid theory. If we take "The Doctor" to be the Doctor's name — even if it is in the form of a title no doubt meaning something deep and Gallifreyan — perhaps our earthly use of the word "doctor" meaning healer or wise man

3893-552: A dissident Time Lady, who opposed the Time Lord High Council's plan to escape the Time War. When she reveals her face to the Doctor, his reaction indicates that he recognises her. Julie Gardner, in the episode's commentary, states that while some have speculated that the Time Lady is the Doctor's mother, neither she nor Russell T. Davies is willing to comment on her identity. When later asked by Wilfred who she was,

4122-645: A faction member in his eighth incarnation ( Interference: Book One and Two ). Eventually, Compassion's implant, linked to the Doctor's TARDIS to prevent her being influenced by random local signals, triggered her unexpected mutation into a sentient Type 102 TARDIS, specifically the "mother" of the TARDISes that would be used in the pending War. With this knowledge, the Time Lords – led by Romana , now in her third incarnation – attempted to capture Compassion, intending to use her as breeding stock in preparation for

4351-406: A fixed number of twelve regenerations, meaning that every Time Lord had a total of thirteen incarnations including the original. The plot of " The Time of the Doctor " involves the Doctor receiving a new cycle of regenerations from the Time Lords before his expected demise, triggering the regeneration into the Twelfth Doctor , played by Peter Capaldi . The origins of the programme were explored in

4580-579: A former classmate of his named Drax. Drax calls the Doctor "Theta Sigma", or "Thete" for short, an alias which is clarified as being the Doctor's nickname at the Prydon Academy on Gallifrey in The Happiness Patrol and is mentioned again in the 2010 episode " The Pandorica Opens ". In the 2015 episode " The Zygon Inversion ", The Doctor tells Osgood that his first name is "Basil". Doctor Who spin-off media have suggested that

4809-575: A friend of the Eighth Doctor in The Company of Friends , when she meets a future version of the Doctor and helps his past self save his life. The first story, The Silver Turk , features the early Cybermen (as seen in The Tenth Planet ). The Witch from the Well tests the pair's relationship; the trilogy concludes with Army of Death , in which Mary decides to leave the Doctor. In

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5038-406: A glance into the eyes to put the subject under a trance. The Doctor can read an entire book cover to cover in a second by thumb-flipping the pages before his eyes ( City of Death , " Rose ", " The Time of Angels "). Though medical skills he shows early in the programme are rudimentary, by Remembrance of the Daleks he can perform sophisticated medical diagnoses merely by touching someone's ear. He

5267-545: A group of Time Lords led by the Doctor's old schoolfriend Padrac. Padrac's latest consultations with the Matrix led him to the conclusion that the only way to save Gallifrey from prophecies of its destruction is to destroy the rest of the universe. The hunt for the Eleven is intended to manipulate the Doctor into gathering the equipment needed for Padrac's plan to succeed, but the Doctor and his companions disrupt Padrac's machines at

5496-468: A joke. Due to the retroactive creation of a numberless War Doctor and the Tenth Doctor's aborted regeneration in " The Stolen Earth "/" Journey's End ", the Eleventh Doctor was the final incarnation in his natural cycle. The Time Lords used a crack in the universe to give him a new cycle consisting of an unknown number of regenerations in " The Time of the Doctor ", triggering the regeneration into

5725-522: A last resort. According to the alien villain Chedaki in the episode The Android Invasion , "his entire history is one of opposition to conquest". As a time traveller, the Doctor has been present at, or directly involved in, countless major historical events on the planet Earth and elsewhere – sometimes more than once. In the 2005 series premiere, " Rose ", it is revealed that the Ninth Doctor

5954-505: A new body. It is stated in The Deadly Assassin that Time Lords can only regenerate a total of twelve times, giving a theoretical final total of thirteen incarnations. However, The Doctor has a natural ability to regenerate an infinite number of times. It is possible to exceed this limit: in "The Five Doctors" the Time Lords offer the Master, who is inhabiting a Trakenite body after exhausting his original twelve regenerations,

6183-608: A new companion, Tamsin Drew , chosen from four prospective companions. This season pits the Eighth Doctor against a new incarnation of the Meddling Monk (now travelling with Lucie Miller). During the season, Tamsin is seduced to the Meddling Monk's way of thinking; Lucie finds the Monk's violence distasteful, and re-joins the Doctor. When the Monk helps the Daleks invade Earth, Tamsin, Lucie, and Alex are killed in driving them off; at

6412-484: A new direction for the series. Cartmel wished to restore the character's "awe, mystery and strength" and make him "once again more than a mere chump of a Time Lord" – an idea the media dubbed the " Cartmel Masterplan ". Under Cartmel, the show foreshadowed this concept; however, its 1989 cancellation meant that it was never realised onscreen. The proposed backstory was fully explored in Platt's 1997 novel Lungbarrow , where

6641-481: A new regeneration cycle as a reward for his help and cooperation, and at some point, during the Time War they resurrected him, with his new body having at least one regeneration of its own. Regeneration is apparently optional, as in " Last of the Time Lords " the Master refuses to regenerate despite the Tenth Doctor's pleading. In addition, there are ways of killing a Time Lord that do not permit regeneration; for example, more than once it has been implied that stopping both

6870-408: A parent or his family life, as in " Fear Her ", " The Beast Below " and " A Good Man Goes to War ". In " The Empty Child ", a hospital doctor named Dr. Constantine says to him, "Before this war began, I was a father and a grandfather. Now I'm neither. But I'm still a doctor." The Ninth Doctor 's reply is, "Yeah. I know the feeling." In " The Doctor's Daughter ", when discussing the topic of parenthood,

7099-506: A police box. The details of their life were also redacted from the Matrix – only snippets remaining, masked as the story of the Irish Garda Brendan. The true origins of the Time Lords remained hidden from themselves and from the Doctor. The First Doctor's subsequent childhood on Gallifrey has been little described in the series. In " Hell Bent " the Doctor recalled his origins as a high-born Gallifreyan. In The Time Monster ,

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7328-516: A position to inadvertently help the Seventh Doctor prevent this timeline from occurring (unable to go back himself, since the TARDIS security protocols prevent him from going somewhere he already was). Big Finish released a 50th-anniversary story in 2013, The Light at the End , in which the Master ( Geoffrey Beevers ) implements a plot to trap and destroy all eight incarnations of the Doctor by keeping him on Gallifrey. The Eighth Doctor and Charley meet with

7557-447: A prosaic distraction for him ( Alien Bodies ). Ultimately this plan proved a failure, as Sam developed into a much more strongly-willed companion than intended; at one point she spent three years avoiding the Doctor, so as to cope with a crush she had developed on him, but managed to survive and make a good life for herself in the future until she rejoined the Doctor as she could make more of a difference with him. The close dynamic between

7786-528: A race of invading aliens, then set back again to exploring time and space ( Escape Velocity ). With his freedom restored, the Doctor chose to counteract his extended exile by seeking as much non-human company as possible. During this period, the Doctor encountered all manner of unusual beings – from a species that at cursory glance resembled the Earth tiger ( The Year of Intelligent Tigers ), to water spirits, to talking apes from another dimension. Though at times

8015-509: A redesigned Sonic Screwdriver, courtesy of Weta Workshop . These changes were independently produced and were not affiliated with Big Finish Productions or the BBC, but were accepted as suitable for official use after the fact. The costume consists of a royal blue leather pea coat , an alabaster white T-shirt , navy blue jeans and brown shoes. In this outfit the Doctor also carries a brown messenger bag . Almost as soon as he'd left San Francisco,

8244-457: A repair shop on Gallifrey. In later episodes, the Doctor mentions that he once took a driving test to pilot a TARDIS and failed, and that he threw the instruction manual in a supernova because he disagreed with it. In " The Doctor's Wife ", Idris (the TARDIS's living soul in a human body) mentions that the Doctor had been travelling with her for 700 years, which indicates that he would have been 200 years old when he first borrowed her. In " Twice Upon

8473-699: A result of the Silence causing the Doctor's TARDIS to explode on 26 June 2010. During the events of " The Time of the Doctor ", the Doctor discovers one remaining crack on the planet Trenzalore, through which the Time Lords transmit the First Question: "Doctor Who?". The intention is for the Doctor to give his true name, which will verify to the Time Lords it is safe for them to return to the universe. Fleets of various races, some being former War participants, gathered in Trenzalore's orbit to either prevent

8702-495: A small, shapeless box– what was left of the TARDIS after its power loss— and a note, simply stating "Meet me in St. Louis ', 8 February 2001. Fitz". Despite his amnesia, the Doctor retained a wide general knowledge. However, he also showed an uncharacteristic callous streak, easily allowing others to die if he felt that they 'deserved' to perish ( The Burning ). To contrast, he was capable of feeling unusually poignant warmth, even dating

8931-550: A species of massive fly-like aliens called the Vore, who would soon have the power to devour the planet. As The Gallifrey Chronicles ended, the Doctor, Fitz, and Trix dove into the Vore mountain, the Doctor equipped with a plan to stop the Vore and save the world. Paul McGann first returned to his role as the Eighth Doctor in Storm Warning , the first in a series of audio plays. During his time with Big Finish, McGann played

9160-540: A spy named Vansell, Millennia, Rallon and Jelpax. With this group, he learns about the Celestial Toymaker and travels to his realm in a type 18 TARDIS with Deca members Rallon and Millennia, who are killed. This leads to the Doctor's expulsion from the academy, condemned to five hundred years in Records and Traffic Control. In The Quantum Archangel , it is revealed the Doctor studied cosmic science alongside

9389-545: A strange old man and hear Susan's voice coming from inside what appears to be a police box. Pushing their way inside, the two find that the exterior is camouflage for the dimensionally transcendental interior of the TARDIS . The old man, whom Susan calls "Grandfather", kidnaps Barbara and Ian to prevent them from telling anyone about the existence of the TARDIS, taking them on an adventure in time and space. The first Doctor, says cultural scholar John Paul Green, "explicitly positioned

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9618-490: A super-human level of stamina and the ability to absorb, withstand and expel large amounts of certain types of radiation (the Tenth Doctor stated they used to play with Röntgen bricks in the nursery, after absorbing the radiation from an x-ray of significantly magnified power). This ability would seem to have limitations which have yet to be fully explained, as the Doctor is harmed by radiation in The Daleks , Planet of

9847-437: A twisted form above Gallifrey, holding within itself the Doctor's original reality where he had regenerated on Metebelis III and never been infected ever since it sensed that something was wrong when the Third Doctor regenerated ahead of schedule. In a final confrontation with his future self, the Doctor resolved the timeline conflict by channelling the TARDIS's built-up energies through its weapon systems, thereby destroying both

10076-538: A war will be fought between the Time Lords and an unnamed enemy. Russell T Davies commented that there is no connection between the war of the books and the Time War of the television series, comparing the wars with Earth's two World Wars. He also said that he was "usually happy for old and new fans to invent the Complete History of the Doctor in their heads, completely free of the production team's hot and heavy hands". The sixth series of Gallifrey features

10305-486: A white shirt , a battleship grey cravat , and moss green trousers intended for a New Year's fancy dress party, which he liberated from the lockers at the San Francisco hospital where he regenerated. He completed it with a pair of black ankle boots taken from Grace Holloway's ex-boyfriend Brian to give him the appearance somewhere between a Victorian dandy and wild west gambler. By the time of " The Night of

10534-413: A woman in the 1980s, and adopting a young girl named Miranda , a Time Lady from the future ( Father Time ). During this time, he often became involved in strange problems outside the norm, such as confronting an entity that was essentially sentient fire ( The Burning ). He experienced a particular funk in the 1950s, feeling that his efforts to learn about his past were pointless, but his interest in life

10763-410: Is an excellent cricket player ( Black Orchid ) and in " The Lodger " he proves to be a prodigiously talented footballer despite unfamiliarity with some of the game's basic rules. Though reluctant to engage in combat against living opponents, this is not for lack of skill; the Doctor is conversant with both real and fictitious styles of unarmed combat (most obviously the "Venusian Aikido" practised by

10992-404: Is direct result of the Doctor's multiple interventions in our history as a healer and wise man. In other words, we got it from him. This is a very silly idea and I'm consequently rather proud of it. The anonymity of the Doctor is the theme of series 7 of the revived programme. After faking his death, the Doctor erases himself from the various databases of the universe. In " Asylum of the Daleks ",

11221-657: Is disintegrated and later woven into the Doctor. The Timeless Child reveal partly took inspiration from this. The Doctor's adoptive mother Tecteun was a native to Gallifrey and an explorer of the Shobogans. She adopted the Doctor when she was the timeless child. She led the Division ;after the destruction of Gallifrey by the Spy Master. She was involved in the creation of the Flux ;and

11450-518: Is finally depicted in the 50th anniversary special " The Day of the Doctor ", featuring the climax of the final battle and the Time Lords' fate. The Last Great Time War pitted the Time Lords of Gallifrey against the Daleks of Skaro . The specific incident that sparked the conflict remains unclear, but according to executive producer Russell T Davies , the origins dated back to conflicts between

11679-444: Is he? Doctor who?" In an ultimately unused idea from documents written at the programme's inception, Barbara and Ian would have subsequently referred to the Doctor as "Doctor Who", given their not knowing his name. Throughout both the classic and revived programme, a running joke is that when the Doctor is introduced as just the Doctor, characters reply "Doctor who?" Another variation is "Doctor what?" The story arc running throughout

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11908-528: Is killed in the crash, but is temporarily restored to life by the Sisterhood of Karn, who finally convince him to fight for the sake of the universe. They further offer an elixir that would control his regeneration. The Doctor accepts, remarking that there was no need for a Doctor in a universe consumed by war, and regenerates into the War Doctor . Davros , the creator of the Daleks, also fights during

12137-510: Is known of the Doctor: not even his name, the actual form of which remains a mystery. In the first serial, An Unearthly Child , two teachers from Coal Hill School in London, Barbara Wright and Ian Chesterton , become intrigued by one of their pupils, Susan Foreman , who exhibits high intelligence and unusually advanced knowledge. Trailing her to a junkyard at 76 Totter's Lane, they encounter

12366-465: Is less difficult but, with their demise, the paths between worlds are now closed. The Time Lords could also prevent or repair paradoxes such as the one created by Rose in an attempt to save her father's life in a traffic accident. Dalek survivors of the war appeared regularly across many episodes, until the Daleks trick the Eleventh Doctor into activating a Progenitor device which creates

12595-521: Is no longer [the Virgin Queen]...". The joke continues in " The Beast Below ", featuring future British monarch Queen Elizabeth X or Liz Ten, and the marriage is finally shown in "The Day of the Doctor" during an adventure with Zygons . In the 2010 Christmas special, " A Christmas Carol ", the Eleventh Doctor accidentally marries Marilyn Monroe but later questions the authenticity of the chapel in which they were married. Steven Moffat did not consider

12824-435: Is only honorary; the Tenth Doctor, however, considers the name to be his legitimate academic rank in " The Waters of Mars " (2009), describing his "name, rank and intention" as "The Doctor; doctor; fun." In an interview with The Age in 2003, Tom Baker mentioned that the Doctor is called so because he is "a doctor of time and relative dimension in space". Apart from being called a doctor of the TARDIS, he has been described as

13053-490: Is open to interpretation. (The "Beginner's Guide to Doctor Who" on the BBC's classic Doctor Who website suggests this may be due to the Time War .) It has been suggested that the Eighth Doctor's adventures in three different forms (novels, audio, and comics) take place in three separate continuities. The discontinuities were made explicit in the audio drama Zagreus . In response, it has become increasingly common to consider

13282-545: Is qualified in, the Doctor replies, "Practically everything." The Fourth Doctor states that his companion, Harry Sullivan , is a doctor of medicine, while he is "a doctor of many things" ( Revenge of the Cybermen , 1975). The Fifth Doctor claims to be a doctor "of everything" in Four to Doomsday (1982), and a message to the same effect is related from the Tenth Doctor in " Utopia " (2007). In " The Tsuranga Conundrum " (2018),

13511-567: Is repeated in the next episode, " The Day of the Doctor ", by the War Doctor , the Tenth Doctor and the Eleventh Doctor collectively. By contrast, the Eleventh Doctor had earlier spoke of the War Doctor as being the man who broke that promise, being the one to fight in the Time War before learning the actual fate of the Time Lords. Since contradicted by the television series, the 2003 Telos novella Frayed by Tara Samms , set prior to

13740-410: Is shown in a flashback with his first, second, third, fourth, ninth and tenth incarnations. In 2013's " Nightmare in Silver ", he is shown in a flashback along with the Doctor's other incarnations; he is also fleetingly seen running past companion Clara Oswald in the following episode, " The Name of the Doctor ", though his face is not shown. His likeness is shown in " The Timeless Children " (2020) when

13969-504: Is used in the title of the serial Doctor Who and the Silurians , but this was a captioning error rather than an in-story mention. The only other time this occurs is in the title of episode five of The Chase , which is titled "The Death of Doctor Who". In " World Enough and Time " (2017), the Doctor's old friend and archenemy the Master (as Missy ) insists that the Doctor's real name is in fact Doctor Who and that he chose it himself;

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14198-629: The Doctor Who Magazine comic strip. These stories spanned the nine years between 1996 and the debut of the new television series in 2005. He is the longest-serving Doctor in the Doctor Who Magazine comic strip. In the wake of the positive reaction to the revived television series in 2005, several of the Eighth Doctor's Big Finish audio dramas were also broadcast on BBC7 radio in an edited form. The trailers for these broadcasts explained that these adventures took place before

14427-456: The Big Bang – that would erase all alternate universes and leaving only one possible timeline. However, Sabbath's allies had been lying to him; in reality, Time would only split if absolutely necessary, and even then, it was nearly impossible to travel between alternate realities. In reality, Sabbath had been manipulated into creating a plan that would effectively wipe out free will itself, with

14656-578: The Eighth Doctor during the early days of the conflict, later expanded into a four-volume series. Paul McGann reprised his role with Rakhee Thakrar playing Bliss, his new companion. The third volume also features the return of the Valeyard , who is recruited by the Time Lords attempt to be a soldier in the War after he is 'recreated' through an accident when the Doctor uses a transmat while carrying

14885-462: The Eighth Doctor remarks that he is half-human on his mother's side, and recalls watching a meteor storm with his father on Gallifrey. The revived series never addresses a human mother again and at times even contradicted this remark: The half-human clone of the Tenth Doctor is initially disgusted to be half-human ("Journey's End") and the Twelfth Doctor rejects that he could be a hybrid of human and Time Lord ("Hell Bent"). The Doctor mentions having had

15114-620: The Eighth Doctor Adventures novel The Adventuress of Henrietta Street , the Doctor's second heart was surgically removed, resulting in the loss of his abilities to metabolise drugs and go without air; these are restored when he begins to grow a new heart after his old one 'dies' ( Camera Obscura ). In his final serial , the Second Doctor states that Time Lords can live forever, "barring accidents". When "accidents" do occur, Time Lords can usually regenerate into

15343-417: The Ninth Doctor ( Christopher Eccleston ). His only companion in the television film is Grace Holloway ( Daphne Ashbrook ), a medical doctor whose surgery is partly responsible for triggering his regeneration. In the continued adventures of the character depicted in audio dramas, novels and comic books he travels alongside numerous other companions, including self-styled " Edwardian Adventuress" Charley ,

15572-535: The Third Doctor to a planet he should never have visited and causing a chain of events that culminated in the Third Doctor regenerating ahead of schedule, allowing them to infect him with the Faction Paradox biodata virus. While his immune system would allow him to resist the virus for a time, it would gain a greater hold on him with each subsequent regeneration, until it would finally transform him into

15801-562: The Thirteenth Doctor states that she is a doctor of "medicine, science, engineering, candyfloss, Lego, philosophy, music, problems, people, hope. Mostly hope." While talking with Harry in Robot (1974–1975), the Doctor says, "You may be a doctor, but I'm the Doctor. The definite article, you might say." In The Ark in Space (1975), aired later that year, the Doctor mentions that his doctorate

16030-601: The collective consciousness of the Cybermen informs the Doctor that he could be reconstructed from the "hole" — the missing records — that he has left behind, a mistake which the Doctor intends to rectify. Few individuals are said to know the Doctor's true name. River Song whispered something to the Tenth Doctor to make him trust her during " Silence in the Library "/" Forest of the Dead ", confirmed to have been his name towards

16259-418: The 50th anniversary special " The Day of the Doctor ". The Tenth and Eleventh Doctors explained that Hurt's regeneration was not the Doctor because his actions during the Time War were a betrayal of the promise that name symbolized. "The Day of the Doctor" revisited the last day of the Time War after "The End of Time" and revealed that the interference of the future Doctors and future companion Clara Oswald caused

16488-520: The Armageddon Factor , it is revealed that the Doctor scraped through the academy with 51% on his second attempt. In The Time Meddler , it is said that the Doctor was fifty years before the Meddling Monk . In Time and the Rani , the Doctor claims to have attended university alongside the Rani , specialising in thermodynamics. At the academy, he met his childhood friend the Master and

16717-555: The Big Finish spin-off audio series Gallifrey and Bernice Summerfield . In the novel Father Time , the Eighth Doctor, during his hundred-year exile on Earth, found an orphaned Time Lord girl named Miranda whom he adopted and raised until she was 16. In the novel Sometime Never... , she returned to the Doctor with her daughter Zezanne. She was also the central character in a three-issue comic book series published by Comeuppance Comics in 2003. Author Lance Parkin, who devised

16946-633: The Christmas episode Death in Blackpool , which dealt with Lucie's departure. The standalone episode An Earthly Child was also released in December 2009, in which the Doctor visits his granddaughter Susan Foreman on Earth (following the events of the First Doctor adventure The Dalek Invasion of Earth ) and meets his great-grandson Alex Campbell. In Situation Vacant the Doctor gains

17175-521: The Cybermen . The Doctor's standing in Time Lord society has waxed and waned over the years, from being a hunted man who was eventually punished with a forced regeneration and an exile sentence on Earth, to being appointed Lord President of the High Council. He does not assume the office for very long, fleeing Gallifrey after his appointment rather than accepting the limitations on his freedom that

17404-425: The Daleks , Susan and her husband David adopt three children whom they name David Campbell Jr, Ian and Barbara; named after David himself, Ian Chesterton and Barbara Wright , respectively. Irving Braxiatel , a character first introduced in the novel Theatre of War , was initially hinted at, and later confirmed to be, the Doctor's biological older brother. He has since become a recurring character, especially within

17633-718: The Daleks attempt to infiltrate the High Council of the Time Lords with duplicates of the Fifth Doctor in Resurrection of the Daleks (1984), followed by an open declaration of hostilities by one of the Dalek Emperors in Remembrance of the Daleks (1988). The Time War officially began with the extinction of several time-traveling powers allied with the Time Lords known as the Temporal Powers. With

17862-502: The Daleks invading Gallifrey, but this invasion is undone thanks to Lord President Romana, Leela, K9 and Narvin, aided by Romana's future self. The ninth series more directly featured the Time War with Romana and Leela playing key roles, including Leela being sent on a mission with the Derek Jacobi Master, and the resurrection of Rassilon through a complex Time Lord project that allowed Rassilon's consciousness to take over

18091-527: The Doctor and the Daleks. In Genesis of the Daleks (1975), the Time Lords—having foreseen the possibility of the Daleks conquering the universe—send the Fourth Doctor into the past in an attempt to avert the Daleks' creation, to affect their development to make them less aggressive, or discover an inherent weakness they could exploit. In retaliation for this ultimately unsuccessful mission,

18320-415: The Doctor " he sported a double-breasted overcoat of bottle green moleskin with peaked lapels, a single-breasted waistcoat of bronze brown brocade with a fob watch, a midnight-blue ascot tie under the collar of a white shirt, gingerbread brown leather gaiters , and caramel brown US Army Cavalry boots; corresponding with his overall weary appearance, presumably as a result of many experiences during

18549-526: The Doctor ", in 2013, which precedes the 50th anniversary special, " The Day of the Doctor ". The episode begins during the raging Time War between Daleks and Time Lords when he is killed when attempting to save a young woman who rejects salvation at the hands of a Time Lord causing them both to die in a spaceship crash. He awakens in the company of the Sisterhood of Karn , who explain that he has died and been temporarily resurrected. They urge him to bring

18778-567: The Doctor ", released as a prelude to the 50th anniversary special, featured Paul McGann reprising his role as the Eighth Doctor and was set during the Last Great Time War, albeit much earlier than during "The End of Time". The mini-episode presented him as a conscientious objector to the war who regenerated under controlled circumstances into the War Doctor ( John Hurt ), a previously unseen incarnation created retroactively by Steven Moffat , Davies' successor as head writer, for

19007-414: The Doctor ". Spin-off media offer the explanation that the Doctor's true name is unpronounceable by humans. In " The Name of the Doctor ", the Eleventh Doctor tells companion Clara Oswald that the name "Doctor" is essentially a promise he made. The promise itself is revealed in " The Day of the Doctor ": "Never cruel nor cowardly. Never give up. Never give in." The episode " The Timeless Children " revised

19236-499: The Doctor adventured with an Ice Warrior named Ssard and a human woman named Stacy Townsend , who fell in love with each other; some while after they parted ways with the Doctor, the two invited him to serve as best man at their wedding ( Placebo Effect ). He also, teamed up with his old companion Bernice Summerfield , Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart and UNIT to combat an Ice Warrior occupation of Great Britain . Eventually, three years after his departure and one hour after he left,

19465-410: The Doctor as grandfather to his companion Susan". He wore long white hair and Edwardian costume, reflecting, Green says, a "definite sense of Englishness". When Hartnell left the programme after three years due to ill health, the role was handed over to character actor Patrick Troughton . As of 25 December 2018 , official television productions have depicted fourteen distinct incarnations of

19694-562: The Doctor as one of 45 cousins grown from his house's genetic loom as an adult. By contrast, the TV programme has shown Time Lords as children and stated that Time Lords can have sexual relationships. The Doctor is assumed to be or to have been married to Susan's grandmother, including by head writer Steven Moffat . In " Blink ", the Doctor mentioned that he was rubbish at his own wedding. In The Virgin New Adventures novel Cold Fusion ,

19923-400: The Doctor evades answering the question, making their connection unclear. In Doctor Who: The Writer's Tale – The Final Chapter , Russell T Davies states that the character was conceived as the Doctor's mother, but her identity was left ambiguous to allow viewers to make up their own minds. In spin-off media, several individuals related to the Doctor have made appearances, and do not appear in

20152-464: The Doctor experienced a very lonely childhood. An elderly woman on Gallifrey died and was shrouded in veils and surrounded by flies, giving the Doctor recurring nightmares, which the confession dial in " Heaven Sent " would later visualise to torment him. In " Listen ", it is ambiguously revealed the Doctor as a child often slept alone in a barn in the Drylands (a desert region outside the city capital),

20381-556: The Doctor faced another radical change: the loss of his second heart. As it happened, the heart served as a bond with Gallifrey; with the planet gone, the heart had begun to fester within the Doctor's body, pumping it with poison. A man named Sabbath , an eighteenth-century secret agent gifted with time travel abilities, excised the blackened organ, both saving the Doctor's life and robbing the Doctor of some of his higher Time Lord abilities, including his respiratory bypass system and his ability to metabolise toxins. It transpired that Sabbath

20610-420: The Doctor firing the shot and Gallifrey's actual destruction where the Doctor's activities in the TARDIS were unaccounted for. Reflecting on his discoveries in the TARDIS, the Doctor, along with the aid of K9 (who had been transported into a hidden area of the TARDIS and trapped there following Gallifrey's destruction) realised that his memory loss hadn't been caused by the trauma of destroying Gallifrey; in fact,

20839-478: The Doctor from speaking his name, or resume the War if the Time Lords return. The Church of the Papal Mainframe undergoes a faith change into the Church of the Silence as a dedication to keeping the peace, with a rogue chapter led by Madame Kovarian unknowingly causing the events in series 5 and 6 and leading to the Doctor's arrival on Trenzalore. In the end, the Time Lords remain in exile and close

21068-403: The Doctor had another brief attack of amnesia, caused by a final trap of the Master's. To regain his memories, the Doctor was forced to visit all seven of his past selves and help them. Having regained his memories, the Doctor met a late twentieth-century Coal Hill School student named Samantha Jones ; shortly after their encounter, the Doctor left her alone at a Greenpeace rally. For a time,

21297-455: The Doctor had wiped his memories to give his mind space to store the contents of the Matrix within his brain, compressed down so he wouldn't be driven mad by the voices of all the dead Time Lords within him, his own memories presumably stored somewhere else in his mind, given his occasional flashes from his past. However, right then, the Doctor had more immediate worries; namely, saving Earth from

21526-451: The Doctor in a series of adventures and a few more stand-alone stories. McGann played an alternate version of the Eighth Doctor from a timeline in which the Seventh Doctor regenerates after being shot by Nazis in the 1950s (first mentioned in the audio drama Colditz ), and appeared in Klein's Story . As "Schmidt", the Doctor teaches Elizabeth Klein how to pilot the TARDIS and puts her in

21755-433: The Doctor in the seventh series, particularly in " The Angels Take Manhattan ", confirmed that they were married; in "The Name of the Doctor", the Doctor refers to her as his "wife" after seeing a grave stone with her name on it, after initially answering "yes" when Clara asks if she was an "ex". In " The End of Time ", the Tenth Doctor mentions marrying Queen Elizabeth I and implies that they had sex, stating: "her nickname

21984-517: The Doctor is revealed as " the Other ", a mysterious figure in Gallifreyan lore who co-founded Time Lord society with Rassilon and Omega . After a curse renders Gallifrey sterile, the Other devises biotechnological looms to "weave" new Time Lords; his granddaughter Susan is Gallifrey's last natural child. To escape a civil war with Rassilon, the Other throws himself into the loom system, where he

22213-511: The Doctor mentions his companions in order, with book companions before audio companions. In " The Night of the Doctor ", the Doctor "salutes" five of his companions by name, all from the Big Finish audio productions. Despite the fact the Eighth Doctor appeared on television only three times, he is the most prolific of all the Doctors (to date) in terms of number of individual stories published in novel, novella, short story and audio form. In 2007,

22442-481: The Doctor proving that Sabbath's perception was wrong when they found themselves in a situation that could only have occurred due to time travel in a single timeline. The explosion at Event One was averted when the Doctor diverted the black light that would have triggered the explosion to 1898, but instead of reality collapsing into a single controllable timeline, what occurred was reality starting to 'slide' between histories, multiple parallel realities fighting to become

22671-474: The Doctor returned to the Greenpeace rally. During their travels, Sam and the Doctor became aware of a great war, looming in the future of Gallifrey, between the Time Lords and an as-yet-unidentified Enemy . While exploring the issue of the war, the Doctor discovered that his Sam was not the original Samantha Jones; rather, her biodata had been manipulated by an outside agency with the intent to mould her into

22900-482: The Doctor reveals that he is able to perceive the fabric of time, discerning "fixed points" and "points in flux" – moments when history must remain as it was originally versus moments when he can change or influence the original course of events, as well as all past, present and possible future events. However, in " Kill the Moon ", the Twelfth Doctor claims that there are "grey areas", points in time for which he cannot see

23129-517: The Doctor says he grew up in a house on a mountainside and talks about a hermit who lived under a tree behind the house and inspired the Doctor when he was depressed. He is later reunited with this former mentor, now on Earth posing as the abbot K'anpo Rimpoche, in Planet of the Spiders . In " The Girl in the Fireplace ", according to Madame de Pompadour who psychically linked with the Doctor's memories,

23358-411: The Doctor seemed somewhat cold – as when he seemed more concerned about damaged plums than a dead man ( Eater of Wasps ) – he retained his passion for life in all forms. Although his amnesia remained a bother, the Doctor acknowledged that whatever had happened to him had happened for a reason, and he might as well make use of the advantages it offered. Only a few months after resuming his old lifestyle,

23587-541: The Doctor the edge needed to stop the council; realising that one of the Council members expected Sabbath to shoot the Council member with a weapon designed to send the subject into the Time Vortex, Sabbath instead shot himself, condemning himself to eternal agony in the Time Vortex, but completely undoing the council's plan and destroying their space station, simultaneously restoring the possibility of parallel worlds to

23816-447: The Doctor through their adventures and serve as audience surrogate characters to ask questions which allow the Doctor to provide relevant exposition. "Doctor" is a self-selected alias. In episodes specifically under showrunner Steven Moffat , the story arcs surrounding events in the Doctor's future implied serious consequences in the event of the Doctor's true name being spoken, with the nature of these finally revealed in " The Time of

24045-447: The Doctor time to recover and the TARDIS time to regenerate from the extensive damage it had suffered, Compassion dropped the Doctor off on Earth in the year 1889; she then delivered Fitz to 2001, with the intent that he waits for the Doctor to catch up to him. With that, Compassion departed for parts unknown. Back in 1889, meanwhile, the Doctor awoke in a railway carriage to discover no memory as to his real identity, and no possessions save

24274-417: The Doctor tries to reassure his companion that Missy is joking, although later in the episode he self-identifies by that name. In " Twice Upon a Time ", before regeneration the Twelfth Doctor states that no one would ever understand his name except for children, saying: "If their hearts are in the right place and the stars are too, children can hear your name." Peter Capaldi offered his own theory regarding

24503-487: The Doctor with the belief he had in fact used the Moment to destroy Gallifrey, the Time Lords, and the Daleks. The Doctor is haunted with the false knowledge of his home planet's demise, with even some of his enemies using that guilt against him. Throughout series 5 , the Eleventh Doctor encounters cracks in "the skin of the universe". The Doctor learns that the cracks, which erase those they consume from history, are

24732-500: The Doctor works on repairing the TARDIS. However, they soon become aware of Divine Intervention, a self-help organisation from the future whose machinations create a divergent timeline that culminates in the destruction of the human race. When the Doctor and his friends restore the timeline, they find themselves back on Earth in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic while waiting for the TARDIS repairs to be complete. On New Year's Day 2021,

24961-419: The Doctor would not leave Gallifrey. Companions Susan ( Carole Ann Ford ), Ian Chesterton ( William Russell ), Vicki ( Maureen O'Brien ), Steven Taylor ( Peter Purves ), Sara Kingdom ( Jean Marsh ), Polly ( Anneke Wills ), Jamie McCrimmon ( Frazer Hines ), Zoe Heriot ( Wendy Padbury ), Jo Grant ( Katy Manning ), Tegan Jovanka ( Janet Fielding ), and Turlough ( Mark Strickson ) also appeared in

25190-490: The Doctor ”. In 2010, Paul McGann revealed a new costume and sonic screwdriver for the Eighth Doctor which he indicated would be the new costume going forward. The cover and promotional photographs for the 2012 Big Finish story, Dark Eyes is, however, the first story to officially feature the new costume. The new outfit was originally premiered in 2010 at the Armageddon Pop Culture Expo , along with

25419-445: The Doctor", McGann said, "[Moffat's] instinctive take on the Eighth Doctor was exactly how I'd imagined this character to be, even way back, back in the 90s. You know, this... like a bruised nobility. I know it sounds wanky now, but... he's decent, but he's compromised. He's not a warrior, really, at all. There's a pacifist side to him, but he's a realist as well." The Eighth Doctor debuts in the TV film Doctor Who . While transporting

25648-550: The Doctor's company. Due to amnesia from a healing coma induced by a cyber-planner, the Eighth Doctor believes that Charley has left him in 2008 Singapore ( The Girl Who Never Was ); she is instead displaced in the year 500,002, from which she is rescued by the Sixth Doctor ( The Condemned ). Believing that the Eighth Doctor died before they parted, Charley travels with the Sixth Doctor. Their time together ends when

25877-790: The Doctor's early life. In the Past Doctor Adventures novel Divided Loyalties , the Doctor recalls his Academy years in a dream induced by the Celestial Toymaker. According to this, he was a member of an organisation called the Deca, ten brilliant Academy students campaigning for increased Time Lord intervention, alongside Mortimus (the Meddling Monk) , Ushas (the Rani) , Koschei (the Master) , Magnus (the War Chief) , Drax ,

26106-498: The Doctor's hearts simultaneously would accomplish this (as demonstrated in the Eleventh Doctor story " The Impossible Astronaut "). The Chancellery Guard (Gallifrey's equivalent of a police force) are armed with stasers, weapons capable of suppressing regeneration. In Death of the Doctor , a serial from spin-off programme The Sarah Jane Adventures , the Eleventh Doctor flippantly responds to Clyde Langer that he can regenerate "507" times; writer Russell T. Davies intended this line as

26335-434: The Doctor's origins, revealing a scientist and space explorer named Tecteun who found a lone, mysterious child with a supernatural physiology – one not belonging to any other life form or species – and an immense intelligence. She adopted the child and studied her, successfully grafting her regeneration capacity (and possibly other traits) into her own species, the Shobogans, and herself. This species, who would eventually become

26564-404: The Doctor's other families (adopted or not) are rare in the programme. In The Tomb of the Cybermen , when asked about his family, the Second Doctor says his memories of them are alive when he wants them to be; otherwise they sleep in his mind and he forgets. In The Curse of Fenric , when asked if he has family, the Seventh Doctor replies that he does not know. In the 1996 television movie ,

26793-399: The Doctor's real name, commenting: "I don't think human beings could even really say his name. But I think we might be able to hear it, at a certain frequency. If the stars are in the right place, and your heart's in the right place, you'll hear it." On occasion, the Doctor uses other aliases, such as "John Smith". In the Fourth Doctor serial The Armageddon Factor , the Doctor runs into

27022-413: The Doctor's sacrifice by again placing herself in danger. For two more seasons, the Doctor, Charley, and a new companion named C'rizz explore the divergent universe. They gradually unravel a plot designed around the Doctor by Rassilon , founder of the Time Lord society, who had been trapped in anti-time by the Doctor for his role in the creation of Zagreus. With the aid of his companions the Doctor escapes

27251-431: The Doctor's surname as she believed was the intent of the dialogue. The 2011 mid-series finale " A Good Man Goes to War ", also written by Moffat, suggested through the character of River Song that the Doctor's travels had influenced the etymology of the word "doctor", perverting its meaning on some worlds from "wise man" or "healer" to "great warrior". In " The End of Time " (2009–2010) it is mentioned that after he smote

27480-504: The Doctor, Liv and Helen set off once again for further adventures. The Doctor (Doctor Who) A number of other actors have played the character in stage and audio plays, as well as in various film and television productions. The Doctor has also been featured in films and a vast range of spin-off novels, audio dramas and comic strips. Ncuti Gatwa has portrayed the Fifteenth Doctor since " The Giggle " (2023). Within

27709-421: The Doctor, to gather to save Gallifrey by freezing it in time and removing it from the universe. The sudden disappearance of Gallifrey left the Daleks firing upon and subsequently annihilating themselves, while the Time Lords remained; albeit powerless and forgotten. As the War Doctor regenerates into the Ninth Doctor , his memory of saving Gallifrey is wiped as a means for his timeline to correct itself, leaving

27938-428: The Doctor. The longest-lasting on-screen incarnation is the Fourth Doctor , played by Tom Baker for seven years. Within the narrative, these changes were explained as regeneration , a biological process which heals a Time Lord when their incarnation is about to die. Consequently, the Time Lord is given a wholly new body. In The Deadly Assassin , the concept of a regeneration limit is introduced, giving Time Lords

28167-467: The Earth in the process. However, the Doctor and his companion Dr Grace Holloway ( Daphne Ashbrook ) are able to prevent the Earth's destruction, and the Master is sucked into the Eye. The TV film did not lead to the commissioning of a revived television series, and while Eighth Doctor stories continued in other media, Doctor Who did not air again on television until 2005. After this, footage and stills from

28396-441: The Eighth Doctor finally made a second appearance (of sorts) within the television series' continuity. In the episode " Human Nature " he appears on-screen as a sketch (alongside other incarnations) in the book A Journal of Impossible Things by John Smith. In 2008 and 2010 he appeared again as a brief image in " The Next Doctor " and " The Eleventh Hour " along with every other incarnation up to that time. In 2010's " The Lodger ", he

28625-460: The Eighth Doctor's first audio adventure, Storm Warning , the Doctor lands on Earth in October 1930 aboard the doomed R101 airship. On the airship the Doctor meets Charley Pollard ( India Fisher ), a young adventuress. He saves Charley's life, and brings her aboard the TARDIS as his latest companion. The Doctor soon learns that Charley's rescue negatively affects the timestream. Charley dies on

28854-415: The Eighth Doctor. In Big Finish audio drama has various companion who include Charley Pollard, Tamsin Drew, Molly O Sullivan, Liv Chenka and Lucie Miller. The BBC's official website describes the Eighth Doctor as an "effortlessly charming, romantic figure." It mentions that he is open about his own background and candid about the future of those he meets, highlighting the irony of an "open Doctor" who remains

29083-405: The Faction Paradox fleet and Gallifrey itself. In so doing, the TARDIS was able to rewrite the altered timeline with the original one that it "remembered"; no longer able to contain both timelines as a result of its energy drain, one reality had to become 'real'. As a side effect, however, the Doctor's entire memory was erased, apparently from the trauma of the event ( The Ancestor Cell ). To give

29312-608: The Fourth Doctor ( Tom Baker ) and Leela ( Louise Jameson ), the Fifth Doctor ( Peter Davison ) and Nyssa ( Sarah Sutton ), the Sixth Doctor ( Colin Baker ) and Peri, and the Seventh Doctor ( Sylvester McCoy ) and Ace ( Sophie Aldred ). Working with the First Doctor ( William Russell ), the Second Doctor ( Frazer Hines ), and the Third Doctor (Tim Treloar)), they escape the Master's trap and prevent time from being rewritten so

29541-509: The Homeworld/Gallifrey abandon their names to symbolise how they are leaving their culture. Similarly, the novel Lungbarrow reveals that the Doctor's name has been struck from the records of his family and therefore cannot be spoken. Quite apart from his name, why the Doctor uses the title "The Doctor" has never been fully explained on screen. The Doctor, at first, said that he was not a physician , often describing himself as

29770-569: The Legacy of Rassilon; as a result, the Doctor's children were systemically culled. The Doctor managed to help Patience escape through the use of the Machine, a prototype TARDIS, after assuring that her daughter-in-law had given birth to a girl named Susan and promised that he would keep the child safely away from Gallifrey. In " The Wedding of River Song ", the Doctor marries recurring companion and love interest River Song . Comments by both River and

29999-691: The Master (the Master of the TV film, the War Master and Missy) to restore the Ravenous to their original state. Following the events of Ravenous , the next Eighth Doctor saga, Stranded , sees the Doctor, Liv and Helen crash land on Earth in 2020. The Ravenous' attack on the TARDIS has made it inoperable so the trio move into the Doctor's house on Baker Street, which has since been turned into flats and already occupied by several tenants, including Torchwood agent Tania Bell. The trio attempt to adapt to life in 2020 without alien invasion or other threats while

30228-582: The Master , a renegade Time Lord and nemesis to the Doctor, as they believe him to be the "perfect warrior for a time war". However, after the Dalek Emperor gained control of the Cruciform, the Master deserted his post. Leadership among the Time Lords remained vague during the earlier phase of the war. Ultimately, Rassilon , founder of the Time Lord society and its time travel technology, is resurrected to assume leadership as Lord President. Refusing

30457-464: The Master could release Gallifrey from the Time Lock. The plan ultimately fails, as the Doctor destroyed the diamond link and the Master apparently sacrificed his life to take revenge on Rassilon, sending the Time Lords back to their apparent doom. However, as "the Moment" had a will of its own, it showed the War Doctor an alternative solution and ultimately enabled the first thirteen incarnations of

30686-616: The Master, taught by Cardinal Sendok. In the Virgin Missing Adventures novel Goth Opera , it is said the Doctor was a frequent prankster while at the academy, introducing cats into Gallifrey's ecosystem with his friend Ruath and electrifying a "perigosto stick" belonging to his teacher, Borusa. Feeling that too much of the Doctor's backstory had been revealed by the Seventh Doctor 's era, writers Andrew Cartmel , Ben Aaronovitch and Marc Platt developed

30915-612: The R101 in another story, and the Doctor cannot return her to preserve the timeline. Her existence forms a rough story arc over two seasons of audio adventures as the Doctor discovers a series of minor historical anomalies caused by damage to the timeline, such as the CIA's existence in 1933 or Benjamin Franklin being president. The Doctor eventually learns that, due to Charley's survival, the universe has become infected with "anti-time" leading to

31144-516: The Spiders and " The End of Time ". The Doctor has withstood, with minimal damage, exposure to electricity deadly enough to kill a human ( Terror of the Zygons , Genesis of the Daleks , " Aliens of London ", " The Christmas Invasion ", " The Idiot's Lantern ", " Evolution of the Daleks " and spin-off audio Spare Parts ). Certain stories imply that the Time Lord is resistant to cold temperatures (" 42 "). To counter extreme trauma, such as exposure to

31373-402: The TARDIS's telepathic circuits to restore Fitz's memories and identity to the clone, believing that the original Fitz was dead and reasoning that the clone would essentially be the real Fitz in every way that mattered. With both Sam and Fitz gone – Sam's origins established as a temporal paradox caused by exposure to a scar in reality created when the Doctor regenerated, which the 'original' Sam

31602-422: The TV film would be used in later episodes " The Next Doctor " (2008), " The Eleventh Hour ", " The Lodger " (both 2010), " Nightmare in Silver " (2013) and " The Timeless Children " (2020). Edited archive footage in " The Name of the Doctor " very briefly shows the Eighth Doctor sharing an adventure with the Second Doctor ( Patrick Troughton ). McGann reprised the role for a webcast mini-episode, " The Night of

31831-426: The Temporal Powers being wiped out one-by-one, the Time Lords formally declared war with the Daleks. The 'duration' and extent of the War has been unclear, with the Daleks vanishing out of time and space to fight the War, would indicate that it is not waged in normal space-time . Nonetheless, there was fighting in a sufficient bulk of the cosmos, including on the planet Gallifrey. The Doctor claims to have fought on

32060-497: The Tenth Doctor confirms that he had at one point been a father and that he lost his children "a long time ago", saying "When they died that part of me died with them"; the nature of their deaths, however, has never been explained, as it is suggested that whatever happened to his family is very painful for the Doctor to talk about. In " The Woman Who Fell to Earth " when the Thirteenth Doctor is questioned how she copes with

32289-526: The Third, Twelfth and Thirteenth Doctors), has won several sword fights against skilled opponents, and is able to make extremely difficult shots with firearms and, in The Face of Evil , with a crossbow. Thanks to exposure to many of history's greatest experts, including those from the future, the Doctor is a talented boxer, musician, organist, scientist and singer (able to shatter windows with his voice), and has

32518-409: The Thirteenth Doctor breaks out of Gallifrey's matrix. In 2013, McGann reprised the role for the mini-episode " The Night of the Doctor ", a prelude to the show's 50th anniversary special . This appearance marked the Eighth Doctor's final adventure and his regeneration . "The Night of the Doctor" proved popular with fans of the series, some of whom petitioned the BBC to make a spin-off series starring

32747-468: The Thirteenth undo her forced regeneration by the Master. Unlike the other incarnations, he appears in his regular costume rather than special robes. The Eighth Doctor initially wore a Wild Bill Hickok costume made up of a double-breasted frock coat made from forest green velvet with peaked lapels , a double-breasted waistcoat of silver grey paisley with a shawl collar and a gold fob watch ,

32976-461: The Time Lords, was restricted to a limit of twelve regenerations by a later incarnation of Tecteun. Tecteun and their child were eventually inducted into a clandestine Time Lord organisation known as the Division. After an unknown amount of regenerations, Tecteun's child began calling themself "Doctor". The Fugitive Doctor , true to her title, was on the run from the Division in a TARDIS disguised as

33205-416: The Time Lords; they evolved to feed on the energy released when Time Lords regenerate. The trio briefly ally with the Eleven against the Ravenous, but he betrays them when he learns that his condition makes him immune to the Ravenous' feeding habits (prompting him to assist the Ravenous in their campaign to turn the universe into their food. The series concludes with the Doctor working with three incarnations of

33434-538: The Time War. During the novel, the War Doctor and his new companion Cinder discover that the Daleks intend to use the temporal anomalies of a rift in time in the Moldox system, to develop a weapon that could completely erase Gallifrey and the Time Lords from history, with Rassilon's plan to stop the Dalek plot involving the destruction of the rift and all inhabited planets around it. The Doctor sabotages Rassilon's plan and uses

33663-401: The Time War. This costume was intended to reference the character's original one, with the long green coat and grey waistcoat; after the positive reception of "The Night of the Doctor", it has been featured on many Big Finish Productions' audio plays set during the Time War and has also been used as promotional material. McGann wears a variation of this costume for his appearance in " The Power of

33892-426: The Twelfth Doctor ( Peter Capaldi ). The Twelfth Doctor later claims to be uncertain he "won't keep regenerating forever" ("Kill the Moon"), and even Rassilon, the president of the Time Lords, expresses uncertainty about how many regenerations the Doctor has available to him. Other skills include his mental communication with other Time Lords, in some cases over a galaxy's distance. His skill with hypnosis requires only

34121-528: The United Kingdom, it was received well, attracting over 9 million viewers and generally positive reviews. It was also generally well received in Australia. Although the film failed to spark a new television series, the Eighth Doctor's adventures continued in various licensed spin-off media, notably BBC Books ' Eighth Doctor Adventures novels, audio plays from Big Finish Productions , and

34350-473: The Viyrans, an alien race, replace his memories of Charley with Mila (another woman) to preserve the timeline. The Eighth Doctor Adventures , featuring the Doctor and new companion Lucie Miller ( Sheridan Smith ), began on BBC7 on New Year's Eve 2006; a second series followed in 2007. A third season was streamed on the Big Finish website, and was available on CD. A fourth (and final) season began in 2009 with

34579-460: The War Council apparently becomes disillusioned with the High Council. On the last day of the Time War, the Daleks launched what is said to be their biggest attack ever on Gallifrey. Dalek forces captured the city of Arcadia, then laid siege to the capital itself. The War Doctor stole an ancient Gallifreyan weapon known as the Moment, and intended to reduce Gallifrey into "rocks and dust" with

34808-456: The War Doctor on missions to give the Time Lords the upper hand over the Daleks . Following Hurt's death, the series ended after four volumes in February 2017. A follow-up series was subsequently launched featuring the Eighth Doctor and set during the early years of the Time War. With the announcement of The War Doctor , Big Finish Productions also announced a prequel box set featuring

35037-425: The War Doctor to change his plan at the last moment. Ultimately, Gallifrey was hidden in a parallel dimension and the Daleks destroyed themselves in the ensuing crossfire; to all observers, it appeared as though the two races had been annihilated together. The unsynchronized timestreams caused the War Doctor to forget the specifics of his actions at this time. The Doctor remembered committing the apparent genocide during

35266-500: The Wasp " (2008) he was able to sense the changes in his body's enzymes (i.e. cyanide poisoning) and expel the cyanide from his body by ingesting a concoction of ginger beer , protein foods and salts. The Doctor has shown a resistance to temporal effects and has demonstrated telepathic ability, both the ability to mentally connect to other incarnations of themselves they have encountered (" The Five Doctors "), and an ability to enter into

35495-469: The academy and his affiliation with the notoriously devious Prydonian chapter of Time Lords. In " The Sound of Drums ", the Doctor describes an academy initiation where, at the age of eight, Gallifreyan children were taken from their families and made to look into the Untempered Schism, a gap in the fabric of reality, to view the Time Vortex. According to the Doctor, when regarding the effects of

35724-404: The actions of Charley, his old companions Leela and Romana, and recreations of his three previous incarnations, the Doctor again sacrifices himself for Charley and the universe by removing himself from space and time. He enters a divergent universe of which he has no prior knowledge (or frame of reference), and in which there is no linear time ( Zagreus ). Charley stows away on the TARDIS, negating

35953-400: The actor reprised the role in the mini-episode " The Night of the Doctor ", which depicts the Eighth Doctor's final adventure and his regeneration into the War Doctor (played by John Hurt ). McGann subsequently reprised the role in a brief cameo alongside other past incarnations in " The Power of the Doctor " (2022), his first filmed appearance for a televised episode of Doctor Who . Within

36182-407: The alias "Dr. Bowman" in the 1996 Doctor Who television movie . Time War (Doctor Who) The Time War , also called the Last Great Time War , is a conflict within the fictional universe of the British science fiction television series Doctor Who . The war occurs between the events of the 1996 film and the 2005 revived series , with the Time Lords fighting the Daleks until

36411-527: The alien Destrii and present-day humans Lucie and Sam . The Eighth Doctor made his first television appearance in the 1996 Doctor Who television film , the first time the Doctor had returned to television screens since the end of the original series in 1989. Intended as a backdoor pilot for a new television series on the Fox Network , the film drew 5.5% of the US audience, according to Nielsen Ratings. In

36640-409: The apparent mutual destruction of both races. The war was frequently mentioned when the show returned, but was not directly seen until the show's 50th anniversary special. Over the course of several episodes, the conflict is only implied by short clues and comments, particularly the discussion in the 2007 episode " The Sound of Drums ", and part two of the 2010 episode " The End of Time ". The Time War

36869-399: The audio drama. In the 2013 live-action mini-episode "The Night of the Doctor", the Eighth Doctor salutes companions Charley, C'rizz, Lucie, Tamsin and Molly before he regenerates into the War Doctor . The Eighth Doctor's earliest audio-released adventures were a trilogy, released from October to December 2011, in which the Doctor travels with Mary Shelley ( Julie Cox ). Mary first appears as

37098-407: The body of another Time Lord. The Dark Eyes audio series is also in effect a lead up to the Last Great Time War from the Doctor's perspective, the first series being a complex plan by the Daleks to erase the Time Lords from existence. Dark Eyes 2 also sees the resurrection of the Master in preparation for the war. Written by George Mann , this novel features the War Doctor and is set in

37327-429: The character of Dr Who first begins appearing in existing documentation from May of that year. It is possible that series co-creator Donald Wilson may have named the character; in a 1971 interview Wilson claimed to have come up with the series' title, and when this claim was put to Newman he did not dispute it. The character was first portrayed by William Hartnell in 1963. At the programme's beginning, nothing at all

37556-412: The character of Miranda, has hinted that her real father is a future incarnation of the Doctor which, if so, would make Zezanne the Doctor's biological granddaughter as well. The Virgin New Adventures novel Lungbarrow presents an alternative take on the Doctor's origins, suggesting that Time Lords are "loomed" in large batches of "cousins" and not produced via sexual reproduction. Lungbarrow portrays

37785-431: The character uses "the Doctor" because his actual name is impossible for humans to pronounce. For instance, the novel Vanderdeken's Children relates that the Doctor has already told Sam his real name, which is entirely alien and virtually unpronounceable. This is repeated by companion Peri Brown in the radio serial Slipback . The Faction Paradox encyclopaedia The Book of the War states that all renegades from

38014-492: The character's name, most frequently in the spin-off material of the 1960s and 1970s, but occasionally also in the TV series itself. For example, in The Gunfighters the Doctor assumes the name of Doctor Caligari and subsequently responds to the question "Doctor who?" with "yes, quite right." In the serial The War Machines , the computer WOTAN commands that "Doctor Who is required", and his human agents also use

38243-409: The crisis, and then, with Sabbath's help, they confronted his masters; the Council of Eight, mysterious beings who gained power by foreseeing likely future events and then ensuring that they came to pass. The Doctor, as a rogue element existing outside of Time, was the only unpredictable factor in their universe, and was thus the only person who could stop them. Ironically, it was Sabbath himself who gave

38472-406: The destruction of Gallifrey , the Doctor's homeworld. The Doctor's homeworld was also detailed in the revived TV series. In 2007, BBC7 broadcast a new series of Eighth Doctor audio adventures, produced specifically for radio. Paul McGann has continued to portray the Eighth Doctor in various audio spinoffs. The continuity of the spin-off media with respect to the television series and to each other

38701-491: The docudrama An Adventure in Space and Time as part of the 50th-anniversary celebrations of Doctor Who , which starred David Bradley as William Hartnell . Although Time Lords resemble humans, their physiology differs in key respects. Like other members of their race, the Doctor has two hearts (binary vascular system), a "respiratory bypass system" that allows the Doctor to go without air, an internal body temperature of 15–16 °C (60 °F) and occasionally exhibits

38930-405: The dominant one. Along with new companion Trix , the Doctor, Fitz and Anji travelled through the realities, including a world where the computer was never invented, a world where Earth was devastated by a strange even as all life aged forty years in 1843, and a world where humanity had time-travelling tours, with the Doctor being forced to erase at least two of these realities as he sought to restore

39159-420: The effect of anaesthetic on his alien biology—he finally regenerates into his eighth incarnation (McGann). The Master manages to cheat death, and while the Doctor is on Earth his spirit takes over the body of a paramedic named Bruce ( Eric Roberts ). The Master (Roberts) then attempts to steal the Doctor's remaining lives by opening the Eye of Harmony inside the Doctor's time machine, the TARDIS , nearly destroying

39388-416: The end of "Forest of the Dead". The events of " The Time of the Doctor " make it clear that his people, the Time Lords, know his true name, despite calling him by his chosen alias as "the Doctor" even in formal settings such as court. Despite the common belief amongst some areas of the fanbase that the Doctor should never be referred to by the name of the series, "Doctor Who" is actually fairly often used as

39617-657: The end of the Time War. He can briefly be seen on a screen in the War Room, though like the other past incarnations of the Doctor, this is achieved through archive footage. McGann reprised his role as the Eighth Doctor in the final Thirteenth Doctor special " The Power of the Doctor ", as one of the “Guardians of the Edge” in an afterlife, inside the Doctor’s mind. He, along with the First , Fifth , Sixth , and Seventh Doctors , help

39846-467: The end of the universe using a Chameleon Arch , having escaped the destruction of both the Time Lords and the Daleks. By taking human form, he avoided detection by the Doctor, who was apparently unaware of his nemesis' resurrection during the Time War. The Master had remained ignorant of the latter phase and outcome of the war until he emerged from hiding, when he is told by the Doctor many years later. The timelines of other races and planets shift without

40075-548: The energy of the rift to erase the Daleks' scheme, but the actions of a Time Lord agent result in Cinder's death, leaving the War Doctor resolved to end the war once and for all as he recognises how far his people have fallen in the name of victory. The War Doctor series was produced by Big Finish Productions following John Hurt 's role as the War Doctor in “ The Day of the Doctor ”. Hurt reprised his role alongside Jacqueline Pearce as Cardinal Ollistra, who frequently sends

40304-431: The events of past serials such as Genesis of the Daleks have been retroactively attributed to the Time War. It was never shown on-screen until " The End of Time ", which was both Davies' last story as head writer and producer and David Tennant 's last regular story as the Tenth Doctor. This episode featured brief views of Gallifrey and the Time Lords on the last day of the Time War. The 2013 mini-episode " The Night of

40533-415: The fictional narrative, the Doctor is a Time Lord who travels through time and space in a dimensionally transcendental – "bigger on the inside" – time machine : the TARDIS . This time machine, whose name is an acronym for Time And Relative Dimension(s) In Space , takes the exterior form of a 1963 police telephone call box and retains the appearance throughout the programme. Human companions accompany

40762-471: The front lines and was present at the Fall of Arcadia, Gallifrey's second city. The Eighth Doctor at first was a conscientious objector , instead working to help where he could. His attempt to save a woman from a spaceship crashing towards the planet Karn fails, when she refuses his aid because he is a Time Lord, apparently believing that the Time Lords had become just as destructive as the Daleks. The Doctor

40991-401: The horrors of war, give near-unanimous support for this plan – only two Time Lords dissented when the issue is put to a full vote. While the High Council continues to lead Time Lord society during the war, a separate War Council is tasked with overseeing the war itself, as well as Gallifrey's defences. The War Council is led by an unknown Time Lord general. During the last days of the Time War,

41220-457: The ideas of parallel universes and the concept of changing time can't have a continuity error—it's impossible for Doctor Who to get it wrong, because we can just say 'he changed time—it's a time ripple from the Time War ' ". The Last Great Time War also features in various Doctor Who spin-off media. In a story arc stretching through several of the Eighth Doctor Adventures novels, the Doctor learns that, at some point in his personal future,

41449-411: The inferno wiping out the Dalek fleet. Rassilon and his fellow councillors attempt to escape the Time Lock by retroactively planting a four-note drumbeat into the Master's brain as a child and cause his descent into madness. From there, once the signal is made tangible enough, a Whitepoint Star, a diamond only found on Gallifrey, is used to create a link between the final day of the Time War and Earth so

41678-590: The inhabitants of the worlds affected being aware of the changes in history , as they were a part of them. Most affected were the Zygons , who lost their home planet, Zygor, and attempted to conquer Earth for its resources; the Eternals , and the Gelth , who lost their physical form and were reduced to gaseous beings, who attempted to possess human corpses in 1869 using a Time Rift in Cardiff . The Time War provides

41907-413: The initiation on participants: "Some would be inspired, some would run away and some would go mad (as he suggests happened to his nemesis, the Master )." When asked to which group he belonged, he replied, "Oh, the ones that ran away. I never stopped!" The Doctor was taught by future Lord President Borusa and Azmael , where he met Drax , with whom he attended a Tech course as part of the class of '92. In

42136-532: The insane Time Lord known as the Eleven, all of whose past personalities are active in his mind at once. The Doctor interacts with River Song , the Eleventh Doctor 's future wife (although she avoids interacting with the Eighth Doctor unless she is disguised), and confronts an alliance between the Monk and the Weeping Angels . Doom Coalition concludes with the Doctor thwarting the Doom Coalition,

42365-560: The last minute, however, the Monk betrays the Daleks to help save the Doctor and Susan. In November 2012 Big Finish released Dark Eyes , a box set of four audio dramas whose stories take place after To the Death . The set introduced a new companion, Molly O'Sullivan (played by Ruth Bradley ), an Irish Voluntary Aid Detachment nursing assistant in World War I . The Eighth Doctor changes his appearance, cutting his hair and changing into

42594-414: The last minute. Big Finish began releasing two Eighth Doctor box sets in 2017: Ravenous and The Eighth Doctor: The Time War . Ravenous is a series of four four-part box sets which are a sequel to Doom Coalition , initially exploring the Doctor and Liv's efforts to find Helen after she is trapped with the Eleven. It then narrates their efforts to oppose the Ravenous, an ancient race who are predators of

42823-469: The lives of his ninth, tenth and eleventh incarnations up until the time of the Eleventh Doctor's present. The character of the Doctor was created by BBC Head of Drama, Sydney Newman . The first format document for the programme that was to become Doctor Who – then provisionally titled The Troubleshooters – was written in March 1963 by C. E. Webber , a staff writer who had been brought in to help develop

43052-400: The loss of her family, she states that she carries the memories of them with her and thus makes them a part of who she is, saying "even though they're gone from the world ... they're never gone from me." In " The End of Time ", a mysterious individual, referred to in the episode credits as "The Woman", appears unexpectedly to Wilfred Mott throughout both episodes. She is later revealed to be

43281-428: The machinations of Faction Paradox came to a head back on Gallifrey. As it turned out, in the new timeline triggered by the Doctor's infection, the Doctor was destined to become " Grandfather Paradox ", the mythical founder of Faction Paradox. The only factor keeping the original sequence of events in play was the Doctor's TARDIS, which had rebuilt itself after its apparent destruction on Avalon, and had now materialised in

43510-415: The marriages to Elizabeth I and Marilyn Monroe to count when questioned on how many wives the Doctor had had, remarking that he was married to Susan's grandmother and River Song. An adventurous scientist, the Doctor usually solves problems with his wits rather than with force. With the exception of his sonic screwdriver (which cannot kill, wound or maim), the Doctor detests weapons and uses violence only as

43739-471: The memories of other individuals (" The Girl in the Fireplace "). The Doctor can apparently reverse this process, sharing their memory with another, as shown in " The Lodger ". Some humans can enter the Doctor's memories after the Doctor enters theirs, as demonstrated by Madame de Pompadour (much to the Doctor's surprise) in "The Girl in the Fireplace", when she explains, "A door, once opened, may be stepped through in either direction." In " The Fires of Pompeii ",

43968-490: The moon. This event had a massive impact on the Doctor, who theorized that he himself was possibly the Hybrid. This is one reason the Doctor has stated as to why he decided to leave Gallifrey – out of fear. He has given convoluted and contradictory reasons as to why he left, for many reasons such as because his life path was pre-determined from his hidden previous life. The Doctor stole a TARDIS with his granddaughter Susan from

44197-696: The name of "Doctor von Wer" (a German approximation of "Doctor Who"), and signs himself as "Dr. W" in The Underwater Menace . He similarly poses as "the Great Wizard Quiquaequod" in The Dæmons ( qui , quae and quod being, respectively, the masculine, feminine and neuter Latin translation of the nominative form of who ). The Master also utilised Latin translation in the same serial, posing as "Mr Magister". The Eighth Doctor 's companion Grace briefly refers to him by

44426-411: The name. The Third Doctor 's car, dubbed "Bessie", carried the plate WHO 1, the only ongoing reference to the "Doctor Who" enigma in the original programme. The Third Doctor later drove an outlandish vehicle called the "Whomobile" in publicity materials, but it is never referred to as such in the programme, being simply known as "the Doctor's car" (or "my car", as the Doctor puts it). The name "Doctor Who"

44655-412: The original timeline. During this adventure, the Doctor appeared to become a bit colder and calculating, sacrificing an innocent man to escape a pocket universe and even leaving alternate versions of Fitz and Anji to die to preserve continuity. However, in the end, their sacrifices paid off, the Doctor managing to stabilise reality by resolving a paradox that had been hanging over them since the beginning of

44884-521: The outcome. Like many other alien species in the programme, the Doctor is able to sense when their own species is within proximity through an inherent telepathic connection. The Doctor exhibits some weaknesses uncommon to humans. For example, according to The Mind of Evil (1971), a tablet of aspirin could kill him. In " Cold Blood ", a process meant to decontaminate him of bacteria from the surface of Earth causes him intense pain, and he says it could have killed him if allowed to proceed to completion. In

45113-410: The pair grew up together. In " The End of Time ", the Master recollects their childhood together where they would run all day across his father's field, described as 'pastures of red grass stretching far across the slopes of Mount Perdition' and the boys would call up at the sky. In " World Enough and Time ", the Doctor claims that they both made a special pact where together they would visit every star in

45342-477: The pair was shifted with the introduction of Fitz Kreiner , a sixties bar singer incorrectly suspected of matricide, and a sort of younger brother to the Doctor. Eventually Fitz found himself abducted by Faction Paradox , a "time-travelling voodoo cult", and brainwashed into their legions. When the Doctor realised that a Faction member, he had encountered was a biomass copy of Fitz- a 'clone' created and shaped based on others' memories and perceptions of Fitz-, he used

45571-411: The poisonous fungus in The Seeds of Death and after being shot in Spearhead from Space , the Doctor can go into a self-induced coma until they recover. The Doctor's hypersensitive body and senses enable them to detect anomalies humans cannot, such as identifying alien species, blood type or chemical composition by taste and determining location or time period by sniffing the air. In " The Unicorn and

45800-402: The possibility of his civilisation being destroyed by the Daleks, Rassilon prepares a doomsday scenario. It included sacrificing all of time itself, thereby destroying the Daleks and all life in the universe. The Time Lords themselves would have transcended into a non-corporeal collective consciousness that would be the only sentient form of life in existence. The Time Lords, apparently hardened by

46029-400: The programme's first episode in 1963, presents the alternative explanation that the Doctor was given that name by medical staff on a foreign planet and liked it. To make up for his lack of a practical name, the Doctor often relies upon convenient pseudonyms. In The Gunfighters (1966), the First Doctor uses the alias Dr. Caligari . In The Highlanders (1966–67), the Second Doctor assumes

46258-490: The project. Webber's document contained a main character described as "The maturer man, 35–40, with some 'character twist'." Newman was not keen on this idea and – along with several other changes to Webber's initial format – created an alternative lead character named Dr Who, a crotchety older man piloting a stolen time machine, on the run from his own far-future world. No written record of Newman's conveyance of these ideas – believed to have taken place in April 1963 – exists, and

46487-440: The remaining crack, but not before granting the Doctor, old and weary from his years protecting Trenzalore, a new cycle of regenerations, which allow him to destroy the Dalek fleet surrounding the planet. In the 2006 episode " Rise of the Cybermen " when the Tenth Doctor , Rose Tyler and Mickey Smith are trapped in an alternate reality, the Doctor explains that, when the Time Lords were around, travel between parallel universes

46716-420: The remains of his longtime nemesis the Master to Gallifrey, the Seventh Doctor ( Sylvester McCoy ) is caught in the crossfire of a gang shoot-out in 1999 San Francisco's Chinatown, USA . He is taken to a hospital where surgeons, confused by his double heartbeat, attempt to correct a non-existent fibrillation . These efforts instead "kill" the Doctor, and he is taken to a morgue where after several hours—due to

46945-505: The restoration of his heart, the Doctor found himself locked in a desperate struggle with Sabbath as, along with his mysterious business associates, Sabbath hatched a plan to destroy all alternate realities. Sabbath believed that time travellers like the Doctor, every time they landed somewhere, created an alternate reality where they didn't show up, and that the universe was unable to support so many alternates without suffering damage; therefore, he attempted to trigger an explosion at Event One –

47174-432: The role would place on him (" The Five Doctors "), and is eventually deposed in absentia ( The Trial of a Time Lord ). By the time of his twelfth incarnation, he is regarded by many Gallifreyans as a war hero, "the man who won the Time War" (" Hell Bent "). In the first series of the 2005 revival, writer Russell T Davies introduced the concept of the Time War to streamline the Doctor's backstory for new viewers of

47403-410: The ruins of Gallifrey, unravel the Web of Time and burn a billion hearts to heal its own. The Wraiths then revealed to him the secret passage leading to another side of the city. The last anyone heard from him was that he apparently stole the moon and the President's wife; however, this was revealed to have been a lie spread about by the Shobogans when in reality it was the President's daughter and he lost

47632-424: The series' narrative, the Doctor is a centuries-old alien Time Lord from the planet Gallifrey who travels in time and space in the TARDIS , frequently with companions . At the end of life, the Doctor regenerates ; as a result, the physical appearance and personality of the Doctor changes. Preceded in regeneration by the Seventh Doctor ( Sylvester McCoy ), he is followed by the War Doctor ( John Hurt ) and

47861-436: The show. It was a war across all of time and space which ended when the Doctor presumably destroyed both the Time Lords and the Daleks . The Doctor's remorse for his actions in his Ninth , Tenth and Eleventh incarnations is a key part of his characterisation throughout the revival. The Time War happened between the 1996 television movie and 2005 opening episode " Rose " according to the show's internal chronology, although

48090-418: The significance of the Doctor's name in his episodes since 2006's " The Girl in the Fireplace ", in which historical figure Madame de Pompadour reads the Doctor's mind and remarks, "Doctor who? It's more than just a secret, isn't it?" According to the in-vision commentary on the DVD release, David Tennant had to inform actress Sophia Myles (who played Madame de Pompadour) that she was not, in fact, revealing

48319-452: The sinking when tracking an alien entity in the novel The Left-Handed Hummingbird . The Doctor has also encountered many of Earth's historical figures. It is his tendency for becoming "involved" with the universe – in direct violation of official Time Lord policy – that has caused the Doctor to be labelled a renegade by the Time Lords as stated in The War Games . However, the Doctor's actions are largely tolerated as he saved Gallifrey and

48548-417: The television series, such as his grandchildren John and Gillian , who appeared alongside the First and Second Doctors in comics and annuals. Two different, conflicting accounts exist on the descendants of Susan after leaving the Doctor. In the audio play " An Earthly Child ", it is revealed that Susan has had a half-human child, Alex Campbell, the Doctor's great-grandson. Alternatively, in the novel Legacy of

48777-421: The tenure of the Eleventh Doctor involved the oldest question in the universe, revealed in " The Wedding of River Song " to be "Doctor who?", giving the phrase in-universe significance. In " The Name of the Doctor ", the Doctor's real name was revealed to be the password used to enter the Doctor's tomb following his death on the planet Trenzalore. The story arc was resolved in " The Time of the Doctor ", wherein it

49006-439: The three ranges separately. The final Eighth Doctor Adventures novel, The Gallifrey Chronicles , obliquely references this split in timelines, even suggesting that the split results in the three alternative forms of the Ninth Doctor (a reference to the fact three different versions of the incarnation have appeared in various media). Mary's Story , a 2009 audio story by Big Finish, contradicted these suggestions, as there

49235-533: The trap, overcomes his emotional burden, learns that he has been purged of Zagreus, and returns to his normal universe with Charley and C'rizz ( The Next Life ). After this, which coincided with the end of the Big Finish "seasons" in light of the 2005 return of Doctor Who to television, the trio wanders freely. The only continuing plot element involves C'rizz, who exhibits unusual (and potentially destructive) psychological development. This culminates in C'rizz's death ( Absolution ), which makes Charley want to leave

49464-442: The universe several times. The Time Lords are partial to sending him on missions when deniability or expendability is needed, implied to have begun after his capture during The War Games and witnessed further in later stories, the Time Lords directing the Doctor and/or the TARDIS to specific locations in Colony in Space , The Curse of Peladon , The Mutants , Genesis of the Daleks , The Brain of Morbius and Attack of

49693-417: The universe. Some while after this, the Doctor was captured by Marnal, one of the few surviving Gallifreyans, and accused of destroying Gallifrey. Although Gallifrey had been all but wiped from history by the Doctor's actions, Marnal was able to jury-rig a Time Space Visualiser to witness the Doctor actually push the button as he faced off against the Grandfather, although there were about three minutes between

49922-411: The universe; however, the Master was 'too busy burning them'. In " Hell Bent ", one day at the academy, the Doctor found himself lost inside the Cloisters (an area located deep beneath the citadel) and spent four days inside. He was contacted by a Wraith who told him about the prophecy of a legendary creature known as 'the Hybrid', prophesied to have been crossbred from two warrior races that would stand in

50151-489: The war after his creations rehabilitated him to a leadership position. In the first year of the War, Davros' command ship is seemingly destroyed. Unbeknownst to the Doctor, who had tried to save him, Davros is rescued by Dalek Caan , via an emergency temporal shift. The war results in countless millions dying endless deaths, as time travel is used by both sides to reverse battles that caused massive fatalities on both sides. These excesses of temporal warfare eventually leads to

50380-413: The war to an end, and give him a choice of elixirs to trigger his regeneration. Saluting his various companions from the Big Finish audio range, he drinks an elixir designed to produce a warrior, regenerating into the War Doctor ( John Hurt ) who declares himself to be the Doctor "no more." In "The Day of the Doctor," the Eighth Doctor joins all of the other incarnations of the Doctor in saving Gallifrey at

50609-428: The war. In response, and in light of the apparent destruction of his old TARDIS in a dimensional rift, the Doctor and Fitz retreated into Compassion and fled, the Doctor refusing to let his people enslave his friend in such a manner and resolving to keep on the run until he could find another way to deal with the issue of the War ( The Shadows of Avalon ). The Doctor and Fitz travelled in Compassion for some time, until

50838-407: The whole of the conflict becoming "time-locked", so that no time traveller could go back into it. The Doctor describes the final days of the war as "hell". As the war progresses, the Time Lords become increasingly aggressive and unscrupulous. Growing in desperation, they access and use a cache of forbidden doomsday weapons known as the Omega Arsenal, save one: "the Moment". Moreover, they resurrect

51067-470: Was actually after the heart for his own purposes: when implanted into Sabbath's own chest, it imparted upon him those same Time Lord powers, including allowing Sabbath to travel further from Earth in his own time machine than he had previously been capable of. An unexpected side effect of this experiment was that so long as the Doctor's heart remained within Sabbath's chest, the Doctor himself remained practically invulnerable to harm, returning to life after up to

51296-422: Was instrumental in preventing a family from boarding the Titanic prior to her fateful voyage. In " The End of the World ", the Doctor recalls having been on board and surviving the Titanic's sinking to find himself "clinging to an iceberg". The Fourth Doctor mentioned this event in Robot and The Invasion of Time , where he insists that the sinking was not his fault; the Seventh Doctor became involved in

51525-417: Was only exposed to because the Doctor met blonde Sam – the Doctor continued his travels with the clone Fitz (although he was treated as the real one and generally thought of himself as such) and Compassion , an ex-Faction agent implanted with an interface that the Doctor found compatible with his TARDIS. Unbeknownst to the Doctor, the Faction – with the aid of the original Fitz – had changed his history, drawing

51754-429: Was re-inspired when he was recruited to defeat his old enemies the Players as they sought to escalate the Cold War ( Endgame ). Unsure what "St Louis" was intended by the note, the Doctor created his own in London: the St Louis Bar and Restaurant. As 2001 rolled around, Fitz indeed turned up there to meet him. With the aid of new companion Anji Kapoor , the Doctor and Fitz completed the TARDIS's regeneration, dealt with

51983-404: Was revealed that the question had been projected by the Time Lords across all of time and space through a "crack in the skin of the universe" as a means of contacting the Doctor and seeing whether it was safe to leave the parallel universe in which their planet, Gallifrey , had been left following the events of " The Day of the Doctor ". This arc was penned by Steven Moffat , who has been exploring

52212-448: Was the one to release Swarm from imprisonment as part of the Division's plan to destroy the universe. She was disintegrated by Swarm shortly after briefly confronting the Thirteenth Doctor after she found out her true origins as the timeless child. Other than Tecteun and Susan Foreman , his granddaughter with whom he travelled during the first two seasons and who has been mentioned occasionally since, references to

52441-432: Was withdrawn from other children, and was cared for by guardian figures who privately doubted the child's ability as an eventual Time Lord. Through the dialogue, it is suggested that several Gallifreyan children were pressured into joining the army, a path which did not sit right with the Doctor's pacifist beliefs, and as a result he wished to enroll into the Time Lord Academy instead. The classic series refers to his time at

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