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Doctor Who: Time Crash

Two DoctorsLast night on BBC One in the UK, the Corporation's annual charity telethon, 'Children in Need' raised £19million for underpriviledged kids around the country.

However, the highlight of the evening was a short Doctor Who segment, filmed specially for the telethon (as has become a tradition every year at this time), which bridged the final episode of season four three, 'Last of the Time Lords' and the forthcoming Christmas Special, 'Voyage of the Damned'.

And it was a fantastic eight-minute segment of television, written by Steven Moffat, who also scripted the brilliant 'Blink' in season three, and featured none other than Peter Davidson, the fifth Doctor, playing the earlier version of himself alongside his modern-day counterpart, David Tennant.

Moffat has a knack for clever paradox-style stories, and managed to capture a fantastic little snippet of emotion, harking back to the early days of Doctor Who, when I was an ardent young viewer myself.

I have to admit, I had a tear in my eye when Tennant told his counterpart -- before he sent him back to his own time: -- "You were my Doctor." I couldn't have put it better myself.

While Davison wasn't my Doctor (Tom Baker was), he was certainly one of the best -- and he demonstrated it here one more time (if you'll pardon the pun).

You can watch the whole segment at the BBC website.

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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)

mblum421

11-17-2007 @ 11:11AM

mblum42 said...

Just a quick note: It's Peter Davison, not Davidson.

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Marc Morrison2

11-17-2007 @ 11:56AM

Marc Morrison said...

I wish this had been a more serious moment, between the two. However, it was nice seeing a previous Doctor interacting with the current one (and dressing him down, as well). My eventual hope would be, that they do something akin to the Five Doctors special from before, where they gather all the previous Doctor's up, in some big grand adventure. That would be nice, especially for us Paul McGann fans.

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Tele-Toby3

11-17-2007 @ 1:16PM

Tele-Toby said...

Moffat even successfully "splained" away the discrepancy of the Fifth Doctor looking so much older than he did when he regenerated, with a flip toss-off that goes on to give the reason why they always looked older whenever they met their later regenerations.

In lesser hands, that reasoning alone would have filled up the seven minutes, yet Moffatt still had time to throw in mentions of specific storylines, the Cloister Bell, other Companions, and of course that celery buttoniere.

Moffatt's a genius!

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Fred4

11-17-2007 @ 1:31PM

Fred said...

I can't seem to connect to the server... is this a UK only video?

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Andy5

11-17-2007 @ 1:35PM

Andy said...

The joke about the Master's beard was absolutely priceless. Since the majority of the men behind the production of Doctor Who (both classic and current) are/were gay, including Russell T Davies and the late John Nathan Turner, it's nice to see a program include some gay cultural references, especially in such as unbiased fashion.

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Erica6

11-17-2007 @ 2:01PM

Erica said...

I thought this was lot of fun as well. The "beard" comment was hysterical. The call backs to LINDA and "timey-wimey" were also priceless.

Definitely has me pumped for a new season of Who.


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Oreo7

11-17-2007 @ 2:40PM

Oreo said...

Andy... "were gay"? Do I even want to ask?

And the current guy doing Doctor Who says he doesn't want to do a five doctors thing. Not sure why. I don't even understand how it's possible considering they are all the same guy with different faces.

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Joe Siegler8

11-17-2007 @ 2:51PM

Joe Siegler said...

Oreo, Russell Davies who has produced all the modern who, and John Nathan Turner who produced the last what 8-9 years of the classic series were gay. RTD has dropped quite a few remarks that a friend of mine calls "RTD random gay moments" - like the bit about the Doctor telling Shakespeare he can snog him later if he wants...

Anyway, having said that (and not being gay myself), I don't understand the Master's beard remaking being gay I don't get Andy.

And I'm not quite sure how Doctor #5 would know about LINDA.

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Tele-Toby9

11-17-2007 @ 3:19PM

Tele-Toby said...

"Beard" had a double meaning. A beard would be a woman who accompanied a gay man to public events, to restaurants, etc. in order to obscure the question of his sexual identity. (It may have applied in a mayoral race thirty years ago.....)

So when Doctor 5 asked if the Master still had the beard, Doctor 10 played on that with the response "Well, there was the wife....." (paraphrased)

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Tele-Toby10

11-17-2007 @ 3:25PM

Tele-Toby said...

Oh, and Fred - you can find several copies of "Time Crash" at YouTube.

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Oreo11

11-17-2007 @ 4:21PM

Oreo said...

Oh... Joe, I thought Andy meant "were" as he was gay, but now he's "cured", one of those times. I never saw the original run so I didn't know that creator was gay too.

The beard thing is interesting, but they are aliens, so how can an alien be gay? :-p

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Gene Cowan12

11-17-2007 @ 5:55PM

Gene Cowan said...

Loved it -- not just a paradox within the scope of the series, but a paradox in that it treaded right on the edge of reality with all the references that were more likely from David Tennant rather than the character he was playing. "You were my Doctor..." etc...
Great fun for anyone but the most anal retentive fans who are probably arguing at this moment about whether it is canon or not and trying to retcon it into place in the Who universe.

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jun13

11-17-2007 @ 8:15PM

jun said...

Indeed, I loved the beard comment.

Random note: "Blink" was actually in series 3.

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Brent McKee14

11-17-2007 @ 8:50PM

Brent McKee said...

John Nathan Turner didn't create Doctor Who, he simply produced the last 8 or 9 years of the original 26 year run of the show (which was about 6 years too long - most producers on the show worked on it for about 3 or 4 years). The original producer was Verity Lambert (a woman) who left the show during the third season. The actual concept was developed by the then head of BBC Drama, Sydney Newman.

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jun15

11-18-2007 @ 12:26AM

jun said...

*nods at Brent*

A spot of random trivia:

In the Season 3 episode "Human Nature," The Doctor (as human John Smith) gives the names of his parents as Sydney and Verity.

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Andy16

11-18-2007 @ 7:57AM

Andy said...

I said "were" to refer to the great number of gay people associated with the classic episode who have passed away. "Were" in the sense not that they are no longer gay, but that they are no longer alive...Nathan-Turner is deceased, as is his longtime partner Gary Downie who also worked on the classic series, as well as a number of other assistants and directors who "were" gay, such as Peter Grimwade.

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Rick17

11-18-2007 @ 9:36AM

Rick said...

I'm more familiar with Moffat's script writing on the original Coupling series from the UK.

While not a follower of Dr. Who, two things are evident to me from this piece that were always found in the comedy of Coupling. First of all, Moffat is a master of manipulating and twisting plot in surprising and deeply satisfying ways. Secondly, after years of hearing Coupling's theories on the melty man, nudity projection and the sock gap, it came as no surprise to me that he should move on to writing for Dr. Who. Moffat definitely loves his science fiction.

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Dee18

11-18-2007 @ 1:16PM

Dee said...

I was so bummed when I couldn't get it from the U.K. site, but a day later there were over 10 postings on youtube and I got to see it. I loved Peter Davison as part of the Adric, Tegan and Nyssa years. It was a great couple of minutes going back in time with the current Time Lord.

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Erik Dasque19

11-19-2007 @ 9:55AM

Erik Dasque said...

That was brilliant ! What, what !

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Ian Thal20

11-19-2007 @ 10:23AM

Ian Thal said...

"like the bit about the Doctor telling Shakespeare he can snog him later if he wants..."

Right, but anyone familiar with Shakespeare's sonnets knows that the Bard was well aware of a man's love for his fellow man-- and his plays were filled with male actors kissing other male actors. So referencing it is just a nod to historical accuracy.

Also "Beard" can be used to refer to anyone posing as a date in order to protect some involved party from scandal-- I first heard the term used in the Woody Allen film "Broadway Danny Rose"-- where the context was heterosexual: Allen's character poses as the date of his client's mistress where his client's family will be present. Obviously, in the days of rampant homophobia, homosexuals may have had a greater need beards more than heterosexuals-- but it's not an exclusively gay practice.

That said, they were both funny moments.

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