Doctor Who has been full of surprises this year.
The icing on Season 12’s controversial cake was the story of the Timeless Child. Turns out…
***SPOILERS*** The Doctor wasn’t actually a Time Lord. He/She was, in fact, a weird kid, whose regeneration skills were pinched by the heartless Gallifreyans (well they’ve got two hearts but you get the idea).
This series is all about change but sometimes it shakes things up worse than a Dalek in a wind tunnel. So as fans rant on social media about whether that’s a good or bad thing, let’s hop in the TARDIS and look back at Doctor Who’s Biggest Curveballs…
FIRST REGENERATION
One of the show’s most game-changing moments happened early on. First Doctor William Hartnell blazed a trail from 1963, saving planets and fluffing lines. After 3 years in the job, he wanted to move on, so regeneration was born.
The legendary body swap took place in the days before the internet, so when Patrick Troughton arrived it must have been a shock. Young fans watched their hero die, only to return with a different face and personality. This neatest of tricks has kept Doctor Who going for over half a century…
DEATH OF ADRIC
80s kids were traumatized by the fiery death of Adric (Matthew Waterhouse). This teen maths wizard travelled with both the Fourth and Fifth Doctors (Tom Baker and Peter Davison). He was great with numbers but ran out of luck battling the Cybermen in 1982’s Earthshock.
Stuck on a space freighter which collided with prehistoric Earth, his heroic exit gave audiences a jolt and wiped out the dinosaurs in the process. Talk about a double whammy.
The credits rolled in silence, the first and only time this happened in Doctor Who’s long history. With a picture of Adric’s broken badge in the background, the effect was devastating…
HALF HUMAN DOCTOR
Doctor Who had been off the air a few years when the Paul McGann TV movie was made in 1996. A US co-production, it had Seventh Doctor Sylvester McCoy regenerating after being gunned down on the streets of San Francisco. This felt like an American take on the series for sure. And one passing comment really set the cat amongst the pigeons.
Eric Roberts’ Master revealed the Doctor was actually half-human. Certainly news to his millions of fans! This detail has kind of been lost to the mists of time. It’s still part of the canon though. Maybe the Timeless Child has something to do with this eye-opening curveball…?
DONNA’S ENTRANCE
Fans were weeping buckets when Tenth Doctor David Tennant parted company with Billie Piper’s Rose. They had no time to recover though. No sooner had Tennant stepped aboard the TARDIS than a surprise passenger appeared on the ship. A famous face in a wedding veil… Donna Noble, played by Catherine Tate!
In The Runaway Bride (2006), Donna’s wedding had been interrupted by the evil scheme of spider race the Racnoss. With her help, the Doctor beat them. Yet more surprises were on the way. Tate may have looked like a one-off but she returned in Series 4 as a full-time companion…
THE MASTER 2020
New Year, New Master. Not that anyone knew about it. As Series 12 opened they figured Sacha Dhawan’s character was an old colleague of the Doctor’s. When showrunner Chris Chibnall dropped a bombshell and revealed him as the Master, the fanbase imploded.
This super-sized curveball was kept secret for months – quite an achievement, given the scrutiny the show was under. Dhawan was well-known in Whovian circles for his role as director Waris Hussein in An Adventure In Time & Space. He was then linked to the Doctor himself when Peter Capaldi left. The BBC weren’t taking any chances, and even edited him out of the Season 12 trailer…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S9iJa5oH74c
The Master has a habit of sneaking up on the Doctor. He disguised himself numerous times but also hid in plain sight. Derek Jacobi was an amnesiac version in Series 3’s Utopia. A few years later Michelle Gomez announced herself as “Missy” to a bewildered Time Lord…
OTHER DOCTORS
Series 12 introduced us to Jo Martin’s character Ruth Clayton. Who was she? Exactly! She was sensationally revealed as none other than the Doctor.
Or was she? Chris Chibnall hasn’t quite answered the question behind that curveball yet!
The Timeless Children finale revealed there were many more Doctors than we thought. Of course, long term viewers were already aware of a few.
In 1986 the Valeyard (Michael Jayston) was about to pull the rug out from under an unsuspecting audience.
Brought in as a villain to prosecute Colin Baker’s Sixth Doctor in The Trial of a Time Lord, he was eventually outed by the Master as a future Doctor!
This extraordinary development came and went, though spin-off media have featured the character since.
Acting legend John Hurt astonished fans when his War Doctor popped up. He was a secret regeneration between McGann and Christopher Eccleston that happened during the Time War
Hurt’s battle-hardened time warrior came face to face with his Tenth and Eleventh selves in 50th anniversary special The Day of the Doctor. The continuity tweak made Matt Smith the Twelfth Doctor (though we’re not sure anyone’s still counting to be honest).
On top of that, a mysterious figure called the Curator appeared, played by classic Doctor Tom Baker!
With so many curveballs you’d think fans would be used to them. They’ll certainly be waiting a long time for more answers – Revolution of the Daleks is coming at Christmas and Series 13 won’t arrive any time soon…
We can’t handle the suspension bri… sorry, the suspense!
