The Doctor's Age

[Stardoe]

Yes I'm knitpicking here but it's annoyed me since the first of the new series began. When the Doctor was with Sarah in the 70's [or 1980 as we're led to believe in Pyramids of Mars] the Doctor was 749 yrs old. So now he is 900, can we assume that 150 yrs have passed for him after he left Sarah? I think that sounds about right because regenerating 6 times in 150 yrs is a bit more believable than regenerating 6 times in 30 yrs. After all, he's done so much and been to many places in that time. And what a waste of regenerations. So in School Reunion when the Dr had never mentioned Sarah to Rose or anyone else is because she was 150 yrs in his past. The sad thing is that she would have been long dead to him.

:-(Something Rose fails to understand. And Sarah.

So what he has actually done by going back to 21st century Earth and meeting Rose, is to go back on Sarah's timeline, which is not what he is supposed to do, not that he did it intentionally. So can I assume now, that he's taking up with 21st C girls, is that he is now operating back on Earth's timeline again, which is not in time with his own? So by meeting Sarah he is breaking the laws of time. He could actually  solve his "I can't spend the rest of my life with you" problem by going back in time constantly and being with these companions.....................which is wong, hence his reasons for never going back.

Love to hear thoughts.

[Llin]

Ooh, I never thought of it like that before...
I know he seems to have regenerated an awful lot in a short time, but I think mostly it's true to what we see onscreen and he spends more or less as long in each incarnation as that Doctor's stint on TV lasts, purely because of the aging of the companions and whatever. If he were an ordinary boring Time Lord, probably his incarnations would last much longer, but as it is he keeps doing reckless things and wasting them.
The way I sort of think of it is that most of that time was taken up with the Time War, so the Doctor was away from humanity that whole time, and then when he was able to return to Earth, he just sort of went back to where in its history it had been when he was last there, because the events of the Time War happened on some sort of other temporal plane, so he's still really in line with contemporary Earth. Or something.
Besides which, I wouldn't say Sarah's been dead to him for years, because Time Lords have longer life spans anyway so 150 years doesn't seem as long to them.
Interesting question, anyway...

[Katzedecimal]

I suspect it's been longer than 150 years.   Nitpicking the Doctor's age is something I (and a lot of other people) have been doing, ever since the new series started.  The reason being, in Revelation of the Daleks, the Sixth Doctor is said to be 900 years old, while in Time and the Rani, the Seventh Doctor is said to be 953.   So when the Ninth Doctor gave his age as 900, right away we had our eyebrows up and were going "Eh??"  That was compounded when the Ninth Doctor stated that he'd had "900 years of phone-box travel." -- wot, he was piloting the TARDIS as an infant, then? ^__~   This has yet to be reconciled in the show, but lots of us oldbies have been having a field day bugging about it.   My personal hypothesis is that he is, to paraphrase my late mother-in-law, "900 years and holding" ^_~  I support this with His Nibbs having lied about his age before (to Romana, another Time Lord, no less)   So I suspect, yes, Sarah Jane was a very long time ago, and a lot of companions away.

One thing I'm disliking about the new series is the increasing tendency towards companions declining to travel on the TARDIS once they recognise that the Doctor isn't as infatuated with them as they are with him.  I feel it cheapens the relationship with the Doctor and the experience of travelling on the TARDIS.  Plus it also plays into the saying that if they can't kill it, eat it, wear it or shag it, humans aren't interested -- a base manner of existance that I'd always felt the companions to be beyond, being one of the criteria that makes them good companions (Captain Jack excepted, as always...)   I don't mind so much the companions being infatuated with His Nibbs, but I do find it ridiculous that they expect him to feel the same way.  Once again, Our Lady of Perpetual Awesomeness leads the way, as Lis Sladen once said that, when playing on Doctor Who, she tried to keep in mind that the Doctor is not human and does not always react in human ways, and did not always recognise human responses.   Upon being asked about whether there was romance between Sarah and the Doctor, at a con in the 80s, Lis apparently replied that Sarah loved the Doctor in her fashion, and he loved her in his fashion - but did not  imply that they were necessarily the same fashion!  (This I can completely understand.  I love my cat and my cat loves me, but is it the same kind of love?  If my cat were in love with me, would I even recognise it?  In any case, I am certainly not in love with my cat! =^..^= )   And as we know, Sarah is the only one of the new series companions who has allowed herself to love the Doctor fully, even after recognising that he doesn't love her the same way, and not go all emo about it.   Martha, Jack -- please learn from her wise example ^__^

...yeah, very long comment, but this is the sort of topic I just love to talk about #^_^#;;

[Stardoe]

All very interesting. I was not aware of the 6th-9th Drs talking about their age because I am more of a [1,2]3,4,5 & 10 follower. And I only became a regular watcher of the new series due to being curious to see how it would go after Martha joined and I got re-hooked because Martha is great and the stories improved so much. [Of course I watched and bought, School Reunion] I wish they would make his age clear to us..... or I guess it's ok to just think he lies about it. Or perhaps he has really lost track outside of Gallifrey time.

I love the attitude Elisabeth Sladen has about the relationship between Sarah and the Doctor and from what I can tell from interviews and the commentaries, it is very similar to the relationship between Elisabeth and Tom Baker. After all, he's relatively alien  in comparison to most humans. A very interesting and eccentric kind of man. One of the producers [might have been Barry Letts] says on one DVD, that he thinks Sarah and the Doctor were/are the best team of all. I agree and think it was because of that ES/TB relationship.

I agree with the comments about the humans being infatuated with the Doctor and I really do resent that the producers/media or whoever are overdoing the romance stuff and it seems that every companion that comes alone has to pash with the Doctor. Even Captain Jack.....it was CPR I know but they just had to put that in didn't they? Also, back in the day we were all left to decide which companion was our favourite. Sarah was mine by far, of course, but I also liked many others for many different reasons. I even liked Rose at first when I started watching the new series but I began to get turned off when it seemed that "they" were out to make Rose the favourite companion of the fans and the Doctor as well. That's why I was glad she left and I hope the rumours about her returning are untrue because I really thought the stories suffered because they dwelt too much with the Mr and Mrs Doctor stuff. It turned me off Rose which is a shame because I thought she was good. I agree with ES when she says that the Doctor is alien and I think they have tried to humanise him too much in the new series which is a shame because DT plays the alien so well. I agree that Sarah loved the Doctor. I love him. We all do. I like the cat analogy. It is exactly that way and I'd like the producers to leave the romance out of it as I agree, it does make humans look shallow and it does detract from the privilege, wonder and awe of travelling in the TARDIS. The specific reasons [apart from missing the Dr] why Sarah is such a fruit cake being unable to adjust to bland earth life ever again. Go Sarah!!! She's hit the nail on the head right there, epitomising just what DW is and should be all about. And we all know she's his real favourite. He hasn't sent presents to anyother companion since leaving them, now, has he?

[Katzedecimal]

Ha!  Yes! - somebody else who remembered about K-9 And Company  I was scratching my head during Sarah's whole "You never came back" whinge, and thinking "Uh, K-9 much?  How do you think you got him?"  He did come back and you weren't home, you goof! ^___^   He's inquired about other former companions in the past (Jo Grant and Leela), but so far as we know, he hasn't given anyone else any gifts - much less a sonic screwdriver!   How much does that have to rock?   He may or may not be in love with her, but its clear he loves Sarah Jane best of all ^_^

The very best Doctor/companion combinations have been ones where the actors have hit it off.  It is a crying shame that so little of the Second Doctor's era survives, because Pat Troughton and Frazier Hines hit it off marvelously.  They were trouble-monkeys from the get-go, always concocting little naughty ideas (and distracting the powers with big naughty ideas so that they could slip the little ones through unnoticed!)   They were constantly cutting up in rehersals and as a result, the relationship of the Second Doctor and Jamie came off just as natural and scintillating as Sarah/Four, Romana-2/Four (er, second romana and fourth doctor... not smacking romana with a two-by-four although there were occasions...)  and Ace/Seven.  Lis was reported as saying that she could feel she was getting on with DT almost as well as she did with TB, and could feel the old magic coming into their acting - that's no doubt half the reason why School Reunion was so powerful (DT being another SJS-'shipper didn't hurt, either ^_~ )

[Stardoe]

Yes, DT does play the Dr in a zany Tom Bakerish way. And he is a big fan of Sarah Jane. I watched Voyage of the Damned this morning [at last] and I have to say that I really enjoyed it but I'm very disappointed to see that yet again someone has to pash the Doctor. And I see in the trailer for the following season that more pashing is on the cards......even with Donna Noble. I had hoped with her that it would be a refreshing change that we would finally have a companion, male or female, that did not have the hots for the Doctor. But, alas, it seems not.

I thought Sarah and Dr3 also had a good relationship. I too wish that Patrick Troughton eps weren't so few as I liked him. I like the comments about Dr2 and Jamie. Who says that a male companion can't have fun with the Doctor without wanting to jump him. It's ridiculous the way that sort of thing has taken over the new series. In Voyage of the Damned, the Doc was all too happy for the young girl to come along with him but he told the old guy that he travelled alone. How sad. Why can't we have an old codger for a companion for a change? Lovely old man he was too. The Doctor was an old codger once and that didn't hurt the ratings. But now it seems people won't watch unless there is $#x.
One of my offspring today made a comment to me after watching VOTD. I said how I was sick of the kissing etc and the offspring said "Imagine if the Doctor had kissed Sarah Jane." I replied "That would just be bizzar and totally unthought of and inappropriate." They all agreed. In VOTD the Doc said he was 903 yrs old. So I guess he was 900 when he met Rose and is keeping count with the yrs of earth. How long are the yrs on Gallifrey? Just what is a TL yr meant to represent? Just how old is the Doctor? 903 earth yrs or 903 Gallifreyan yrs? The mind boggles.

[sarah_janesmith]

its sad but its true, its like people who go on about bringing other companions back, like leela, the fact is shed be long dead to the doctor by now.

[Stardoe]

Did they bring Leela back? Or r u just hypothesising? I must say that my knowledge of Drs 6-9 isn't that great. I know Leela has featured in some of those Big Finish or Children in need specials....not that I've seen or heard any of them, but did they bring her back in the show? Yes I feel that most of the companions, except Romana, would be long dead to the Doc. I'd like to see Joe Grant make a return. I'd like to think that she was still married to her wonderful husband Cliff, the environmentalist. But perhaps he could be out on the ''Steve Irwin'' ship as part of the anti whaling crew belonging to that radical environmentalist group, Sea Shepherds. Yes, that would be interesting. But I think politics [and other societal issues] should be left out of Dr Who and SJA.

[sarah_janesmith]

it was hypothetical, me and my mum were talking about it a while ago, leela would be long dead by now, and anyway if she was still on gallifrey when the time war was happening she wouldmost likely be dead from that.

[Katzedecimal]

Too right.   They crossed that line in the 6th-Doctor episode The Two Doctors, when they went all gory-extremist pro-vegan.  That, unfortunately, was the last nail in my Whovian coffin; I was so disgusted by then, I quit watching the show after that.  I didn't pick it up again until well into the 7th Doctor era (just in time for them to cancel it, actually :-/ )

[Katzedecimal]

Wellllllll.... ^__^;;;   what ticked me about all this Doctor-snogging is Sarah Jane didn't get a snog.  I mean, come on, the one character who deserves a snog, who's bloody well earned a snog and what does she get? -- a great monster huggle and a sonic screwdriver.  Really, is that any sort of compensation?? :D    Clearly, snogging doesn't carry anything like the weight to His Nibbs as it does to us humans, but sonic screwdrivers do.

[Stardoe]

Being alien, the snogging may not mean anything at all to the doctor. Maybe on Gallifrey, one shows one's affections by giving presents like robot dogs, sonic screwdrivers, alien detecting watches etc. After all, as ES always points out, the doctor is alien and he doesn't always respond to situations as a human would. So perhaps all the hugging is just a habit he got into because his latest companions are into it and he snogs because the companions seem to be into that too. I don't ever want him to snog SJ but a nice moment of endearment would be good the next time they meet, or farewell eachother. I really like in Ark in Space when SJ is chryogenisised and the doctor says "For the first time in my life I feel surplus requirements." That's the doctor. Says alot in a subtle way.

[Katzedecimal]

Well, the "Sarah deserves a snog" joke is mainly just that, a joke rooted in the fact that the most popular and deserving companion didn't get one.   But if there's to be any bilabial interaction between His Nibbs and Her Awesomeness, it should be of the gentlest, feathery, butterfly-wing variety.  Something that would speak volumes in its silence.

... he better not be giving Rose any robot dogs or sonic screwdrivers.  I'm just sayin' >.<

[Stardoe]

Just wondering how you all feel about general returns of companions. I"m not sure if the coming and going of companions will work in the new season. I think Jack is a good recurring character but to have Martha go and then come back and then Donna return and there is a rumour that Rose is returning. That's one bird that I think needs to never come back, ever. If they do the rumoured big special with all the companions present, I would prefer that SJ was not in it.

[Stardoe]

Yeah, and I don't want to be sitting back in my rocking chair in 30 yrs time watching the Rose Tyler Adventures, either.

[Katzedecimal]

We almost had that as a spin-off.  We should both be grateful :-P    Actually, the other companion I'd not mind seeing again in a guest spot would be Jamie MacCrimmond.   I know he had a guest spot during the 6th Doctor's reign, but I'd love to see how he and DT's Doctor would get on.  Rather well, I'd imagine.  I'm seeing Wacky Hijinks....

[Stardoe]

I did not know that Jamie was with the 6th Dr. Does that mean his memory is now returned and he knows and remembers the Dr. It would be good for them to go back to that time and see Jamie again. It could be yrs later so Jamie's aging would seem normal. [Yeah, I'm a bit hung up on the age thing. lol]