Tori Bonnell ENGL1102-009 Inquiry Paper Ms.

Schley Doctor Who Through the Years There is a man that has twelve different faces who travels through time and space in a blue, British police call box. Who is this man? Is he even a real human man? He is a Timelord from the planet Gallifrey called The Doctor from the British television show Doctor Who, which began in 1963 and is known as the longest running show on TV. This show still exists today and the popularity in society has grown exponentially! Over the 50 years, this show has changed dramatically, yet has still kept many main aspects. Even though the show has changed so much with each decade, the characters involved will always be the same. The show Doctor Who has transformed greatly from decade to decade because of the actors involved, the audience, the technological advancements, and the historical events of time. But how have these alterations influenced the end product of today? The reason Doctor Who has been able to continue for 50 years is because of the periodic change of The Doctors character. It is almost impossible to have a show running this long with the same plot and characters. The writers created the idea of regeneration to keep the show running without having the current characters getting too old. The Doctor regenerates and by doing this, the actors are switched out. This idea is used as a plot device in the show and can be accepted because The Doctor is an alien. But quite often the new actors go through a period of hatred when they first begin on the

Bonnell 2 show. Since this new actor is replacing the older one, who has been loved and watched for many years, people tend to get angry. An article from Britains The Telegram talked about this anger after Matt Smith replaced David Tennant. Actor Matt Smith need not worry; Newly-published BBC Archive documents show viewers' hostility to each new face of the Time Lord. (Doctor Who: BBC viewers 'critical of new Time Lord every time he changes'). So far, there have been 12 known true Doctors due to regeneration. The list of actors in order from first to current is: William Hartnell, Patrick Troughton, Jon Pertwee, Tom Baker, Peter Davison, Colin Baker, Sylvester McCoy, Paul McGann, Christopher Eccleston, David Tennant, Matt Smith, and now Peter Capaldi.

This is a photo of the actors who have played The Doctor from 1963-2014.

All of these men have played the role of The Doctor for at least a year in the past 50 years. Since they are playing the same character, you would think that their acting would be similar, but that is the complete opposite. Each one of these actors has brought a new spin on The Doctor according to the decade that they were in. Some are serious, while some act as comic relief. For example, there is a big difference between William Hartnells portray of The Doctor compared to Tom Bakers. William was the firs t Doctor who was scientific and thoughtful of his actions, while Tom Baker saved the world by goofing around with a scarf. Even though Tom Baker is one of the most popular Doctors, he also had many haters. General opinion was that the new Doctor Who is a looney - he is an eccentric always, but the way it was presented made him stupid. But after Tom was

Bonnell 3 The Doctor for a couple years, many people began to love him. (Doctor Who: BBC viewers 'critical of new Time Lord every time he changes'). Some actors are older than others when they played The Doctor as well. Due to this constant change of actors, the show is kept interesting because you never know what is going to happen next. It seems that as the years go on, the physical appearances of the actors have become more and more important. This could be in response to the media because as the years go on, the appearance of the actor is thought to be more important. It seems that because of this change, the audience has formed along side. When this show first aired, mainly boys who were interested in science fiction watched it. But recently, the audience has changed dramatically. Just in the past couple years; more girls (especially teenage girls) have struck an interest in the show. Many say that this is due to the fact that the actors of The Doctor have become increasingly attractive. It is not known if that is on purpose though. But nevertheless, it seems that many girls who watch the show are more interested in how cute The Doctor is. This huge shift in audience occurred right when the modern series began in 2005 with Christopher Eccleston. During this time of change, the show seemed to get more attention from the media due to the response of all these girls and some boys. The amount of available merchandise multiplied to include more girl items, such as dresses and jewelry. One of the most influential items from the series was the bow tie. This obsession from the audience started with Matt Smith on his very first episode as the Doctor. One sentence did it all. Bow ties are cool. It seems like such a small sentence, but that caused an exponential increase in bow tie sales in the UK. A British bow tie store online called Topman was influenced a lot by this show. The spokes person from the store told The

Bonnell 4 Telegram a very shocking statistic. In the last month, bow tie sales have increased by 94%. ("Doctor Who prompts surge in popularity of bow ties.").

This is a picture of THE 11TH Doctor, Matt Smith, sporting his red bow tie and saying his favorite line, Bow ties are cool!

Some girls fall apart just at the mentioning of either David Tennant or Matt Smith. It seems like some of the people who watched did not even watch the show for the stories and ideas. A lot of the girls were only interested because of the actors involved. Not only was the show for boys who liked sci-fi, but it also became something that everyone can enjoy. But did this enormous shifting of audience change the show? Did the media influence people so much that the show just was not the same? As of right now, many people do not know. There is an obvious change in audience, which could have possibly changed some things in the show. The main issue right now is the change from Matt Smith to Peter Capaldi. But a change in actors should not affect a change in audience too greatly. Many people of different generations still love and watch the show. Across British universities, the show has spawned a number of student societies who meet to discuss the show. Jonathan Martindale, president of the Oxford Doctor Who Society president, said 30 of his members would be watching the 50th anniversary special. Even though there has been a shift in audience, true Whovians stay strong (Evans). Yes, the show is not exactly the same as it was in 1963, but things are destined to change as time goes on. Another main influence to this change is the advancement of technology.

Bonnell 5 If you have a television show that has been playing as long as Doctor Who you are going to see differences in technology as the decades progress. When this show was first aired on the 23rd of November in 1963, it was in all black and white. The technology at the time was just not developed enough to have color TV. The first color episode of Doctor Who was in 1970 with The Third Doctor, Jon Pertwee. This makes a major difference between the first decade of the show and all that follow. Another large difference between the decades is the special effects. The magic behind the show was more up to your imagination because special effects just could not be done. Many ideas were difficult to portray because of the limited technology. But with a little imagination, that could change. There are no limits to where or when the character can go one minute you could be watching the downfall of Pompeii, and the next you could be a billion years into the future. But now that technology has advanced, more and more does not have to be put up to the imagination. You can actually see the magic occur right in front of you on the screen (Truitt). The various places and planets look real because of the invention of green screens and computer programs that can add objects in that are not actually real. The enemy alien costumes were not as complex and detailed as they are today either. Take the Daleks for example. The Daleks are an alien race that is obsessed with being the master race and exterminating all organisms in their way. These aliens started off as tin cages with actors inside of them. These actors created the strange voices of the Daleks by themselves. Now that technology has advanced more, the actors that portray the Daleks do not even have to be in the show physically. It is just their voice that is recorded and then auto tuned to sound more like what a Dalek would sound like. The actual Dalek is a robot controlled by someone behind the scenes. Another example would

Bonnell 6 be of the cybermen. Originally born on Earths twin planet Mondas, the Cybermen were created as the Mondasians replaced parts of their dying bodies with plastic and steel. Eventually they added emotional inhibitors, supressing all feelings love, hate, and even fear. Cybermen can convert humans wherever they go, and take orders from a Cyberleader, whose data can be downloaded to a drone if the leader is destroyed. (50 Years of Doctor Who: Doctor Who). These enemies technically are not alien because they are human organs placed inside of a metal body in the hopes that humans will now be perfect with this upgrade. They began as a mixture between a tin and plastic body suit that really did not look very intimidating.

The evolution of the Cybermen uniforms. As you can see, the technology has changed drastically.

Now, Cybermen are very large and strong metal structures that can shoot lasers and destroy anything at the slightest touch. Technology really played an important role in taking the show into the modern era. But, along the way, references to many historical events occur. Many historical events have been a big role during the making of Doctor Who. The show began in 1963, so of course many things happened before and after this time frame. Because of this, some ideas in the show were used as either direct or indirect references of historical events or people. Directly, a lot of the episodes took place during certain events or involved a certain person of history. For example, at one point, The

Bonnell 7 Doctor met Hitler before the start of the holocaust. A bunch of references were used during the making of this show. In the beginning of the episode Lets Kill Hitler, The Doctors spaceship fell through a building in Germany and almost killed Hitler himself. The characters were in complete shock because they almost changed all of history after that moment. Afterwards, they play it off as a comic relief section by taking a huge criminal that killed millions of people. The Doctor tells to Rory, Rory, take Hitler and put him in that cupboard over there. Now. Do it. Rory does what The Doctor tells him to do by saying, Right. Putting Hitler in the cupboard. Cupboard. Hitler. Hitler. Cupboard. Come on. By doing this, the show takes horrific events and pokes fun at it (Wilson, Marcus). Because of it popularity, propaganda was sometimes used without people even realizing the meaning behind it. The Daleks were used as a reference of the Nazis because of their obsession with creating a master race and would exterminate anyone in their way.

This poster shows the main point of the Daleks, Extermination!

The Daleks are seen as the biggest enemy of The Doctor because they are so purely evil. The Doctor first encountered the Daleks on the radiation-soaked planet of Skaro, waging war with the peaceful Thals. The Daleks were the mangled and mutated remains of the Kaled people, placed in metal war machines by the Kaleds chief scientist Davros.

Bonnell 8 Pursuing the Doctor across space and time, the Daleks invaded the Earth (50 Years of Doctor Who: Doctor Who). Another connection is with the enemies called the Slitheens. These are aliens that can take the shape of any organism without anyone knowing. In one episode, the Slitheens take the shape of government officials and cause a lot of problems. This is a connection to the corruption found in most government officials. Ideas like this are used as propaganda and keep audience member interested if the connection is made. During the classic era of Doctor Who, there was more propaganda found as a plot device. But now it seems that the stories of the modern era are used more to entertain, rather than propagate. But of course the main ideas, such as the Daleks, will always stay the same. Fifty years of Doctor Who has not just created a very popular show, but it has become a connection between decades and generations. So much has come out of this show over the years and there is still more to come. The Who fandom has often been a place of refuge. The Doctor is, in many ways, an unusual hero figure. ( Bartlett). As of December of 2013, The 12th Doctor has arrived and the writers have great plans for Peter Capaldi. There has been many changes over the past 50 years of Doctor Who and hopefully Peter will bring back more of the classic version of the show. Ever since the creation of the modern series in 2005, the show has been rapidly changing and morphing to the rapid changes in pop culture. Many events have influenced this show, but nevertheless it will always be about this caring alien man called The Doctor who goes to far away planets and the earth to save anyone in need.

Bonnell 9 Reflection: Doctor Who Through the Years At first, I picked the show Doctor Who because I thought it would be fun to write about. I also thought I knew a lot more about that topic than I really did. This show is even more complex then I thought it was! I realized this extreme complexity after looking up all of my sources. It was very difficult to not go over the page limit. Since I was writing my paper on a TV show, it was difficult to find resources that werent just written articles by random Doctor Who fans. I was able to find some articles that were of importance and formal, but most of my information came from official fan sites and the shows themselves. So, some of the resource sites were not helpful for my particular topic. I was glad that there was too much information rather than too little. At first it was very overwhelming because there was just so much reading involved, but I was able to narrow it down to a couple very good sources. Because the show just had it 50th year anniversary, there was a bunch of articles to use. I tend to write more formally because I am a science major who has to write a LOT of formal lab reports. But since my topic was so informal, I found it difficult to write formally. I did not use many pronouns while writing because Ive trained not to by the science department. But I still write a tiny bit informal to fit my topic. Doing group work helped a lot for me. It really showed my what I was missing in my project because my peers are unbiased when it comes to my writing. They were able to pick out mistakes that I did not even notice after self-editing. I have to do a lot of research for my biology classes, so this was not very new. But, it was definitely a little different because of the topic I was researching. I have primarily watched the modern series as compared to the classics of Doctor Who, so I learned a lot about the episodes that I have not seen yet!

Bonnell 10 Works Cited "50 Years of Doctor Who: Doctor Who." Doctor Who. N.p., n.d. Web. 15 Mar. 2014. <http://www.doctorwho.tv/50-years/>. Bartlett, Myke. "Revenge of the Geeks: Fifty Years of Doctor Who." Screen Education 71 (2013): 74-81. Academic Search Complete. Web. 18 Feb. 2014. "Doctor Who: BBC viewers 'critical of new Time Lord every time he changes'." The Telegraph. Telegraph Media Group, 13 Apr. 2010. Web. 2 Apr. 2014. <http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/tvandradio/doctor-who/7581878/DoctorWho-BBC-viewers-critical-of-new-Time-Lord-every-time-he-changes.html>. "Doctor Who prompts surge in popularity of bow ties." The Telegraph. Telegraph Media Group, 30 Apr. 2010. Web. 2 Apr. 2014. <http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/tvandradio/doctor-who/7656389/DoctorWho-prompts-surge-in-popularity-of-bow-ties.html>. Evans, Ivan. "Doctor Who: 50 Years On, Global Acclaim for a Distinctly British TV Icon." The Christian Science Monitor (2013): n. page. Academic Search Complete. Web. 18 Feb. 2014. Truitt, Brian. "The Doctor Is Still Making the Rounds, 50 Years Later." USA TODAY (2013): n. pag. Academic Search Complete. Web. 18 Feb. 2014. Wilson, Marcus. Doctor Who: Season 7. BBC. 2012. Television.