Age-ism..

popebenny16

So.

How old is The Doctor?

This question came up when I suggested to my eldest son that, whilst The Doctor is just over 900 years old, being a Time Lord and all that, he may not have been born yet. He could be born hundreds of years into the future.

Now, to be fair, there are very few instances of The Timelords (or to be more accurate, the Writers) ever actually engaging in messing about with Time but Rassilon did it to the Master and well, it would be interesting if it turned out that way. (then again there were suggestions in the 80's that The Doctor was there with Rassilon Omega and the rest right back at the start)

So,that was our first pondering. Next was ........... how old is the 9th Doctor? From The Christmass Invasion to The End of Time part two. He says six years, based on the Doctors age as he says it in those two shows (903 to 909 I think? Not exactly sure). This of course gives him plenty of time in Audio, Internet, Animated, Comic and good old fashioned Book based adventures.

But.... and this is a good one, if The Doctor was around with the founders, maybe the 9th Doctor is over 900 years old. Now this suggests that there may have been a hell of a Gap Twixt the companions he has had and may be a bit of a stretch, but its and intereresting idea.

Next ponder.......... How old (or more precisely, how long) did each Doctor actually live for? Now the 4th Doctor deffo actually got younger during the time of Romana/Romana 2 by a few years, and we know from audio and books ect that the 6th Doctor was a lot busier before he fell off the exercise bike than we would have believed only ten years ago.

So, any guesses, informed or otherwise?

amazing what you think of in the car with a home grown whovian

doctorwhogirl

Really interesting article on this few months back in Doctor Who Magazine...

Must pull it out and will report back with my findings!

Doctor DooM

In my personal cannon, the Doctor is a bit touchy about his age and just straight up lies about it.

He's ancient, but like his real name we will never learn his actual age.

Problem solved

ixoy

I'm a fan of the Virgin New Adventure books so I'll go with their take on it whereby in 'Set Piece' he drunkenly celebrated his 1,000th birthday. All those years allow plenty of time for him to have all the myriad spin off adventures.

And if I'm really bothered with those novels take as canon, then sure I'll take their stance that Gallifrey's time is at the beginning of our galaxy, millions of years ago. Kinda makes sense in that it explains how they're so complacent, settled and arrogant in their power.

As to how long each Doctor was around... okay that's a tough one! Do you believe in Season 6B for example? It says that because we never saw Troughton regenerate into Pertwee, the 2nd Doctor actually had a lot more adventures after "The War Games", often working for the Time Lords as penance. It explains why the 2nd Doctor looked older in "The Three/Five/Two Doctor" stories and why Jamie looked older too... Argh!

Doctor DooM

I too like the idea that the Gallifreyans are ancient. They were the first species to develop to a type n civilisation on the Kardashev scale.

Actually, I think that fits new series wise- If Gallifrey exists time locked in the present that means it must have been time locked in the past, no?

popebenny16

Doctor DooM wrote: »

If Gallifrey exists time locked in the present that means it must have been time locked in the past, no?

non linear wibbily wobbily timey wimey stuff, a clear example of which was that Blink was on the day after Carey Muilligan won her BAFTA film award :cool:

In an effort to demonstrate how Blink worked to my sons I sat down with a piece of paper and some coloured pens to to it in a grapic form. Must post it up here this evening if i get the scanner working.

Gambler

Based on the fact that 42 is the ultimate answer to life, the universe and everything I have to assume that it's also his age.. :P

Sleepy

Or is it his real name?

Gambler

He is not a number! (Just watched the remake of the prisoner..)