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The
Ninth Doctor
(2005) |
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The
Sound Vault |
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| Rose
Tyler |
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The Best Doctor
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if I am your favourite Doctor |
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 Nearly
nine years after the "Doctor
Who: The Movie", and almost
sixteen years after the last episode of the television series was
aired, The Doctor finally returned to our screens, with a new face,
a new companion, a new TARDIS console room, and an all-new backstory...
if a bit of a confusing one.
Unlike with all previous new Doctors, the audience did not have the chance to see this new Doctor’s regeneration at first, simply starting out with him already fairly comfortable with his new body (Although the fact that he looked at a mirror and commented on his ears in "Rose" suggests that it happened only shortly before he appeared for the first time). While we have learned that the Eighth Doctor initially regenerated into the ‘War Doctor’ incarnation during the devastating Time War between the Time Lords and the Daleks before he regenerated into this incarnation ("Night of The Doctor"), since the later Doctors officially considered the War Doctor to not be ‘The Doctor’ due to the actions taken by that body when he triggered the galaxy-destroying Moment to destroy Gallifrey and the Daleks, this incarnation is thus The Doctor’s official ninth incarnation despite being the Doctor’s tenth body overall. While the Tenth Doctor and Eleventh Doctors were later able to redeem the War Doctor by helping him save Gallifrey by sending it to an unknown pocket universe ("The Day of The Doctor"), the War Doctor’s memories of their plan were erased as he departed and regenerated, resulting in him being left convinced that he had destroyed Gallifrey as he had originally intended.
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| The Doctor in "Rose" |
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While we are unaware what happened to him immediately after his regeneration, the end result is the same; the Ninth Doctor, tracking his old foes the Nestene Consciousness shortly after his regeneration, arrived on Earth in London, 2005, and, while tracking the Nestene signal, met shop assistant Rose Tyler as he checked out a department store where Nestene energy had been detected ("Rose"). With Rose's help, The Doctor
was able to track the main Nestene Consciousness to its base under
the London Eye, where Rose was able to take it out with a sample of
antiplastic The Doctor had prepared earlier while The Doctor fought
with an Auton. Having defeated the Consciousness, The Doctor offered Rose the chance to travel with him, but Rose initially rejected the offer, prompting The Doctor to depart on his own, concluding that he was still too new to this incarnation to have a companion. However, after a brief trip with new potential companion Ali - which nearly went wrong due to Ali’s nature as a Karkinian causing her to approach threats in a more violent manner than The Doctor might prefer ("The Beast of Babylon") - The Doctor returned to Rose based on Ali’s suggestion, informing her that the TARDIS travelled in time as well as space. Her interest inspired once more, Rose thus joined the Ninth Doctor for the trip of a lifetime with this newest of Doctors.
From
the beginning, it was obvious that this Doctor was, in many obvious
ways, far more human than the others, even if his means of expressing
it made it clear that he was still very alien. Throughout the series,
even in minor, subtle ways, it was apparent that he cared a great deal
for his companion Rose Tyler, holding hands with her on several occasions
and actually being jealous of her still-close friendship with her ex-boyfriend
Mickey Smith - who he commonly referred to as 'Ricky' to avoid admitting
that he didn't remember his name -, occasionally referring to Mickey
as ‘the Idiot’. Throughout his life, however, despite his
normally light-hearted appearance, he had a melancholy and lonely personality,
which he mainly concealed with the habit his past selves had of making
jokes in the face of danger, only letting his 'guard' down when he
was alone. His loneliness could be attributed to his guilt at being
the last survivor of the Time War, all other Time Lords having lost
their lives in the conflict, leaving him to deal with the guilt and
knowledge that he had survived the destruction of his entire race.
In
many ways, however, he combined some of the best qualities of his previous
selves; the frivolity and emotional availability of the Eighth Doctor,
the ingenuity of the Third
Doctor, the apparent vulnerability of the Fifth
Doctor,
the keen sense of humour of the Second
Doctor (As well as the early Seventh
Doctor),
the depth of feeling of the Sixth
Doctor, the (occasional) irascibility
of the First
Doctor, and the quirkiness and refusal to be mistaken for a human
of the Fourth
Doctor. On some occasions he also demonstrated a certain enthusiasm
for his travels, showing great excitement when he met Charles Dickens
("The
Unquiet Dead"), and occasionally philosophically musing
about various minor matters, such as when he commenting that humanity
spent so much time wondering about how they would die that they never
considered the possibility that they might survive ("The
End of the World") or when he reflected that a flower Rose had found
on her first trip to an alien world could be the local equivalent of
a daisy or the rarest flower in the universe ("The
Monsters Inside").
He also displayed his past selves' dislike of violence, although like
many of them, he wasn't afraid to use it if he had to, taking up a
gun in "Dalek", breaking a window with a robot’s head
to escape an underwater tunnel - although this can be excused due to
the sonic screwdriver having been stolen - ("The
Clockwise Man"),
and knocking out a guard in "Bad
Wolf/The Parting of the Ways".
However, his temper was far more apparent than in past lives; unlike
the Fourth Doctor, who once said 'It may be irrational of me, but
human beings are quite my favourite species', the Ninth Doctor
often referred to humans as 'stupid apes', and showed less patience
with them than
he used to, sometimes seeming unimpressed by their mental and observational
qualities, yet at the same time wanting to protect them and other species.
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| The End of the World |
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Ironically,
despite his disdain for humans’ intellectual abilities, this
Doctor occasionally appeared less intelligent than other incarnations,
requiring others to save him by coming up with their own plans where
other Doctors could have come up with escape strategies on their
own or never fallen into those traps in the first place, such as
The Gelth tricking him into helping them spread over London ("The
Unquiet Dead"). He also fell victim to minor deceptions such
as his jacket being stolen while he was attending a dinner ("The
Clockwise Man"), and needed help identifying The
Slitheen's planet
of origin by having his companions go over the facts available about
them so that he could narrow down the options ("Aliens
of London/World War Three"). He also regularly displayed a certain lack of the ‘on-the-spot’ initiative
that had often characterised some of his previous selves, such as
when he locked himself and his companions in the conference room
of 10 Downing Street to escape The Slitheen without considering how
he would defeat the invasion trapped inside the conference room ("Aliens
of London/World War Three") or gave himself the ‘alias’ of ‘Doctor
Table’ to rescue a Neanderthal from a hospital rather than
come up with something more original ("Only
Human"). Despite
this, he still had a significant amount of raw intelligence, quickly
determining how to reverse teleportation systems to prevent his enemies
escaping ("The End of the World" and "Boom
Town"),
giving Rose instructions that allowed her to pose as an astrophysicist
using code phrases that only they would understand ("The Monsters
Inside"), refining a gene that would allow humans in the vicinity
to temporarily breathe fire using a rogue geneticist’s equipment
("Only Human") and putting together a Delta Wave emitter
in under an hour despite his initial claim that it would take three
weeks (Although this may have been referring to the time he would
need to refine it to only target his enemies rather than a setting
that would kill everything).
This
Doctor is also noteworthy as, for the first time since the UNIT era,
The Doctor actually had regular contacts on his visits to Earth,
rather than just meeting up with someone already involved in the
crisis and enlisting their aid in sorting it out. Like the Third
Doctor, the Ninth commonly contacted the first people he had met
in this incarnation (As far as we know, at least); in this case,
Rose's mother, Jackie Tyler, and Rose's ex-boyfriend Mickey. Despite
his apparent dislike of the two of them, reflected on such occasions
as The Doctor being unwilling to even thank Mickey after his assistance
proved vital in saving innocent lives while battling the Quervils
in "Winner
Takes All", it was evident that he appreciated
them in his own way; he respected Jackie's concerns about her daughter
travelling with him, and entrusted Mickey with a virus that would
wipe all information relating to The Doctor from the internet, although
Mickey never apparently used it. This version of The Doctor also
possessed a wider variety of gadgets than before. While other Doctors
were content with merely using the sonic screwdriver to get out of
awkward situations (Baring the brief period when it was destroyed,
for obvious reasons), the Ninth Doctor, while using a modified sonic
screwdriver with far more functions than his old versions, was also
known to use psychic paper, with which he could show anyone looking
at it whatever he wanted them to see, thus providing himself with
ready-made 'official documentation' whenever he needed it. On their
second adventure, The Doctor modified Rose's mobile phone so that
she could call home from wherever - or even whenever - she was (As
well as the more basic advantage of allowing her to call home even
if normal phones couldn't receive a signal in her current location,
such as when they were trapped in the Downing Street cabinet room).
The
Doctor’s darker side was eventually demonstrated in "Dalek",
when The Doctor and Rose arrived in the alien collection of billionaire
Henry Van Statten and The Doctor was asked to look at Van Statten's
only live specimen - a Dalek (Specifically, what The Doctor believed
to be the last Dalek in the universe). In the confrontation with
it, The Doctor showed a side of himself that had never been seen
before; the side that not only truly hated the Dalek, but actually
took delight in its pain and frustration, as well as its helplessness
due to a damaged gun, The Doctor confidently proclaiming his role
in the destruction of the Dalek fleet before becoming more melancholy
when the Dalek’s questions forced him to recognise his status
as the last of his kind. The Doctor was initially angry at the Dalek
claiming that the two were the same - both the last of their kind
- but then claimed that it had a point, as he knew what it deserved.
The Doctor then showed his vicious side in the confrontation with
the Dalek, sending massive electric shocks through it and dismissing
its plea to have pity where past Doctors would take the Daleks’ lack
of mercy as a reason to show it. As the Dalek broke out of its cell
and began to advance out of the underground base, The Doctor ordered
it to die after establishing a video communication with it, to which
the Dalek replied that 'You [The Doctor] would make a good Dalek'.
When Rose was cornered by the Dalek, The Doctor took up an alien
gun to stop it, but, in the confrontation between him and the Dalek,
it took Rose to point out that the Dalek had changed... and The Doctor
realised that, if he continued what he was doing, he too would have
changed into what he'd always fought.
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| Aliens
of London/World War Three |
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This
Doctor’s greater hostility was further explored during confrontations
with his own companions. During a trip to Satellite Five in the year
200,000, new companion Adam Mitchell attempted to transfer information
from the future back into his own time after having a chip planted
in his head, nearly resulting in a being called the Jagrafess gaining
access to the TARDIS, until another resident of the space station where
they'd landed managed to shut the Jagrafess down ("The
Long Game").
Despite the fact that no harm had been done, outraged at Adam’s
violation of his trust, The Doctor took him home and kicked him off
the TARDIS in a fit of rage, condemning him to a lifetime of non-importance
as merely going inside meant he ran the risk of the implant being discovered
and his head cut open by curious scientists. In the very next story,
he then almost left Rose behind when she changed history to prevent
her father dying, apparently only staying because the TARDIS had lost
its link to its interior dimensions due to the destabilisation of reality,
leaving The Doctor to battle the time-beasts known as the Reapers while
they fed on the 'scar tissue' of the tear in time caused by Rose's
actions.
Despite
his hostility towards Rose, his time in the past also gave The Doctor
a chance to show his kinder side; when trapped in a church and talking
to a young couple about to get married, he told them that even though
he’d travelled to places and done things they couldn’t
imagine, he’d never had an ordinary life like them... and, on
some level, it was obvious that he wished he could have had that chance,
if the universe was only a kinder, safer place. His continued compassion
for humanity was reflected during a later adventure in London in World
War Two ("The
Empty Child/The Doctor Dances"), where The Doctor not only
gained a new companion in the form of ex-Time Agent Captain Jack Harkness but simultaneously saved the entire city from an infection by renegade
nanogenes that Jack had unintentionally released on the city. Reprogramming
the genes by discovering ‘Patient Zero’ - a young boy who
had been unintentionally ‘infected’ with the genes and
improperly repaired due to their lack of knowledge of human anatomy
- The Doctor not only demonstrated his joy at the knowledge that he
had managed to save everyone who had been altered by the nanogenes,
but also displayed his continued fondness for humanity, praising the
dedication of Doctor Constantine, who had continued to care for his
nanogene-infected patients even when he had lost his entire family
and had no idea what was wrong with the victims, and expressing great
glee at being able to reunite a mother with her child by curing him
of the ‘infection’, his optimism and general enthusiasm
given a significant boost. The Doctor and Rose then departed, after
picking up Jack as their new companion from his soon-to-self-destruct
spaceship.
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| Boom
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Shortly
after this, The Doctor was transported back to Satellite Five ("Bad
Wolf/The Parting of the Ways"), where he, Rose and Jack found
themselves facing a new Dalek army that had been assembled by the Dalek
Emperor, another survivor of the Time War, abducting humans by using
seemingly fatal game shows - the shows apparently culminated in peoples’ deaths
when in reality they were transmatted over to the Dalek ships and used
to provide genetic samples to create new Daleks -, the controller of
Satellite Five having defied her masters long enough to bring in The
Doctor to stop them as the only man they had ever feared. While Rose
and the TARDIS were sent to her home time, Jack organised the humans
remaining on Satellite Five into a defence against the Daleks while
The Doctor began construction of a delta wave emitter, a device that
would fry the brain of every Dalek in the blast radius... and, unfortunately,
every human on Earth as well, since The Doctor wouldn't have time to
refine the blast in the hour or so before the Daleks arrived. As all
the humans on Satellite Five fell in a desperate attempt to buy time
for The Doctor, he completed construction of the delta wave emitter
just as Dalek forces arrived in the control room with him... but, even
though Earth had already been decimated by Dalek bombs, when faced
with the chance to destroy the Daleks at the cost of whatever life
was left on Earth, The Doctor refused, preferring to be a coward rather
than commit genocide to vanquish the Daleks for a second time. Gleefully,
the Emperor ordered The Doctor exterminated, but, at the last minute,
Rose arrived, imbued with all the power of the Time Vortex, and using
it to turn the entire Dalek fleet into dust. However, the vortex energy
was so powerful that it would have killed her, so The Doctor was forced
to take the energy into himself... along with all the damage Rose had
already sustained. As Rose recovered in the TARDIS, having apparently
forgotten everything about her brief reign as a god, The Doctor revealed
that the energy of the Time Vortex was destroying every cell in his
body, and he would soon regenerate, meaning that he wouldn't see her
again 'with this daft old face'. Rose begged him not to talk
like that, but The Doctor kept on talking, telling her 'Before
I go, I just want
to tell you, you were fantastic. Absolutely fantastic. And you know
something? So was I'.
And,
as the radiation of the Time Vortex burst from his sleeves and neck,
transforming him into his tenth incarnation as the cells in his body
died once and all, nobody watching could deny the truth of his last
words to the universe. Even though he had a short life compared to
his other selves, the Ninth Doctor had made an incredible impact on
a new generation of viewers, bringing a modern-day legend back to our
screens, reminding children that sofas weren't just for sitting on,
and teaching a whole new generation that the police box was a widely-recognized
symbol of heroism in a world that needed heroes like never before...
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