^ Indeed. I first saw Baker and would long have considered him my favourite but I've liked each of the 3 actors from the new series even more than him and I've also liked each new actor more than the one who went before him.
The first Doctor I saw was Tennant, though he's not quite my favorite, but high up there. At the moment my favorite I suppose is McCoy. But like Bond actors, that top spot is constantly changing for me.
Yea, I have everything burned to home DVD from Hartnell through the latest Smith Christmas Special, so, when I watch Doctor Who it's typically the entire run for a specific Doctor, so when I watch their run, I remember what it is I really like about them, and while I am watching their run, they become my favorite, until the next Doctor I watch, who in turn becomes my favorite
Its wierd. Pertwee is my favorite, even though Baker is the first Doctor I watched on a regular basis. However, three years before our PBS station picked up the show, I watched The Green Death at a local SF con. So I suppose the 'your first Doctor' rule still applies.
I'm a smidgeon younger than Tennant and so Davison was kind of "my Doctor" even though Baker was the first I encountered. However, I've always had plenty of respect for Pertwee's no-nonsense approach. I don't recall ever thinking that the current incumbent was a bit rubbish, but in retrospect perhaps Baker 2 and McCoy... No, screw it. I love them all!
I love them all too. I can understand how Colin Baker's interpretation doesn't sit right with some, but, I've never understood the lack of appreciation for McCoy, although they're all different, he's as much "Doctor-y" as 1-5 and 8-11, IMHO.
While I suppose this is true to a lesser extent for the other actors. For some reason I just get a great joy out of watching McCoy play the Doctor. There's something about his performance that just resonates with me more than the other Doctors. I can't quite put my finger on it.
McCoy was amazing as the Doctor. It was fascinating the way he could seem like a funny little clownish guy one moment, but then reveal a wisdom and gravitas and inner power that made him seem truly ancient and almost godlike. He really encompassed both extremes of who the Doctor is, as well as any other actor and better than most. I suspect that the reason his character became so much darker and more serious in his second and third seasons, evolved into this mighty cosmic chessplayer, was because the producers saw the unexpected potential in McCoy and began writing to take advantage of it.
^ That seems very plausible. I recall that McCoy said something at the time about the first several scripts not having been written with his Doctor's character/portrayal in mind. McCoy gets a bad rep given that his era marked the show's less-than-dignified end; but given the right script he could turn in perfectly fine work, as indicated in The Curse Of Fenric, Ghost Light and, er, probably some other stories.
McCoy's era was sort of like Enterprise. It got off to a bad start and the fanbase never really allowed it to recover, even though it improved 100% as time went on. DWM refers to the last two seasons of the series as being brilliant in the recent feature on Ace, and that's a fair assessment. Once Ace joined and they began to darken the character (via the so-called "Cartmel Masterplan") the stories got a lot better, from Remembrance of the Daleks through the scathing Thatcher parody of The Happiness Patrol (which received some belated media discussion a couple years ago), to the underappreciated anniversary story Silver Nemesis to the rather cool Greatest Show in the Galaxy (best title ever). Then Battlefield was worth it for the return of the Brigadier alone but it also introduced Brig. Bambera ("Shame!") and gave us the potential future of the Doctor-as-Merlin, and then the series ended with the Ace trilogy of Curse of Fenric (which featured the Doctor at his absolute darkest in 50 years of the series), Ghost Light (a story that has a fascinating history behind it and is so complex many folks still don't understand it) and Survival. In my opinion not a bad egg among them. But by this time - to borrow Rick Berman's phrase - franchise fatigue had set in and not even the return of Tom Baker would have saved the show by this point. My proof on that point is the fact Battlefield - the story that brought the beloved Nicholas Courtney back to Doctor Who - scored some of the lowest ratings the series had ever seen; I'm talking Sarah Jane Adventure numbers, at which point it was pretty much game over. Michael Grade the BBC had turned their back on it, and judging by the ratings, so had the viewers. Funnily enough (and let's hear it for bringing the conversation back to the OP) you could say, in terms of popularity, that The Five Doctors was something of a last hurrah. Of course Davison's last year was popular, and gave us The Caves of Androzani and Resurrection of the Daleks, two stone-cold classics, but the original show never really did reach the same height of popularity as it did when 5D aired. It started slowly down a slippery slope and someone greased the slide when Colin Baker's era began. Alex
^ Just watched Battlefield last week. I thought it was a pretty good episode. I kept thinking I'd seen Brig. Bambera somewhere, then realized she was female Lister on Red Dwarf (Parallel Universe) from S.2 Yeah, Sylvester seemed darker than other Doctors. How many of the others used the touch telepathy thing?
As regards the viewing figures for the McCoy era, it should be pointed out that Grade (probably deliberately) stuck it up against Coronation Street, which is one of the biggest shows in the UK. Funnily enough, the DW Xmas specials nowadays often go up against the Christmas Day Corrie ep and hold their own but back in the 1980s, this was a graveyard slot.
The first mention of telepathy among Time Lords was in "The Sensorites" way back in the first season of the original series. The Sensorites used telepathy to communicate with Susan, the Doctor's granddaughter, and the Doctor said he sometimes knew what Susan was thinking, and that her gift for telepathy could be perfected if they ever went home. We also saw the Second Doctor use telepathy to summon the Time Lords in "The War Games," and the titular "Three Doctors" using it to quickly get each other up to speed or plot together privately. The Master's hypnotic power was telepathic in nature, and the Doctor was shown on occasion to have similar abilities. And of course we've known for a long time that the TARDIS had telepathic circuits. The only new thing that "The Girl in the Fireplace" did (which I never cared for) was portraying Gallifreyan telepathy as essentially identical to a Vulcan mind meld.
What does everyone think of Anthony Ainley's performance as the Master in "The Five Doctors?" I am glad he was included and think it rated better than some of his other serials, such as "Time-flight" and "The King's Demons" which were rubbish IMO.
Seven also used his touch telepathy to heal Ace's leg in "Remembrance of the Daleks" and again to stun Sgt. Patterson in "Survival."
I love it. The Five Doctors was the only time the Ainley incarnation of the Master was written for by Terrance Dicks, the co-creator (with Barry Letts) of the character. His characterisation therefore seems far more reminiscent of the Roger Delgado version - suave and debonair rather than flamboyant and maniacal - than in any other Ainley story, and he makes the most of it. His first scene with the Time Lord High Council is great. "I may be seated?"
To me there was always just something a little 'off' about most of Six and Sevens stories compared to earlier Doctors, but I've never been quite able to put my finger on. Too many plot-threads? Scenes that just didn't go anywhere? Motivations and villains that were never explained properly? I hope its not becuase the show tried to tell more complex stories and I was just too dim to appreciate them. Theres never been a bad Doctor, just bad writing.
OK, in Battlefield, he doesn't do "touch" telepathy. He does more of a Jedi thing to get the innkeeper & the professor to leave. As to the OP, in The Five Doctors, after #5 says something about having "cosmic angst", I swore Tegan said "cosmic how much?". But, the line isn't in either version on the DVD. Could I have just read it in the novelization? Still certain I remember hearing her say it.