I'm buying this Hurt guy as the Doctor. This ties in neatly with the last ep. Nothing more to say at the moment.
I couldn't be happier that Paul McGann didn't just get a huge slap in the face for the 50th and I hope there are still plenty of other successfully kept secrets yet to be revealed!!
so, Whovians, does this event neatly tie onto the way McGann "died" in his run as the Doctor? or is it something completely different?
McGann only got one episode, the 90's Doctor Who tv movie that was the pilot for a FOX/BBC co-produced series that fortunately never eventuated. He has been in a lot of Big Finish produced audio adventures since then, but we never knew how that incarnation ended until now since the revival of the TV show just started with Eccleston as the Ninth Doctor.
We don't know. The only canonical information about 8 is his first adventure. Then comes the gap before nuWho, which they're apparently about to close, at least in part. Though I'm very excited, I must say I am also a bit worried that this will remove a lot of the mystery that RTD returned to the Doctor. They had this problem in the old show apparently, once they had shown us Gallifrey during 4's run. To think I once posted a thread on WF asking which Who story I should watch first! This board has been around for a while now.
sooo....(I know I could look this up but...) you have the original series that had seven (?) doctors.....and you had the pilot with McGann in which 7 becomes 8....then the "big Finish" stuff... then (chronologically) THIS story in which McGann becomes Hurt....then presumably we pick up with Eccleston in NuWho... and this story is going to both tell us about the "War Doctor (Hurt) and end up with the transition from Smith to Capaldi? Did i get all that right? (one of these days I'd like to watch the whole thing from Baker through to the present but i don't have several years of my life to give up...)
So it seems to me the "numbering" of the doctors must change, with everyone from Eccleston forward being bumped up +1. You realize that, following Capaldi, our very own 14th Doctor is next?
Ay-NO. Smith to Capaldi doesn't happen until the Christmas special. That might be a continuation of what is here but I'd say it is unlikely. They usually like to make the Christmas ones standalone (well as standalone as anything in nu-who is).
Moffat said the numbering stays the same. Not sure whether they will attempt to mumbo jumbo away him having an extra regeneration (for example, the transition to Eccleston might not be a 'regeneration'. Although given Eccelston apparently isn't in the episode I'm not sure how they will handle that.
Doctor isn't his original name, it's a name the First Doctor chose for himself based on comments about him made by his first human companions, Ian and Barbara. Hurt is the same character, but isn't a Doctor, he's a warrior.
No...he's 9. 8 was dead...as in doornail and they used to elixer to bring him back shortly so they could trigger the regeneration his extreme wounds prevented from happening. This is the second time he's been saved by the immortality elixer...you just know that will be the key to the Doctor's never-ending regenerations.
Yeah...but 10 and 11 have been called the tenth and eleventh in the show. Maybe because the time war was outside of time or something, is why the War-Doctor is unknown to the outer universe? I dunno... Hopefully, the episode will sort this shit out.
All the responses above sound like a bunch of mamby-pamby excuses to me. If you want to talk "canon", there have now technically been twelve Doctors with Capaldi being the thirteenth. Fuck, even the credits in the video call Hurt "the War Doctor". So, thirteen Doctors. It's a fact. Deal with it.
I have only seen nuWho and TORCHWOOD and this canon alone has already warped my mind beyond recognition. I don't want to think what an additional 40+ years would make of me. Probably or something. Rubber cell material.
Might it not be argued that every time the elixir is applied it "resets the count" on the limit of 12?
The War Doctor isn't the same as The Doctor (and it isn't known what Hurts character will actually call himself) Think of it like a family line. You have John Smith. John Smith has a son and gives him his name, making the child John Smith Jr. John Smith Jr has a son and names him Bob Smith. Bob Smith has a son and decides to name him after his father, so the child is named John Smith. Now, that youngest John Smith is John Smith the 3rd, but is 4th in the line. The whole point of The Name of the Doctor was that the Hurt incarnation was not "The Doctor". This was further backed up by The Night of the Doctor now showing that Eight consciously made a decision to not be The Doctor anymore. If at the end of Day of the Doctor they have accepted the "War Doctor" (or whatever his title actually is) as being a Doctor, then you will have a point.
All this name shit is just muddying already murky waters. The fact is, The Doctor is a Time Lord and is the same Time Lord regardless of what he is calling himself. It is also a fact that we have no idea how many times this Time Lord has regenerated or how many names he has used before. When the show began there was no limitations on regeneration, it was tossed in there to create tension when the writers were too lazy to create it in better ways.
No. The Fourth Doctor was given the Elixir and there is no reason to suggest that the count was reset. In Mawdryn Undead (Fifth Doctor) it was stated explicitly that the Doctor only had eight regenerations remaining then.
I suspect the "limit" was imposed by Rassilon who wanted to be the only "immortal" Time Lord. The Master's refusal to regenerate shows they have some control of it...if you are made to believe 13 is all you have....well, 13 will probably be all you have. Then there is the elixer 8 drank...it was different than the elixer 4 drank...the leader of the sisterhood said she designed that goblet full herself...she may have removed the limitation right then and there...I mean isn't that essential for the ultimate warrior about to step into a Time War that is deep into the endgame? Who knows how many times Hurt Doctor could have been killed before acquiring the Moment. He would have wanted to remain the Warrior until the end of the war, so would retain his appearance and personality which this version of the elixer could also have given him.
It was good to see McGann again, would've been an interesting Doctor to for more than a crappy telemovie and decent webisode (not listened to the Big Finish stories). As for the Hurt Doctor not being The Doctor, well he is. A warrior one though, and his war TARDIS ought to be interesting, so yes we really need to increment the number from Ecclestone onwards, but they'll come up with some guff to get round it. That, or as we've been told before, The Doctor Lies. With the regeneration count, I imagine the Time War got the Time Lords upgrading their regeneration technology, so the 12 regenerations limit would have been lifted.
