Doctor Who - An overview of 53 Aussie Years

The newly unveiled logo

Originally written for Doctor Who Club of Australia's magazine, Data Extract, in 2017

2018 is an odd year for Doctor Who.

With the anticipated release of Series 11 in October with a completely new team, I thought it would be a good idea to review some thorough facts and research I've made about the show's mammoth history and I hope you enjoy it. 

Doctor Who was a science fiction fantasy show that aired on the Australian Broadcasting Cooperation on the 2nd of January 1965.

Originally, the show was commissioned to make its debut in May 1964, but was pushed back due to the popular demand of shows such as Homicide (1964-1977) and the ABC made the decision to wait.

Profound Science Fiction Author George Reginald Turner claims that Doctor Who was indeed his spark of imagination. Turner had previously written a novel in 1962, The Cupboard Under The Stairs and had found a new love for writing, so much so that the ABC picked him up as a screenwriter. After approaching the ABC with the idea in early 1964, he then approached Peggy Hamilton, who had previously produced Children’s TV Club (1961) and had the claim to fame of being the ABC’s first female television producer.

Hamilton and Turner worked closely together to make sure that Doctor Who would indeed be something different.

The pilot episode, which was held on the shelf for those seven months, was written by Australian writer Anthony Coburn, who had recently been working under Sydney Newman at the BBC on various projects such as The Avengers and Wednesday Play.

The famous TARDIS exterior from 1965
to 1995.

The ABC saw potential in Coburn, so commissioned him to make the mould for the first episode, ‘Nothing at the End of the Lane’, saw Melbournian sixteen year old school girl Susan Foreman (played by Briony Behets) lead her two school teachers Barbara Wright (Amber Mae Cecil) and Ian Chesterton (Ray Barrett) lead into the dreary and mysterious Totter’s Lane, where the elusive Doctor would be waiting for them. The cliffhanger of the episode revealed to the audience that the Doctor had a time machine disguised as an Australian Telecom Red phone booth and the machine itself taking off into the whirlwind of time.

Totters Lane, the fictional street based in Melbourne Docklands

The wait was well worth it, as the show somehow earned gratifying viewing figures on its pilot episode. However, within the first season, the team had troubles with Telecom Australia with finding the rights to use the phone booth as the time machine’s cloaking device, so the creative thinking in the team decided that the TARDIS (Time And Relative Dimensions In Space, the name of the time machine) should be able to change “like a chameleon” Turner had suggested. When creating the title character, George Turner had several ideas of what the Doctor should be like. All arrows pointed to actor Peter Finch (Elephant Walk, The Nun’s Story) who looked the part of the Grandfather to Susan Foreman.

Peter Finch, the First Doctor

Peter Finch was in the title role as the Doctor from 1965 to 1967, when his health began to deteriorate. Producer George Turner was not sure what to do to replace his title character, and in conversation with Peggy Hamilton, the idea of renewal (or later, regeneration) was born.

During the Finch Era of Doctor Who, the ABC were able to obtain the use of the Telecom Australian phone booth again, monsters and foes such as the War Machines and the Voord left viewers mesmerised and many actors and actresses played the role of the Doctor’s assistants. Ray Barrett said he “always enjoyed working with Peter Finch, who was a true gentleman indeed, who loved the role so dearly and talked about the show with great pride”.

As Peter Finch left, Peter Adams of Cop Shop fame would completely shake up the character again with a new face and persona. Although not much is left remaining in this era of the show due to the ABC wiping tapes to save money, the most prolific stories of Adams’ run include ‘Lords of the Red Planet’, ‘Tomb of the Voord’ and ‘Evil of the War Machines’. Most of the disappearing episodes have since been re-animated with modern technologies of the 21st century re-vitalising the whole era again.

Adams left the show in 1971, just as ABC Television began to see colour on their screen and would later appear in The Young Doctors and Cop Shop.

Peter Adams, the Second Doctor

In the story of the show leading up to the Second Doctor’s endgame, the Time Lords (the Doctor’s own people) recruited the Doctor as their agent to go about the universe doing their dirty work. The last season of the Adams era saw the Doctor and his companion Jamie McCrimmon being pitted against some of the show’s most obscure foes such as the one-hit-wonder Daleks and fight for their lives in the Battle of Waterloo in ‘World Games’ and finally face up against the mysterious controller of the Land of Fiction – the Master, played by Paul Hogan.

Peter Adams regenerated on our screens in September 1971 into actor Christopher Doyle.

Christopher Doyle, the Third Doctor

After being turned down the role of Willy Wonka (instead being played by Jon Pertwee), Christopher Doyle’s Doctor was convicted to Earth where, from Sydney, he would fight against all the alien incursions. Doyle’s incarnation of the Time Lord, by far the quirkiest so far, resided in a house hidden in the Australian country. The seventh season debuted with ‘The Laird of McCrimmon’, the farewell story for the longest travelling assistant, Jamie.

The Quarks, one of the most famous baddies.

The stories in Doyle’s era of the show would have included the return of the Voord, the Quarks and introduced new monsters such as “Those nasty Nestenes!” in the words of the Third Doctor. This era also saw the regular appearance of the Meddling Monk, a Time Lord who always came to play practical jokes on the Doctor and would get himself in all sorts of nasty scrapes. Doyle’s artistic side came into the character of the Third Doctor and added to the eccentricity that George Turner had hoped for from the beginning. In 1975, the 10th anniversary of the show was commemorated with a special called ‘The Three Doctors’, which saw Finch, Adams and Doyle all together in the lead role in a maze of death controlled by the show’s most popular villain, WOTAN.

The ever famous WOTAN

In the following story, ‘The End for the Doctor’, which saw the Meddling Monk reveal himself as the physical embodiment of the Doctor’s clownish and jokey side created by the Time Lords to give the Doctor somebody fun to hang around with. Unfortunately, their needs did not meet and the two Time Lords were faced up against each other in a chess game, friends and foes included, resulting in the demise of both the Doctor and the Monk.

Doyle left the show to continue his career in cinematography, which took him to Taiwan in 1977. He is still producing many films to this day.

In January 1976, viewers took a glimpse of the Fourth Doctor, Richard Moir, who would soon be the longest running actor to play the character that the country had seen. By now, Doctor Who had made its way to PBS and the BBC, so the pressure was on to produce good content.

Richard Moir, the Fourth Doctor

Arthur Bertram Chandler, famous for science fiction novels such as False Fatherland, The Dark Dimensions and The Rim Gods was asked by the ABC to bring a new edge to the Doctor Who and became the new Head Writer and Series Producer. After Doyle’s quirky and bombastic time to the base under siege vibe that the Adams era brought, the Fourth Doctor era would go to places that the show had not had travelled to before. Richard Moir brought a calm and fatherly status to the role with a hint of oddity, which made him perfect for the Doctor. Episodes such as ‘The Broken Cycle’ and ‘The Coils of Time’ were prolific for “Scaring children behind the sofa”. In 1979, the ABC felt that while the darker tone to the show was good, it needed a lighter change. This did not necessarily mean that they needed to change the actor who would play the Doctor, but there was a change in Head Writer and Series Producer.

Enter Paul Jennings.

Jennings is an English-born Australian children’s author who would later be successful for his prolific short story books such as Unreal, Unbelievable, but in the meantime lived a

very different life.

After teaching at Kangaroo Flat State School, Paul Jennings applied to be a screen writer for the ABC and handed in the early drafts of what would be his short stories in years to come as screenplays. The ABC saw potential in Jennings and after several meetings, they convinced him to take over Doctor Who in 1981. He worked with Richard Moir for a whole two years and got along famously. In the Fourth Doctor’s final adventure, ‘Project: Zeta Sigma”, the Doctor was once again pitted against the Monk, played by Mark Mitchell, who had been resurrected by the evil force Omega and was being used as a puppet to torment the Doctor until the very end.

Mark Mitchell as the Meddling Monk in
'Project: Zeta Sigma'

Rhys Muldoon was set to replace Richard Moir as the Doctor and was witnessed by audiences around the world at the end of this story with no notification.

Rhys Muldoon, the Fifth Doctor

While working on Play School, Muldoon was the youngest actor to play the Doctor and would sport a more casual look for the Doctor. Muldoon thought that all the previous incarnations were too batty, pompous or proper to be casual in the way Muldoon had intended. Mark Mitchell made regular appearance as the Meddling Monk and intergalactic meanies such as the Great Serpent and the War Machines were never far away. WOTAN’s catchphrase “Who is the Doctor?” became infectious around the world.  

1985 saw the 20th anniversary of Doctor Who. To commemorate a monumental event for the ABC, a special story was made called ‘The Six Doctors’.

This saw the comeback of Peter Adams, Christopher Doyle, Richard Moir and Tim Robertson (in character as the First Doctor since Peter Finch’s passing in 1977) and the debut of the real First Doctor, Esben Storm, the incarnation that originally resided on the Doctor’s home planet Gallifrey. The story revolved around how Storm’s incarnation, who was referred to as “The Zero Doctor” on how he left Gallifrey and the adventures he went on, defeating Lovecraftian monsters and putting all of the Time Lords at risk, resulting in him coming back to Gallifrey for trial, and then running away with his granddaughter Susan to go in hiding on Earth.

Esben Storm, The Zero Doctor

The other Doctors present were depicted playing new characters helping the current incarnation persuade the Zero Doctor to leave Gallifrey so that they could all exist. It also saw the re-appearance of companions Susan, Jamie McCrimmon, Brigadier Lethbridge Stewart, Sarah Jane Smith, Hi-Fi and villains like the Voord, the Drashigs and the Meddling Monk, with a special appearance from Paul Hogan reprising his role as the Master.

Paul Hogan's return as the Master in the 20th Anniversary
Special

This was the icing on the cake for fans, as the Master had not been seen since the Second Doctor’s final adventure and had only  ever been ‘The Mind Robber’, his debut performance. We learned that the Doctor and the Master had something more to do with each other in their history at the Academy, which we will learn about more in the future of the show. Other highlight stories in Muldoon’s run included ‘The Elite’, ‘Nightmare Country’ and ‘The SCI’.

The season after in 1986 would see the departure of Rhys Muldoon in his swansong story, ‘The Warmongers’, which dealt with the Sontarans battling against the Rutans in 1940’s England during the Blitz.

Jennings decided that the Doctor’s sixth incarnation needed a darker tone, but the ABC told him that he should be lighter, and “larger than life”.

Hugo Weaving, the Sixth Doctor

Hugo Weaving’s first television appearance was in 1984’s Bodyline as the English Cricket Captain, Douglas Jardine. Jennings saw this and thought Weaving had a great English character about him that he wanted for the role in whoever the next Doctor may be, so called him into a meeting discussing the idea.

Weaving agreed to a two-year contract for the first time flying solo in the TARDIS where he brought a warm, friendly vibe wherever the Doctor travelled. “I thought while the Doctor was a friendly character, he still needed his guards up,” Says Weaving in his debut public appearance in costume at the announcement of the Sixth Doctor, “So I was given a very black velvety costume that harkens back to the Finch and Doyle Doctors rather nicely. They were both actors who brought mystery to the role. I think by now we have a better idea of who the Doctor is. The costume designer thought it might be an idea to put question marks on me, but I thought that was too big of a metaphor!”

Weaving went onto do famous stories such as ‘The Water Spirit’, ‘The Leviathan’, ‘Copy Cat’ and concluded in his final epic – ‘Memoirs of a Time Lord’, which saw the Sixth Doctor reunite with the Third, on a quest to save the mysterious Valeyard, a Time Lord who was genetically created by the Meddling Monk as an apparition of all that is good in the Doctor’s hearts to be used in a peace treaty between the Vervoids and the Monoids.  

The Doctor was killed in the crossfire of the war between the two factions and to pay tribute, both races turned down their weapons and made an alliance.

Weaving then left to go into other shows such as The Dirtwater Dynasty and Barlow and Chambers, and to this day carries a successful career having being apart of The Matrix franchise as well as The Lord of the Rings, The Hobbit and Transformers.

At the time of Weaving’s departure, Jennings was keen for a major face lift in the Doctor Who franchise, so it was timely that a new Doctor would enter the role. As auditions took place in the utmost secrecy, it wasn’t until Part 12 of ‘Memoirs of a Time Lord’ that we saw Geoffrey Rush ascend on our screens.

The fan-base and the general public exploded in delight and viewing figures in the following season and was probably the highest staking since Arthur Bertram Chandler’s Fourth Doctor serial, ‘The Revenge of Morbius’.

Geoffrey Rush, the Seventh Doctor

Rush’s Doctor was more bouncy and childish, while at the same time carried the authenticity of a university professor.

This was another time of change for Doctor Who, as new Melbourne-bound script editor, Steven Amsterdam, entered with great visions for the show.

At this time, Paul Jennings was preparing for his departure as he had been asked to adapt more of his stories into a more child-friendly show, and thus Round the Twist was born in 1989. Jennings had called upon the likes of Esben Storm and Richard Moir to make the crossover into the Twist world as the adult lead characters, and they were more than happy to knowing the amount of success that had been made with Doctor Who.

Amsterdam was more than happy to bring back the mystery and the darker edges to the character of the Doctor and gave Geoffrey Rush a lot more to play with than Doctors Weaving and Muldoon had had in previous years.

Paul Jennings however didn’t agree with some of the motives Amsterdam tried to press into the character, so felt it was right to hand him over the baton as Show Runner and head writer in 1991. Jennings would continue to praise his time on Doctor Who and wrote many more stories as well as helping to produce four seasons of Round the Twist.  

When things were looking to turn even darker for the Seventh Doctor, Geoffrey Rush was becoming unsure about what he signed up for. This was the beginning of ‘The Amsterdam Master plan’. Rush was convinced by Amsterdam that the show was going into a groundbreaking territory of science fiction that was applicable to the period of the 1990’s, such as the looming date of the New Millennium (which Amsterdam later used as apart of his novel, Things We Didn’t See Coming) and in March 1994, took the Doctor back to Gallifrey to meet his family. This was a side that was only ever brought up at the very beginning of the show with Susan and had never been addressed since ‘The Six Doctors’. In this epic finale, we learn that the Doctor and the Master are indeed brothers as they are forced to battle to the death in a very Holmes and Moriarty manner. The Master gains victory, causing the Doctor to regenerate, but we never see who the next

face is. Amsterdam decided to leave this to the creative direction of the following Show Runner, who had big plans for Doctor Who. But in the meantime, the show was due for a two year break, then returning in 1996 for a big surprise.

With a fleeting eight seasons under his reign starting from 1987, Geoffrey Rush’s time as the Doctor came to a conclusion.

Having significant episodes such as the 30th anniversary special The Dark Dimension (by Adrian Rigelsford) guest starring Heath Ledger as the villainous Professor Hawkspur, then  The Might of All Things (by Christopher Milne) which revealed the Doctor’s past-life as The Other, one of the founding members of the Gallifreyan society.

Rush’s penultimate story The Makers of Time (1994) summarised the era fittingly by including Ray’s farewell, with UNIT and the uprise of Torchwood battling the Thaleks (the Daleks’ equal) and the Grim Reaper’s army of the dead, a symbolism of the Seventh Doctor’s upcoming death, and then the big battle against the Doctor and the Master, causing him to regenerate.

The final episode ended with the title card ‘The End?’, then teasing the audience with something that had been wanted for years - Doctor Who: The Movie, which wouldn’t be for another two full years.

The original teaser poster for the movie

It was announced in a press release through The Age newspaper four months later that Russell Crowe was to fulfill the role of Doctor number Eight.

Fans were skeptical that such a big-name actor was to take the lead role, particularly as the only production scheduled was the film for the following year in 1996.

Wishes were granted. Originally, writer Christopher Milne, who had previously written The Might of All Things, Warlock and the Daleks and The Smell From Hell in the last five years, had heard the cries from fans to include the integral passover from one Doctor to the next, to certify the film’s canonicity.

Russell Crowe, the Eighth Doctor

The film was released globally and served as a reintroduction to those entering the Whoniverse for the first time.

The story began with a surprise flashback of the Seventh Doctor having a face-down against Paul Hogan’s depiction of the Master, and then both been taken by Gallifreyan forces to be dealt with elsewhere.

The Master makes attempt to escape, but the severity of his punishment becomes greater when he does so, resulting in him being atomised in the Time Lords’ regeneration chambers, causing him to devolve into a giant snake-like creature, who slips away into the time vortex. Fans were enticed.

Gallifrey, the Doctor's homeland, based on the Aussie outback

The movie’s secondary introduction overall shows us what the Doctor’s life was like when he was on Gallifrey in the meeting of his father in the house of Lungbarrow, who then tells his son that he has unfinished business in another dimension which he insists that the Doctor must complete - to defeat Omega, and reclaim the Anti-matter universe in the name of the Time Lords once again.

The story comes full circle as the anti-matter leaks back out onto Earth in all of the capital cities, and a power play between the Doctor, the Master, appearing in the form of Hugh Jackman, and Omega sways back and forth, until the Master and Omega meet their sticky end by falling into the Eye of Harmony in the Doctor’s TARDIS.

The movie overall proved to be a great success, and thus two more films were commissioned.

Crowe’s version of the Doctor proved successful and was a healthy separation from his predecessor. This incarnation was no-fuss and no-bother, getting the job done, with a touch of suaveness, which Crowe claims was “an inspiration from the British James Bond series”. He was accompanied with his companion, Grace Holloway, played by Radha Mitchell, who was a Royal Australian flying doctor.

Radha Mitchell as Grace Holloway

The Eighth Doctor officially and famously became “the movie-exclusive Doctor”, who featured in four further films between 1998 and 2004.

In the same year of his last film, changes were afoot.

Working Dog Productions had taken notice as soon as 20th Century Fox no longer retained the licensing for Doctor Who, so bought it out themselves when it almost seemed that the franchise was going to die out.

In the final film, Christopher Milne (who had written all the previous films) set up the story to be an apocalyptic Earth story with the Doctor battling a conchord of new-age Cybermen in the story simply titled, ‘The Flood’.

The Cybermen from 'The Flood'

The story ended just as Rush’s final TV story did with a title card saying ‘The End?’ as the Doctor in battle-worn clothes alongside his companion Grace walked off into the sunset.

12 months later, the press announced that Doctor Who was alive again in the form of small-time Australian actor and comedian, Colin Lane!

Colin Lane, the Ninth Doctor

Lane had been sought out by Working Dog Productions, who had previously made ‘The Castle’ in 1995, and had made him into the Ninth Doctor.

Russell Crowe was invited for a guest appearance as series producer and head writer, Thomas Keneally, thought it was righteous to pass over the baton once again and leave no gap.

Colin Lane’s first few episodes of the reboot series took a little bit of settling into as he retained his whimsical and comedic persona, but as the series progressed, the working class side of the character shone through episodes such as ‘The Daughters of Mars’ and “The Doctor Jives’.

Colin kept the role for three seasons, along with his companions, Rose and Captain Jack until 2007, when the Doctor turned into none other than Adam Hills.

Adam Hills, the Tenth Doctor

Hills brought a bit more of a warmer approach to his role as the Tenth Doctor and was naturally adored by fans old and new, soon competing with Richard Moir and Geoffrey Rush for the title of the best Doctor. He was given a quaint and simple personality donned in a grey checkered suit. At this time in the show’s history, writer Richard Flanagan introduced us to one of his own characters, River Song, played by Lara Cox, a mysterious woman from the Doctor’s future.

Lara Cox as River Song

Thomas Keneally wrote for all of his era as well, keeping a very fluid flavour for fans who were new to the franchise, so the Ninth and Tenth Doctor eras didn’t feel so separate.

At this time, Hills was juggling his commitments with the music quiz show, Spicks and Specks, and soon found the two very demanding. In 2009, in his third season, Hills decided to leave the show, but went out with a bang, with the return of Hugh Jackman as the Master.

Hugh Jackman as the Master

The show was in for a major changeover at the time of the Tenth Doctor’s departure to keep the fanbase enticed, so writer Richard Flanagan was called in to take over.

Richard, having been an established author, took to the role with ease, and made significant changes to the show’s style, enhancing and giving more focus to the fantasy lense more than the science fiction.

Melbourne homegrown comedian and actor Lawrence Leung was adopted as the Eleventh Doctor, who gave a more quirky interpretation of the time travelling alien than Lane and Hills may have, who both thought it was safer to keep the Doctor as human as possible.

Lawrence Leung as the Eleventh Doctor

At the time of the Harry Potter hype, the fantasy tones felt right for Doctor Who, and Leung gave a bit of a wizard-esque look to his Doctor, with a large blue coat covered in stars.

He had a bit more of a happy vibe to the character which gave it an almost mad scientist feel.

At this time, Bella Heathcote came aboard to play the role of Amy Pond as the companion with Frank Woodley as the clumsy Rory Williams.

Bella Heathcote as Amy Pond

The trio became iconic within the three year run they stuck together, having faced off the likes of Sea Devils, Weeping Angels and Cthulhu. This was topped off with a recurring series of appearances of Lara Cox reprising her role as River Song, soon to drop the bombshell that she is indeed the Doctor’s wife and the mother of Rory Williams.

Frank Woodley as Rory Williams

They battled their way until 2015, being the 50th anniversary of Doctor Who, and made a special episode entitled ‘The Dawn of the Doctor’, which saw Russell Crowe, Colin Lane and Adam Hills return to their roles as the Doctor alongside Lawrence Leung with a special appearance by Geoffrey Rush, all playing their respective versions of the Doctor.

The story featured the Doctors all in a battle to save Earth from an invasion of an army of monsters and foes who have all been shown over the last 50 years alongside UNIT.

Geoffrey Rush returns for the 50th anniversary

Lawrence Leung left in the following episode, ‘The Time of the Doctor’, a macabre story which saw the Doctor, Amy and Rory trapped on a planet infested with Silent creatures.

Living in an old rickety haunted house, the Doctor, losing his memories, forgets his friends over and over, and soon loses them with old age, and when he reaches his capacity regenerates himself, killing all of the remaining Silents in the process in a blinding golden light.

Lawrence Leung's regeneration sequence

As the fire dims down, the haunted house has fallen to pieces, and a figure walks away out of the dust, turning around to stare directly into the camera barrel and the hearts of many fans, the face of the next Doctor - Shaun Micallef.

Micallef, playing the Twelfth Doctor, was given the opportunity to go a lot more darker than the show had allowed Leung to go, by giving him a new companion, Clara, played by Eliza Taylor, who is the physical embodiment of the Doctor’s timelines embroiled from the TARDIS in the mighty explosion of his regeneration.

Shaun Micallef, the Twelfth Doctor

Richard Flanagan wanted to harken back to the Arthur Bertram Chandler era of the show by using some of the tropes that made the Gothic-Horror era so great, and thus made an incredible season with back-to-basic dark storytelling.

Shaun Micallef and Eliza Taylor acted together for three seasons. Eliza Taylor soon left and was replaced by Carl Barron as Nardole (the Doctor’s butler) and Danielle Walker as Bill Potts.

Their third season ended as a spanner was thrown in the works of time and everything stopped. 

Time froze as the TARDIS was transported to a place the Doctor knew was awfully familiar. 

The Third Doctor walks out of the shadows, battle worn from his fight with the Meddling Monk. 

Christopher Doyle returning as the Third Doctor

Together, the two Doctors travel through time to find their salvation and ultimately accept their own fates.

As the Twelfth Doctor acknowledged the coming of his death as foretold in a prophecy, he parted ways with the Third Doctor, Bill and Nardole and went alone into a battlefield, fighting in World War One.

Tired, triumphant and unbeaten, the Doctor falls into the water, which glows a brilliant gold and immerses back to reality as her Thirteenth self, Emelie de Ravin. 

Emelie de Ravin's debut scene as the Thirteenth Doctor

Only time will tell what will happen next.