Not even two years after its 50th anniversary, Doctor Who is now celebrating its (second) tenth birthday, a scenario normally reserved for the timey-wimey plots of the show itself.
2008
As the New Year came, so did the revelation that there were other people out there like me. People who played video games all day, or would binge on Red Dwarf boxsets. I was starting to meet and become friends with people who would engage me in lengthy conversations over Doctor Who.
As soon as each episode ended I would be talking to people on MSN messenger, displaying my shock at Rose appearing in ‘Partners in Crime’ or lamenting at how Catherine Tate was so much better than we’d expected. We discussed at length who River Song may be, and if we would ever find out, and all sat in unusual silence before a night out watching ‘Turn Left’.
‘The Stolen Earth’ / ‘Journeys End’, to me, was an epic. Four years’ worth of storylines, characters and spin offs colliding to create one huge, but coherent story. The inner fanboy in me cheered at the appearance of Harriet Jones, and the mention of the ‘Mr Copper Foundation’. It felt like an ending, but I knew it wasn’t.
Things were about to change all over again, new job, new city, new friends, but Doctor Who would be a constant that would stick with me.
I think it’s more than clear that I was a fan of Doctor Who at this point, but there was still a long way to go to get to where I am now. Aside from 2005’s Season 1, I still didn’t own any of the DVDs, and the classic episodes remained unseen. I knew about them, could name most of the companions and enemies, but hadn’t yet made that leap of faith in to the past.
2009
Three years after his debut, and David Tennant’s departure from the show had been announced. We also now knew that we wouldn’t be seeing a full season this year, but would instead get a run of specials leading up to the Tenth Doctor’s regeneration.
This too, is the year that I underwent my own Doctor Who related transformation. Having started working at a video games company, my exposure to geekdom was higher than it had ever been. I soon became friends with a long-standing fan of the show, who was slightly appalled at the revelation that I had never seen any classic episodes. Of course, he soon changed that.
My initial reaction was less enthusiastic than I’d expected; the episodes felt slow, repetitive and made watching a story from start to finish a somewhat tedious experience. Fortunately, I very quickly realised that this was my own doing. These stories weren’t designed to be watched in two hour chunks, they were weekly pieces of an ongoing serial; much as I had assumed ‘Rose’ was four years prior.
So, I changed the way I watched the DVDs, viewing them the way they were meant to be viewed. I relished in the glee of Tom Baker running around Paris in ‘The City of Death’, smiled sympathetically as I could see what the TV movie was attempting to do whilst not quite getting there, and loved watching different faces and facets of the character I had come to love.
I remember New Years Day, sat with my family in silence as I watched the last few minutes of the Tenth Doctor, and saw a brand new young face appear in the TARDIS. They didn’t get it, but that didn’t matter. I was joyous, seeing the Doctors’ companions living their lives without him, I was sad seeing his fate catch up with him, and I was excited and resentful at the prospect of a brand new Doctor.
When the Ninth Doctor regenerated, I hadn’t really felt anything. The story excited me, but there was no emotional attachment. But this time, as Tennant uttered the words ‘I don’t want to go’, I could feel my heart(s) breaking.
As the year before though, I knew this wasn’t the end. There were far bigger changes waiting for Doctor Who in the next few years and even bigger changes on my own horizon…
What are your favourite memories of being a Doctor Who fan over the past decade? Let us know below…