13th Doctor

My idea for who (Who?) should be the next Doctor...

Paul McGann.

Yes, yes. I know. It should go to a person of another race/colour/sexual preference/etc. I agree the world needs to change in it's attitudes, but personally I like Doctor Who the way it is. Now, back to Paul McGann. Go on. Give him his chance. He would be brilliant! He has demonstrated as much in The Night Of The Doctor and many, many Big Finish productions he has done. He has been hard done by. He is the best Doctor there never was... or almost was... or something.

But how can the 8th Doctor be the 13th Doctor?

I have ideas around that too. There are a number of occurrences that give precedence to a Timelord regenerating into whoever the Timelord wants:

• In War Games, the 2nd Doctor was allowed to choose the 3rd Doctor's face.
• In Destiny Of The Daleks, Romana tried on a number of appearances before settling on her regeneration.
• In The Night Of The Doctor, the 8th Doctor drinks a potion to regenerate into a warrior.
• In The Day Of The Doctor, The Curator (Tom Baker) implies he is the Doctor revisiting an old face. 
• In The Girl Who Died, it is revealed that the 12th Doctor chose the face of someone he previously saved, to remind him to save people.

That gives me 3 (yes, THREE) ideas of ways the Doctor could be Paul McGann in his next regeneration:

1. He simply chooses to regenerate into the form of the 8th Doctor again. Revisit the face, as it were.
2. The regeneration process goes screwy because it has been interfered with in the past. It goes back to when it was first interfered with and resets the regeneration back to that point. The Doctor who drank the potion to choose his regeneration was the 8th Doctor.
3. My favourite, as it could last a whole episode and has lots of nice fanboy geek moments. The regeneration process goes very screwy and he starts regenerating backwards. The 12th Doctor regenerates into the 11th Doctor. Oooo. Hello Matt Smith! The process is dangerous and so keeps nearly killing him, causing him to regenerate again. So before the 11th Doctor has worked out what is going on, he regenerates again into the 10th. Mr Tennant, I presume. And so on. It could get progressively worse and so the 9th and War Doctors could be done pretty quickly, requiring no intervention from the actors. Although if they could get Christopher Eccleston... FANTASTIC! John Hurt, as the War Doctor, not so much. So either the 10th or 9th (depending on the actor) would need to hit upon the solution and put it into effect. It would take place a regeneration or two down the line and.... BOOM... it settles when the Doctor reaches the 8th. Off we go with Paul McGann as the next doctor.

Of course, it won't be Paul McGann. You can never go back. But it would be cool.

My Christopher Eccleston Story

Let's begin this blog by saying that I seem to struggle typing Eccleston. If, in the process of this blog, I spell it Ecclseton, Eccleton, Ecclestone or any other variations and I don't notice to correct it, please feel free to not tell me. I do know how to spell it. I just type it wrong more often than not.

The year was 2007. The month was April. The location was The Bridgewater Hall in Manchester. Our hero was me. I was 27 years old. 

I quite like going to music gigs. I used to average at least one a month. I mostly went to them with my mate Rick. I had just started seeing Sharon and was starting to go to gigs with her too. Occasionally, if no one else fancied the gig, I would go on my own. I like my own company and have no problem going to see something I want to see on my own. I have seen Paul McCartney, U2 and Eric Clapton on my own. They were all awesome. In April 2007 Sharon was in stupid, rubbish Australia. Van Morrison was playing The Bridgewater Hall in Manchester and I bought a ticket for myself. It turned out my Mum and Bill (her boyfriend) also had tickets for that gig. As it was seated I would not be with them, but I could have a drink with them before and after. Not quite such a lonesome gig after all.

I met my Mum and Bill in the bar of The Bridgewater Hall and had a beer. Then we went to find our seats. I was in the middle of the row, in the middle of the stalls. A good view; I was happy. There were 2 empty seats to my right. The lights went down and there were still 2 empty seats to my right. A couple of minutes in and someone excused himself down the row to get to one of those empty seats. I stood and let him pass. He sat down next to me and I sat down again. My brain told me something I hadn't realised, "You know him. Look at him again." I did; It was Christopher Eccleston. "Oh. That cool actor who was great in Shallow Grave; 28 Days Later and has just been Doctor Who is sat next to me." I texted my Mum and then carried on watching Van Morrison. He was, after all, the person we were all here to see. The gig finished and Van was very good. I had left Christopher Eccleston alone. He was at a gig. Plus he's just a bloke who happens to be famous; that's still just a bloke. I noticed him hold his phone up when a song came on, but apart from that thought no more about him. As the gig finished I figured I should say something. I am a fan. But I don't want to be one of those excitable fan people. As I said, he's just a bloke. So I made no mention as to who he was and asked him if he enjoyed the gig. He said he did and that Van Morrison has mellowed a lot over the years. We exchanged a couple more thoughts on the gig and then went about our day. I spotted my Mum making her way over as we shuffled out. She got to me and said, "WHERE IS HE?!" I sheepishly pointed to the man still right in front of me. My Mum tapped him on the shoulder and said, "I want to shake your hand. You were Doctor Who. My son is a fan of yours". I was a 27 year-old MAN. I had been a COOL 27 year-old MAN! In 5 seconds my mother stripped away all those years and I said, "MUUUUMM! I'd played it cool and not mentioned Doctor Who or anything! (to him) I'm very sorry." He said, "It's ok; I have a Mum too. Pleased to meet you both." He shook both our hands and then was gone into the TARDIS... errr, night.

Doctor Who? What? Where?

I'm just going to come right out and say it.

The ending for Rory and Amy in the Angels Take Manhattan was shit!

Was I the only person to think, "Try harder to get round this, Doctor"?

I think the Weeping Angels are pretty great creations of Stephen Mofat, but they should have been left where they belong. In greatness. In Blink. What made them great was how they "killed" you. Zap you back in time to live out your life there. Not really much of a threat to someone who has a time machine, or knows someone who does. Only a threat to average, every day people. Like Sally Sparrow.  That was what made Blink great (besides the cool one sided Doctor conversation on the DVD extras). It was that it was told from the perspective of real people, who didn't have a TARDIS or a Doctor to hand to fix everything. Seeing the Angels since has meant that Stephen has tried to come up something different for them.  Changing people to stone and actually killing people. Didn't really work for me.  

The Angels Take Manhattan was promising and mostly good because it took the Angels back to their roots and had them sending people back in time.  What I struggled with was the TARDIS suddenly not being able to get to New York in 1938, because of all the temporal shite going down. Ok, whatever, something to overcome in the episode.  But to then use this as the reason that Rory and Amy are "stuck" at the end? Errrr, no.  So, the Doctor can't go back to New York in 1938 to go and get them. What about 1939? Or 1940? Surely a year or 2 is ok.  Are we saying the TARDIS can no longer travel back in time in New York?  Ok, go back to Boston in 1938 and hire a car.  Hell, go back to a different planet and borrow a spaceship!

The point is that it wasn't a very air tight version of "stuck". It stung more of "can't be bothered" or "being a bit stupid".

Rose being in a different dimension with a impenetrable barrier. Now that's stuck! Or Donna not being able to get back to being herself because she'll die.  That's stuck! Even Martha just not wanting to travel with the Doctor anymore was a better way of leaving.