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Time Crash

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"Time Crash"
Doctor Who charity special
"What!?" The Doctor meets himself.
Cast
Production
Directed byGraeme Harper
Written bySteven Moffat
Produced byPhil Collinson
Executive producer(s)Russell T Davies
Julie Gardner
SeriesChildren in Need special (2007)
Running time8 Minutes
First broadcastNovember 16, 2007
Chronology
← Preceded by
"Last of the Time Lords" 		Followed by →
"Voyage of the Damned"

"Time Crash" is a "mini-episode" of the British science fiction television series Doctor Who. It was broadcast on BBC One as part of the 2007 appeal for the children's charity Children in Need on 16 November. It was written by Steven Moffat and starred David Tennant and Peter Davison as the Doctor.[1]

The episode depicts a humourous encounter between the Doctor's fifth and tenth incarnations, played by Davison and Tennant respectively. "Time Crash" was a ratings success, with a viewership of 10.9 million and a 45% share of the total television audience that night, making it both the most watched portion of the 2007 Children in Need special and, at the time, the most watched Doctor Who episode since the show's 2005 revival.[2]

Plot

After saying farewell to Martha, the Doctor encounters a problem with the TARDIS. Because of this the Fifth Doctor appears in the console room. The Tenth Doctor is gleeful at the meeting, but the Fifth Doctor is initially baffled, assuming his future incarnation is a deranged fan, possibly from LINDA.

The Tenth Doctor explains that he forgot to put the shields up after rebuilding the TARDIS and it collided with the Fifth Doctor's TARDIS (its earlier self) in the timestream. This is generating a paradox at the heart of the ship, which is powerful enough to rip a hole in the universe the (exact) size of Belgium. The Cloister Bell signals the impending end.

However, without a thought, the Tenth Doctor manipulates the TARDIS controls to manipulate a supernova into exact counterbalance; it cancels out the black hole caused by the paradox, so that all matter remains constant. This amazes the Fifth Doctor, but he quickly realises that the Tenth Doctor 'came up with' the solution only because he remembered this encounter. The Fifth Doctor says his farewells, and the Tenth Doctor tells the Fifth of the personality traits that he retained from his fifth self (trainers, the altering pitch of his voice and his spectacles), also telling him he loved being him and that he was "his" Doctor (a meta-reference to David Tennant's having fallen in love with the character of The Doctor while watching Peter Davison's episodes as a child).

As he departs, the Fifth Doctor reminds the Tenth to raise his shields again, but it appears that he was too late, since the hull of the Titanic crashes through one of the TARDIS walls, as originally seen at the end of the last series.

Cast notes

  • Freema Agyeman appears, uncredited, as Martha Jones in footage from "Last of the Time Lords" at the start of the episode, adding to the established events depicted then.
  • On the date of filming, Peter Davison — still the current record holder for the youngest actor to play the Doctor — was older (at the age of 56) than William Hartnell was when he began his run as the First Doctor, 55 - the oldest anyone has been when they first played the Doctor. From an in-character point of view, the aged appearance of the Fifth Doctor was explained away as an effect of the merge.
  • This is not the first time David Tennant and Peter Davison have appeared on screen together - they both appeared in 'Death at the Opera', an episode of the 1999 series The Mrs Bradley Mysteries.

Continuity

Both the Fifth Doctor and the Tenth Doctor make references to each other's respective storylines throughout the episode. The Tenth Doctor mentions Nyssa and Tegan, the Mara, Time Lords wearing silly hats, as well as commenting at length on the Fifth Doctor's clothing. The Fifth Doctor asks the Tenth Doctor if he's connected with LINDA and uses the phrase "Wibbly-wobbly, timey-wimey" first heard in "Blink", also by Steven Moffat. Other elements from the series such as Zeiton crystals, the helmic regulator and the thermobuffer are also mentioned.

Both Doctors refer to common elements throughout the series such as the Cybermen and the Master. The Fifth asks if the Master still has "that rubbish beard" (referencing the fact that actors Roger Delgado and Anthony Ainley portrayed the character with a beard), and the Tenth replies "No, no beard this time... well, a wife" (referring to Lucy Saxon). The Fifth Doctor also notes that the TARDIS's "desktop theme" has been changed, accounting for its radically different appearances throughout the series, and resolving a longstanding issue dating back to the 1996 TV movie.

The Tenth Doctor offers to loan the Fifth Doctor his sonic screwdriver, which the Fifth Doctor declines. The latter's own sonic screwdriver was destroyed in the serial The Visitation, as then-producer John Nathan-Turner saw it as an "easy way out" for writers to resolve any difficult situation the Doctor faced. The sonic screwdriver would not appear in the show again until the TV movie in 1996.

During the original run of Doctor Who, the Doctor met different incarnations of "himself" in three stories: The Three Doctors (1973), The Five Doctors (1983) and The Two Doctors (1985). The Children in Need special Dimensions in Time (1993) also featured all the five surviving Doctors at the time, with specially made busts standing in for the remaining two. In the Comic Relief sketch Doctor Who and the Curse of Fatal Death (1999), also written by Moffat, the Doctor regenerated four times, resulting in five different actors playing the role. Multi-Doctor stories have also appeared in Doctor Who spin-off media. Time Crash is the first such story produced for television that provides an in-universe explanation which acknowledges the returning actor's visible aging.

There were several instances where the style of incidental music closely matched that used during Davison's era. This differed greatly from the orchestral music now favoured by the programme makers.

It is never explicitly stated where the Fifth Doctor's segment fits into his own continuity. From the Tenth Doctor's perspective, the special takes place at the very end of "Last of the Time Lords", immediately prior to the Titanic crashing into the TARDIS. The canonicity of Time Crash within Doctor Who continuity was confirmed by Steven Moffat in an interview in Doctor Who Magazine #389.[3]

Production

The episode was directed by Graeme Harper on October 7 2007, who twenty-three years previously had directed Peter Davison's last regular appearance in Doctor Who in the serial The Caves of Androzani.[4] It was officially announced by the BBC on October 21.[1]

According to the Doctor Who Confidential episode featuring behind-the-scenes footage, the Fifth Doctor's coat and trousers are originals taken from the Blackpool Doctor Who exhibition. The trousers had been previously altered in order to fit Colin Baker for the regeneration scene in The Caves of Androzani (and the opening of The Twin Dilemma). The jumper was knitted especially for this episode, and the hat was a new roll-up Panama hat with an original band added on.

Previous Doctor Who charity specials transmitted over the years include the aforementioned Dimensions in Time, Doctor Who and the Curse of Fatal Death and "Doctor Who: Children in Need". The first two are generally not regarded as canonical by Doctor Who fans, but the last one is, directly connecting "The Parting of the Ways" with "The Christmas Invasion". The anniversary special The Five Doctors was broadcast on Children in Need night for its United Kingdom premier broadcast.[5]

Broadcast, reception and release

The episode was introduced by Terry Wogan and John Barrowman, who plays Captain Jack Harkness; Barrowman had just performed the song "Your Song".

Children in Need was the most-watched television programme of the night, with an overnight rating of 9.4 million viewers, and figures peaked between 8:15pm and 8:30pm, when "Time Crash" was aired, with a total of 10.9 million viewers. The episode was therefore the most-viewed since the show's revival in 2005, surpassing the revival's premiere, "Rose", which achieved a rating of 10.8 million viewers.[2] Calls also peaked during the episode's airing.[6] When the episode was replayed later that night it garnered an audience of 2.5 million viewers.[7] This rating was later beaten by "Voyage of the Damned", which received 13.3 million viewers.[8]

Critical reaction was positive, with reviewers calling it the highlight of the Children in Need special.[9][10] Steven Moffat was praised for his writing of the episode, which was characterized as witty and clever.[9][11] The performances of both Peter Davison and David Tennant were also well-received.[12][10]

See also

References

  1. ^ a b "Who Needs Another Doctor?". BBC.co.uk. 2007-10-21. Retrieved 2007-11-18. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  2. ^ a b Marcus (2007-11-17). "Time Crash - Ratings". Outpost Gallifrey. Retrieved 2007-11-18.
  3. ^ "Steven Moffat: 'This is an event ... Peter Davison is back!'", Doctor Who Magazine #389. 12 December 2007, p. 14
  4. ^ Griffiths, Nick (November 10–13 2007). "A Doctor calls". Radio Times. 335 (4361): p. 18. {{cite journal}}: |pages= has extra text (help); Check date values in: |date= (help)
  5. ^ Rawson-Jones, Ben (2007-11-18). "Cult Spy: 'Doctor Who' in Need?". Digital Spy. Retrieved 2007-11-18. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  6. ^ "BT takes 212,000 'Pudsey' calls". BBC.co.uk. 2007-11-17. Retrieved 2007-11-21. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  7. ^ "Time Crash Ratings!". BBC.co.uk. 2007-11-19. Retrieved 2007-11-19. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  8. ^ "Titanic Success!". BBC.co.uk. 26 December 2007. Retrieved 2007-12-26. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  9. ^ a b Conaghan, Martin (2007-11-17). "Doctor Who: Time Crash". TV Squad. Retrieved 2007-11-19. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  10. ^ a b Hogan, Dek (2007-11-19). "I love the sound of breaking glass". Digital Spy. Retrieved 2007-11-19. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  11. ^ Stuart, Alasdair (2007-11-17). "Review-Doctor Who - 'Timecrash'". Firefox News. Retrieved 2007-11-19. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  12. ^ Terranova, Brian A. (2007-11-18). "Time Crash Reviewed". Kasterborous.com. Retrieved 2007-11-19. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
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