First incarnation of the Doctor

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When we first meet the Doctor, he is already hundreds of years old, yet he is apparently still in his first incarnation. After that he is never able to go more than 9 years (between start of 8th doctor until start of 9th) before he needs to regenerate again, usually less than that.

So it seems a bit improbable that he managed over 850 years without that first body wearing out or becoming mortally wounded!

I did consider if perhaps he was only the 1st doctor from OUR point of view, and he had many regenerations before we first met him. But I don't think this has ever been implied in the series, and anyway it would conflict with the idea once mentioned that time lords can regenerate a maximum of 12 times.

Now I know obviously the reason for this is because when the first few episodes were written, they hadn't even thought up the idea of regeneration, and they had no idea the series would continue for so long, but I was just wondering what everyone else thinks about this presumably unexplained part of the Doctor's history of regenerating?

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  • daveyboy7472daveyboy7472 Posts: 16,354
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    When we first meet the Doctor, he is already hundreds of years old, yet he is apparently still in his first incarnation. After that he is never able to go more than 9 years (between start of 8th doctor until start of 9th) before he needs to regenerate again, usually less than that.

    So it seems a bit improbable that he managed over 850 years without that first body wearing out or becoming mortally wounded!

    I did consider if perhaps he was only the 1st doctor from OUR point of view, and he had many regenerations before we first met him. But I don't think this has ever been implied in the series, and anyway it would conflict with the idea once mentioned that time lords can regenerate a maximum of 12 times.

    Now I know obviously the reason for this is because when the first few episodes were written, they hadn't even thought up the idea of regeneration, and they had no idea the series would continue for so long, but I was just wondering what everyone else thinks about this presumably unexplained part of the Doctor's history of regenerating?

    I think someone else raised this topic a few weeks ago, so I'll repeat what I said then.

    That is, that Susan is his Grand-daughter, she refers to him as Grandfather, I find it very unlikely she would keep calling him that if he was had regenerated a few times. It was implied a couple of times that it was this Doctor who had escaped from his own planet so I have no other reason to think that this was the First Doctor.

    Plus the fact that in several other stories, some incarnations have referenced what incarnation they are at. The Fifth says in Mawdryn Undead he has eight lives left. In The Five Doctors he says he has regenerated four times and obviously the Eleventh Doctor has mentioned it as well that he's the 11th so the idea there was another Doctor before the first doesn't really hold up.

    :)
  • [Deleted User][Deleted User] Posts: 0
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    No, I agree, it doesn't fit with the storyline to say that there could have been any other incarnations before the first. But that's my point really! How could the Doctor have lasted for more than 850 years before he needed to regenerate for the first time?
  • WebslarkWebslark Posts: 18,946
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    No, I agree, it doesn't fit with the storyline that there could have been any other incarnations before the first. But that's my point really! How could the Doctor have lasted for more than 850 years before he needed to regenerate for the first time?

    The answert is he didn't :)

    http://tardis.wikia.com/wiki/The_Doctor%27s_age

    Second doctor says he was about 450,

    Fourth Doctor mid 700's

    Fifth 813 etc
  • Bruce WayneBruce Wayne Posts: 5,326
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    I think someone else raised this topic a few weeks ago, so I'll repeat what I said then.

    That is, that Susan is his Grand-daughter, she refers to him as Grandfather, I find it very unlikely she would keep calling him that if he was had regenerated a few times. It was implied a couple of times that it was this Doctor who had escaped from his own planet so I have no other reason to think that this was the First Doctor.

    Plus the fact that in several other stories, some incarnations have referenced what incarnation they are at. The Fifth says in Mawdryn Undead he has eight lives left. In The Five Doctors he says he has regenerated four times and obviously the Eleventh Doctor has mentioned it as well that he's the 11th so the idea there was another Doctor before the first doesn't really hold up.

    :)

    It's almost as if that as he got older, he started to take more life threatening risks which ended badly for him. He probably started out just observing things, but once Barbra and Ian joined up with him he became more of an active participant in what was going on. If he hadn't brought them along he may well have only been in his 2nd body at this time instead of his 11th.
  • daveyboy7472daveyboy7472 Posts: 16,354
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    No, it doesn't fit with the storyline that there could have been any other incarnations before the first. But that's my point really! How could the Doctor have lasted for more than 850 years before he needed to regenerate for the first time?

    Maybe it's because he spent most of his First Life on Gallifrey and therefore didn't get himself in any danger. If you look at the Time Lords shown in the 70's, some of them had had very long lives indeed.


    Remember, how many Earth Years make a Time Lord Year? In Tomb Of The Cybermen The Doctor said something along the lines of 'In your terms, it'd be about 450 years old'

    :)
  • daveyboy7472daveyboy7472 Posts: 16,354
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    It's almost as if that as he got older, he started to take more life threatening risks which ended badly for him. He probably started out just observing things, but once Barbra and Ian joined up with him he became more of an active participant in what was going on. If he hadn't brought them along he may well have only been in his 2nd body at this time instead of his 11th.

    Yeah, that's just what I was saying and I totally agree.

    :)
  • VabosityVabosity Posts: 2,999
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    When we first meet the Doctor, he is already hundreds of years old, yet he is apparently still in his first incarnation. After that he is never able to go more than 9 years (between start of 8th doctor until start of 9th) before he needs to regenerate again, usually less than that.

    So it seems a bit improbable that he managed over 850 years without that first body wearing out or becoming mortally wounded!

    I did consider if perhaps he was only the 1st doctor from OUR point of view, and he had many regenerations before we first met him. But I don't think this has ever been implied in the series, and anyway it would conflict with the idea once mentioned that time lords can regenerate a maximum of 12 times.

    Now I know obviously the reason for this is because when the first few episodes were written, they hadn't even thought up the idea of regeneration, and they had no idea the series would continue for so long, but I was just wondering what everyone else thinks about this presumably unexplained part of the Doctor's history of regenerating?

    The Brain Of Morbius planted the seeds of doubt in the viewers' minds that Hartnell's Doctor was the first, but otherwise it is generally accepted that he is.

    Time Lords age at a much slower rate than humans. So although the First Doctor looked about 70 in human terms, he was actually more than 400 years old, although nowhere near the 850 you claim. In fact, in one story, his successor, the Second Doctor states that he is 450, so the First Doctor could not have been as old as 850 when he regenerated.

    Most Classic Who Doctors lived for several years longer than their time on screen, often travelling alone or with companions we do not know and having off-screen adventures we are unaware of.

    The Fourth Doctor and Romana could have been travelling together for decades having off-screen adventures, but as both are Time Lords who age at a much slower rate than humans, we would have been none the wiser.

    We don't really know what happened to the Seventh Doctor between Survival and the TV Movie. He too could have been travelling for decades.

    We only saw the Eighth Doctor once on our screens. Yes, it was nine years before we saw the Doctor back on our screen in his Ninth incarnation, but from the Eighth Doctor's perspective, it may have been 50 years or 100 years or 200 years before he regenerated.

    Then there's Season 6b. Google it. The Second Doctor looked very much older when he returned to our screen in The Two Doctors than he did in The War Games. This would confirm that the Season 6b theory that the regeneration and exile he was sentenced to at the end of The War Games was delayed so that he could work for the Celestial Intervention Agency for a short while. Although, by his physical appearance in The Two Doctors, it seemed that "a short while" was, in Time Lord terms, hundreds of years.
  • ukgnomeukgnome Posts: 541
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    The age of the doctor - according to Prof Brian Cox it would depend on which planet he was on at the time. Generally speaking bigger planets have slower rotations. As Gallifrey is a larger planet than the earth the year is longer. As I do not know how long it takes for Gallifrey to orbit there sun it would be almost impossible to calculate.

    However we have seen Gallifrey in comparison to the Earth and it looks like a similar size to one of our gas giants. If it was the same size as Jupiter then one year on Gallifrey would be 11.86 earth years. Hardly scientific but hey, it's fantasy rather than fiction.
  • mccolloughmccollough Posts: 209
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    ukgnome wrote: »
    The age of the doctor - according to Prof Brian Cox it would depend on which planet he was on at the time. Generally speaking bigger planets have slower rotations. As Gallifrey is a larger planet than the earth the year is longer. As I do not know how long it takes for Gallifrey to orbit there sun it would be almost impossible to calculate.

    However we have seen Gallifrey in comparison to the Earth and it looks like a similar size to one of our gas giants. If it was the same size as Jupiter then one year on Gallifrey would be 11.86 earth years. Hardly scientific but hey, it's fantasy rather than fiction.

    Which puts the current doctor (1109 years old as of the 200 year gap in s6) at 93 and a half years old in gallifrey years!
  • JohnnyForgetJohnnyForget Posts: 24,061
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    The Doctor lies ... especially when it comes to his age.

    He must do, the Seventh Doctor said he was 953 and then the Ninth Doctor said he was 900. How does that work?

    And how does he keep track of his age, gallivanting all over Time and Space? And even if he can somehow keep track, does he measure it in Earth years or Gallifreyan years (which presumably are different)? Or maybe both, which may account for the Seventh Doctor saying he's 953 (Gallifreyan years, perhaps?) and the Ninth Doctor saying he's 900 (may have changed to giving his age in Earth years as Gallifrey is no more).
  • [Deleted User][Deleted User] Posts: 0
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    The reason why I said over 850 is because he is just over 900 in new Who, ( prior to what happened in series 6) and the start of Doctor Who is less than 50 years before that.

    I know the doctor lies about his age (and in general), but even allowing for this, the difference between Gallifreyan years and Earth years, and the fact that many of the Classic Doctors might have lived for longer off screen, it would still seem that his first incarnation lasted quite a lot longer than any of the others.

    I think the explanantions for that could be what Bruce Wayne said about the Doctor being less involved and not taking the same risks, and also perhaps that the original body is a lot stronger than the regenerated versions.
  • stafsstafs Posts: 1,540
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    I think I would just go with the boring but most reasonable explanation, that he lived in the relative safety of Gallifrey until a few years before we meet him, when he got got bored and decided to "borrow" a TARDIS to explore the universe and therefore putting himself in much greater danger.
  • lordOfTimelordOfTime Posts: 22,267
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    The Doctor lies ... especially when it comes to his age.

    He must do, the Seventh Doctor said he was 953 and then the Ninth Doctor said he was 900. How does that work?

    And how does he keep track of his age, gallivanting all over Time and Space? And even if he can somehow keep track, does he measure it in Earth years or Gallifreyan years (which presumably are different)? Or maybe both, which may account for the Seventh Doctor saying he's 953 (Gallifreyan years, perhaps?) and the Ninth Doctor saying he's 900 (may have changed to giving his age in Earth years as Gallifrey is no more).

    I've got it! Wibbly Wobbly Timey Wimey!
  • ShoppyShoppy Posts: 1,094
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    He must do, the Seventh Doctor said he was 953 and then the Ninth Doctor said he was 900. How does that work?

    Maybe when he timelocked the Time Lords he altered bits of his own past, causing a retrospective shortening his lifespan to date?

    That would neatly explain the difference in the Doctor's age to when we last saw him in the classic series and also allow for the longevity of his 8th incarnation in spin-off media.
  • JohnnyForgetJohnnyForget Posts: 24,061
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    Shoppy wrote: »
    Maybe when he timelocked the Time Lords he altered bits of his own past, causing a retrospective shortening his lifespan to date?

    That would neatly explain the difference in the Doctor's age to when we last saw him in the classic series and also allow for the longevity of his 8th incarnation in spin-off media.

    If you believe the spin-off media to be canon, which I do, then I believe the Eighth Doctor lived for at least 200 years, or wasn't it even longer than that? I haven't read as many EDA novels or listened to as many Eighth Doctor audios as I should have done.
  • ShoppyShoppy Posts: 1,094
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    If you believe the spin-off media to be canon, which I do, then I believe the Eighth Doctor lived for at least 200 years, or wasn't it even longer than that? I haven't read as many EDA novels or listened to as many Eighth Doctor audios as I should have done.

    I think In one story he spends 100 years stood in a wardrobe ?
  • JohnnyForgetJohnnyForget Posts: 24,061
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    The reason why I said over 850 is because he is just over 900 in new Who, ( prior to what happened in series 6) and the start of Doctor Who is less than 50 years before that.

    Just because it's 50 years for us it doesn't mean it's 50 years for the Doctor. As has already been said the Second Doctor claimed to be 450 years old, so the First Doctor could not have been 850 when he regenerated. This means that the theory that the vast majority of the Doctor's life since we first saw him has been spent in having off-screen adventures unseen and unknown to the viewers is probably true.

    Oh and yes, I too believe he spent most of his First incarnation stuck on Gallifrey ... and hating every minute of it! Hence his desire to get away, even though the opportunity to do so didn't arrive until relatively late in his First incarnation.
  • JohnnyForgetJohnnyForget Posts: 24,061
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    Shoppy wrote: »
    I think In one story he spends 100 years stood in a wardrobe ?

    I'll take your word for that! :)
  • ShoppyShoppy Posts: 1,094
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    If you believe the spin-off media to be canon, which I do ...

    Look at it like this, time can be and has been re-written, but the Doctor is a time-sensitive being, he's lived through alterations in time, is covered in timey-wimey stuff and has lived in a time machine for over half his life...

    He'll remember both versions of events when an alteration is made to a timeline because that's how his timey-wimey brain works ...... something along the lines of how Rory has memories of being an Auton Roman Centurion.

    So it can ALL be canon AND contradict itself and it makes no difference.
    It doesn't even matter that stories like Shada and Human Nature have been retold in different media with different incarnations of the Doctor, or that Dalek, Cybermen, UNIT and Time Lord histories are self-contradictory because past stories can simply be seen as having happened before an alteration to a timeline, they are still in the Doctor's memory as they are in ours, they just simply didn't happen in the same way for the rest of the Doctor's contemporary universe.

    :)
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