But he IS a God to those he helps out, in the same way that the God some believe in was probably something else misinterpretated as a God over time (perhaps a alien?). He IS a God. To us. That doesn't mean he IS a God but the Doctor is what we see as a God-like figure.

I'll admit there have been shades of this in the show, post-revival. ("Last of the Time Lords" being one of the most egregious instances.)
But, still. Sorry, no.

This.

At the end of the day, he's just a wanderin' bloke in a police box, travelling the universe, sometimes lending a hand. A sort of handyman of the universe too.

No. He's a hero to the people he saves. To us, he is a hero. That was the whole message of Martha wandering the Earth. The whole message of the show - messianic overtones have always been to shut them down, not back them up.

Of course the Doctor is a hero, but wonderfully flawed. And doesn't think of himself that way. Love the scene between Eleven and Amy in The God Complex; "I'm not a hero. I really am just a mad man in a box."

Absoutely! "The Face of Evil" illustrates your point perfectly.

He's both. You can't possibly ignore that the show portrays him that way.

Regeneration is essentially reincarnation or resurrection for a start.

Again, that doesn't mean he IS a God but to us he is definitely a God. It's not one or another. The Doctor is essentially the same principle as Superman, who is seen as both a hero and a god-like figure.

He isn't.

I suppose The Doctor goes where something needs sorting, so a little like Superman but there was also Supergirl, Superwoman once that's done, onto the next job.

The Doctor always ends up in the right place at the right time........

(This struck me the most in Daleks In Manhattan where the Daleks attempt to take over New York in the 1930s and the Doctor just happens to show up and stop them.)

......but as we discovered in The Doctor's Wife, that's all down to the TARDIS, the clever girl, taking him to where he needs to be.

There must be a lotta love between The Doctor and his Tardis.

"What do I call you?"
"Well usually you call me sexy"
" Only when we're alone."



Suranne Jones is a brilliant actress. Maybe we should start a campaign for "Sexy" to be the new companion. That could be fun. The TARDIS as a blue box AND a wild-haired woman.

Did we ever hear any of the Doctors call the TARDIS that. I can imagine Jon Pertwee doing that. Remember when Rose and Sarah-Jane were comparing notes and observing how he strokes the console (when he thinks no-one's looking IIRC)?

Great quotes

Suranne was very good as The Tardis, there was a kind of newness, she could look at The Doctor and The Doctor could look at her from all sides and still be amazed, The Tardis talking and just there until she went away, that was so sad.

'You didn't always take me where I wanted to go'
'But I always took you where you needed to be'

That simple two line exchange is just brilliant. That small clip could be shown to silence anyone who says 'but isn't it a bit co-incidental how he always lands where there is a problem' because even though im sure it had been implied in the past, to have the TARDIS itself say that actually it was no lucky coincidence at all, gives the whole show more credibility.

I didn't ignore it. I specifically pointed it out in my response - but feel free to not read it properly! Whenever the Doctor has been portrayed as anything more than a humble or angry hero, it has been as a bad reflection of himself. The show purposefully knocks any 'god' imagery down to be the undesired representation of him. It is sledgehammering the point that the Doctor is not a god.

Oh, and 'god-like' is vastly different to 'god', as you wrote in a leter response. So you're either discussing two very different concepts, or you're confusing the two different meanings. Which could explain the adherence to your belief in GodDoctor.

But that's boring. The hero that never fails, the Superman that never encounters Kryptonite, the Batman that never gets punched, is just pointless.

When a character can literally rewrite reality, there's nowhere else for him to go, no challenges for him to overcome, no enemy that can pose a threat. You can de-power him by making him realise that he's a threat to others (as per the Time Lord Victorious, or The Runaway Bride), or have him fail catastrophically in one of his plans - but putting him in a position where he can show how awesome he is on an ever bigger scale is going to make the problem worse, not better.

Frustratingly, Moffat cycles between wanting to make the Doctor a shadowy traveller on the fringes, and then turns around and makes him President of Earth. Lazy writing from all sides doesn't help - the Doctor can just make whatever plot point is required happen out of thin air.

If the Doctor is a God, he should be a trickster god, not an omnipotent one.

Edit: a point from some of the later comments, I suppose there are two things here - the perception of the Doctor (and the imagery used), and the Doctor's actual actions.

How is it 'sledgehammering' the point?

If anything, it is reinforcing it. Your weaknesses aren't removed from how you come across to other people because they're your weaknesses.

Everytime he starts to act like one, or he gets upheld as one, he fails. That pretty much sledgehammers the point home.

Great post.

Moffat can't seem to decide what he wants the Doctor to be. I was all for the Doc 'stepping back into the shadows' after Series 6, and 7A built on that (albeit, imo, a bit clumsily - he's just gone and wiped all records of himself from every database ever? Must've taken a ruddy long time and as a one-line reference it seems pretty throwaway. Although I like when Solomon's scanner can't attach a price tag to him, etc.) But then by the end of Series 7, he's on Trenzalore defending a planet from half the universe again, the Daleks have remembered him, and then he's - like you say - President of Earth in the Series 8 finale.

Not really.

I struggle with tying shoe laces. Does that mean I don't struggle with tying shoe laces? No.

I'm not sure you've grasped the point somehow.

Isn't selective snipping fun...?

I'm a bit lost, to be honest. So the Doctor being able to tie shoelaces makes him a God? Is that it? Have I got the general jist?

I don't know at all what you are talking about here. It makes no sense.

Whether or not you have trouble tying shoe laes, you certainly have trouble with analogies.

I don't care who's area she was. Just no more River, ever again. Please. I found her tiresome in her first appearance. Can you imagine how I felt during her last (and please God, let it be her last)...? Offhand, I can't think of a character in Who - classic or Nu - I dislike more.