She seemd to know of or know the Doctor (which is not really a surprise) but seems very happy he's about and even wishes him happy Christmas - but yet her Grandmother Queen Victoria banished him/declared him an enemy of the British Empire and even set up Torchwood to keep an eye out for him, surely Queen Victoria would have passed this information down through her children?

Being a bit picky I know.........

Surely her majesty does not believe everything her grandmother believed. She is certainly aware that it was Torchwood that caused the problem with the Cybermen and the Daleks, and the Doctor who saved the planet. She would also have been offered a different view of the Doctor from Harriet Jones (MP for Flydale North) following the events at 10 Downing Street.

The politics forum would love this conversation!

But yes like NewbieCanuck said I am sure the Queen got a different viewpoint from Harriet and is well aware of how the Doctor has saved the country many times!

Let's also not forget that he prevented her coronation from being ruined by Maureen Lipman

All good points!

Another good point is that he had just prevented a huge spaceship from pulverising her home. For which I'd be thankful!

Well he saved Queen Victoria from a werewolf but she wasn't very grateful!!!

Good point!

Also Downing Street look out for a code 9(the Doctor) in an alien emergency so she would have got from them that the Doctor is a good guy.

She was quite grateful. She knighted him. But she was not prepared to accept change or differences and was foolish enough to think she had the power to prevent it.

The present monarch lives in a very different world, and realises how limited her power really is.

Let's be realistic here for a moment. As a species, we lack the resources to travel within our own solar system. Anyone who is capable of reaching Earth by definition has the power to completely destroy us and there's nothing we can do about it. So anyone who's aware of the Doctor, and of all the times he's saved the planet (or at least Card, er, London), is understandably going to be a fan.

It didn't take the Raxacoricofallapatorian army to bring down the UK government - just 3

I've been wondering the same thing

wonder if QEII would have connections with torchwood?

i was still suprized they had that in actualy, i had always asumed RTD was a bit anti monarchist for some reason -

The original report of the show (from 'The Sun', no less) said that the ship was supposed to crash into Buckingham palace.

Wonder if the tensions between the BBC and the Royals stemming from the documentary controversy led to a swift change of mind on that, assuming that was the original plan.

Regards,

Cypher

I have finally caught up with VOTD & I gotta say that I was annoyed at what happend at the end... Nooo not Kylie taking her own life to save everyone & no I ain't talking about the old geezer learning he was rich.

I'm talking about the ship not crashing into the palace, I was at the edge of my seat with an ice cold bud and a phat cigar looking on in the hope that the ship smashed right into the palace & no such luck, the ruddy doc saves the day again.

Just once it would be nice to see the queen cop it, after boring us with her yearly speech.

Am I not mistaken that in V for Vendetta - Parliment copped it
And in Mars Attacks - some famous buildings copped it.

But this being the bbc who doesn't earn enough money from our license fees to be able to create a special effect of the palace being smashed into & wiping the smug look off the queens face

I was so tempted to reply to this post with "It was the Titanic, not the QEII" but then I actually READ the post properly!

Well they smashed up Big Ben in series 1 so it's not like they're afraid to take on some famous landmarks in the not-quite-real Doctor Who London.

In reality the answer was after the fabulous SFX of the Titanic being bombarded with meteors there probably wasn't enough money left in the coffers for another high profile demolition job...

I thought it wasa great touch DW saves the world, Buckingham Palace & the Queen.

I agree with some of the comments of my fellow posters it's clear that the Queen sees DW in far more favourable light than did Queen Victoria.

Sorry to be really slow on this one, but I was still under the impression the doctor was a shrouded-in-mystery character to the general public. During the first season he was a bizarre myth that only a few Internet nerds believed in and despite spending 90% of his time in London, I thought he'd still largely kept his existence a secret. So why does the queen and her corgis know all about him?

But he spent quite a few years working for UNIT in the 1970's/80's (I still cannot work out the timeline) so he was obviously known to Government. Also during some episodes such as the first slitheen story the Government were on the look out for him and during The Christmas Invasion Harriet Jones makes a public appeal for him on TV.

Finally - he is known to the Royal Family following his involvement with Queen Victoria (not forgetting Queen Elizabeth 1st in The Shakespeare Code).

He was just kept a secret from the GBP.

Probably because on the past two Christmases, as well as a few other times, he has saved the world from alien threats. Pretty difficult to retain a low profile after that I would have thought.

(a) Because she is part of the 'establishment' that know of him (if only from handed down stories from Queen Victoria)

(b) Because he phoned her?

And he gave his name as the doctor? Wouldn't he have said something like - I am a creature of light and dark and I come to save thee blah blah?

And every Xmas when he saves London there are so many reset buttons and ways that the general public wouldn't see him that I'm sure he wouldn't be recognized. Bernard Cribbins didn't for a start.

I know he was in Clive's(?) scrapbook early on in the CE years, but has anyone whipped out their mobile recently and snapped him during his escapades? They're probably too busy screaming and running. His face probably isn't that well known to the general public.

Sorry, I forgot about his Olympic run in front of the world's media in Fear Her, but that hasn't happened yet!

I am more confused by how the Queen knew the Doctor was on the ship. She must have fantastic eyesight.

I'm also slightly concerned that so many people on here think Queen Victoria is our Queen's grandmother. Our Queen is Vicotria's great great granddaughter. I know Elizabeth is old but not that old

According to the podcast for the episode, they didn't have enough money to destroy the palace. It would require building a detailed model and then destroying it.

It's not because of the cost of the Titanic though. The big budget killer was K9's Corgi costume. Fantastic effect that. Most people looking would have sworn it was a real dog, not a robot.