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Tom Cleaver
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Completely off-topic: which Dr. Who are you?

November 22, 2013 · in Uncategorized · 21 · 0.7K

I'm sure among this collection of weirdos, I am not the only Whovian.

As you all know, the BBC is making a Very Big Deal out of Dr. Who this week (been watching all my favorite episodes from the re-boot). They have a "Which Dr. Who Are You?" personality test online. For a lark, I took it, those things are fun. Amazingly enough the comments in the explanation of why my personality is closest to the Ninth Doctor were very close on to describing me very accurately. I've never seen something like that with one of these things. Of course, it is Dr. Who, so why wouldn't it be?

All set for "An Adventure in Space and Time" tonight, and "Day of the Doctor" tomorrow!

http://www.bbcamerica.com/anglophenia/2013/11/personality-quiz-doctor/

Reader reactions:
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21 responses

  1. I didn't know Dr Who or for that matter British T.V. in any form was popular in the U.S. , what else do you get ?
    N.

    • I also watch a lot of the BBCA & PBS here in the States but while I will admit to being hearing deficient I believe I would still need to use C-C even if I wasn't .
      Did not know Copper was cancelled but I agree with Tom, sorry to see it go.

    • Neil
      I'll go back a few years; "The Avengers", "Secret Agent", "The Saint", "Upstairs,Downstairs", "The Prisoner", "Robin Hood" "Fawlty Towers" were all very popular British TV shows here in the States, back in the 1960's-1970's. I think the biggest hit was Monty Python, in the 1970's, it developed a cult following. John Cleese could read the London phone book and he'd have me laughing...Nudge nudge, Wink wink...

      • I remember when the Writer's Guild had a reception/party for the nominees for the 1988 Writing Oscars (a really formidable bunch - Ron Shelton for "Bull Durham," etc.), John Cleese, who was nominated for "A Fish Called Wanda" came. Every heavy hitter there (and there were even a couple who could legitimately qualify as "legendary," like Robert Towne) was crowded around Cleese and for the next two hours he did not disappoint as he "performed" for an audience of fellow magicians, effortlessly pulling rabbit after rabbit out of the hat conversationally. It was a privilege to be there.

  2. We have BBC-America on cable. So there are lots of British shows. Top Gear is incredibly popular with the Guys Who Wish They Had Garages audience (and those who do). Dr. Who was around throughout the 70s and 80s on Public Television and there was a small band of visionaries who were dedicated fans (like me). The re-boot has gotten huge ratings here in the states now, which is why the Eleventh Doctor had so many episodes over here. Also "Torchwood" is popular with Whovians. Personally, as a lifetime science fiction fan and as an s-f writer, I think Dr. Who is the best pure science fiction (as opposed to "space opera") show ever.

    Sure do wish BBC hadn't cancelled "Copper."

    • Never heard of copper ,did you ever get Red Dwarf ? I am a commited Dwarfer.
      N.

      • Yeah, we had Red Dwarf back in the late 80s/early 90s on PBS. "Copper" was an American series (done by several of the creators of "Homicide: Life on the Streets" and executive produced by Barry Levenson) done in Canada by BBC-America. Story of an Irish-American detective in Civil War New York City, and a very realistic look at how life was lived back then.

  3. Dr. Who was on my local PBS station for years (Minneapolis). Mostly Tom Baker episodes. I have seen a few of the newer ones, but do not to watch much TV in recent years. Off topic, but interesting, there are models of the Tardis and Daleks out there. Has anyone made a figure of Davros? (the 'creator' of the Daleks.)

  4. The quiz must not be able to make up it's mind on me. Tried twice & as they say "it just goes round & round"

  5. Funny, I always thought Who's on first.

  6. Brit comedies..."Waiting for God', etc. Always a laugh.

  7. I tested as the fifth Doctor. Funny since I don't remember the fifth doctor at all. The shows I saw as a kid were all Tom Baker ones. My son Stephen has collected all of the modern ones - Doctors nine, ten and eleven. All prepared to watch the 50th tomorrow. Enjoy!

  8. I just watched "An Adventure in Space and Time," and if you didn't watch it I'd really like to recommend it highly. I only ever saw one William Hartnell episode, the one where they dealt with the Aztecs. I was impressed as a history major in college with the fact they actually got Aztec culture right. So when I saw Sidney Newman tell Verity Lambert that he wanted the history right as a way of educating kids, I was really impressed. All the tales of how Dr. Who was created - a group of outsiders, from Sidney Newman, brought into the BBC from ITV to enliven them, his decision to give the show to Verity Lambert "the pushy Jew" as she called herself (the first female producer in BBC history, a Very Big Deal), and to hire Waruis Hussein, the first Indian director ever hired at the BBC, that really resonated to somone who has been in "Duh Biz" for 34 years and knows how hard it is to (still today) try and convince them to stop the Upper Class White Boys Club from running things (I ended up really messing with Hollywood's vision of action heroes back 20 years ago, following Dan O'Bannon's decision to change Ripley from a man to a woman in the first "Alien" - think how not good that movie would have been the other way! - that having a woman trying to be taken seriously and having to use her brain rather than her brawn made for better drama if "all drama is conflict"). I have been watching a lot of really early Dr. Who episodes over the past few months on BBC-A, and I have been reminded of a conversation I had with my good friend (and mentor) Roger Corman early in my career, when he said to me: "Tom, I don't have a million dollars in special effects to hide the fact there's no story, that there's no there there." Roger spoiled me - he took the story seriously, something most people in Hollywood never do, which is why when I hear people denigrate a "Roger Corman movie" I always file them in the Moron File (it's round and is right beside my desk). All Dr. Who episodes, whether they're the old ones with the "cheesy" effects or the new ones with the great effects, are good because of the STORIES. The effects are nice in the new show, the stuff it deserved from the beginning, but they're not the show. It's the best science fiction show, and science fiction is about *ideas", not space wars.

    But what was really incredible in this movie was the portrait of an artist aging and coming to The End, in the portrait of William Hartnell by the great David Bradley. I'm two years older than he was when he died, and I understand exactly how he wanted to continue, that he had things to do and say. Fortunately, I stopped smoking 30 years ago so I am in better shape, but the struggle to find a way to continue to work in my creativity in a world that wants to tell me I am "too old" resonated. And watching him deal with incipient Alzheimer's was very poignant, since I have had to deal with that with elders in my own life, particularly now someone whose life changed that part of the world he inhabits, whose friendship over the many years I have known him has had everything to do with my having what career I still have. As a writer, I hate "sentimentality," but the end of the movie was perfect in its sentimentality of the moment when the First Doctor looks over and sees the Eleventh.

    If you missed this movie, watch the re-runs. You don't even have to be a Dr. Who fan to like it.

    • Yes we watched AST last night while visiting one of our daughters in Hampshire and enjoyed the 'docu-drama'. 50th anniversary programme tonight so will try to catch that too.

  9. I finally got through on the test. Good or bad I tested as the 9th doctor.

  10. Dr Who was originally a BBC children's TV show, broadcast during what was known as children's hour, immediately before the six o'clock news. We used to watch it as in the sixties there wasn't much choice on TV, only two channels, and in black and white. Not being into sci-fi, my school friends and I used to find it very funny, especially the daleks. Later, I only used to watch it for the girls, of the more recent ones, Billie Piper gets my vote!

  11. Wow, the end of Day of the Doctor was totally mind-blowing. Especially when "the Curator" showed up! Fannnnnn-tastic! I loved it!

  12. Never watched a minute of it. Guess I'm just not that weird.

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