Doctor Who and our Changing Culture

As Plugged In’s resident television reviewer, I am often asked by hypothetical people, “Paul, with all the TV that you have to watch for work, what do you watch for fun?”

I always tell these hypothetical people that I never watch television for fun. Television should always be educational and enriching and very serious business. One should watch television with a sober eye and a downturned mouth and—what are you doing, hypothetical people! Don’t look at my Netflix account! Put that remote away! DON’T GO—

OK, so now you know. I watch classic Doctor Who.

My whole family does, in fact. While most modern viewers are probably more familiar with the new incarnation of the show—the 2005 reboot that brought the good Doctor into the 21st century—we’re watching the old stuff from the 1960s and ’70s on Netflix.

In some ways, the show hasn’t changed all that much since its first episode in 1963: The series still focuses on a mysterious galactic traveler only known as The Doctor. He looks human, and he often takes humans on his romps through time and across the universe, but he’s not precisely one of us. He’s a Time Lord, and while he’s practically immortal, every now and again, the Doctor goes through a strange process of reincarnation: His former self dies and is replaced by a new Doctor—one who looks and acts entirely differently. (BBC’s on their 12th Doctor, I believe, which helps explains why the show has been able to have such a long run.)

But while the Doctor’s escapades aboard the TARDIS are fictional, Doctor Who’s long history actually has made it something of a time machine itself. When you compare the first shows to the last, you can see how the culture has transmogrified around the comfortably familiar TARDIS. Take, for instance, how …

Television Has Changed. We sometimes snigger when watching episodes of the original Star Trek series and see their cheesy special effects and stilted action sequences. Well, compared to early Doctor Who, Star Trek looks like Avatar. Monsters were typically hand puppets. Robots were constructed from cardboard.  In 1964’s “The Aztecs,” the Doctor and his friends must deal with one of history’s bloodiest empires, but the climactic battle between a titanic Aztec warrior and Ian, one of the Doctor’s companions, looks about as fearsome as two sleepy toddlers battling for a graham cracker. In 1973’s “The Green Death,” featuring the Third Doctor, the most frenetic action sequence featured—I kid you not—the Doctor spilling milk from the back of a milk truck.

None of this mattered back in the day. Doctor Who terrified plenty of kids and helped coin the phrase “behind the sofa,” where children dove when the action got too scary. It illustrates, I think, the inevitable desensitization that has taken place in entertainment the last few decades. I find the hokey special effects charming. Most modern viewers probably would just roll their eyes and look for something else. But—and I say this with a bit of sadness—hardly anyone would hide behind the sofa anymore.

Our Respect for Television Has Changed. While hardcore fans of Doctor Who (Whovians? Who-verites? Who-siers?) probably know a wee bit about the First and Second Doctors (William Hartnell and Patrick Troughton, respectively), not even the most rabid devotee has seen their complete body of work. BBC accidentally lost or, in many cases, unceremonially tossed nearly 100 episodes from Doctor Who’s first six seasons. Now, of course, every television show is painstakingly preserved and, if there’s interest enough, redistributed through reruns and DVDs and through streaming avenues like Netflix. Now, the BBC is trying to piece together some old Doctor Who stories from what little remains—a certainly more laborious and expensive process to do so now than it would’ve been had they kept everything safely in the first place.

Back in the early days of Who, television was considered as consequential as cotton candy—and just as disposable. Now, many would argue that it’s both art and history, with some of its products—Doctor Who among them—practically revered.

The Culture Around Us Has Changed. Though the Doctor is practically timeless, his adventures are very much a product of their times. The First Doctor’s companions in 1963-64 were straight-laced and clean-cut—and the Doctor himself was a strict father figure, befitting the age. Just a few years later, as society was in the grips of the counterculture, the Second Doctor was a flute-playing clown and his companions were bedecked in shag cuts and bell bottoms. By the time the Third Doctor game along (and perhaps before), the show was dabbling in the issues of the day. “The Green Death,” for instance, was chock full of environmental messages oh-so-timely for its 1973 airdate.

But it felt like a big deal when a couple of lovebirds swapped a smooch back then. In today’s Doctor Who, it’s not unusual to see same-sex couples together. Back then, the most risqué exclamation likely heard on the show was “good grief!” Today … well, you hear a bit more.

Granted, Doctor Who is still one of television’s cleaner shows. But what constitutes clean today is different than it was back in the 1970s.

Doctor Who was, and still can be, a pretty fun show. I like marveling at the Doctor’s exploits and maybe chuckling at the monstrous hand puppets he fights. But even the good Doctor can still teach us a thing or two.