My Favourite Doctor Who Regenerations (62nd Anniversary Special)

Written by The Wandering Fox

Freddy and Teddy were going through some old Doctor Who DVDs the Wandering Fox had, looking at them with sombre expressions.

Freddy: He used to buy these so much.

Teddy: Yeah, it was a regular thing he’d do. Those days ended a decade or so ago. But at least he’s been buying the audios.

Freddy: No wonder he’s an Eighth Doctor fan. I wonder, do you think he’ll celebrate Doctor Who this year? With how bad Doctor Who is, is it worth celebrating?

Teddy: Well, I think he’s got something for us.

That I do! Doctor Who is in a bad way now but I can still look back on certain moments from the franchise and tell you what I love. This topic is about my favourite regenerations in the series. Ironically the last episode we had ended with a reshoot and regeneration that has turned Doctor Who into a big laughing stock.

“Oh, hello!”

GET LOST!

But coming away from that bloody awful era of Doctor Who I want to talk about my favourite regenerations of Doctor Who over the years. From 1966 we had been getting many different Doctors through a process called “Regeneration” though the name itself was not coined until 1974 with the Third Doctor’s regeneration. The regeneration stories are the big ones in the series as it’s all about the outgoing Doctor’s epic end to his/her story and the beginning of a new Doctor and era. With so many Doctors over the years it’s hard to ask which is my favourite? I can tell you my most hated regenerations are Paul McGann’s and Matt Smith’s, the former with the utter disrespect to the last Classic Doctor and Moffat “Oh I can’t see the Eighth Doctor being a dark character and do fighting….even though I canonised the audios that he did!” Matt’s regeneration was terrible as we didn’t even see his face change. I used to like David Tennant’s regeneration back in 2010 but since he returned and got the special treatment of not needing to regenerate I can’t look at that regeneration the same way anymore.

I would have hated Colin Baker’s regeneration. But I’m gonna come back to that ;)

The regenerations that follows aren’t in any order but they are my own favourites. I won’t be talking much about the real life reasons of why the actors left as some of it is rather emotional and personal to a lot of the actors, hence unlike David Tennant doing that terrible documentary which threw s*** and laugh on Tom Baker and Lala Ward’s relationship, I won’t be mentioning it.

Let’s go all the way back to 1981.

Logopolis

It had been a long seven years, he had become an icon to not just the tv, but to the sci-fi genre, but finally Tom Baker left Doctor Who. The Fourth Doctor’s era was being phased out bit by bit with Romana and K-9 leaving him, the question mark lapels on the collar replacing his iconic scarf, the Master had ditched his green cloak for the goatee and slick hair, new companions who’d stick with the Fifth Doctor. It had finally come to an end in Logopolis.

With the TARDIS’s chameleon circuit needing repairs, the Doctor is confronted by the mysterious phantom known as the Watcher, who urges him and Adric go to the planet Logopolis, the home planet to the greatest mathematicians in the universe, but the Master also has his own plans for Logopolis. The Master has accidentally caused an entropy wave throughout the universe, forcing him and the Doctor to team up to stop it with a programme the Logopolis mathematicians created. Going to Earth they use a radio telescope to stop the entropy wave. However, the Master then holds the universe hostage by saying he will let the wave take the universe unless they submit to him. The Doctor goes out to disconnect the telescope to stop him and while he succeeds the Master tilts the gantry which causes the Doctor to fall to his death.

Laying on the ground, the Doctor reflects on his previous friends and companions, Sarah, Harry, the Brigadier, Leela, K-9, and the Romanas. He looks so bitter and sad, and you can tell that it’s genuine. Tom looks gutted to be leaving.

What I love about this regeneration is how it’s slowly built up thanks to the Watcher. This strange entity is stalking the Doctor and when the Doctor talks to him, we don’t hear the Watcher talk. Once the Doctor returns he looks unnerved. The Watcher keeps appearing to the Doctor on Logopolis and the way the music shifts, going with an eighties cosmic gravely sound, it’s telling you again that something is coming for the Doctor. The Watcher is capable of piloting the TARDIS which only builds the intrigue. Then we get the bit on the telescope. It’s tense, the Doctor is quite high above the ground, he’s struggling to hold on, he’s trying to get the cable disconnected, the music continues to become ominous, it doesn’t even stop in relief once the cable is disconnected. Then we get that moment in which the Doctor is holding on and he stares out, remembering his enemies over the years, the music changes to this creepy almost childlike theme, like it’s a piano playing for somebody in a spiral. Then the music climbs and climbs, we linger on that shot of the Doctor’s hand, then he lets go, brief blur of red as he falls. The way how the Doctor is laying there, the music has this whimsical dark tone as we see him there. Then...he gives us one last smile.

“It’s the end….but the moment has been prepared for”.

Then he reaches out to the Watcher, who walks over to him and merges with the Doctor, the music has this soft and sad tone as if finally telling us it’s over now and while this Doctor is dying, he will be okay. We then find out who the Watcher is: he is the Doctor. Or at least an energy projection of his regen for the next body. The music softly lightens as then the Fourth Doctor almost cocoons up in the Watcher’s, then he fades and we get our first look at the Fifth Doctor. He’s covered in white flaky makeup. Then that goes and we get the Fifth Doctor fresh out of his regeneration, sitting back up. Then that’s it, the episode ends with the eighties theme with us meeting Peter Davison as the Doctor.

This regeneration really scored in just the way how sad and sombre fans had to have felt back then that the Doctor they had known for seven years was gone. While Tom’s Doctor got a sad ending, he at least saved the universe and accepted his fate had come. It was prepared for. It wouldn’t be the last time we’d see Tom as the Doctor as he would return as him for a little scene in the re-release of the unmade episode Shada back almost a decade ago. And of course he would appear as the Curator, who’s said to be the Doctor in the far future and has retired and swaps his old bodies around.

With Tom Baker having left the role, it was now with Peter Davison, who took the series to a fresher era which reintroduced the Cybermen and the Brigadier and Omega as well as a big celebration of Doctor Who which turned twenty in 1983, bringing back Patrick Troughton and Jon Pertwee as the Second and Third Doctors, Sarah Jane returned as well and a recast First Doctor.

But then Peter Davison would leave in 1984 with.

The Caves of Androzani

This story is often greatly debated by Doctor Who fans as the best story in the series’ history. The Doctor and new companion Peri arrive on Androzani Minor, a dessert planet which is a battleground between General Chellek and Sharaz Jek, all to do with a substance called Spectrox, which is fatal and sadly the Doctor and Peri end up inhaling it and that’s it, both are on death’s door. With both surrounded by cruel people, death and blood everywhere, his regeneration coming, the Doctor is desperate to save Peri and find a cure for her. Despite being chased by gunmen, traversing battles and collapsing caves, the Doctor is able to find a cure for Peri. We then get this epic climax where the Doctor, worn out, tired, is carrying Peri across an exploding dessert back to the TARDIS. He has the cure not just for Peri, but for himself. But then he makes one fatal mistake. While trying to open the TARDIS door, he drops the key and loses a bit of the cure. He gets Peri inside, de-materialises the TARDIS and what does he do? He gives the cure to Peri. He doesn’t think of himself. He thinks of her. He gently tells her to open her mouth and drink it. With it done, he lays upon the floor and we hear the music getting tighter in a whine. Peri then gets up fully healed and begs the Doctor not to leave her. He then becomes delirious and he notes he feels different.

Then we see his former companions. Teagan, Nyssa, Turlough, Kameleon, and lastly. Adric. They’re all urging him to not die. It’s haunting, for though it’s comforting, we know these companions left the Doctor under sadder circumstances. Teagan left out of trauma, Nyssa chose to leave out of duty, Kameleon died, and Turlough left only in the previous story to finally return home. But Adric appearing here gives us that sad final words of the Fifth Doctor before he regenerates.

“Adric? Oh no…..!”

Even to the very end this Doctor was haunted by Adric’s death. He was a young boy under his care and he died, to the end the Doctor still felt terrible. Then we get a nasty newcomer in the visions. The Master. He’s urging the Doctor to die, twisting the other visions in urging him to die. Then the music almost boils with the strange pink and black waves taking up our vision. Then we get a slight boom and then up comes the new Doctor, with a faint imprint of the Fifth Doctor left behind. The Sixth Doctor easily manages to take the show in his first few seconds, the earlier darkness of the episode behind him, smiling in confidence.

This was truly a good regeneration as it comes after such a agonising story for the Doctor. He’s surrounded by evil and darkness and all he wants is to save Peri, who only just became his companion in the previous story. It feels like a good ending with this Doctor doing whatever he could to save the life of a companion after those he lost, thus while his ending is sad he at least died knowing Peri was safe.

The Fifth Doctor would not return until 2007’s Time Crash with the Tenth Doctor who would become his son in law in real life, and then he’d return in 2022’s The Power of the Doctor both as a Guardian and a hologram to Teagan.

We now go forward to 2005, Doctor Who is back and it’s come back well, but it’s new Doctor Christopher Eccleston ended up leaving at the end of the first series in.

The Parting of the Ways

We had the Ninth Doctor only for one series and he stolen the hearts of many, from his own sense of humour, his drastically different wardrobe, his struggles of fighting his guilt and his character arc into becoming a lighter hearted and more hopeful Doctor was great. He was my first Doctor. It’s why him leaving at the end gutted me, especially how I didn’t understand what regeneration meant.

The Doctor, Rose and Jack have uncovered the return of the Dalek Emperor who has created new Daleks to take over the Earth in the far future and wants to restart the Dalek Empire. The Doctor, fearing for Rose’s safety and seeing this as his final stand against the Daleks, sends her home in the TARDIS and gives her a heartfelt goodbye message.

The Doctor, Jack and a small team of resistance groups try to stop the Daleks with the Doctor building a Delta Wave, a device that will take out all life around it, not just the Daleks, but Earth and maybe even the Galaxy. The Daleks are getting closer and closer, killing everybody in their way. In the past in 2005 Rose is determined to save the Doctor and with help from her mum and her ex boyfriend Mickey they open the heart of the TARDIS, which Rose stares into and the TARDIS takes Rose back to the Doctor. By now, the Daleks have killed Jack, they have the Doctor surrounded with the Dalek Emperor taunting the Doctor, who grabs the Delta Wave, but the Dalek Emperor taunts him, asking him “WHAT ARE YOU? COWARD OR KILLER!?”

The Doctor tries to force himself to turn on the Delta Wave. But by this point with the trauma of the Last Great Time War on his mind and still fresh, with the belief he killed his own people, the Doctor couldn’t. He just couldn’t do it again. He then stands up and says “Coward. Any day”. He then stands there ready to be exterminated. Then the TARDIS materialises and Rose steps out, having become the Bad Wolf. With the power of the Time Vortex, Rose turns the Daleks to dust and resurrects Jack. With the power of the vortex flowing through her it will kill Rose. The Doctor feels terrible enough that so many have died to stop the Daleks and now Rose will die. But then she says something that great connects with him.

“I can see everything. All there is. All that was. All that ever could be”. The Doctor gets to his feet with new resolve and explains he sees it all the time and it drives him mad. He then takes her and kisses her to take the Time Vortex out of her. With the vortex flowing in him, the Doctor returns it to the heart of the TARDIS but it’s done its damage. Even a Time Lord cannot stand the power of the vortex. With Jack left behind, the Doctor takes Rose in the TARDIS and she wakes up with no memory. We then have this little look at the Doctor’s hand, it’s glowing. He smiles sadly and remarks how he could’ve taken her to so many places like the planet Barcelona. He is talking a bit more nervously and then we have him writhing in pain. We have this orchestral music being played with a slight piano going on, it’s soft and quiet at first, as if the music itself is not sure of what’s happening like Rose. She doesn’t know what’s going on. The music gets lighter and then we get that wincing moment in which the Doctor looks to her and tells her he’s going to change, he won’t see her again. Then he tells her that before he goes.

“Before I go. Rose I just want to tell you you were fantastic. Absolutely fantastic! And you know what? So was I!”

In that moment there’s pain and fear in his eyes as he tries to hold back the regeneration. But his voice is full of compassion and gratitude have met Rose, how in this series she helped make him better. That and he wants her to know that not just because of what she helped him with, but how she herself has become a stronger woman since he first took her on. The music then levels up in a triumphant beat as he smiles one last time and then.

Hello there Doctor Ten.

This regeneration was my first and I was so confused but so hooked as well. It was sad to see this man who I had seen face and battle monsters suddenly change into a stranger. But to see his character come to a good ending was a nice reward and in a way if you ask me? His regeneration is probably the best of the Modern Doctors. Tennant’s was good thanks to how his Doctor’s ego and arrogance led to his downfall and his loneliness made it all the more gutting, but the 60th anniversary just took that away.

With Eccleston being the first of the Modern Doctors, we now go forward to the end of the first female Doctor’s era in.

The Power of the Doctor

Jodie Whittaker’ era was sadly not one of the best in Doctor Who’s history, following off of Moffat’s downturn era with the Twelfth Doctor, and then followed by the horrendous Fifteenth Doctor era. With only a handful of good episodes, the Thirteenth Doctor’s era was marred by bad writing, bizarre choices like giving the Doctor an origins and destroying Gallifrey again, then shoehorning I’m a romance with Yaz, the Thirteenth Doctor needed to bow out big before the 60th. The result? Eh, the episode was a mess. I’d argue a fun mess. You had old faces returning including.

The First Doctor.

The Fifth Doctor.

The Sixth Doctor.

The Seventh Doctor.

The Eighth Doctor.

The Fugitive Doctor.

Teagan.

Ace.

Ian Chesterton.

Jo Jones.

Mel Bush.

Graham.

Kate Lethbridge Stewart.

Daleks.

Cybermen.

The Master.

The Thirteenth Doctor didn’t even get to do much through the middle of her last episode, with the Master taking up her body and running around in many Doctor’s clothes, she was trapped in a mindscape with several older Doctors. But why is it I’ve got this episode’s regeneration as a favourite? I love the way the regeneration was done.

It was shot really well and Jodie has this sombre little moment in the TARDIS where she materialises it at the edge of a cliff overlooking the ocean. The way she looks back and tells the TARDIS to look after the “next one” is sweet and that while the Thirteenth is gutted to be dying she’s at least hopeful for the next Doctor. She smiles at the TARDIS and goes outside, looking to the sunrise and laments how the only sad thing is that she won’t know what happens next, but with a cheeky grin and regeneration flowing she says with excitement.

“Alright then. Doctor whoever I’m about to be! Tag! You’re it!”

I love how they did it. The regeneration was shot in a studio with a green screen while they filmed the cliff top without her or the TARDIS and made sure to edit both shots together.

I like how her theme plays as she regenerates, as if celebrating her era and letting her essence freely go into the air around her to be free with her previous bodies in mind and spirit. It’s nice as well as she’s the first modern Doctor to regenerate outside the TARDIS so it made for a nice regeneration. If only we had the original ending. The thing is back when they filmed it, David Tennant was not there. Jodie filmed her part in the Autumn of 2021 while David did his just several months later. Why? Because Chris Chibnall wrote this as the last ever Doctor Who episode because while RTD was in talks to return back in 2020, nothing was concrete. The original ending had Jodie’s Doctor regenerate and the screen fades to darkness. If only we had that ending instead of the utter trash RTD gave us with the 60th and the Fifteenth Doctor era.

The Thirteenth Doctor did return in the reshot ending of the Series 15 finale.

Now, for the next regeneration, this comes with some much needed context. That would be the Sixth Doctor’s. Back in 1985, Doctor Who was facing the chopper and was on hiatus for a while until it was brought back in 1986 with the Trial of a Time Lord series which was sadly Colin Baker’s second and final onscreen appearance as the Doctor until The Power of the Doctor. The Trial of a Time Lord saw the Doctor being on trial for crimes he was said to have committed with the Time Lords to decide wether he is to live or die. The series was Peri’s last appearance until Tales of the TARDIS. It also introduced Mel Bush as another companion of the Doctor’s, and the mysterious Valeyard who was there as the Doctor’s prosecutor.

In the final story the Ultimate Foe, the Master came to the trial and revealed the Valeyard was in fact the Doctor’s darkness having gained physical form and was trying to steal the Doctor’s regenerations and tampered with the Matrix to make it look like the Doctor committed these crimes. The Doctor thought he had killed the Valeyard but it was revealed he had escaped. With him believing the Valeyard dead, the Doctor left with Mel and the last thing we heard him say was “Carrot juice, carrot juice, carrot juice!”

The Sixth Doctor then regenerated in Time and the Rani. But here’s the thing. That was not Colin Baker playing him in that scene. It was Sylvester McCoy wearing a wig.

The reason why is that back then the head of the BBC Michael Grade not only hated Doctor Who but he hated Colin for reasons I don’t think are right to reveal on the blog, so he had Colin sacked from the role of the Doctor. John Nathan Turner, the producer of the show then, tried to get Colin back for the regeneration but he refused. The reasons why the Sixth Doctor regenerated was because he either “banged his head on the TARDIS console” or “the Seventh Doctor manipulated the past to cause the Sixth Doctor to regenerate”. These were not fair on Colin who did nothing wrong. But then came Big Finish being made in 1999, which took on Classic Doctors and did more stories right them and Colin Baker and Paul McGann benefitted greatly with these audios as not only did the Eighth Doctor get a stronger characterisation in audios, but the audios helped to really smooth out the Sixth Doctor’s character, turning him from a egotistical man who’s strong passion for justice made him clash with his companions to a humbled man who became more softer hearted and kinder to others.

Then after the 50th anniversary of Doctor Who, Big Finish decided to give the Sixth Doctor a regeneration that was to give Colin the respect he deserves. Thus we ended up getting.

The Last Adventure Part 4: The Brink of Death

While I think the boxset could have done better in its story I get what they were doing. The Valeyard is stalking the Sixth Doctor throughout his life having come up with a scheme to not only steal the Doctor’s life but to take over the Time Lords. The Valeyard took in the Nathemus which he’d then implant in the TARDIS’s matrix to take over the Doctor’s bio link and then he re-enacted the previous Doctor’s regenerations. This was done to trick the TARDIS matrix in thinking the Valeyard was the Doctor, coming to the audio the Brink of Death. The Doctor and Mel return from an adventure and he goes to the TARDIS console and opens up a panel on the floor, then something happens. He disappears, then the Valeyard steps out and Mel believes he’s the Doctor.

The Doctor ends up trapped in the Matrix and is to be deleted, meaning he will cease to be. Though help comes in the Time Lady Genesta, who tries to help him. They find out what the Valeyard was doing and that he isn’t just taking over the Doctor’s life, he is taking over the Time Lords. Desperate to stop the Valeyard, the Doctor and Genesta go in her TARDIS and travel back in it and find an earlier Sixth Doctor and Mel just before their adventure which is to avoid Lakyerta. The Doctor has a plan: he can telepathically link Genesta’s TARDIS to his and convince his younger self not to land on the planet. However, Genesta starts laughing and then she turns into the Valeyard, horrifying the Doctor. He taunts the Doctor in that he was Genesta all along and was cruelly giving the Doctor false hope. The Doctor refuses to believe Genesta was the Valeyard and he changes his plan at the last second: he instead telepathically pilots his earlier self’s TARDIS to fly into the radiation beams of Lakyerta The Doctor explains that in doing this it will kill his younger self and that the Nathemus will not recognise the Seventh Doctor thanks to the Valeyard not confusing them and the matrix sign him. The Nathemus will die and the Valeyard will be trapped in the Matrix.

In the end the plan succeeds: the Valeyard and the future Sixth Doctor are trapped in the Matrix and face deletion. We get the Sixth Doctor fondly remembering his friends.

“Frankly, I will die happy if the last words you ever hear are mine. Words in praise of the best of times: Peri, Mel, Evelyn, Flip, Mila, Constance, and all the others!"

In the final scene, the future Sixth Doctor is about to be deleted but he can feel his younger self starting to regenerate. The Seventh Doctor’s essence is there and can be heard.

Sixth Doctor: Change. I feel it! Yes! I will regenerate!

Seventh Doctor: Yes. I will regenerate.

Sixth and Seventh Doctors: Our future is in safe hands.

I have this in my head. He’s alone in the Matrix, blue light is taking up his body but he looks to his hands, they’re glowing. We then get a close up of his eyes which then shift to the Seventh Doctor’s. Then there’s a screen split as we see their faces and then we see the Sixth Doctor’s body fade, deleted but happy to have saved everybody.

I can’t help but feel a bit emotional, Colin deserved a heroic end and I’m glad he got it. If only Steven Moffat did that for the Eighth Doctor but nope, had to have him die in misery and nobody saved and invent another Doctor because Christopher Eccleston refused to come back. Oh Steven, you’re the reason Doctor Who is in this mess in the first place, if you just had the Eighth Doctor come back in the 50th and gave him a heroic end we wouldn’t have had: the Timeless Children mystery Doctors, regeneration being used as a gimmick or fake out or heal minor injuries, Gallifrey wasted. All because you don’t like Classic Who and you were really just scared of McGann outshining Tennant and Smith.

I think there is one last regeneration that I will include and it’s going back to 1969. That’s right we are going all the way back to.

The War Games

With the exception of 1963, 1969 was the first time Doctor Who was facing the chopper as its viewing figures were decreasing, Dalek Mania was dead, and there was waning interest in continuing it. Jon Pertwee and Barry Letts saved Doctor Who at the last second but Pertwee was casted too late to film a full regeneration from Troughton to him. But even then the War Games gave us an epic finale to the Second Doctor’s era and what could have been the show.

The Doctor, Jaime and Zoe and up uncovering a dastardly plan involving the many battles over the years of Earth being used as a mere game by aliens called the War Lords, with the combatants unknowingly being pawns in their game. The Doctor realises the main guy, the War Chief, is another Time Lord and out of desperation to stop him, the Doctor contacts the Time Lords to stop the War Chief. This was a bad gamble the Doctor took as by then he was on the run from the Time Lords for stealing the TARDIS, but it did the job, the War Chief was killed and the War Lords were defeated. But the Time Lords were not done. The Doctor, Jaime and Zoe tried to flee in the TARDIS but the Time Lords manipulated it, forcing them to return. On Gallifrey, the Doctor was forced to stand trial but he argued that the Time Lords have so much power that they could be helping others and he’s stopping evil like the Daleks. The Time Lords ended up curious, but as punishment they forced him to say goodbye to Jaime and Zoe, with them returned to their own places in time with their memories of the Doctor erased. The Time Lords though agree that there is darkness that the Doctor has battle with many of it occurring on Earth, which is more in need of his help. He is sent to Earth in exile and his memories of piloting the TARDIS taken. The Doctor will also be punished by being forced to regenerate. We then have this dark final scene of the Second Doctor thrown in a void with him being forced to regenerate. The last thing we hear is the Doctor screaming.

“NO! NO! NO NO NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO NO!”

It is quite a gutting final scene….but it’s largely believed this was not the end of the Second Doctor thanks to his final appearance in The Two Doctors seemingly revealing the Time Lords stopped his regeneration to make him an agent of theirs.

I’d say that is it for my favourite regenerations. I would have included Capaldi but his last episode took a big crap on the First Doctor so I’m not including that.

Freddy: Quite the lengthy essay.

Teddy: But it’s better than thinking about how bad Doctor Who is.

Yeah. I hope everybody likes this, if you have a favourite regeneration tell me in the comments.