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The Tenth Doctor is the name given to the tenth and current incarnation of the Doctor seen on screen in the long-running BBC television science-fiction series Doctor Who. He is played by David Tennant.
Overview
After the successful premiere of Rose and the announcement of a second series being commissioned by the BBC, the story broke that Christopher Eccleston, who played the Ninth Doctor, would not be returning for the second series. On 16 April 2005, the BBC announced that David Tennant had been selected for the role of the Tenth Doctor.
The Tenth Doctor's first appearance in the series was for 20 seconds after the Ninth Doctor's regeneration at the end of The Parting of the Ways. His first full episode as the Doctor, barring an appearance in a "mini-episode" during the 2005 show of Children in Need, was the 2005 Christmas Special, The Christmas Invasion. He appeared in the 2006 series and will continue through at least one further seasonal episode and series.
Biography
The Ninth Doctor regenerated into the Tenth due to cellular damage caused by absorbing the energies of the time vortex at the climax of The Parting of the Ways. In the Children in Need mini-episode, the Doctor acted erratically and said that his regeneration had "gone wrong". He remained in a delirious and semi-conscious state through most of the events of The Christmas Invasion until his regeneration was settled through absorbing the free radicals and tannin from some hot tea. He then saved the Earth from invasion by defeating the leader of the alien Sycorax using a satsuma.
The Doctor seemed disappointed that his tenth incarnation was not "ginger". Instead of the Ninth Doctor's leather jacket, the Tenth chose an outfit consisting of a dark brown pinstripe suit, shirt and tie, a light brown overcoat and a pair of Converse Chuck Taylor basketball shoes from the TARDIS wardrobe, a costume which Tennant described as "geek chic" *. He also sometimes wears spectacles — his use of them in Tooth and Claw and The Impossible Planet suggests they are reading glasses.
In Tooth and Claw, the Doctor and Rose were also knighted by Queen Victoria as a reward for saving her from a werewolf. He was knighted as "Sir Doctor of TARDIS". Afterwards, she banished the Doctor from the British Empire.
In The Girl in the Fireplace, he appeared to develop romantic feelings for Madame de Pompadour while attempting to discover why clockwork androids on a 51st Century spaceship were stalking her throughout her life. Ultimately, he was unable to take her with him as the last, asynchronous time window returned him to her after her death.
In Rise of the Cybermen, the Doctor was forced to fix the broken TARDIS giving up the energy from ten years of his life. Given the general longevity of the Time Lords, whether this will affect him to any significant degree is yet to be seen.
While the series had played around with the idea of romantic feelings between Rose and the Doctor, it was only at the end of Doomsday that Rose, left on a parallel Earth, told him that she loved him. The Doctor began to reply, but only managed to get out her name before communications between worlds was cut off.
Companions
The Tenth Doctor begins with Rose Tyler as his companion; she subsequently left on the final episode of the 2006 Season. At the end of the episode, a bride named Donna played by Catherine Tate had somehow appeared on the TARDIS and it appears she'll be a temporary replacement companion.
Rose's boyfriend Mickey Smith (Noel Clarke), a recurring character from the previous season, joined the TARDIS crew as a regular companion in School Reunion. Mickey departed the TARDIS in The Age of Steel, replacing his deceased counterpart on a parallel Earth. He returned in the 2006 two-part series finale, Army of Ghosts and Doomsday.
Rose's mother, Jackie Tyler is also a recurring character in the first two series, and played a major role in several episodes, notably The Parting of the Ways, The Christmas Invasion and Love & Monsters, finally travelling in the TARDIS in Army of Ghosts.
In a 5 July 2006 press release, the BBC announced that the Doctor would be joined by a new companion called Martha Jones in Series 3, played by Freema Agyeman. Agyeman previously played Adeola in Army of Ghosts, a character who died by the end of the episode. It is not yet clear when or how Martha will join the TARDIS; she will not be appearing in the 2006 Christmas special.
Previous companion "Captain" Jack Harkness was originally to have rejoined them in the 2006 season. However, John Barrowman was unavailable to return in the role, likely because of obligations created by the new Doctor Who spinoff series Torchwood, and the announcement that at least initially there would be no crossovers between the two series. Barrowman has stated that he would return to the series in 2007, and this has been confirmed by producer Russell T. Davies in Doctor Who Magazine.
The Doctor was also reunited with previous companions Sarah Jane Smith and K-9 (Mark III) in School Reunion.
Personality
So far, the Tenth Doctor has displayed a light-hearted, easy-going and somewhat cheeky manner, yet with a strong personal sense of justice that makes him quick to anger when he feels it is violated, as in New Earth when he learned of the plague farm run by the Sisters of Plenitude. In The Christmas Invasion he showed a grimmer side when he sent the Sycorax leader (who was attacking him from behind) tumbling to his death while commenting that, with him, there were "no second chances." He was equally unforgiving of Prime Minister Harriet Jones; after Jones had given the order to destroy the retreating Sycorax ship, the Doctor warned her that he could "bring down" her government with six words ("Don't you think she looks tired?", whispered to Jones' aide). Like the Ninth Doctor, he sometimes uses a cheerful facade to mask inner emotions.
The Tenth Doctor has a tendency to babble, mixing apparent nonsense with vital information, sometimes acting erratically to put his enemies off guard like some of his earlier incarnations. He can also be rude on occasion, and is not always aware of it. In School Reunion, he acknowledges that he is less merciful than he used to be. He has a tendency to use technobabble to describe scientific concepts before substituting it with a simpler, analogous explanation.
The Doctor is also able to rapidly switch between moods, from manic to angry to nonchalance. He used this as a form of reverse psychology on two occasions (Fear Her and Army of Ghosts). By switching gears suddenly when confronted, it made the person disconcerted enough to allow the Doctor his own way.
It has been made clear that the Doctor is, despite constant interaction with others, a lonely person deep down. In School Reunion, he describes the ability of Time Lords to live so long as a curse, because while his human companions all someday leave him and eventually die, he continues to live. Other characters have also commented on the Tenth Doctor's loneliness.
Where the Ninth Doctor tended to be somewhat standoffish around most humans, the Tenth is more extroverted and gregarious, quickly establishing a firmer rapport with Rose Tyler's friends and family than his predecessor ever managed. The Tenth Doctor is also fonder of mankind, and is apparently in awe of their tenacity and curiosity, a trait exhibited by his fourth incarnation.
The Tenth Doctor and Rose often faced their adventures with a cheerful, almost blasé attitude, even when terror and death happened around them. Queen Victoria commented on this in Tooth and Claw when she banished them, and producer Russell T. Davies hinted that there would be consequences to this carefree attitude later in the series. At the end of the 2006 series, in Doomsday, the two were separated, seemingly forever, when Rose was left in a parallel universe as a consequence of foiling a Dalek and Cyberman invasion of Earth.
The 2006 series continued the exploration of the Doctor's romantic aspects, with the Tenth Doctor sharing kisses with Rose (albeit while she was possessed by Lady Cassandra) and Madame de Pompadour. In School Reunion, Sarah all but confesses that she had been in love with him. In Doomsday, during their farewell, Rose tells the Doctor she loves him; he begins to reply but only manages to say her name before the transmission is cut off.
The Doctor was also seen to put on a pair of spectacles, which may imply a degree of longsightedness, like the Fifth Doctor, with whom he shares his youthful appearance. He also exhibits a remarkable sense of taste, able to identify the blood type of a blood sample (The Christmas Invasion), the presence of mistletoe oil (Tooth and Claw) or bakelite (The Idiot's Lantern) just by licking.
The Tenth Doctor speaks with an Estuary English accent, rather than the Northern inflection that the Ninth Doctor used, the Received Pronunciation of most earlier Doctors or Tennant's natural Scottish brogue. In a December 23 interview on BBC Radio 1, Tennant explained that a line had been scripted for the Christmas special explaining that the newly regenerated Doctor had imprinted on Rose Tyler's accent, "like a chick hatching from an egg," but the line was cut from the final programme. (Had the line been kept, it might have caused a continuity issue, since the first voice the Sixth Doctor heard was that of his American companion — yet he kept his English accent; this was also the case with the Eighth Doctor, who regenerated in a San Francisco hospital). The Tenth Doctor also briefly affected a generic American Appalachian accent in the Children in Need special and The Christmas Invasion, and a Scottish accent (actor David Tennant's own accent) in Tooth and Claw.
Like his predecessor, the Tenth Doctor shows a fondness for human popular culture — a characteristic not all of his previous incarnations seemed to share — but even more so, to the point where he finds himself unconsciously quoting The Lion King during a confrontation with the Sycorax leader. He also referred to his pyjamas and dressing gown as being "very Arthur Dent", a Hitchhiker's reference. He also appears to be a fan of pop music, and has made quips about Balamory (in Tooth and Claw), EastEnders (in The Impossible Planet), and Ghostbusters (in Army of Ghosts).
His references are not all restricted to modern pop-culture. In Tooth and Claw, his description of Rose as a "tim'rous beastie" is an allusion to the poem To a Mouse by Robert Burns, an 18th century Scottish poet.
Other appearances
Three full-length novels have been released featuring the Tenth Doctor. They were published by BBC Books in April 2006.
- The Resurrection Casket by Justin Richards
- The Stone Rose by Jacqueline Rayner
- The Feast of the Drowned by Stephen Cole
- The Nightmare of Black Island by Mike Tucker
- The Art of Destruction by Stephen Cole
- The Price of Paradise by Colin Brake
See also
External links
"Tenth Doctor"