“When I was a little girl I had an imaginary friend, and when I grew up, he came back. He’s called the Doctor.” – Amy Pond.
Here’s a sketch I did of Karen Gillan as the lovable ginger Amelia Jessica “Amy” Pond, and faithful former companion of The Doctor. She shall be missed!
“This is a situation that requires tact and finesse. Fortunately, I am blessed with both.” – The Doctor (‘Terror of the Vervoids’)
Hey folks! It’s another week of The Doctor! Last Saturday we left off with Sketch of The Fifth Doctor played by Peter Davison, where as with every inspired illustration I post, I also explained about what made this incarnation of The Time Lord unique. Sadly, as we all Whovians know, change is a big thing with Doctor Who and with that we continue onto, Sketch of The Sixth Doctor played by Colin Baker!
At the end of The Fifth Doctor‘s life, he goes out with one last heroic act when both him and his last companion Peri Brown were exposed to a raw and toxic version form of the drug spectrox on The planet Androzani Minor. With only one dose of the antidote at his disposal, The Fifth Doctor selflessly sacrificed himself to save Peri. In the end, he expressed his doubt for the first time that regeneration might not be possible this time. But as unpredictable as The Doctor can be, he suddenly regenerates into the Sixth Doctor.
Colin Baker’s Sixth Doctor is a total polar opposite of the Fifth Doctor’s sensitive nature; in which upon completing his somewhat unstable regenerative process, he nearly strangled Peri before he came to his senses. Still, The Sixth Doctor exhibited a brash and overbearing personality that set him apart from all his previous incarnations. One can say that in some ways, it was a throwback to the quick to temper nature and initial undertones of untrustworthiness of the First Doctor.
Along with a brand new personality came a brand new multicoloured attire to match. In his new existence, The Doctor saw himself as the finest incarnation yet, and along with having an almost egoistical superior complex, he did have the I.Q. to back it up. For example, This version of The Doctor actually managed to fix the long dysfunctional Chameleon Circuit, which actually allowed The TARDIS to finally take on the appearance of any object that seemed appropriate with its surroundings. Of course, this didn’t last long cause… Well a Blue Police Telephone Box is way cooler! Well… that and it’s way better than when The TARDIS reappeared as an Organ, to which The Sixth Doctor simply found too ridiculous.
Yes, This Doctor was unpredictable with the tendecy of showing melodramatic arrogance. But deep down the very being of this incarnation still remained The Doctor’s strong moral sense and empathy. Revelation of the Daleks, is prime example of The Sixth Doctor’s compassion when he shared it with a dying mutant. Then in The Trial of a Time Lord, he displayed total outrage at his fellow Time Lords for their part in a plot and cover-up which resulted in the death of most of the Earth’s population. Underneath his tough and unstable demeanour, he was beyond determined to win his universal battles against evil more than ever before. He carried a fire, a thirst to do what was right that was far more apparent than ever before. He jumped into action when necessary, and no one, even his companions could get in his way of doing so.
The Sixth could of been called the “most dislikable” Doctor ever, but to me (and I bet many others), there is still a charm and intrigue for being such a strong character despite his many faults. Much like any of us, we all aren’t perfect and prone to show an ugly side of ourselves from time to time. But what matters is what you ultimately do in the end that defines you for who you really are, and that’s WHO this Doctor was. He was the personification of that specific side of the Time Lord who calls himself, The Doctor. With this said, To Mr. Baker; I just want to say that you played that quite brilliantly, and despite your turbulent on Doctor Who, you were magnificent and perhaps too far ahead of your time to be completely appreciated. Be proud of your now iconic multicoloured suit, because you made us see the beauty it truly held.
Stay tune for, Sketch of The Seventh Doctor played by Sylvester McCoy!
“Well, of course I’m being childish! There’s no point being grown-up if you can’t be childish sometimes.” – The Doctor (‘Robots’)
“Would you like a Jelly Baby?” – The Doctor (‘The Face of Evil’)
So from Sketch of The Third Doctor as played by Jon Pertwee, we now arrive to the piece that inspired me to create this series of Doctor Who sketches in the first place, Sketch of The Fourth Doctor as played by Tom Baker. This is The Doctor I initially grew up on and loved watching as a kid. Funny fact about me watching Doctor Who as a kid is that I didn’t know much about it, and with information not being as available to me as it is today, I was never aware about his previous incarnations. This was also due to the fact that my parents had a tendency of monitoring what I watched, so I was only able to watch a hand full of the Tom Baker episodes at a time. Eventually I sort of drifted off to watching other things that my parents deemed as “safe” like Ghostbusters and Transformers. But then whenever I saw promotional ads about Doctor Who in a TV Guide or magazines my dad used to have lying around, I was baffled to see that there were three other Doctors before and after the Fourth (keep in mind this is around the time of the 80s and reruns were already going on).
This made my young mind explode into different theories as to why there were six other guys that also called themselves “The Doctor”. Eventually, I came to the conclusion that perhaps these six Doctors were a team of adventurers who would called themselves the same name in order to confuse their enemies. Hence, this was my understanding as to why the show was called, “Doctor Who”… Because I thought the baddies would be like Who is the real Doctor? Kids do say the darndest things after all, but looking back at that now, I wasn’t too far from the truth since The Doctor in essence keeps his true identity a deeply guarded secret.
But going back to Tom Baker’s Doctor, he was so much fun to watch as he outsmarted his enemies with his childish pranks. As a kid, I thought it was fantastic to have a role model you shared common traits with, and Tom Baker’s portrayal of The Doctor did just that with his cool trademark colorful scarf, interestingly unique voice, and obsession of candy, preferably Jelly Babies. To me, in that aspect and many others, he greatly identified with his kid audience.
The Fourth Doctor holds a great deal of nostalgia to me as well as a special place in my heart. To Mr. Baker, thank you for the fond memories and for introducing me to an excellent show that I hope will run forever. You definitely made my time growing up an awesome one.
Stay tune for, Sketch of The Fifth Doctor played by Peter Davison!
Johnny Tie Studios 