Doctor Who has steadily grown in popularity since 2005, but the show has actually been around much longer, and it’s all thanks to the Doctor’s ability to regenerate. Back in 1963, when television was a slowly growing medium with only two channels available in the UK and three in the US, Doctor Who broke tradition and introduced sci-fi video series to the public. Initially, the brief for the show was simple, with an old wandering alien humanoid traveling through Earth’s history in his space ship which looked an awful lot like a telephone box. The show and the creative team behind it quickly pursued more ambitious feats introducing aliens, machines, and adventures to far-off planets and the distant future, but at its core, it was about one man, the Doctor, and his journey through time.
During this period, the Doctor was played by the then 67-year-old William Hartnell. Hartnell had garnered reasonable success in the UK in both film and TV with roles typically portraying a military man, hot-tempered, organized, and at times, rather intense. Many of these traits were also present in his portrayal of the Doctor, however, Hartnell also had the chance to display a softer side as the series saw him travel with his granddaughter, Susan Foreman. From 1963 to 1966, Hartnell helmed the Tardis through a total of 134 episodes, due to the fact that many shows during this period were released weekly and continued for many months of the year, unlike today. However, due to health issues and challenging relationships on set, Hartnell and the Doctor Who team decided to part ways in 1966, but the show was incredibly popular, and replacing the lead actor had to be accounted for within the story, that is when regeneration was born.
How Regeneration Works in Doctor Who
While non-fiction shows would require a change in actor to go unnoticed, the genre of Doctor Who lent itself to being able to interact with this development. The Doctor had been shown to be from a distant time in the first episode, but it wasn’t until “The Tenth Planet” that his ability to entirely change his physical form was revealed. Living up to its namesake, Doctor Who continued to leave many questions about its titular character unanswered. The Doctor’s species, the Time Lords was first revealed during the Second Doctor’s run in “The War Games,” his possessing two hearts was only revealed in 1970 during the Third Doctor’s debut in “The Spearhead From Space” and the series continued to reveal more about the man in the box throughout the following decades.
The Doctor has himself explained that the ability to regenerate came from Time Lords’ continued exposure to the Time Vortex, while lore from the books and audio adventures appear to attribute the ability to regenerate to Rassilon, a Time Lord leader who has had several run-ins with the Doctor throughout the show’s history. When a Time Lord grows old and frail or their body begins to shut down due to mortal injuries, the cells of their body change entirely, becoming fresh and new. This leaves the affected Time Lord with a brand new body and often a number of changes in their behavior, personality, and attitudes as well. Despite this, regeneration and its finer details still appeared to be somewhat mysterious and Time Lords were able to effect regeneration through further experiments, as shown in the 50th anniversary short “The Night of the Doctor” which showed Paul McGann’s Eighth Doctor drink an engineered liquid to influence his next regeneration into the War Doctor played by John Hurt.
The Timeless Child Paradox
As is often the case with shows that continue for extended periods of time, Doctor Who has also had a number of continuity issues. The Doctor’s age has been hotly debated, as has the total number of regenerations which he either had remaining or lived through previously. During the Chibnall era, the concept of regeneration as long-term fans knew it was altered in a significant way with the introduction of the Timeless Child narrative. Essentially, the Doctor was revealed to have been a separate being from the rest of their species who was found beneath a wormhole. Tecteun, a Shobogan from Gallifrey took the child home with them before discovering their ability to regenerate due to an accidental fall from a cliff. Tecteun then became obsessed with learning and replicating the child’s ability and eventually found success. Tecteun provided the other Shobogans with this ability and limited their ability to regenerate to a total of 12 times.
This child was revealed to be the Doctor, long before they had regenerated into Hartnell’s First Doctor. How this story may develop or if it will be retconned going forward is unclear at present, but there was earlier evidence of the Doctor living other lives even in classic Who with “The Brains of Morbius” revealing an additional eight faces of the Doctor which had not appeared before on-screen. The Chibnall era also introduced concepts like forced regeneration into another body as The Master performed in “The Power of the Doctor.” It’s possible that some of these storylines will be picked up and further explored with the return of Russell T. Davies as the Doctor Who showrunner and Ncuti Gatwa’s eventual appearance as the Doctor, but until then, the source of the Doctor’s ability to regenerate remains unclear.
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