Forum:Is the K9 TV series canon?

From what I am aware, it has nothing to do with the BBC, nothing to do with any of the current Doctor Who writers (Who also write For Torchwood and the Sarah Jane Advetnures) that have the series following on from the original series, no reference - at all, ever - it made to the Doctor or the Last Great Time War, either. No reference it made to any Doctor Who story ever made in that series, as far as I'm aware.

Due to this, it honestly won't follow continuity. Doctor Who (old and new), Torchwood and The Sarah Jane Advetnures all follow a somewhat solid continuity in the main, proper Doctor Who universe. They crossover, they reference each other, they flashback each other (Sarah Jane Advetnures has flashbacks to old and new Who), they share characters, they all have a place on the modern-day Earth timeline for Who, ect.. They share writers, and they're all related to the BBC, and share producers/whatever.

That allows them, as a sister shows, to keep continuity between all their stories. They're all part of the main Whoniverse. However, as I said, the K9 TV series makes no reference to any Who story, no reference to the Doctor or the Time War, nothing. The writers have nothing to do with the main Whoniverse writers, either, and probably don't know about what is going on in the main Whoniverse, about the Time War and all that.

We know that, because of this, there will probably never be anything to go into continuity connecting it to the main Whoniverse. The only connection is K9 (who, as I said, makes no reference to anything from Who or the Time War).

The best can be said is that it follows a completely different continuity to THE main continuity of the Whoniverse. Delton Menace 15:19, December 28, 2009 (UTC)


 * Wasn't the K9 in that series though the one that Leela had, but had his memory wiped or something? Guess if it wasnt wiped it could have been canoned and depends when it exactly it came from. Leela was left on Gallifrey but no mention was ever made of her again on Gallifrey as far as I'm aware (and on that matter how come Humans were not allowed on Gallifrey but others were?). Leela could have been on Gallifrey say a 100 years before the Time War started and even then it depends which one as there was a time ware in the EDA novels. Besides the K9 series is written by a completely different set of writers and they're not allowed to use a lot of stuff I thik due to copyright (unless they're willing to pay which I doubt they would).

SJA, Torchwood and Doctor Who have continuity problems too mind...... Rhysy54 15:45, December 28, 2009 (UTC)


 * There is more to Doctor Who continuity than the Time War, well the Last Great Time War to be precise, there has been other temporal wars.
 * In Doctor Who those writers who create characters often hold onto the copyright of them, whilst the design of the character remains with the writer/creator.
 * An example is the Dalek, created by Terry Nation though designed by Raymond Cusick. This is why K9 goes through a 'regeneration' and changes shape, the classic shape of K9 is owned by the BBC, K9 the charcter is owned by Bob Baker.
 * Other things that were created in Doctor Who have been spun-off into other series', though they are part of Doctor Who continuity given their start and presence there; thing such as the Autons (they appeared in BBV's Auton Trilogy), Zygons (appeared in BBV's Zygon trilogy of audios), Sontarans (appeared in Reeltime Pictures' Shakedown: Return of the Sontarans, much of which was in PROSE: Shakedown). Liz Shaw appears in BBV's P.R.O.B.E. series...I could go on.
 * K9 is in the K9 series, and he's from Doctor Who, how is that not sharing a character?
 * The Doctor Who universe isn't just about continuity shout outs in story, or flashbacks, or stuff like that. But really what does it matter if they're not making Time War references? The Big Finish audios aren't (in fact can't according to their contract). --Tangerineduel 15:55, December 28, 2009 (UTC)

Well, everything reavealed as the Doctor travels in new Who could completely contradict the K9 series. What if the Doctor travels to London 2050, and something about it contradicts what is seen in the K9 TV series? That shows they're really not going to click into the same continuity. Due to contracts, they're going to be further distanced as time goes when it comes to continuity.

And the K9 from the K9 TV series shouldn't even exist looking at the main Whoniverse continuity, he should have been destroyed with war going off from left to right. We need a Russel T. Davies or Moffat interview where one of them says what is and isn't canon with the what we already know is part of the main continuity. Delton Menace 16:03, December 28, 2009 (UTC)


 * How is that different from anything in the post-2005 series contradicting anything in the novels, comics, audios, or the TV series 1963-989/1996? Or the reverse?
 * Or indeed the numerous other contradictions and other things that don't exactly gel together cohesively?
 * The BBC has always been somewhat vague on what is continuity and what isn't.
 * If you're looking for contradictions and things that don't make sense there's a whole forum post just waiting to happen (how many times have the Daleks, Skaro, Time Lords, Gallifrey been killed off?, how many times has the Doctor met Shakespeare, when did Mel meet the Doctor?
 * Doctor Who continuity before 2005 was a pretty big pool of contradictions even before RTD put his oar in. One more series isn't going to mess with things any more than the couple of dozen other spin-off series have done so already. --Tangerineduel 16:36, December 28, 2009 (UTC)

Because I personally believe the current writers are trying to establish a little more continuity regarding canon and non-canon. Novels released and set during the revived series have been referenced, showing intent that they happened. And some things regarding contradiction can be stemmed from the fact that the Time War was fought across time and thus could have damaged or altered events in the past. The Doctor recently tried to change a fixed point in time. It shows that some events are simply re-written. There is at least one new Who episode that I believe may have been re-written: 'Dalek'. This is due to the complete lack of Dalek knowledge in 2012, among other things, and why Rose suddenly doesn't recognise what the a Dalek really looks like, which she learnt in 'Dalek'.

I believe that even if time changes here and there the Doctor maintains knowledge of the origin event while no one else does. Earth being removed and re-named could have been altered, too. Like time was retconed here and there. I don't know who brought it up, but it could have been Moffat, but something was said about how the Time War could have literally changed some events that happened in the original series. Delton Menace 16:50, December 28, 2009 (UTC)

The BBC allowed Jetix to use K-9, therefore allowing it to be accepted into canon. I'm A Hydroponic Tomato! Bigredrabbit (talk to me) 07:29, January 3, 2010 (UTC)

That means nothing. It's story-telling that identies canon. Delton Menace 14:31, January 3, 2010 (UTC)


 * If I remember correctly, the end of the legal action filed by the BBC and Terry Nation vs. the band Dalek I Love You and their record label was that the label paid some money for retroactive permission. Does that mean that their songs are canon, because the BBC gave them permission?


 * Besides that, Jetix is not allowed to reference anything else from the whoniverse, only to use the character K-9. I don't know if the BBC is allowed to refernence the K-9 series, but I doubt the writers have any plans to.


 * Each person or organization can define their own canon however they choose. But really, the one that matters is the one chosen by the writers, because that's the only one they will even attempt to keep consistent. Unless the BBC puts pressure on Moffat and the various and sundry licensees (the way, say, Lucasfilm does with Star Wars), which there's no reason to believe they'll do, there's no reason to treat their definition as anything special. --99.157.75.211 02:36, January 5, 2010 (UTC)

Despite all that though they did manage to sneak in some references to Doctor Who, K-9 has a music file of the Doctor Who theme song in his head and while that is playing they reference the ability to travel through the whole of time and space. That has to be a sub-linal message to fans that it is canon or somehow apart of The Whoniverse alongside Doctor Who, Torchwood, The Sarah Jane Adventures and that unsuccessful pilot episode of K-9 and Company. My definition of The Whoniverse is Doctor Who, K-9 and Company, Torchwood, The Sarah Jane Adventures and K-9. YOURS SINCERLY COUNTDRACULANOVA969 !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


 * The fact that the original K9 was in the pilot episode sells it for me. Tardis1963 12:13, April 11, 2010 (UTC)

Having watched it now (yeah, I was bored), I agree. They may not be allowed to tied it to Doctor Who in any substantial way, but they're making it clear that the past K-9 can't remember is the time he spent with the 4th Doctor and Leela. And I can imagine that Moffat and friends (or RTD and friends over at the spinoff shows) might make a similar kind of in-jokey reference to something out of K-9 at some point, but I don't think any world-shaking events from one series will be at all referenced in the other.

It's kind of like Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy. The 4th Doctor read a book by Oolon Coluphid, the 7th Doctor quoted The Book in the book in Ghostlight, the 8th Doctor saw a Lazlar Lyricon custom spaceship in one of the radio plays, and the 10th Doctor referred to Arthur Dent (possibly the character in a book he'd read, but it sounded like he meant a real guy he'd met) as a nice man who saved the world in his jammies. But that doesn't mean there's going to be a big reveal at the end of season 32 that Earth was built by Magratheans as a computer for the hypermice. It'll never go beyond in-joke references for the fans that could be interpreted as maybe they're in the same continuity. And I think the same will turn out to be true with K-9.

Or maybe I'm wrong, and later this season, we'll get to hear the line, "This unit has fixed the terrible pain in the diodes all down your left side, robot master." :) --32.175.102.39 13:03, April 13, 2010 (UTC)