Board Thread:The Panopticon/@comment-31010985-20180428165444/@comment-25472716-20200901234857

Scrooge MacDuck wrote:
 * 1) The Cushing Movies are revalidated, on the basis that they never actually broke Rule 4, they just conflict with most modern viewers' personal beliefs about DW "canon". Dr. Who (Dr. Who and the Daleks) is brought in line with this sandbox.

I would like to express my agreement with this proposal.

I'm aware that some of what I'm about to discuss has already been covered or discussed, but it's easier for me to illustrate all my thoughts together rather than in reference of others here. But... let's start with out-of universe intention of the movies since authorial intention seems a key matter and really hammer on why I would say that Dr. Who and the Daleks fits Rule 4;

Point 1: Why the Dr. Who main cast are so different - The Doctor Who File by Peter Haining quotes the following from Heather Hartnell when asked about Hartnell wanting to play the Doctor in the film: "He would dearly have loved to play the Doctor but he just didn't have the time. The programme was then on for 48 weeks of the year." Which is a fair point in matters - there was little chance of these versions looking and acting exactly the same because the main TV cast were exceptionally busy.

Point 2: The name of Dr. Who - Let's leave aside all the in-universe points and take note of one thing here. Terry Nation used Dr. Who in his scripts. That's how he referred the character - this is evident firstly in the DWM Companions special with the excerpt of Susan's farewell where he is listed as such, and secondly in the episode title of "The Death of Doctor Who". (A title that the production team seem to have been happy to go with. They weren't as fixed on the matter as we are now in the typical perspective of The Doctor.)

Doctor Who Bulletin 81 (now known as Dream Watch Bulletin) features an interview with Subotsky [who co-wrote the film with Whitaker] and he says, rather interestingly; "I just read the script. In fact, I haven't seen those Dalek episodes at all." Subotsky used two things for reference, then, in reshaping the script alongside Whitaker... and those were: Nation's scripts (which have them rendered as 'Dr. Who' in dialogue assignment & - if I recall correctly, also the title header... those I may be wrong on that for The Daleks specifically, I know that the 'And the Silurians' debacle happened because the internal procedure had been to write 'Doctor Who and... [TITLE HERE] & the recovered and auctioned Hartnell copy of the script for An Unearthly Child has the main heading 'Doctor Who and the Tribe of Gum'...) and Whitaker himself (who seems to have been flexible on the nature of the show in the main defining points, as his earliest drafts for Power of the Daleks show, indicating the intention that the First Doctor wouldn't be the first regenerated incarnation.)

Point 3 - He's a human Well, there's still several years to go before the concept of Timelords exist. And the individual interpretations of the Doctor up until then seem unclear and without consensus. For what it's worth, I think it notable that The Monsters from Earth (a 1966 Annual story, originally published in 1965) has the Doctor note himself as both a human and Dr. Who. And it is worth saying that though the First Doctor is firmly not of our time - as has been noted by someone here, Dalek6388 did a really good video pointing out the ambiguity on the TV show.

Now, there's a lot in said video but noting amongst various other things are three key points for me; 1. that Susan only ever notes to David in The Dalek Invasion of Earth that she is of another time, not another species. Seems like a large omission for Nation to make if he was viewing things otherwise. 2. that the First Doctor responds to the mention of Einstein with someone called Venderman in relation to the Time Space Visualiser, and that Vicki knows of this person. We can explain this away in-universe rather simply these days, but it seems a bit unlikely that Nation would have the Doctor citing a scientist Vicki would know of if he wasn't of the view that the Doctor was human. 3. that in The Massacre, the Doctor seems to imply that he is of another species... but in The Savages, the Doctor outright says "They're men. Human beings, like you or me.". Surely enough indication of the flexibility and lack of consensus even after the Cushing films?

Point 4 - He built the TARDIS Okay, we have a debatable matter of the intentions of that line in "Flight through Eternity" about the Time Path Indicator being in the TARDIS since he built it & what Nation's intentions were there. But I'm gonna forego that for now... Let me come back to this in a moment...

Point 5 - Where has An Unearthly Child gone?/The different start & Ian and Barbara dating etc. Is this really a distinct and deliberate attempt to be separate from the TV show and thus the DWU at the time? I would argue not so. It seems rather more than the opening is one of feasibility, than trying to break away from the DWU.

As has been noted above, Doctor Who in an Exciting Adventure with the Daleks has a different start and is considered valid. As well as that, it must be noted that said different start came around because Whitaker, though with permission of Nation - was without permission of Coburn to touch anything definitely An Unearthly Child in nature. He not only wasn't trying to hold himself to the TV show exactly there in that valid source, he was also adapting to necessity. He changed the opening to fit what was feasible.

Firstly; why should DWiaEAwtD be accepted where Dr. Who and the Daleks isn't? Secondly; would it not be reasonable to expect that - having only the rights to Nation's scripts for the film, and that they already had 7 25-minute episodes to fit into the length of said film - Whitaker and Subotsky made these opening/character starting point changes for similar legal & length concerns...?

And back to 4. He built the TARDIS (or TARDIS) Could this not then be a change either in reflection of opinion of Whitaker, or out of necessity too?

It seems to me that those five main points that tend to be used against Dr. Who and the Daleks in validity (and indeed in discussions outwith this wiki about canon) are easily defeated when you look at them in perspective of the time rather than with our retrospective eyes, and I would say that there is a strong case here for revalidating them.