Theory talk:Timeline - Second Doctor

Fear of the Daleks Place in the Timeline
This article says that the entirety Fear of the Daleks takes place immediately after The Wheel in Space, but I'm not too sure… Now yes I will agree that the first couple minutes when they're in the TARDIS does indeed take place right after that particular story, I do not think rest of the story came immediately after The Wheel in Space. The main reason for this is because when we first see the Doctor in the next TV serial, The Dominators he says he's exhausted from "projecting all those mental images." Meaning that this serial would logically take place after the end of The Wheel in Space as well as the first couple minutes of Fear of the Daleks. The rest of The Fear of the Daleks could take place at any point after The Dominators, but I still don't think the main part of the Fear of the Daleks takes plave before this TV story. I think this needs to be reevaluated. –Nahald ☎  23:14, February 13, 2014 (UTC)

Placebo Effect (novel)
In Placebo Effect (novel) Samantha Jones encounters Kleptons, and the events of The Klepton Parasites, including mention of the Thains, are told. So the TV Comic comics must occur in the same reality as the Eighth Doctor Adventure novels. Master of Spiders ☎  13:34, May 27, 2014 (UTC)

Placement of The Five Doctors
As you're including Season 6B then there is a clear placement for the Second Doctor's appearance in The Five Doctors (TV story). As is made clear, the Second Doctor's appearance in Players (novel) occurs during World Game. And so does the Second Doctor's appearance in The Five Doctors (TV story).

At the end of Chapter Thirty-Six Serena has died, and the Doctor gets in the TARDIS which dematerialises.

When the next Chapter starts the Doctor is back as the CIA headquarters. His hair is now grey. And then the dialogue states:

The CIA say that the Doctor "took his time getting back", and the Doctor admits that he took side steps before returning to the CIA. It is of course stated that he has a working TARDIS, which he is able to control.

So between Chapters Thirty-Six and Thirty Seven of World Game the Second Doctor takes various solo adventures, during which his hair turns from brown to grey. This is at a time when he i)Has lived through and remembers The War Games (TV story) ii)is travelling alone and iii)is able to control his TARDIS. And since the Second Doctor looks significantly older in The Two Doctors (TV story) then he does in The Five Doctors (TV story), The Five Doctors (TV story) must take place before The Two Doctors (TV story) from the Second Doctor's perspective. Master of Spiders ☎  13:48, May 27, 2014 (UTC)

Placement of The Two Doctors
It's currently stated that during The Black Hole the Doctor and Jaime "almost" visit the events of The Two Doctors but leave upon seeing the Sontarans. However, in the audio, Jaime says they've had several stops after the Sontarans and have been gone for weeks. So where did the "almost" part come from? Steed ☎  02:22, May 13, 2016 (UTC)
 * Somebody misunderstood the audio and was being very insistent. Ideally it should be placed both within The Black Hole and after World Game. Fwhiffahder ☎  05:02, May 13, 2016 (UTC)
 * I wasn't just insistent, I was also rather obtuse! The Champion of Time     ☎  11:19, May 13, 2016 (UTC)
 * Perhaps you could fill me in on this, because to me it just seems that Big Finish is coming up with their own explanation for Season 6B independent of BBC Books series. I honestly find it hard to believe that they are ignoring the events of The World Games, Big Finish has always seemed ignore the BBC Books canon, they've already wrote their own version of events regarding the Sixth Doctor's regeneration which completely ignores Spiral Scratch, I don't see why they wouldn't be doing the same thing with Season 6B and The World Games. After this, all that will be left for them to do is make stories depicting when Mel first joined the Doctor (Business Unusual) and the circumstances behind the Master's failed regeneration (Legacy of the Daleks), or maiming, depending on how you interpret those events. To me it doesn't seem like that big a stretch to say that Big Finish constantly ignores most pre-New Who non-television media unless it was made by them (this includes their _Short Trips_ books). The only reason why they acknlowedge the Virign New Adventures as canon—in spite of the massive continuity problem that the series represents to the new series alone—is because Bernice Summerfield was their first successful series and paved the to them securing the rights to produce official Doctor Who audio dramas from the BBC. But even then they currently seem to be in the process of rewriting the Virgin New Adventures series in their recent adaptations of them in order to make them more continuity friendly, which then lead to them adapting the Virgin Missing Adventures as well. In fact the _only_ pre-New Who non-Big Finish media that I know of them referencing is the Marvel _Doctor Who_ comics when they did Circular Time and the Stockbridge Trilogy.  So if you do have any solid proof that says that this story isn't meant to set up Season 6B, I'd very much like to hear it, because something tells me it simply comes from a desire to try fit all of these stories in the same continuity when, in fact, that simply is not possible to do without taking massive leaps in logic that border on fan fiction. Seeing as how this is a theory page however (a blatant misuse of the phrase that I think the Doctor himself would very much disapprove of, by the way) none of the admins have authority here and would likely only get involved if we had an edit war that escalated to the point that drama arises from it. At the same time, however, I also acknowledge that there is currently no official sources that give an official account of what is and is not canon in the Whoniverse so really, as long as it doesn't contradict anything in the TV series itself, there's really no reason for one form thing to be considered more canon than the other. I personally rank the Doctor Who canon in tiers which are as follows: the TV series > all Big Finish productions and writings > modern Doctor Who novels > non-Big Finish audio dramas (the Fourth Doctor AudioGO series, for example) > all Virgin publications > IDW, Titan, and Marvel published comics > all other novels > BBC Books novels > the comic strips. Now I know that simply disregarding certain publications or favoring one continuity over the other will likely not go over well here, so here's what I propose: We consider the publisher behind each story and their intention when writing the story and place it where it best fits in the timeline. If we have a case of two stories that are meant to lead into another story but have a different placement in the timeline (like with this one and the Two Doctors) we will simply put said stories in two different places in the timeline and include an explanation. We will also hold all stories by these publishers to this continuity, meaning that Helicon Prime and all Big Finish produced Short Trips that take place during Season 6B while the Doctor is traveling with Jamie (the ones where he's traveling alone will be a bit trickier) would take place before the second half of Black Hole while any BBC books stories that feature the Season 6B Second Doctor will take place after The War Games and The World Games. Interested to hear everyone's thoughts on this idea, so let's keep this civil. –Nahald  ☎  08:58, September 1, 2016 (UTC)
 * Simon Guerrier, not Big Finish as a whole, has introduced another explanation for The Two Doctors. It doesn't explain the rest of Season 6B, like The Five Doctors or That Time I Nearly Destroyed the World whilst Looking for a Dress. Big Finish has also referenced BBC Books publications at least as much as they've contradicted them. There is absolutely no canon, and the very idea is stupid and harmful. The intent of authors, editors, and publishers is never and will never be considered meaningful: only the narrative is important. I do think The Two Doctors should be placed both during The Black Hole and after World Game: we can speculate that the CIA removed The Black Hole from time because of the Monk's interference, and had the Doctor re-enact The Two Doctors independently once they had control over him. Fwhiffahder ☎  13:18, September 1, 2016 (UTC)
 * What you mean the canon thing I presented, the tier thing? Of course that's not accurate, was just giving an example of how I perceive some media in the series having more significance than others, and obviously Big Finish is going to consider their own continuity first and foremost before any other established continuity. I will say thought that I have yet to listen to the interviews included in The Black Hole, perhaps that will provide some additional insight. One thing I will say though: hats off to Simon Gurrier for making sense of that nonsensical handwave of "studying graphology." True many writers have tried their hand at making sense of nonsensical bits of writing from the classic series, but making sense of a poorly written bit of dialogue from the cesspool of terrible writing that was mid-eighties Doctor Who? That takes a special kind of talent. –Nahald ☎  04:19, September 3, 2016 (UTC)

Final Adventures

 * Continuing from edit summary discussion...

In the case of the CCs, I can see your perspective, but the point is that most of these stories lack any such mention in this article. On the topic of probabilities, these stories are equally likely to occur in release order as some randomly chosen order, so a default of release order seems sensible to me. Stories with better defined placement presumably already have descriptions assigned to them. Regardless, I've moved The Rosemariners, The Queen of Time, and The Light at the End into later placements, since the "busy few weeks" section is already well populated with stories which have no choice but to be placed there. Thanks for your time, Danochy ☎  00:16, March 12, 2020 (UTC)

I’m not hugely familiar with the Second Doctor's Timeline, especially not this particular era. So I can’t personally comment too much about how things should be placed. However I do agree with your sentiments regarding release order. Absolutely if evidence in a story suggests a particular placement then that should take precedence but if we have several stories in the same gap with no evidence where they go respectively of each other, then release order is champion.

One of my issues with the timelines right now is it seems when release order is appropriate, arbitrary stories are placed in an arbitrary order. But when it makes sense to group something out of general release order (Like the DWM and Titan Comics for the Thirteenth Doctor) they're placed that. Another thing is that so many of the placements on these pages are taken straight from EyeSpider and as much as I respect that he’s constructed his timelines, so much of it is factually inaccurate and randomly placed. I think that the order for this particular section is largely based on his timelines actually. SarahJaneFan ☎  11:47, March 12, 2020 (UTC)


 * Sorry for the delayed reply. Been working a job that gives me little computer time, and am sharing a computer with the family, which has been dedicated to home schooling the younger generation since the Corvid-19 outbreak. Been editing on my phone for the majority of the past few days, and its not the best for discussions. To cut to the chase, the Lost Stories are placed close together because of their status of being depictions of lost stories from that era of Doctor Who, with a few other entries placed there because they amount to cameo or minor appearances from the Second Doctor. Apologies I can't debat the point better, but it's been a while and I've forgotten what we were discussing to begin with.BananaClownMan ☎  23:14, March 23, 2020 (UTC)


 * It's fine, I understand your situation. The main point of discussion was regarding clarification of how stories should be placed without other evidence, however that perhaps deserves to take place in Theory Talk:Timey-wimey detector, as it affects the whole Timeline section of the Wiki. This is something both SarahJaneFan and I are eager to talk about. No need to rush such a conversation - now that I know about your situation we'll be sure to take it slow to allow you to respond. On top of that, we wanted to discuss a potential rework of the Second Doctor's timeline, and the relationship between the timeline pages and their corresponding main wiki page, but we should stick to one topic at a time, I think. Danochy ☎  04:50, March 24, 2020 (UTC)


 * Yeah I’m pretty much in agreement with what Danochy is saying and can confirm that at least on these points he’s speaking for the both of us. SarahJaneFan ☎  10:59, March 24, 2020 (UTC)


 * Perhaps I should begin my part in the debate on the relationship to the main pages by telling the origins to how I ended up contributing to the timeline pages. It was in roughly 2014 or 2015 (maybe 2016 actually), when I decided to update the Doctor pages with the 12 Doctors, 12 Stories stories, only to find that I had no idea where I should place them. I typed in "Dr Who timelines" to Google, and got redirected to many sites that had no consistency between them. Finding these forums, I decided to use them as a home base to jot down all notes on potential placements from the conflicting websites, and find a way to order them into the closet to a coherent timeline as I could. My Asperger's syndrome helped to stay dedicated to the task, even when misunderstandings and disagreements lead to lengthy blocks. Once I had finished all the Doctor timeline pages, I applied my findings to the main pages and was able to add details on 12 Doctors, 12 Stories to where they most logically took place. I like to think that anyone else who wants to add information to biographies can look at the timeline forums and see where their entries are most likely to take place from them, and update the entries to an even more logical location if they have information to add of their own.BananaClownMan ☎  20:10, March 25, 2020 (UTC)

Thoughts mostly conveyed on the timey-wimey talk page. SarahJaneFan ☎  15:02, April 3, 2020 (UTC)

Overhaul of this timeline
It has been thought that there are numerous problems with this timeline that need to be discussed. The problems are created, or at least made worse, by the limited nature of the Second Doctor's life, particularly the fact that his television stories often lead into one another.

The major issues off the top of my head are as below, but feel free to bring any others to attention.

1. The gap between The Wheel in Space and The Dominators, which has been shoehorned open, with The Dominators clearly occurring soon after Evil of the Daleks recap. An argument could be made that Fear of the Daleks also involves mind projection, however that story clearly takes place right after The Wheel in Space.

2. Last of the Cybermen, Legend of the Cybermen, and the few weeks pretty much every story must take place in. According to Last of the Cybermen, The Space Pirates was "last Wednesday", while The Invasion was "weeks back". Later, the Sixth Doctor indicates that one of the next stops will be The War Games, creating a very confined space for which these many 2/Jamie/Zoe stories can take place. One could make the assumption that the Sixth Doctor was wrong, but to be off by a matter of months, to even years? (Legend of the Cybermen has it that Zoe aged around 2 years while away from the Wheel.) Whatever the case, this section needs serious discussion, or at least candidacy in the article as to the problematic nature of this area of the timeline.

Again, feel free to contribute more problems, and I look forward to discussing this. Danochy ☎  01:08, April 3, 2020 (UTC)


 * Yeah I’m in complete agreement with the points above. I think the Zoe section of the timeline needs a complete re-evaluation to be honest.


 * Also I think that The Two Doctors should be placed on the timeline twice. Once after The Black Hole and again after World Game with an “according to one account” to explain the discrepancy. SarahJaneFan ☎  12:57, April 3, 2020 (UTC)


 * To add further to the discussion, Jamie says in The Invasion that only a couple of weeks have passed since The Web of Fear, so with Victoria’s final Adventures and the Doctor and Jamie's time alone needing to be squeezed into that small gap, alongside Zoe’s first few adventures I reckon there’s really no room to open a gap between The Wheel in Space and The Dominators. SarahJaneFan ☎  12:46, April 4, 2020 (UTC)

It sounds a lot like these "issues" are of your own making. As this Covid-19 crisis has shown, a lot can happen and change in a couple of week, so Jamie's comment in The Invasion doesn't need to be taken so literally. Also, Legend of the Cybermen brings up a point that can't be contradicted; Zoe was on the TARDIS for around two-years, and there's no way that can be argues against. So, The Wheel in Space and The War Games have a two-year gap, despite no such gap being hinted at in the television series. This is the curse of the "in-between adventures" for an franchise, be it Star Wars, Gravity Falls, or even the MCU.

Even entries like The Dominators, which is intended to take place immediately after The Wheel in Space, had an entry forced between it, Fear of the Daleks, which is explicitly shown to take place after the The Evils of the Daleks repeat, and then trails of to an unrelated adventure, much like the opening of The Wheel in Space, which starts with Jamie upset about Victoria, then a scene cut of unknown time and Victoria is never mentioned again. Since there's never an indication how much time was skipped, and recent entries such as Ladt Day at Work confirm there is indeed adventures between the The Wheel in Space and Fury from the Deep, writers and fans can shoehorn further entries between the two if it is backed up by the limitations of said gap.

Also, me and User:RogerAckroydLives debated a storm about The Black Hole, but it was eventual agreed that Season 6B was the logical place due to a number of factors; We never see the dark-haird Doctor and teenaged Jamie land on the space station in The Black Hole, we're just told they went as far as seeing the Sontaran attack and fled. Meanwhile, the Season 6B entry World Game explains why the Second Doctor has grey hair and an adult Jamie with him, with the The Two Doctors novelization showing how the Time Lords retrieved Jamie, and A Brief History of Time Lords explain that the events of The Two Doctors was what made them decide to go through with the forced regeneration at last.BananaClownMan ☎  23:09, April 5, 2020 (UTC)


 * You bring up a lot of good points Banana, and I'm inclined to agree that the current situation (mostly) works. While it's not perfect, we'll need a solid idea of replacement before we could engage in fruitful discussion.


 * Although I do disagree with your proposal that "Zoe was on the TARDIS for around two-years, and there's no way that can be argues against". There are plenty of times when the Doctor and companions are separated for lengthy spells of time, such as The Indestructible Man where the three are apparently separated for 6 months. There are also cases such as The Kingmaker where a matter of days for the Doctor equal years for Peri and Erimem. Whether that's relevant here or not, I'm not entirely sure, but it's good to keep in mind.


 * As to The Two Doctors, obviously placing it after World Game is the best option if we had to choose, but we could just as easily go with "according to one account" and put it in twice. Not to start a precedent across the whole timeline space, but in this case both stories lead directly into it, so it's kinda necessary. Danochy ☎  05:23, May 11, 2020 (UTC)

I’m kind of open to things going either way in regards to The Two Doctors, as long as we don’t make the claim that the Doctor and Jamie left the events of The Two Doctors. That could be inferred but it’s clearly not the intention. We could at least have a note saying that the author intended The Two Doctors to then take place in that gap.

As for the Zoe thing, I’m in agreement with Danochy. Plus I’m very adamant about there being no stories except Fear of the Daleks between The a Wheel in Space and The Dominators. None of the stories that sit there now need to be there and could easily be moved. I’ve explained why I think this before but I’m going to be stubborn and keep insisting on it. If something absolutely needs to come in that gap, then so be it. But it doesn’t so it can be left. Besides the next few stories only take up a few days and there’s stories set after those where Zoe is still claiming that she’s only just joined the Doctor and Jamie.

I think the situation with Last of the Cybermen can only be resolved by deciding whether you trust Jamie’s claim that The Invasion was a few weeks ago more than the Doctor’s belief that The War Games is going to happen very soon. Honestly I’m more inclined to believe the Doctor and I’d be more comfortable with more stories being before Last of the Cybermen and The Space Pirates than after to be honest but I don’t think there’s an easy solution. SarahJaneFan ☎  22:52, May 13, 2020 (UTC)


 * OK so I think we're in agreement here. As it stands we have:
 * 1. The Two Doctors twice
 * 2. Moving a bunch of stories from between The Wheel in Space and The Dominators to
 * after The Wreck of the World.
 * 3. Either have Last of the Cybermen soon after The Space Pirates or soon before The War Games. Personally I've come around to BCM's opinion that Jamie should be trusted, considering he's the one living the events. Whether the numbers are precise is a different matter though. Spearhead from Space and other Season 6B stories indicate heavy mind-wiping of the events surrounding The War Games, so it makes sense if the last clear memory the Doctor has is of Last. As such, I have little problem with having stories set after Last of the Cybermen any more, except perhaps it should be curated so that he hasn't lost too much of his memmory, and stories the Doctor is know to later recall are set earlier. Danochy ☎  02:55, May 20, 2020 (UTC)

I can’t say there’s much for me to add other than I agree enough with your points. The second one in particular for me personally. SarahJaneFan ☎  11:54, May 22, 2020 (UTC)

Season 6B
Beyond War Games has presented a new, slightly different origin for Season 6B that doesn’t entirely line up well with what we have already been told. It’s not a huge deal but it’s also something that’s worth talking about.

World Game and Players cover the same events. World Game is essentially an extended account of the Second Doctor's involvement in Players and lifts a lot of text directly from Players before spinning off into its own thing. Anyway, World Game begins with a note stating that the original version of the Doctor’s trial was significantly edited for the public record and that the following events depicted are the unedited account. We are then presented with an alternative version of the Doctor's sentencing at the end of The War Games. Instead of being sentenced to exile and regeneration, the Doctor is sentenced to death and effectively put on death row. He spends some time waiting around in an anteroom for his execution to be carried out when a representative of the CIA called Sardon meets with him and offers a plea deal. If he runs missions for the CIA for a time then they will eventually commute his sentence to exile rather than death. World Game then leads directly into The Two Doctors.

Save Yourself is another 6B story written by Terrance Dicks and it begins very similarly and intentionally to World Game. The Doctor is waiting in the Time Lord anteroom after his death sentence but is visited is visited by an unnamed member of the CIA who offers him a way out. This could be Sardon again or someone else entirely. It’s then revealed that the Doctor isn’t on his first mission for the Time Lords but the latest in a very long line and that simply after every mission the CIA have been wiping his memories and making him think he only has to do one mission for them and then will be freed over and over again.

Beyond War Games begins where The War Games ends, with the Doctor being spun away in a void. He then arrives on a planet and briefly believes that he’s escaped his exile, until it’s later revealed to him by CIA operative Raven that he’s been taken out of time a quantum second before his regeneration to run missions for the CIA. It’s also stated that the Third Doctor is already in exile on Earth and the Doctor has visions of Spearhead from Space which is running concurrently to The Final Beginning. So in this account, the CIA pull the Second Doctor out of time after he has already regenerated rather than interrupting his trial to offer him a plea deal like in earlier accounts. He’s also not sentenced to death and is instead aware that he’s already been exiled and has a choice between running missions or returning to his natural timeline to regenerate and start his exile.

Beyond War Games very clearly follows on from where we leave The War Games exactly. Whereas World Game and Save Yourself work on the assumption that what we saw onscreen at the end of The War Games didn’t actually happen and alternate events occurred.

We have a few options for dealing with this as far as I can tell:

1. We treat BWG and the Terrence Dicks stories as simply two alternate accounts that don’t mesh together.

2. They all fit together after The War Games and any inconsistencies are down to memory wipes.

3. The Terrance Dicks stories actually take place during the events of The War Games while the Big Finish stories take place afterwards. We could say that the Doctor had two sentencings, his original is the one presented to us in World Game and then after many missions with the Time Lords as depicted in stories like The Two Doctors and World Game, the CIA finally grow tired of him and decide to wipe his memory one last time and give him his exile. This is the one that we see onscreen. Then he’s exiled to earth and becomes the Third Doctor, but the CIA decide that actually he may yet still be useful and pull the Second Doctor out of his time stream again from just before he was exiled and after his initial stint with the CIA.

Personally I like the third option. It allows both versions of Season 6B to exist together but also separately in their own contexts. Plus it gets around the fact that the Terrance Dicks stories completely retcon the end of The War Games away. This reinstates those final scenes.

The sequence of events would be as follows: 1. The Doctor has his trial and waits to hear the verdict 2. The Doctor attempts to escape with Jamie and Zoe, but when this fails he is forced to say goodbye to them. He is informed that a verdict has been reached in his trial. 3. The Doctor is sentenced to death then sent to an anteroom to await execution. 4. Sardon intervenes and offers him a plea deal to commute his sentence to exile if he runs missions for the CIA 5. The Doctor agrees and World Game, The Two Doctors, Save Yourself and other stories occur with the CIA regularly wiping the Doctor‘s memory back to immediately post his death sentencing. 6. The CIA eventually decide to give the Doctor his exile. The wipe his mind again then send him to a second sentencing. He’s shown what happened to Jamie and Zoe on a monitor and then informed that he is to be exiled and forced to regenerate. He then disappears into a mysterious void. 7. The Third Doctor arrives in exile on Earth and begins working for UNIT. Meanwhile Raven extracts the Second Doctor from his final moments and uses him as an agent for the CIA once again.

SarahJaneFan ☎  00:04, 8 July 2022 (UTC)