Howling:Breaking the Fourth Wall

In the show's history the fourth wall has been broken a few times in clever ways.


 * The Dalek's Master Plan - The First Doctor wishes the audience a happy christmas.
 * Rememberance of the Daleks - Ace hears someone talking about a new sci-fi program on the TV in England, 1963.
 * Blink - The Angels never move even if the audience are the only people who can see them.
 * The Wedding of River Song - DOCTOR WHO? DOCTOR WHO? DOCTOR WHO?

I'm just wondering are there other episodes of DW, TSJA or TW notable for breaking the fourth wall? 87.102.117.106talk to me 18:36, January 6, 2012 (UTC)

The Daleks' Master Plan is a definite breach of the 4th wall, since the Doctor addresses the audience directly. The others are arguable.

In Remembrance of the Daleks, we don't (quite) get to hear the name of the programme. It's self-referential but doesn't really breach the 4th wall.

In Blink, not seeing the Angels move is really just giving the audience the same point of view as the characters and that's not breaking the 4th wall.

The Wedding of River Song is again self-referential but no more.

As far as I can recall, The Daleks' Master Plan is the only unambiguous breach in the show's history. --78.146.183.1talk to me 22:53, January 6, 2012 (UTC)

I'll accept your argument for ROTD and TWORS but "Blink" I like to think breaks the fourth wall. In one scene a woman is looking through a crack in a door. An Angel from the garden comes up behind her and... stops. Why? Why not get on with it and zap her into the past? Nobody was watching it. Or were they? 87.102.117.106talk to me 00:07, January 7, 2012 (UTC)

That's a reasonable question. The trouble with trying to answer it is that we don't know enough about who or what needs to be observing an Angel to stop it. If it was limited to intelligent beings, that would raise the question: How intelligent? As a defense mechanism, which is what the quantum lock is, it wouldn't be much use if any old predator could gobble up an Angel, as long as the predator was dim-witted enough. Conversely, if being observed by any organism capable of observing was enough to stop an Angel, they'd hardly ever get the chance to move. In the case you cite, I could speculate that maybe a stray cat happened to glance at the Angel. For all we know, that might do it -- but it's not a very satisfactory explanation. I don't think it qualifies as "breaking the 4th wall" but it is a hole in the plot. --78.146.183.1talk to me 00:46, January 7, 2012 (UTC)

i also saw a 4th doctor episode not so long ago where the 4th doctor seems to be breaking the 4th wall right after stepping out of the tardis, although it could have just been a soliloque (sp?). i can't remember which episode it was, but i know for certain it was in season 15 or earlier as i have not seen later episodes yet. Imamadmad talk to me 02:16, January 7, 2012 (UTC)

Info: "soliloquy". Episode description rings no immediate bells. Can you remember which companion(s) and/or monster(s)? A soliloquy is quite likely -- the 4th Doctor especially had a habit of talking to himself, even if there were others present. Other incarnations have done the same but not usually as much. --89.241.73.88talk to me 05:11, January 7, 2012 (UTC)

it's in face of evil, episode one around the 3:30 mark Imamadmad talk to me 06:58, January 7, 2012 (UTC)

Got it. He's definitely talking to himself but facing the camera. "A little look round, Doctor? Why not." It's not the audience he's addressing. His tendency to talk to himself is probably aggravated by not, at this point, having a companion. --89.241.73.88talk to me 07:58, January 7, 2012 (UTC)

The TWORS thing does come kind of close to breaking the fourth wall. The basic description of the question "the oldest question in the universe, hidden in plain sight," doesn't really make sense from an in-universe point of view, but in real life it obviously makes sense because it is the title and has been for the entirety of the show. Still, I'd say that that is really just being self-referential and not actually breaking the fourth wall.Icecreamdif talk to me 09:49, January 7, 2012 (UTC)

Imamadmad just reminded me - in the "Terror of the Zygons" there is a scene before the episode starts to play where the Doctor steps out of the TARDIS with a message from the Brigadier, and talks to the audience. However I wouldn't say that's part of the episode - that's Tom Baker telling us about the episode. "Attack of the Graske" breaks the fourth wall, but no matter what anyone says I will never regard that as canon. 87.102.117.106talk to me 10:52, January 7, 2012 (UTC)

Now I think about it I probably wouldn't regard the part in TDMP where the First Doctor talks to the camera as canon. After all, it's William Hartnell wishing the audience a Happy Christmas, not the Doctor. 87.102.117.106talk to me 17:16, January 7, 2012 (UTC)

Maybe it was but it annoyed me when I saw it (aged 12). I thought then and still think now that they shouldn't have done that. It did have the effect of breaking the 4th wall, whether it was the Doctor or Hartnell speaking. --89.241.75.207talk to me 17:43, January 7, 2012 (UTC)

If it really annoys you, 89, just imagine that one clip is in the exact same realm as Doctor Who confidential. In fact, just imagine it like this clip http://www.bbc.co.uk/doctorwho/dw/videos/p00mffw3 but incorporated into an episode, because there was no other media formats back then. 87.102.117.106talk to me 18:04, January 7, 2012 (UTC)

If it had been stuck on at the end, after the close of the episode proper, that would have been OK. It would have been the same as, in a theatre, the lead actor appearing in front of the curtain, after it was down, to wish the audience a Merry Christmas. The point is the curtain having come down first. I suspect the makers of the show realised it had been a mistake. They never did anything like it again. --89.242.67.48talk to me 00:27, January 8, 2012 (UTC)

Wasn't it Hartnell's decision anyway? 87.102.117.106talk to me 10:43, January 8, 2012 (UTC)

That's what I heard. I'm not anything close to being an expert, but as I understand it they didn't really do a lot of editing back then. That's why people flub their lines so much in the early stories. If Hartnell just chose to wish the audience a merry Christmas, it might have been easier to just keep it in. Especially since they didn't think that anyone would really be bothering to watch on Christmas anyway, and they didn't really think that people would watch the episodes again afterwards.Icecreamdif talk to me 04:32, January 9, 2012 (UTC)

Editing the tape was so difficult they'd stop recording only for a total disaster (studio falling down, that kind of thing). There's an extra on The Romans DVD where Barry Jackson (who was in the story) talks about William Hartnell's strategy for coping when he dried during recording: he'd resort to saying, "What? What? What?" -- which may sound familiar! --89.241.77.143talk to me 05:55, January 9, 2012 (UTC)

Actually, according to this wiki's page for The Daleks' Master Plan, Hartnell's Christmas wish was scripted. Shambala108 talk to me 06:36, January 9, 2012 (UTC)

There was certainly none of the fuss you'd have expected from the BBC (at that time) if it had been unauthorised. Hartnell did ad-lib but not like that.--89.241.77.143talk to me 08:13, January 9, 2012 (UTC)

Are there any known instances of a scene going horribly wrong? I mean horribly wrong as in sets falling down and people completely forgetting what to do next? 87.102.117.106talk to me 16:43, January 9, 2012 (UTC)

Not in DW. It happened occasionally in other shows at that time. I seem to recall (it's 40-odd years ago, remember) an episode of Z-Cars when the set -- or a largish chunk of it -- fell down. With some difficulty, they carried on. In DW, there were collisions with the furniture, from time to time. Line fluffs are pretty common. I don't remember any actual set collapses, though.

In The Web Planet, there are a few examples of things going awry. One of the Zarbi collides rather heavily with the set. There's also a scene, fairly early in the story, where William Hartnell ad-libs a line about the Doctor's ring and William Russell obviously has no idea how to respond. That's a fairly typical Hartnell ad-lib because it's done in such a way that Russell's reaction is actually also the appropriate reaction for his character (Ian). Hartnell was often -- fairly obviously -- just having a bit of fun when he did that kind of thing but, in this instance, he had a good(ish) reason for it: Later in the story, the Doctor's ring becomes important to the plot and, without the ad-lib, there would have been no groundwork laid for that.

It was very difficult to stop recording and do another take, but not totally impossible. If what went wrong was bad enough, they would do it. In The Dalek Invasion of Earth, there's a scene where the Doctor is being helped down the ramp of the Dalek ship. In the first take, there was an accident and Hartnell was injured. (It's mentioned in one of the extras on the DVD.) Something as drastic as that would persuade them to do a second take. --78.146.182.117talk to me 19:35, January 9, 2012 (UTC)

P.S. The most serious case of a set collapsing in DW actually comes from much later. In the first story of season 26, Battlefield, there's a scene with Sophie Aldred (Ace) in a glass watertank which shattered during shooting. Aldred credits Sylvester McCoy (the Doctor) with saving her life by his quick thinking. That is the subject of a documentary extra, Watertank, on the DVD. In the finished story, the cracks in the tank are visible, the water level can be seen falling as the stuff leaked out (into a studio full of electrical equipment) and Aldred can be seen being pulled up out of the tank, although the technicians doing the pulling can't be seen, as they're hidden by the set. Even if you normally don't watch DVD extras, Watertank is well worth seeing. --78.146.182.117talk to me 19:51, January 9, 2012 (UTC)

I like to think TWORS breaks the fourth wall. The Doctor even looks at the camera at the end. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6U91sWgPc9s {C}94.72.237.220talk to me 09:57, January 21, 2012 (UTC)

I hate to burst your baloon but looking into the camera isn't breaking the fourth wall. Addressing the audience (as the audience) is. Even addressing the camera may not be breaking the fourth wall. If, say, the camera is giving us the point of view of one character (call him Fred) in a conversation and another character (call her Ann) looks into the camera and talks to it, that's still only a "point of view" shot, not a breach of the fourth wall. Ann is looking at and talking to Fred, not the audience. The audience is simply seeing and hearing what Fred sees and hears. --89.241.68.90talk to me 12:38, January 21, 2012 (UTC)

It's a fair enough point but if you watch the clip carefully it seems that if the Doctor isn't looking at the camera he is smiling straight at the floor. It would be weird for him to smile and look at basically nothing with Dorium shouting "Doctor Who? Doctor Who? DOCTOR WHO?" in the background. 87.102.94.3talk to me 18:00, January 21, 2012 (UTC)

It wouldn't be weird, if he was simply smiling to himself. It wouldn't be particularly unlikely, either. --89.240.243.187talk to me 18:36, January 21, 2012 (UTC)

There's one gaping huge fourth wall breaking that nobody has mentioned yet! Remember in Series 3, 4, and 5 of The Sarah Jane Adventures? At the beginning of each episode there's a small clip where Clyde tells the audience about 13 Bannerman Road, then Sarah Jane asks Clyde: "Ready?" and Clyde replies with: "Always." and then looks at the camera. They are all in character when this happens. 94.72.237.220talk to me 10:00, January 22, 2012 (UTC)

well, for starters, that's during the opening credits, meaning it's not really part of the story. does this website consider what's in the credits as canon? anyway, i don't believe that instance counts imo Imamadmad talk to me 11:59, January 22, 2012 (UTC)

As Imamadmad says, that is the introduction to The Sarah Jane Adventures -- and there was something similar in Series 1, with Maria Jackson saying, "This is Bannerman Road ..." etc. It's just an into, with a character narrating it. In theatre terms, it's before curtain up. They don't do it during the episode itself. The closest Doctor Who has got recently has been when a character has served as narrator -- Rose, in Army of Ghosts/Doomsday, and Rassilon, in The End of Time. Narration isn't quite the same as breaking the fourth wall, although they're close enough that poorly done narration can break the fourth wall. In the cases mentioned, I'd say it was properly done and didn't break the wall. --89.241.74.254talk to me 12:14, January 22, 2012 (UTC)