A birthday was the anniversary of someone's birth. Birthdays were celebrated by many cultures, with birthday presents, birthday cards, and birthday cake being received in birthday parties.
One's eighty-eighth birthday was a joyous year for the Japanese. (TV: Captain Jack Harkness)
According to River Song, the Doctor did not forget her birthday, but he would always remember "the same one", so that one year, she received six-hundred and forty seven birthday cards from him, and got nothing in other years. (AUDIO: R&J)
History[]
River Song was taken by the Doctor for her birthday to the last Winter Frost fair on the River Thames in 1814. Stevie Wonder unknowingly performed before being taken back to his original time. (TV: A Good Man Goes to War)
In an alternate timeline, the Sixth Doctor and Evelyn Smythe attended Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's one-hundredth birthday party in 1856. (AUDIO: My Own Private Wolfgang)
Maxwell Edison was born in the autumn of 1956. (COMIC: The Stockbridge Showdown)
At some point in the latter half of the 20th century, for his birthday, Sweep was taken to Butchers Sausage Fun Park, which he squeaked a lot over. (PROSE: It's Raining Gin [+]Jon Arnold, The Curse of Fanfic! (The Curse of Fanfic!, Obverse Books, 2020). Page 134.)
Ellie Oswald was born on 11 September 1960. (TV: The Rings of Akhaten)
Toshiko Sato's was born in July 1975. (TV: Greeks Bearing Gifts, AUDIO: torchwood_cascade_CDRIP.tor)
Clara Oswald's birthday was on 23 November 1986. (TV: Death in Heaven) Her 19th century splinter was also born on this day in 1866. (TV: The Snowmen) The Twelfth Doctor threw an "Infinite Clarabration" birthday party for the original Clara in his TARDIS. (COMIC: The Partying of the Ways)
In the 21st century, the Tenth Doctor first met Barnaby Edwards at his birthday party at the Shady Grove Rest Home. (COMIC: Old Friend)
In 2004, to celebrate Anthony Wallenda's birthday, his friend Stephen Norris went to put a birthday message up on the Liverpool website. (PROSE: Have You Seen This Man? [+]various authors, Who is Doctor Who? (BBC, 2005).)
The London Eye's fifth birthday was in early 2005. (PROSE: Have You Seen This Man? [+]various authors, Who is Doctor Who? (BBC, 2005).)
Due to his artificial creation by the Bane in the late 2000s,[nb 1] Luke Smith had no birthday. (TV: Secrets of the Stars)
Toshiko Sato celebrated her grandfather's eighty-eighth birthday in the late 2000s[nb 2] by going from Cardiff "to London to watch grown men throw rice". (TV: Captain Jack Harkness)
In the 2010s, the Eleventh Doctor sent letters to a group of humans to thank them for saving him and the world, and, after he told them to look out for him returning to check up on them, he mentioned he would be watching their next birthdays through their windows from behind the shrubbery. (PROSE: Hello! [+]Tom MacRae, The Crash of the Elysium tie-ins (Punchdrunk and BBC, 2011).)
In 2011, when Sky grew after a short span of time, Clyde Langer noted her lack of birthdays, remarking it was "rubbish". (TV: Sky)
The Doctor had long forgotten his birthday by the time he had reached his twelfth incarnation, but the Master remembered it from their childhood friendship. As Missy, the Master created an army of Cybermen from deceased humans in the mid-2010s and gave control of the army to the Doctor as a gift with which he could potentially rule the universe. (TV: Death in Heaven)
Maxwell Edison's sixtieth birthday party. (COMIC: The Stockbridge Showdown)
Maxwell Edison celebrated his sixtieth birthday with the Twelfth Doctor and many others in 2016. (COMIC: The Stockbridge Showdown)
The Thirteenth Doctor, Ryan Sinclair, and Graham O'Brien threw a surprise birthday party for Yasmin Khan. (PROSE: Dr. Thirteenth)
Umbreen's birthday. (TV: Demons of the Punjab)
Umbreen celebrated her birthday in 2018 with her daughter, son-in-law, and her granddaughters Yaz and Sonya. She seemed unimpressed that the cake was shop-bought, though Najia insisted it was still nice. She gave a collection of letters from her second husband to Najia, a present from her second husband to Sonya, and the watch she received from her first wedding to Yaz. (TV: Demons of the Punjab)
In 2020, the Fugitive Doctor, under the Chameleon Arch identity of "Ruth Clayton", was celebrating her alleged birthday on the day the Judoon came looking for her. (TV: Fugitive of the Judoon)
Undated events[]
Romana was given an air car for her seventieth birthday. (TV: The Pirate Planet)
Ace and the Seventh Doctor went to a birthday of Bonjaxx, where they met a future incarnation of the Doctor. (COMIC: Party Animals)
The Eighth Doctor tried to take Charley Pollard to a party to celebrate her birthday. (AUDIO: Neverland)
Hex attended a birthday party for himself at a pub, but left early. (AUDIO: The Harvest)
Princess Clio was poisoned by her Uncle Ferdand on her fifth birthday. After the First Doctor put her into stasis, she was only awoken on subsequent birthdays, each of which was attended by an incarnation of the Doctor. (PROSE: The Glass Princess)
Other references[]
The video game Happy Deathday's title was a spin on the phrase "happy birthday." (COMIC: Happy Deathday)
Footnotes[]
Notes[]
- ↑ No on screen date is given for the first two series of The Sarah Jane Adventures, outside of The Day of the Clown from the second series being set shortly after 9 October in an undisclosed year. While Donna Noble's present from the fourth series of Doctor Who is set around the same time as the first series of The Sarah Jane Adventures, and The Temptation of Sarah Jane Smith from the second series of The Sarah Jane Adventures is explicitly described as being set a year after Whatever Happened to Sarah Jane? from the first series, Doctor Who's fourth series is not consistently dated, with TV: The Fires of Pompeii, TV: The Waters of Mars, and AUDIO: SOS setting the present of the 13 regular episodes in 2008 (heavily implied by TV: The Star Beast and TV: The Giggle as well), and PROSE: Beautiful Chaos setting them in about April to June 2009.
- ↑ Episodes 11-13 of the first series of Torchwood are set anywhere from 2007-2010 as a result of conflicting evidence shown in the episodes Ghost Machine, Greeks Bearing Gifts, Random Shoes, To the Last Man, Reset, Adrift, Fragments, Exit Wounds, and The New World. As episode 10, Out of Time, is set at the end of December, this means that episodes 11-13 are almost certainly set the year after episodes 1-10.