10 False Doctor Who Facts You Probably Still Believe
Tom Baker is the longest serving Doctor Who? Yeah, about that...
Doctor Who is one of the most documented and analysed TV shows of all time, and yet there are still untruths and misunderstandings that find their way into the fandom.
Who can forget the "fact" that Doctor Who was all filmed live in the 1960s? That started due to a misunderstanding between Carole Ann Ford and Doctor Who Magazine in an early interview. Doctor Who was filmed as live, but wasn't broadcast as such.
Although it's easy to see how the confusion arose, given William Hartnell's fondness for a fluffed line.
In the age of social media, DVD commentaries, and Doctor Who Confidential, the modern era of the show is surely immune to such confusion, right? Wrong.
Whether it's failing to read irony in a print interview, or a misreading of a fact that snowballs into something else entirely, there are still some false Doctor Who facts that many people believe.
Whether it's Classic, New, or New New Doctor Who, Fake Whos is a persistent problem for the fandom. So allow us to pick apart some common Doctor Who misconceptions.
10. The Identity Of The Woman Is A Mystery
For a show that has a mystery in its very title, it's unsurprising that fans see enigmas in places where there aren't any. Take Claire Bloom's mysterious Woman from David Tennant's final-ish story The End of Time, the identity of whom fans have debated ever since.
Was she Susan? Romana? Or was she, as was intended, the Doctor's mother? While nobody vocalises this fact on screen, Russell T Davies emphasized that she was the Doctor's mother in the expanded version of The Writer's Tale, the book that documents the making of the show during his first era in charge.
This means that Claire Bloom – who was told this fact when she was cast – and David Tennant are playing their one scene together as mother and son.
Although Doctor Who has now complicated matters with the story of the Timeless Child and the Doctor's adoption, Claire Bloom's character is unequivocally whoever the Doctor knew as their mother at this point in their lives.
However, did Steven Moffat ever explain who the woman in the barn was in Hell Bent? The one that serves Capaldi soup? Is that the same character, regenerated after the Master sent Rassilon and Gallifrey back to hell?
Maybe there's a mystery to be solved here after all.