8. Russell T. Davies Wasn't In Charge Of The 2005 Revival
When work started on Series 1 of Nu-Who, Queer As Folk creator Russell T. Davies signed on to spearhead the revival, making the biggest contribution to Doctor Who in decades. But how different would Nu-Who be if someone else had taken the job? There were at least three other pitches put forward including a more gothic vision by Life On Mars co-creator Matthew Graham, a fantasy retelling by author Dan Freedman, and considerably different approach by Mark Gatiss that would have seen the Doctor filling the audience surrogate role usually occupied by the companion. Other than these broadly different pitches, the biggest potential change is that Gallifrey would probably still be around since the Time War was Russell T. Davies creation. Because of this, the Ninth Doctors personality would be markedly different from that of Christopher Ecclestons Doctor as the Time War was the inciting incident that caused his hardened and bitter personality. Because of the absence of the Time War, this hypothetical Doctor would probably be more along the lines of the previous Doctors as opposed to the completely new direction that Davies took. On the subject of potential Ninth Doctors, another possible difference is that Richard E. Grant may have been the Ninth Doctor. Grant
played the Doctor in the 2003 animated webcast Scream Of The Shalka with his Doctor deliberately animated to look like him in case a live action series was made. But because Davies personally disliked the Shalka Doctor, he decided to render the webcast non-canon and create a new Ninth Doctor. Theres no real way to tell just how different Doctor Who would be if Russell T. Davies hadnt been involved. It could have been better (thered be no Slitheen for a start) but the high points of Davies tenure vastly outweigh the low points. It would certainly have been different but not necessarily better or worse.