10 Things About Doctor Who That Seem To Confuse Non-Fans

7. Sonic Screwdriver

The Doctor's faithful sonic screwdriver is an ever-handy tool that's been used to get him out of his fair share of sticky situations over the years but it's also often accused of being a way for the writer's to get out of their own sticky situations, too. And do you know what? It absolutely is.

As such, saying the sonic screwdriver is more of a cop-out than convenience isn't really an insult at all. It's a pretty obvious and widely accepted fact really and a lot of the show's plots have taken a lot less time to get to the action than they would've without it. Each story is (usually) confined to a limited slot of 45 minutes and sometimes there just isn't time to hang about. The Doctor can use it to do vital things like opening locked doors and scanning for alien tech without having to sacrifice the pace or substance of the overriding story.

Credit where credit's due, the sonic screwdriver has helped the show more times than it's helped the Doctor. At the end of the day, though, why does it even matter that the Doctor's got a tool to help him get things done more efficiently (unless that said thing is made of wood)? You use a remote control to change the TV channel quicker and texting someone is more time-effective than actually talking to someone these days, and it's all basically the same thing.

It's Doctor Who's equivalent of "There's an app for that". Looks like you've been complaining about nothing. The sonic screwdriver isn't the most annoying tool around here after all.