The Silver Nemesis was one of Doctor Who's many attempts at being dark and edgy in order to boost ratings in the 80's. The serial had Doctor and Ace visit England in 1988 to prevent a Time Lord super-weapon from falling into the wrong hands. The villains of the story consisted of three groups; long-term enemies the Cybermen, a group of Neo-Nazis and a 17th-century sorceress named Lady Peinforte. The weapon in question, a living metal statue, had been launched into space by the Doctor on an asteroid in the 17th Century. However, the three groups were all alerted to the return of the weapon by a mathematical prediction that it will return in exactly three and a half centuries. The specific date, 23rd November 1988, was significant because it was the air-date of the serial's first episode, which marked the Silver anniversary of the airing of the first episode of Doctor Who in 1963. Except nothing screws up soothsayers like a change in the calendars. In 1638, the mathematician calculates that the asteroid will return exactly 350 years later. Sure enough, the comet returns exactly as scheduled on 23rd November 1988. However, in 1752 the UK switched from the Julian calendar to the Gregorian calendar. The biggest repercussion of this change was that Britain skipped the eleven days from the 3rd to the 13th September 1752. This puts the mathematician's calculations out by nearly two weeks, and the Nemesis asteroid should actually return on 4th December. And that's before we get into the different ways that the two calendars treat leap years.
With a (nearly) useless degree in English literature and a personal trainer qualification he's never used, Freddie spends his times writing things that he hopes will somehow pay the rent. He's also a former professional singer, and plays the saxophone and ukulele. He's not really used to talking about himself in the third person, and would like to stop now, thanks.
