20 Things Doctor Who Wants You To Forget

15. The Other First Doctor

Doctor Who Forget
BBC

The Five Doctors is many a Doctor Who fan’s guilty pleasure, we forgive its weaknesses because of its ambition. Take for instance, Richard Hurndall’s fondly remembered performance as the First Doctor. Hurndall may have fooled the general audience, but in reality, apart from sharing a similar surname he was nothing like Hartnell’s original first Doctor.

Even the unmarketable figurine that Borusa plays with to show that the First Doctor has entered the death zone is a more realistic representation. But for ninety minutes in 1983 even the diehard fan was expected to forget the ‘original you might say’, despite the archive footage in the pre-credits sequence.

Whatever next – publicity stills with a stand-in Madam Tussauds Fourth Doctor? Ridiculous.

Contributor
Contributor

Paul Driscoll is a freelance writer and author across a range of subjects from Cult TV to religion and social policy. He is a passionate Doctor Who fan and January 2017 will see the publication of his first extended study of the series (based on Toby Whithouse's series six episode, The God Complex) in the critically acclaimed Black Archive range by Obverse Books. He is a regular writer for the fan site Doctor Who Worldwide and has contributed several essays to Watching Books' You and Who range. Recently he has branched out into fiction writing, with two short stories in the charity Doctor Who anthology Seasons of War (Chinbeard Books). Paul's work will also feature in the forthcoming Iris Wildthyme collection (A Clockwork Iris, Obverse Books) and Chinbeard Books' collection of drabbles, A Time Lord for Change.