Doctor Who: 10 Similarities Between The Classic And Revived Series
2. Long Stays By The Doctor
THE NEW: The Doctor has lived for centuries, and if you believe Rule One, he has almost certainly lived for more than two millennia. While fans only get to see some parts of it (and read about a few more), the sad truth is that for a long-lived alien with 13 lives, he has lived for an admirably long time. He is not adverse to staying for a long, long time, either. Most notably the Eleventh Doctor fled from his death at Lake Silencio for 200 years, being stuck in a white hole for three years, and defending Christmas and Trenzalore for 900 years. Even the Tenth Doctor spent an undisclosed amount of time searching for his friend Carla in the Haldenmor Fugue. The modern incarnations are certainly willing to spend large parts of their life in a fixed time and place, surely strange for a Time Lord often eager to fight and leave.
THE OLD: Unfortunately, its a trait not unique to his later incarnations. The Doctor in his early lives have also been so stuck in one place and time - the First Doctor had to be educated on Gallifrey for countless years, the Third Doctor was lost in the time vortex for ten years, the Fifth Doctor was trapped in Victorian London for a year while looking for both his TARDIS and Nyssa (not necessarily in that order) and the Eighth Doctor was comatose for 100 years, stuck on a Wetworld for 600 years defending jellyfish-resembling aliens and was kept a prisoner for three years preventing a space station from blowing up. The Doctor may be a wandering mad man in a blue box but occasionally he can choose to stay to help the ones in need - and hardly look a day older than when he first started.