Doctor Who: 20 Things You Didn't Know About The Day Of The Doctor

9. Why It's Called The Day Of The Doctor

Doctor Who The Day of the Doctor the Doctors
BBC Studios

Coming up with the title for any Doctor Who episode must be a difficult task, but coming up with the title for the 50th anniversary special? That's a whole other level of pressure.

During development, the special was known as The Time War, until the official title was announced on 11 September 2013.

Moffat explained his choice of title to SFX magazine:

"It's very rare in Doctor Who that the story happens to the Doctor. It happens to people around him, and he helps out - he's the hero figure who rides in and saves everybody from the story of the week. He is not the story of the week. In this, he is the story of the week. This is the day of the Doctor."
 
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Ellie has been part of the WhatCulture team since 2021 where she began as a freelance presenter for the WhoCulture channel. As a diehard Whovian with a BA (hons) degree in Drama and Acting, this role was the perfect opportunity for her to combine her screen presence training with her extensive Doctor Who knowledge. From there, she branched out to various other WhatCulture channels, including TrekCulture, and became a full time Content Producer/Video Presenter in 2023. Ellie is now a regular fixture on both WhoCulture and TrekCulture and has become a well respected public figure within both fandoms, building up a substantial following across her social media platforms and being given the opportunity to represent the channels and the wider communities at several industry events. Her favourite Doctor Who character is River Song and her favourite Star Trek character is Captain Janeway - which tells you everything you need to know about how she approaches her role within a generally male dominated field.

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Danny has been with WhatCulture for over ten years, and is currently Doctor Who Editor and WhoCulture Channel Manager, overseeing all of WhatCulture's Whoniverse coverage. In 2022, he took charge of WhoCulture and has grown it into the biggest Doctor Who channel on YouTube, and one of the biggest Doctor Who communities on the web full-stop. He has been writing and video editing since his early teens, and first got a taste for content creation after making his own Doctor Who trailers, off the back of a burning obsession with the Matt Smith era of the show. Like many his age, he first got into Doctor Who with the 2005 revival, but has since gone back and fallen in love with the classic years too. If you need someone to recite every Doctor Who episode in order, or to give you a random factoid about the making of Gridlock, Danny is the person to ask!