The Torchwood Institute - A Doctor Who and Torchwood Blog

Tuesday, December 12, 2006

About Time

About TimeOne of my favorite series of books about Doctor Who has been Lawrence Miles and Tat Wood's About Time series. I don't always agree with their opinions about the series, and I don't really need another book of Doctor Who facts. But the commentary throughout the series is fascinating -- for example, discussing where and when Gallifrey was, or why it's not at all uncommon for two people in the Doctor Who universe to have the same physical appearance, or connecting the trends in British society and our favorite television series.

I had a chance to briefly page through proofs of the volume that is coming out that primarily covers the Second Doctor's era, and it looked to be as fascinating as the already released volumes.

One of the other things that is also interesting to start to see how the new series has impacted the commentary and views of the classic series. My example (though this volume of About Time isn't out yet) is that a story like Delta and the Bannermen begins to look like a template for the new series, with a higher awareness of romantic issues, Welsh accents, and a rock and roll soundtrack.

But you've got to wonder about stories like The Ark and Frontios after seeing The End of the World. And finding a time for a story like The Satan Pit makes sense when you here that the relationship between the Ood and the Sensorites might be something similar to those from Raxacoricofallapatorius and the Abzorbaloff from Clom.

One of my favorite things about the entire series is seeing "patterns that aren't there" -- making connections between stories that might not be intentional, but looking at the entire series as a puzzle to a fictional universe that hasn't been entirely locked down.

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