While we wait with baited breath for November to roll around, here’s a few references to Classic Who that have been dropped in here and there during Matt Smith’s tenure as the Eleventh Doctor. How many did you spot?
Series 5 - The Beast Below
1. It is noted that Earth was abandoned in the 29th century due to solar flares. This was a central plot point of the Fourth Doctor serials “The Ark in Space” and “The Sontaron Experiment” (both 1975).
Series 5 - Amy’s Choice
2. The Dream Lord says to the Doctor, "I bet you're a vegetarian!" in a butcher's shop and calls him "veggie", referring to the 1985 multi Doctor story “The Two Doctors” in which the sixth Doctor (Colin Baker), after a run-in with some hungry cannibals, announced that he and then companion Peri would eat a vegetarian diet from then on. Clearly fish is still on the menu though, given his penchant for fish fingers and custard.
Series 6 - A Christmas Carol
3. In one of the many Christmas Eves the Doctor and Kazran spend with Abigail, they present themselves to her in long, stripy scarves - the Fourth Doctor's iconic trademark accessory.
Series 6 - The Impossible Astronaut
4. “Brave heart, Canton” The Doctor says. This is a phrase the Fifth Doctor always used to use when talking to his companion Tegan Jovanka.
Series 6 - The Day of the Moon
5. The Doctor and Rory discuss both having been present at the fall of Rome. Rory of course was there guarding the Pandorica but the Doctor was also present, in his first incarnation and indirectly caused the great fire of Rome in “The Romans”... Oops.
Series 6 - The Doctor’s Wife
References a-plenty in this one, unsurprisingly:
6. The cube the Doctor receives at the start of the episode which he recognises as a message from the ‘Time Lord emergency messaging system’, is almost identical to (probably an updated version of) the cube the Second Doctor contact the Time Lords with in that Doctor’s swansong “The War Games”.
7. When the Doctor first encounters the TARDIS in human form she refers to him stealing her - As New Who fans will know from the Series 7 finale, the First Doctor stole the TARDIS upon his exile from Gallifrey.
8. When The Doctor and Idris are rebooting an old discarded TARDIS console, it strongly resembles the original console room in both shape and design.
9. When talking about how he ‘patched up’ Auntie & Uncle, the Doctor says he used to have an umbrella like that. This is probably a reference to the umbrella carried by the Seventh Doctor, which amongst other things had a handle shaped like a question mark and a built-in fold-out seat. Nifty.
Series 6 - The Almost People
10. Geeky Girl Helen's personal favourite ‘throwback’ moment comes when Ganger Doctor provides us with a plethora of old who references. While struggling with the Doctor's past regenerations, the Ganger misquotes the first ever episode: “One day we shall get back... yes, one day" as "one day we will get back... yes, one day"; speaks the Third Doctor’s catchphrase: “Reverse the polarity of the neutron flow”, and brilliantly speaks with the voice of the fourth Doctor (Tom Baker), asking: “Would you like a jelly baby?”. Genius.
Series 6 - The Wedding of River Song
11. The eyedrives worn by Madam Kovarian and the characters in the alternate timeline are a tribute to the late great Nicholas Courtney, who wore an eyepatch when playing an alternative version of Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart from a parallel universe in the intense 1970 season finale story “Inferno”. Courtney died in 2011 and there was not a dry eye amongst old who fans when, also in tribute, Steven Moffat included the Doctor discovering that his old friend had died. Blub.
Series 7 - Asylum of the Daleks
12. Did you spot all the different incarnations of the Daleks? The production team located as many remaining models as they could find and had them shipped to the studio to use in this episode. They include the special weapons Dalek from the brilliant 1988 story “Remembrance of the Daleks” (a story worth mentioning in it’s own right even though it’s Old Who, for including a brilliant reference to much earlier episode - this story was set in late 1963 and Ace switches on a Television to hear a BBC announcer saying “Saturday viewing continues with an adventure in the new science fiction series, Doc-” before the scene cuts).
Series 7 - The Snowmen
13. The Great Intelligence previously featured in the second Doctor serials “The Abominable Snowmen” and “The Web of Fear”, set in the 30s and 60s respectively. In both these stories, the Great Intelligence uses robot yeti as its physical presence. Not only that, but The Snowmen could be considered as a prequel to the Second Doctor Yeti stories. The events of The Web of Fear are certainly alluded to by the Doctor in The Snowmen when he presents the London Underground biscuit tin to the Great Intelligence in Dr Simeon's laboratory - The Intelligence states: "I do not understand these markings", in reference to the 1967 London underground map design on the tin. The Doctor remarks that the Underground is a "key strategic weakness in metropolitan living", referring to (and possibly setting in motion) the future Yeti attack on London via the Underground. Again - oops!
14. As seen on her gravestone at the close of the episode, this version of Clara has the birthdate of 23 November, the date Doctor Who was first transmitted in 1963.
Series 7 - The Bells of Saint John
15. The overall arc of Series 7 is of course the first question - Doctor Who? Clara asks that very question upon meeting the doctor - as did both previous versions of her that the Doctor has met. But Series 7 isn’t the first time this question has come up. It’s been a continual theme throughout the show’s history but most notably in the very first episode - when Ian Chesterton mistakenly refers to him as Doctor Foreman, the Doctor himself utters in surprise “Doctor Who?”, setting the stage rather nicely for this series, 50 years on. It’s like there was a plan all along...
Series 7 - The Rings of Akhaten
16. The Doctor mentions to Clara that he had visited Akhaten long ago with his granddaughter. This is a reference to Susan Foreman (Carole Ann Ford), who travelled with his first incarnation following their exile from Gallifrey. This is the first explicit reference to Susan in New Who, although The Doctor has made vague references to having had a family - most notably Ten tells a shocked Donna that he was a father a long time ago after his daughter Jenny is created from his DNA.
Series 7 - Cold War
17. The Doctor informs Clara that the TARDIS has "relocated" to the South Pole automatically as he accidentally reactivated the HADS (Hostile Action Displacement System) while fiddling with the controls. The HADS is one of the defence mechanisms of the TARDIS, and was first mentioned in the Second Doctor story The Krotons. Right from the off, the Doctor would often forget to manually set the HADS. In addition, the Ice Warriors were first encountered by the Second Doctor, and later the Third.
Series 7 - Journey to the Centre of the TARDIS
18. The scene where Bram from the salvage ship tries to dismantle the TARDIS features audio clips from the very first episode, “An Unearthly Child”, the third doctor adventure “Colony in Space” (Jo Grant’s first TARDIS outing), and the fourth Doctor episode “The Robots of Death” (as well as from earlier episodes of New Who). Nice.
Series 7 - The Crimson Horror
19. When the Doctor arrives, he mentions to Clara that he once spent ages trying to get a "gobby Australian" to Heathrow Airport, a reference to the Fifth Doctor’s companion Tegan Jovanka (played by Janet Fielding) and his efforts to get her back to Heathrow in the finale of Series 19, “Time Flight”. The Doctor obviously has Tegan on his mind when, like in “The Impossible Astronaut”, he utters that phrase again: "Brave heart, Clara," harking back to what he always used to say to Tegan. Aw.
Series 7 - Nightmare in Silver
20. Webley calls the chess-playing Cyberman, "the 699th wonder of the universe," a reference to the Third Doctor adventure “Death to the Daleks” when the Doctor called the Exxilon city one of the 700 wonders of the universe. At its destruction, he comments that the universe will have to "make do with 699 wonders." And it will have to make do with 698 now.
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