The Five(ish) Doctors Reboot

Chapter the 347th, one of the two best things made to celebrate the 50th anniversary of Doctor Who.

Plot:

It's late 2012, and the 50th anniversary of Doctor Who is less than a year away. The fifth Doctor actor Peter Davison is concerned that the planned TV special will only feature new series Doctors, and starts a campaign for old Doctors to be included too. He recruits sixth and seventh Doctor actors Colin Baker and Sylvester McCoy (eighth Doctor actor Paul McGann could only promise to be involved subject to work commitments, and fourth Doctor actor Tom Baker doesn't answer his phone). The three of them protest outside Television Centre; a passing John Barrowman informs them that the special is being filmed in Cardiff. They get a lift with Barrowman, sneak into the studios via the Doctor Who Experience exhibition, and end up performing in the special inside three Dalek props. They celebrate while ignoring a phone call from Russell T Davies, who's also desperate to be involved. In post-production, the scene with the three Daleks is cut, but luckily they were also filmed for a scene where they hide under dustsheets (as the Zygons do in The Day of the Doctor), which makes it to the finished programme.

Context:

At the time of writing, the most recent Blu-ray season box set from the Doctor Who collection has been out about a month; this one showcases the 21st season of the series, first broadcast in 1984. I've been watching the episodes and extras on it continuously since it came out, and I'm only halfway through - it is a very comprehensive ten disc set. One of the extras I have watched already was The Five(ish) Doctors Reboot, Peter Davison's comic short film made for Doctor Who 50th anniversary in 2013. I did touch on this story in passing in the Deeper Thoughts section of the post on The Five Doctors, which I blogged in 2020. Seeing it again on Blu-ray, and listening to the newly recorded commentary on the set, I feared I hadn't done it justice with that fleeting reference, so am covering it as another unexpected extra for the blog in April 2026 (following the two episodes of Dalek Master Plan covered last time).

First Time Round:

One could argue forever about what's the worst or the best Doctor Who story. The Season 21 Blu-ray season box set contains one story (The Caves of Androzani) that has topped polls, and one (The Twin Dilemma) that has languished at the bottom of the same polls. A good few fans, though, find the former a bit overrated and the latter unfairly maligned. Official Doctor Who skits are much less numerous, of course; with less competition, I think there's a good argument to be made that The Five(ish) Doctors Reboot is the best Doctor Who skit. It was probably given a boost on my first watch from coming hard and fast after what is indisputably the worst Doctor Who entertainment show. Again these are few and far between, so there's never been a poll. If there were, Doctor Who The Afterparty would almost certainly come last. On the evening of 23rd November 2013, after having enormously enjoyed The Day of the Doctor anniversary story (another poll-topping story), I switched over to BBC3 to watch the Afterparty. This was a shambolic live show attempting to celebrate 50 years of a television show by being dismissive of most of its stars and interviewing pop band One Direction over the worst satellite link-up ever seen on live television. It did do a good service in featuring the three stars of the comedy skit that was to land on the red button service immediately after the live show, something that might not have been known about by many viewers. To say that the following 30 minutes of comedy were better than the Afterparty is like saying that chocolate is better than a tracheotomy.

Reaction:

Elsewhere on the aforementioned Season 21 Blu-ray box set, there is an interview with companion actor Mark Strickson (who played Turlough in the 1980s) recorded at the Doctor Who 50th Celebration at the ExCeL in London, the day after The Day of the Doctor's transmission. Strickson is a little grumpy from being in the middle of travel to and from his home in New Zealand (and - who knows?! - maybe from being at the Afterparty the previous evening too). Asked what he thought of The Day of the Doctor, he tells the interviewer that it was a good story, but maybe not that great as a celebration of 50 years of Doctor Who. Featuring all the old Doctors just with archive clips clearly wasn't celebratory enough for Strickson, and perhaps many other viewers. What's fun, though, is that - by extending a gag about his taking mock umbrage at this very idea - Peter Davison ends up creating exactly the celebration required. Stuffing The Day of the Doctor with all the surviving classic Doctor actors, many looking markedly different to how they did back in their day, could have been made to work (The Power of the Doctor has a good stab at it a few years later), but it would have been contrived and cluttered. Steven Moffat made the right choice; his insurance, of course, was providing production funding to Davison's comic short; he'd clearly seen that Davison had stumbled across an original and effective way to complement the main anniversary special. It's not just a clever name - the Reboot acts as a nice comic sequel to The Five Doctors, and has the same intent: to showcase as many Doctors, companions, guest stars and monsters as possible. It even has some call backs - the use of Shada footage to explain away Tom Baker's lack of involvement, and Davison getting to say "Sorry - must dash!" at one point.

It's funny too. Though Davison had long displayed comic chops as a performer, he was untested as either a comedy writer or director, but does both extremely well. His co-stars Sylvester McCoy and Colin Baker have also both demonstrated over the years that they can handle humorous material, and with their director they each form distinct and heightened comic personae as themselves (in inverted commas): Peter is a bit grumpy and at odds with the world, Colin is the slightly brash voice of common sense, and Sylvester - in a sweet performance - is permanently bemused. McCoy's delivery of "He probably won't", after talking of famous Hollywood director Peter Jackson's tendency to keep his cast hanging around until he gets a moment of inspiration, is worth the entrance fee on its own. Then there's his almost thrown-away "Got it a bit wrong actually" when he and Baker are both quoting their best Doctor Who lines. This is prompted by McCoy being asked by baker whether he wants sugar in his tea, calling to mind a famous scene in Remembrance of the Daleks ("Every great decision creates ripples" / "In your tea?"). McCoy was filming the Hobbit trilogy with Jackson around this time, which forms a running gag. Watching all these mentions of the director and his work, one doesn't think for a moment that Jackson would actually appear, but then amazingly he does, and even more amazingly we get Ian McKellen in costume as Gandalf too. It's the biggest but not the only casting coup. Getting Olivia Coleman was impressive enough - as is mentioned on the Blu-ray commentary, the joke about Coleman's ubiquity ("I'm usually in everything") has become even more relevant in the years between then and now.

One shouldn't underestimate the casting coups that came from inside the world of Doctor Who, of course. From the commentary, it's clear that a certain guerrilla style was required, with Davison grabbing any opportunities when he could (filming at a real-life convention allowed him to get a very funny scene with Paul McGann, short notice arrangements nabbed a quick scene with Matt Smith and Jenna Coleman, a sheer fluke led to an appearance from Dan Starkey in costume as a Sontaran). A sequence inspired by Davison's regeneration sees Steven Moffat haunted by floating heads of many, many companion actors from Doctor Who's long history whizzing around him. Most are accounted for, though it's a shame that Mark Strickson didn't get to take part in this very celebratory moment. He was in New Zealand during filming, of course, but then so were Peter Jackson and Ian Mckellen! John Barrowman gets a bigger cameo. The revelation of the personal secrets of "Barrowman" ("Don't tell anyone - please") is such an insanely good gag that I won't spoil it for the uninitiated by spelling it out here. It's undoubtedly coincidence, but the action meshes perfectly with the real world of Day's production: Tom Baker doesn't need to join the classic Doctors' protest as he's been cast in the 50th anniversary show already; Paul McGann is up for it but then drops out, off filming The Night of the Doctor. Davison, Colin Baker and McCoy appear in the sets used for Day, and interact with many of the real life production crew playing themselves.

It was only when Russell T Davies appeared right at the end of this story that I realised he had otherwise kept himself completely out of the 50th anniversary hoopla. Maybe he didn't want to steal any of his friend Steven Moffat's thunder. Or maybe he was just saving himself for this triumphant moment ("Quel dommage Davros!"). Everyone is more than happy to send themselves up, and it's all very good natured and fun. Doctor Who's a family show, and the stars and fans alike all talk about the Doctor family; as such, it's appropriate that this is a family affair. Davison's wife, sons and grandson appear in the story. His daughter appears too as well as producing the short, and she ropes in his son-in-law. Georgia Moffat and David Tennant are both hilarious, acting out being put-upon by Davison and reluctantly helping him with his crusade. Colin Baker's family are all present and correct and contribute to another funny scene. The sons of Patrick Troughton and Jon Pertwee are in small roles within the piece too. It's like the most expensive home movie ever, but is always entertaining enough to justify its existence (rather like the show that inspired it). It truly is the perfect celebration of Doctor Who's history in all its quirky glory.

Connectivity:

The Five(ish) Doctors Reboot, like the two recently found episodes of The Daleks Master Plan, features Daleks and journeys between different locations within one story. If one were to cheat just a tiny bit and include Day of Armageddon (the episode in between the newly found episodes, discovered a couple of decades earlier) they both feature human characters disguising themselves as aliens (the three heroes of the Reboot pretend to be Daleks and Zygons, the first Doctor dons the garb of alien delegate Zephon).

Deeper Thoughts:

More new old Who. After nearly a year of no Doctor Who on TV, spring 2026 brought not only a couple of found episodes, but three stories newly available in novelised form. These new Target paperbacks are clad in the usual stylish design, with evocative cover illustrations by Dan Liles. It may be my imagination, but the paper stock being used feels a little bit nicer than for previous books in the range too. Unlike the last few batches which concentrated on recently broadcast tales, these three adapt stories from 2005 to 2010. The first, Aliens of London, is a version of a story from the earliest season of the relaunched series. It's adapted by long-term Doctor Who extended universe creative Joseph Lidster. In an author's note, he celebrates ticking off a bucket list achievement in writing a Target novelisation. It surprised me that he'd not done one before now, to be honest. He's a good fit for the material (a favourite story of mine, by the way, though many wouldn't share my opinion). Like many a long-term fan, he comes to this book primed with approaches that have been used before for such adaptations. He chooses what I'll call the Malcolm Hulke method: finding or inventing POV characters within the story to expand on the events they witness. This undercuts just one moment: there's a great throw-away line on TV about a character having a "wife, a mistress and a young farmer" that doesn't work as well here because we've had a preceding scene where we've met all three at length. The rest of the time it works. I enjoyed sequences from the perspective of Barry (I'll give nothing more away - it's better to go in unspoiled) and Tosh (Torchwood's part of the action is somewhat expanded from the original). The strictness shown in avoiding any omniscient narration, and some nips and tucks for better flow, mean some details are lost, for example the rising hysteria about aliens that gives context to Jackie's reporting the Doctor and Rose to the authorities.

The inner life of characters like Mickey, Jackie and Harriet Jones brings out the melancholy in the story that TV viewers might have missed.  Lidster's work also nicely dovetails with Russell T Davies's short story prequel "Where Did They Get the Pig?" from a Doctor Who Magazine special in 2025. There's some nods to future stories, like a scene of Captain Jack watching Margaret Blaine escape to the Isle of Dogs at the end. Jenny T Colgan gets to pull the same trick in her adaptation of the Weeping Angel 2-parter from Matt Smith's first season, The Time of Angels. River Song's inner thoughts are informed by the knowledge she has that Amy is her mother, even though that wasn't revealed to the audience back in 2010 (presumably the writer of the TV version Steven Moffat already had it in mind back then). With the full details of River, Amy and the eleventh Doctor's character arcs (which Moffat probably hadn't fully worked out this early) known to her, Colgan is able to be add many nice touches, and she captures all the characters well. There's also a - very nerdy, but nonetheless welcome - reference to Amy somehow being linked to the Pompeiian character also played by Karen Gillan in earlier story The Fires of Pompeii. All the stories adapted this time are 2-parters, so there isn't the need to put in much extra material to fill the page count. Colgan adds an opening section introducing the person that wrote the journals about the Weeping Angels referenced by River and the Doctor; amusingly, this is a person from our present who romanticised the past and sought the Angels out to send him there. He finds once he's living in it that it's very far from being a golden age.

If you want more radical new material, then the final one of the three books is for you. This is Matt Jones's The Satan Pit, based on his own scripts for the 2006 David Tennant story. If Lidster took the Malcolm Hulke approach, then Jones does it like Donald Cotton: he reshapes the material using a framing device where his characters tell the tale in their own words. We join the story after the events depicted on TV have taken place, and the rest of the book is formed of first-person testimonies from the three survivors, Ida, Danny and Zack, to authorities that disbelieve their talk of a magic man in a flying box that saved them. The book acts therefore as both novelisation of and sequel to the TV version. Like Lidster, Jones is rigorous about limiting the action to what these three characters' experience, though at the end there's a clever way of covering the climactic events for which none of them are present. Like Colgan, he makes use of future developments in the series after this story - by the end of the book, the Ood have been liberated (as shown in TV in Planet of the Odd, a couple of years on from The Satan Pit), and there's an addendum connecting to The End of Time. Jones tweaks the characterisations of the guest cast to make them more distinct from one another. Danny becomes a hopeless romantic who rapidly develops a somewhat creepy crush on Rose. Having this as Danny's emotional starting point gives more room for him to mature into as the story progresses. I don't rate the TV version of this story that highly (though many wouldn't share my opinion), but this prose version is much better. The book ends with a courtroom drama climax, the resolution of which will be new to anyone reading, For this reason, and for its more original structure, it's probably my favourite of these latest three books, but all of them are definitely worth a read.

In Summary:

A very expensive home video, but much better than that sounds!