Speak Now Storyteller

Hello again! So, to retread what I said in my Companion ranking post, I recently watched the entirety of NuWho because I watched the Fifteenth Doctor’s (Ncuti Gatwa) season in real time due to how much my friend talked about the show in general and how interested and excited she was for the new Doctor. So, I decided to watch The Giggle and went from there to support the new black Doctor Who.

I went into it with no expectations and not much knowledge of the previous Doctors past what my friend told me from them over the years. I never particularly had an interest in watching and I’m not sure why because after watching the show, it’s right up my alley and reminds me so much of Supernatural, which is my favorite tv show so I don’t really know why I was so resistant to watching. 

But then I found out the show was leaving HBO Max on July 31st! So, I had to speed up my watch. I finished though. The only thing I haven’t seen yet are two of the Fourteenth Doctor’s specials, since I watched The Giggle. But I wouldn’t be ranking him anyway because I’m counting him as an extension of 10 since it’s the same actor.

Anyway, I’ve had many things to say during my watch. So, in this post, I’m going to rank the Doctors. I’m ranking the Doctors on how much I enjoyed them as the Doctor, and by extension their run, but that could potentially move the ranking around so mostly by how much I resonated with them.

Starting from the bottom. Again, I’m not ranking the Fourteenth Doctor. I’m going to watch the movie with the Eighth Doctor at some point, so I’ll update the list when I watch that.

8 – Fugitive Doctor (Jo Martin) – Unranked

I’m not really ranking her because we don’t see a full run with her, but I felt it necessary to include her since we do see her a few times. With the Fugitive Doctor, I knew a black lady Doctor existed because of the fandom but of course I didn’t know anything about her. So, my introduction to her was in The Story and the Engine episode with Fifteen. I thought she looked very cool; I really like her outfit, and I got a bit of an indication of who she was personality wise but not much. So, when she popped up in Thirteen’s run, I was like oh! But I didn’t really care for her much. I kind of don’t like how “hardened” she is, and it honestly makes me wanna go “oh so the black lady has to be all hard and stuff”. I hope that wasn’t a thing, but it feels that way. Anyway, I wanted to like her, but I didn’t really. If she popped up again maybe that could change. I’m sure there are like audios and podcasts things that exist as I’ve seen the mentioned when I’ve watched video essays, but I can’t say I would get into any of that right now. I’m also confused on where she fits in to the Doctor’s timelines. I would assume she’s after Thirteen but she was adamant that she was younger and I guess she could have existed at any point even during the classic era. I’m not sure but I wanna know. Jo Martin was good though. Very strong presence.

7 – War Doctor (John Hurt) – Unranked

The War Doctor is also unranked technically because there wasn’t a full run as we only see him once, but I did want to include him because he was in the special and I actually did enjoy him. He was gruff and tired and faced with a difficult decision. It was interesting to have Billie Piper as a in person figment of the weapon that would destroy Gallifrey, and I thought they had good chemistry. It was fun watching him watching him interact with 10 and 11 and even with them being chronologically older, how he’s visible older and treats them like they’re younger than him. It was a fun dynamic to explore. I thought his indecision and grief about how to end the war was handled very well. It was also cool to see just how much the Doctor tried to hide the War Doctor from themselves because of the choice he made that day. How neither of them wanted to even really acknowledge that incarnation. It’s really too bad Christopher Eccleston was like “leave me outta of this” because Nine is directly regenerated from the War Doctor because THAT would have been an interesting dynamic to see. It’s all so mind tricky. John Hurt is great though and I think I read he said he didn’t know what was going on and I find it funny how older actors pop up in fantasy or sci-fi things and have no idea what’s going on but still participate. He does well though as the hardened War Soldier, who gave up the name “Doctor” because he didn’t consider himself a “Doctor” in that time. Intriguing.

6 – Thirteenth Doctor (Jodie Whittaker)– Unfair Run

With Thirteen, she’s probably the first Doctor I was aware of in real time when it was airing because I exist on the internet. I remembered seeing the comments and pushback by some because she’s a woman. I have to say though that I did like her as the Doctor. I liked her energetic persona and how she leaned heavily into the engineering part about the Doctor. I feel like each Doctor has their own specialties and engineering felt like hers. I liked that she made her own Sonic Screwdriver (she used it too much though when she didn’t need to) and I liked that she was always tinkering with something. She was excitable and generally kind and in a lot of ways felt like a teacher, in the earlier seasons because it felt very “after school special”. She’s still very socially awkward as the Doctor tends to be in some incarnations. I don’t think Ten was socially awkward. In the moment when it wasn’t about historical events, she was very indecisive and didn’t seem to be able to deduce things that quickly on the spot compared to past versions, often using her sonic to figure things out, which I found annoying. Sure, not every Doctor needs to be quick on the draw, but I felt like she was often very slow on it. She also felt the most alien and I felt that her companions didn’t do much to help her humanity. She felt separate from Earth which I think is supposed to be the point in how important Earth and humans are to the Doctor. I really liked her style though and I wish we got to see her get her ears pierced during the moment of picking her clothes. I love her outfit, it’s so good and every version of it with the blue or purple shirt worked for me. I also thought she had the least chemistry with her companion group, with Graham being the best one. She’s very expressive when reacting to things, sometimes really annoyingly and overacting depending on what’s going on, I felt like Jodie was good but sometimes it felt try-hard. Girl relax. But at the same time, when Graham came to her about his fear about his cancer returning, her response to him was insane. Sure, she’s socially awkward but telling him you’re not good with this kind of stuff when all you had to do was actually listen to him and at least reassure him. Especially coming off Twelve who tried to be better with that after his first season. I know the Doctor is the same but different but you retain the lessons you’ve learned right? Her regeneration was okay but I was pre-annoyed because I knew DT returned for the 14th Doctor and my friend already lamented to me about DT returning so much to the show, but it was annoying to see her clothes also change when 14 could have easily been in her clothes. They’re androgenous enough AND it would have been cute (fun) to see tall David Tennant in Jodie Whittaker’s smaller clothes. Not to mention, her final line was lame when she’s not tagging a new person. But in the end, it’s really unfortunate how her run went because while I liked Thirteen, I did not enjoy her run. “Tag, you’re it.”

5 – Fifteenth Doctor (Ncuti Gatwa) – Unfair Run

I almost feel like I’m cheating putting Fifteen here, but I genuinely enjoyed him for the most part. His run was just very unfortunate and unfair really. Neither Fifteen nor Thirteen got to have the full 13-episode seasons. I hate that Fifteen didn’t get that because if he did, I might have put him higher. But he’s my first Doctor so I’ll always give him his props for that. What’s interesting about Fifteen, which I think I picked up on quickly even without prior knowledge is that this is a Doctor who thinks he’s healed from all the trauma and it’s so untrue lol. He’s all smiley, youthful and full of cool energy. He’s charming and magnetic and I feel like he’s disarming. His personality just feels welcoming, the most out of all the Doctors we’ve met. However, I remember asking my friend “is the Doctor normally this loud and dramatic?” Him paired with Ruby was overwhelming because he was so loud and dramatic that I found it annoying. Honestly, one of his best episodes in S1 where we got to see more to his personality was in Boom. Every other episode I don’t think he had the opportunity to really showcase deeper emotions past what we’re always seeing on the surface. Not to mention, how much he cried. I don’t mind an emotional man, crying is healthy, but he cried in situations where he didn’t need to. If the first time Fifteen cried was in Boom, it would have been so much more impactful. Or if he cried in Dot and Bubble, which I think was another fantastic showcase for him as a character AND Ncuti’s acting. But I think they never go far enough with his character development and writing for moments to feel earned. Him crying over Rogue? Okay whatever lol. Tearing up that Carla Sunday is a mess without Ruby, meh. Could have worked but didn’t. Crying in Space Babies over the booger monster? Ugh. I think he was much better in S2 but again it just wasn’t enough and then with how the show ended, as a new watcher who loves characters and character development, it was so annoying to see the potential and see it be squandered. Joy to the World, the time he spent with Anita was top tier and I really enjoyed him in that special. He was great with Belinda because she wasn’t enabling him like Ruby would do (outside of her telling him not to call her Rubes). In the Space Eurovision episode, it was great to see him kind of lose it since he’s clearly trying to be “I’m healed!” but it didn’t feel earned. *Sighs* Ncuti Gatwa is very talented, charismatic and it’s so unfortunate that he didn’t get the chance to have a fully fleshed out Doctor. We didn’t get to know him that well and because whatever was going on behind the scenes, he left before there was even really a chance. That’s a travesty. Now that I’ve seen other regenerations, I don’t like how this one looked and then into Billie Piper and we still don’t know what’s going on? They should have just cut to black before revealing the new face. Silly. “This has been… an absolute joy!” It could have been more of a joy if you were written better Fifteen! Justice!

4 – Eleventh Doctor (Matt Smith)

If 13 and 15 had full seasons, honestly, I might have put them both over Eleven. It took me a long time to resonate with him. I wonder how it would have been if I watched in real time but while I think Matt Smith is a great actor, I found Eleven to be too much. He has very childlike energy where everything is amazing to him and not in the way it was with Thirteen. He had very spastic energy and it was overwhelming, which is why Amy’s more straight-forward personality worked with him. I think everything was so fast with him, the way he moved, the way he talked sometimes, the way he absorbed information and talked about it out loud. I’ve seen it talked about that he acted this way because of how self-loathing 9 and 10 were so he dialed up the silly to mask that and I can get behind that. It makes sense to me, similar to how 15 fakes being “healed” when in reality he’s still just as messed up as he’s always been and still needs to the actual work. He was very touchy feely, which I didn’t really care for. No one ever really said anything about it, but I think someone should have. “Stop touching me.” Belinda would have said it lol. But he did grow on me as his seasons went on. I particularly liked Eleven when he interacted with River. I thought they had a lot of chemistry and while it was a little weird at times because of how he acted, I still really enjoyed watching their relationship grow, especially since he had an idea of her after meeting her (and watching her die and seeing how much she loved him as 10). I loved their first meeting for River (when she regenerated from Mels), when they got married, learning that she was the astronaut, him discovering how serious this is when we find out she’s Amy and Rory’s daughter. The scene with her ghost later on. Man. That’s when I particularly enjoyed him because the awkwardness was cute, but it wasn’t too much. Plus, Alex Kingston was a joy to watch with him. His bond with Amy was very nice, especially during his regeneration and he hallucinated her. *cries* I didn’t like him with Clara and honestly, I barely remember it at the end of it all lol. It was a weird relationship and obviously he was into her, but it came off weird. Anyway, Matt Smith is a good actor, and he did very well with the goofiness, with his physicality and everything and in the moments where he had to be serious, he did really well with those too. But again, he’d probably be much lower if 13 and 15 had better written and full season consistently because I just didn’t like him as much. His regeneration scene was great, wonderfully written and acted, I teared up… but then it was ruined by the quick flash regeneration even though I understand why it happened that way but it’s still funny lol. “I’ll always remember when the Doctor was me.”

3 – Ninth Doctor (Christopher Eccleston)

Personally, I think he’s the hardest to pin down with his personality and I think I can attribute that to the Doctor coming off of the Time War in this incarnation and still trying to figure out who he is and what to do with himself. With Nine being one of my friend’s favorite Doctors, I was curious to see how I would feel about him. I also had preconceived ideas of his personality going into this because of his look. From all the other Doctor’s I’d seen, he doesn’t fit which works for him, especially since he’s coming off the War Doctor. He’s very intense and excitable and kind of mean lol. He can be a gruff in his responses to things and even react in a very snarky often callous way. When he tells that Dalek to kill itself, I went OOP because I’m sorry that’s so funny because he was so serious. Again, I get it. The Time War just happened and for him, they blew up Gallifrey to stop the Daleks. He’s really good with Rose, in that he’s protective but also willing to prop her up. I thought it was super cute how he tried to help her when she was trying to act like she knew when and where they were when that loser guy who put the computer in his head, traveled with them that one time. But also, how he handled the guy afterwards, which totally, that guy’s a loser. But I really enjoyed him though. His chemistry with Rose and Captain Jack were great to watch. I enjoyed his episodes, and I was sad to see him regenerate. Especially since I was a Tenth Doctor hater by association lol. But his last episode where Rose saves him by taking in the Time Vortex and then he kisses it out of her, now that’s a Rose Tyler/Doctor romance I could get behind. Even though they’re all the same person, I felt she had better chemistry with Nine. “You were fantastic, absolutely fantastic, and you know what, so was I.” Great line to end on. Because you know what! You were!

2 – Tenth Doctor (David Tennant)

When I started watching, I was really hoping I wouldn’t be a basic hoe and find Ten to be my favorite Doctor. Thank goodness he’s not so be glad you’re in second place Ten! But Ten is clearly most people’s favorite and the most iconic version just from what I’ve seen over the years, and you know what? I can understand it but at the same time, he’s a bit overrated. Ten is cocky/arrogant, charming, a flirt, mean and a bit more carefree. This was particularly with Rose. I think it’s safe to say that Rose heavily affected the Doctor because he does soften from how he was as Nine, being a bit more accepting to humans than Nine was. But he still views himself as a step above everyone else. He often said he was “the cleverest one in the room”, which sometimes led to even bigger problems, showcased in Midnight. Like I said in my companions ranking, I didn’t like TenRose together because they were too childish and maybe because he felt himself falling for her and he physically looked younger (but not as young as Rose lol), he felt he could act up a bit more. It was annoying actually. The werewolf episode was so annoying because they were insufferable. Ten is also reckless because what do you mean you’re gonna walk away from the fireplace KNOWING that the time is different for Madame de Pompadour and time moves slower for you. When he did that, it pissed me off so bad lol. I think he got much better and more interesting when Martha came into the picture. He was sad because Rose got stuck in a parallel world. Yeah, that’s sad. But then Martha comes into the picture, and he recognizes she’s clever too and I think he immediately respected her, different than what he had for Rose. I do really think if Rose wasn’t such a big issue, he would have treated Martha differently and it’s annoying even with Rose being an issue, that he didn’t. They worked really well together. After all, Martha is the greatest companion in that she saved the world and him without space magic! And he trusted her enough to do that! With Donna was exciting because there weren’t any romantic feelings in the way. Donna was his best friend, and I believed that. When he had to take her memories to save at the end, I was so sad for the both of them because I’m sure they would have traveled with each other forever if they could. When he was alone, it was clear why he probably needed to have someone travel with him because when he was “Time Lord Victorious” I was like OOP. He thought the rules didn’t apply to him anymore, because he changed them, just to be checked by Adelaide. He also connected really well to people, but depending on the circumstances he could still be an ass so it was always interesting to see which way it could go. He also promised a lot and I think he had it in his mind to save everyone all the time or die trying, except when it came to the constraints of time, in the earlier seasons. He felt his emotions very strongly when it came to higher emotions. David Tennant is also a great actor, so seeing the change in Ten throughout the seasons, or to see the quiet rage simmering underneath everything. Or whenever the Doctor was truly scared. He did that very well. His regeneration scene was good, because everything leading up to it was so good. The four knocks and his monologue with Wilf. The fact that he even said what he said and still chose to save Wilf, it’s good stuff. I kind of rolled my eyes at his little tour at the end but it’s fine lol! I could probably say more but this is already long lol “I don’t wanna go.” Get outta here bro!

1 -Twelfth Doctor (Peter Capaldi)

I’m obsessed with Twelve lol. He’s one of my friend’s favorite’s too but I don’t remember her talking about him as much as she would about other characters outside of the fact that she loved him. So, I went into his seasons eager to learn more about him. He was probably the Doctor (besides 9) I knew the least about from my time on the internet. His first season is also fresh in my mind as I rewatched it before the show was forcibly snatched away from me and I’ve rewatched a lot of his scenes. Twelve starts out, after getting over his regeneration sickness as extremely grumpy, cold, callous and no longer the touchy feely, in your face persona he was as 11, but now no longer wanting to be touched or hugged, which was so funny because of how 11 was always touching people. But I also think Twelve has the best character arc of the Doctors because we see literally the beginning where he’s having a hard time connecting to people, even Clara who was there before with 11 but she stuck around because 11 asked her too. Not to mention him asking her “Am I good man?” and him learning the answer to that question over his three seasons. Also, him learning through Clara how to become more human by the end. He ends up having this “I’m an idiot with a box” mentally, which is so different from like how Ten viewed himself. But he really had to learn this the hard way because if Clara didn’t react the way she did in Kill the Moon, he never would have changed and grown the way he did. I’m glad Clara checked him about it too even though she kind of backtracked a little in the next episode. He’s brutally honest and usually says whatever because before Clara, who was gonna check him? Some could argue Danny did but eh, I think Danny was wrong about the Doctor most of the time. Projecting. Also, what’s funny is that there’s a constant through line about how he has like face blindness because I cackle during the Christmas special when he comes back to the scientists and go “Are you the same people from before? I deleted you.” It’s soo funny lol. But he constantly thinks he looks the same as Clara, or when he meets the First Doctor and he says “I AM younger!” Which technically the first Doctor is younger but looked physically older (to me). He gave great lectures and speeches because Peter Capaldi could handle them and he always had great things to say. But I was already in love with him because this was the most interesting Doctor to me by far. Definitely mean and rude similar to how I viewed 9 and 10 at times but I found myself smiling instead of making a face lol. Though I found 10 to be more of an ass than 9 at times lol. By series 9, we see the Doctor in a midlife crisis sort of state and this is when I was like “oh…I’m attracted to him” lol. I officially said it aloud to my friend when he played “Amazing Grace” at the start of the Zygon episodes I think. I loved his new outfit. His series 8 outfit was clearly inspired by the Third Doctor (I think he’s Peter Capaldi’s fave Doctor) and it was hilarious how everyone called him a magician. But I liked how he was finding his own style and he was giving me Hobo Rocker Chic lol. His hair was longer, he had sonic sunglasses and a guitar. Yes, let’s go! In this season, there’s a lot of two-parters which is annoying a lot of the time. But I liked how they were opposite of each other, kind of showcasing Twelve’s character arc throughout the season. As I said in Clara’s portion, their time together really amplified their relationship in how he became more human by being with her and she tried (and failed) to become more like the Doctor, making them the Hybrid. The three episode arc of Face the Raven, Heaven Sent and Hell Bent were so mesmerizing. I honestly think Peter Capaldi was the only Doctor who could carry an entire episode alone. You know that “would you rather” scenario where you’re offered a billion dollars but the catch is you’re being chased by a snail for the rest of your life and if it touches you you die a horrible death? Heaven Sent made me think about that lol. But anyway, him losing his memories of Clara to fix their toxic codependent relationship was so sad and it makes sense they had him be the one to lose his memories since Donna already lost hers years before. I really enjoyed series 10 and I liked how he mellowed out so much more and how Bill got paired with a Doctor who has gone through so much. Losing Clara, turning around and being reconnected with River Song, spending 24 years with her before knowing she was going to leave him and go to her death with his younger self. He scanned her in the Sonic so he could save her in the past (her future!) I could just cry! Twelve and River were the couple I wanted to see more of because THAT’S what I call chemistry. I think River would have fallen for Twelve before she realized who he was. She was already intrigued because he was quick, clever and jumped right into things with her. One episode wasn’t enough! But there was still hope in him and then Bill shows up and she reminds him of Susan just for her to be taken from him like that. UGH! Devastating! I really could go on and I should but I won’t because I know this is long. Plus! His whole thing with Missy and trying to help her be a better person and he died thinking he failed but he doesn’t know she actually stood with him at the end! But I think Twelve’s last three episodes were even more masterclasses at acting from Capaldi. Oh also, his arc of being blind. I mean really! Twelve has been put through the ringer! His regeneration was fantastic. I know he was supposed to regenerate at the end of Doctor Falls but they had to postpone it because Chris Chibnall either didn’t want to do a special or he wanted Thirteen to be introduced officially for an entire season. I don’t know but I got an extra episode and Twelve got to see Bill be free at least. But his speech is sweet and I definitely cried losing him.

I was so intrigued by Twelve because Capaldi’s such a good actor. He’s probably the best of the new Doctors we’ve seen and sometimes it’s not even close. What a masterclass of acting in a lot of episodes. Really! “Doctor, I let you go.” No, don’t leave me!!

So that’s my ranking of the Doctors! I feel pretty solid in this list. It could change as I get the chance to rewatch the show in the future but my top option will NEVER change, I’m sure lol.

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