I’m sorry, but if I see Patrick Troughton’s face ever again, it will be too soon.
Doctor Who’s latest attempt to distract us all from the, well, World in Which We Live is not a new piece of short fiction, or a tiny slice of audio-drama fun, but instead a procrastination nightmare from which I cannot escape.
Doctor Who: Thirteen is simple enough, really. A tile-sliding game in the vein of 2048, you have to match Doctors from William Hartnell’s first (well, I guess now he’s “First” in a different context), all the way through to Jodie Whittaker’s incumbent Time Lord. Two Hartnells make a Troughton, two of which make a Pertwee, and so on and so forth. Good luck getting even the modern era of the show’s Doctors however, because blimey, by Rassilon’s ridiculously oversized shoulderpads it seems unnaturally hard for a little time waster.
Maybe I’m just better at trying to split my brain in two over the chronology of the Time War than I am at logic puzzles. I’ve seen John Hurt’s War Doctor exactly once, but otherwise, I’m drowning in seas of Bakers, Colin and Tom alike, and Troughtons, endless Troughtons, as I curse one trapped in a circle of McCoys and McGanns that I’ve somehow managed to cut off from the pack. It’s like when the second Doctor regenerates at the end of “The War Games” and is just surrounded by spinning ghosts of his own confused face.
[referenced url=”https://gizmodo.com.au/2020/06/the-timey-wimey-history-of-doctor-whos-time-war/” thumb=”https://gizmodo.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/18/s6pdecuhhx3kpauy6exi-300×169.png” title=”The Timey-Wimey History of Doctor Who’s Time War” excerpt=”The Last Great Time War. Those five words have hung over Doctor Who ever since it was revived in 2005: an earth-shattering conflict that saw the Doctor’s people, the Time Lords, pitted against the Daleks. It’s been started, ended, revived, and discussed across Who media for years, and will be…”]
At this point, I’m with the Master: turn them all into Cybermen, blow Gallifrey to smithereens, and start all over. Should you desire to waste a bit of your own time — no TARDIS required — you can check out Doctor Who: Thirteen here.