Is saving the universe a girl job or a boy job?

As long-term readers may recall, I'm a lifelong Doctor Who fan.  I'm basically a fan of what has become known as the 'classic series' (ie. the period between 1963 and 1989), but I've watched and enjoyed the revived series since 2005, and I was particularly pleased when Steven Moffat used the 50th anniversary in 2013 to create a 'narrative bridge' between the classic series and the new, making the two seem more like an integrated whole (in spite of the very obvious differences of format and style).

What people may not be aware of is that talk of casting a woman as the Doctor goes all the way back to the days of the classic series, and in particular to a press conference in 1980 when Tom Baker announced his resignation and mischievously wished his successor well, "whoever he or she may be".   The tabloids initially took that seriously as a possible hint that radical change was on the way, and ever since then there has been fevered speculation about a female Doctor whenever a vacancy has occurred.  Somewhere I must still have a copy of Doctor Who Magazine from early 1987, just after the excellent Colin Baker was idiotically sacked from the role for no discernible reason, containing an impassioned plea from a young reader that the Doctor must remain male.  "I'm not a sexist," he wrote, "but a female Doctor is as ridiculous as a male Miss Marple".

That eerily echoes the much-mocked arguments of the sceptics three decades on.  But is it so obviously wrong?  If the well-remunerated Derek Thompson was ever to finally stop playing Charlie in Casualty (which, yes, is still running after thirty-one years!) and if the BBC were to recast the role, nobody would think it was remotely odd if only male actors were considered.  Doctor Who's status as a make-it-up-as-you-go-on sci-fi show means that the same rules need not apply, but nevertheless I think there's at least an arguable case that, until very recently, the 'fact' that Time Lords retain the same gender throughout their life-spans had been clearly woven into the programme's 'lore' over a very, very long period, creating certain fixed expectations among viewers.  The Doctor has had thirteen incarnations so far and they've all been male.  Borusa had four and they were all male.  Romana remained female when she regenerated (and she also 'tried on' several female appearances before settling on her second incarnation).  The Master was of course always male until she suddenly wasn't a couple of years ago...and it's arguably only the acceptance and success of that innovation that made Jodie Whittaker's casting possible.

I think she's a good choice, and a new departure like this could be a shot in the arm for a long-running series which is always battling against the danger of becoming stale.  It's liberating that Doctor Who has the opportunity to do this when, say, the James Bond franchise doesn't, but in a sense that's the nub of the matter.  The only reason why changing the lead character's gender isn't self-evidently a strange thing to do is that Doctor Who is such an unusual series.  And that's why I've been so troubled by the extreme and intolerant reaction to the minority (and it is only a minority) of long-term fans of the show who are struggling to accept a woman Doctor.  Although I don't personally agree with those fans, neither do I think it's inherently daft for them to choose, if they wish, to say "we think the Doctor is a male character, just like Ken Barlow is a male character".  Instead of it simply being accepted that this is based on nurtured ideas about who a specific much-loved character that they've grown up with should be, they're all simplistically dismissed as Neanderthal sexists who are resisting proper female representation on television.  Maybe a few of them do deserve that characterisation, but believe me, if someone with an American accent was ever cast as the Doctor, the controversy over female anatomy would pale into utter insignificance.  And would that mean Doctor Who fans are anti-American?  No, of course it wouldn't.

I've tried gently making the point to a few feminists on Twitter that much of the negative reaction is Doctor Who-specific and not a rejection of on-screen gender equality, but to very little avail.  A couple of hours ago, I got a highly abusive response ("f***ing clueless") when I pointed out that "the Doctor isn't an MP, she's a fictional character".  Extraordinarily, the same person then angrily declared that "I'm done justifying myself to men. Help the cause or get out of our f***ing way."  I just think all this dogmatic shoutiness is terribly, terribly sad, and it's little wonder a dialogue of the deaf has developed as a result of it.  You're not going to gain much sympathy for your cause by effectively telling someone that their favourite TV programme has become no more than a box to be ticked on an ideological checklist.  It would be far more constructive to say (as Jodie Whittaker has done herself) that "I know this is new, but don't be scared of something new, it'll be fun".  And if you took that less confrontational approach, you might also be pleasantly surprised to find that the person you're talking to isn't the monster you assumed they are, and is actually extremely positive about female lead characters in other series.

If you're aiming for greater diversity, I think it's generally best not to do it in an artificial way.  For example, when the BBC were belatedly trying to address the absence of major network dramas filmed in Scotland, they should have created a new series that organically belonged here, rather than awkwardly transplanting Waterloo Road to Inverclyde.  By the same token, if more female lead characters are required, they should in general be devised from scratch, rather than lazily saying "oh let's bring Arthur Daley back and make him a woman".  With Doctor Who it can work - but it wouldn't go amiss for us to acknowledge the obvious point that this is the exotic exception, not the rule.  And once you do acknowledge that, you can perhaps begin to empathise with the people who resent the fact that their own favourite series is the designated exception.  You don't have to agree with someone to empathise with them.

Wisdom on Wednesday : There is no such thing as Macra! Macra do not exist! There are NO MACRA!

"It's just possible that you've been given a series of orders while you've been asleep. You know, 'do this', 'do that', 'do the other thing'. My advice to you is don't do anything of the sort...

Don't just be obedient. Always make up your own mind."

The second Doctor, Patrick Troughton, in the story The Macra Terror, giving some prescient advice 47 years early on how to withstand the brainwashing techniques of the anti-independence campaign and their associates in the mainstream media. Of course, one of those brainwashing techniques is to try to convince us that an independent Scotland would be just about the only country on Earth unable to watch Doctor Who, meaning that we wouldn't have heard the Doctor's anti-brainwashing advice in the first place. Now, if ever there was a paradox of time vortex-shattering proportions...

Regeneration : a complete new life cycle

Since it's very nearly Christmas, I'm going to indulge myself with a shameless geek-post about continuity problems in Doctor Who. Cut me some slack here, guys - if Ruth Davidson's sincerest fears (ahem) are realised, it might be my last ever chance to do something like this.

As a more or less lifelong fan of the show, one thing that really bugged me when it was revived in 2005 was the apparent attempt to 'retcon' out of existence the established principle that the Doctor (in common with all other Time Lords) could only regenerate twelve times, and was therefore restricted to thirteen incarnations before there had to be some sort of cunning plot twist that allowed him to live on. It just seemed like pure laziness on the part of the programme-makers, because if they had wanted to dispense with the rule so badly, it would only have taken them ten seconds to drop in a throwaway explanation. It's not hard to think of what that explanation could have been - even in the days of the classic series, some fans quite liked the idea that twelve regenerations was not a biological limit, but was instead something imposed by the Time Lords upon themselves. This was implicitly supported by the suggestion in a couple of stories that extra regenerations could be gifted to an individual Time Lord. So the Doctor could very easily have just casually mentioned that he used to be restricted to thirteen lives, but as a result of the Time Lords' demise the bar had been lifted and he was now effectively immortal. But no, instead there was just a pretence that the rule had never existed in the first place, which reached its nadir with the unexplained ability of the Master to regenerate in the episode Utopia, in spite of the fact that in the classic series he had well and truly used all his lives up. Again, fans were able to concoct their own methods of explaining the contradiction away (the Master had been resurrected and therefore had perhaps been restored to the start of his regeneration cycle), but the lack of any explicit reference to the problem in the narrative made it clear enough that retconning was the order of the day.

But why? Russell T Davies, the man who masterminded the revival of the show, was a dedicated fan of the classic series who was constantly dropping in self-indulgent continuity references that new viewers were never going to pick up on. This culminated in David Tennant's Doctor reciting a lengthy and near-verbatim quote from Tom Baker's famous 'homo sapiens' monologue - ironically in the very same episode as the Master's regeneration. So Davies would certainly have been aware from the word go of the twelve regenerations rule, leaving only one real conclusion to be drawn - that he personally disliked the rule so much that the idea of even taking ten seconds to explain it away offended him, and he therefore preferred to just ignore it.

That theory was put to the test a year or two after Davies stepped down as the 'showrunner', when he penned an episode of the spin-off series The Sarah-Jane Adventures that was billed in advance as containing an explanation of how the Doctor could essentially go on regenerating forever (or, more specifically, 507 times). But in fact, there was no 'explanation' offered at all - just yet another statement that flatly contradicted the established rule. After the episode was broadcast, Davies said this in an interview -

"507 – I could not resist! I was hooting. It'll never stick, though. That 13 lives is stuck in people's heads. It is, isn’t it funny? Yet they only said 13 once or twice...

There's a fascinating academic study to be made out of how some facts stick and some don't – how Jon Pertwee's Doctor could say he was thousands of years old, and no-one listens to that, and yet someone once says he’s only got thirteen lives, and it becomes lore. It’s really interesting, I think. That's why I'm quite serious that that 507 thing won’t stick, because the 13 is too deeply ingrained in the public consciousness. But how? How did that get there? It's fascinating, it's really weird. Anyway, that'll be my book in my retirement!"

I must admit my jaw dropped to the floor when I read that. Er, no, Russell. The twelve regeneration rule was not mentioned only "once or twice", and more to the point when it was mentioned it wasn't in the same casual way as Jon Pertwee's Doctor claiming to be thousands of years old. The rule was in fact at the very core of several storylines, leaving not even the slightest conceivable mystery about how it came to be so deeply ingrained in the public consciousness. For example...

THE DEADLY ASSASSIN (1976) : In this story the Master is in an emaciated state, having reached the end of his thirteenth incarnation. A key part of his motivation is to extend his life.

THE KEEPER OF TRAKEN (1981) : The Master returns in the same emaciated state, still with the plan of extending his life, this time by taking over the Doctor's body - although ultimately he takes over the body of a character called Tremas instead. It is stated that: "I am now reaching the end of my twelfth regeneration." / "Then that is the end for a Time Lord." / "But not for the Keeper of Traken."

LOGOPOLIS (1981) : The aftermath of the Master's rebirth, now in the body of Tremas. Again, we have a very clear statement of the position: "The Master escaped from Traken? Why take Nyssa's father?" / "To renew himself. He was very near the end of his twelfth regeneration."

MAWDRYN UNDEAD (1983) : In this story, a group of undead creatures want the Doctor to donate his remaining regenerations to help them to die. Again, the position is made absolutely crystal-clear: "I can only regenerate twelve times. I have already done so four times." / "So?" / "Don't you see? Eight of them, eight of me!" / "They want your remaining regenerations?"

THE FIVE DOCTORS (1983) : Reminding viewers once again that the Master has used up his twelve regenerations, the Time Lords offer him "a complete new life-cycle" as an inducement to do what they want.

THE TRIAL OF A TIME LORD (1986) : In this epic story, the sixth Doctor encounters a prosecuting lawyer who turns out to be himself in a future incarnation. The Master explains that "the Valeyard is an amalgamation of the darker sides of your nature, somewhere between your twelfth and final incarnation - and I may say that you do not improve with age". The strong suggestion in episode 13 is that the Valeyard's motivation is the same as the Master's in The Keeper of Traken, but with a twist - he wants to extend his own life by killing an earlier incarnation of himself and "inheriting" that incarnation's remaining seven regenerations. Unfortunately, this very imaginative storyline is somewhat undone in episode 14 (the final installment) when a completely different motivation is suggested instead. The contradiction came about because of behind-the-scenes chaos - the original writer withdrew his script for episode 14, and new writers were brought in at the last minute who completely misconstrued the meaning of key dialogue in episode 13.

When you take all that together, you can see how the twelve regenerations rule is rightly considered to be an indispensable part of Doctor Who 'lore', as Davies calls it. So I was delighted to hear that the current showrunner Steven Moffat will be addressing the problem (and effectively reinstating the original rule) in this year's Christmas special that sees Matt Smith regenerate into Peter Capaldi. Until recently, it had been assumed that Smith was the Doctor's eleventh incarnation and that Capaldi would be the twelfth, but the 50th anniversary episodes introduced John Hurt as a previously unheard-of ninth incarnation between Paul McGann and Christopher Eccleston - and now apparently it's going to be additionally claimed that another regeneration was used up in the David Tennant episode Journey's End, meaning that the Doctor has reached the end of the road and can't regenerate anymore (until the aforementioned cunning plot twist, which is presumably about to arrive).

This is all good news, but it throws up a few continuity problems of its own. It's been implied a good few times that Matt Smith's Doctor anticipates having several lives ahead of him - but why would he anticipate that, if he knows full well that he is the thirteenth incarnation? For instance, when he meets Tom Baker's Doctor in the anniversary special, it's hinted (but thankfully not stated explicitly) that Baker may not be playing the original fourth Doctor, but rather a future incarnation that has revisited an old body. Smith's Doctor doesn't seem remotely surprised by this, which would seem to contradict the idea that he knows his lives are all gone - although because this plainly doesn't make any sense, I would be happy enough to infer that the alternative interpretation of the scene (that Baker is in fact playing the fourth Doctor) must be the correct one. Furthermore, in the episode The Angels Take Manhattan, Smith's Doctor heals River Song's hand by using his regeneration energy - but why would he be able to do that if he doesn't have any regenerations left?

These are all minor quibbles, though. As this is such a pivotal moment in the show's development that has been speculated upon for such a long time, my main concern is that whatever explanation is given for the Doctor being able to live on, it should 'feel' right. One slight cause for doubt on that point is that Steven Moffat, just like his predecessor, has given a clear indication that he misunderstands something important from the classic series - he said in an interview that he wasn't sure if the Valeyard was really intended to be a future Doctor in a literal sense. Well, that certainly was the intention, and it was explictly stated to be the case. So that makes Moffat's unexpected mention in an episode earlier this year that the Doctor will "before the end" be known as the Valeyard a bit worrying, and makes me wonder if that whole storyline is about to be (perhaps unintentionally) retconned as well.

To be fair, introducing a future incarnation of the Doctor in a 1986 storyline was always a bit of a hostage to fortune in continuity terms, because it wasn't realistic to expect writers several decades down the line to reconcile it with their own plans. The simplest method of explaining the contradiction away would be to assume that the Valeyard was simply a 'possible' future for the Doctor, and that the encounter between the two was in itself sufficient to avert that future (the fact that the Doctor seemed fairly untroubled by the whole situation at the end of The Trial of a Time Lord would certainly support that interpretation). However, that's been blown out of the water by Moffat reinforcing the idea that the Valeyard is still part of the Doctor's future. I think the most elegant way around the problem now would be to spot a bit of creative ambiguity in the Master's original words that wasn't actually intended to be there - when he said "the Valeyard is...somewhere between your twelfth and final incarnation", he doesn't actually specify that 'final' means 'thirteenth'. It could be argued that he was choosing his words with care, because he somehow had foreknowledge that the Doctor would escape the twelve regenerations limit - in which case, the Valeyard could be absolutely any incarnation from the twelfth onwards. So I just hope nothing in the Christmas plot twist contradicts that serendipitous potential explanation!

I'll be on tenterhooks about all that, but of course mostly I'll be on tenterhooks to find out if Peter Capaldi utters his first lines in his own Scottish accent...

Has Peter Capaldi 'gone English' for Doctor Who?

I said back in August that if Peter Capaldi followed David Tennant's example, and spoke his first words as Doctor Who in an English accent, I might just have to give up on the series. Is that exactly what happened tonight? The new Doctor's unexpected cameo in the 50th anniversary special was heralded with the words "No sir, all thirteen!", and there wasn't a trace of Scottishness to be heard. I wasn't entirely clear, though, whether Capaldi actually spoke those words or if they were supposed to be coming from one of the other characters, and having watched that bit back again on the iplayer a couple of times I still can't work it out. The Metro review seems convinced that it was indeed Capaldi's voice and that he has therefore ditched his native accent for the role, in which case I just despair. It would mean that two out of the three Scottish actors to play the Doctor have had to 'Anglify' their voices (Sylvester McCoy being the only exception), whereas all of the nine English Doctors were able to keep their own accents. So much for Scotland's much-vaunted "valued place as a partner in the United Kingdom". After Capaldi's casting was announced, anti-independence campaign supremo Blair McDougall tweeted a risible graphic comparing Scotland's 9% share of the UK population to our 25% share of Doctors. Well, Blair, if Capaldi has indeed 'gone English', an equivalent graphic showing the percentage of Doctors who actually spoke in a Scottish accent will look considerably less healthy, won't it? Or are Scottish actors speaking to the UK in a nice, 'normal' southern accent your idea of "better together" and "the best of both worlds"?!

I'd been intending to watch the anniversary special at home, but at the last minute a friend suggested that we snap up a couple of the remaining tickets for one of the cinema showings in Edinburgh. I'm so glad I went, partly because it was on the big screen, partly because it was in 3D, but mainly because of the shared experience of watching it in a room full of passionate Doctor Who fans. It made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up a fair few times. Here were the bits that earned spontaneous cheers or rounds of applause -

1) The original title sequence and theme music from 1963.

2) David Tennant's name appearing in the opening credits.

3) Billie Piper's name appearing in the opening credits.

4) The appearance of Tom Baker's scarf around the neck of the boffin-girl.

5) The painting with David Tennant's face on it.

6) The picture of the Doctor's granddaughter Susan on the wall (someone actually shouted out "Susan!", as if they'd just seen an old friend).

7) The short clip of Christopher Eccleston.

8) Capaldi's cameo appearance.

9) The unmistakeable sound of Tom Baker's voice at the very end (this time someone positively screamed "TOM BAKER!!!!").

10) The end credits.

The only downside to seeing it in Edinburgh was that I had to make a nightmare journey home with barely any room to breathe on a train full of insufferably smug Aussie rugby supporters. One of them took a shine to a chap with an impressive moustache. "Hey, Tom Selleck, did you use that moustache to sleep with women in the 80s?" he asked about seventeen billion times. "Selleck, you're going to get LAID tonight." Oooh, how I laughed.

A Scottish woman who seemed to be channelling the "everything good came from India" man from Goodness Gracious Me said : "Isn't Scotland amazing? You just wouldn't get banter like this on the London Underground. We'd all be sitting in silence, ignoring each other". For the first time in...well, possibly ever, I found myself contemplating London's superior virtues.

Don't worry. I'm still a Nat!

Sorry to be so repetitive..

...but if the No campaign and their friends in the media can't help themselves, why should I? From the Guardian -

"Darling, chairman of the pro-UK campaign Better Together, told the Institute of Chartered Accountants in Scotland (Icas) that the Scottish government was moving into 'very dangerous waters' if it set out to instruct the rest of the UK on the terms of future independence talks."

So let me get this straight. The Scottish Government do not have the right to "instruct" London...but the Welsh Government do? Those are the rules now?

This whole brazen exercise in hypocrisy is starting to remind me of Tony Blair's concepts of "reasonable" and "unreasonable" vetoes at the UN - a "reasonable" veto being one used by the US or UK, and an "unreasonable" veto being one that is used against a resolution supported by the US and UK.

* * *

In the light of the special day tomorrow, I wonder if Ruth Davidson can "guarantee" (to coin a term) that Scotland will continue to receive Doctor Who if we DON'T become independent? I mean, what if the BBC cancel the show again, like they did in 1989? I take it from the way Ms Davidson is talking that the Scottish Tories and Better Together have some sort of control over the decision-making process?

The Enemy of the Empire and The Thistle of Fear

I don't know how rare it is to be both an SNP supporter and a lifelong Doctor Who fan, but as one such person I felt it was my public duty to inform you of something rather odd.  Like many others, I was thrilled and amazed the other day to discover that nine Patrick Troughton episodes that had been missing from the BBC archives for decades (five episodes of The Enemy of the World and four episodes of The Web of Fear) had suddenly turned up in Nigeria.  I dutifully downloaded itunes onto my computer, as for now it's the only way of watching the episodes.  So far I've got to episode five of The Web of Fear, which contains a series of scenes in which Victoria and Professor Travers are held captive by the Yeti in the London Underground.  Bizarrely, in the background, large as life, is the SNP logo.  Initially I thought I must be imagining things, and that it was probably an advert for a brand that used a similar logo, but no - clearly discernible in the middle of the thistle head are the letters 'SNP'.

I don't think anyone could accuse the BBC of giving free advertising to the SNP or the Yes campaign these days, but clearly things were different back in 1968.  How it happened is anyone's guess - the story was filmed in a studio rather than in the real London Underground, so the logo must have been put there 'deliberately', as George Foulkes would say.  I suppose the SNP weren't as well known back then (notwithstanding the Hamilton by-election) - maybe the people decorating the set thought it was an advert for washing-up liquid!

A plea to Peter Capaldi - if you're the new Doctor, please use your natural accent

I've no idea if the rumours swirling around that Peter Capaldi is the new Doctor Who have any truth to them. Certainly last time round when the bookies got to the point of refusing new bets, it turned out they had settled on the right name (Matt Smith came out of nowhere after Paterson Joseph had been the long-term favourite). But it may be that the BBC have learned from that experience, and that Capaldi's name is being used as a decoy, or is just a spontaneous false rumour. My guess is that the production team might be (wrongly) concerned about choosing someone of Capaldi's age, if only because the audience have become accustomed to younger Doctors since the show's comeback in 2005.

But if by any chance Capaldi is the choice, my fervent hope is that he won't follow in David Tennant's footsteps by ditching his Scottish accent. If it's plausible for a Time Lord from Gallifrey to speak the Queen's English, or to use Christopher Eccleston's Lancashire accent, or even to have a semi-Scottish accent during his seventh incarnation, then there's no good reason why he shouldn't speak like Malcolm Tucker, albeit perhaps without the expletives. Tennant's decision to become the first Doctor in history to abandon his natural accent was the absolute epitome of the Scottish cringe. If this whole 'better together' thing (which it's assumed Tennant is a firm believer in) has any meaning at all, it ought to be about celebrating each other's differences, not about everyone in Britain aspiring to the 'normality' of being a good little Englishman.

Accents have consequences

Interesting to read Mike Small's speculation (taking his cue from Angus Macleod) that David Tennant might have a leading role in the No campaign during the independence referendum. As you might know, I'm a great fan of both Doctor Who and Tennant, but if he did end up fronting some kind of all-singing, all-dancing 'save the union' campaign, I fancy there'd be one rather problematical question he'd find himself faced with again and again -

If Scotland is such a "valued partner within the United Kingdom", why was it not considered possible or desirable for you to retain your Scottish accent while playing the Doctor, especially since your predecessor Christopher Eccleston was perfectly able to use his own Lancashire accent?

The Doctor is, after all, from Gallifrey in the constellation of Kasterborous, not from inner London, so a Ralston accent would have been just as appropriate as the Mockney one Tennant adopted for the part. Paradoxically, there's been much more of a Scottish element to the show since the moment Tennant left.

Harry Potter syndrome?

This post has nothing whatever to do with politics, but I must just note in passing my horror that I seem to have unwittingly agreed with Tom Harris about something on Twitter. Observe...

Kate Higgins : I'm kinda struggling with #drwho these days. Have they forgotten that it's actually a kids' programme and we adults are just incidental?

Me : I think it's really supposed to be a family show - adults and children are equally important.

Sophia Pangloss : Ah think ye underestimate the weans there. Plenty fer them tae laugh at an get feared o in there.

Tom Harris : It's not a kids' programme - it's a *family* programme aimed at kids and adults.

Kate Higgins : @TomHarrisMP @JamesKelly @SophiaPangloss Almost identical responses - methinks you all protest too much. It's Harry Potter syndrome...

I presume what Kate means is that all three of us are adults who like watching Doctor Who, but I don't think any of us are actually 'protesting' about that. I was a young child when I first got the bug, and I'm absolutely certain I would have found the programme a good deal less exciting if I hadn't been aware that it was partly aimed at adults. That's the paradox of appealing to children - they don't like being talked down to, which is why they often prefer to watch programmes that are intended for an adult audience, let alone a family one.

Personally, I find it quite dismaying that so many people (including some in the TV industry itself) don't seem to get the concept of a genuinely family audience - it appears the attitude is that if something is accessible to children, it must by definition be exclusively for children. That was an assumption Doctor Who suffered from terribly during its original 26-year-run - whenever it occasionally degenerated (if I can use that word) into a programme aimed mainly at seven-year-olds, audiences of all ages deserted it in droves. All of the best stories from the 'classic series' (with a few honourable exceptions such as The Curse of Peladon) are actually very adult - and that includes the early shows from 1963/4 that first got the public hooked. Indeed, the original characters reflected the broad-ranging audience that was being sought - the Doctor as played by William Hartnell was the elderly 'grandfather' figure, two of his companions were substitute 'parent' figures in their thirties, and there was just one 'child'. And even she was fifteen!

I can't tell you what I thought of the Royal Wedding because...

...I somehow contrived to get myself stranded on the Isle of Arran last night, and missed the whole thing as a result! I can't say I'm overly sorry about that side of things, but the mishap cost me £60 in B&B accommodation and transport home. I had very 'cleverly' bought a day return Rail & Sail combined ticket - but of course that just ended up costing me money, because it was invalid by the time I was able to travel back. I don't think I've ever asked for a refund on an unused return rail ticket before in my life, and I've no idea if it's even possible to do so in these circumstances, but I'm just about sufficiently annoyed with myself to risk the inevitable "are you mad" look. Apart from anything else, I'm an on/off Doctor Who fan, and the closing lines of Terror of the Zygons keep coming back to me...

Did they have return tickets?

Yes, I believe so.

You should have taken them in and got your refund, man. I thought you were a Scotsman. 

You'll be relieved to hear that, while I missed the Royal Wedding, I was still able to watch John McTernan on Newsnight Scotland last night from the comfort of my B&B room. That lifted my morale no end.

The Tories in war with Planet Reality

The right's paranoia about the 'liberal' (ie. light on active Tory advocacy) BBC reaches a new height of absurdity today, with a bizarre claim in the Sunday Times that the corporation used Doctor Who as a vehicle for anti-government propaganda in the late years of Margaret Thatcher's rule. The paper has taken a characteristically mischievous comment from Sylvester McCoy (who played the Doctor in the three seasons before the show was 'put on hiatus' in 1989) and, using regenerative technology worthy of the TARDIS itself, transformed it into a full-blown BBC conspiracy to "hire left-wing scriptwriters" to write "propaganda into the plots in an attempt to undermine Margaret Thatcher’s premiership".

Sadly for the Sunday Times, the details of their own story make unmistakably clear that what was happening was not directed from on-high, but was simply the result of a young script editor following his own political idealism. What I find especially amusing about the paper's spin is the 'secret conspiracy, only just uncovered' angle - the idea that anyone could have missed the political message in those episodes is risible. Sheila Hancock's character Helen A in The Happiness Patrol, who ruled a planet where everyone 'had to be happy', was instantly recognised at the time as a not-very-subtle satire of Thatcherism. Any pro-CND slant in the story Battlefield (written by David Aaronovotich's brother Ben) was not going to easily go over people's heads either, given that at the conclusion of the story the Doctor screams as the villain "are these weapons YOU WOULD UUUUUSE?". Perhaps there were some viewers who came away thinking they had spotted a nod towards the case for proportionate nuclear deterrence in that outburst, but I have my doubts.

Even funnier is the article's rather desperate attempt to imply that the BBC's effort to foment a "TARDIS revolution" backfired and was responsible for viewers leaving the show in "droves", leading to its ultimate demise! As any Doctor Who fan of the right or left will tell you, the real reasons for the programme's dip in fortunes were rather more prosaic - shocking scheduling and almost zero publicity.

My issues with this year's Eurovision contestants - no. 4

Regína Ósk of Iceland

"This is my life"

Life, perhaps, but not quite as we as know it. How else do we explain why a woman now looks like this...

...when just two short years ago she looked rather more like this?

Now try and tell me that's the same person. You can't, can you? It seems to me there is only one satisfactory explanation - that, horrified by her 2006 look, she decided to use up one of her twelve regenerations. On last week's episode of Doctor Who, Catherine Tate posed the obvious question "what do you call a Time Lord who's a girl?" Answer : a caterwauling Icelandic Eurovision megastar, that's what.