I was reminded that today is the 87th birthday of the one and only Tom Baker, who definitively portrayed the Gallifreyan Time Lord known as the Doctor between 1974 and 1981. During my high school years, I became a devoted fan of Doctor Who, thanks in no small part to Baker's remarkable performance. His effortless combination of eccentricity, wit, and, if you'll pardon the expression, humanity absolutely sold me on a program that, by all rights, I should have viewed with derision. Baker elevated the show and I look back on watching it all those years ago with great fondness largely because of him.
Happy birthday, Mr Baker!
Did you know he's still doing Doctor Who? On Audio Plays for Big Finish. He's now been doing those for longer than he was on the TV.
ReplyDeleteAre they any good? I am congenitally skeptical of contemporary iterations of older pop culture.
DeleteThat's surprisingly hard to answer. The productions are uniformly excellent, with strong actors, great editing, effective scoring, etc. In many ways, the BF shows feel like finding a previously lost episode of Doctor Who and watching it with your eyes closed. Baker has gotten to play with most of his old companions, such as Leela and both Romanas (I shed a manly tear that they never got him in the studio with lovely Liz Sladen) and the chemistry remains untouched (particularly with Louise Jamieson, who you would never believe started doing this character over forty years ago!). BF seem to be the gravity well of Doctor Who in a way that the actual programme is not.
DeleteAnd yet...the Baker stories never quite live up to the promise IMO. I think that it is because the Grand Old Man just can't do his thing with the same energy anymore. He almost sounds as if he has been artificially slowed down...except, of course, it is actually the most natural of slowings.
On top of that, I think that the BF stories for Baker have - for whatever reason - aimed at recreating the lesser Graham Williams era, rather than the apogean Hincliffe series.
The same age as my dad! And he was sorta my TV Doctor father-figure.
ReplyDeleteDerision?
ReplyDelete1974 was quite the auspicious year. Tom Baker is objectively the best Doctor!
Scientifically proven as far as I am concerned.
DeleteI suspect this is might be a 'generation gap/nostalgia' phenomenon occurring here, but: Although I was aware of Dr. Who from a very young age (my parents watched the show [in the 70's at the very least]), I didn't really start to get into it myself until the 'reboot/restart' that happened in 2005. Given that context, Peter Capaldi has to be my favorite Dr. Who ever.
DeletePossible nutty question: Was the Greyhawk deity Heward inspired by Dr. Who? I vaguely recall references *somewhere* (original GH boxed set maybe?) to some sort of - I don't remember - "abode" of his that was connected or could travel to different planes or worlds (with or without the mystical organ involved)... Sort of TARDIS-y. And there were other elements to his physical description that led me to believe that many, many years ago, except for his bald pate (which was where I learned the word "pate"). But I've never been able to find the text passages online to prove I didn't hallucinate this. Any ideas?
ReplyDeleteI believe that Heward's name is derived from the name of Gygax's cousin Hugh E. Burdick.
DeleteMy favorite Doctor too, for the same reasons.
ReplyDelete