Older fans will remember JVR's "What has happened to the magic of Doctor Who?" after "The Deadly Assassin". One major concern of his was that the 13-regenerations limit would make Tom Baker the penultimate Doctor. He was counting the Morbius Doctors.

When I first watched "Brain of Morbius" I felt that it was clear that those were the faces of Morbius' previous incarnations. The Doctor had shown his hand, and it was Morbius' turn.

McGann's 8 was not the first action Doctor, that was Pertwee's 3

The idea of Time Lords being granted a new set of regenerations was originally mentioned in The 5 Doctors - it's also where 11 gets the copy of the Seal of the High Council that he hotwires into Handles.

2:03 -- One year I gave my dad a sonic screwdriver for Christmas. It was a genuine screwdriver that looked like the sonic screwdriver and if you pressed the button at one end, it made the iconic noise.

The idea itself of the Doctor having unknown previous regenerations isn't that bad. But it was Chibnall's writing that was horrendous.

Actually, the double-banking of Love and Monsters was done because the BBC wanted one EXTRA episode (a Christmas special) in the same amount of time.

If you can, find the clip of the 1st Doc & Ian Chesterton opening a Dalek casing for the first time, and catching their first glimpse of the Dalek mutant within. The look of nausea that William Russell put on Chesterton's face as they swiftly slam the lid was a series-defining moment of brilliant acting. That moment forever characterised how the mutants would eventually be seen, but cleverly left it to the imagination. They use Susan's cape to wrap the mutant before evicting it, and all we see is a malformed limb protruding from it as the now helpless creature flounders on the floor.

3:50 Did you just call 'Midnight' a Doctor-light episode?

My theory about the sonic screwdriver is that it's more a sort of comfort blanket. The Doctor waves it around unnecessarily to reassure people he knows what he's doing.

hold on there. a lightsaber and a sonic screwdriver used in conjunction with each other? imagine the possibilities.

Also remember - the “villain” of Love & Monsters was created by a kid who won a TV competition. And the writers made the story around it.

The timeless child wasn't just picking up the plot thread of the morbius doctors but also the plans for the 7th doctor if the show wasn't cancelled. Which I'd argue probably inspired the timeless children more. Also the morbius doctors have always been the doctor and were originally interested to be the doctor and when watching the scene they are framed to be previous incarnations, with morbius literally asking the doctor how many lives has he had. Those who argued/argue still that they aren't are ignoring the actual show. Whether you like it or not is a different subject, the fact is that they are.

The Master was offered a new regeneration cycle in the 5 Doctors, if he helped the Doctor in the Death Zone.

Yeah, count me among the weirdos who likes the Doctor with unlimited regenerations. Not sure about the Doctor starting as a sort of Timelord messiah figure who winds up getting absolutely abused by them, but we'll see how that's handled (or ignored) going forward.

Proof that there is no set canon. The writer's have been constantly making it up as they go

One argument I read against the Timeless Child was that it takes away from William Hartnell being the "First Doctor". Balderdash! Bullocks, I say! Hartnell was the first actor to play the Doctor. He will forever be the First Doctor, just like the War Doctor didn't change Christopher Eccleston into the Tenth Doctor. And actually, I think it makes things make a little more sense. It actually fits into him running away with the TARDIS. Why he never mentioned being a Timelord, and why Patrick Troughton's Doctor was justifiably afraid of them. His memories were locked away in the Watch Fob of doom, but there has always been a mistrust between The Doctor and his fellow Timelords. And not just The Monk, The Master, and The Rani.

Matt Smith waving the screwdriver around!?? Ellie, you disappoint me; WHAT ABOUT JODIE FLAMING WHITTAKER??

The Sonic is a scientific instrument, not a water pistol!

8:33. Do you want a Jelly Baby?

Paul Mcgann was the first time I've seen Doctor Who, and oddly enough, he is my favorite Doctor Who. All versions of Doctor Who are great.

The 'other' faces in the duel between the doctor and morbius are morbius's past regenerations as the two personality's combat.

I'm surprised you didn't talk about logopolis and how it introduced the cloister bell. One of the most recognizable sounds in doctor who from the TARDIS

I always assumed that the unfamiliar faces we saw in the Time Lord Duel between #4 and Morbius were previous regens of Morbius... who was a timelord. If Morbius could bend the Doctor's mind back through his previous lives, the Doctor could battle back with the same in a counterattack.

I never assumed the extra faces in the Doctor-Morbius scene were those of the Doctor.

Robert Holmes did not write the Brain of Morbius, though he undoubtedly rewrote it extensively. It was conceivex by Terrance Dicks, under the name Robin Bland.

Brain of Morbius was pretty quickly initially rejected early on. The idea that Time Lords had only 12 regenerations was established not even a year later in Deadly Assassin, and the Doctor having had pre-Hartnell incarnations was rejected in Mawdryn Undead. BoM was only "resurrected" over 40 years later in Timeless Children because Chibnall felt the need for there to be non-white and female Doctors before Hartnell - not really any other reason

Donna never sees the same face of the Doctor regenerate normally.

Man I tried to wrap my head around the timeless children. The revelation that The Doctor is not a time lord but something else entirely. The Time Lord civilization is a billion years old so is The Doctor over a billion years old and only has memories for the last few thousand years? That could mean that The Doctor has potentially thousands of regenerations that are unknown. They they use the Toymaker in an attempt to fix all this with his line about messing with The Doctors history. Now The Doctor "bigenerates" splitting into two of the same person with different faces. TARDIS duplicated by magic. It's just so weird. I will keep watching but I miss Tenant already.... Into the wild blue yonder was so amazing.

10:00 - i recon that these faces (even though it was some of the actual DW crew members), were actually meant to be Mobius's previous faces and NOT the Doctor's

So yesterday - I am watching “Spearhead from Space” and was gobsmacked to see Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart and Liz Shaw plainly being Mulder and Scully more than 20 years before Duchovny and Anderson. 6 to 5 and pick ‘em who were the real icons.

With the Timeless Child revelations, does this mean The Valeyard is a forgotten previous incarnation rather than one that would come in his future (as everyone assumed at the time?)

“It’s not a lightsaber, man!” IT IS, WHENEVER IT’S CONVENIENT TO THE PLOT!

Not to brag, but I called out how the show was going to get around the 12 regeneration limit ages before "The Time of the Doctor". The difference in my version was that it would've been revealed that the Doctor already had the extra regeneration cycle given to him during the Time War because the Time Lords didn't want to lose their Dalek expert.

Huge missed opportunity, not including the Tenth planet. The episode that introduced regeneration, the one reason the show is still going to this day

So many small moments that turned huge later on

Just to throw a spanner in the works, I don't believe 8 actually means he is half human. When I rewatched the episode, it was ore about distracting someone so he came up with a quirky comment whilst grabbing a pass key. Incidentally if his mother was half human, and because of timey wimey stuff, Leela who stayed on Galifray could actually be his mother ;) Bet that's not cannon either.

I love the doctor with unlimited regenerations cause then there is no threat of the show ending. I mean if they wanted to he could regenerate 5 times in one episode (which hasn’t been done yet) and that would be interesting. Let’s say that The doctor is at the end of his run and instead of one regeneration or bi-generation. The episode is of him getting killed and regenerated 5 times before it’s the new doctor. I mean why not the show is silly enough anyway. If I ever get to be the show runner I will for sure do this 😂

The timeless child should have been The Master. The doctor could have had any other secret life and it would have been fine. But it should have been The Master who was the first. It gives so much more BITE to the mad, violent, traumatised time lord he became, so much more justification for wiping out the time lords, so much interesting capacity for the doctor to do some fun character progression in coming to terms with having part of The Master in them. It would have tied in so well to Racelan using The Master to pull gallifrey out of the war, and the various other way's the "renegade" has been used by the powerful of gallifrey, and other times given almost preferential treatment, receiving a "fresh" regeneration cycle before The Doctor ever did. This change could have saved Chibnals run.

That twice a week was annoying for those of us of my age. Cubs being on Monday meant that I missed the first and third episodes of stories. And there were letters on "Points of View" from parents with children in a similar situation.

but The Timeless Child completely removes the 12 regeneration limit for The Doctor. Only the Time Lords have the limitation. Sure, they didn't know The Doctor was the Timeless Child so still gifted the new regenerations, but they weren't necessary.

I mean, about the number of regenerations, now that they made The Doctor be the timeless child, and making him the origin of the time lords regenerations, wouldn't he have infinite regenerations?

Remember when the Doctor got so mad he picked a Dalek up and just yeeted it offscreen?

Even back when The Deadly Assassin aired, we knew the 12 regenerations limit was going to bite them in the backside eventually. Of course, no one back then could have imagined they would still be making Doctor Who episodes 50 years and 8 Doctors later. So, it was inevitable that, having established the 13 incarnation barrier, someone was going to have to find a way to move past it. And, really, the series already kinda established it was possible since in The Five Doctors, the Time Lords tempted the Master into helping the Doctor by promising him a new regenerative cycle. If they could do that for the Master then, there is no reason why they couldn't do that for the Doctor later. Since introducing the concept of "regenerative energy," never really named until the new series, we already had a bye to use it in different ways, which the Tenth Doctor did to regenerate his own hand. I have long had a theory that Time Lords are not born with a second heart and only develop one after their first regeneration. It is the second heart that generates the regenerative energy when it is needed. Our heart is autonomic, and we have no control over its functioning. That doesn't mean a Time Lord does not. The regenerative process seems to be automatic once a Time Lord experiences a fatal incident, and the Twelfth Doctor showed that the process has become so engrained in the Time Lords that the Doctor can shoot the General without fear of killing him so long as the General retained regenerative energy. The Doctor has never really been able to control his regenerations, but other Time Lords have proven that ability is always there. After all, Romana seemed to be able to select her next body and even test out potential forms before finally completing the regeneration. The Eighth Doctor was able to select HOW he regenerated (if not the precise form) with the aid of a draught from the Sisterhood of Karn. The Twelfth Doctor (and perhaps the First Doctor) was able to delay the regeneration process, but the next incarnation would still be catch can - neither Doctor had any idea what the next incarnation would be like. It now all comes down to the concept of regenerative energy. As long as a Time Lord can continue to generate this energy, there can really be no limit to the number of lives the Time Lord can have -- and how the Time Lord uses that energy. That was a good change because it opens up HOW the energy can be used in future stories. Of course, it totally ruins the denouement of The Five Doctors, but that's a lost argument now. Naturally, the biggest changes to Doctor Who canon in recent years are establishing the Timeless Child and the fallback of bi-generation. Stephen Moffett pretty much rendered the Timeless Child a fait accompli that can be accepted or not, and bi-generation can now be used to justify any event in continuity because every Doctor has effectively bi-generated, allowing previous Doctors to continue having adventures into their old age. This MAY also explain the Watcher who manifested during Logopolis and aided the Doctor in regenerating into the Fifth Doctor - it's bi-generation. WHEN it happened is probably irrelevant, but it is still a game changer. Personally, to use the proper British term, I say both are bollocks. Both basically give us a "everything is real so everything goes" vibe to the series which renders the very concept of continuity into a trash heap. DC Comics did that in its latest retcon (done purely to return the real Superman to continuity), and it is just as improper there as here.

i started watch doctor who when I was in 9th grade and ever since then I became a whovian.

the five doctors offers the master a brand new regeneration cycle why wasnt that mentioned

3:48 How is Midnight a Doctor-light episode? Did you mean Donna-light? 😂

What can't gatwa make look good you ask? Doctor who for a start

pretty sure the additional regens were also set up in old Who

Remember, the 13th doctor was evil, and that wasn’t the master.

I still say that the other faces that we saw in The Brain Of Morbius were Morbius’ past incarnations.

7:13 Yeah its cool that RTD made sure hid math was correct with Meta Crisis doctor But what do we do about the Ruth Doctor

2:03 specifically a Walther ppk

:I've always regarded Deadly Assassin as a big mistake for ruining the Time Lords. They'd previously been seen in trouble and requiring the Doctor's assistance but generally portrayed as an ancient civilisation with great knowledge and power and an unknowable role in the universe. Their wisdom had led them to non intervention and their only real concern was how to deal with colourful renegades from their number - presumably exercising a complex understanding of potential consequences. From this point onwards, they've been portrayed as insular, decaying and corrupted by power and greed. This has had a far bigger impact than the regeneration limit. I think they'd have been better left as a mysterious agency of fate.

Brain of morbius lead into the cartmel master plan which was then tinkered with by chibs looking back at it, the only thing chibs SHOULD have explained is that the timelords knew the doctor was the other (in this case the timeless child) and that they blocked his memory of it, although the multiverse in who is quite the nice setup I'll admit. McGann's doctor wasn't the first action oriented doctor, it was the third doctor, he used space martial arts to beat people up but only when necessary.

I guess Daleks really are bug-eyed.

Shame on you Ellie, you leave out the Timelords offering the Master a whole new cycle of regenerations in The Five Doctors, yet you highlight Love and Monsters?...

Superman's cape? just a word of advice. Don't tug on Superman's cape. While you're at it don't spit into the Wind, Don't pull the mask off the Old Long Ranger and DON"T mess around with JIM>

Does anyone else really like love and monsters? It has the same appeal as Blink with the Doctor being portrayed as mysterious entity, a hilarious enemy, and ELO in the soundtrack. What more could you ask for in a Doctor who episode?

i choose to believe that 8 was just lying about being half-human. just being silly

1:16 If the great Mr Moffat sat on his tuffet And changed the shows cannon forever wrote in extra lives so the doctor can't die Then I understand that creative endeavour But Hit and miss Chris Must of thought about this And thought that he could solve the same problem better So he made it all pointless The sacrifice by the time lords The regenerations the doctor needs never It means the doctor took lives When galifrey was alive It was there this whole time! So he killed them off again 😢 meta The timeless child took the entire storyline from the anniversary undone it all so the doctor saving his "home planet" and "his people" in the time war pointless. undone all that whilst solving the same problem Steve did.. The reason why it feels like chibs changed so much and nothing at the same time is because he tackled a problem that was already solved by stevey boy.. though mr mofferz didn't change the core identity of the doctor make it all a lie .. the flux was quite good but I still can't get over how he made it all for nothing 😂 Everyone's favourite timelord .. isn't a timelord .. he/shes adopted ... 😂 And potentially infinite with a super powerful mind that doesn't remember most of her life

The Time Meddler isn’t the first time Historical and Science fiction had mixed, in fact just the story before this had done it with Daleks being the Cause of the Mary Celeste’s crew completely disappearing, as the Mary Celeste mystery being a Historical event and the Daleks being the first science fiction Monster in the show, that makes the chase the first time. That’s if we don’t count the doctor and the TARDIS being a science fiction element in the Stone Age.

Weren't the other faces in The brain of Morbius, previous incarnations of Morbius?

The 12th regeneration limit was not gotten around by Moffatt and the 11th Doctor'e Christmas episode. It was mentioned in the Sixth Doctor's run that a new regeneration cycle cold be granted by the High Council (sorry I cannot site it because I don't have access to those episodes). Also, the 8th Doctor did mention that The Master had was of cheating death beyond the 12th regeneration and had done so many times. I also believe there was a cannon book that mentioned this in the late 80s early 90s. Maybe "Cat's Cradle"? It's been so long, I don't recall, but the 11th Doctor was the first time was actually saw this new cycle granted on TV or film (especially to The Doctor) as it has been mentioned before. I think it may have been mentioned prior to the 6th Doctor too, maybe in "Maudlin Undead"? Poke about, you will find it.

The Daleks serial made the show what it is today… yeah, it was the second d serial 😂

"Really riveting stuff..." I love you guys.

Paul Mcgann needs more screen time.

4th..like Tom...😎

It was actually mentioned in the 5 Doctors that a whole new life cycle can be given to a Time Lord who’s reached the end.

Oh this is Awesome, I own the cd but this was totally unexpected ❤

How does anyone actually like the daleks? I tend to skip those episodes on rewatches

7:37 you can practically hear Ellie’s aggressive side-eye at Timeless Child

Fascinating indeed. Doctor Who really is a show forged upon genius ideas and spontaneous decisions.

if RTD didn't research the regenerations before Time of the Doctor, the fans would have first gotten furious, then they'd have gone and got pissed.

I think you can get every Sonic now, can't you? The only one I knew of growing up came with the Tom Baker doll. It got nudged out of the way, like K-9, in the 1980s. Before nostalgia started bringing everything back.

The Master should've been the Timeless child, Gallifreyan screwed up his regeneration cycle so much it warped his mind, drove him to insanity thus more susceptible by staring into the time vortex. That's why he destroyed Gallifrey in the newest reincarnation.

Don't forget, The War Machines was also the first serial to carry the same title across all episodes within.

I'm glad they got rid of the hipster glasses I just couldn't get into them

I was perfectly content to think those eight faces were just Morbius' bodies. I'm still content to think so and firmly reject the Timeless Child and Chris Chibnall's era onwards as a whole.

We got 3 doctors at once 2 David Tenants and the new guy . The Metachrosis doctor, And then the bio regeneration doctors (another David Tenant )

I'm not an older fan. I did used to watch the Tom Baker reruns as a little girl on PBS back in the naughties. One thing that I have never understood was that these videos always try to put the assumption on the viewers that everyone was curious about the unknown faces shown between Tom Baker's Doctor and Morbius. Even as a little girl I just naturally thought that these were the faces of Morbius's past generations. It never even occurred to me that it was a mystery. They were either faces of Morbius or people they'd met we'd never seen. More likely Morbius. I can't possibly be the only person who thought this. I mean, it was a kid's show during a time television wasn't sophisticated enough to bury plot lines and Easter Eggs. This is a show that tried to just throw away a huge part of it's origins to save room in the archives.

You couldn't take over writing for james bond and suddenly change the core concept so this whole time james bond has been a robot thats why he looked different in different movies and never died 😂 its just too much of a change that doesn't make a difference.. it's exactly the same .. and completely different 😂 .. regressed back to only the doctor and master and but really the master is the only timelord .. the doctor had a family before the timewar .. he's not a time lord so what about his kids that were half infinite immortal lords of the timey wimeless

The workaround was already known, Ellie. The master was given a new set of 12 regeneration in the 5 Doctors, when the High Council granted the master a new regeneration cycle in exchange for helping the doctor.

With 50 episodes a year, yje aerly years featured some episodes with the Doctor either absent or just in a short film insert. I believe one episode of The Chase has him missing completely!

I thought they wrote 'The Timeless Children' to ensure that they wouldn't have to scramble to come up with another plotline to explain the doctor getting yet more regenerataions.

Nice different DW list.

Imagine if instead of the 13 incarnations people instead hooked on to the line that said they had 90.

This is just someone making shit up and giving those lies its own lore 😂 chill Tf out

I did enjoy the Jodie Whittaker era and I liked her Doctor because it was something new and different but the whole Timeless child stuff was totally unnecessary it shouldn't have happened it didn't need to happen it could had been someone else as the Timeless Child i was hoping RTD would quietly ignore it like the half human thing with the TV Movie but anyway. I don't like that they retconned the First Doctor not being The First Doctor it was a disrespect in the memory of William Hartnell and after it's been firmly established in "The Five Doctors" that he is the original Doctor the whole Morbius Doctors as far as I'm concerned are Morbius The Fugitive Doctor as played by Jo Martin would make 10 times more sense if she was a future version of the Doctor rather than beforehand then the whole thing with the TARDIS being a Police Box would add up i just don't think Chibnall thought things through when he wrote this but every showrunner has their faults. I miss the days when the sonic screwdriver was just a tool that unscrew screws now it does everything and used like a magic wand i hate that so much I wish they destroyed the bloody thing and have the Doctor using his wit rather than his gadgets.

In "An Unearthly Child" and the final episode of "The Chase" the Doctor _et al._ are on present day Earth.

Did you notice the street light in the trailer appeared to have a tardis light, was it dematerialising?

It is strange how Resurrection and Torvill & Dean are connected in the memory, but I guess that's how it works. The only difference is we had Davros on Ice.

the sonic screwdriver is definitely overused

Sydney Newman's initial rule was "No robots or bug-eyed monsters". the Daleks are technically both and neither.

Still remember the T.V. woman one. Hungry!!!!

Tosh! We would have had Blink without Love And Monsters. It was an adapted 9th Doctor story from years back.

Spearheads from space: the first episode to be broadcast in colour. 🙋🏻

What's in a number but sometimes there a numerous other ways around the number 12 is just a fix it can be a negative to say how it affects the doctor regeneration process a stability point. But of course, Gallifrey isn't in any time it exists outside of our time so 12 isn't expected to be related to our timelines. Think why time lords need to be inside a tardis or nearby one because of the fact of their timelines related to the existence of their timelines being outside ours. 12 regeneration are designed to be a measure and connection to Gallifrian's timelines and possibly this means only for a time lord his or hers abilities to live beyond measure of time scales related to Gallifrey time scales a close connection between the tardis and the planet of origin. Bigger on the inside could mean a time of recovery for a time lord. 12 may expend regeneration in a time measure?

It was Moebius images of his regenerations ..not the doctors..that's what every one gets wrong

Wow 😲😲😲