The introduction of the Timeless Youngster shook up Physician Who canon in an enormous manner, and plenty of followers weren’t completely satisfied. The Timeless Youngster was first referenced in Jodie Whittaker’s first season because the Physician, however wouldn’t be absolutely defined till the tip of her second season, when the Physician discovered herself again on Gallifrey and dealing with off towards the Grasp. A deep dive into hidden Gallifreyan historical past revealed the Physician was not who she thought she was, however was actually the progenitor of all the Time Lord race. Whereas the large reveal appeared to rewrite Physician Who historical past, it had its roots in unrealized plans for Sylvester McCoy’s closing seasons because the Physician. A few of these storylines went on to encourage Physician Who novels printed whereas the present was off the air.
Physician Who’s so-called wilderness years lasted from 1990 up till 2004 the interval by which the BBC put Physician Who on indefinite hiatus. Whereas no new seasons of the present have been produced throughout this period, it did see a wealth of Physician Who content material created on the earth of publishing. Throughout varied novels, comics and different books printed over these years, the thought of “the Different” was launched to Physician Who lore. This mysterious historical Time Lord if, certainly, the Different was a Time Lord shared many traits with the Timeless Youngster and Tecteun, the Gallifreyan explorer who found the Youngster. In essence, the Timeless Youngster storyline solely served to carry these concepts into mainstream Physician Who.
In direction of the tip of Physician Who’s unique broadcast run which started in 1963 and concluded in 1989 plans have been being drawn behind the scenes to reintroduce some thriller into the origins of the Physician and the Time Lords. When the sequence started, virtually nothing was recognized of the Physician’s origins past the truth that he hailed from “one other time [and] one other world.” It was even hinted the Physician could have been a human settler on an alien planet. Over time, although, Physician Who launched the Time Lords and Gallifrey. Thus, audiences would study much more in regards to the Physician’s dwelling planet and his folks. In the course of the Seventh Physician’s period, script editor Andrew Cartmel and the sequence’ writers got down to restore the sequence’ thriller.
Cartmel together with writers Ben Aaronovitch and Marc Platt concocted an concept that followers would later dub the “Cartmel Masterplan.” These concerned, nonetheless, have admitted it was extra of a basic story route than an in depth plan for the sequence’ future. The essential thought launched by Cartmel, Aaronovitch and Platt was that the Physician could be revealed to be a reincarnation of the Different a mysterious determine in Gallifreyan historical past, who had helped Rassilon and Omega set up Time Lord society. Cartmel did not essentially need this secret origin acknowledged outright in Physician Who, however needed to have the ability to drop hints of the Physician’s true origin to depart followers asking the query: Physician who?
Physician Who was sadly canceled earlier than a lot progress could possibly be made on the so-called Cartmel Masterplan. A couple of hints have been dropped within the sequence’ closing seasons, however the notion that the Physician was the reincarnated Different was as an alternative additional explored in Physician Who publishing. The novelization of the 1988 serial “Remembrance of the Daleks” featured the primary look of the Different in a flashback, whereas the 1997 novel Lungbarrow revealed that the Physician was certainly the Different reborn. While this model differed barely from the Timeless Youngster storyline by which the Youngster was not born once more because the Physician however that the Physician was a regenerated model of the Youngster despatched again to infancy the broad strokes are a lot the identical.
Depictions of the Different within the wilderness years confirmed they helped set up Time Lord society alongside Rassilon and Omega. The Physician Who Season 12 finale, “The Timeless Youngsters,” implied this function was as an alternative taken on by Tecteun, the Timeless Kid’s adoptive mom. It could be surmised that the Different of Gallifreyan legend was actually an amalgamation of each the Timeless Youngster and Tecteun. As Physician Who doesn’t have a strictly regulated canon like franchises akin to Star Wars, there isn’t any cause to contemplate novels that includes the Different as non-canonical. Nevertheless, they might be distortions of the historical past that has now been illuminated by the unearthed historical past of the Timeless Youngster.
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