John Lavalie: Created page with "{{article | publication = The Wichita Eagle | file = 1981-07-23 Wichita Eagle Beacon.jpg | px = 650 | height = | width = | date = 1981-07-23 | author = Bob Curtright | pages..."

2021-12-24T19:38:48Z

Created page with "{{article | publication = The Wichita Eagle | file = 1981-07-23 Wichita Eagle Beacon.jpg | px = 650 | height = | width = | date = 1981-07-23 | author = Bob Curtright | pages..."

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| publication = The Wichita Eagle
| file = 1981-07-23 Wichita Eagle Beacon.jpg
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| date = 1981-07-23
| author = Bob Curtright
| pages = 7B
| language = English
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Matt Orsman, 13-year-old "Doctor Who" devotee who sounds like he's not going to miss a single one of the 98 episodes of the new [[broadwcast:KPTS|KPTS, Ch. 8]], series, has done his homework about the BBC time traveler and gives the following report:

The series has been running 18 years in England, rather than the 14 I reported last week from unofficial BBC sources in New York.

There have been five actors in the lead role, and each time there was a change, there was a plot twist (stress of time travel, etc.) to explain his different appearance. The five: William Hartnell (who was Edwardian), Pat Troughton (Chaplinesque), Jon Pertwee (dashing in tuxes and cloaks), Tom Baker (a tweedy eccentric, and the one we are watching) and Peter Davison (who took over the role in England just this year).

Tardis, Doctor Who's spaceship which whisks him erratically along, is an acronym for "Time And Relative Dimensions In Space." (I had speculated that it might come from "tardy," since the ship is notoriously unpredictable).

Because the series was so long-running, it apparently became very "in" for noted British actors to appear as guest villains — not unlike what happened on the campy American series, "Batman," back in the 1960s.

The series, available in syndication here only a couple of years, has spawned a number of novelizations and comic books and has achieved the ultimate in American cult recognition. The first "Doctor Who" convention was last March in Los Angeles, and 10,000 fans (Whoots, perhaps?) showed up.

Sounds like the Trekkies may have some competition.
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John Lavalie: Created page with "{{article | publication = The Wichita Eagle | file = 1981-07-23 Wichita Eagle Beacon.jpg | px = 650 | height = | width = | date = 1981-07-23 | author = Bob Curtright | pages..."