After a lengthy “catch up marathon” it’s time for the main event, on today the 60th Anniversary of Doctor Who’s first episode going live, I’m going to rank all 43 multi-Doctor stories I could find (not including short stories, as there was a surprising amount of them and so few are actually easy to find, and not including stories where two version of the SAME Doctor feature, as that’s still technically multiple Doctors but not in the way I mean…) Now the key thing here is I’m not ranking them on anything other than being a good multi-Doctor story, and by that I mean having fun multi-Doctor interactions and more often than not, some good anniversary stuff as well. So while some stories lower down on the list are clearly better than some higher that most likely means that the multi-Doctor aspect was only a small part of it. Make sense? Good. Let’s rank ‘em!
“Defender of the Daleks” comes in at 43 as the multi-Doctor interaction is literally handful of panels where the Thirteenth Doctor appears to give the Tenth a lift back in her TARDIS. They only exchange a couple of sentences and given this was the third Titan comic story to feature this duo it wasn’t particularly a strong moment either… (My review can be found HERE)
“Under Pressure” is a fun comic strip that sees the Third Doctor and his successor talk over the radio, with the earlier incarnation having no idea who he’s talking to. Fun, but their talk over the radio is a small scene in a very short comic, so it doesn’t rank highly here! (My review can be found HERE)
“Time and Time Again” is much like the previous entry in that it’s a very short comic strip and only has small bits of Doctors interacting so it doesn’t rank very high. It does see Bernice Summerfield and Ace meet past Doctor as well but again we’re talking a page each at most. (My review can be found HERE)
“Together in Eclectic Dreams” sees the Eighth Doctor appear in his Sixth self’s dream while they both under the influence of the “Dream Crabs” from the Twelfth Doctor Christmas special “Last Christmas”. They exchange a few words which tips the Sixth Doctor off that he must be in a dream before his later self vanishes. It serves a story purpose but it doesn’t go on long enough for it to have any substance… (My review can be found HERE)
“Thin Time” has a small scene at the end of it where the Fifth Doctor meets the Eleventh Doctor (well impersonated by Jacob Dudman), but this is the Eleventh Doctor while he’s in his depressed post-Amy and Rory phase and so his negative outlook inspires his younger self to rejoin the companions he ran from (long story) so not only was it a well written scene but it played an important role in the on-going story arc. (My review can be found HERE)
“Empire of the Wolf” is the first story that is actually a full-on multi-Doctor story but boy, it’s not a fun one. The artwork is poor, the fact it was advertised as a celebration of the Eighth Doctor but focused far, far more heavily on continuity from the Tenth Doctor era is annoying and just in general it’s not a very good read. Oh well, the Eighth and Eleventh Doctors meeting was a fun idea as well… (My review can be found HERE)
“Alternating Current” would’ve scored higher had it been the first comic to feature the Thirteenth Doctor meeting the Tenth, but instead it was the second… in a row! Plus it didn’t even follow on from the last one from the Tenth Doctor’s perspective meaning we had his reaction to his future self all over again. It’s also not very good either, but hey-ho. (My review can be found HERE)
“Dead Man’s Hand” is actually a really fun Eleventh Doctor comic featuring Clara and lots of Western themes but it ranks low because it’s multi-Doctor-ness is focused on a single issue and they don’t really interact with each other as much as stand around talking to the enemy as a group. Still, some fun splash pages of all of them! (My review can be found HERE)
“The Forgotten” was a big deal at the time because beyond the “Time Crash” charity sketch the classic Who series hadn’t really touched the “NuWho” stuff and this comic promised to bring all the incarnations together. It did this by doing short stand-alone stories with each Doctor with a meet up at the end but sadly as each issue passed the art got worse and worse until the final issue, with the big splash page of all ten Doctor together, is completely ruined by terrible likenesses. Frustrating! (My review can be found HERE)
“The Eight Doctors” is a misleading title (like most “The X Doctors” stories, to be fair!) as at no point do more than two Doctors meet, but some of those meetings are fun. The Eighth Doctor has lost his memory and must visit his old selves to regain them, it’s a fun concept but the big issue though is the seven previous Doctors are all in the middle of TV stories that were originally written by Terrence Dicks or are in new stories written by the book’s author… Terrence Dicks. The fun idea is drowned in his refusal to do anything he’s not personally already handled in the past, plus his attempt to write about the then-current youth culture is … well, “not very good”, let’s put it that way… (My review can be found HERE)
“A Little Help From my Friends” is the first Thirteenth Doctor meets the Tenth Doctor story and is by far the best, with a fun use of the Weeping Angels and tying the story to their classic debut story “Blink”. Sadly the art isn’t great and due to the length the story isn’t up to much either… still, there are some fun multi-Doctor moments in there. (My review can be found HERE)
“Happy Deathday!” is another one-shot comic from Doctor Who Magazine, but unlike the others its genuinely funny and uses its short page count perfectly. I understand if some don’t like the caricature artwork or the intentionally silly tone, but I found it fun. The twist at the end is a bit crap though… (My review can be found HERE)
“Prisoners of Time” has a lot going for it, really. It’s set out like IDW’s previous multi-Doctor effort “The Forgotten” but with better art and each Doctor gets a whole issue rather than a brief story before they all come together at the end. The only issue, and it’s a big one, is the reveal of the main villain as it’s so… crap that it takes me completely out of the story, and the final few panels are just laughably unjustified. (My review can be found HERE)
“The End of the Beginning” was hyped as the final monthly “Main Range” audio drama before switching to the current boxset format and saw the Fifth, Sixth and Eighth Doctors meet up in a story set out in a similar manor to the first ever Main Range audio: The Sirens of Time. Sadly it missed the mark quite dramatically as the story was just… really dull. Not offensively bad and it had a few fun Doctor interactions but as a whole it was really forgettable. A sad way for the decades-long range to go out on. (My review can be found HERE)
“Destiny of the Doctor” was a series of eleven Companion Chronicles style one-hour narrated audio books with a linking narrative that the Eleventh Doctor pops up in each of his ten previous selve’s stories to ask them to do something, leading to the final release with the Eleventh Doctor himself tying it all up. It’s a fun idea and some individual stories are good, but quite a few of them are just “okay” or worse, and the finale isn’t a very good pay-off either… (My review can be found HERE for Doctors 1-3, HERE for 4-6, HERE for 7-9 and HERE for 10 & 11)
“The Sirens of Time” was the very first Big Finish audio drama with the Doctor Who license so they decided to celebrate with the three Doctors they managed to actually get on board back in 1999, that being the Fifth, Sixth and Seventh Doctors. Sadly early days production limits and a pretty poor script knock it down a few pegs, but there are some fun moments between Colin Baker and Sylvester McCoy if nothing else… (My review can be found HERE)
“Dimensions in Time” is, frankly, a bit crap… Okay, it’s completely crap, it’s Doctor Who crossing over with Eastenders for Children in Need and at that point Doctor Who was a silly old thing that used to air in the past and is sadly treated as such. Still, you get to see Doctors 3 – 7 in person again, so that has to count for something, right? (My review can be found HERE)
“Project Lazarus”, specifically its second half, is a dark but very interesting story that sees the Seventh Doctor encounter a clone of his Sixth self helping the evil clandestine organisation known as The Forge. There are some good moments between the two Doctors that go beyond “fun celebration” and into just good storytelling, which is why its so far down on the list despite being so good at what it set out to do. (My review can be found HERE)
“Peri and the Piscon Paradox” is a fantastic example of the Companion Chronicles range and something of a tour-de-force for Nicola Bryant and her Peri character. While the Fifth and Sixth Doctors do interact, and in a very fun and non-traditional way, the story itself is firmly about Peri and her struggles / future, so again for that reason its low down on this list. Highly recommend the story though! (My review can be found HERE)
“Zagreus” is a personal guilty pleasure but even I have to admit the 40th Anniversary audio drama is far more a big finale for the first story arc of the Eighth Doctor and Charley adventures than it is anything celebratory, and it’s about an hour too long to boot. Technically the four Doctors featured on the cover only talk briefly within a mental landscape but Peter Davison, Colin Baker and Sylvester McCoy do feature in the story prominently… (My review can be found HERE)
“The Name of the Doctor” technically only features two Doctors interacting briefly at the end as the Eleventh Doctor talks to the suddenly introduced War Doctor but the whole episode features old footage and quick cut-aways with all the classic Doctors as well as some colourised William Hartnell footage so ticks the “anniversary fun” box enough to bump it up this high on the list. (My review can be found HERE)
“The Light at the End” was Big Finish’s 50th Anniversary release and was hyped up as being the first multi-Doctor story to actually have Tom Baker interact with other Doctors, and it does indeed do that, in fact his back and forth with Paul McGann’s Eighth Doctor is the real highlight of the release, but sadly a lot of the rest of the story leaves a lot to be desired… (My review can be found HERE)
“All Flesh is Grass” is the big finale to the “Time Lord Victorious” story strand that ran across novels, comics and audio dramas and it does it with the combo of the Eighth, Ninth and Tenth Doctors all meeting, oddly with the earlier two incarnations having to stop their older self from doing something very drastic. There is one scene where the Ninth and Tenth are arguing the Eighth tries to break it up and the two older incarnations realise that their younger self had yet to experience the Time War that was brilliantly written. For the purpose of this list though it is all about the “Time Lord Victorious” story and not about multi-Doctor fun, so it falls a bit due to that. (My review can be found HERE)
“The Legacy of Time” was actually Big Finish’s Anniversary story rather than the show itself and saw several stand-alone stories followed by a final part that saw not just Doctors 4 – 8 but also the first three Doctors and David Tennant himself appearing as the Tenth in a fun scene towards the end. Sadly though it falls a bit short as the finale lacks any real impact or central threat. Some of the non-multi-Doctor stories are great though, but that doesn’t count! (My review can be found HERE)
“Once and Future” was Big Finish’s 60th Anniversary series that came to a close at the start of this month and thankfully that final part was great fun, with lots of Doctors, fun callbacks and some great lines and it’s because of that final part that it goes this high because most of the single releases leading into the finale were dull or straight up bad. If you’re wondering, Christopher Eccleston as the Ninth Doctor shares a bunch of scenes with David Warner’s “Unbound Doctor”, so the series still counts as multi-Doctor, even if the finale has many Doctors without them talking to each other! (My review of the final part can be found HERE)
“The Lost Dimension” was a multi-part comic story from Titan to celebrate its third year (and sadly, its final year as a regular producer of good comics…) and it does so with an interesting story that features classic Doctors as well as modern ones in the spotlight. Sadly some dodgy art does rear its ugly head and some side-stories are a bit flat, but it still does a good enough job. (My review can be found HERE)
“The Eye of the Storm” sees the Sixth and Seventh Doctors crossover into the Diary of River Song series and it works really well! Seeing River get on with the Sixth Doctor and start to dislike the Seventh was fun and each Doctor trying to tackle the same problem in two completely different ways and therefore stepping on each other’s toes was a good way to do the story. The last scene of the Seventh Doctor being the only earlier incarnation to figure out River’s mind wiping (so her debut story with the Tenth Doctor stays canon!) is good laugh. It’s only an obviously understandable stronger focus on River that bumps it down on this particular list… (My review can be found HERE)
“The Annihilators” is a strange one as it has the Second Doctor crossover into a Third Doctor story but it’s the mysterious “Season 6B” version of the Second Doctor and due to being the first story to feature Big Finish’s new Second Doctor recast it really it feels like a backdoor pilot to that series. Luckily the actual story is really good and the two Doctors play off each other well, though not quite with the same chemistry as the actual Pertwee and Troughton did on screen. (My review can be found HERE)
“The Four Doctors” is a great story that sees one military-obsessed man get flung down the Doctor’s timeline from his Eighth to his Fifth self, and also has a good scene with the Eighth talking to the Fifth via a radio as well as a quick scene with all four at the end. So doesn’t tick a lot of the multi-Doctor criteria for this list but gets on this high mainly for having such a unique and fun spin on the idea of multi-Doctor stories. (My review can be found HERE)
“Twice Upon a Time” had a real solid premise as the Twelfth Doctor is regenerating and ends up meeting the First Doctor, who is likewise about to regenerate, and it includes scenes where the earliest Doctor gets flashes of all the crazy stuff he’ll do the future and freaks out, and other really good ideas. Sadly it all gets knocked down several pegs because the First Doctor, played by David Bradley, is written to be a really unpleasant sexist git. I get the idea was to show “how far we’ve come” since the 60s but there must have been a better way to do that other than throw the First Doctor under the bus! (My review can be found HERE)
“Timewyrm: Revelation” is much like “The Four Doctors” in that it’s a great story that found a unique way to have different Doctors interacting, in this case the Seventh Doctor goes through a trip across his own mental landscape and sees his past selves as aspects of his personality. It leads to some fun scenes but obviously they aren’t the main focus here, which again is why it’s this far down the list. Saying that given it nearly cracked the top 10 should tell you how much I enjoyed it! (My review can be found HERE)
“The Power of the Doctor” took me by surprise not just by having past Doctors appear to the Thirteenth Doctor once again in the Doctor’s mental landscape but also had Doctors Five and Seven appear as themselves to past companions Tegan and Ace to add some extremely direct continuity to the classic series. Even though the main focus was on The Master’s plan and the Thirteenth Doctor’s regeneration it still made for a very fun celebratory story for the series as a whole too. (My review can be found HERE)
“The Gates of Hell” was the second in a series of three audio dramas that paired the Tenth Doctor with other incarnations but unlike the other two the shine was off this one a bit because these two Doctors had already met on screen, and the story itself wasn’t super memorable either. Hearing David Tennant and his father-in-law pal about for longer than five minutes was still good fun though! (My review can be found HERE)
Speaking of Tennant and Davison meeting on screen! Yes, “Time Crash” only lasts a few minutes but boy are those few minutes great fun as the two Doctors play off each other really well. This was the first time old and new met and it was, and still is, great fun. (My review can be found HERE)
“Cold Fusion” started off life as a Fifth Doctor book that crossed over with the then-current Seventh Doctor books, but fast forward to the audio drama remake and it feels more like a Seventh Doctor audio with the Fifth Doctor crossing over, but either way I can’t deny the story is really good, well paced and there was a good focus on the different companions meeting as much as the two Doctors. A good example of the multi-Doctor story without relying on the central gimmick too much. (My review can be found HERE)
“Wink” was the third and final audio drama featuring David Tennant’s Tenth Doctor crossing over, this time with the Sixth Doctor and while that combination may seem not-very-obvious they work together well and most importantly the story is really well written with a fun take of the Weeping Angels. Much like the entry above it’s a good example of a good story and a multi-Doctor story. (My review can be found HERE)
“Daughter of the Gods” was advertised as a what if “5th anniversary story” as it features the First Doctor appearing in a Second Doctor one, and hearing a story with the Second as the “current” is a weird one given how often he appeared in other stories but it works really well and tells a great story involving Katarina from her extremely short run in the First Doctor TV stories of all things. This one really took me by surprise at the time and that hasn’t changed with a re-listen. (My review can be found HERE)
“Four Doctors” wins the prize for best comic multi-Doctor story by focusing in on just three incarnations (the 10th – 12th) and while there is plenty of fun banter between them they also tell a good story involving the time war and alternate realities that’s pretty bonkers but is a very fun way. (My review can be found HERE)
“The Two Doctors” is a weird one, a long TV story featuring the Second Doctor crossing over to the Sixth but for no anniversary reason or anything, they just… did it. It has some fun moments and its nice seeing Patrick Troughton on screen again, but the story has some pacing issues, to put it politely. Still good fun though. (My review can be found HERE)
“Out of Time” was the first of the David Tennant crossover audios and still the best as hearing his Tenth Doctor alongside Tom Baker’s Fourth is brilliant. Frankly they could’ve just done that and I would’ve been happy but they also wrote a really fun story with the younger Doctor seeing his older self’s arrogance to be rather off-putting while the Tenth brushes it off as him being too young to understand (despite the reverse with the actor’s ages!) and then they both learn a bit from each other. It gave the crossover meaning as well as being fun, it was a no-brainer for best multi-Doctor audio. (My review can be found HERE)
“The Three Doctors” is the serial that started it all and still tells a really fun Third Doctor era UNIT story with some Time Lord lore mixed in. Some padding in the final part hurts it and some may find Omega’s way… way over-the-top panto villainy to the be off-putting (I find it fun!) but it’s still a great story highlighted by Jon Pertwee and Patrick Troughton being such a great double act. (My review can be found HERE)
This was a hard one, but thinking about it logically it wasn’t. “The Five Doctors” is a great anniversary story with some really fun bits of continuity and seeing the First (via Richard Hundrell), Second, Third and Fifth Doctor all on screen at once is still great. The only reason I’ve put this second is because if I’m honest with myself the story isn’t actually up to much beyond the multi-Doctor fun, whereas the story I’ve picked as best has that aspect to it but also tells a good story separately as well. (My review can be found HERE)
“The Day of the Doctor” is rather a predictable one to pick, but not only do David Tennant’s Tenth Doctor and Matt Smith’s Eleventh play off each other brilliantly but so does John Hurt’s War Doctor, making for a charismatic trio. Add in a good storyline and a fantastic end sequence with all twelve incarnations up to that point (plus a quick cameo from the in-coming Peter Capaldi) that still sends shivers down my spine and I have to give the crown to this mini-masterpiece. It was the show’s 50th anniversary story and boy it delivered! (My review can be found HERE)
*Phew* … Remind me not to do this again in ten years time…
Hogan Reviews 