Listen to the RadioTimes.com Doctor Who podcast: David Tennant takes the crown
In a new RadioTimes.com poll the former Tenth Doctor came out on top – but did he deserve the win? And how did this new ranking come about?
It’s official – after nearly 50,000 votes RadioTimes.com’s Doctor Who poll has its result, with David Tennant named fans’ favourite Doctor over 10 years after he left the role behind.
Close behind him (fewer than 100 votes behind, in fact) was Jodie Whittaker, followed by Peter Capaldi, Matt Smith and Tom Baker – but what made these Doctors so much more popular than the others? Why wasn’t the classic series better represented, and why didn’t Christopher Eccleston get more of a fair chance?
In this week’s RadioTimes.com Doctor Who podcast we try our best to answer these questions, drilling down into the overall rankings (below) to work out why some Doctors seemed to appeal to voters more than others.
- David Tennant 10518 / 21%
- Jodie Whittaker 10423 / 21%
- Peter Capaldi 8897 / 18%
- Matt Smith 7637 / 16%
- Tom Baker 3977 / 8%
- William Hartnell 1983 / 4%
- Paul McGann 1427 / 3%
- Christopher Eccleston 1144 / 2%
- Jon Pertwee 1038 / 2%
- Patrick Troughton 915 / 2%
- Sylvester McCoy 462 / 1%
- Colin Baker 359 / 1%
- Peter Davison 351 / 1%
Was Jodie Whittaker’s rise a response to criticism from those who still haven’t accepted her as the Doctor? Has Peter Capaldi’s era been reevaluated in the years since he handed in his TARDIS keys? And did the shocking twists of the Timeless Children, which seemed to rewrite the Doctor’s history, bring a groundswell of support for First Doctor actor William Hartnell?
Plus, our hosts make the case for their own favourite versions of the Doctor – assuming, of course, that they get around their equal love for each and every Time Lord.
Want more Doctor Who chat? Check out last week’s podcast about the Peter Cushing Doctor Who movies, read the full story of David Tennant’s Doctor Who win or check out a strange new detail about Sacha Dhawan’s Master…
Doctor Who returns to BBC One in late 2020/early 2021. Want something else to watch? Check out our full TV Guide.
