Funny the things that occur to you when you’re in that meditative zone while evacuating the bowels.

I’ve heard it said by several friends that the Doctor as played by Christopher Eccleston wasn’t nearly as Zany or fun as David Tennant’s.

Eccleston has been described as much darker, moodier… nastier in places, and it’s demonstrated several times, when he refers to humans as “stupid apes”, when he is ruthless in his punishment of the Dalek, unrepentant when Cassandra dries to the point where she is ripped apart… and then so very desparate to help the Gelth.

I feel that all this tracks back to his loss of his planet and his friends and family in the Time War. He’s mentally scarred from this; and I’d suggest that the first new series of Doctor Who occurs very close to the initial conclusion of this war. In the first episode, he is checking-out his appearance, indicating he may just have regenerated from his previous incarnation, played by Paul McGann.

As a shellshocked and perhaps even depressed individual, his forced humour at times and absolute fury makes so much more sense, and it shows what a good actor Ecclestone actually is.

Tennant’s doctor, on the other hand has some distance — notalot to be honest, but some — from the events of the Time War, and so is a little lighter (but no-less ruthless — as evidenced when he massacres the Racnoss young in Runaway Bride). Hence he is somewhat lighter and can be zanier. This is as much to the writers credit as to the actor playing the character.

Bring on Season 2.

Well, Doctor Who season 1 (new stuff) was awesome. The payoff at the end was a kicker…

Shows how much I’ve changed!

Avoiding episode 1 seems to have helped. I’ve seen that one already anyway. I liked Christopher Eccleston and freely admit that I teared up when he was dying.

I don’t like goodbyes.

I’d love to have seen him do more though. Very good in the part, he was.

The dialogue was good too, the exchanges worked well. And the final Kiss before Captain Jack went off to face the Daleks was appropriate, interesting and a great touch.

And I fully expect my glorious friends to bag me stupid for this 180 degree turnaround. Well, I’m a woman, I’m entitled to change my mind!

Strangely enough though, one of the reasons I avoided it was that I was scared I’d lose creativity. I’ve kept myself in a vacuum entertainment-wise for a year and a bit because of this issue. And at the time I was right; I needed isolation to let my mind do its thing.

But my mind is a different one now, and Doctor Who is a part of things.

As I’ve said already: Out with the old…