Talk:Chronology of the Doctor Who universe

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1 Edit history
2 A note for every episode!
3 End of the world short visits
4 Satellite 5 or satellite 5?
5 Explanatory Sentences
6 Torchwood
7 More in depth Chronology?
8 July 20th 1966
9 Thanks
10 Chronology of The Doctor?
11 Filler
12 Flesh and Bone
13 1941?
14 Genesis of the Daleks in the future?

[edit] Edit history

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This article is within the scope of WikiProject Doctor Who, an attempt to build a comprehensive and detailed guide to Doctor Who and its spin-offs on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, you can edit the article attached to this notice, or visit the project page, where you can join the project and/or contribute to the discussion.

Some of these dates are suspicious. Is Logopolis really dateable to the date of transmission? Morwen - Talk 16:02, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

I don't know. I just merged two lists. If you think a date needs to be changed to something along the lines of: presumed to be.. (date of transmission), then feel free to do so.--Bjw e bb (talk) 17:04, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

I love this project. There is so much that can be done with it. I've straightened up the columns so it looks more presentable and changed the notes to footnotes for formatting purposes. --The Core-Man 12:33, 24 June 2006 (UTC)

Do you think that this page should have brief descriptions as to what happened in the episode? It will make the article bigger, but we could eventually break it up into smaller pieces. --The Core-Man 19:13, 26 June 2006 (UTC)

Wasn't the date given for The Impossible Planet something like 43k 2.1 which would make it the year 43,000 AD and it was 2nd January (2.1)?--Alan-WK 21:13, 26 June 2006 (UTC)

Whereabouts in the episode was that mentioned? I'd like to take a look at it again. --The Core-Man 09:34, 27 June 2006 (UTC)

You hear 43k 2.1 mentioned near the end of the 2nd part of The Impossible Planet when the captain is listing the deceased.--Alan-WK 19:33, 27 June 2006 (UTC)

According to whoniverse.org[1] "The deaths are all dated as 43k2.1. According to Russell T Davies on the commentary track, earlier versions of the script placed the story in the 43rd century." --The Core-Man 21:57, 27 June 2006 (UTC)

So, if it's the 43rd century then the 43 could be the year, k could be the month, 2 could be the day, .1 could be hour. (So it could be 4243 November 2, 1am.) --The Core-Man 21:57, 27 June 2006 (UTC)

But, the must be just a date, no time, because BOTH episodes 42k2.1 is mentioned, and this adventure took place well over an hour! --The Core-Man 11:56, 28 June 2006 (UTC)

The 43 could be the century, but if the k was the year we would be stuck at 36 (A-Z, 0-9, assuming that there are no new letters in the English alphabet.) --The Core-Man 21:57, 27 June 2006 (UTC)

Any other suggestions???? --The Core-Man 21:57, 27 June 2006 (UTC)

In Castrovalva... Doesn't the TARDIS travel nearly to EVENT ONE? Wouldn't that be the beginning of Everything? Even without a true date to reference the universe was (likely?) created sometime between 10 billion and 20 billion years ago. One way or the other it should be at the beginning of the timeline, right?

BTW - Great work here, guys. THIS is what Wikipedia was created for! :-D Umm... And pardon me if I posted this to the wrong spot.

[edit] A note for every episode!

Can people who have access to serials try to check them all to find out where these dates come from: and what is said about them in dialogue, if anything? I've done all the ones I have access to (apart from an Unearthly Child). As noted above, I am particularly suspicious about the preciseness of some of the episodes, e.g. Logopolis. Morwen - Talk 00:23, 5 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] End of the world short visits

During the opening scene of the end of the world, they make momentary stops in various points in the future, visting amoungst others, the new Roman Empire. Alas, I don't have a recording to hand, does anyone want to fill these in? --Billpg 20:38, 8 July 2006 (UTC)

They only mentioned the 22nd century and the New Roman Empire; I've added the latter. --Arctic Gnome 00:50, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Satellite 5 or satellite 5?

Is 'satellite 5' capitalised?

I believe that Satellite 5 should be capitalised. IMHO, it's an actual name of a location, not just a numbered satellite. --The Core-Man 01:21, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Explanatory Sentences

I question the usefulness of sentences like "Like the real Victorian era." or "Like the real 1980's" Apart from being sentence fragments, what do they mean? If there is a reason for these notes, perhaps a caveat can be added at the start. If nobody posts a reason for them I'm going to delete them all. (At the same time I'll try to add some further pertinent entries) --Bolognaking 21:00, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

Those sentences are leftover from an article that was merged with this one describing the various eras in Doctor Who. They are most useful for giving an overview of future eras that the Doctor returns to a few times, like Satellite 5 in 200,000-200,100 or the post-Earth times in 5,000,000,000-5,000,000,023. They are also useful for the present times to show the difference between our world and the shows. I say keep them, though they need to be rewritten. --Arctic Gnome 23:03, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

I understand your point about the shows set in the future. For the present and past ones all they seem to say is that the Victorian era is the Victorian era and that people as a rule don't know about "supernatural phenomena" (I think that's the wording) which tells us nothing. What is the "difference between our world and the shows"? Fictitious events take place? Not really earth-shattering for a work of fiction. I'd still like to delete the present and past ones. --Bolognaking 03:14, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

I think for the contemporary ones, and some of the past ones, we should note in what ways the Doctor Who chronology differs from our own. That's the easyest way of discribing each era. --Arctic Gnome 02:16, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Torchwood

Should Torchwood be listed as part of the Doctor Who chronology?Wiki-newbie 20:24, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

Support

Support - in the same universe, and as A Girl's Best Friend is there, so should Torchwood. Will ^{(message ♪)} 22:54, 12 November 2006 (UTC)

Support - as per Will. --Arctic Gnome 02:11, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

Support - as per the others. Seems pretty obvious, really. Doug A Scott ^{(4 8 15 16 23 42)}

Support - as per the others. Torchwood, IMHO, is canon. 'Nuff Said! Coreman

Oppose

It is not an "episode" of Doctor Who. Pure and simple. It should not be listed as such, and neither should A Girl's Best Friend for that matter.

Comment - This is not a list of episodes, this is a chronology. K9 and Co. as well as Torchwood are part of that chronology since they are in the same world. There are also events in the list that were mentioned but never had an episode about them. If we are only listing episodes, than this entire list should be merged into List of Doctor Who serials. I think the best solution is to take out the word "episode" from the headers of the lists. --Arctic Gnome 02:11, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] More in depth Chronology?

Does anyone think that we should make this a more in depth chronology? (ala Lance Parkins "A History") Should we put brief descriptions of what happened in the story and references to events that occurred off screen? I know that this would make this article go across several pages, but I think that just listing an episode and putting the date there with a footnote just isn't enough. --The Core-Man 01:21, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

(From above topic) - This is not a list of episodes, this is a chronology. K9 and Co. as well as Torchwood are part of that chronology since they are in the same world. There are also events in the list that were mentioned but never had an episode about them. If we are only listing episodes, than this entire list should be merged into List of Doctor Who serials. I think the best solution is to take out the word "episode" from the headers of the lists. --Arctic Gnome 02:11, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

I would mildly support the inclusion of spin-offs if their historical contexts are verifiable (and so far they all are). AG raises an important point, however. If this is a chronology, why, for example, do we have sections about episodes with no verifiable date? If we can lump all Torchwood episodes together, why not lump all the UNIT episodes together, put them in the 1960's-1970's section with a footnote and wikilink to the dating controversy? Although I don't think we can do away with references to episodes altogether, perhaps we should be listing events as opposed to episodes. We could, for example say "Daleks land on the Marie Celeste" as our event. The reader may well wonder when we found out about that and therefore we need an episode reference as well. --Bolognaking 16:02, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

Events should be the main focus of a chronology, but it most cases it would be useful to keep the episode names with their link and years. --Arctic Gnome 20:01, 25 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] July 20th 1966

I don't know whether it is notable enough to add to this fine (and fun) table that all of you Doctor Who wikipedians have been working on but I have read (in more than one publication - though I can't remember which ones right at the moment) that this day is considered the busiest in the combined history of the Doctor and Earth. As already noted:

The First Doctor defeats Wotan and the War Machine and says goodbye (though he actually doesn't do so onscreen) to Dodo and Ben and Polly join the crew.
The Second Doctor foils the plans of the Chameleons and says goodbye to Ben and Polly
The Tardis is stolen at the start of the events of The Evil of the Daleks.

That leads to my question, is it possible to add episode one of that story to the July 1966 part of the table or are those events not a part of the criteria that have been set up for this table? I just thought that I would ask here on the discussion page since I know that the members of the Doctor Who wikiproject are so dedicated in taking good care of these pages. MarnetteD | Talk 20:03, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

In my opinion, heck yeah! I think that every minute detail should be added. If part of a story occurs or mentions a specific date, the story title and episode number should be noted. The Core-Man 20:13, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Thanks

As the original creator of this page, I love the recent revamp and additions! It's come a long way since I let go of it, so thanks for all the work you guys have put into it with the date checking and everything. --Mark J 10:05, 28 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Chronology of The Doctor?

Does anyone out there think we could (and should) do a chronology of the Doctor? Putting his adventures in the order they occurred. I know that, for the most part, this would be the order the episodes aired, but multi-Doctor stories would also be inserted in there. I would like to add books and audios in the list. (Even though their canoncity is questionable.) The Core-Man 02:15, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

I am not saying don't do it, especially if you get encouragement from others, but be aware that what you suggest has already been done at www.drwhoguide.com [2] and that this website is an external link on all (or most all) of the pages about the individual stories. MarnetteD | Talk 02:30, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

I love that website. But I would like to see a season breakdown and place multi-Doctor stories in all instances where they occur. (For example, for Jon Pertwee place "The Five Doctors" in there somewhere in the Season 11 stories.) The Doctor Who Reference Guide doesn't do that, they only place the multi-Doctor stories with the current Doctor involved. The Core-Man 12:59, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

The DWRG may not do that, but Outpost Gallifrey does [3], in an almost insane amount of detail. Still, as MarnetteD says, feel free to try and get one started here. Doug A Scott ^{(4 8 15 16 23 42)} 15:48, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

You are right about OG. There's is insanely indepth. I would like detail, but more of a 'quick reference' (like this Chronology is set up.) The Core-Man 16:54, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

Two other suggestions you might want to take this discussion to the wikiproject Dr Who pages that are linked in the templates at the top of this page as you will get some quick responses from the group that oversees all of the Doctor's pages, or start your project in a sandbox then create a link to it and again present it to the DW project page and see what they say. Good luck and happy editing.MarnetteD | Talk 17:33, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Filler

I don't think that we should put filler into the chronology. Someone had put a story that will take place over 5 million years in the future. The problem with this is that there was no title for the story, (It hasn't been released yet.) and there was no specific date given. Until we get more precise details (for example, "The Shakespeare Code" has aired, but there is a link in the footnote to it stating the date.) on the adventure. The Core-Man 20:46, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Flesh and Bone

I see this entry on this page. First off, where was the title of this story listed? Secondly, where was the date listed? I don't see any reference note put on that page for the date, considering the story hasn't even aired yet. The Core-Man 22:07, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] 1941?

I would question the two dates given for 1941. The Torchwood site is notoriously unreliable in terms of dates (for example, a lot of them are marked 2006, despite the fact that we know The Christmas Invasion took place on Christmas 2006, and Torchwood is clearly after that. Plus, the poster we see on the door before they enter says that the dance quite clearly takes place on the 20th of January. The comment in Everything Changes about Captain Jack Harkness failing to report for duty on the 21st of January is, as I understand, Torchwood Jack's messing with the records so it seemed like the original Jack never died. So the episode Captain Jack Harkness takes place on the 20th of January, 1941, and The Empty Child/The Doctor Dances takes place some time after that (since Jack is already going by the name 'Jack'). --Ryttu3k 10:52, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

I'm not sure that's right. If I remember correctly, the reference to Jack's disappearance in "Everything Changes" includes the comment that it occurred during the Blitz, in London. I understood that to refer to his departure from earth (and therefore records) in The Doctor Dances. It can't be 'Captain Jack Harkness': he was in Cardiff, and Jack took his identity the day after the dance: no point taking the identity of a man gone AWOL! Gwinva 13:53, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

I don't know! I'm not sure the exact wording in that episode ever mentioned London OR Cardiff. I do remember that Jack was described as an American who disappeared 'during the Blitz' (I think - the bombing in Cardiff was part of the Cardiff Blitz), and the exact words used were "On the morning of the 21st of January, 1941, Captain Jack Harkness failed to report for duty." I thought that referred to TEC/TDD as well until I saw CJH, and that the dance very explicitely took place on the 20th. Here - even though most of the source material on the website was never in the episode, this poster was, and prominantly enough to see the date - http://www.torchwood.org.uk/html/ritz/images/poster2.jpg . I'm taking the episode to be canon in light of conflicting information on the site. And also, from the clothing and stuff in TEC/TDD, I doubt it's the middle of winter, as it would be if it was in January. I mean, the kids are happily running around in shorts. --Ryttu3k 07:02, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

In the 1940s, children wore shorts all year round: long trousers were for grown-ups. The Blitz ran from September 1950-May 1941, with only seven raids on London after February. With the acceptance of nightly raids by the individuals in TEC/TDD, they must be set before beginning of February. But taking your suggestion that the comment referred to the Cardiff Blitz, it still seems illogical. Why would Jack assume the identity of a man gone AWOL, or confirmed dead? The only way he could use his ID to mix with the officers in London, is if Captain Jack Harkness was believed to be alive, and that he is him (if that makes sense). If his assumed ID was not checked, and there were no records of him using it in London, then he didn't need to assume it. I mean, he was in London, he used that ID, he lived as an officer (at times). He must have left traces, so when the police say there is no record of him after 21 January, then that must refer to Jack's disappearance in TDD, not Captain Jack Harkness's in CJH. Gwinva 08:56, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

Good point. But still, at any rate, CJH is definitely INTENDED to take place on the 20th of January, the poster actually seen ON SCREEN being a case in point. Judging by said poster and the statement in Everything Changes, it still sounds like this is supposed to be the case - the first statement is a red herring, we think it's supposed to be our Jack, when it's actually the real one. Whether or not this is actually logical is a moot point, it'd seem. It's entirely possible that TEC/TDD takes place only a few days later, though, and hence those records haven't been sent to London yet. (Perhaps with all the stuff going on in London and Cardiff, records were mixed up and there were two Jack Harknesses at the same time? In that case, there could have been a neat parallel where our Jack assumed the name, did the con, and it was on a subsequent con that he left with the Doctor.) It's all very tricky! --Ryttu3k 10:14, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Genesis of the Daleks in the future?

I believe that Genesis of the Daleks is set in the 'distant past', according to the Docor Who book 'The Legend Continues'. I have never seen Genesis, so someone should make sure if Genesis really is set in the future, or the distant past. -- 86.133.161.166 10:53, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

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