You're going to love this - A Fugitive Doctor Thread

[RandomJoke]

@JayPea

What did you think about her when she was introduced?

To be honest, my Opinion on this will probably differ since I was quite aware of her before I fully tipped my toes into her first appearances and her appearances in general. I was curious mainly and having watched it, I was pretty unsure what to think since she doesn’t have too much time in the Role itself, although I did love the whole Scene with her and Jodie interacting already at my first viewing.

@JayPea

What are your thoughts on Pre-Hartnell incarnations?

For a long while I had massive Issues with Pre-Hartnell Incarnations in general, now I feel more neutral about it. I will say I don’t like that Fugitive is a Pre-Hartnell Doctor (I would have originally put her around Season 6B honestly, since she does give off a similar vibe as the very early classic Doctors to a certain extent). For me, you could do Pre-Hartnell Incarnations very well, as long it’s remembered that those shouldn’t act too much like the Doctor we know nowadays. Does that make sense? Well, I hope so, it does. Overall, my Judgement on it is pretty neutral, I guess?

@JayPea

What do you think about her Characterisation?

Well, while I am not massive on her being a Pre-Hartnell One, I really enjoy her Characterisation for the most part, I really need to see/listen more from her, since I am not sure what’s her deal is overall with the rather limited screentime.

@JayPea

Are you excited for Most Wanted?

I am cautiously hopeful, love Jo Martin, glad she is getting to BF, hoping it will be a better first outing than Beyond the War Games. I do hope they go in a different Route and make her distinct as the Doctor.

Overall, big Fan of Jo Martin, excited to see how her Doctor continues in the Future!
Although I’d agree with what @deltaandthebannermen said, while I do love Jo Martin and think she has such a screen presence, her Doctor is a very different one compared to Jodie.

[thegallifreyanrebel]

@JayPea

What did you think about her when she was introduced?

I thought that she was an absolutely brilliant Doctor and was really intrigued about how she fitted in to everything.

@JayPea

What are your thoughts on Pre-Hartnell incarnations?

I completely understand why people hate the actual Timeless Child concept, the Doctor being the origin of regeneration. But Pre-Hartnell Doctors absolutely fits with canon and the Doctor’s character. I think that Hartnell’s Doctor isn’t defined by whether he’s the first face or not, what fundamentally defines his Doctor is that he ran away from Gallifrey, came to Earth, and went on the journey we have followed the Doctor on since An Unearthly Child, there being Pre-Hartnell Doctors before the journey we’ve followed him on doesn’t affect any of it.

@JayPea

What do you think about her Characterisation?

Big Finish: Coda - Final Act spoilers below

Apart from the Fugitive Doctor using the title Doctor, she does act very un-Doctor like and is different to the fundamental core of the Doctor, which Bernice points out in Coda. The Fugitive Doctor barks orders like a military officer, carries/uses guns, uses harmful physical combat and violent methods to take down her enemies, like ripping a Judoon’s horn off. In Coda she recruits an army of Voord soldiers, and provides them with guns from an armoury on her TARDIS. The obvious thing that makes her Un-Doctor like is the fact that she was an operative for a Time Lord black ops organisation, leading squads who also used guns and weapons, to enforce Time Lord control over the universe. From a characterisation perspective, the Fugitive Doctor being before Hartnell’s Doctor works very well. From this difference to the fundamental core of the Doctor, I don’t think the title Doctor has the same meaning to the Fugitive Doctor as it does the Post-Hartnell Doctors. Doctor doesn’t just mean physician or healer, it can also mean scientist. So I think that Hartnell was still the one to choose the title Doctor as we know that title to be, to help and save people.

In regards to her TARDIS being a Police Box, we know that the TARDIS is a sentient time machine, who in The Doctor’s Wife said that she could archive future console rooms, so if the TARDIS that Hartnell’s Doctor stole from the repair shop was their old TARDIS, then that explains quite a lot. When the Fugitive Doctor went on the run from Division, the TARDIS deliberately brought her to her future home planet of Earth so that the 13th Doctor could meet her and learn more about her forgotten past. When landing at the Lighthouse, the TARDIS took on the Police Box shape so that when the 13th Doctor dug her up, she’d know that it was her TARDIS. It’s a timey wimey explanation.

[DarthGallifrey]

That’s a brilliant and well thought out response. Welcome, by the way. Feel free to hop over to Introductions and tell us a bit about yourself.

[DontBlink]

Welcome to the forum!

I took think Fugitive is brilliant!

I recommend you check out the graphic novel Origins (if you haven’t already), as it stars the Fugitive and is an intriguing glimpse into her adventures in Division.

[thegallifreyanrebel]

Thank you very much⭐️

[JayPea]

Welcome to the forum, absolutely go make an intro post like others have said

Also I really need to get round to Coda at some point, it sounds great!

[thegallifreyanrebel]

Thank you.

I definitely recommend Coda. I hadn’t listened to any of Once and Future, but it was very easy to understand and the idea of two Doctors fighting was great.

[thegallifreyanrebel]

Thank you very much.

Yes, those comics were really interesting and I loved the very Time Lord political style story of it. Also the first time we see the Fugitive Doctor interact with Tecteun, which is right at the end of the comic. It was one of the things I wished we’d seen in Flux. Though Tecteun’s presence is felt in Fugitive of the Judoon, with Ruth telling the 13th Doctor that her parents were cold and distant, and that she rebelled against them, which I think is supposed to be a metaphor for how the Fugitive Doctor rebelled against Tecteun and Division. Then on the Judoon Ship, the Judoon Captain says “contract states Judoon must deliver Fugitive to contractee at Division” and Gat says she’s there on behalf of the contractee, who was much higher in authority than her. So that contractee being Tecteun makes a lot of sense I think, especially as she said in Flux that she was the one who ordered the Doctor’s mind-wipe.

[DontBlink]

@thegallifreyanrebel

the first time we see the Fugitive Doctor interact with Tecteun, which is right at the end of the comic

That was Tecteun?

Of course! That makes a lot of sense now.

Although I wouldn’t say she interacts with Fugitive.

@thegallifreyanrebel

I definitely recommend Coda. I hadn’t listened to any of Once and Future, but it was very easy to understand and the idea of two Doctors fighting was great.

I give in, I’m definitely listening to this as soon as possible!

[joerack]

@thegallifreyanrebel

When landing at the Lighthouse, the TARDIS took on the Police Box shape so that when the 13th Doctor dug her up, she’d know that it was her TARDIS

I really like this explanation.

Also welcome!

[thegallifreyanrebel]

Thank you⭐️

I hope that the Fugitive Doctor’s Big Finish stories one day reveal the mysteries of her incarnation.

[TARDIS32]

So my initial thoughts was disappointment that the leaks looked like they were going to be correct. Not because I had a problem with the story in the leaks, I just wanted the leakers to be wrong. Pre-Hartnell Doctors? Go watch The Brain of Morbius, there isn’t really another way to interpret the scene.

MORBIUS: How far, Doctor? How long have you lived?
…
MORBIUS: Back. To. The. Beginning!

It’s pretty cut and dry, even if the transcriber seems to think the faces are of Morbius, but that doesn’t fit in context.

Characterization, she is tougher and rather less kind than the Doctor we know, which fits with how you’d imagine a pre-Hartnell version of the character. I think she’s a good character, but we didn’t get enough on the show. Actively frustrating that in Flux we’d get these flashback scenes, but we get Jodie Whittaker in her place. Nothing against 13, but we should have seen Martin in Martin’s scenes.

As for the TARDIS appearing like a police box. I don’t think any kind of elaborate reasoning or backstory is required. We know from Davison’s time there is a degree of control over the chameleon circuit, he showed how he could make it turn into a pyramid, but it isn’t working, so we’re stuck with police box. Assume the chameleon circuit is functional in the Fugitive Doctor’s time. I argue it’s a police box simply because it landed in the UK, so they wanted some kind of outdated British artifact they could bury that no one would even think of. Police box is perfect and makes sense. Land, chameleon arch, and the assistant guy with her buries the box. Easy, and I don’t understand why it’s such a sticking point for the Fugitive and Timeless Child detractors.

I don’t have a good explanation for the name The Doctor other than maybe it was a codename she used while working with Division, I’d imagine they don’t use real names there. Yes all of this does require a good number of coincidences, but as Elim Garak says “I believe in coincidences. Coincidences happen every day.”

Anyway, I like Fugitive Doctor, even if she was underused in the Chibnall years, and she was good addition to our numerous Doctors.

[shauny]

Ultimately what people are forgetting is that this is a drama show.

For the Thirteenth Doctor to dig up a police box, we instantly get curious and excited, what could this mean? How is that there? Does that mean…? Is that…? But…!!?

Now imagine if she dug up a grey cylindrical default TARDIS shell and had to add context by saying “oh my giddy aunt, this is a TARDIS!”

It would have lost all impact of that scene.

Yes, there needs to be some weird timey-wimey explanation, or you say it’s because it’s the same TARDIS and it is conscious, or it’s because the chameleon circuit has a kind of “memory” of the future when it meets the future Doctor, or any of those head-canons.

But ultimately, given the choice for what was best in that moment, digging up the police box was absolutely the right thing to do to make that scene impactful. It gave me goosebumps!

[ItsR0b0tNinja]

Who the Fugitive Doctor is, both positive and negative, has been talked/debated about to death.

I would have loved the idea of the Fugitive being a future incarnation that is many regenerations from now. Give the Doctor a sense of dread at how they will turn out in the future.

Fugitive gives me vibes of War, which we had only gotten a few years before.

It’s not my favourite thing and from what I heard in Coda, I’m still not sold on the character/actor.

But hey, people like what they like. No shade from me if it’s your jam.

[shauny]

@ItsR0b0tNinja

I would have loved the idea of the Fugitive being a future incarnation that is many regenerations from now. Give the Doctor a sense of dread at how they will turn out in the future.

Isn’t that just The Valeyard though?

[ItsR0b0tNinja]

The Valeyard is a “This is going to happen soon” thing. My idea was hundreds of regenerations from now.

[joerack]

One aspect of the Fugitive Doctor that doesn’t get talked about enough is her outfit.

I think it both looks great and works well for the character. The waistcoat and jacket have the vibe of a military greatcoat which works for this harsher incarnation of the Doctor. The shirt gives a pop of colour that keeps the outfit fun and is made from an African Kente cloth which was chosen to reflect Jo Martin’s background.

[thegallifreyanrebel]

Tecteun in Fugitive of the Judoon

The Fugitive Doctor was on the run from the Time Lord black ops organisation she used to work for, Division. But that also means she was on the run from her adoptive parent Tecteun as well, and I believe while we don’t see her, she is present in other ways.

I think this is an allegory of the Doctor and Tecteun, with how the Doctor rebelled against her and ran away. And having Ruth’s parents live in a lighthouse in the middle of nowhere who weren’t good with people, a metaphor of Tecteun’s cold and distant nature. In universe, I think the TARDIS created an identity when the Fugitive Doctor used the chameleon arch, in order to reflect her true identity, to make her rebellious in case Division found her.

As shown in this scene, the Time Lord and Division Operative called Gat wasn’t the person who had hired the Judoon. The contractee was a Time Lord much higher in authority who put on the contract that the Judoon bring the Fugitive Doctor to them at Division, who Gat said she was there on behalf of, so a person not multiple people. That being Tecteun makes perfect sense.

This was an earlier scene, but I put it after the other two examples as this isn’t as obvious. But I think that this moment of Ruth’s true identity breaking through, and her talking about bullies, was talking about Tecteun, because she was a bully and liked to pick on the Doctor’s vulnerabilities.