idk anymore

omg hiii dearest pls always feel free to invade my asks whenever you like i always have time for you and also this is the best ask ever. i love nothing more than talking about doctor who unfortunately. still!!!

soo yes obviously i could just recommend random eps of classic who but since you've seen some already i think you're right some actual jumping on points would be better... that way you can actually test out some eras a little more

forgive me if i lay out some stuff ive already said to you before, but i want to answer properly !

also this will be long bc a. I can'tttt do concise im so sorry i have tried and it just suffocates me and b. i don't know exactly what your doctor who preferences and tastes are so i want to give enough general detail so you can get the vibe of the eras and choose what sounds most interesting to you :)

1.

always my first recommendation to anyone getting into classic who will be to start from the season 24 episode 'dragonfire' and to continue on from there until the show's original end with 'survival'.

this might seem random but it is in fact a little era of its own. dragonfire is the ep that introduces ace, and from then on it's seven and ace together, and it really marks the beginning of andrew cartmel's particular vision for the show, which is great. also whilst i have some affection for the other episodes in season 24 they're.... um. mostly an acquired taste to be honest. camp doesn't even begin to cover it.

sure, dragonfire isn't a great episode (there is a hilariously ridiculous sylvester mccoy pratfall tho, and i personally always enjoy those) but it is a great introduction to ace, who is one of the best companions of all time ← not even a biased opinion, just a fact! she also was certainly the model/ influence for most new who companions - particularly re having a notable backstory which actually comes into play during her run, and a more complex, emphasised psychology, which 60s who aside, was extremely rare in the classic show. because of that, I definitely think she is a companion very easy for new who fans to bond with, as well as displaying the correlation between the two periods of the show, which is always interesting to see imo!

after dragonfire though, season 25 and 26 follow, and they are generally held in very high esteem, rightly so in my opinion. they really showcase such a bold, fresh new direction for the show - which was really needed at that time for doctor who. it could be light hearted, complex, exciting, eerie, silly.. everything it should be! not every single episode is amazing of course, but there are some absolute classic stories, like 'the greatest show in the galaxy', 'ghost light' and 'the curse of fenric'.

it also takes the doctor in a really intriguing new direction. although seven absolutely can be one of the goofiest doctors, with sylvester mccoy's background in slapstick, he is also one of the darkest. especially of the classic era. he's often referred to as the 'chessmaster' doctor, because he's very adept at manipulating people and creating complex, interweaving plans, treating people as, you guessed it, chess pieces on his board. all for the greater good of course, but no one likes to be treated as just a pawn, and it is a risky methodology that can have dire consequences. it's a really interesting thread that's developed through season 25 and 26 with ace, particularly in how he treats and manoeuvres her. she's the only companion to not call him doctor, but 'professor'. i think that's notable.

also notable and important for me tho, is that they never veer into the 'oh he's like a god he's the burning sun he's the beginning of it all he's always there he's so scary and dark and tortured' stuff that the new who showrunners seem to love as a feature of the doctor and get really into exploring and basically hyping up all of the time, as if he's batman and the specialist most important guy in the universe. im not saying none of that can ever be cool, but it does often feel like a pretty superficial read of the character to me, which basically makes him out to be a male fantasy of a really cool superhero.

with seven's manipulations and machinations however, although they are a dark, complicated part of him absolutely, and there are lots of directions to take that and explore as a part of him, it is also a genuine, understandable flaw, and fairly subtle in the way its handled. it's also not especially overplayed or obsessed over in his era, more slowly built up and seeded.

additionally, ace and seven are a great dynamic to watch the era of, because then there are also tons of great extended universe stories to get into if you ever want, which build on those rich, darker aspects of their relationship even more!

2.

another great place to start is tom baker! maybe the obvious choice.. but honestly, he's popular for good reason. unless you have a specific aversion to his portrayal (some people just don't vibe with him which is fair - it's a very 'big' performance), tom baker is kind of this wonderful, magnetic star in the role. i can see why for many his is still the definitive doctor performance. if you've watched a story of his, you might have seen some of this, but he's definitely one of the most otherworldly and alien doctors, whilst still being generally sort of friendlyish and approachable, which is such a fun combination - and again, is kind of one of the basic parts of the doctor's characterisation now. but tom baker definitely does the alien stuff the best imo. he's totally weird and witty and wild, whilst still able to do the dramatic, weighty stuff as well, and i think it all really works.

moreover though, he also happened to join the show during the amazing period of collaboration between philip hinchcliffe, and a great script editor robert holmes, *and* he got some of the best ever companions in sarah jane, leela, and romana (i like both romana's, but romana ii is generally the fave). so there were also a lot of other talented people involved in making his era great, and as such, the first three seasons of his in particular are held up especially as a golden era. i definitely recommend just watching all episodes from those seasons. there are a high number of excellent stories, and many, many 'just' good ones.

it does all start to go a bit off the rails after that - with tom baker's alcoholism and generally difficult behaviour on set, and the loss of philip hinchcliffe, creating more and more challenges as they went on. unfortunately tom baker's performance becomes the definition of hammy and ott, and the era loses its distinctive flavour and wit.

that's not to say there aren't good moments and episodes after that point though, they're just much less frequent. there is one of the classics in season 17, with 'city of death' (written by douglas adams), but on the whole the last two seasons are very uneven. it depends on how completist you are, but i don't think anyone would blame you for skipping around at this point.

tl;dr i think season 12 to season 14 are classic who essential watches, season 15 and 16 are solid, and season 17 and 18 are worth it for completists, to catch the odd good moment or episode, or for my beloved romana :)

but i lovee tom baker

3.

thirdly and lastly, i would heavily recommend the third doctor's era!

as i mentioned recently, it's one of the show's most successful soft reboots, transporting and imprisoning a newly regenerated doctor to earth, giving him a job at UNIT, and having him be accompanied by a bunch of co workers, rather than companions, and a new foe - the master.

hands down his first season is one of theeeee best seasons of the show. i love it. inferno is still one of my favourite doctor who stories - an apocalyptic, alternative universe story about the dangers of messing with the environment, it is just an incredibly gripping and exciting ride from start to finish, and so well acted by the regulars. also there's an evil brigadier in the parallel universe and they visualise his evil by having him wear an eye patch.. so yay :D

season 7 also contains one of the great short lived companions in liz shaw - a smart, confident feminist scientist, who really does not mind taking the doctor to task (which is honestly especially refreshing in classic who), and understands almost as much as he does on the science front. she's not a typical companion in these respects, and that does give the dynamic a bit of a different feel - even if the third doctor is still an old white man lol.

you could just watch season 7 and see how you feel with that really. it's an extremely cohesive, consistent season, and is distinctive in its assuredness in tone and aims.

especially as after it, they go in a pretty different direction. with season 8 to 11, it definitely becomes a safer, less experimental era in feel - i get why many people call it a cozy one.

the first change is that they replace liz shaw with katy manning's jo grant, who is definitely much gentler, and much more deferent to the doctor. but luckily she's also very charming and light-hearted, and the introduction of her, and roger delgado's master, really gives this period of the show a great sense of fun which it was probably lacking a little in season 7, excellent though it was.

and whilst there have been many great masters at this point, maybe even too many, i still think roger delgado was, and is, the best. he is the perfect moriarty to pertwee's sherlock, and they are so unbelievably fun to watch together. their campy quips alone make whole episodes worth watching.

the era stays mostly pretty consistent after that really, in tone and in quality, so if you like it, you can definitely continue on until its end. i also particularly like its fairly continual leftist politics (communist writer malcolm hulke writes quite a few episodes) - especially re the environment, and including getting the third doctor to yell at tories :)

the onlyyyy other comment i would add for consideration is the fact that jon pertwee, rather famously despite his comedic background, played the role mostly pretty straight. im not saying he never cracks a joke, but compared to the doctors directly preceding and succeeding him for instance, he almost seems severe. he always strikes me as much more bond-like than any other doctor - he wears smart formal wear, has a team and homebase, likes a gadget, and has a car he races around and chases the bad guys in. of course he's still not bond, he is the doctor, and there are more classic, recognisably doctorish qualities of his as well. but if you like the doctor more quirky, or more alien, he may not be your favourite. obviously that doesn't mean you shouldn't watch this great era, just that it might affect your prioritisation of when to watch it.

i think that's it for really good jumping on points imo, aside from just starting at the very begining and trying to make it all the way through (i started doing that several times and never could make it that way personally).

there are other doctors i would have loved to recommend, bc i love them, but unfortunately they're not the best starting points for classic who. for instance the second doctor's era unfortunately starts with tons of missing episodes, which are a bit of a pain to get through in terms of reconstructions, and the fifth doctor's era is very inconsistent, even though there are a couple of my favourite episodes within it.

obviously tho, you can start wherever you like, these are just my personal recommendations! i hope you've got a good sense of these three eras /what the vibes are roughly now, and that it might be somewhat helpful in deciding on where to go. it is so overwhelming looking at all of classic who.

one of the best things in rereading this book is trying to map out just when tom comes to understand polly's use to him. like when does the Grooming really begin. bc on the page, even aside from polly's own assumptions and perspective, it looks pretty immediate to me. we can't ever know the 'truth', but i like her retrospectively thinking that if he hadn't seemed so desperate to escape the house, then she might not have stayed with him - 'she was his excuse for coming out of it' ←similar to later discovering that she is his saviour for escaping the family/ his relationship and tether to laurel, which is physically embodied by the house (so in the very first instance of them meeting, polly demonstrates her usefulness to him in literally getting him out of it.) and so as rereaders we know that his desperation is in a number of ways truly and honestly felt ←there is always a level of honesty to him which is fascinating and still underhand and arguable..but how 'real' was his evocation of it in front of polly, subtle as it might appear through her ten year old eyes. she is very precocious and always assumes a level of understanding that she believes most of the adults in her life don't guess at, that does seem true and fair a reading of her character and perception. but we know about the things she does miss nevertheless and we knowwww what tom needs of her, from her. might his desperation in fact have been so very obvious, performed, for such a young girl to pick up on it, to be so drawn in, instantly?

Maybe yet another one of the clearest displays of cain's ownership and violence and misogyny and grooming and control in one little sceneeeee. his possession of debbie and her body. He pays for her, supports her materially, she is His (← as he wanted/ viewed his relationship with charity). rages at her for the violation done to her not for the man who enacted it, ofc, forever (when he is forced to meet himself, his mirrors over and over. from andy to tom king jr. the violations and rapes of christmas past). and ofc His anger that of an abusive spurned and betrayed lover / sexual rival than that of a supposed parent - well ofc bc he's the father forever grooming his daughter into partnership into ownership. Their romance, his seduction of her from charity. that will always be the basis of debbiecain. if i can't have you (wife), then ill have her(our daughter). coerce the daughter to coerce the mother, the love story, the twisted incestuous love triangleeeeee. He knows what to do, to take what he wants, he gets it. His entitlement and his successes. using their vulnerabilities - emotional, physical and material/ financial to further his superiority and power.

and nowwww he's horrified by what he sees as the turning of his Girl his child to her mother. when the daughterwife truly becomes the daughterwife. His hatred of whores, his hatred of the motherwife, of the treacherous ungrateful charity. The bitch and the abandonner, the slag who wouldn't stay in place, who left him for something better, who rose above her station and degraded herself with another man. And now it's happening again. the slut has converted the maiden. baby girl is tainted, spoilt. No longer His now. so now he has the right to punish her however he sees fit

'you're as bad as that rapist! you took advantage of her, you used her! she is a kid'

Wow i love how they say it all out loud for an episode. even the great patriarch zak, particularly him. For a second i thought they might care, they might protect a little girl who's been abused

Debbie now is so glad charity has left, triumphantly throwing it back in cain's face. the disrupted nuclear family he fought so hard to force. and now debbie can appreciate that, His failure, even if she has lost her own mum, even if her childhood dreams are broken. now she can see. This failure is better, she prioritises it over her own pain, her own loss. bc at least charity the mother the wife has escaped Him, the father the husband, at least she has A life now, at least she can. debbie the understander debbie the knowerrrrrrr. her understanding equal to a too soon coming of age. abuse negates naivety, childhood, at last. when did debbie last tell one of her stories? she has grown up, she has had to. How much does she think back to her own so called choice, cain's grooming and seduction to Keep her, her coerced belief that he Needed her, that he should be favoured. did she really believe that? i don't think so. it wasn't a proclamation of greater love from cain, or a misogynist view of debbie's that he the man Deserved more. it was merely the continuation of his coercion, a perfectly targeted guilt trip, emotive rhetoric. 'he's been getting to you hasn't he' says charity, she Knew. his wounded face, his child like performance. don't leave me like all the other women do (his mother, charity, Angie..) cain the little boy who needs protecting who needs love and care. who's got nothing and no one, but deserves something, someone. And poor little baby debbie, so selfless and brave, offered herself up. the sacrificial girl the sacrificial lamb. her pure kind heart and her love for her father - or her attempt to love him. (What does she feel?). the monster all cowed and sad, the monster in her heart. His claws and his grip - she thought loving, now she knows, feels, their oppression. his fury at her being spoiled, His little girl, come back into my grip. but she's not so sure now, not so lost, forgiving.