The 10 Doctors



Not so much a traditional web comic as a funny and very well written Doctor Who Fanfic in comic form. The references come thick and fast, so if you don't know the difference between a Renegade Dalek and an Imperial Dalek be forewarned — but not discouraged.

To briefly summarise — the Tenth Doctor, in a bad mood following "The Runaway Bride", has gone to a luxurious world called the Eye of Orion to cheer himself up...only to gradually find eight of his previous selves having all arrived at the same time along with their companions. While they begin to investigate what's going on and why they've been brought together, the Eighth Doctor (the odd one out) is on Gallifrey, investigating mysterious goings-on which seem to involve the recently-disappeared Daleks. And then things get complicated...

The story is 247 pages long (plus a few extras along the way) and was posted from March 10, 2007 until May 27, 2009...so in a sense, it could be considered the "official" unofficial Doctor Who 45th-Anniversary Special.

It can be read here, or downloaded in PDF format here.

For other works by this author, see Rich's Comix Blog.

"Five: Be Careful What You Wish For."
 * Actor Allusion: The first thing Five says to Four is "So you've decided to join us this time, have you?" Tom Baker, of course, has consistently refused to reprise his role as the Fourth Doctor in any of the multi-Doctor episodes (unless you count "Dimensions in Time").
 * At one point, Seven mentions he thinks it would be better if they all worked on solving the mystery alone, as "too many bakers spoil a crust". Four looks vaguely alarmed, and Six demands to know what he's talking about.
 * Peri asks Six if he and Maxil are related, and Six scoffs at this notion. Of course, both characters were played by the same actor. Six later asks "Could you picture me as a stranger, Miss Brown?" in reference to BBV's video series The Stranger, in which Colin Baker and Nicola Bryant played the Stranger and Miss Brown.
 * Six tells Four "It's a wonder I got more than seven years out of you."
 * Most of the Doctors bicker, but Two and Three are definitely the worst. (Patrick Troughton and Jon Pertwee enjoyed pretending to hate each other at fan conventions.)
 * Ten calls Four an "arrogant overbearing smartass" during their goodbyes, probably referring to the end of Tom Baker's tenure when he became incredibly difficult to work with on-set.
 * Ten is especially glad to see Five, referencing how David Tennant became an actor entirely in the hopes that he might get to play the Doctor, after his adoration of Five's episodes in his childhood. Keep in mind that The Ten Doctors was written well before Time Crash.
 * However, the end was uploaded after Time Crash, and in said end Ten says he hopes to see Five again, and Five responds with this gem...

"Glitz: Personally, I think it tastes like Nimon sh-- Two: Ahem-hem!"
 * And the Adventure Continues...: The last page of the comic segues immediately into the beginning of "Smith and Jones".
 * Arc Words: In Page 54, there's a throwback to the "Bad Wolf" storyline in the second panel, which focuses on 9.
 * Ascended Meme: From one fan work to another! During a scene where Two needs assistance performing a TARDIS function that requires two Time Lords, he.
 * Balance Between Order And Chaos:
 * Battle in the Center of the Mind:
 * Battle Royale With Cheese: A ridiculously huge one over the skies of Earth including Ice Warriors, Draconians, Sontarans, Movellans, Rutans, Renegade Daleks, Imperial Daleks, (several incarnations of) the Doctor, the Master, etc.
 * Beard of Evil: The Master, unsurprisingly.
 * Big Bad: At some point during the story this may seem like the Master, the Cybermen, the Renegade Daleks, the Imperial Daleks, Omega, the Toymaker, the Rani, the Valeyard, the War Chief, Dalek Ahn,, or the Sontarans. But nope, it's actually.
 * Or it could be . Of course, this status could be unjustified.
 * Big Damn Heroes:
 * Call Forward:
 * The Dalek / Cybermen "negotiations" play out almost exactly as they do in "Doomsday", and Romana mentions "jiggery-pokery class" at the Academy.
 * Cartoony Eyes: The caracters switch between these and relatively realistic ones, depending on whether or not they're in the background or foreground. Most notable with Five, whose Cartoony Eyes are dots.
 * The Chessmaster: Quite a lot of them, all in conflict.
 * Combat Pragmatist: Leela. She stabs the Valeyard with a knife, and attempted to stab him again while he was regenerating, only to be held back by the Doctor.
 * Continuity Lock Out: Masterfully averted. While the story is at parts a lot easier to understand (and definitely a lot easier to predict) if you have a huge memory of all things Doctor Who, the continuity references don't actually get in the way of the plotline, and plenty of positive reviews have come from readers with only a smattering of Whovian knowledge.
 * Continuity Nod / Mythology Gag: In spades.
 * Creator Cameo: Rich, his wife, and their daughter appear briefly as Muggles watching buzz a city.
 * Curse Cut Short:
 * Curse Cut Short:

"Rich: I knew how rude the word was, having English parents and relatives. The scene is one of ultimate despair for the 9th Doctor and all his previous incarnations are playing into the hands of the enemy. It seemed that he was the Doctor who would snap and get rude at such a time."
 * Cybernetics Eat Your Soul: Case in point for both the cyberized Silurians and the.
 * Development Gag: Maxil takes a TARDIS over to the Renegade Dalek ship to apprehend Six, reflecting Colin Baker's idea to have Maxil arrest Six during "Trial of a Time Lord". (And if you recall, Baker played both characters at different times on the show.)
 * Did Not Do the Bloody Research: Averted. On one page, an enraged Nine calls his other selves "tossers." Rich is actually Canadian, but he also knew full well how rude the word is in the UK.

"Mel: (via radio) Doctor! How are you? It's me, Mel! Five: Mel? I don't know a "Mel"."
 * Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?:
 * Did You Just Scam Cthulhu?: Having been trapped in the Toymaker's pocket universe, Two tricks the Toymaker into a game of Crazy Eights, then . Omega is not pleased.
 * Dragon with an Agenda: The Celestial Toymaker to Omega; the Rani to the Daleks.
 * Early-Bird Cameo: In-universe? Anyway, a pre-"Smith & Jones" Martha shows up briefly as Grace Holloway's assistant.
 * Fan Service: During his time as, Ten is entirely shirtless.
 * Leela goes one better when we get a shot of her from behind, completely naked. Of course, at this point, Leela is an old woman. Then again...
 * Fire-Forged Friends: Rose and Ace. They start off Volleying Insults, but are soon blowing up Daleks and Cybermen together.
 * Flat What / Big "What?": Ten gets in the usual "What? What?! What?!?"
 * Foregone Conclusion: Given what we know about when the Doctors and companions came from and when this story is set, a reader can safely assume that Susan, Jo, Sarah Jane, K9 Mks. II and IV, Romana, Tegan, Turlough, Peri, Rose, Jack, the Brigadier, and the Doctors will all survive. It's more unclear with Jamie, Zoe, Leela, K9 Mk. I, Nyssa, Glitz, Mel, Ace, and Grace, but.
 * A Form You Are Comfortable With:
 * It's also mentioned that their appearances as played off of Four's need for an authority figure.
 * Future Me Scares Me: At one point, after hearing what other Time Lords think of his career, One (during his exile but before An Unearthly Child) wonders what kind of lunatic he's going to turn into. Later, Four wants to know what kind of toxin he had to ingest to become Six.
 * Doctors One through Eight also feel this way about Nine, wondering just what could have happened to make him into such a hard edged, bitter, cynical person. Of course what none of them know is that.
 * Gag Boobs: Peri, just like usual. She's even referred to as "the one with the boobs".
 * Gambit Pileup: At first it looks like the story is a plot by the Sontarans to get the various alien races of the galaxy to attack the Daleks and begin the Time War, only to find out it's really a plan by the Master . Whew. And that's not counting the roles the Rani, Davros, Dalek Ahn, the Toymaker, the War Chief, and Mortimus (the Meddling Monk) play in all this.
 * Groin Attack: The Rani deals with Glitz the same way she did the Master.
 * Have We Met Yet?: Happens quite a bit, and it's inevitable with all the time traveling and multiple incarnations of the same fellow gallivanting about, but it's especially notable with this gem:

"Dalek Ahn: EXTERMINATE!"
 * Heel Face Turn:
 * Hoist by His Own Petard:

"Nine: I am the Doctor, not "Thete", not "The Professor"! Ace: Sorry, Professor! Drax: Sorry, Thete! K-9: Apologies, Master! (Nine sighs)"
 * Heinz Hybrid: The Time Daleks are.
 * Loads and Loads of Characters
 * Mind Rape: Part of what the Keeper is doing to his "experiments".
 * Ms. Fanservice: Peri, of course, has a considerably more revealing neckline than the rest of the female companions.
 * My Name Is Not Durwood:

""The 10 Doctors merge their consciousnesses, experiencing each others' memories past and future. Then, combined into one mighty Doctor, they face off against the Dalek conditioning. Y'know, written down, that sounds stupid.""
 * Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: Ten has.
 * Ninja Zombie Pirate Robot: (As a close second, there's cyberized Silurians.)
 * Oh Crap:
 * Two and immediately make a panicked break for the TARDIS.
 * One Steve Limit: As it would be very difficult to have ten-er, characters named "the Doctor" running around, many of the Doctors are referred to by their incarnation.
 * Order Versus Chaos:
 * Original Character: There is precisely one character in this story who is not from Doctor Who canon or (in the case of the Creator Cameo) Real Life, that being the Lady President of Gallifrey.
 * Precision F-Strike: Some mild swearing is occasionally employed, but the highlight is Nyssa and snarling ""
 * Second place has to go to Nine, whose use of the word "tosser" is part of what convinces the other Doctors that he's finally snapped.
 * Put on a Bus: Nine and Ten get a bit of this, with the former acting like a bit of a spaz and the latter . But they more than make up for this later with.
 * Screaming Woman: "Mel, as we all feared, screams." For three straight panels.
 * Self-Deprecation: From Rich's Notes on Page 202:
 * Self-Deprecation: From Rich's Notes on Page 202:

"Jamie: An' I could see her bra..."
 * Sequel Hook: Most plot threads are wrapped up in a rather conclusive manner, except . Rich admitted this was a deliberate hook for a possible future story.
 * Seven Minute Lull: Page 141 features everyone talking at once, and Jamie gets a line at the very end:

"Ten: It's...squishy-squashy... Seven: Wibbly-wobbly. Five: Gelatinous. Six: Semi-fluid! Nine: Mushy-gooey. Drax: Higgledy-piggledy. Four: Hi-ho the dairy-o! Romana II: Green grow the rushes-o! One: Alright, you lot!"
 * Shown Their Work: Holy crap has he. The author's even pointed out exactly where and when all the Doctors and their companions are coming from.
 * Summon Bigger Fish: Quite a few villains are defeated or set back by one or other Doctor summoning their arch enemies, but the best example of this trope comes towards the end, when Nine and Ten
 * Take a Third Option: Have they watched the show?
 * Timey-Wimey Ball: Mentioned by name as to how all ten Doctors can be in one place at the same time.

"Five: You know, if actual lives weren't involved, this would almost be exhilarating. Four: What, clones, mutants, androids, and blobby things? I don't think any of them count."
 * Tomboy and Girly Girl: Ace and Rose, eventually. Though they bond over blowing up Cybermen with Nitro-9.
 * Unwitting Pawn: Maxil.
 * What Could Have Been: In the complete .pdf, Rich Morris includes an appendix with sketches of how some scenes would have originally played out, including Leela . It's exactly as disturbing as it sounds.
 * What Happened to the Mouse?: Barbara, Ian, Dodo, Bret Vyon, Steven, and Vicki aren't mentioned, but that's okay because they travelled with One, who hasn't met them yet. But Polly, Ben, Victoria, Adam and Chang Lee aren't mentioned either. No, wait, hold on, Nine hasn't met Captain Jack and Six hasn't met Mel or Sabalom Glitz. Wait, Jack also travelled with Ten, which won't happen for another 11 episodes yet. At least the dead ones are mentioned by name, near the end of the comic.
 * What Measure Is a Mook? / What Measure Is a Non-Human?: While Three, Four, Five, and Seven are manipulating a space battle:

"Ten: You're barmy! Bonkers! Totally flip-noggan twitters and shakes mad! Valeyard: You think so? We shall see when the universe is firmly under my control. Ten: That won't change the fact that you're a loonie."
 * Xanatos Roulette: As mentioned above, there's a number of tables going at once, but special mention must be made of Omega, who.
 * You Can't Go Home Again: Nine and Ten suffer this trope the hardest, obviously. Still, the disruption to the timeline allows them to successfully travel to Eight's Gallifrey in order to investigate the mystery. They can't stick around, however.
 * You!: Ten when he meets the Valeyard, and vice versa.
 * Your Answer to Everything: Two when Three suggests reversing the polarity.
 * You're Mad: Ten's reaction to the Keeper's plan. When Eight sees it, he says almost the exact same thing.