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Doctor Who Makes Guinness Book of World Records

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the cue-the-music dept.

shadowlight1 writes "According to a BBC press release, cult favorite Doctor Who has entered the Guiness Book of World Records as the world's longest running science fiction show! There we go, it's official. Also, the second season of Who premieres on the SciFi channel tonight." From the release: "The series began on 23 November, 1963, and was revived in 2005 after 16 years off the screen. William Hartnell played the original Doctor Who, with Jon Pertwee, Tom Baker and Peter Davison among those following in his footsteps. Christopher Eccleston took up the mantle of the ninth Timelord last year - following the show's relaunch. He was replaced after just one series by David Tennant after Eccleston dropped out. "

22 of 227 comments (clear)

  1. Here Here by AlzaF · · Score: 5, Informative

    A prime example of traditional great british entertainment

    1. Re:Here Here by TimothyTimothyTimoth · · Score: 3, Funny
      There has to be some comedy combination of longest run through time and Time Lord ... sort of pun.

      If only I had a TARDIS I could grab the best one from the end of this thread and insert it her.

      --
      It doesn't matter which ape activates the Monolith
    2. Re:Here Here by TimothyTimothyTimoth · · Score: 3, Funny

      I have to reply to myself on behalf of Freud.

      --
      It doesn't matter which ape activates the Monolith
  2. Christopher Eccleston, best Dr., Evah by fatboy · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Better than Tom Baker, but not by much :) I just loved what he did with the character.

    --
    --fatboy
    1. Re:Christopher Eccleston, best Dr., Evah by HFXPro · · Score: 4, Interesting

      He did do an extremely good job with the doctor. A doctor who seemed happy go lucky, yet at any minute could show signs of a nervous breakdown or go psycotic. I am not that impressed with the new guy. His rendition of the doctor is not nearly as good. It seems it is played two happily, rather then a mix of happiness, sadness, depression, and wisdom gained from so many years of existance.

      --
      Reserved Word.
  3. Dr Who Makes Guiness.... by krell · · Score: 5, Funny

    "Timelord. Brewer. Patriot".

    --
    Where were you when the voynix came?
  4. Den Den Den Den Woooooooo by Luke+Psywalker · · Score: 5, Funny

    http://youtube.com/watch?v=0s95Mm0cFqg

  5. Then maybe we can change that Slashdot icon... by ProteusQ · · Score: 4, Funny

    Enough of that ST:TOS head. Replace it with the TARDIS!

  6. Not true, it is science fiction... by KingSkippus · · Score: 3, Insightful

    At least, using the Wikipedia definition. Dr. Who does not delve into the magical or supernatural, which is what differentiates science fiction from fantasy. Or rather, at least when it does, it does so with the understanding that there's some logical scientific explanation.

    Just because they make up some of the science (and may be wildly inaccurate) doesn't make it not science fiction.

    1. Re:Not true, it is science fiction... by Squalish · · Score: 3, Informative

      So... just to pull the last few books of Heinlein's I've read off the shelf and flip through them...

      Stranger in a Strange Land
      blurb: "The best-selling underground novel by the dean of American science fiction writers"
      features: Martian psychokinetic abilities which include teleportation and mentally causing matter to cease to exist/

      Starship Troopers
      blurb: "the classic novel by the greatest science fiction writers of all time"
      features a "brain bug" which controls a colony psychically, as well as good old-fashioned human psychics.

      Glory Road
      blurb: "the irrepressible science fiction classic!"
      features: Magicians and transdimentional portals

      I Will Fear No Evil
      blurb: "Magnificent - a science fiction masterpiece"
      features: A body which, after a complete brain transplant, interjects the donor body's personality into the consciousness of the new composite as a self-aware, sentient split personality.

      Not much of Heinlein's work qualifies as science fiction under your definition.

      Like it or not, but "science fiction" has become a genre based primarily upon finding necessary in the reader a willing suspension of disbelief in order to experience the story within the parameters given. The disbelief is generated because the story usually violates current scientific understanding. What we classify as 'hard sci-fi' as advancing only technology, rather than fundamentally changing what we know of science - and in its true form it's a rather small genre.

      --
      People in Soviet Russia, however, appear to be afflicted with amusing juxtapositions of the aforementioned situation
  7. Dr. Who in the record books... by crazyjeremy · · Score: 3, Funny

    Perhaps there should be another mention of Dr. Who in Guiness Book of World Records. As far as I know it's the only sci-fi show EVER to be able to complete a season in one country, before that season starts in another.

    If one so wishes, he could watch all of the second season already, but in the US the second season is just now starting.

    That's some amazing technology! Time travel? Alternative-Universe? Or just plain old creative bittorenting?

    --
    Funnypics
    1. Re:Dr. Who in the record books... by grapeape · · Score: 3, Interesting

      At least they are starting the second season now...that gives them time to catch up and possibly show the third while its actually current. (I hope!) SciFi sure did drag its heels about getting it on the lineup though.

      The second season is BTW fantastic. You will miss Eccleston for all of about an episode or two. I have watched Dr Who since the Tom Baker days and have actually grown to like David Tennants version best of all. He has the sense of humor that Baker had, the wit of Sylvester McCoy and more athleticisim than any Doctor since Peter Davison. Christmas Ivasion is a great introduction while New Earth is a bit silly. By far the best of the second season episodes is The Girl in the Fireplace, though Cybermen and Satans Pit two parters are also fantastic. The only real stinker in the second season is Love & Monsters which as a farting monster designed by a child (chosen from a contest) that looks remarkably like Fat Bastard from Austin Powers. Overall the second season ends up even better than the first, its peppered with old favorites as well as a few rather shocking surprises.

  8. I'll take.... by Siberwulf · · Score: 5, Funny

    I'll take "Topics That Would Have Made Sense the First Time I Read Them, had the Author Used More Punctuation" for 1000, Alex.

  9. Guinness Book of Trivia by jimmichie · · Score: 3, Insightful
    world's longest running science fiction show ... revived in 2005 after 16 years off the screen.
    That's the equivalent of running a marathon but stopping halfway through for a couple of pints at the pub, and it has nothing at all to do with the qualities that made Doctor Who great. Not everything in life needs a prize; we know Dr Who's good already.
    1. Re:Guinness Book of Trivia by Zephiria · · Score: 3, Informative

      Being english, I can tell you that the idea of stopping a marathon, heading off to the pub for a few pints before stumbling onto the track again makes PERFECT sense :D

    2. Re:Guinness Book of Trivia by nagora · · Score: 3, Funny
      Yes, but you don't get a prize for it.

      Only because some cheaty bastard would run on while all the honest people were in the pub.

      --
      "Encyclopedia" is to "Wikipedia" what "Library" is to "Some people at a bus stop"
  10. Re:Longest running? by abandonment · · Score: 3, Insightful

    yeah this is pretty questionable. Just because they 'revived' an old series from ancient history doesn't make it 'longest running' by any sense of the term.

    How do they factor this? number of episodes? number of screen minutes? I mean stargate has been running for how many years?

    Just because they haven't bothered to change the actual doctor who series name (even though it's been morphed in countless other ways) is it considered the 'same series'?

    dunno, seems like a pile of crap to me.

    --
    Gekido's Lair
  11. The Title of This Article... by commisaro · · Score: 3, Funny

    ... is a dependant clause. It really needs to be finished. Doctor who makes Guinness Book of World Records... does what, exactly?

  12. Re:Longest running? by xtieburn · · Score: 4, Insightful

    There is a seperate record for consecutive series which SG1 is winning.

    There are 723 episodes of Doctor who in comparison to a couple of hundred SG1 episodes. In every concievable way Dr Who is the longest running series. Even if you discounted the two recent Seasons of it. Though really, every series morphs with time to some extent. However, the Doctor is still the same character, existing in the same universe, with the same enemies, the same TARDIS, the same camp quirkyness, the same relationships with companions. Its all still very much Doctor Who.

    Yes it is the same series. Yes it is the longest running.

  13. Re:Nitpick: it's "Hear, hear" by AlzaF · · Score: 3, Funny

    its not my fault you can't understand my accent

  14. you misread the Wikipedia article! by Xtifr · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Because, when I read it, it specifically said that Dr. Who was an exception and does not qualify as science fiction. And then it went on with something about the population of elephants tripling in the last six months that I didn't quite understand.... :)

  15. Sorry, which season is that? by brainburger · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Am I the only one who gets annoyed when the Eccleston/Tennant seasons (or series to us Brits), are referred to as numbers 1 and 2 instead of 27 and 28?
    The whole point is that the show is 43 years old, so why pretend the other 26 series never happened in the numbering?