B00DPX9ST8 EBOK (313 page)

Either way, the overwhelming amount of evidence suggests that Earth survives and continues to have great influence on the universe, at least for billions of years into the future (
The End of the World
). It’s probable, then, that there’s a fifth and many more Empires after this point.

[
1295
]
The Crystal Bucephalus

[
1296
]
Tomb of Valdemar

[
1297
] Dating
The Impossible Planet/The Satan Pit
(X2.8-2.9) - Casualties in this story are repeatedly said as dying on “43K2.1”. If the numbers mean anything we could interpret, the “K” perhaps suggests a date in the 43,000s. In the DVD commentary, Russell T Davies says the draft script stated it was the forty-third century. The overriding consideration, however, is that the story presumably happens before the Ood are liberated from slavery (
Planet of the Ood
, set in 4126).
Doctor Who: The Encyclopedia
and
Doctor Who: The Time Traveller’s Almanac
both concur with that, dating events with the Beast to “the forty-second century”.
Timelink
goes for an earlier dating of 4043. The Doctor’s assertion they are “five hundred years” from Earth would seem to mean five hundred light years
or
that it would take the humans here five hundred years to get to Earth.

The Doctor previously encountered life from before the creation of our universe in
Terminus
,
Millennial Rites
,
All-Consuming Fire
,
Synthespians™
, and more.

[
1298
] Commonly referenced as “K37J5”, but it’s “K37Gem5” in the closed captioning on the DVD - and indeed, that
is
what it sounds like Cross Flane is saying. (This is possibly the same dating system that starts inserting words like “apple” into year designations, as in
The End of the World.
)

[
1299
] Dating
Orbis
(BF BBC7 #3.1) - The Doctor and the Headhunter confirm that he’s been on Orbis “six hundred years or thereabouts”. The plotline with the activator continues in
The Eight Truths/Worldwide Web
.

[
1300
]
Orbis
,
The Eight Truths
,
Worldwide Web.

[
1301
] Dating
Planet of the Ood
(X4.3) - The Doctor first says that the Ood are “servants of humans in the forty-second century”, then gives the exact year.

[
1302
] Dating
42
(X3.7)
-
While no date is given on screen, prepublicity for the episode said it was set in the forty-second century - possibly just as a take-off on the title. Nonetheless, the Doctor’s spacesuit bears the same design as the one he wore in
The Impossible Planet/The Satan Pit,
perhaps indicating that all three episodes take place in roughly the same time.

[
1303
] “Centuries” before
Destiny of the Daleks
.

[
1304
]
The Story of Martha:
“The Weeping”

[
1305
] Dating
The Last Voyage
(BBC
DW
audiobook #6) - Earth currently has an empire, but as Eternity has a population of eight billion humans, this is well in advance of the struggling Earth Empire as seen in the Pertwee era. The only other historical clues are that a) robots are in use, b) a straight-shot flight from one end of the Empire to another is considered advanced (so presumably, standard spaceships aren’t too shabby either), and c) human longevity is such that Cluxton is 160, and is spry enough to undertake pioneering business ventures involving space transport. With all of that in mind, this story has been arbitrarily set during the Second Empire.

[
1306
] Dating
Pest Control
(BBC
DW
audiobook #1) - The Doctor identifies the Pioneer Corps soldiers as being part of the Second Great and Bountiful Human Empire.

[
1307
] Dating “Body Snatched” (IDW
DW
Vol. 2, #10-11) - It’s “two hundred years” before the opening of “Body Snatched”, which is set in the “forty-fifth century”.

[
1308
] Dating
The End of Time
(X4.17) - It’s been “one hundred years” since the Doctor’s last visit (
Planet of the Ood
).

[
1309
] Dating
The Death Collectors
(BF #109a) - The participants seem human; not only do they possess such names as “Nancy” and “Smith Ridley”, the sky station’s computer has Puccini’s “Madame Butterfly” in its music collection. No date is given, and so placement here amounts to little more than a guess, but the overall tone suggests it’s a story where mankind has simply ventured so far into space, it’s encountering horrors beyond its comprehension. Dar Traders also appear in
The Darkening Eye
.

[
1310
]
A Christmas Carol
. The date is given on Elliot’s portrait.

[
1311
] “Centuries” before
The Davros Mission
, and probably explaining why the Doctor blows up Skaro in
Remembrance of the Daleks
without fear of eradicating the Thals as well.

[
1312
]
The Crystal Bucephalus
(p42).

[
1313
] “Centuries” before
Emotional Chemistry.

[
1314
] Dating
A Christmas Carol
(X6.0) - The Doctor first meets Kazran Sardick (from Kazran’s perspective) when Kazran is 12, but the precise year isn’t given. Elliot Sardick was born in 4302, so couldn’t have a 12-year-old son until, say, 4332 at the earliest (and while he has dark hair; Elliot’s clearly at least middle aged at this point). The older Kazran was played by Michael Gambon, who was 68 at the time, so we can infer that Kazran is around 70 in the “present day”. The Doctor then revisits Kazran on seven successive Christmas Eves.

[
1315
] “Twenty years” before
A Christmas Carol
; the year of Elliot’s death is on his portrait.

[
1316
]
Spiral Scratch

[
1317
] Dating
A Christmas Carol
(X6.0) - We’re told Elliot Sardick died “twenty years” before the story, and a plaque below his portrait states he died in 4378. In
SJA: Death of the Doctor
, the Doctor mentions a seemingly unrelated incident in which he dropped Amy and Rory off on a “honeymoon planet” that as it turned out was itself on a honeymoon, having married an asteroid.

[
1318
]
Red.
“The Needle” in this story is not the same one as the Needle in
The Infinity Doctors
. The time-travel process described here is similar to the early Gallifreyan experiments (as detailed in
Cat’s Cradle: Time’s Crucible
).

[
1319
] Dating “Body Snatched” (IDW
DW
Vol. 2, #10-11) - It’s the “forty-fifth century” according to the opening caption.

[
1320
] Dating “Keepsake” (BF #112b) - The Doctor says that it’s “nearly two thousand years” since
Kingdom of Silver
.

[
1321
]
Only Human

[
1322
] Dating
Here There Be Monsters
(BF CC #3.1) - The back cover says it’s the “distant future”. Mention is made of yet another “human empire”, but in itself, this isn’t very telling. Rostrum says he doesn’t know the year in Earth terms - a pity, as that would’ve been helpful.

“Benchmarking” has here been linked to the “dirty rip” engines mentioned in
Only Human
, as they seem to work on roughly the same principle. That would make this “empire” the Second Great and Bountiful Earth Empire.

It’s unclear if the tentacled “deep space” creatures seen here are an evolved form of the Yssgaroth from
The Pit
, which were similarly loosed on our reality after Rassilon punched holes in the fabric of space-time.
Tomb of Valdemar
also alludes to similar creatures, and this chronology places the two stories at roughly the same time.

[
1323
] Dating
Tomb of Valdemar
(PDA #29) - No date is given, but this is within a generation of the fall of the Second Empire. Since the last edition of
Ahistory
, which placed this story in 16,000,
Planet of the Ood
established that the Second Great and Bountiful Human Empire was around in 4126. Earth no longer seems to have an Empire in the Davros Era, so the latest this story can be set is around 4500.

[
1324
] See The Davros Era sidebar.

[
1325
] Dating
Destiny of the Daleks
(17.1) - The Daleks and Movellans have been locked in stalemate for “centuries”. At this point, the Daleks are feared, highly advanced and have a vast war fleet which operates as their command base. In
Resurrection of the Daleks
, it is made clear that there is deadlock between the Movellans and the Daleks’ computers, not the Daleks themselves.

[
1326
] According to
War of the Daleks.

[
1327
]
Resurrection of the Daleks

[
1328
] “Forty years” before
Revelation of the Daleks.

[
1329
] Before
Davros.

[
1330
]
Christmas on a Rational Planet
. No date is given, but Riften-5 was the home planet of Lytton according to
Attack of the Cybermen
, and this is (presumably) his home timezone.
Attack of the Cybermen
ends with the Doctor saying he misjudged Lytton, yet they didn’t meet at all in
Resurrection of the Daleks
(unless you count Lytton shooting at the Doctor from a distance) and they barely meet in
Attack of the Cybermen
. If we wanted to fix that, we could theorise that the Doctor met Lytton - from his perspective - between the two stories (it would be before
Resurrection of the Daleks
for Lytton).

[
1331
] Dating
Resurrection of the Daleks
(21.4) - This is the sequel to
Destiny of the Daleks
. Davros says he has been imprisoned for “ninety years”. According to some reports, the rehearsal script set the story in 4590, which would follow the date established in
The Programme Guide
. This date also appears in
The Encyclopaedia of the Worlds of Doctor Who
.

[
1332
]
The Juggernauts

[
1333
] Dating
Davros
(BF #48) -
Davros
is set after
Resurrection of the Daleks
. It’s never explicitly stated that it occurs between that story and
Revelation of the Daleks
, but the Big Finish website places it between
The Two Doctors
and
Timelash
. TAI was formed “back in the thirty-eighth century”.