“I am not a student of
human nature. I am a professor of a far wider academy of which human nature is
merely a part.”
In 1966 Patrick Troughton
took over the role of The Doctor from William Hartnell. It has been said that William Hartnell
approved of this choice and saying “There's only one man in England who can
take over, and that's Patrick Troughton" well in my mind he was right as
Patrick Troughton was an excellent choice to take over and in no time at all
made the role his own.
Patrick Troughton had the
hard position of taking over the role from William Hartnell and immediately had
to win the television viewers over. If
he did not get them to like him, and in a way, forget William Hartnell then the
show was doomed to continue. Luckily that
didn’t happen and the show, as we know it, continues on to this day. So that is something we should be very appreciative
of Patrick Troughton for. As his
portrayal of The Doctor was that good that viewers continued to watch him week
in and week out as he saved the universe from the usual threats as before. I guess it didn’t hurt that he took on the
Daleks in his first story also which was an added bonus.
Patrick Troughton’s Doctor
was referred to many times as “The Cosmic Hobo” which was a 180 degree turn
from his predecessor’s tough as nails approach.
Patrick Troughton played that part magnificently as his comedic genius
was pretty evident in his Doctor. All
you have to do is look at some of his facial expressions and you could
tell. Sometimes by not saying anything
you can get your point across with a good facial expression and Patrick
Troughton’s Doctor was good at doing that.
But his Doctor wasn’t just silly.
He was also dead serious at times and was short tempered also. The Second Doctor could go from silly to
serious in the blink of an eye. The
Second Doctor was a man of many ranges of emotion and all were present at any
time during an adventure.
One of the greatest Second
Doctor scenes comes from “The Tomb of the Cybermen.” It takes place in the tombs with Victoria and
they are talking about family. The
Doctor talks to her so sweetly grandfatherly like. It is such a great scene and you see The
Doctor open up about his past and his family to Victoria as she is finding it
difficult to cope of her father’s death.
That scene in episode 3 is one of the best scenes in Doctor Who and
Patrick Troughton’s performance makes it really special.
What is a real shame is
that a majority of Patrick Troughton’s stories are missing and most likely will
never be found. That is a real shame as
there were a lot of good stories and performances from Patrick Troughton’s Second
Doctor that we will never see. Stories
like The Web of Fear, Power of the Daleks and The Enemy of the World will never
be appreciated and we will not be able to marvel at how The Second Doctor was
able to defeat The Daleks and Cybermen and other great monsters. But we should be lucky to have the ones we
have that are complete and completed with animation for the missing parts. At least we have a handful of his stories to
see how wonderful Patrick Troughton was as The Second Doctor and get a hint of
how good his era was.
So here is to the Second
Doctor. A Doctor who made us laugh and
protected us against the Quarks, Ice Warriors, Yeti and The Cybermen on his many
adventures. To the man who introduced us
to the sonic screwdriver and a legendary man in Brigadier Lethbridge – Stewart. Patrick Troughton was indeed The Cosmic Hobo who
blended his brand of comedy with a serious streak and is The Doctor that
current Doctor Matt Smith has based his Doctor on. His era is one to cherish with the stories
that we have left. Cause basically
without a great performance by Patrick Troughton as The Doctor there would not
be a 50th Anniversary. 
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