Consider the thankless task presented to David Bradley some time ago… As an actor with some stature in British acting circles, he was in the right age range (although, as it happens, considerably older than the subject he would was about to play) and bearing to play the first Doctor in the 2017 Christmas Special Twice Upon a Time.
Although there were cameos in The Doctor Falls and The Power of the Doctor, Twice Upon a Time is by far the most fulsome outing for Bradley in Doctor Who proper. In the dark dingy past we have remarked about how all we could see are the differences between Bradley and Hartnell.
Care and attention was paid to get the Hartnell’s look and mannerisms down for a modern audience. But there is a ‘steel’ in Hartnell that Bradley can’t quite capture, and that’s largely down to a script which sought to comically point out the societal differences between a Doctor of the sixties with modern sensibilities. We very much prefer his downbeat, world-weary performance as Hartnell himself in An Adventure in Space and Time. That was an unexpected treat.
The last of our 4K-recapping of nu-Who falls to a genuine Christmas Special, Twice Upon a Time. It was also the last special written by Steven Moffat, who will also be behind the upcoming Ncuti Gatwa Christmas Special ‘Joy to the World.’ Can’t wait.