Happy birthday, DOCTOR WHO

Doctor Who was originally scheduled to premiere November 22nd, 1963, but was postponed a day because of the Kennedy assassination. (A historical footnote that really puts this show's longevity into perspective.) What better way to celebrate the longest running sci-fi show in TV history than taking another look at the evolution of the show's opening titles over the decades?

This video features the opening titles for all ten incarnations of the Doctor. There are times when it gets so pixelated that it's kind of hard to make out, but it gives you a pretty good idea of what the titles were like (and this is the clearest version I could find on Youtube).



The credits from the '60s and '70s actually hold up pretty well. That music must have been freaky as heck in 1963, and the graphics were simple but effectively creepy. Then things start to go totally berserk towards the end of the Tom Baker era, culminating in the sparkly Commodore 64 acid trip that was the Colin Baker-era titles. The titles were at their most strenuously "modern" in the '80s, and as a result they have dated pretty badly.

I wonder how the show's current titles will look to audiences four decades from now? (And will Doctor Who still be in production in some form, even then? It seems a bit unlikely... But then again, this is a guy who has been saving the universe since before the Beatles were on The Ed Sullivan Show.)

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