How To Spot A Real Doctor Who Fan

After reading the recent online postings about the shocking number of fakers invading geek culture and trampling true geekdom into the dirt with their fakery ways, I’ve decided to do my part to fight against the cruel boot of society and defend our mighty citadel from those trying to steal the glory.

Now, it’s Doctor Who I’m most familiar with, so it’s Doctor Who where I shall set my flag and die on my hill, defending it against the foul fakery of those who dare to pretend they take joy in this most sacred of television shows. For those of you that are True Fans and care about True Geek Culture, I have made a list of the ten most important ways to identify a True Doctor Who Fan. I promise you, anyone who doesn’t meet this modest list of criteria is NOT A TRUE FAN and they must be shunned and rejected for the exploitative frauds that they are:

1 – A True Fan’s favourite Doctor will always be something esoteric. People who like one of the eleven canonical Doctors best are just mainstream fakers. If they’re not insisting that the definitive Doctor was Peter Cushing, Joanna Lumley or David Warner, then they are a FAKE FAN.

2 – They must have seen ALL the episodes; recons and audios are for those frauds buying into the commercialism of television. ANYONE can buy an audio recording, but True Fans (if they’re under fifty, anyway) will have designed and constructed a time machine. Of course, they won’t have used it to do anything except go back to the sixties and watch Doctor Who on the telly. Using time travel for any other purpose is the clear mark of a faker.

3 – A True Fan is able to regenerate. Not necessarily twelve times. We shouldn’t be unreasonable here, but at least twice.

4 – All True Fans will have collected all the Targets, Virgin New Adventures, Missing Adventures, the BBC’s Eight Doctor Adventures and Past Doctor Adventures books etc, and had every book signed by its writer. In blood.

5 – Each True Fan keeps a Yeti in their loo. In order to get their Yeti, a True Fan will have journeyed to the Himalayas to the secret Lair of the Yetis and captured it themselves. Anyone who just buys a Yeti, or in any other way doesn’t bother to capture it themself is an obvious faker.

6 – Every True Fan knows how to make rooms of their home dimensionally transcendental. Partly this is because of their Real Knowledge and Passion for the show, partly it’s out of necessity. Any True Fan will need several large houses to store all the gubbins they’ve collected over the years that’s been stamped with the various incarnations of the Doctor Who logo. If they’ve actually got room enough to live in a normal house with all their Doctor Who junk? FAKER.

7 – Every True Fan has their own copy of The Tenth Planet, episode 4, stashed away. This is because all True Fans have discovered the secret location of The Tenth Planet, episode 4, journeyed there, and made their own copy before returning to civilisation and writing up an account of their Quest. Their Quest write-up will contain clues to the location, so as to help the next generation of True Fans get their copy.

8 – And, of course, all True Fans will only write about their Tenth Planet, episode 4, Quest in Old High Gallifreyan.

9 – Any True Fan will have tried to create their own race of Daleks (it’s okay if you don’t quite succeed – if you’ve managed to get a Giant Clam to try and eat your cat, I’d give you a pass). I know this one’s a bit controversial, and some people may think that experimenting on human brains in order to create a race of maniacally genocidal killing machines they saw on the telly is going a bit far, but those people? ARE NOT TRUE FANS.

10 – And, naturally, the favourite story of all True Fans is The Time Monster.

So now, readers, you’ve a quick and easy way to identify those just hopping on the Doctor Who bandwagon to get all those life-altering perks of geekery, as opposed to all us Real Fans! Phew! Just as long as they’ve managed everything on this list then you can rest easy knowing that you are not wasting your time with someone who doesn’t really know or care about Doctor Who.

Unless, of course, they’re a woman, in which case they must have done everything on the list twice.