Dr. Who going strong ... again

If I haven't mentioned it, the new 2005 version of
"Dr. Who" featuring Christopher Eccleston as the Doctor
rocks pretty hard. I got to see it through means not entirely
pristine. After all, it is only available on the BBC and I'm a
yank, but I hardly think anyone could deny that as a fan
of this show since 1981, I am entitled to some leeway.

Even my sci fi buddies don't dig on Who. They like "Star
Trek" and "Star Wars" and comics and just about
everything else that has come down the pike since sci fi
was born but they'd be god damned if they will watch
"Dr. Who." They find it boring and childish. Maybe it is.
But then tell me watching Capt. Kirk and Spock isn't a bit
on the childish side. Who makes me feel like a kid again.

I started watching it when my parents were getting
divorced and I just latched onto it. The first episode I ever
saw was "Planet of Evil." Tom Baker was teh Docotor and
Elizabeth Sladen was Sarah Jane Smith. It was weird and wild.
I couldn't quite figure it out since I started in the middle.
Just as I was catching on, these two walk into a big blue box and
it disappears and I was all like, "What the hell was that?"

I've never looked back. I did get all confused again when
the Doctor fell to his death a few years later. The episodes just
stopped coming and I felt like I'd lost my best friend. Of course,
there wasn't anyone I could talk to about it. After all, it was just
a TV show on PBS and I didn't know anyone who watched it.

What I liked most about Dr. Who was the very straight forward,
anti-violence, use-your-head mentality of the thing. It encouraged
me to help stranded motorists, ask strangers if they needed help
whenever I could and try to stay cheerful when I was depressed.

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