Bigger on the Inside: Explaining It to the Neighbors

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EXPLAINING IT TO THE NEIGHBORS
A FIELD GUIDE FOR AMERICAN FANS

Sooner or later it happens to every one of us. The neighbor comes over to return the hedge clippers, sees the police box on top of your television set, and asks. Or worse, he catches you carrying an eighteen-foot scarf out to the car in July. You have about thirty seconds before his eyes glaze over. Here is what sixteen years of practice have taught me.

THE THIRTY-SECOND VERSION

Memorize this. Say it calmly. Do not wave your arms.

"It's an old British show about a traveler from another planet who looks like a man and goes anywhere in time and space in a machine that's bigger on the inside. He gets people out of trouble by being smarter than the monsters, not by shooting them. It ran for twenty-six years. You'd like it."

Then stop talking. This is the hardest step. I have never once managed it.

THE QUESTIONS YOU WILL GET

"Why is his spaceship a phone booth?"	It's a police box, which is a different thing, and they used to stand on street corners in Britain. It's supposed to disguise itself wherever it lands and the disguise got stuck. Yes, it's ridiculous. That's the charm. Don't apologize for the box.
"Wait, he's a different guy now?"	Explain regeneration. I compare it to a long-running job where the man stays the same but the face changes, like a new anchorman taking over the evening news, only it's still the same anchorman. My neighbor Dale said that made it worse. Try your own comparison.
"The monsters look cheap."	They were cheap. Agree right away; it disarms people. Then point out that cheap monsters forced the writers to be good, because the ideas had to carry the story, and they did. Big budgets have made plenty of dull television.
"Is it for kids?"	It went out at teatime on Saturdays in Britain, and whole families watched it together. Plenty of British grown-ups will tell you they watched the scary parts from behind the sofa. So: it's for kids the way The Wizard of Oz is for kids.
"Is it still on?"	Be honest. The series stopped in 1989 and there was one TV movie in 1996. Then say that the old stories are on tape and still turn up on public television, and that you'll lend him one. Do not promise a new series. I've seen men lose all credibility on a neighbor's porch that way.
"What's with the scarf?"	The fourth Doctor wore one. A long one. My wife made mine and it's the finest thing anybody ever made me, and that's all a man needs to say about a scarf.
"Is it like Star Trek?"	Careful. Say it's a cousin: same family, different personality. Star Trek has a starship, a crew and a chain of command. Doctor Who has one eccentric, a friend or two, and no plan whatsoever. Both are fine. Never start a fight you don't need.

THE STARTER KIT

If he's still standing there, lend him one of these three tapes, in this order:

Pyramids of Mars (Tom Baker, 1975). Spooky, quick, and Tom Baker at full strength. If this doesn't do it, nothing will.
City of Death (Tom Baker, 1979). Funny, and set in Paris, so it doesn't look cheap.
Remembrance of the Daleks (Sylvester McCoy, 1988). Daleks, and proof the show didn't stop with Tom Baker.

Don't start with: anything in black and white, however much you love it, or anything from the year the scripts got tired. You know which year I mean. Build up to those.

RESULTS FROM MY OWN STREET

Dale Torkelson, next door. Retired from the post office, watches every war movie ever made. I lent him Genesis of the Daleks because it's set in a war, which was a stroke of genius on my part. He kept the tape three weeks. Now when he sees me getting the mail he asks how the Daleks are doing. I count that as a conversion.

Lee Partee, across the street. Thinks the scarf is a fire hazard and has told Sue so. Has never watched a minute. I've stopped trying, but I left City of Death on her porch at Christmas with a bow on it, and she hasn't given it back, so there's hope.

Francis Vanbuskirk, from the pledge drives. Came to answer phones for the British comedies and was assigned to my table during a Doctor Who night in 1991. Went home with a list of tapes. Now he owns more of them than I do and corrects my dates. I created a monster, which in this hobby is a compliment.

My own children. Both grown. My son watched every Tom Baker story with me on Saturday nights when he was a boy and now claims he only did it to stay up late. My daughter prefers Peter Davison, and we don't discuss it at Thanksgiving.

Good luck out there. Be patient, be kind, and keep a spare tape in the car.

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Last updated Sunday, September 19, 1999