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Doctor Who: Fluffs in Classic Who – when they’re forgivable (and when they’re not)

By James Aggas

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Fluffed lines aren’t just expected in certain eras of Doctor Who, but can be even endearing. But are there times in the show’s history when they’re a little less forgivable?

If you’ve watched the Classic era of Doctor Who, particularly the earlier seasons, then there’s a good chance you’ve come across these little moments. They’re small, but instantly noticeable, and can be either difficult to watch or entertaining in their own right. I am, of course, talking about fluffs.

Whether by a guest actor, or even one of the lead actors themselves, fluffed lines were common in the Classic Series. Especially during the Sixties.

One actor became particularly infamous for them, and that was none other than the first Doctor himself, William Hartnell. He would get words wrong or stumble along some of his lines. This was at least partially due to his ill health, of course.

An intense schedule

However, many other actors fluffed their lines in the Sixties, and it’s not surprising. The key reason for this was that in the Classic Series, episodes were made on a very tight schedule. Each of the first six seasons were approximately forty episodes long! That’s an incredibly tight schedule for any series even today, let alone a science-fiction series!

So re-shooting a scene from scratch because of one little fluff would’ve simply been too time consuming. Not to mention that editing back then was much, much harder to do.

So the fluffs never bother me whenever I watch a Sixties episode. In fact, I’m usually impressed that the cast and crew for each of those stories were able to get so much right in such a short space of time. Fluffs are to be expected from an era as intensive as that.

Later eras, however…

When everything changed

Doctor Who changed in a big way in 1970. And not just because it was in living color!!! Seasons were now reduced from over forty episodes a season to twenty-five. (Or twenty-six in later seasons.)

Such a huge reduction in episodes would normally be seen as a bad thing. But that still left the show on television for approximately half the year.

And it had a huge benefit: producers and directors could take more time with their stories. They could shoot multiple takes until everyone had got it right. They could spend a lot more care and work out the best ways to edit the show to the best it could be. In short: there would be a lot less fluffs.

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Or at least, there should’ve been.

When fluffs stop being forgivable

When I was re-watching Planet of the Spiders last year, one thing that stuck out was the fact that the story had a few very noticeable fluffs. Not too many, but they were still noticeable. (Noticeable enough, in fact, that they actually show up in the Honest Trailer for Classic Who!)

In a Sixties story, a few fluffs is nothing, especially across six episodes. But in a story from the Seventies, when the directors and editors had the luxury of having more time to polish the story, fluffs are a bad sign. It comes across as sloppy, like the director wasn’t paying enough attention, or didn’t want the best possible version of the story. In that instance, it’s definitely more problematic.

Unsurprisingly, fluffs were far less common in later seasons. And perhaps there were significant reasons for why stories like Planet of the Spiders still had fluffs – for example, as the last story season eleven, it could have been more pushed for time than usual. But in this writer’s opinion, fluffs definitely become a lot less endearing the moment you add color to an episode.

Next. How did the Master escape one of his biggest on-screen deaths?. dark

What fluffs in Doctor Who really stuck out to you? What are some of your favorite examples? Do you think fluffs should still be excused, even in Seventies stories or later? Let us know in the comments below.

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