Doctor Who: The sting – why it’s such an important part of the series
By James Aggas
For several decades now, the sting has been a key part of not just Doctor Who’s theme tune, but even a part of the series itself. We look at why it has endured.
You’ve heard it at least a hundred times. You know what it means. Sometimes, it’s done to mark the end of a story. But other times, it comes when you want to hear it least – when the Doctor and his friends are in peril, there’s no way out, and you’re dying to know just how they’re going to escape…
And that’s when you hear it. The sting.
For almost fifty years, the sting has been such an iconic part of the Doctor Who theme tune. It’s almost strange to think that this wasn’t always the case. Generally, during the Sixties, when the end credits kicked in, the theme tune quietly began from the iconic main part of the tune. However, the end theme used was always the original version, which was rather quieter than what we got with later variations – including the version used for Patrick Troughton’s intro, which was first heard in The Faceless Ones.
The Ambassadors of Death was the first story to introduce the sting. Naturally, it was far from the last…
(Image credit: Doctor Who/BBC.
Image obtained from: official Doctor Who website.)
How it was introduced
It was only with Pertwee’s Doctor that the closing theme was changed as well. Like the intro, the closing theme’s variation was louder and had a little more kick than the original version. It’s a theme that works very well for Pertwee’s first two stories.
Still, it’s clear that the producers thought that there was something missing. And so, with Jon Pertwee’s third story – The Ambassadors of Death – we were introduced to it: the sting.
It’s clear to see that during the first story it was used, the producers were clearly experimenting with the use of the sting. It wasn’t just used at the end of each episode, but even at the start!
When the intro finished for each episode, instead of showing the title at the end of it, there was instead a short scene shown – usually the last scene from the previous episode – before we hear the sting and see a zoom-in on the title. There was even a pause in the middle of it, so it became, “The Ambassadors…of Death!”
This way of doing the titles was never used again for a Doctor Who serial, but the sting was kept for the end credits, at least. Which is just as well, as the sting itself is arguably an important part of the theme tune now.
What makes it so iconic?
The sting is so simple, but it’s so brilliant. It works at its best when we hear it before we see the end credits. When we’re on the edge of our seats, when we’re reaching the cliffhanger, when we’re really, really hoping there’s more…and then that sting kicks in, leading us to screaming, “No!” or various expletives.
It just makes those brilliant cliffhangers of Doctor Who that much more dramatic. It’s announcing the end theme before you really want it to end, especially when a cliffhanger is really good.
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And of course, like so much of Doctor Who, it just sounds so strange. Like the show’s very theme tune, there isn’t anything quite like it. We use the word “sting” to describe it because that’s the best word to describe such a weird sound.
Naturally, like the theme tune itself, the sting has changed over the years. Some versions of it have been more effective than others, although the best one is probably the original. Interestingly, Murray Gold used a version that was as close to the original as possible during the Russell T Davies era of New Who, and Segun Akinola has also aimed for something as close to that original sting as possible for his theme tune.
Regardless, it’s an element that’s been a key part of Doctor Who for decades, and should remain so for a long time to come. Like the series itself, there really isn’t anything else quite like it.
Next. The Ambassadors of Death is a frustratingly forgettable story. dark
Are you a fan of the sting? Do you think it’s a great way of marking the cliffhanger or ending to a story? Can you think of any particular moments when it was perfectly used? Let us know in the comments below.
