Matt Smith

Matt Smith is leaving “Doctor Who” after four years of portraying the time-traveling hero on the long-running British sci-fi adventure series. Smith, the 11th actor to portray the wandering Time Lord from Gallifrey, will leave the role following the show’s 50th anniversary special in November, BBC announced Saturday. The character will regenerate in the Christmas special. “‘Doctor Who’ has been the most brilliant experience for me as an actor and a bloke,” Smith said in a news release. “I’m incredibly proud of what we have achieved over the last four years.” Although Smith’s fans will be sad to see him go, it’s the show’s ability to continue transforming itself over time that has helped it remain fresh and compelling for multiple generations of viewers. GRAPHIC: Meet the 11 Doctors “The beauty of ‘Doctor Who’ is its incredible flexibility, anchored by […]

Fans of the BBC sci-fi series “Doctor Who” know that this season’s biggest mystery isn’t about sinister aliens or otherworldly adventures, but rather about the origins of the latest in the Doctor’s long and lovely line of traveling companions. Played by Jenna-Louise Coleman, Clara Oswald has been dubbed “the impossible girl.” Before the Doctor (Matt Smith) recruited Clara, a London nanny, to join him on his jaunts through time and space, he had met her before — or at least he met two women who looked just like her. Both women died, and Clara’s existence baffles the Time Lord. Coleman’s Clara has big shoes to fill after the departure of  Amy Pond, played by Karen Gillan, a fan-favorite companion who shared the screen with Matt Smith’s Doctor for 2 1/2 seasons. Like Amy, Clara is adventurous and spirited and not afraid […]

“Doctor Who” star Jenna-Louise Coleman has been warned. She knows that two months from now, fans at Comic-Con International in San Diego will line up in the thousands, camping overnight outside the city’s convention center to secure seats for the annual panel devoted to the BBC TV sensation. Many will wield sonic screwdrivers or wear Dalek costumes, and more than a few will come dressed as Coleman’s character, Clara. But back in March, the hype hadn’t caught up with her. “Everyone wants to know, ‘Has your life changed since joining the show?’” Coleman said over a lunch of baby beets and tangerine at downtown Los Angeles’ Lazy Ox Canteen. “And I’m like, ‘No, not really.’ I just go to Cardiff, and I do mad things and experience mad stuff on set, and then I come back to my London life, […]

Matt Smith’s Doctor will cross paths with David Tennant’s Doctor in an upcoming 50th anniversary special of “Doctor Who.” Tennant, whose vivacious performance as the time-and-space-traveling alien helped catapult the long-running British television series into the mainstream of popular culture, has joined the cast, along with Billie Piper, who played his traveling companion and love interest, Rose Tyler, the BBC confirmed Saturday morning. The show is rumored to include all 11 incarnations of the Doctor. The BBC also announced that John Hurt (“Alien,” “Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy”) will be guest starring in the special, which is written by Steven Moffat and begins filming in Britain this week. (“Merlin” fans will note that Hurt voiced the Great Dragon in that recently wrapped-up fantasy series.) GRAPHIC: Meet the 11 Doctors When Tennant and Piper appear alongside Smith and Jenna-Louise Coleman (who plays new companion Clara […]

“Doctor Who” returns Saturday with “The Bells of St. John,” starring Jenna-Louise Coleman as mysterious new companion Clara opposite Matt Smith’s Doctor. It’s an auspicious year for “Doctor Who” as the sci-fi series turns 50. Whovians are celebrating the anniversary with commemorative postage stamps, an audio drama, a three-day event in London and two TV movies — one about the filming of the first “Who” episode and the second an adventure rumored to feature all 11 incarnations of the Doctor. “In Britain, you can practically define yourself, your generation by which actor played the Doctor when you were a kid,” executive producer Steven Moffat told Hero Complex. To celebrate 50 years of “Who,” Hero Complex takes a look at the many faces of the time-traveling Doctor, as well as the monsters he fought and the friends who traveled with him, in […]

PERSPECTIVE In the annals of space, time and television, there is nothing quite like “Doctor Who,” the British sci-fi series that this year is celebrating a 50th anniversary, in your Earth years. Only “Star Trek” comes close for persistence of a franchise, and it does not come close. What sets “Doctor Who” apart is that, notwithstanding the distance from its paint-and-cardboard, spaceship-on-a-string early episodes to the beautifully realized, seamlessly fantastic creation it is today, the current series is the same one that began on the BBC in 1963 — neither a sequel nor a re-conception, but the identical show. It has centered on the same character: an extraterrestrial Time Lord who travels all of creation in what looks like an old London police box and who has been played by 11 actors, each new Doctor a “regeneration” of the last, […]

The time-and-space-traveling alien known simply as the Doctor made his first appearance on TV screens in the United Kingdom on Nov. 23, 1963. Five decades later, he’s still going strong. The second half of the relaunched show’s seventh season is set to return March 30, with Matt Smith as the Doctor and a Clara Oswin Oswald making her bow as the companion, Oswald is played by actress Jenna-Louise Coleman. The first new episode, titled “The Bells of St. Johns,” introduces new villains called the Spoonheads. Meanwhile, the Doctor investigates something sinister going on with London’s Wi-Fi. There’s reason for celebration this year as the Doctor — who has racked up quite a lot of screen time and mileage on the TARDIS –  turns 50 (or 500 … who really knows?). It’s time to question just how well you know him. […]

For all the talk of 2013 being the 50th anniversary celebration of “Doctor Who,” the Doctor himself has been conspicuously absent from screens for the first two months of the year. But that’s about to change on March 30, when the second half of the relaunched show’s seventh season returns with Matt Smith as the Doctor and a brand-new companion, Clara Oswin Oswald, played by Jenna-Louise Coleman. Eagle-eyed viewers will recognize the Doctor’s fez from the fifth-season finale, “The Big Bang,” and that year’s Christmas special, “A Christmas Carol.” Actually, dedicated Whovians will remember that the fez originally belonged to Albert Einstein and that the Doctor has been wearing fezzes since his seventh incarnation back in the 1980s. The first new episode, titled “The Bells of St. Johns,” was written by show runner Steven Moffat and will introduce new villains […]

The Doctor and his recently recruited companion Clara Oswin Oswald will face off against some new nemeses and reconnect with familiar friends when “Doctor Who” returns March 30 after a three-month hiatus. BBC released details about the mid-season premiere episode “The Bells of St. John” as well as a new poster for the second half of Season 7 on Thursday. The poster features the 11th Doctor (Matt Smith) clad in a purple smoking jacket and a gold bow tie, astride a motorcycle, with Clara (newcomer Jenna-Louise Coleman) hanging onto his waist. Surrounding images reveal glimpses of the season’s upcoming aliens, including Cybermen, Ice Warriors and a face that appears to be a Sycorax. The motorcycle appears to be racing down the side of the Shard, a 95-floor London skyscraper that was completed last year and opened to the public in […]

This year marks the 50th anniversary of “Doctor Who,” and to celebrate the landmark series, fans in England soon will be able to send mail with the Doctor’s face — all 11 of them. Beginning on March 26, the Royal Mail will offer “Doctor Who” stamps featuring all 11 actors who have played the Doctor, from his debut on Nov. 26, 1963, up to the present. That includes the three Doctors who have been part of the show since the relaunch in 2005: Christopher Eccleston, David Tennant and Matt Smith. In addition to the 11 Doctor stamps, there will be a sheet of second-class stamps featuring some of the Doctor’s notable villains, including the Daleks, the Cybermen and the Weeping Angels. There will also be a first-class stamp featuring the TARDIS. The stamps are coming at a particularly exciting time […]