TARDIS

The TARDIS is the name of a time machine in the British science fiction television programme Doctor Who. The name is an acronym of Time And Relative Dimension (or Dimensions) In Space.1 A product of Time Lord technology, a properly piloted and working TARDIS is capable of transporting its occupants to any point in space and time. Its interior exists in multidimensional space, leading to it being significantly larger on the inside than it appears from outside.

The Doctor's TARDIS

In the programme, the Doctor's TARDIS is an obsolete Type 40 TT capsule (presumably TT stands for "time travel") that he unofficially "borrowed" when he departed his home planet of Gallifrey. There were 305 registered Type 40s, but all the others had been decommissioned and replaced by new, improved models. However, the changing appearance of the primary console room over the years implies that the Doctor does upgrade the TARDIS's systems every now and then.

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As noted above, although the TARDIS is supposed to blend inconspicuously into whatever environment it turns up in, it invariably retains the shape of a police box because of a faulty chameleon circuit. The circuit was first mentioned, but not given a technical name, in the second episode of the series. It was first termed the "camouflage unit" in The Time Meddler (1965). The name was changed to "chameleon circuit" in the Target Books novelisations of the serials, and eventually made its way on screen as "chameleon circuit" in 1981's Logopolis.

Related Topics:
The Time Meddler - 1965 - Target Books - 1981 - Logopolis

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Despite his considerable ingenuity in other fields and his ownership of a sonic screwdriver, the Doctor has been unable to fix the chameleon circuit. Attempts to repair the circuit were made in Logopolis and Attack of the Cybermen, but the successful transformation of the TARDIS into the shape of a pipe organ in the latter serial was later followed by a return to the status quo. In the 2005 episode Boom Town, the Ninth Doctor implied that he had stopped trying to fix the circuit quite some time ago because he'd become rather fond of the police box shape.

Related Topics:
Sonic screwdriver - Attack of the Cybermen - Pipe organ - 2005 - Boom Town - Ninth Doctor

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For most of the series' run, the exterior doors of the police box operated separately from the heavier interior doors, although sometimes the two sets could open simultaneously to allow the ship's passengers to look directly outside and vice versa. The entrance to the TARDIS is capable of being locked and unlocked from the outside with a key, which the Doctor keeps on his person and occasionally gives copies of to his companions. In the 2005 series, the keys are also remotely linked to the TARDIS, capable of signalling its presence or impending arrival by heating up and glowing.

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The doors are supposed to be closed in-flight; in Planet of Giants, the opening of the doors during a dematerialisation sequence caused the ship and its occupants to shrink to doll size. In The Enemy of the World, taking off while the doors were still open resulted in rapid decompression, with the villainous Salamander being sucked out of the TARDIS. The Second Doctor and his companions managed to cling to the console, and the crisis passed when Jamie managed to shut the doors.

Related Topics:
Planet of Giants - The Enemy of the World - Rapid decompression - Second Doctor - Jamie

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Once through the doors of the police box, the TARDIS interior has a vast number of rooms and corridors. The exact dimensions of the interior have not been specified, but apart from living quarters, the interior includes an art gallery (which is actually an ancillary power station), a bathroom with a swimming pool, a medical bay and several brick-walled storage areas (all seen in The Invasion of Time). Despite this, the TARDIS is light enough to be lifted by several men as if it were an actual police box and any movement of the exterior has also been known to be transmitted to its interior. The fact that the Doctor was able to jettison 25 per cent of the TARDIS's structure in Castrovalva to provide added "thrust" also implies a finite volume.

Related Topics:
The Invasion of Time - Castrovalva

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Other rooms seen include living quarters for many of the Doctor's companions, although the Doctor's own bedroom has never been mentioned or seen. The TARDIS also had a "Zero Room" — a chamber that was shielded from the rest of the universe and provided a restful environment for the Fifth Doctor to recover from his regeneration in Castrovalva — but it was among the 25 per cent jettisoned.

Related Topics:
Fifth Doctor - Regeneration

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The exterior dimensions can be severed from the interior dimensions under extraordinary circumstances. In Father's Day, a temporal paradox resulting in a wound in time threw the interior of the ship out of the wound, leaving the TARDIS an empty shell of a police box.

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The TARDIS was already old when the Doctor first took it, but exactly how old is a matter of conjecture; the spin-off media have, on a number of occasions, had the TARDIS wait around for the Doctor for decades and even centuries in relative time. In The Empty Child, the Ninth Doctor claimed that he has had "900 years of police box travel", meaning the TARDIS is at least that old.

Related Topics:
Spin-off media - The Empty Child

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The console rooms

Obviously, the TARDIS actually consists of two sets: the police box shell and the internal sets representing its dimensionally transcendental interior. The most often seen room of the TARDIS is its console room, where its flight controls are housed.

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The TARDIS has at least two console rooms — the primary, white-walled, futuristic one most used throughout the programme's history and the secondary console room used during the fourteenth season (1976–1977), which has wood panelling and a more antique feel to it. Two other console rooms have also been seen, in the 1996 Doctor Who television movie and the 2005 series. The cavernous, steampunk-inspired console room of the television movie may have been a reconfiguration of either of the previously mentioned console rooms (as first suggested in Virgin New Adventures spin-off novels and later in the Big Finish Productions audio plays) or another one entirely.

Related Topics:
1976 - 1977 - 1996 - ''Doctor Who'' television movie - 2005 - Steampunk - Virgin New Adventures - Big Finish Productions - Audio plays

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In the 2005 series, the console room became a dome-shaped chamber with organic-looking support columns. The interior doors are now absent, with the police box doors being clearly visible from inside the TARDIS. Although the interior corridors have yet to be seen in the new series, the fact that they still exist was established in The Unquiet Dead, when the Doctor gave Rose some very complicated directions to the TARDIS wardrobe. New series designer Bryan Hitch confirmed in an interview in Dreamwatch magazine that at least one more room would be seen in the 2006 series.

Related Topics:
The Unquiet Dead - Rose - Bryan Hitch - Dreamwatch - 2006

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The Virgin novels introduced a tertiary console room, which was described as resembling a Gothic cathedral (Nightshade by Mark Gatiss), and suggested that the "native" configuration is so complex and irrational that most non-Time Lords who witness it are driven mad from the experience (Death and Diplomacy by Dave Stone).

Related Topics:
Gothic - Cathedral - Mark Gatiss - Dave Stone

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The main feature of the console rooms, in any of the known configurations, is the TARDIS console that holds the instruments that control the ship's functions. The appearance of the primary TARDIS consoles has varied widely but share common details: hexagonal pedestals with controls around the periphery and a moveable column in the centre that bobs rhythmically up and down when the TARDIS is in flight. The central column is often erroneously referred to in fan literature as the "time rotor", although in The Chase, the time rotor was actually another component on the TARDIS console. However, the use of this term passed into fanon and then finally, into canon when the Doctor referred to the central column as the time rotor in the 1996 television movie. The current production team also uses the term "time rotor" to refer to the central column.

Related Topics:
The Chase - Fanon - Canon - The 1996 television movie

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The secondary console was smaller, with the controls hidden behind wooden panels, and had no central column. The 1996 television movie console also appeared to be made of wood and the central column connected to the ceiling of the console room. The new series' console is circular in shape and divided into six segments, with both the control panels and the central column glowing green, the latter once again connected to the ceiling.

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A distinctive architectural feature of the TARDIS interior is the "roundel". In the context of the TARDIS, a roundel is a circular decoration that adorns the walls of the rooms and corridors of the TARDIS, including the console room. Some roundels conceal TARDIS circuitry and devices, as seen in the serials The Wheel in Space, Logopolis, Castrovalva, Arc of Infinity and Terminus. The design of the roundels has varied throughout the show's history, from a basic circular cut-out with black background to a photographic image printed on wall board, to translucent illuminated discs in later serials. In the secondary console room, most of the roundels were executed in recessed wood panelling, with a few decorative ones in what appeared to be stained glass. In the new series, the roundels are built into hexagonal recesses in the walls of the new console room.

Related Topics:
Roundel - The Wheel in Space - Castrovalva - Arc of Infinity - Terminus - Stained glass

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In the Third Doctor serial The Time Monster (1972), the console room of the TARDIS was dramatically altered, including the wall roundels. This new set, designed by Tim Gleeson, was disliked by producer Barry Letts who felt that the new roundels resembled washing-up bowls stuck to the wall. As it turned out, the set was damaged in storage between production blocks and had to be rebuilt, so this particular design only saw service in the one serial.

Related Topics:
Third Doctor - The Time Monster - 1972

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TARDIS systems

Because the TARDIS is so old, it is inclined to break down. The Doctor is often seen with his head stuck in a panel carrying out maintenance of some kind or another, and he occasionally has to give it "percussive maintenance" (a good thump on the console) to get it to start working properly. Efforts to repair, control, and maintain the TARDIS were frequent plot devices throughout the show's run, creating the amusing irony of a highly advanced space-time machine which, at the same time, is an obsolete and unreliable piece of junk. The new series console room has a much more thrown-together appearance than previous consoles, with bits of junk substituting as makeshift controls, including a glass paperweight, a small bell and a bicycle pump.

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The TARDIS possesses telepathic circuits, although the Doctor prefers to pilot it manually. In Pyramids of Mars, the Fourth Doctor told Sutekh that the TARDIS controls were isomorphic, meaning only the Doctor could operate them. However, this characteristic seems to appear and disappear when dramatically convenient, and various companions have been seen to be able to operate the TARDIS and even fly it. It has been theorised that either the Doctor was lying to Sutekh or the isomorphic feature is a security feature that the Doctor can activate and deactivate when convenient.

Related Topics:
Pyramids of Mars - Sutekh - Isomorphic - Companions

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The take off and landing of the TARDIS is accompanied by the famous materialisation sound. In The Web of Fear, the TARDIS console was also seen to have a light that winked on and off during landing, although the more usual indicator of flight is the movement of the central column. The TARDIS also possesses a scanner so that its crew may examine the exterior environment before exiting the ship. In some of the First Doctor serials, the console room also contains a machine that dispenses food or nutrition bars to the Doctor and his companions. This machine disappears after the first few serials, although mention is occasionally made of the TARDIS kitchen.

Related Topics:
The Web of Fear - First Doctor

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The Time Lords (as well as similarly powerful beings) are able to divert the TARDIS's flight path (The Ribos Operation), as the renegade Time Lord known as the Rani also did once (The Mark of the Rani). The Rani used a Stattenheim remote control to summon her TARDIS to her. In The Two Doctors, the Second Doctor also used a portable Stattenheim.

Related Topics:
The Ribos Operation - Rani - The Mark of the Rani - Remote control - The Two Doctors

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Some of the TARDIS's other functions include a force field and the Hostile Action Displacement System (HADS), which can teleport the ship away if it is attacked (The Krotons). The force field may no longer be present on the current TARDIS, as an external device had to be hooked up to provide one in the 2005 series episode The Parting of the Ways. The Cloister Room on the TARDIS sounds the Cloister Bell when "universal disaster" is imminent (Logopolis).

Related Topics:
Teleport - The Krotons - The Parting of the Ways

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The interior of the TARDIS is said to be in a state of "multidimensional temporal grace" (The Hand of Fear). The Fourth Doctor explained this meant that, "in a sense," things do not exist while inside the TARDIS. This has the practical effect of ensuring that no weapons can be used inside its environs. However, this last function is also inconsistent in its application — weapons were fired in the console room in both Earthshock and The Parting of the Ways. In Arc of Infinity, the Fifth Doctor was planning to repair the temporal grace circuits but was interrupted by the events of that story.

Related Topics:
The Hand of Fear - Weapon - Earthshock - Arc of Infinity - Fifth Doctor

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The TARDIS also grants its passengers the ability to understand and speak other languages. This was previously described in The Masque of Mandragora as a "Time Lord gift" which the Doctor shared with his companions, but was ultimately attributed to the TARDIS's telepathic field in The End of the World.

Related Topics:
The Masque of Mandragora - The End of the World

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At times the TARDIS appears to have a mind of its own. It is heavily implied in the television series that the TARDIS is "alive" and intelligent to a degree (Inside the Spaceship), and shares a bond with those who travel in it; in the television movie the Doctor calls the TARDIS "sentimental". In Boom Town, a portion of the TARDIS control panel opened and a luminescent vapour could be seen within, described by the Doctor as the "heart of the TARDIS". In The Parting of the Ways it was shown that this is connected to the powerful energies of the time vortex. These characteristics have been made more explicit in the spin-off novels and audio plays. In the Big Finish Productions audio adventure Omega, the Doctor meets a TARDIS which "dies" after its Time Lord master has passed away.

Related Topics:
Inside the Spaceship - Television movie - The Parting of the Ways - Spin-off - Audio plays - Big Finish Productions

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In the novels, a portion of the TARDIS could be separated and used for independent travel. This was featured in two Virgin novels, Iceberg by David Banks and Sanctuary by David A. McIntee. This subset of the TARDIS, resembling a small pagoda fashioned out of jade, had limited range and functionality, but was used occasionally when the main TARDIS was incapacitated. A Yahoo! Groups electronic mailing list dedicated to discussion of the Doctor Who spin-off novels adopted the name "Jade Pagoda".

Related Topics:
David Banks - David A. McIntee - Pagoda - Jade - Yahoo! Groups - Electronic mailing list

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