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Old 05-10-2015, 08:09 PM   #2
Zigūr
Ghost Prince of Cardolan
 
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One thing which comes immediately to mind is the "Melkur", the evil creature in penultimate Tom Baker serial "The Keeper of Traken" which is trying to wrest control of the Source of Traken away from its Keeper. The BBC Classic Doctor Who page for the serial goes so far as to list The Silmarillion as an influence. While I don't think this can be stated definitively, "The Keeper of Traken" was produced in 1981, only four years after The Silmarillion was published. The serial's writer, Johnny Byrne, was an established science-fiction writer who had worked on, for example, Space: 1999, so it's possible a much-anticipated work of "fantasy" like The Silmarillion might have been on his radar.

Another substantial thematic similarity between the works of Professor Tolkien and Doctor Who might include the representation of the evil of tyranny. It doesn't happen so much in the new series because I think they don't have as much time for worldbuilding, but in the Classic Series the Doctor used to overthrow dictatorships all the time, which bears similarities I would argue to the plot of The Lord of the Rings in broad strokes.

Both texts also consider nonviolence: war is almost never really the answer in Professor Tolkien's work, and while it's sometimes mandatory it never results in the best solution. In Doctor Who the Doctor is primarily a nonviolent character, although not all the time, who usually tries to resolve the plot through intelligence rather than brute force. This might be compared again to the plot of The Lord of the Rings: the aim is not to defeat evil with weapons but rather by destroying a weapon (the Ring).

Both texts value learning. Also, the protagonists are often eccentric: Bilbo and Frodo and the Doctor are all eccentrics who are discontented at one point or another with the limiting nature of their own societies. Both also deal with the nature of time. The Elves probably wouldn't object to a TARDIS until they realised that, like with the Rings, ultimately things still change. Good typically triumphs over evil, but only after suffering and hardship. Both texts are of a "family" nature, I would argue - they can be appreciated at different levels by both children and adults.

I could go on, but I'll be going forever if I don't stop now. Doctor Who has 252 televised stories so far and Professor Tolkien's corpus of work is enormous so one could find similarities all day (one might consider how both explore colonialism/imperialism and channel the zeitgeist of their respective eras).
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