greenpenguino said:

doubleofive said:

Let me get this straight:

Eccleston was pretty excitable. It's actually one of the things I liked about him.

Then Tennant comes along, and he's just as excitable, but less little kid-ish about him

And Smith is even more kid-ish than 9 or 10? I've managed to avoid any previews of 11, hardly the impression I got from the plot I've gleaned (its hard to be 4 years behind on a show).

Eccleston was more thuggish than excitable. But he would get excitable at times.

Tennant was a lot more excitable and running around-y than eccles.

Smith is like tennant X 2 on acid turned up to eleven. I do like his doctor sometimes though.

I agree with this very much.

I like the excitability of both Tennant and Eccleston. Since those are the only Doctors I have seen, I see the Doctor as sort of an excitable alien genius. So I expect excitability. Matt Smith has the excitability down, but sometimes it is annoyingly over the top (or Jar Jar esque), and I feel the genius part isn't shown much. I liked how Tennant and Eccleston felt like wise old men underneath the goofy excitability and carefree attitude. I feel that part is very lacking in Smith's Doctor, sure, it shines through sometimes, but if Smith were my first Doctor I am sure I'd have a very different view of the character.

I think River goes a long ways in hurting Smith's Doctor as well. Besides being an annoying character a lot of the time, she is constantly showing him up and proving to be just as smart or smarter than him.

All that being said, I think the overall quality of the show is strides better than the RTD era. All my favorite RTD era episodes without exception bear the name "Steven Moffat" in the credits. Even the absolute worst episodes of seasons five and six make the mediocre episodes of the RTD years look awful, and make the awful ones feel unwatchable. And Amy and Rory are really hard to beat as companions.