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Rick and Morty is pretty much Doctor Who except with a fixed (infinitely dispensable) companion and weird cartoon enemies (just my opinion).

However in Rick and Morty the main theme is dimension travelling and the fact that there are an 'infinite' number of universes and dimensions; Rick isn't phased by danger and other people's lives being at risk because he knows it has happened an infinite number of times before.

So, similar to Rick and Morty, are there an infinite number of dimensions in Doctor Who? There surely must be, because going back in time and changing things surely makes two alternative dimensions one where the Doctor doesn't appear to save everyone and the one where he does and the one where he fails etc.

Anyway, I digress, are there an infinite number of dimensions in the Doctor Who universe or is it just the one dimension and the one universe?

(If this was the case, I would have thought the Doctor would develop a Rick mindset and not care when the next [insert villain name/race here] tries to enslave the universe because there's always a spare universe he can move into.)

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  • so, for this question, do you intend for the answer to include both classic doctor who and new doctor who (the rules are a bit different between the two from what I understand), or would you rather an answer from one period over the other?
    – DForck42
    Commented Dec 6, 2017 at 18:50
  • I didn't realize the rules were different? I mean I don't want to sound plastic but I only started watching after the 9th Doctor! But could you include both classic and new doctor who please?
    – Metro Boomin
    Commented Dec 6, 2017 at 18:53
  • it seems that they've kept this rule consistent after a little research
    – DForck42
    Commented Dec 6, 2017 at 18:58
  • What about infinite timelines? Then things get complicated.
    – OrangeDog
    Commented Dec 8, 2017 at 12:45

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There are an infinite amount, according to Tardis Wiki:

There were countless billions of dimensions, some of them incomprehensibly different to N-Space. Beings from these distant dimensions obeyed very different laws of physics and were (presumably) forbidden to cross into other dimensions. Nobody No-One came from a reality 45 billion dimensions away from N-Space and was composed of language and communication instead of matter and energy. (AUDIO: The Word Lord)

The Sixth Doctor described there being trillions and trillions of alternate dimensions, some of which could be infinitesimally small micro-universes. (AUDIO: The Macros) However, the Seventh Doctor later commented that one billion cubic centimetres was small in terms of a dimension's size. (AUDIO: The Light at the End)

Time was often considered by humans to be the "fourth dimension" (TV: "An Unearthly Child") and Vicki Pallister later elaborated that time, even though a dimension in itself, had dimensions of its own. The First Doctor even stated, in their adventure at the time, that he did not understand "this" fourth dimension. (TV: The Space Museum) Different universes possessed different time dimensions. Time moved faster in Capron's universe, requiring metabolisms to be altered so as to prevent rapid ageing when travelling to it from N-space. (AUDIO: The Macros)

According to the Twelfth Doctor, the Boneless were "from a universe with only two dimensions", although the Doctor also described them as "creatures from another dimension" and mentioned a way of sending them "back to their own dimension". People in N-Space, where three dimensions were required for life to survive there, had theorised such a universe's existence, but according to the Doctor, "no-one could go there and prove its existence without a heck of a diet". (TV: Flatline)

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    You would think there being an infinite amount of Doctors they would have created a Citadel of Docs where maybe an evil Martha can infiltrate and become the president
    – Metro Boomin
    Commented Dec 6, 2017 at 19:04
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    @MetroBoomin from my understanding it's unusual in the doctor who series for being to be able to cross dimensions as it normally takes a considerable amount of energy. in some cases there's even a barrier to prevent it, a la rose being trapped in a different dimension
    – DForck42
    Commented Dec 6, 2017 at 19:06
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    I always felt like Doctor Who intentionally does not try to explain paradoxes and such stuff in too much detail. They just give you a rundown of the events happening and omit some detail. If you immerse yourself into the story without thinking too much about physics and realism, the experience becomes more genuine. Personally, I like it that way. I don't want realism, I want nice stories (because that is all that we are in the end, right?).
    – Ian
    Commented Dec 7, 2017 at 11:14
  • Note that while Dr Who doesn't really have a "canon", anything marked AUDIO isn't going to be considered canon.
    – OrangeDog
    Commented Dec 8, 2017 at 12:44
  • Note that (to the best of my knowledge), the "dimensions" mentioned above are not necessarily alternate timelines. There are definitely Doctor Who stories where travel to the past affects the future. In most cases, the effect was already in place before the time travel (In "The Visitation", the Fifth Doctor story from Season 19, the Doctor and his companions are partially responsible for the Great London Fire of 1666 (or somewhere thereabouts), an existing historical fact). I recall (but cannot place) a scene where the TARDIS goes to the future and it's destroyed, so they go back and fix it.
    – RDFozz
    Commented Dec 8, 2017 at 22:39

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