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In the beginning of Matt Smith's tenure of being the Doctor you see David Tennant's "Coral" templated TARDIS control room getting, basically, blown up and destroyed.

Therefore the Doctor has to wait a while for the TARDIS to rebuild itself.

Later in the episode called "The Doctor's Wife" we see that the TARDIS keeps a copy of all control room templates in a room of the TARDIS.

So, if that is true, why didn't the TARDIS just take a copy of the old template and place it in the main control room?

Yes I know it is an opportunity to use a new TARDIS set, but that is not what I am asking here.

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  • @Xantec -- that is not really a spoiler, and if it is, you did not block the end of the OP as well.
    – Naftali
    Jan 19, 2012 at 21:03
  • My bad. If you feel the edits are not necessary then please feel free to roll it back.
    – Xantec
    Jan 19, 2012 at 21:12
  • @Xantec I don't think any of it is spoilery... rolling back.
    – Naftali
    Jan 19, 2012 at 21:13
  • I think the episode you are thinking of is "The Doctor's Wife", there is no episode called "House" en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Doctor_Who_serials Jan 19, 2012 at 22:08
  • @NathanKinsinger haha thanks. The creature was called "House". My mistake.
    – Naftali
    Jan 19, 2012 at 22:59

2 Answers 2

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Well, she could have... but the Tardis, being a living being AND female, occasionally likes to change things up, or re-decorate. It would probably require the same (or comparable) energy to copy an old template as it would to simply build a new one, so she chose to create a new one. I'm not sure WHAT exactly determined the change, but I would guess, in her mind, the new format fit the Doctor's new 'format'.

One aspect of extremely long life is boredom; I wouldn't be surprised if the tendency to rebuild when the opportunity arises is hard coded into the Tardis matrix.

Besides... as we see in The Doctor's Wife, she knows (and has copies) of many control rooms.. including ones he hasn't used yet.. She simply 'grew' another variant she had a stored copy of.

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  • 1
    The TARDIS isn't female; the TARDIS' avatar was female. The TARDIS in its proper form is utterly genderless. Jan 25, 2012 at 14:19
  • 2
    shrug As is the case for (arguably) most machines, gender really doesn't apply.. HOWEVER, they tend to be assigned genders (by those that interact with them) based upon visible behaviors, even if it is anthropomorphism. Then, when you start to get into machines with some degree of consciousness and volition, you often see them adopt behaviors consistent with the way they are treated -- they have no ACTUAL gender, but they often develop one based on treatment and experience, and, over time, this can becomes rather ingrained. YMMV; this is fiction only, so far.
    – K-H-W
    Jan 25, 2012 at 16:11
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    I don't see what gender has to do with re-decorating.
    – OrangeDog
    Jan 10, 2015 at 19:19
  • 1
    @OrangeDog -- It's a stereotype; and, right or wrong, a well known one.
    – K-H-W
    Jan 10, 2015 at 19:49
  • @Blazemonger The Doctor regularly refers to the TARDIS as "she". Apr 9, 2016 at 23:25
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It got destroyed. The TARDIS and the Doctor probably decided it was time for a change

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