Who’s afraid of the Big Bad Wolf? Certainly not Rose Tyler, the first companion to when Doctor Who revived in 2005.
Doctor Who likes to play games with fans and hide nugget references in episodes that will eventually come into play in a series finale with a bang.
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Bad Wolf was a reoccurring phrase for not one but four seasons!
Did you spot all these times it connected the Doctor and Rose across time and space?
Check out our thoughts below and share yours in the comments.
Bad Wolf Scenario: “The End of the World”
Possibly the first reference to Bad Wolf is on Doctor Who Season 1 Episode 2, “The End of The World.” The Moxx Of Balhoon is seen telling the Face of Boe that it’s the Bad Wolf Scenario. This is just before the space station used to view the Earth’s destruction from the sun expansion is infiltrated by Cassandra.
“The Unquiet Dead”: Ghosts of the Rift
Doctor Who Season 1 Episode 3 is set in 18th Century Cardiff. Ghosts called the Gelth have opened the mind of Gwenyth, a servant girl, to the rift. The rift is a weak point in time and space that is able to charge a TARDIS for space/time travel. When Gwenyth looks into Roses’ mind with her psychic powers, she sees “the darkness…the Big Bad Wolf.”
“Aliens of London”/”World War Three”
On Doctor Who Season 1 Episodes 4/5, the Doctor is grounded on Earth while the Slitheen try to take over the British Government. A kid paints the words BAD WOLF on his TARDIS. Once the crisis has cleared, the Doctor makes the kid remove the paint. But he doesn’t realize what the phrase means.
“DALEK”: Bad Wolf One
On Doctor Who Season 1 Episode 6, the billionaire Harry Van Statten lands his hovercraft. The announcement of his arrival to the underground alien treasure trove states that “Bad Wolf One is descending.”
“The Long Game”: Bad Wolf TV Station
On Doctor Who Season 1 Episode 7, a TV station broadcasting from Satellite Five to the fifth great and bountiful human empire includes a channel called Bad Wolf TV. A glimpse of the program reveals that the Face of Boe is pregnant. The Face of Boe is later known to fans as Captain Jack Harkness, who also traveled with Rose and the Doctor.
“Father’s Day”: Back in Time
On Doctor Who Season 1 Episode 8, The Doctor and Rose visit the past to see her father Pete Tyler, who died in 1987. Rose cheats the system and tries to save her father from the impending car crash, creating a paradox as a result. When the Doctor and Rose go back and watch themselves, a poster on the wall can be seen that’s scribbled over with ‘Bad Wolf.’
“The Empty Child”/”The Doctor Dances”
On Doctor Who Season 1 Episode 10/11, a bomb in Nazi Germany has spread a plague that turned people into gas mask zombies. Hidden in the middle of a German camp, it reads Bad Wolf on the side. The ‘Wolf’ portion is visible as Captain Jack teleports the bomb up to his spaceship to self destruct.
“Boom Town”: Blaidd Drug
Tricky one, this. On Doctor Who Season 1 Episode 11, Blaidd Drug was the title chosen for a project that would explode the center of Cardiff to power Slitheen Blon’s trip home. Rose realizes in this episode that she’s heard Bad Wolf a lot of times, and the Doctor teases that the words are following them through time and space. In the real world, Blaidd Drug translates as ‘very poorly wolf’ or ‘naughty wolf.’ Still, has a ring to it.
“Bad Wolf”: It’s in the Name
Going to point out the obvious for Doctor Who Season 1 Episode 11. “Bad Wolf” is the title. The Corporation that runs the game station on Satellite Five calls themselves the Bad Wolf Corporation. The Doctor arrives after 100 years to find that he created the new world where humans sit inside and watch telly all day, the air too polluted to go outside. No one knows where the name of the corporation came from.
“Parting of the Ways”: A Message for Rose!
After the Doctor sends Rose back to Earth, she eats fish and chips with her mum and Mickey, as one does. In the back of her in the restaurant, a poster with the words Bad Wolf can be spotted. BAD WOLF is also written in huge block letters on the basketball court tar, and graffiti has been painted over with BadWolf. Rose realizes its a message to lead her back to the Doctor
Bad Wolf Entity: “Parting of the Ways”
Rose takes the heart of the TARDIS into her mind and scatters the words across time and space. She creates a bootstrap paradox doing so. A bootstrap paradox is when something goes back in time and creates itself. BadWolf is a message to lead herself to that specific point in time to save the Doctor.
“Tooth and Claw”: Empire of the Wolf
Even after Rose becomes the Bad Wolf, it still crops up in Doctor Who. On Season 2 Episode 2, a werewolf wants to bite Queen Victoria to start an empire of the wolf. When it sees Rose, it says “There’s something of the wolf about you. You’ve seen it too.”
“Love and Monsters”: Torchwood Files
Ah, a Whovian’s favorite, Doctor Who Season 2 Episode 10. Not for most, but worth a second go for a gang of lovable misfits. When Viktor Kennedy (the Abzorbaloff) crashes a club’s meeting to search for the Doctor. It’s revealed he and his companions have been wiped from Torchwood files by the Bad Wolf virus.
“Doomsday”: Bad Wolf Bay
No, wait! Don’t click away after that one. Bad Wolf comes back! On Doctor Who Season 2 Episode 13, Rose gets trapped in another dimension. The Doctor meets with her for what they think is the last time. The two are reunited via psychic projection from the TARDIS on Bad Wolf Bay in Norway.
“Turn Left”: Two Words
On Doctor Who Season 4 Episode 11, Donna ends up in another universe where she never met the Doctor because she turned left instead of turning right. In this world, he dies because she wasn’t there to save him from the Racnoss. Rose helps Donna get back home and whispers the words “Bad Wolf” which then appears all over the planet the Doctor and Donna were visiting. His TARDIS is covered with the words Bad Wolf. It means the end of the universe.
“Day of the Doctor”: Save the Day
Bad Wolf returns in the Doctor Who 50th-anniversary special: “Day of the Doctor.” This time it’s through use of the Moment, a powerful galaxy destroying weapon from Gallifrey. The Doctor plans to use it to destroy Gallifrey and end the time war. It takes the appearance of Rose Tyler but calls herself Bad Wolf. She lets the Doctor decide that destroying Gallifrey is wrong and helps him think of another way to save his home planet.
Torchwood: “Captain Jack Harkness!”
Doctor Who spin-off shows have included this phrase too! Torchwood tells the story of how Captain Jack Harkness founded the alien-fighting force and is geared more towards an adult audience. In Torchwood Season 1 Episode 12, we meet the man Captain Jack named himself after, and we see the words Bad Wolf graffitied on the entrance of a dance hall.
UNIT Rocks!
UNIT, that’s Unified Intelligence Taskforce, has a website written by BBC. The password to get inside files for the military alien fighting force is Bad Wolf. Once entered, fans have access to information about the army from the showrunners.
“The Clockwise Man”: Team Up
In the Doctor Who Companion novel “The Clockwise Man” by Justin Richards, the phrase Bad Wolf is also slipped in! Melissa Heart says that the Doctor and Rose keep teaming up like a Bad Wolf. It was published three months prior to the Bad Wolf episode airing.
