Hold onto your hats and ready yourself for innuendo galore – today marks the birthday of two of Doctor’s Who sassiest and sexiest stars! But when there’s a double entendre… I mean, double celebration like this, where do we begin? Well, ladies first, of course…
Alex Kingston, who turns 53 today (what’s her secret? “Spoilers!”), first blasted onto the show and into The Doctor’s life in Steven Moffat’s Series 4 two-parter, Silence in the Library/Forest of the Dead. Shrouded in allure and mystery, the plucky archaeologist sacrificed herself to help the Time Lord defeat the Vashta Nerada, and the last thing we saw was The Tenth Doctor uploading her dying mind to the library database… or so we thought! Fast forward two years into Series 5’s The Time of Angels/Flesh and Stone and River Song was back with a bang, travelling on a timeline heading in the opposite direction to The Doctor. After a face-off with the Weeping Angels, she would soon become a regular recurring character throughout The Eleventh Doctor era – she popped up again in the Series 5 finale, became the central figure in Series 6’s story arc (turning out to be Amy and Rory’s daughter as well as The Doctor’s wife/killer/bespoke psychopath!), before returning for some emotional farewells in Series 7’s The Angels Take Manhattan and The Name of the Doctor, which seemed to be her final goodbye. You can’t keep a good girl down though, and her appearance alongside Peter Capaldi in the 2015 Christmas special The Husbands of River Song proved to be a festive treat for many fans alike. And then, they lived happily ever after…
But if that’s still not enough, The Doctor’s feisty other half has previously appeared in videogame The Eternity Clock and has recently been enjoying her own spin-off media in the form of The Legends of River Song book and numerous audio adventures from Big Finish, in which she turns up with even more Doctors (and even more husbands) than we’ve seen before! Without a doubt, River has become of the most iconic characters in the revived Doctor Who, and it certainly won’t be long before people are clamouring for even more of Alex Kingston on our screens.
Not one to be outdone though, John Barrowman – who turns 49 today – was bringing sexy back to Doctor Who even earlier, right from when the show first came back in 2005. The handsome time agent Captain Jack Harkness has a decidedly parallel journey to River Song, first also appearing in a Steven Moffat two-parter – Series 1’s The Empty Child/The Doctor Dances. He would later be dragged into the battle against the Daleks alongside The Ninth Doctor in Bad Wolf/The Parting of the Ways, in which he died… and then came back to life, turned immortal by the Bad Wolf form of Rose Tyler. Captain Jack would triumphantly return again in The Tenth Doctor era for the three-part Series 3 finale as well as the two-part Series 4 finale, bowing out with a cameo appearance in David Tennant’s swansong The End of Time Part Two. In the interim though, Barrowman would star in his very own darker and more adult Doctor Who spin-off – Torchwood enjoyed a successful run of four series between 2006 and 2011. He’s also appeared in the recent Torchwood audio stories from Big Finish and reprised his role in vocal form for Lego Dimensions’ Doctor Who content. Captain Jack may have been absent from the television show since 2010, but with knowing references to his character in The Day of the Doctor and The Woman Who Lived, will we ever see him again? The fan demand is definitely there, so only time will tell!
Please join us in sending many happy returns to both Alex and John on their special day – the only thing more exciting than their joint birthday could be a joint comeback appearance in Series 10! We can but dream, but in the meantime… Happy Birthday, sweeties!
 & Alex Kingston (River Song) a very Happy Birthday){kind=link}