I started watching Dr who when the reboot was 3 seasons in, I think David Tennant was the greatest doctor. A few years later I finally got wife to give it a shot as I started a fresh rewatch in preparation for Matt Smith’s second season, she was ok with Eccelston and Tennant but Matt Smith is far and away her favorite doctor. Does this pattern hold true for any other Dr fans?
No, but I’m in a somewhat unusual situation. I’m an American fan who was introduced to the show right at the tail end of the classic era. I’d seen one or two serials that my aunt had taped off of our local PBS affiliate (IIRC, The Five Doctors and Revelation of the Daleks were among them), but the first serial I saw as someone with an active interest in the show was the regional premiere of Battlefield, followed that same night by the premiere of Ghost Light (the PBS station in question showed omnibus movie format versions and had doubled up the season 26 stories to get through them in two weeks). So, by that metric, my “first” Doctor was Seven.
But it’s not that simple, because I was technically within broadcast range of two PBS stations, one that aired the show late night on Saturdays, and the other that aired them late night on Sundays. And the very next day after seeing that Seven double feature, the other station was airing a One story, and jumped around semi-randomly after that. And, after the first station got through season 26 in those two weeks, they cycled back around and started showing the extant complete One stories, starting with An Unearthly Child. So I have a fair bit of association with the first Doctor, as well.
Initially, I guess I was a fan of both One and Seven, and they were at least near the top of my list. But being a fan in the wilderness years wasn’t really as straightforward as all that. The closest I had to a “current” Doctor was Seven, especially since I avidly followed the New Adventures novels when they started releasing a year or two after that, but there was never a time when I wasn’t also flitting around and watching other Doctors as they aired on PBS, or as the VHS releases came out, or (eventually) as the Missing/Past Doctor Adventures novels were published. If pushed, I might have named either One or Seven as my favorite, but I might have also named Five or Six, and I never considered them my firsts.
In any case, that was a long time ago, and even if I had felt that way at the time the revived show has given me additional options, and I’m pretty confident in saying that Twelve is my favorite nowadays, with Eleven ranking pretty highly (on par with One, Five, Six, and Seven, at least) as well. 🤷