About

London 1965 refers to the repetitive use and spamming of the phrase "London 1965", and variations thereof, in the 2018 'Twitch Presents' Doctor Who Marathon chat feed.

Origin

The original line "Barbara, we made it… London 1965" was spoken by character Ian Chesterton in the 1965 Doctor Who episode The Planet of Decision. A clip of the line was used in Twitch's promo teaser for their streaming of the William Hartnell era, which was aired one or twice between every individual episode broadcast on the stream from the 29th May 2018. Because of the constant replaying of the promo, most of its constituent phrases became fodder for enthusiastic repetition to the point of incoherence. The most popular and consumable phrase that naturally gave rise from this was the "London 1965" line.

Other frequent chat catchphrases spawned from their repetition in the Twitch promo include "He Knows [Believe Him]", "Round and Round [in Circles]", and "Speak up I Can't Hear You", as well as story-specific references such as "Pants For Altos", "My Legs", "Eeyan Chesterthumbs", and "Open The Flaps".

Spread

The chanting of relevant variations of London 1965 were fairly consistent throughout the episode streamings, but would particularly erupt each time the promo teaser was shown or a character made reference to their location and/or date. Popular spellings of the quote included "L O N D O N 1 9 6 5", "LondonNineteenSixtyFive", and "LONDINIUM MCMLXV". Variations were also inspired by aspects of the concurrent episode, such as "JUDGE JUDY 1965", a comment made during streaming of 'The Keys of Marinus'.

The meme quickly permeated through to Twitter, where fans altered their account name to include a reference to the phrase. It spawned fan-art, custom merchandise, video remixes, and further image-based memes to the bemusement of those who were unaware of London 1965. One user created a colourised version of the original clip, which was shot and broadcast in black and white.

By May 31 the wikipedia page for events of 1965 had been updated to include a listing for the fictitious return of Ian and Barbara to London in the Dalek Time Machine.

Official recognition of the popularity of London 1965 first came from the BBC when the official Doctor Who YouTube channel's video of the original scene from The Planet of Decision was renamed from "Ian and Barbara leave the Doctor" to "London 1965!".

The Planet of Decision finally aired on the Twitch stream to a raucous reaction on June 1 (after a lengthy initial delay of the stream's beginning, which caused "The Web Planet" to trend on Twitter in the United Kingdom).

On June 28 Doctor Who Magazine Issue 527 was released, featuring an article titled 'LONDON, 1965!' about the meme and the Twitch marathon. Pieces of related fan-art by Lewis Lee Grant and Sophie Iles were also printed in the 'Galaxy Forum' section of the magazine.

The ultimate climate of the 'LONDON, 1965!' meme came on October 13th when Ian actor William Russell was videoed at a Fantom Films signing event reciting his iconic line.

#London1965 #Twitch #DoctorWho #WilliamRussell https://t.co/unas3mfnQ2 pic.twitter.com/C7HTBPxviQ

— Fantom Tweets (@fantomfilms) October 13, 2018