The flat-pack Tardis is unveiled

Mar 4 2008 by Abby Alford, South Wales Echo

DID Dr Who get his time travelling machine from Ikea?

That is what fans were left wondering when the Time Lord’s secret was revealed – his Tardis does not zip between dimensions in an instant but comes flat-packed on the back of a lorry!

Generations have grown up marvelling at the Tardis as the blue police box travels through space.

But the BBC has accidentally revealed the down-to-earth reality to Cardiff residents during filming for the latest series, starring David Tennant and Catherine Tate.

Instead of flying through space and taking short cuts through wormholes, the Tardis must contend with the city’s traffic just like the rest of us.

And when BBC crews get the icon to its destination, they use ordinary screwdrivers instead of the Doctor’s sonic screwdriver to put it together.

Fan Sue Bishop, 32, said: “What a disappointment! I expected the Tardis to beam down from some far-off galaxy in outer space and the Doctor to pop his head out!

“But it looked more like some flat-pack furniture from Ikea when it was pulled from the back of the lorry to be screwed together.

“It’s the last of my childhood fantasies shattered.”

The Tardis – which stands for Time and Relative Dimensions in Space – is known for being bigger on the inside than the outside.

But fans could see it is just as small inside when the technicians built it.

Rhodri Jenkins, 22, said: “The Tardis looks so exciting on-screen - so it was a bit of a shock to see them pull the pieces off the back of a lorry.

“It took a while for them to put it all together, but I guess they have to be careful that it doesn’t fall apart around Dr Who.

“But if it did fall apart during filming they could keep it in as it is meant to be an unreliable time machine that needs fixing!”

The Tardis is modelled on blue police boxes which were a familiar site in British cities in the 1950s.

It was adopted as Doctor Who’s space ship for the show’s debut in 1963 and despite the real-life police boxes being phased out the show stuck with it.

abby.alford@mediawales.co.uk