Doctor Who’s Hidden Treasure Hunt #FindTheDoctor
Welcome to a mystery across space and time. Work together to solve the hiDden clues and reveal a password below. #FindTheDoctor
Last week Doctor Who launched a brand new trailer for Series 13. You know, the usual aliens and monsters and heartfelt moments between The Doctor and her companions. But eagle-eyed fans spotted something else hidden inside the trailer: a cryptic clue that read only:
/mystery
On this page only more mysteries await, from here many fans spotted further unusual clues on the page – from a hidden word ‘FRED’ written in white text, to possible Morse Code in the latest poster, to unusual hints in the page’s source code itself.
Would-be treasure hunters have set up unofficial Discords to try to crack the case, working around the clock. At this stage it is unknown what will happen when the code is cracked, but it seems like BBC have been planning this for a while – with hidden typos and cryptic clues dotted all around their website and social media pages these past weeks.
Whatever we’re looking for… It begins: 13:13.13.
What We Know About #FindTheDoctor
For a little in-depth analysis of all the clues that have been compiled so far by Twitter user @updates_who, read on. Or if you choose to discover them yourself, you can head to /mystery here
- The D is capitalised in hiDden
- FRED can be found by highlighting white text on the page
- By looking in the page source you can find ‘X4G6H66TZ114Z33H19K6’. If you decrypt it using Arcfour, it reveals ‘Z’
- Interestingly, ‘X4G6H66TZ114Z33H19K6’ contains the exact number of letters as the Time Lady’s real name.
- John Bishop posted something with ‘a d’ in it but it should say ‘and’. ‘N’ is the missing letter
- A spectrogram of the page’s image reveals high frequencies around the ‘OR’ in ‘DOCTOR WHO’
- Mandip Gill posted something with ‘T.AR.D.I.S’. ‘It should say ‘T.A.R.D.I.S’
Fan Theories About #FindTheDoctor So Far…
- Twitter user @BBCWilliamWho pointed out that another article confirmed ‘universes’ and speculates if #FindTheDoctor will introduce more universes to the show
- Twitter user @updates_who theorised that 13:13.13 could be a timecode for a video or a time of day/year. It could also lead to Apollo 13 in 1970 – their rocket was launched at 13:13pm
- Twitter user @DampPuddle pointed out that Romana’s first episode (connected to the word FRED) references 116 parsecs at 13 minutes – the co-ordinates of the Planet Ribos.
- Many users have pointed out that some passwords get an ‘incorrect password’, and others take you to a page that says “You have not cracked the code this time.”, indicating that a password can only be input at a certain time.
Doctor Who returns to BBC 1 later this year, but if you can’t wait that long you can book your own Doctor Who adventure at Escape Hunt.
