BBCSince the beginning of science fiction, there have been time-travel stories. And with time-travel stories comes the opportunity for contemporary characters to meet human beings from history, at a time when those people didn’t consider themselves historical figures. From Mark Twain’s A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court to Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, coming face-to-face with history is part of what makes the sci-fi subgenre of time travel so appealing. But there’s a delicate balance with this kind of storytelling. And, despite a very long history with time-travel stories, the longest-running sci-fi show ever, Doctor Who, didn’t really perfect the formula around a historical drama until 15 years ago.In 2010, with the episode “Vincent and the Doctor,” Doctor Who delivered a platonic ideal of how to do a sci-fi story about a famous historical figure. Fifteen years later, both within Who and relative to the broader genre of TV science fiction, this episode has few equals. Here’s why.From the very beginning, Doctor Who had episodes grounded in some kind of history lesson. The very first adventure with William Hartnell’s cranky, original Doctor took the TARDIS back to the Stone Age. Later in that first season, the Doctor met Marco Polo, and famously went back to the time of “The Aztecs” in the 1964 serial of the same name. One agenda of Who in the old days was actually to provide educational value for youngsters about history. Oddly enough, it’s with this slightly wholesome criterion that 2010’s “Vincent and the Doctor” excels. If middle school or high school art history teachers had any sense, they’d screen “Vincent and the Doctor” whenever kids are first learning about Vincent van Gogh. This isn’t to say that the show captures 100 percent historical accuracy, and purists would likely be quick to point out that van Gogh is played by Scottish actor Tony Curran, rather than say, a Dutchman.But because Who is quirky about history by its nature, it’s quite shocking how much “Vincent and the Doctor” gets right about the truth of this famously tempestuous artist. As the episode opens, the Doctor (Matt Smith) and Amy (Karen Gillian) are visiting a massive van Gogh retrospective in a contemporary art gallery. The Doctor notices an alien monster lurking in one of van Gogh’s most famous paintings, The Church at Auvers. And so, the Doctor and Amy must travel to 1890 and figure out if it’s really an alien that is making van Gogh depressed, or something else.Prior to this, modern Who’s most successful historical figure episode was arguably, “The Shakespeare Code,” in which space witches appeared to quite literally inspire Shakespeare’s writing. After that, the Clue-esque whodunit, “The Unicorn and the Wasp” did a good job pairing the Doctor with Agatha Christie, and taking a real historical question (why did Agatha Christie disappear?) and giving that story at timey-wimey spin. Amy and the Doctor find something wrong in a Van Gogh painting. | BBCBut “Vincent and the Doctor” stands firmly apart from those two episodes because instead of going utterly goofy, the episode treats van Gogh’s depression with the correct kind of weight it deserves. While the episode starts off with some great Matt Smith banter, what makes the whole thing work so well is that yes, there’s an alien menace, but no, that’s not van Gogh’s entire problem.Heartbreakingly written by brilliant screenwriter Richard Curtis (Four Weddings and a Funeral, et al.) “Vincent and the Doctor” demonstrates how the format of Doctor Who really lends itself to guest writers with very specific styles. While this episode sits firmly in the early Steven Moffat era, it also stands apart because the script is so tight and specific. Curtis wants to tell a time-travel story about van Gogh, but this episode is classic because it’s a van Gogh story first and a Who episode second. Of course, the audience is wondering if Amy and the Doctor can change van Gogh’s tragic suicidal fate; if the monster is eliminated, surely he’ll be better, right?In this way, “Vincent and the Doctor” has a fatalist quality that it shares with one of the other great time-travel classics of sci-fi television, Star Trek’s “City on the Edge of Forever.” No, the Doctor can’t create a more ideal timeline, even though he certainly wants to. Since “Vincent and the Doctor,” the series has attempted similar historical episode with mixed results. Jodie Whittaker’s 13th Doctor met Rosa Parks (Vinette Robinson) in 2018’s slightly clumsy “Rosa.” Though, the 13th Doctor era probably did its best historical figure episode with 2020’s “The Haunting of Villa Diodati,” in which the TARDIS gang met Mary Shelley (Lili Miller) before she was Mary Shelley. Last year, Ncuti Gatwa’s 15th Doctor met the Beatles, which we’ve all somehow collectively forgotten. (This is particularly interesting, since as artists, the Beatles are probably more relevant to the lives of modern viewers, certainly more than van Gogh.)Amy, the Doctor and van Gogh just doing arty things. | BBCSo, why is “Vincent and the Doctor” so much better than all of these other examples? Again, the episode isn’t really about the Doctor, despite what the title suggests. Instead, it really does present as sweet, cutting portrait of an artist who influenced millions. At the end of the episode, the Doctor presents van Gogh with his legacy in 2010. As Bill Nighy’s delightful museum tour guide explains the impact of the artist, van Gogh weeps. This is the power of a time travel story. To show us the before and after, and how the knowledge of greatness still can’t always fix our problems. Doctor Who Season 5 (2010) streams on HBO Max.