I am a hard-boiled hater of sci-fi self-important waffle, and the Doctor has his share of this, as I know from my small sample of perhaps 20 episodes. But in its best moments (- too rare for my taste -), it has that typically British twinkling in its eye when quoting British and other clichés - rightly cherished by fans. I read that Douglas Adams wrote some of the scripts, who of course in his books offers a higher concentration of British humour.