Like a lot of people, I was first introduced to Doctor Who via the 2005 revival series. When I first started watching Doctor Who, it had already been on TV for a while. Matt Smith had just finished his first season as the Doctor. However, I never like to start something in the middle, so I started watching with Christopher Eccleston, since that was a logical starting off point for new viewers.
And I loved it. Doctor Who was my new favourite thing ever. I knew Doctor Who had been on for a long time before I had ever started watching it. So I knew I had a lot more to watch before I could ever consider my Doctor Who viewing experience complete. I watched the very first episode (An Unearthly Child) and found the black and white and the less than impressive production values extremely difficult to tolerate. The missing episodes from the black and white era also did not help. I also found the First Doctor to initially be extremely irritating. Grumpy old men tend not to be my favourite characters under any circumstances.
So I skipped over the first two doctors and started my Classic Who experience with Jon Pertwee. And then I also skipped Jon Pertwee and ACTUALLY started my Classic Who experience with Tom Baker. At that point there were no more missing episodes, no random black and white episodes, and no more exile on Earth (being stuck on Earth without a working TARDIS was the main reason I initially skipped Jon Pertwee).
Tom Baker was a wonderful Doctor. He had his ups and downs, but he was very rarely boring, even when he was in bad stories. There is a reason Tom Baker is widely considered to be the most popular Doctor. He had a presence that made him stand out, and he is, in my opinion, the only incarnation of the Doctor who actually looked like an alien.
After Tom Baker, I kept watching Classic Doctor Who. until I got to the final episodes that aired in 1989. Then I got around to watching the Jon Pertwee era. While I was progressing through this era, I set about acquiring the soundtracks for the missing episodes from the First and Second Doctors eras (see the Wikipedia page about the Doctor Who missing episodes to read more about why they are missing). Fans of Doctor Who were actually very lucky because the soundtracks of every missing episode do still exist. The audio versions include all the dialogue and sound effects from the original episodes with linking narration from one of the actors from the serials. And since I have a fairly low tolerance for black and white television, I actually found it easier to listen to the soundtracks than to actually watch the episodes, which was my first official introduction to Doctor Who as audio.
Some of the stories of Classic Doctor Who were completely forgettable and some were absolutely wonderful. I came to a conclusion: despite the much higher production values of New Who, I actually preferred Classic Who. I found the classic stories to be much more engaging and the characters to be much more memorable. As New Who progresses, I am becoming more indifferent to the show (although Peter Capaldi is wonderful and I am very glad he became the Doctor), so I am glad Classic Who will always exist.
I haven't mentioned the TV Movie starring Paul McGann. The only thing I have to say about it is that it exists. Other than that, it is not a very memorable movie. I only recommend it to very dedicated fans.
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