Doctor Who & Spin-Offs A-Z Game

[Alan]

T ~ Turlough, Vislor - Probably best known as the only companion who deliberately tried to kill the Doctor of his own free will, Turlough was a political prisoner, exiled to Earth after a civil war on his home planet of Trion. Desperate to escape, he agreed to an offer made to him by the Black Guardian - kill the Doctor and regain his freedom. Little is known about Turlough's life on Trion before and during the civil war, although his desperation to destroy a distress beacon he recognises as being Trion in origin, and his reluctance to contact his own people to save the people of Sarn indicate that there were severe penalties for him escaping his exile. It can be reasonably assumed he was an active member of the military, as he was assigned the rank and serial number of "Junior Ensign Commander Vislor Turlough. VTEC9/12/44". His mother was killed during the civil war, and his younger brother Malkon and father exiled to the abandoned colony planet of Sarn, whilst Turlough himself was exiled to 20th Century Earth.

On Earth he lived as a human schoolboy, hiding his alien origins and attending Brendon Public School, Turlough was under the supervision of a Custodian masquerading as a solicitor in Chancery Lane. He was contacted by the Black Guardian, who offered him his freedom in exchange for the death of the Doctor. Turlough subsequently ingratiated himself with the Doctor as his companions Nyssa and Tegan Jovanka, assisting in resolving a time paradox, after which he was invited to join the Doctor in his travels.

Spoilered for length:

Spoiler:

In subsequent adventures, Turlough received recurring messages from the Black Guardian, reminding him of his obligation to kill the Doctor, an act he became more loath to do as he grew fonder of the Time Lord. Finally, he chose to destroy a prize that would have guaranteed his freedom and his pact with the Black Guardian rather than kill the Doctor, ending his association with the villain and becoming a loyal member of the Doctor's team.

It was after breaking away from the Black Guardian that Turlough's outlook changed from one of self-preservation to wanting to help others, leading to him deliberately putting his own life at risk to save the Doctor and Tegan, facing the demons of his own people and finally accepting personal responsibility and trading in his own freedom to save the lives of the population of Sarn. After discovering his younger brother was still alive, and the persecution of political prisoners had long been abandoned on Trion, Turlough left the TARDIS to return to his home planet, after effectively putting the Doctor in the hands of new companion Peri Brown

[Guest]

U ~ Untempered Schism - A gap in the fabric of reality, the Untempered Schism allows one to look directly into the Time Vortex. It is depicted as a stonework portal through which one sees the Time Vortex unaided. Gallifreyan children are taken to the Schism at the age of eight and made to face the Schism as a form of initiation into the Timelord Academy. According to Tenth Doctor, Gallifreyan children who look into the time vortex through the Untempered Schism were either inspired, ran away, or went mad. In a flashback during 'The Sound of Drums', the Master is seen looking into the Schism as a child, an event that Tenth Doctor describes as the moment the Master went mad. The Doctor says he himself was one of those who "ran away, and never stopped".

[Alan]

V ~ Voga - Voga, also known as the Planet of Gold, was a planet that featured in the 1975 story Revenge of the Cybermen. Voga has an extremely high gold content. It contained more gold than in the rest of the known galaxy and with rocks being 50% gold, sometimes even higher.

Voga was originally a full sized planet, inhabited by the Vogans. During the Cyber-Wars, the Vogans started supplying the gold dust which would be used in the manufacturing of glitterguns. The Cybermen tried to stop this by destroying the planet, but one emergency bunker survived, which started drifting in space. Centuries later, it was captured in Jupiter's orbit. The Cybermen later discovered the planet again and attempted to destroy the remaining gold.

[Guest]

W ~ Warpstar - A small crystalline device carried by Sarah Jane Smith in 'Journey's End' that looks like a necklace, but is in fact a highly explosive device (a "Warp-fold conjugation") inside a carbonised shell. According to Sarah Jane, it was given to her by a Verran soothsayer to be used at "the end of days". Jack Harkness wires it into the Dalek Crucible's mainframe and threatens to use it; however, he does not get the opportunity as the Daleks swiftly transmat Jack, Sarah Jane, and their companions away.

[Alan]

X ~ Xeros - Xeros is the planet on which a massive Space Museum was located. The planet featured in the 1965 story The Space Museum. The native Xerons are humanoids. Xeros was part of the Morok Empire, located only three light years from Morok itself.

[Guest]

Y ~ Yates, Captain Mike - Yates first appeared in the Third Doctor serial 'Terror of the Autons', the latest in a line of Captains assisting Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart. He proved more durable than his predecessors, appearing semi-regularly in the programme from 1971 to 1974 alongside the Brigadier and Sergeant Benton. Together with the Doctor and his companions, Yates fought off alien invasions, the machinations of the renegade Timelord known as the Master, rogue computers and mutated maggots.

Spoiler:

Yates was a fairly non-descript character, typical of the British Army officer class, and little is known of him outside of his time with UNIT. He was cool under fire, efficient, and both gave and carried out his orders with a minimum of fuss. He appeared to have a relatively good rapport with his men, although he did remind Benton on occasion that "rank hath its privileges". He was attracted to the Third Doctor's assistant Jo Grant and they may have dated for a time - Jo was dressed up to go on a date with Mike at the start of 'The Curse of Peladon' only to be taken on a trip in the TARDIS by the Doctor.

Yates's fall from grace started when he was brainwashed by the artificial intelligence BOSS in the 1973 serial 'The Green Death'. The brush with ecological disaster apparently made Yates very concerned about the future of the planet, and he was easily recruited by Sir Charles Grover into a conspiracy to reverse time and return Earth to a "golden age" ('Invasion of the Dinosaurs'). The conspiracy was thwarted by the Doctor, and in return for his past service to UNIT, the Brigadier allowed Yates to take medical leave and then quietly resign (actor Richard Franklin believes the initial plan for this story was to kill off Yates[1]).

Trying to recover, Yates attended a meditation centre but uncovered strange goings-on, which he reported to Sarah Jane Smith, since he felt that UNIT would find him untrustworthy. Sarah communicated this back to the Doctor, leading into the rest of the events of the Third Doctor's last serial, 'Planet of the Spiders'. It is not known if Yates returned to UNIT after that, or if he went on to other things.

'Planet of the Spiders' was Yates's last appearance in the series. Richard Franklin returned as an illusory image of Yates in the 20th Anniversary special 'The Five Doctors' and reprised the role of Yates in the 1993 charity special 'Dimensions in Time'.

[Alan]

Z ~ Zeiton-7 - Rare ore found on the planet Varos. Zeiton-7 is part of the design of a TARDIS. It was mentioned in the 1985 story Vengeance on Varos.

[Guest]

A ~ Ace - Ace (born Dorothy Gale McShane) played by Sophie Aldred, she was a companion of the Seventh Doctor and a regular in the series from 1987 to 1989.

[Alan]

B ~ Brown, Perpugilliam "Peri" - Peri Brown first appears in the 1984 story Planet of Fire, in which she encounters the 5th Doctor and Turlough on the island of Lanzarote. After an encounter with the Master and the shapechanging android Kamelion (who disguises himself as her stepfather, Professor Howard Foster), Peri asks to join the Doctor on his travels, while Turlough departs to return to his home planet of Trion.

Peri is present when the Doctor regenerates into his sixth incarnation and continues to travel with him, despite the fact that one of the first things the temporarily unstable 6th Doctor tries to do is strangle her.

Peri is a bright, spirited young woman, who travels with the Doctor because, like many of his companions, she wants to see the universe. Although she shares a more abrasive relationship with the 6th Doctor, there is an undercurrent of affection in their verbal sparring.

Peri's last appearance was in the second chapter of the 1986 story The Trial of a Time Lord known as Mindwarp. She is abducted by a slug-like creature named Kiv, who apparently transplants his brain into her body. Soon after, the Doctor is led to believe that Peri is dead, and is severely distressed by this. It is later revealed in the fourth and final chapter of The Trial of a Time Lord known as The Ultimate Foe that the evidence of Peri's death was faked by the Valeyard. Peri has, in fact, survived, presumably recovered from Kiv's transplant (if it ever actually occurred), and married King Yrcanos of Thoros Alpha, a warrior king who had assisted the Doctor and Peri during the Mindwarp incident.

In the New Adventures novel Bad Therapy, it is revealed that, although becoming Yrcanos' Queen, Peri is reunited with the Doctor (now in his seventh incarnation) and blames him for abandoning her. The 7th Doctor makes peace with Peri and returns her to late-20th Century Earth.

[Guest]

C ~ Cybermen - Cybermen were originally a wholly organic species of humanoids originating on Earth's twin planet Mondas that began to implant more and more artificial parts into their bodies as a means of self-preservation. This led to the race becoming coldly logical and calculating, with emotions usually only shown when naked aggression was called for. First appearing in the serial, 'The Tenth Planet', the last to feature William Hartnell as the First Doctor. They have since been featured numerous times in their extreme attempts to survive through conquest.

A parallel universe version of the Cybermen appeared in the 2006 series' two-part story, 'Rise of the Cybermen' and 'The Age of Steel'. These Cybermen also appeared in the two-part 2006 season finale, 'Army of Ghosts' and 'Doomsday'. This then carried through to the spin-off Torchwood in the episode 'Cyberwoman'. They would later return to the revived series in the 2008 Christmas Special 'The Next Doctor', introducing two new variants of the race; the Cyber-Shades and the Cyber-King.

[Alan]

D ~ Dragonfire - 1987 story starring Sylvester McCoy as "The Doctor", Bonnie Langford in her last appearance as "Mel Bush", and introducing Sophie Aldred as "Ace".

Synopsis
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Iceworld. An intergalactic trading post, ruled by the power-hungry Kane. Now his dream of total power is near to realisation with his acquisation of a band of mercenaries from the infamous Sabalom Glitz in part payment of his debts. For "Cryosleep" will render the men utterly in his power. Meanwhile, Glitz still owes the balance of the debt and looks to Iceworld's mythical dragon and the Dragonfire - the treasure it reputedly guards - to solve his problems at last.

Intrigued by the legend of the Dragonfire, the Doctor, Mel and young Earth girl, Ace, accompany Glitz - unaware that they are being followed by Kane's mercenaries. For the psychotic ruler believes that with the Dragonfire in his possession he can avenge the rulers of his home-planet who banished his long-dead partner 3,000 years ago.

And so it seems that beneath Iceworld's superficial civility lies a frozen core of corruption and the Doctor has embarked on something far more sinister than a mere treasure hunt...

[Guest]

E ~ Exxilon - Exxilon was an ancient planet, significantly older than Earth and featued in the Third Doctor serial 'Death to the Daleks'. It orbited a sun which was both larger and closer than the sun of Earth. Its sky was copper in colour. Due to the influence of the Great City of the Exxilons, it was a barren planet, covered in deserts, sand dunes and rocks. The seas had dried up, leaving behind few lakes. It was bitterly cold during the night and unbearably hot during the day. There was little in the way of life on the planet. Exxilon was rich in Parrinium.

[Alan]

F ~ Fenric - Fenric was a being described by the 7th Doctor as "evil from the dawn of time", a malevolent force that survived the clash of energies present at the birth of the universe. The Doctor had previously encountered Fenric and defeated him by challenging him to solve a chess puzzle. When Fenric proved unable to solve it, the Doctor then trapped the being in a flask where he remained for several thousand years.

However, Fenric was still able to manipulate human minds and events through time and space. He set up pawns, bloodlines of families that were under his control and he could use, "The Curse of Fenric" stretching down through generations. These people were known as the "Wolves of Fenric", and their true purpose was unknown even to them. He also had the power to summon Haemovores, vampires which were to be the evolutionary destiny of mankind in a possible far future. The Haemovores were strong enough to be able to weld metal with their bare hands, and were also immune to bullets. They could be countered, however, with a psychic barrier caused by faith.

Eventually, the flask was brought to a British Army base in Northumberland in 1943, where several Wolves, including the Doctor's companion Ace, were manipulated into freeing Fenric from his flask. He also summoned the Ancient One, the last of the Haemovores from the future, in an attempt to poison the world with a deadly chemical toxin. Fenric then revealed that he had manipulated the 7th Doctor's life upon several occasions as part of his game, including creating the time storm that originally took Ace to Iceworld and influencing the Cybermen in their attempts to gain the power of the Nemesis statue. Eventually, the Doctor convinced the Ancient One to turn on Fenric; the Ancient One then destroyed Fenric and himself with the same toxin.

[Guest]

G ~ Giant brain - A creation of the Rani in 'Time and the Rani', it was linked to the minds of several geniuses, such as Albert Einstein, Louis Pasteur, and Pierre Curie.
A giant brain also appears in the 2008 episode 'Planet of the Ood'; in this case, it is part of the gestalt mind of the Ood.

[Alan]

H ~ Highlanders, The - 1966 story starring Patrick Troughton as "The Doctor", Anneke Wills as "Polly Wright", Michael Craze as "Ben Jackson", and introducing Frazer Hines as "James 'Jamie' McCrimmon".

Synopsis
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Arriving in Scotland in the aftermath of the Battle of Culloden, the Doctor and his companions are taken prisoner by a group of Scottish rebels. Offering medical help to the clan's injured Laird, the Doctor is able to win over their captors.

Their respite is short-lived, though. While Polly and the Laird's daughter, Kirsty, go to fetch water, the others are captured by a Redcoat troop under the command of Lieutenant Ffinch. Ffinch leaves his prisoners in the custody of Grey, a crooked solicitor who plans to sell them into slavery in the West Indies.

To win his friends' freedom, the Doctor must stretch his powers of disguise to their limits...