Characters / Doctor Who – Immortals and Eldritch Abominations

Doctor Who characters index
Incarnations of the Doctor
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | War | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 & 15
The TARDIS
Companions and Supporting Cast
Classic Series Companions (K9, Romana) | Revival Series Companions (Rose Tyler, Captain Jack Harkness, The Ponds, River Song, Clara Oswald) | Other Supporting Cast (The Paternoster Gang) | UNIT Staff
Villains
Immortals and Eldritch Abominations | The Master (John Simm's Master, Missy, Expanded Universe Masters)
Aliens and Monsters
Daleks (Davros) | Cybermen | Robots | The Silence | Silurians | Sontarans | Time Lords | Weeping Angels | Slitheen

The various Doctor Who foes who qualify as immortals and/or Eldritch Abominations. As with all Doctor Who characters, they also appear in the Expanded Universe.

---

First Doctor era debut

The Toymaker

The Celestial Toymaker (First, Fourteenth and Fifteenth Doctors)

"The game is not yet over."

"Make your next move, Doctor. Make your move."

Played by: Michael Gough (1966); Neil Patrick Harris (2023)

"I'm bored. I love to play games but there's no-one to play against. The beings who call here have no minds, and so they become my toys. But you will become my perpetual opponent. We shall play endless games together, your brain against mine."

The Celestial Toymaker was a mysterious superbeing who ensnared sentient beings in apparently childish games, with their freedom as the stakes. However, the Toymaker hated to lose and every game ended in Heads I Win, Tails You Lose. The First Doctor had encountered him briefly before. He appeared in "The Celestial Toymaker", and would have returned in a sequel entitled "The Nightmare Fair". Due to Executive Meddling, Doctor Who then went into an involuntary eighteen month-long hiatus and the production team scrapped all previously commissioned storylines and decided to start afresh. The Toymaker returned in comics in Doctor Who Magazine, a Past Doctor Adventures novel, and Big Finish Doctor Who audio plays. The Nightmare Fair was eventually released as one of Target's Doctor Who novelisations and adapted to audio by Big Finish.

The Toymaker returned in the 60th anniversary specials, specifically as the main antagonist of "The Giggle", portrayed by Neil Patrick Harris.

---

• Above Good and Evil: The Toymaker's response after the Doctor demands to know why he's so small and uses his powers and abilities on such a small, petty scale.
  The Toymaker: You know full well this is merely a face concealing a vastness that will never cease, because your Good and your Bad are nothing to me. All that exists is to Win, or to Lose.
• Affably Evil: Gough's Toymaker is unfailingly polite to the Doctor and his companions. He doesn't want to kill the Doctor, he just wants to keep him around as his perpetual opponent because his intelligence makes playing games more fun and challenging.
• Always Someone Better: Casually establishes himself as more powerful than the Time Lords, the Guardians of Time, and (maybe?) God. More specifically, he turned the Doctor's history into a convoluted mess, and beat the Master and the Guardians in games. However, he makes mention of his better, "The One Who Waits".
• Anthropomorphic Personification: The Doctor states he's "an elemental force" personifying play and games, outside of order-chaos and good-evil.
• Badass Boast: Claims to have turned GOD himself into a Jack-in-the-Box!
• Beware the Silly Ones: Harris's Toymaker is a prancing, comical Large Ham who revels in his own campiness. None of this stops the Toymaker from being one of the Doctor's most dangerous opponents; he's a Physical God who's able to beat the Doctor's most dangerous opponents with ease, and the Doctor is terrified of him.
• Blue-and-Orange Morality: In his own words: "Your good and your bad are nothing to me. All that exists is to win, or to lose." It’s worth noting that he does seem to have a grasp on mortal morality when he snarks at the Doctor brushing off the fates of his companions, he just doesn’t believe it himself.
• Break Them by Talking: Harris's Toymaker is disturbingly good at getting under the Doctor's skin, despite his over-the-top antics and silly mannerisms, by simply putting on a puppet show harkening back to some of the Doctor's greatest hits.
  The Toymaker: The show is just beginning. Worldwide premiere! Donna Noble, this is for you. Let me tell you what happened. When the Doctor, he was leaving you.
  (Brings out a puppet of Amy Pond)
  The Toymaker: He met eine friend called Amy Pond. Und he loved Amy Pond. Yes, he be liking the redheads. Und they went to and fro in time und space, but... Amy Pond was touched by der Weeping Angel, und she died!
  The Doctor: ...She died of old age.
  The Toymaker: WELL, THAT'S ALRIGHT THEN!
  (Brings out a puppet of Clara Oswald)
  The Toymaker: Und then he was meeting Clara. Ooh! But she was killed, by a bird!
  The Doctor: She still survives in her last second of life.
  The Toymaker: WELL, THAT'S ALRIGHT THEN!
  (Brings out a puppet of Bill Potts)
  The Toymaker: But then the Doctor met Bill. Not Stooky Bill, but laaaady Bill. But she was killed by the Cybermen!
  The Doctor: But her consciousness survives.
  The Toymaker: OH, WELL, THAT'S ALRIGHT THEN!
  (Brings out a bunch of planets on strings)
  The Toymaker: Und then there came the Flux. Ohhhh, Donna Noble! The poor Doctor... (Snips a planet) The Flux... (And again) ...was killing everything! (And three more)
  Donna: ...Is all of this true?
  The Doctor: I challenge you to a game.
• Breakout Villain: Despite only appearing in one story in the main series for over a half-century, he became a prominent recurring villain in EU material, and would eventually be made the Big Bad to the 60th anniversary specials.
• The Bus Came Back: The Toymaker made his return to televised Who a whopping fifty-seven years after his debut.
• Characterization Marches On: The revival phased out his Yellow Peril elements due to the racism of the archetype and makes it a character trait that the Toymaker adopts caricaturist elements of different human nationalities and cultures.
• Cold Ham: Gough's Toymaker is quite theatrical, but he always remains poised and composed even as he boasts and threatens.
• Connected All Along: In Past Doctor Adventures novel Divided Loyalties, he's part of the same...group? Species? Entity?...as the Black and White Guardians, his true identity being the Crystal Guardian, personification of games and illusion.
• Corrupted Character Copy: A bit of an inverse, since the character predates the other. While like Q he plays with the characters (sometimes quite lethally), indeed the Toymaker dance scene is comparable to some of the most dramatic Q displays, the difference is Q actually shows that he cares on some level about Humanity's plight (or at least Picard) with his tests having something to do with human philosophies. The Toymaker, however, has nothing resembling morals except the ethic not to cheat and doesn't even interact with humans except to use them like, well, toys. 'Fun' toys at that. Notably during the musical number in "The Giggle" he doesn't actually STAY in the scene like Q would, he just passes through after violently shaking their reality like it was a snow globe and kills people (or worse) without a second thought. It's like if Q was ACTUALLY completely amoral, and only did things for sheer sadistic pleasure.
• The Dreaded: The Toymaker is notable for being one of the few enemies the Doctor is genuinely terrified of. Considering he took out the Master, the White and Black Guardians, it's more than justified.
• Even Evil Has Standards:
  • The Toymaker may be a Psychopathic Manchild who sees the universe as his plaything, but he never cheats, looking sincerely affronted when Donna insists he will. That said, he's not totally aboveboard in this regard, throwing the first ball in his climactic game of catch with the Doctor midway through explaining the rules, taking him by surprise and leaving him barely able to catch it in time.
  • He expressed mocking disgust at the Doctor's deflection of the fates thaf Amy, Clara and Bill were subjected to, taunting him by putting on a macabre puppet show for the Doctor and Donna. This wasn't strictly any actual moral outrage on the Toymaker's part and more him trying to push the Doctor's buttons, fully succeeding when he brought up the Flux.
• Evil Counterpart:
  • When the 60th Anniversary Special "The Giggle" overhauled the Toymaker's character to bring him into the 21st Century, it made the Toymaker into this for the Doctor by characterising him as an eccentric face-changing godlike entity who has developed a twisted interest in Humanity and its creativity, travels around using a wooden door which can also take on many forms and leads into a space much bigger than it appears on the outside, and has explored the furthest corners of Time and Space in search of enjoyment and the ultimate games.
  • Interestingly enough, this might have been the intention for the Toymaker from the very beginning, with the writers reportedly originally intending to make him be another member of the Doctor's then unknown race, same as with the Meddling Monk. It was simply never made explicit within the text of his original appearance and as more details about the Doctor's people became known it became more and more difficult to reconcile the Toymaker's unique abilities with the established capabilities of the Time Lords.
• Evil Is Hammy: He is consistently portrayed as quite the larger than life figure, although both portrayals differ as to this. Gough's Toymaker is a composed and poised Cold Ham who rarely raises his voice, where Harris is a flamboyant, energetic Large Ham.
• Eviler than Thou: In "The Giggle", he states the Master played his game to escape death, lost, and was imprisoned in the Toymaker's gold tooth as punishment. He also claims to have defeated the Black Guardian. However, apparently an unknown villain called "The One Who Waits" is even stronger than him, and he's openly too scared to play against him.
• Expy: In a rather fun case of something coming full-circle, the original portrayal of the Celestial Toymaker as played by Michael Gough was cited as a major inspiration for Q, and in turn, Neil Patrick Harris's portrayal took quite a few of Q's cues, most notably his hamminess, childish antics, and god-like power cranked up to eleven. The "Spice Up Your Life" sequence was even compared to something Q would do.
• Fair-Play Villain: The one limit on his power — he must abide by the rules of any game he plays, even if he made them up (although he can certainly use dirty tactics as long as they're not explicitly against the rules). He seems outright offended when Donna accuses him of planning to cheat. Be very, very careful, though, because he may have his own idea of what the rules are, as Fourteen discovers when invoking "best of three".
• Faux Affably Evil: In the revival, he's quite polite and disarmingly flamboyant, but he's also deeply sadistic and takes a certain pleasure in hurting people as part of his games.
• A Form You Are Comfortable With: Implied this in "The Giggle"; his Shut Up, Kirk! moment has him assert that his form is only a front, "concealing a vastness that will never cease".
• The GM Is a Cheating Bastard: Downplayed, somewhat. He actually does abide by a certain set of rules, though that's not to say that going through his games is a pleasant experience.
• A God Am I: Has multiple speeches to this regard in "The Giggle."
• Heads I Win, Tails You Lose: Suicidal Cosmic Temper Tantrum if he loses; And I Must Scream if he wins (though that's only in his own realm; if he loses in our universe, there are no immediate consequences for the victor, but he does threaten that his legions will come).
• Humanoid Abomination: He looks human (or close enough), but he has godlike powers over reality and is bound solely by the rules of his games. The Expanded Universe has associated him with the Great Old Ones of the Cthulhu Mythos; the TV series says his "toy room" is a hollow beneath the Under-Universe.
• Humanity Is Infectious: In a twisted parallel to the Doctor, the Toymaker has become a fan of humanity since being let back into our reality. He's absolutely fascinated and delighted by how humans have turned everything into a game, from sporting events to gambling and even Tetris. It's all so amusing to him and he has come to regard Earth as his ultimate playground. Of course, being a fan of humanity doesn't mean he isn't above driving the entire planetary population insane with his Hate Plague for shits and giggles (as, after all, there will be winners and losers from such a global brawl).
• Hydra Problem: After a mortally wounded Fourteen bigenerates the Fifteenth Doctor, the Toymaker gleefully decides to keep killing Doctors until he has a whole field of Doctors to play with.
• Intrigued by Humanity: He's fascinated by the games humanity can create and even more thrilled by their potential for cruelty.
• It Amused Me: Everything he does is just because he's bored.
• Large Ham: Harris's Toymaker is gleefully flamboyant and hammy. While Gough's Toymaker was always composed and dignified, Harris's revels in his own campiness.
• Laughably Evil: As played by Neil Patrick Harris, he's a campy loon who puts on over-the-top fake accents and dances to and lip-syncs to The Spice Girls while attacking UNIT personnel.
• Leitmotif: His return in "The Giggle" gives him a recurring 7-note Arpeggio, C-E-G-C-G-E-C. It's the sound his Hate Plague takes, it dominates his music, he even laughs in that rhythm.
• More Teeth than the Osmond Family: It's subtle and it's never pointed out within the episode, but in "The Giggle", the Toymaker in some shots sports roughly twice the amount of teeth than could fit inside a human jaw. They are visible whenever he shows off his gold tooth.
• Multiple-Choice Past: We never find out what the Toymaker actually is, only that he's immortal with god-like powers. However, there are some explanations of what he is:
  • Past Doctor Adventures novel Divided Loyalties says that he's one of the six Guardians of Time, like the White and Black Guardians. He's specifically identified as the Crystal Guardian, representing dreams and fantasy. A young Doctor, Master, and others read about him and being young and impulsive decide to seek him out, unaware of his identity and underestimating his power.
  • The Quantum Archangel expands on this by claiming the Guardians - and thus the Toymaker - are the upper echelons among the Great Old Ones (entities such as Nyarlathotep, Hastur, and others from the Cthulhu Mythos).
  • Big Finish audio The Queen of Time says he's the titular character's brother, but reveals no further details.
  • The Fourteenth Doctor states he's a powerful being from a different universe underneath ours where everything is a game, an elemental force of play. He was let into this universe when the Doctor unintentionally played a game at the edge of the universe by convincing the Not-Things to count every grain of salt. In commentary for "The Giggle", Russell T Davies says he's part of a pantheon.
• Non-Linear Character: When the Doctor and Donna confront him in 1925, the Toymaker already knows why they're there and what's going on in 2023, as well as what humans get up to in that time.
• The Nth Doctor: Played by Michael Gough in "The Celestial Toymaker" and Neil Patrick Harris in "The Giggle". The Doctor and the Toymaker recognize each other despite both having changed faces since their previous meeting, and being a Reality Warper Physical God, changing bodies is certainly within the Toymaker's powers.
• Outside-Context Problem: In the most extreme way possible. The Doctor is a hard man of science. Even creatures like The Beast (aka, the Devil), he can ultimately rationalize as an incomprehensibly ancient alien. Even the Carrionites, who are for the lack of a better descriptor witches that use spells, incantations and curses, simply use a different kind of science that he pretty quickly gets the hang of. The Toymaker isn't a being of science, magic, or anything even coming close to logical. He simply thinks things, and they happen. Apart from a few rote rules the Toymaker has to abide by, the Doctor can't even remotely begin to understand or rationalize how he does the things he does, and that alone scares him half to death of the Toymaker. This is justified, since the Toymaker comes from a different form of existence entirely.
• Pet the Dog: Despite snidely referring to Donna and Mel as the Doctor's "handmaidens", he allows them to approach Fourteen and be with him as he regenerates, despite threatening everyone present with the Galvanic Beam just moments prior. The novelisation explains he sees it as a ceremony, a situation with rules of its own, and is amused by Donna and Mel's wish to be at the Doctor's side.
• Physical God: The First Doctor claims that the Toymaker is an immortal and can't be killed. Even if his world is destroyed if he's defeated, he survives and just creates a new one. He also claims to have gambled with God and won, though this cannot be fully confirmed.
• Politically Incorrect Villain: He checks off quite a few boxes here. He's unapologetically racist, sexist, and at the very least transphobic. Whether or not he genuinely possesses these views or is merely playing the role as part of the 'Game of the 21st Century', however, is more ambiguous
• Pop-Cultured Badass: Despite being a Humanoid Abomination who warps reality at a whim, he's a fan of The Spice Girls and knows their lyrics by heart.
• Psychopathic Manchild: He uses his powers to turn people into living dolls and make them play his twisted games, out of sheer boredom. When he's defeated in "The Giggle", he petulantly complains and accuses the Doctors of cheating somehow.
• Reality Warper: Can seemingly do basically anything he wants as long as he can frame it as part of a game. The Doctor states it isn't mentally manipulating atoms, but something more alien.
• Reimagining the Artifact: He was a straight example of Yellow Peril in space in his first appearance. For his return in 2023, this is played more as the affectations of a racist.
• Serious Business: Games are the only thing that matter to him, and despite his Reality Warper abilities, he has to play them fair, Sore Loser or not. If it wasn’t for this, he’d be practically unstoppable.
• Sore Loser: If he loses a game in his own world, it's destroyed. He makes sure that whoever beat him dies with it. He is also not very happy about losing the game of catch at the end of "The Giggle".
• Suspiciously Similar Substitute: Neil Patrick Harris' Toymaker is one to John Simm's Master. Both were enemies of an incarnation of the Doctor played by David Tennant as well as Evil Counterparts to the Doctor in general, both treated their conflicts with the Doctor like one big game and both were psychopathic manchildren who loved making big entrances, changing tones unexpectedly, lip-syncing British pop songs, and transforming everyone in the world as part of their plans.
• Took a Level in Jerkass: Harris' Toymaker is much more openly unpleasant and malicious than Gough's, along with showing some nastily bigoted sentiments.
• Tranquil Fury: Despite Neil Patrick Harris playing him as a bombastic Large Ham for most of "The Giggle", the moment the Doctor essentially calls him out as petty and wasting his powers, he delivers his whole Above Good and Evil speech in a poisonous tone, his rage being very obvious in how the Toymaker literally bristles at the choice of words and his whole form is seen wavering slightly as in a heat shimmer, but he never rises his tone from that quietly furious tone despite being clear that this is him at his angriest. It's deeply unnerving.
• Villain Respect: In "The Giggle", he admits that he has developed a fondness for humanity, even if he doesn't have a great view of their character, citing an amazement for their capacity for games.
  Toymaker: You make games out of bricks falling upon other bricks. You are exceptional.
• Villainous Gold Tooth: After beating the Master in a game, he turned him into a gold tooth in his own mouth. After he's beaten in turn, the gold tooth is one of the things left behind (escaping things like this is what the Master does, after all).
• We Will Meet Again:
  • In his first televised appearance, the First Doctor mentions that the Toymaker is immortal, and that he fully expects to run into him again. This would eventually come to pass in "The Giggle", which as noted elsewhere on this entry is fifty-seven years and over fourteen regenerations from when the Doctor said this.
  • The Expanded Universe featured several other return matches before "The Giggle", though they're ignored for the purposes of the story.
• Who Wants to Live Forever?: He's driven to his villainy by the sheer boredom of immortality. He doesn't even mind the Doctor destroying his realm because at least rebuilding it will mean he has something to do.
• Wicked Toymaker: The name isn't just for show. If you lose his games, you become his toy, and beyond that he uses toys to populate his games, to serve as his minions, or as a medium for his Hate Plague.
• A Wizard Did It: Jacqueline Rayner's short story "Trick Or Treat" has him trying to convince the Doctor that he was trapped in the Toyroom for the last few centuries with all his adventures being faked by the Toymaker. He says his reality filters failing explains various Special Effects Failures like plastic Daleks, wobbly dinosaurs, the giant plush rat and the time tunnel decorated with Christmas tinsel. The Daleks' repeated appearances were due to the Toymaker reusing his favourite enemy when he's run out of ideas. This all turns out to be a lie though.
• World Limited to the Plot: "The Celestial Toymaker" takes place in his own personal dimension, his "toy room". Most subsequent stories have him getting involved with the main universe.
• Worthy Opponent: Considers the First Doctor one due to his brain power. It's why he wants to keep him around as his perpetual opponent.
• Yellowface: Borderline example, in that Michael Gough dressed as a mandarin and adopted the title of "Celestial" (a word that the English associated with Chinese culture) but did not adopt a Chinese-sounding accent or wear makeup. In the Fourteenth Doctor specials, he no longer wears this for obvious reasons, being reimagined as adopting caricatures of human nationalities and cultures. Official publicity also dropped the "Celestial" from his title, referring to him simply as "the Toymaker".

Second Doctor era debut

The Great Intelligence

The Great Intelligence (Second and Eleventh Doctors)

Played by: Wolfe Morris (as Padmasambhava) (1967); Jack Woolgar (as Staff Sgt. Arnold) and Jack Watling (as Prof. Travers) (1968); Sir Ian McKellen (2012); Richard E. Grant (as Walter Simeon) (2012–2013)

"Now the dream outlives the dreamer and can never die. Once I was the puppet... Now I pull the strings!"

The Great Intelligence, which usually referred to itself simply as the Intelligence, was a disembodied sentience who attempted to find a body and physical existence. It first (from its own perspective) encountered the Eleventh Doctor, followed by the Second, and it got quite complicated from there.

---

• Aborted Arc: "The Web of Fear" strongly implies that there will soon be a third encounter with the Intelligence. In fact, such a story was being worked on under the working title of "The Laird of McCrimmon" (as the name suggests, it would also have been Jamie's farewell story). This was abandoned following Mervyn Haisman and Henry Lincoln falling out with The BBC over the abridgement of "The Dominators", and a dispute over the ownership of the IP relating to the Quarks. Nonetheless, the arc was un-aborted decades later in stories with the Eleventh Doctor.
• And I Must Scream: Padmasambhava is fully conscious while the Intelligence spends hundreds of years using his body to carry out its plans.
• Arch-Enemy:
  • To Clara Oswald, who spends most of her reincarnated lives stopping the damage that it did to the web of time.
  • The fact that the Great Intelligence has attacked the Doctor at essentially all points in his lifetime means that it is the third contender for the Doctor's archenemy, alongside The Master and Davros.
• Bad Boss: Eats the hired hands who obtain samples for it in "The Snowmen", and mindwipes its minions in "The Bells of Saint John" once the Doctor ruins its plans.
• Big Bad: For "The Abominable Snowmen" and "The Web of Fear" of the original series. It returns as this for Series 7 of the revival, which showcases the Intelligence's first and last encounters (from its point of view) with the Doctor.
• Body Surf: One of its goals is to obtain a suitable physical body for itself.
• Brain Food: Feeds on human minds.
• The Bus Came Back: Became the main antagonist of Series 7 after disappearing from the show for 44 years.
• The Chessmaster: It can play the role of a puppetmaster and manipulate countless humans to carry out its endeavours. It is responsible for a large amount of the events in Series 7. As of "The Name of the Doctor", technically it was partially responsible for everything that ever went wrong for the Doctor.
• Complete Immortality: The Intelligence has no physical form that can degrade or be destroyed. This has allowed it to survive despite losing multiple "receptacles" since the 1800s. Scattering itself across the Doctor's personal timeline, though, is implied to have finally killed it, unless it truly is the consciousness of Yog-Sothoth, in which case it's likely that it simply was reabsorbed into its original body, which exists across the fabric of time and space.
• The Corrupter: In Series 7, the Great Intelligence is shown to seek out humans to corrupt and use as pawns for its own schemes, before disposing of them when their usefulness runs out.
• Create Your Own Hero: The Great Intelligence throwing itself into the Doctor's timeline to undo all his victories is what led to Clara Oswald throwing herself into the time stream after it, creating all the echoes of her including the Victorian Clara who helped the Doctor against the Great Intelligence's plot in "The Snowman" and who inspired the Doctor to take on the original modern-day Clara as his companion, which is what led to that Clara being in the position to foil the Great Intelligence's plan in the season finale and... yeah...
• Death Seeker: In its final appearance, the Great Intelligence has grown weary of eternal life, and is quite pleased to have found a way to end it. That it can take a cruel revenge on the Doctor in the bargain just makes it all the more irresistible.
• Disproportionate Retribution: Prior to its appearance as the arc villain of Series 7B, the Great Intelligence was a formidable recurring but not omnipresent threat to the Doctor; certainly not on the same level of personal enmity as the Master, Daleks or Cybermen. Even during its grand comeback in the revived series, the Doctor only foils two of its plans (that we know of). The Great Intelligence's response? Break into the Doctor's entire timestream and replace all of its victories with defeats, an action that would cripple the entire timeline and certainly destroy the Intelligence in the process.
• Eldritch Abomination: In "The Abominable Snowmen", it was introduced as a monster that existed outside time and space that possessed Padmasambhava through Astral Projection for 300 years. The Expanded Universe even suggests it is the disembodied conscience of Yog-Sothoth.
• Everything's Deader with Zombies: What it did to Staff Sgt. Arnold, and Edward Travers.
• Evil Counterpart: Moffat's reinvention of the Great Intelligence is a dark mirror of the Doctor, taking young "companions" it manipulates and feeds on for its own ends.
• Evil Genius: It's the Great Intelligence, so of course it's very cunning and manipulative.
• Evil Is Hammy: In "The Snowmen", Ian McKellen's portrayal sees the Great Intelligence pile on a bit of ham, although afterwards, Richard E. Grant sticks to a cold-blooded, Soft-Spoken Sadist performance.
• Evil Is Petty: To take revenge on the Doctor for his interference in its plans, the Great Intelligence tries to avert every single one of the Doctor's victories throughout his life, not caring in the least that it's destroying itself in the process, or that doing so will mean the end of time and reality themselves.
• Evil Has Good Taste: Likes wearing Victorian-era dress suits. Its minions in "The Bells of Saint John" and "The Name of the Doctor" also dress in nice suits.
• Evil Sounds Deep: Ian McKellen's portrayal has a deep, booming voice.
• Faux Affably Evil: The very image of a polite Victorian gentleman. Doesn't stop it from eating human minds and treating its minions like dirt.
• Forgotten First Meeting: The Doctor's first two encounters (from his point of view) with the Great Intelligence were while he was the Second Doctor. By the time of "The Snowman" however, the Eleventh Doctor appears to only vaguely recall either of his previous encounters with the Great Intelligence.
• Have We Met Yet?: The Great Intelligence meets the Eleventh Doctor, the Second Doctor (twice) and... well, then things get really, really complicated as it is ripped into a million pieces across the Doctor's entire timeline.
• Hell-Bent for Leather: Wears very stylish leather gloves, and makes a point of grabbing the Doctor's face with them.
• Hypocrite: Claims in "The Web of Fear" to be above revenge, yet by the time of "The Name of the Doctor" the Doctor's repeated victories over the Intelligence have gotten under its skin to the point where it was willing to destroy the entire universe'' just to spite him.
• I Am Legion: Often refers to itself in the plural.
• Internal Homage: To the Expanded Universe novel Unnatural History, in which the Doctor’s lifeline becomes a scar woven through space and time, which the villain — dressed as a Victorian undertaker — is going to attempt to use to rewrite his life, until the Doctor’s companion (who he’s met before in a different version) saves the day by leaping into it at the cost of her own existence.
• Interim Villain: The Great Intelligence was the Big Bad for Series 7, the only season of the Eleventh Doctor's tenure without the Silence (who technically return in the "The Time of the Doctor" special that aired after.
• It Can Think: It began as a flock of telepathic snow simply reflecting a young Walter Simeon subconscious back at it, but over time it absorbed enough of Dr. Simeon's disturbed thoughts that it became fully sentient and able to existing independently of Simeon.
• It's All About Me: The (self-described) Great Intelligence devours human minds, uses people up and tosses them aside, and shamelessly kills innocent people for the sake of its own selfish goals. It's even fine with reversing all of the Doctor's victories, endangering all of time and space, to end his own life (because it's tired of it) and to avenge itself upon the Doctor.
• Living Dream: "The Snowmen" suggests the Intelligence is the "darkest dreams" of a lonely, hateful man come to life. Dr. Simeon had his subconscious mind mirrored by alien snow which is implied in the Expanded Universe to be Yog-Sothoth. The Great Intelligence is later forced to separate from Dr. Simeon and possess Yog-Sothoth/the alien snow due to Dr. Simeon having his memories erased, and is later stripped even of Yog-Sothoth when the tears of an entire family take over the Outer God converting it into tears, thus leaving Dr. Simeon's subconscious mind as a being of pure intelligence.
• Maker of Monsters: Has a habit of creating monster minions to carry out its will, such as the mechanical yetis in "The Abominable Snowmen", the monstrous snowmen in "The Snowmen" and the Whisper Men in "The Name of the Doctor".
• The Man Behind the Monsters: In "The Name of the Doctor", whichever Whispermen the Intelligence is using as its main body takes on the fully human appearance of Dr. Simeon, in contrast to the others which are lacking in facial features apart from teeth.
• Mecha-Mooks:
  • Its Yeti are actually robots, as it realized snowmen weren't going to cut it.
  • Later the walking wi-fi base station "Spoonheads", robots that camouflage themselves to look human.
• Mind Control: Many of its plots involve brainwashing humans to do its bidding.
• More than Mind Control: Dr. Simeon and Ms. Kizlet were fully aware of the Intelligence's influence on them, and yet wished to do its bidding anyway.
• Narcissist: The Great Intelligence.
• Near-Villain Victory: It would have erased the Doctor from history and destroyed the universe had Clara not entered the time stream after it.
• Not Brainwashed: It's revealed that the mind exuding from the alien snow speaking to Dr. Simeon throughout his life wasn't the alien's own mind, but the mirroring of Dr. Simeon's subconscious mind, thus meaning he was doing his own childish bidding; and when his memories were being erased, the Great Intelligence/Dr. Simeon transferred to the Eldritch Abomination that was taking the shape of snow, only to be kicked out of said alien Eldritch Abomination by a grieving family on Christmas Eve.
• Omnicidal Maniac: The Great Intelligence's ultimate plan in Series 7 is to enter the Doctor's time stream and undo every victory he achieved, destroying the universe as a side effect.
• Origins Episode: "The Snowmen" explains how the Intelligence first came to Earth, adding to its debut earlier in "The Abominable Snowmen".
• People Puppets: Many of the humans its machines brainwash don't remember anything they did while under its control.
• Perpetual Frowner: The only time we see its "Simeon" form so much as smirk is right after it proves its point about not having a body.
• Pet the Dog: Subverted. The Great Intelligence takes the time to say goodbye to Ms Kizlet before wiping her memories, rather than doing it there and then, but given that it's still erasing her entire life, this can hardly be called an act of compassion.
• Psychopathic Manchild: The Intelligence is a reflection of Simeon's subconscious thoughts. All the loneliness and resentment of an isolated little boy, which he poured into his only friend: a Snowman.
• Rule of Two: It being a bodiless intelligence means it usually acts through henchmen who do have physical bodies, with at least one often taking the role of The Dragon.
• "Shaggy Dog" Story: It sacrifice itself to spite the Doctor by turning every victory he's had into a defeat, only for the Intelligence's victory to be immediately undone when Clara enters the Doctor's time stream after it and reverts all its actions.
• Soft-Spoken Sadist: After taking Simeon's appearance, the Great Intelligence never so much as raises its voice, always speaking in a low, chilling tone that displays its immense cruelty.
• Sore Loser: Wants to undo all the good the Doctor has ever done (which would undoubtedly wreck the timeline) just to get back at the Doctor for being constantly beaten.
• Taking You with Me: What its plan in "The Name of the Doctor" essentially amounts to. The Intelligence plots to throw itself into a dimensional tear in the Doctor's tomb on Trenzalore and sabotage the Time Lord's every established victory throughout the timestream into a defeat. Although aware that this action would certainly destroy every trace of itself as well, the Intelligence sees it as a worthy sacrifice.
• Unknown Rival: The Great Intelligence is very much a backseat schemer, manipulating events from the shadows and rarely making its presence known (usually because it has no physical body to interact with). The Doctor has probably thwarted the Intelligence more times than he knows. As a result, the Intelligence has a burning hatred for the Doctor whereas the same cannot be said in reverse. In fact, the Doctor barely even remembers the Intelligence when it officially returns in "The Snowmen".
• Unseen Evil: It being a bodiless intelligence means it doesn't even have a true form apart from whoever it's possessing. Although in the revival series its capable of assuming a quasi-physical form on its own, usually taking on Dr. Simeon's appearance.
• Who Wants to Live Forever?: Part of its motivation for breaking into the Doctor's tomb in "The Name of the Doctor" is a desire to find a way to end its eternal life.

Time Lords

They have their own page.

Third Doctor era debut

Nestene Consciousness

Nestene Consciousness (Third and Ninth Doctors)

Voiced by: Nicholas Briggs (2005)

Rose: And this living plastic, what's it got against us?
Ninth Doctor: Nothing, it loves you. You've got such a good planet! Lots of smoke and oil, plenty of toxins and dioxins in the air, perfect. Just what the Nestene Consciousness needs.

The actual mind behind the Autons. After a couple of stabs at invading Earth in the Third Doctor's era, they returned in 2005 out of sheer desperation, having lost their "protein planets" in a mysterious war.

---

• Ancient Astronauts:
  • The BBV movies say that they buried Nestenes on Earth's ley line sites thousands of years ago.
  • The Novelization to "City of Death" says that they had to abandon an invasion on Earth because plastic wouldn't be invented for thousands of years.
• Anti-Villain: To a degree, it comes across as this in "Rose". After losing its planets during the Time War, which the Doctor claims he's partially responsible for failing to prevent, it plans to cannibalise Earth out of desperation to rebuild its race, rather than wanting to do so out of malevolence.
• Barrier Warrior: The BBV movie Auton 3: Awakening has a Nestene-possessed human able to create energy barriers.
• Combat Tentacles: They nearly throttle the Doctor in "Spearhead from Space".
• Drop Pod: When invading, small portions of Nestene are dropped on a planet inside hollow meteors called Energy Units.
• Eldritch Abomination: According to the expanded universe, the Nestene Consciousness is the offspring of Shub-Niggurath, an actual Lovecraftian creation.
• Elemental Baggage: The Novelization to "City of Death" mentions that it had to abandon an invasion because it landed on Earth thousands of years before plastic was invented.
• The End... Or Is It?: For a sequel chapter that Russell T Davies wrote for the Lockdown Watchthrough of "Rose" celebrating its 15th anniversary, part of the Nestene escapes its destruction and merges with someone in Westminster. It is implied that this person is Boris Johnson, the current Prime Minister at the time of the story's writing.
• Energy Beings: Some episodes have it being an energy being when it's not made from plastic.
• Genius Loci: The Nestene is completely infused with its home planet Polymos.
• Hive Mind: Controlling the Autons.
• Imported Alien Phlebotinum: The Novelization to "City of Death" says that Scarroth's Latex Perfection mask was made from technology that the NC left on Earth during a failed invasion.
• Kryptonite Factor: The Ninth and Tenth Doctors defeat him with vials of blue liquid called Anti-Plastic. The earlier Plastic Millennium comic has the Seventh Doctor and Mel defeat it with a similar unnamed substance.
• Octopoid Aliens: The Novelization to "Spearhead from Space" says they originally were cephalopods before becoming Energy Beings.
• Single Substance Manipulation: It can control plastic.
• Starfish Aliens: Whenever it (they?) takes a physical form, it's a decidedly weird one. Sometimes it's a space-squid, sometimes it's just a vat of talking molten plastic.
• Suspiciously Similar Substitute: To the Great Intelligence. It possesses plastic instead of people or robot yeti.
• Teleportation: The BBV movie Auton 3: Awakening has a Nestene-possessed human able to teleport.
• Vestigial Empire: The Pandoric's Box short story says the Nestenes had a massive space empire that Rassilon wiped out with a Galaxy Eater. He knew that they weren't completely gone but would also never be as powerful as they were.
• A Wizard Did It: The Novelization to "Rose" says that the Time War altered its history so that it was always made from plastic.

Kronos the Chronovore

Kronos the Chronovore (Third Doctor)

A being capable of devouring time. Responsible for the destruction of Atlantis on Earth. Expanded Universe materials maintain that Chronovores exist in the same realm as the Eternals, but that the Eternals consider themselves superior.

Fourth Doctor era debut

Sutekh

Sutekh (Fourth Doctor)

Played by: Gabriel Woolf (1975)

Fourth Doctor: You use your powers for evil.
Sutekh: Evil? Your evil is my good. I am Sutekh the Destroyer. Where I tread, I leave nothing but dust and darkness. I find that good!

Sutekh is the last of the Osirians, a powerful race from Phaester Osiris. Sutekh destroyed his planet and left a trail of destruction across the galaxy. In Egypt 7000 years ago he was imprisoned by the remaining 740 Osirians led by Horus beneath a pyramid, paralysed by a power source from Mars. When archaeologist Marcus Scarman entered his tomb in 1911, Sutekh took control of him, planning to destroy the power source. However, when he was finally escaping his prison the Doctor sent the entrance far into the future, ageing Sutekh to death. Sutekh appeared in "Pyramids of Mars". He also shows up in the Faction Paradox series, though he also appears in the Bernice Summerfield series by Big Finish, both with their own rather exclusive conclusions to him.

---

• Always Someone Better: He's so powerful that if he gets loose, not even the full power of the Time Lords will be able to stop him. It took the combined efforts of seven hundred and forty one of his fellow Phaester Osirians to imprison him the first time — Sutekh is that powerful.
• Ancient Astronauts: The Osirians inspired Egyptian Culture.
• And I Must Scream: Was physically immobile the whole time trapped in a pyramid. The most he could do was tilt his head slightly. However, thanks to his vast psionic abilities, he could directly influence events from beyond his prison walls.
• Bad Is Good and Good Is Bad: How he sees things.
• Been There, Shaped History: Sutekh's battle with Horus and the last of the Osirians inspired Egyptian mythology.
• Big "NO!": He lets one of these rip before his death.
• Card-Carrying Villain: "Your evil is my good. I am Sutekh the Destroyer. Where I tread I leave nothing but dust and darkness. I find that good."
• Cold-Blooded Torture: Sutekh's bread and butter. He uses his mental powers to inflict excruciating agony on the Doctor while interrogating him about his home planet.
• Cold Ham: He manages to out-ham Tom Baker without ever raising his voice above a malevolent whisper.
• Evil Cannot Comprehend Good: If Sutekh's last stab at bargaining with the Doctor is any indication — he offers to spare the planet Earth (just Earth) and give it to him as "a plaything".
• Evil Sounds Deep: Sutekh's voice is deep and booming, as befits any self-respecting would-be god and Omnicidal Maniac.
• Genocide from the Inside: Long ago, he destroyed his own planet, wiping out virtually all other members of his species.
• Glowing Eyes of Doom: His eyes glow a bright green whenever he uses his powers to Mind Rape the Doctor.
• Humanoid Abomination: At the time, the Doctor describes him as the worst threat he has ever faced, the greatest time of peril in the history of the Earth, and given his awakening would have rendered the planet a barren wasteland before he spread across the universe to kill everything, his concern was very much justified.
• Invisible Means Undodgeable: His magic.
• Kneel Before Zod: If you refuse, he'll just psychically torture you into obeying.
• Knight of Cerebus: He's bad enough to make the Fourth Doctor scared.
• Last of His Kind: Destroyed his home planet, and the remaining 740 survivors have by now died.
• Mind over Matter: He uses telekinesis throughout the story to counter his own paralysis; at one point, he even uses his mind to contain the blast from a gelignite explosive. Doubly impressive considering the explosion is occurring in England and Sutekh's pyramid is in Egypt!
• Mistaken for Gods: The Osirians became the Gods of Ancient Egypt.
• Near-Villain Victory: He comes scarily close to winning thanks to his minions' efforts, but luckily the Doctor travels back to the mansion just in time to trap him within his own time corridor.
• Nepharious Pharaoh: He's a Sufficiently Advanced Alien with an Egyptian theme and Mooks disguised as Mummies.
• Omnicidal Maniac: Sutekh the Destroyer was a Sufficiently Advanced Alien with these tendencies to preclude the possibility that something that could challenge him might evolve.
  Sutekh: The alien who dares to intrude, the humans, animals, birds, fish, reptiles... all life is my enemy. All life shall perish under the reign of Sutekh the Destroyer!
• People Puppets: He can brainwash his servants so thoroughly that their original personalities are all but dead the moment he enters their minds. The usually compassionate Doctor roundly dismisses any notion that a possessed servant of Sutekh can ever be returned to normal.
• Person of Mass Destruction: When unencumbered, he's powerful enough that he could wipe out the entire universe. The Doctor realizes he has to be prevented from escaping at all costs, because if he ever gets free, there's probably nothing capable of stopping him from eradicating everything but himself.
• Physical God: Incredible mental powers, telekinesis even when paralysed, and it is shown if he escaped he would be capable of destroying entire worlds. Not even the Time Lords could stop him.
• Really 700 Years Old: Really 7000 Years Old.
• Sealed Evil in a Can: Imprisoned in a pyramid in Egypt.
• The Social Darwinist: Despite already being one of the most powerful beings in the Universe he takes this to extremes, he wants to destroy all life to prevent something that could kill him evolving.
• Soft-Spoken Sadist: Starts off as this. Frankly, it's a relief when he breaks out the ham.
• Tranquil Fury: After the Doctor and Sarah Jane destroy his pyramid-rocket, he is beyond furious but doesn't vocalise it. He creepily and effectively whispers every word, even when torturing the Doctor. Until he's freed, when predictable characterization developments occur.
• We Can Rule Together: Offers an alliance with the Doctor not once but twice. The Doctor of course refuses.
• What Is Evil?: Folder quote for Sutekh. He finds spreading destruction to be "good".

Black Guardian

Black Guardian (Fourth and Fifth Doctors)

Played by: Valentine Dyall (1979, 1983)

The Black Guardian was an anthropomorphic personification of forces opposed to the powers of light, as embodied by the White Guardian. According to the Expanded Universe, he was, together with the White Guardian and four others, part of the Six-Fold God known as the Guardians of Time.

---

• Anthropomorphic Personification: Represents chaos and evil.
• The Anti-God: He serves as an Evil Counterpart to the White Guardian.
• Arc Villain: For two different Story Arcs: The Key to Time and the Black Guardian trilogy.
• Big Bad: Of both the Guardian arcs.
• Bus Crash: He probably isn't exactly dead, but the Toymaker states in "The Giggle" that he turned the Black Guardian and his white counterpart into voodoo dolls.
• Card-Carrying Villain: The Shadow admits that both he and the Black Guardian have no desire for political power, they just love watching stuff getting blown up and people killed.
• Creepy Crows: Yeah, that's right. There's a crow on his head. Wanna make something of it?
• Deal with the Devil: Partly how the Black Guardian gets mortals to do things for him.
• Evil Is Hammy: And it has No Indoor Voice.
• Evil Sounds Deep: Valentine Dyall was well-known for his deep, rich, baritone voice.
• God of Evil: He represents chaos and darkness in the Doctor Who universe.
• God's Hands Are Tied: Can't be seen to intervene directly.
• Manipulative Bastard: He's bound by rules that prevent him from acting directly, so he tricks unwitting pawns like Turlough and Captain Wrack to do his dirty work for him.
• No Indoor Voice: He apparently doesn't think making your mole conspicuous might in any way get in the way of success.
• Noodle Incident: He was apparently defeated and imprisoned by the Toymaker at some point, along with the White Guardian.
• Order Versus Chaos: He takes the side of chaos in an endless, cosmic chess match versus the White Guardian.

Great Vampires

King Vampire (Fourth Doctor)

Huge space vampires hailing from another dimension and manifesting themselves in multiple forms based on what species or individual were perceiving them, they were accidently unleashed into "our" universe where they soon clashed with the early Time Lords in a conflict that would later became known as the Eternal War. Unbeknownst to everyone except themselves and possibly also the Time Lords, they were actually emanations and avatars of a force of destruction known as the Yssgaroth.

---

• No Immortal Inertia: When the Great Vampire is destroyed, the Three Who Rule's thousand years of unlife suddenly catches up with them.
• Our Vampires Are Different: They were gargantuan winged creatures that could survive in space, feasted on planets and could only be killed by having their hearts destroyed. They were so massive that the early Time Lords that fought them had to invent a new type of ship specifically for hunting them. The only way the Doctor managed to best the one he encountered was by stabbing it with a rocket ship.
• Viral Transformation: They reproduced like this.

Fifth Doctor era debut

Eternals

Eternals (Fifth and Seventh Doctors)

Played by: Lynda Baron (Captain Wrack), Lee John (Mansell) Keith Barron (Captain Striker), Christopher Brown (Marriner) (1983)

The Eternals were beings of immense power but limited creativity. They used the thoughts and emotions of so-called Ephemerals (their word for mortals) for their own ends.

---

• Always Someone Better: They are this to the Time Lords. The Time Lords considered themselves to be the mightiest, most advanced race in the cosmos, but even their powers were paltry compared to the Eternals', who view Gallifreyans' attempts to master Time a mere curiosity compared to their complete dominion over Eternity.
  • However, they are a little below the White and Black Guardians in the universe's Super Weight scale as the Guardians can offer them powers and desires that even they cannot grant themselves.
• Blue-and-Orange Morality: The Eternals shown in "Enlightenment", like Striker and Marriner, simply do not understand human/Time Lord morality. Wrack is a bit more of a clear-cut villain, but still has shades of this.
• Complete Immortality: The Eternals dwell in the domain of Eternity, rather than the smaller one of Time. This means they are unaffected by Time and thus unaging. Another factor is that Eternals cannot be destroyed, only transferred back to Eternity. However, in the Doctor Who Magazine comic Uninvited Guest, the Seventh Doctor might have found a loophole.
• Creative Sterility: The Eternals exist in a perpetual state of boredom because they lack the imaginative capacities of Ephemerals.
• For the Evulz: As shown in the Doctor Who Magazine story Uninvited Guest, the more sadistic Eternals sometimes pose as gods and doom whole worlds in the process.
• Humanoid Abomination: Exist outside of time and space in eternity, have great Reality Warper powers and they are to Time Lords what Time Lords are to other races.
• Screw This, I'm Out of Here!: Supplemental material states they left reality after the Time War and never came back.
• Sealed Evil in a Can: They were the ones who locked away the Carrionites.
• Telepathy: They could use telepathy and create objects from the memories of Ephemerals, but their powers were not limitless and they could not read minds from great distance or from strong minds (though Adrenaline from the mind they're accessing helps greatly).
• Wacky Racing: The whole plot of their debut serial deals with them ritualistically racing each other in antique-looking sea vessels across our Solar system for Enlightenment.
• Who Wants to Live Forever?: Eternity is boring, so they have to find something to do to occupy their time.

Seventh Doctor era debut

The Gods of Ragnarok

The Gods of Ragnarok (Seventh Doctor)

A trio of statue-like beings who possess phenomenal cosmic power, the "family" manipulate lesser beings into entertaining them in their Dark Circus, allowing them to live as long as they fulfil their craving for amusement.

---

• Action Figure Speech: The three Gods of Ragnarok indicate which of them is talking by raising and lowering their arms.
• Clarke's Third Law: They're an alien species powerful enough to be considered gods.
• Creative Sterility: Similar to the Eternals, the Gods of Ragnarok are supremely unimaginative but constantly demand entertainment from lesser beings. This is instrumental to the Take That, Audience! satire in their debut episode.
• Evil Sounds Deep: All three have deep, booming voices.
• For the Evulz: The Gods of Ragnarok were trapped in a parallel dimension (possibly by the Doctor himself) and take over a circus to force people to perform for them, just to alleviate their boredom. When they lose interest in an act, they kill the performer.
• Humanoid Abomination: Unfathomably powerful Silicon-Based Life.
• Noodle Incident: The Doctor's previous encounter with them.
• Silicon-Based Life: They appear to be made of stone.
• The Stoic: Any kind of emotion at all is rare. Although as the Doctor continues to test their patience with his parlour tricks, they become increasingly agitated and trigger-happy.
• Take That, Audience!: The Gods of Ragnarok can be read as this to the general audience at large. In the circus tent, they're presented as a rather dull family with no imagination of their own who just sit disinterestedly in front of a parade of entertainment moaning about how nothing's ever good enough to interest them no matter how creative it is, and anything they vote down is pretty much wiped out of existence. Could also be a Take That! at the executives or producers of the show (remembering this is in the original run's dying days, with the metaphorical axe hanging over it), never satisfied by entertainers no matter how hard they try to perform.
• Tennis Boss: The Doctor defeats the Gods of Ragnarok by using the mirror amulet to reflect their energy blasts and collapse the roof of their balcony seat on them.
• Who Wants to Live Forever?: Like the Toymaker, they are immortals whose prime motivation is boredom.

Light

Light (Seventh Doctor)

Played by: John Hallam (1989)

An entity of unknown origin who manifests himself in the form of an angel, Light has made it his fanatical duty to travel through time and space, documenting every single species in the universe in his exhaustive "Catalogue of Life". Light detests change; so much so that that the process of evolution turns him completely genocidal.

---

• Archive Panic: In-Universe. Light gets a severe case of this when he tries to catalogue all of Earth's life forms.
• Camp: Just take a look at his appearance, not to mention his Large Ham tendencies.
• A Form You Are Comfortable With: Light is not really an angel, or even humanoid; like an Eternal he's simply "naturalised into" human form.
• Light Is Not Good: Literally. Although Light appears as a heavenly vision of white and gold, his motives are anything but pure, and he soon reveals himself to be insane, murderous and irrational.
• Our Angels Are Different: As in, they're not really angels. It's more of a case of Sufficiently Advanced Aliens (though his exact nature remains a mystery).
• Talking the Monster to Death: Light is infuriated by the fact that the Earth has changed, making the inventory he was working on meaningless. He resolves to destroy the Earth so it will stop changing. The Doctor points out the idiocy of thinking that you can stop change, and that everything in the universe is changing, including Light. Light commits suicide because he considers change a Fate Worse than Death.

Fenric

Fenric (Seventh Doctor)

Played by: Dinsdale Landen (as Dr. Judson) and Tomek Bork (as Captain Sorin) (1989)

An evil entity from the beginning of the Universe that plans to make humans evolve into the Vampiric Haemovores. Defeated, but returns in the 2012 Big Finish audio "Gods and Monsters".

---

• Arch-Enemy: To the Seventh Doctor.
• Arc Welding: Revealed Ace being transported to Iceworld and Lady Peinforte's magic were his doing.
• Bad Future: Trying to force one where humanity evolve into Haemovores. It's not clear whether this has been averted.
• Batman Gambit: Plans for his Wolves to open the flask that contains him once again.
• Big Bad: Serves as this to the Seventh Doctor's era despite not appearing till his third season.
• Body Surf: Can do this between his "Wolves".
• The Chessmaster: He and the Doctor, who literally played chess. Though subverted with the Doctor tricking him with a blatantly illegal move.
• Clap Your Hands If You Believe: Haemovores can be held back by faith.
• Demonic Possession: How he manifests.
• Eldritch Abomination: Fenric is supposed to have been something from the dawn of time, possibly even earlier. The Expanded Universe gives us a more accurate identification: Hastur, the Unspeakable One, the Ragged King. YES, that one!
• Glowing Eyes of Doom: When he takes possession of a new host.
• I Have Many Names: Fenric has, according to the Doctor.
• Kneel Before Zod:
  Fenric: The choice is yours, Time Lord. I shall kill you anyway, but if you would like the girl to live... kneel before me.
  Ace: I believe in you, Professor.
  Fenric: Kneel if you want the girl to live!
  The Doctor: Kill her.
• Meaningful Name: Fenric comes from Fenrir, a wolf in Norse Mythology who would break free at the end of the world. And the Haemovores are called "Wolves of Fenric".
• Noodle Incident: The Doctor imprisoned him around the 3rd century after tricking him in a game of chess. It's not revealed exactly what happened.
• Out-Gambitted: He thinks that he's The Chessmaster, but the Doctor has an Ace up his sleeve.
• Psychic Powers: Despite being imprisoned, he can still transport people through time.
• Red Eyes, Take Warning: When he possesses Judson.
• Sealed Evil in a Can: And the can got opened...
• Stable Time Loop: Apparently trying to perform one. The last original Haemovore, known as the Ancient One, getting transported back from the year 500,000 and spreading poison will enable the Haemovores to evolve. Subverted when the Ancient One performs a Heel–Face Turn and destroys Fenric's host body in a Heroic Sacrifice.
• Viral Transformation: How the Haemovores are created.
• You Have Outlived Your Usefulness: When Fenric no longer needs the Haemovores, he orders the Ancient One to kill them all.

Ninth Doctor era debut

Reapers

Reapers (Ninth Doctor)

Winged dragon-like monsters from the Time Vortex who feed on temporal paradoxes. Completely invincible, the Doctor describes them as being like bacteria infecting a wound in history, running rampant in the aftermath of the Time War now that the Time Lords are gone.

---

• All There in the Script: They are never identified by name in-universe; the name "Reaper" comes from the script, as well as other sources such as Doctor Who Legacy and the comic Four Doctors.
• Chuck Cunningham Syndrome: Clock Roaches who feed off of paradoxes would be an integral threat in the show, considering how much the Doctor, their companions, and their enemies mess with time, AND that the Time Lords (who keep them in check) spend the Revival Series (seemingly) extinct, stuck in a pocket dimension, placed at the end of time, and destroyed apparently for real, right? Nope, they're not seen after the episode revolving around them.
• Clock Roaches: They "sterilize the wound" left by a temporal paradox Rose created.
• Draconic Abomination: They come from outside time, appear when paradoxes are created to feast, and can't be damaged or destroyed.
• Early Instalment Weirdness: The Reapers feel like an important addition to a show that revolves around time travel, but they're never seen or mentioned after this episode, even in cases where a paradox should lead to their appearance. It could also be that they're simply just one threat that can show up during a paradox, but not guaranteed.
• Flat Character: They're temporal predators whose purpose is to cleanse paradoxes by devouring everything in the vicinity, and don't have individual personalities.
• The Grim Reaper: It's in the name. They even have tails shaped like scythes. Their appearance is appropriate for an episode all about coming to terms with a loved one's death.
• Insurmountable Waist-High Fence: Despite being flying extra-temporal abominations with teleportation abilities that are said to be potentially universe-threatening, the Reapers are incapable of breaking into a simple stone church. It's somewhat Handwaved as the Doctor states that they have difficulty affecting particularly old things, and once they receive power from a further paradox, they manage to get in easily.
• Non-Malicious Monster: It's implied that the Reapers are acting on instinct with no intent to cause pain or grief.
• Planet Eater: In the event of a paradox, the Reapers will indiscriminately consume absolutely everything in the vicinity of the time wound, including the entire planet that the paradox is localised on.

Tenth Doctor era debut

The Beast

The Beast (Tenth Doctor)

"You know nothing. All of you. So small!"

Voiced by: Gabriel Woolf (2006)

"I am the rage and the vile and the voracity! I am the Prince and the Fallen! I am the Enemy, I am the Sin and the fear and darkness! I shall never die! The thought of me is forever: in the bleeding hearts of men, in their vanity, obsession, and lust! Nothing shall ever destroy me! NOTHING!"

A being of great power who claims to have fought the Disciples of the Light before the Universe was created, and was later imprisoned on the planet Krop Tor, circling a black hole. Describes itself as the Devil, which greatly upsets the Doctor's belief system, although he ends up using the description himself for lack of a better explanation. It is given the chance to escape when human explorers fly onto its planet and drill through to its cell. Its mind plans to escape by possessing the team's archaeologist Toby Zed, leaving its original body behind in its prison, but is eventually prevented by the Doctor opening the Beast's cell, activating its failsafe and causing the planet to fall into the black hole, along with the Beast and Toby.

---

• Armour-Piercing Question: When the Doctor refuses to believe its claims that it existed before the universe, since nothing could exist back then, the Beast asks him if that is his religion. The Doctor is too stunned to give a proper answer.
• As Long as There Is Evil: See the above quote. Rose decides to put this to the test.
• Attack of the 50-Foot Whatever: Look at that picture. That's the Doctor between the two pillars standing in front of it.
• Badass Boast: Almost everything it says.
  The Beast: This is the Darkness. This is MY domain. You little things that live in the Light, clinging to your feeble Suns... which die. Only the Darkness remains.
  The Beast: I am the sin; and the temptation. And the desire. And the pain and the loss.
  The Doctor: Tell me, which Devil are you?
  The Beast: All of them!
• Batman Can Breathe in Space: Humans possessed by it can.
• A Beast in Name and Nature: Refers to itself as the Beast, among other Satanic titles. For good measure, his human hosts even manifest a Mark of the Beast.
• Big Red Devil: It claims to be Satan, and it certainly looks the part. No sign of a pitchfork though.
• Body Surf: After screaming orders at the Ood telepathically, it travels into three of them as smoke from Toby to possess the entire hive mind, while still hiding in Toby.
• Boring, but Practical: With its power greatly reduced, the Beast relies upon straight-forward but deeply effective strategies to keep the humans afraid and manipulated, such as turning out the base's lights or disabling the Doctor's ability to communicate with them.
• Break Them by Talking: Reading people's minds and taunting them by playing on fears and insecurities.
  The Beast: Mr. Jefferson, tell me, sir: Did your wife ever forgive you?
  Jefferson: I don't know what you mean.
  The Beast: Let me tell you a secret. She never did.
• Demonic Possession: First it possesses Toby after he handles ancient artifacts, then it possesses the empathic Ood. Toby manifests runes on his skin, red eyes and grey lips, but the Ood gain red glowing eyes and speak through their orbs in the Beast's voice.
• Devil, but No God: Maybe. If you believe that the Beast actually is the Devil, then the proof for a God is that the Beast fought the Disciples of the Light, who possibly could be followers of a God. Also, the Ood mention that "he will rise from the pit and make war on God."
• Devil in Disguise: When it hides in Toby it sounds like him when it wants to.
• Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?: Rose and Doctor throw a being claiming to be Satan into a black hole.
• Dug Too Deep: How Humanity and, by extension, the Doctor cross his path.
• Eldritch Abomination: It claims to be older than time itself, and its origin is logically impossible even by the Doctor's standards.
• Empty Shell: The Beast's body, as its mind has escaped to possess Toby and the Ood.
• Evil Is Petty: There's no insecurity that the Beast won't mock, including Toby's' virginity.
• Evil Is Not Well-Lit: Invoked by the Beast and discussed by the Doctor. The Beast preys on basic, childish fears within people to defeat them, such as fear of the dark. As soon as the humans get the lights in the Sanctuary Base working again they feel better.
• Evil Sounds Deep: He shares a voice actor with Sutekh.
• Fantastic Racism: The Beast treats human beings as nothing more than pathetic, fearful monkeys who are no danger to it. The only character it treats with even a hint of respect is the Doctor, and only because he can insightfully analyse it and form a plan to fight it.
• For the Evulz: Why it kills Scooti.
• Game Face: As Toby, having red eyes, blue lips and glyphs on his skin.
• Genius Bruiser: When it faced the Disciples of the Light, it was with that giant monster form. In order to escape its prison the Beast split itself into its Genius and Bruiser parts to let the Genius escape.
• Genre Savvy: The Beast relinquishes its outright possession of Toby at the same time it possesses the Ood, to make the humans assume that it has left Toby.
• God of Evil: What it inspires in some religions, as well as war gods and devil figures.
• I Am Legion: It even says the exact quote.
• I Have Many Names:
  The Ood: Some may call him Abaddon. Some may call him Krop Tor. Some may call him Satan. Or Lucifer. Or the King of Despair. The Deathless Prince. The Bringer of Night.
• Leaking Can of Evil: It possesses Toby and dozens of Ood even before its prison door opens up.
• Legions of Hell:
  • In the Torchwood season 1 finale, Abbadon the "Son of the Beast" is revealed to have been imprisoned in a similar manner in the Cardiff Rift on Earth. In supplementary materials, Tosh speculates that there might be other demons trapped elsewhere in the universe in secret prisons...
  • The Ood serve as this on the space station while his body is chained. They even call themselves the Legion of the Beast.
• Lovecraft Lite: The Doctor and Rose send its body and mind flying into a black hole.
• Manipulative Bastard: The Doctor quickly calls out the Beast out on playing on basic fears, such as fear of the dark or an abusive parent.
  Danny: But that's how the devil works.
  The Doctor: Or a good psychologist.
• Many Spirits Inside of One: Inverted. The single Beast possesses many Ood, as well as Toby, at once.
• Mark of the Beast: Toby is covered in glyphs that are so old that the TARDIS can't translate them when the Beast possesses him.
• Maybe Magic, Maybe Mundane: Is he really the Devil, or just a Sufficiently Advanced Alien who happens to resemble our popular conception of the Devil and perhaps was even the basis for ours and other Devil myths? Never established for certain, though the episode hovers closer to the former explanation.
• Mind Control: His signature power. He can only exercise it over vulnerable individuals though, such as the empathic Ood or Toby after his exposure to the relics.
• Mind over Matter: Telekinetically shatters reinforced windows, cuts cables and opens its pit.
• Mysterious Past: The only hints at the Beast's past are its claims (which can't be trusted or proven), some vague cave drawings the Doctor finds nears its cell, and humanity's own Devil myths.
• Nigh-Invulnerability: It's strongly hinted that the mind of the Beast can never be destroyed, that it will live on in the minds of every being in the universe.
  The Beast: I shall never die! The thought of me is forever: in the bleeding hearts of men, in their vanity, obsession, and lust! Nothing shall ever destroy me! NOTHING!
• Our Demons Are Different: This one may be the inspiration for all the ones who followed.
• Outside-Genre Foe: In a strictly sci-fi series, a creature appears claiming to be Satan himself. Even better, there is more evidence for the idea that it really is the Devil. Not even the Doctor, an ancient scientist who has travelled all through time and deconstructs religions and Gods as if it were his day job, can truly disprove that the Beast is what it says it is.
• Playing with Fire: Toby breathes fire when the Beast possesses him and is ranting when the Doctor destroys the gravity field, dooming himself, the Beast and the human survivors.
• Psychic Powers: The Beast possesses telekinesis, technopathy and telepathy, which it uses to attack, possess and terrify the Sanctuary base crew once its mind separates itself from its body. It also foretells Rose's death announcement after the battle of London between the Cybermen and Daleks.
• Red Eyes, Take Warning: It's a sign that the Beast has taken someone over. He can hide it when he wants to, though.
• Satan: The Beast claims it is one of his names, and apparently inspired not only Christianity's Devil, but the Devil figures in every religion to have one in the entire universe.
  Toby: It was so angry. It was fury and rage and death. It was him. It was the Devil.
• Scary Teeth: Big scary demon teeth!
• Sealed Evil in a Can: It's so powerful it was sealed miles underground the surface of a planet precariously orbiting a black hole, meaning that any attempt to escape would send the Beast and the planet to fall into it. These Disciples of the Light guys really didn't want this guy to escape — and one can see why.
• Shout-Out: A homage to Event Horizon and Prince of Darkness as well.
• Slasher Smile: When it gets to do its first kill in eons.
• Sliding Scale of Villain Threat: At least universal when unbound and possessing its own body. Its mind alone is certainly a planetary threat, possibly greater.
• Tailor-Made Prison: The Beast's prison was designed to be VERY difficult to get out of, and if broken, it would fall into a black hole before it could properly escape.
• Technopath: Voluntarily or not, it makes the A.I. controlled doors, the hologram display, the Ood's speech devices and Rose's mobile phone announce its imminent release.
• Telepathic Spacemen: A telepathic being from (maybe beyond) outer space.
• There Is No Kill Like Overkill: If it escapes from its prison, then it falls into a black hole. The Doctor states that the Devil is really an idea shared among societies, so even this may not truly kill it. In any case, the Beast's prison planet falls into the black hole, apparently with its body, while its mind possessing Toby follows it to the same fate.
• Time Abyss: It existed before the universe, though the Doctor claims that is impossible (it lampshades his Arbitrary Scepticism). Nevertheless he concedes it could have existed at the start of the universe.
• Villainous Breakdown: When the Doctor dooms it to fall into the black hole, both the Beast's mind and body rant, thrash and breathe fire.
• Voice of the Legion: The Ood speak in this when possessed.
• Volcanic Veins: The veins in its body glow.
• You Cannot Kill An Idea: Although the Beast is defeated, it still possesses psychic influence over every being in time and space.

The Family of Blood

The Family of Blood (Tenth Doctor)

Son of Mine played by: Harry Lloyd

Mother of Mine played by: Rebekah Staton

Father of Mine played by Gerard Horan

Daughter of Mine played by: Lauren Wilson

"We are the Family of Blood."

A family of gaseous aliens who hunted the Doctor and Martha throughout time and space. They could only survive by possessing body after body in short-period bursts, and as such sought to steal the Doctor's regenerative immortality.

---

• Aliens Are Bastards: The Family are extremely sadistic. They murder, taunt their victims, bombard a village of civilians with missiles to draw the Doctor out and, after their objective is complete, they'll take over the galaxy starting with the Earth.
• Arc Villain: Of "Human Nature"/"The Family of Blood".
• Asshole Victims: Their ultimate fate is horrific, but given their sadistic and violent actions it's hard to feel bad for them. Son of Mine's host is also an example, due to being a snobbish and racist Jerkass who went off to smuggle beer.
• Be Careful What You Wish For: They hounded the Doctor across all of time and space to gain his immortality. In the end, the Doctor gave them exactly that, just not how they expected it...
• Character Tics: All four of them share the habit of taking unusually sharp sniffs, as they're always trying to smell out their Time Lord prey. Son of Mine in particular tends to speak sentences in a rapid-fire fashion, typically in threes.
• Creepy Child: Daughter of Mine stares people down with an unsettling blank expression. And she's no less dangerous than the other three, as shown when she disintegrates Headmaster Rocastle.
• Demonic Possession: While not literal demons, they are certainly as vicious. This is how their species operates; they possess any lifeforms unlucky enough to cross their paths and extinguish any trace of the previous occupant.
• The Dreaded: Initially it speaks volumes to their level of danger in the lengths the Doctor went to run from them, by disguising himself as a human and hiding in 1913 England to throw them off the trail. And even then, the Family still found him. Though as the Family learns, the Doctor wasn't running because he was scared, that was his way of being kind.
• Expy Coexistence: Their episodes were based on the New Adventures novel Human Nature featuring The Seventh Doctor and Bernice Summerfield and the Family were based on a race of aliens called the Aubertides. The Shadow Passes audio/short story had Bernice Summerfield meeting Daughter Of Mine and saying she'd never met Daughter before but fought someone similar.
• Family Theme Naming: Each of them are known by their position in a traditional family followed by the possessive pronoun "Of Mine".
• Fate Worse than Death: At the end of the two-parter the Family is subjected to the fury of a Time Lord, and he punishes them by giving them the immortality they wished for in the most awful way imaginable. The Doctor binds Father of Mine in chains forged within the heart of a dwarf star, traps Mother of Mine in the event horizon of an imploding galaxy, and imprisons Daughter of Mine inside every mirror in existence. Son of Mine's punishment is particularly fitting, in that he is suspended as one of the very scarecrows he animated to watch over England for all of time.
• Gone Horribly Right: The Doctor ultimately defeats them by giving them the immortality they wanted at the cost of a Fate Worse than Death. When Son of Mine is frozen in time and suspended as a scarecrow to watch over the fields of England for eternity, he muses that "We wanted to live forever, so the Doctor made sure that we did".
• Grand Theft Me: They steal the bodies of four humans in order to get around, killing the humans permanently.
• Handshake Refusal: The Doctor offers a hand to Daughter Of Mine when she finally releases her from the mirror but Daughter refuses to take it.
• Immortality Seeker: Their species has an extremely short natural lifespan, and they seek to instead live forever by stealing the life force of a Time Lord. Eventually, they get their immortality... in the most unpleasant ways the Doctor could think of.
• Large Ham: It's a Christmas hamper of ham with this family. Father, Mother and Son of Mine are prone to Suddenly Shouting and Son shows off many horrific Slasher Smiles.
• Mirror Monster: Daughter Of Mine ends up trapped in mirrors and can access every mirror in the universe.
• Mook Maker: Son of Mine creates a legion of soldiers by animating the scarecrows scattered around the village.
• Names to Run Away from Really Fast: C'mon, the Family of Blood?
• The Nose Knows: They can smell their prey from light-years away, even across the barrier of space-time. The scent of Time Lord is unique and especially easy to locate. It took the Doctor using the Chameleon Arch to turn himself human to erase his scent.
• Puny Earthlings: None of them think highly of humans and they consider the Doctor's human form a disappointment.
• "The Reason You Suck" Speech: Son of Mine gives the disciplinarian headmaster a verbal dressing down about his willingness to send schoolboys out to fight and die for him, obliquely referring to the oncoming conflict that will destroy their innocence forever. Rocastle responds with an effective Shut Up, Hannibal! speech of his own.
• Sickly Green Glow: The inside of their spaceship is lit like this. As well, when they're communicating with each other and retrieving memories from their stolen bodies, their faces glow like this.
• Smug Smiler: Son of Mine has a permanent aristocratic smirk while in possession of Baines' body.
• Telepathic Spacemen: Are able to communicate with each other this way, indicated by a green glow on their faces.
• The Unapologetic: The Doctor visits Daughter Of Mine every year and promises to release her if she apologizes though she always refuses. The Thirteenth Doctor ends up letting her out anyway.
• We Are as Mayflies: Their natural lifespan is very short; if they hadn't tracked down the Doctor and Martha they would have died after three months.
• Wizards from Outer Space: The "Blood Will Out" short story had Daughter Of Mine freeing most of the family using magic she learned from studying an alien wizard from his mirror.

Torajii

Torajii (Tenth Doctor)

"Burn with me."

A sentient star at the centre of the Torajii system, it was hurt and angered by its substance being illegally used to fuel the S.S. Pentallion spaceship. It tries to pull the ship into it to return what was stolen from it.

---

• The Bad Guy Wins: Zig-zagged. Torajii uses its Demonic Possession powers on the Doctor to explain that it wants its fuel back, and the crew comply with its demand. Once Torajii reclaims its fuel, it calms down and lets the S.S. Pentallion go.
• Demonic Possession: It has the power to possess living creatures using its gas, causing their body temperature to increase to hundreds of degrees and subsuming their original personality.
• Meaningful Name: The star at the centre of the Torajii system, and its name is Torajii.
• Revenge: Members of the S.S. Pentallion illegally used this star's substance as fuel for their ship, oblivious that it was sentient and causing it intense pain. It's willing to make the ship crash into it and kill the crew if it means getting its fuel back!
• Sentient Stars: A sentient star whose gas can possess humans and even Time Lords, though the latter can resist with sheer willpower. Temporarily.
• The Unfettered: It will reclaim the fuel that was stolen from it, no matter how many members of the S.S. Pentallion it must kill to do so.

Weeping Angels

They have their own page.

Midnight Entity

The Midnight Entity (Tenth Doctor)

Played by: Lesley Sharp, David Tennant (2008)

"It's inside his head. It killed the driver, and the mechanic, and now it wants us. He's waited so long. In the dark, and the cold, and the diamonds. Until you came. Bodies so hot, with blood, and pain."

A strange creature found on the inhospitable planet Midnight, which possesses Sky Silvestry. Its physical appearance is never shown, if it has one at all. While possessing Sky, she repeats everything that is said, then she speaks at the same time as others, before finally focusing on just the Doctor and speaking before him, stealing his voice.

---

• Beyond the Impossible: Its very existence is treated as this, especially by the officious Professor Hobbes, who constantly insists that Midnight's xtonic sunlight — which vaporises any organic tissue within seconds — makes the planet absolutely uninhabitable for any form of life. And yet, the entity exists.
• Demonic Possession: While it doesn't appear to be a demon, its hold on Sky Silvestry is pretty much this.
• The Disembodied: It's suggested the creature might simply be a disembodied consciousness, as the Doctor asked if it wanted a body. Which would explain how it could survive in xtonic radiation and how it entered Sky's mind, although it doesn't explain how it can knock on the hull and rip the ship apart.
• The Dreaded: This thing terrifies the Doctor in a way almost no other villain in the history of the show can match.
• Eldritch Abomination: Manages to achieve this status without any special effects whatsoever.
• Enslaved Tongue: In the final phase, the entity spoke before the Doctor, who was paralysed and forced to repeat the words calling for his own death.
• Faux Affably Evil: Once it has the Doctor at its mercy, the entity speaks up, pretending to be Sky, grateful for being freed from a state of helplessness, all in a tone that drips with malevolence.
• Generic Doomsday Villain: Done effectively — nothing is known about what it plans to do or where it comes from, and it comes off as all the scarier for it. Virtually the only thing we can glean is that it wants a human body to inhabit.
• Living Shadow: Claude the mechanic spots a shadow running towards the shuttle bus in the irradiated diamond wasteland. Various fans have claimed they can see movement, but they recall seeing it in different places on the screen and no one has ever posted a slow-motion video actually showing any clear movement, making this a great example of the power of suggestion.
• No Name Given: Not even a nickname, the term "Midnight Entity" comes from the TARDIS Data Core Wiki.
• Nothing Is Scarier: When the Doctor tells Sky to turn around, any experienced viewer will know that something terrible will have happened to her appearance. The fact that there's no obvious change to her appearance, yet her behavior is so alien, just adds to the fear of the moment. Also on a meta level: we don't know what species it is, we don't know where it came from, we don't even know if it died. All told, we know next to nothing about it.
• Psychological Horror: The creature is never physically shown, and all the fear mechanism stems from the way its possessed victim behaves.
• Riddle for the Ages: Just what the frick is this thing? We'll probably never know, but fan theories abound.
• Smug Snake: Once it has a voice of its own, it revels in the Doctor's helplessness but quickly says too much, cluing the Hostess in to the truth of the situation and earning itself a one-way ticket back out into "the dark, and the cold, and the diamonds".
• Stop Copying Me: Played for maximum horror. First it repeats you, then it mimics your words in perfect sync... and then it starts talking ahead of you.
• Thousand-Yard Stare: Perhaps the most unsettling thing about the entity is its piercing, unblinking gaze when it's in possession of Sky's body, not helped at all by Lesley Sharp's Icy Blue Eyes. The way it looks at the passengers alternates between intensely studying every movement they make to dully looking right through them.
• Uncertain Doom: It could already survive on the surface of Midnight, so it's not entirely clear if being dragged out there while possessing Sky might have killed it. The Doctor isn't willing to take any chances and makes sure that the entire planet is evacuated and declared off-limits.
• Unseen Evil: The most we see of it are the people it possesses, all of whom begin to react strangely. It’s actual body is never shown or even described.
• Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds: Based off what Possessed!Sky said about it, Midnight is not a pleasant place to live. When it realizes that it's going back outside, it lets off an absolutely terrified scream.
  Sky: Cast him out. Into the sun. And the night. The starlight waits. The emptiness. The midnight sky.

Eleventh Doctor era debut

House

House (Eleventh Doctor)

Voiced by: Michael Sheen (2011)

"Fear me. I've killed hundreds of Time Lords."

A sentient and parasitic Genius Loci planetoid that primarily feeds on TARDISes.

---

• Badass Boast: Tries one on the Doctor. It backfires.
  House: Fear me. I've killed hundreds of Time Lords.
  The Doctor: Fear me. I killed all of them.
• Demonic Possession: It rips the TARDIS' soul out of her shell, stuffs her into a human body, and then takes over the shell itself when it finds out there are no more TARDISes.
• Eldritch Abomination: House lives in a pocket reality at the "bottom" of the universe, hunts and eats TARDISes, and demonstrates a good deal of control over its surroundings — both the asteroid and later, the TARDIS.
• Evil Counterpart: To the TARDIS; like her, House is an extremely powerful Genius Loci with a number of humanoid beings living on/in it. Unlike the TARDIS, House regards them as entirely disposable People Puppets, and devours any other Genius Loci (usually a TARDIS) unfortunate enough to cross its path — usually, after it lured them there in the first place.
• Faux Affably Evil: House is perfectly polite and, apparently, friendly, enough to deceive the Doctor into thinking it's a perfectly decent being. As it happens, it never loses that calm and polite tone even after its true nature as a Soft-Spoken Sadist is revealed.
• Genius Loci: As the Doctor puts it:
  "This asteroid is sentient."
• Laser-Guided Karma: On the receiving end after the Doctor manipulates it into a fatal error, accidentally bringing all of them, including Idris — the TARDIS' current vessel — into the TARDIS' control room. The TARDIS promptly retakes control, eradicating House, while the Doctor smiles contentedly at the sound of House's dying screams.
• People Puppets: Has a number who extol its virtues, their current bodies being stitched together from the corpses of dead Time Lords and other unfortunate species, to the point where the Doctor doubts there's anything left of who they originally were.
• Sickly Green Glow: Represented by this. When it possesses the TARDIS, the normally golden lighting, inside and out, changes to green, most noticeably when it tracks the Doctor, Amy, Rory and Idris to the old console room they're in.
• Soft-Spoken Sadist: It never raises its voice or loses its level tone, not until it's screaming in pain as the TARDIS gets her revenge. It also spends who knows how long (possibly minutes, possibly decades) psychologically torturing Amy and Rory with Mind Screw after Mind Screw, simply because it was more amusing than killing them — which was why they suggested it, hoping to stay alive long enough to get out/for the Doctor to get them out.
• Year Inside, Hour Outside: As part of its sadistic illusory mind games with Amy and Rory, it keeps separating the two and makes Amy believe that while only seconds have passed for her, decades have passed for Rory, who appears to have died hating her for abandoning him.

Akhaten

Akhaten (Eleventh Doctor)

Also known as "The Old God", Akhaten is a parasitic, monstrous creature that's as large as a planet. It's so big, in fact, that it has its own centre of gravity, and has several inhabited asteroids surrounding itself. Akhaten awakes from its slumber every thousand years at the Festival of Offerings on Tiaanamat, where it feeds off the memories and experiences of the inhabitants.

---

• Eldritch Abomination: Akhaten is actually revealed to be an unbelievably ancient, sentient, planet-sized parasitic monstrosity of immense power with formless features that must be kept asleep, otherwise it will devour everything.
• Emotion Eater: "Grandfather"/the Old God feeds on emotions and stories.
• Generic Doomsday Villain: It never speaks, is never given any backstory/origin, and barely has any personality other than "it wants sacrifices or it will consume the whole star system".
• Genius Loci: It's either a sentient planet or simply a being so gigantic that it might as well be.
• Jerkass Gods: Akhaten's true nature is a merciless parasite that has to be appeased with memories and kept asleep with Music Magic. When the mummy stirs, the song changes to a much more urgent "never wake from slumber".
• Phlebotinum Overload: The Old God feeds on the life experiences of others. The Doctor tried to invoke this with his own memories, and came pretty close, but the planet survived that. When Clara offers it "the most important leaf in human history", containing not only the experiences of its owner but all the experiences they could have had, it implodes.
• Too Spicy for Yog-Sothoth: The Doctor's 1200 years of far flung adventures are not quite spicy enough to bring down Akhaten. Clara's leaf of infinite possibilities does the trick.
• Villain with Good Publicity : Akhaten, the sentient planet god of the seven systems, is depicted as God Is Good, being referred to as "my warrior" and "my hero" in the songs. This suggests that the songs are to assure him that everything's fine and he can continue to rest his "holy head".

Twelfth Doctor era debut

The Perfect Hider

"The Perfect Hider"/"The Figure" (Twelfth Doctor)

"Listen! Question: Why do we talk aloud when we know we're alone? Conjecture: Because we know we're not."

— Twelfth Doctor

A creature hypothesised to exist by the Doctor: an entity so good at making itself hidden that it is completely undetectable. But it is nevertheless always present, and every other being is subconsciously aware of its existence. Or at least, so the Doctor theorises...

---

• Abstract Apotheosis: The creature may be no more than the Doctor's madcap theory, an idea representing his own primal fears dating back to his troubled childhood on Gallifrey.
• Ambiguous Situation: Whether or not the individual underneath Rupert's bedsheets was the hypothetical creature or just one of his friends playing a prank is never made clear. Or perhaps it was neither of the former two options?
• Bedsheet Ghost: It evokes the iconic image of one (although red rather than white) when it rises from Danny's bedspread.
• Crazy Survivalist: The Doctor speculates that such a creature would have evolved perfect camouflage skills for survival and that one day they might "come a-slithering from under the bed" when they have successfully outlasted every other species. If that's the case, then their patience is certainly to be admired.
• The Dreaded: Although they may not even be actively malevolent, they are subconsciously feared by every other sentient being in the universe. The Doctor theorises that the only way to make them go away is to let them know your fear. Tellingly, Orson Pink's bunker at the end of the universe has doors with warnings scrawled all over to never open the door because something seems to want to come in.
• Forgot About His Powers: The whole definition of this creature is "the perfect hider" yet it ends up under a blanket completely in view of three people! That is, of course, assuming that that wasn't one of Danny's friends playing a prank.
• Invisibility: Not just invisible, but the hypothetical creature could make themselves completely undetectable in every sense of the word.
• Living Shadow: The concept for the creature is loosely based on the "shadow people" phenomena commonly associated with sufferers of lucid dreaming and sleep paralysis who claim to see demonic silhouettes. The Doctor even investigates random people having night terrors across the world to help validate his hypothesis.
• Maybe Magic, Maybe Mundane: The closest we get to a tangible encounter with it is in a young Rupert (Danny) Pink's orphanage, but as the Doctor duly notes, it could very well have just been another kid hiding under the bedspread to prank Rupert. Alternatively, it wasn't.
• Nightmare Face: While it's completely blurred out, we do briefly see the creature reveal itself when it removes the bedsheets, and from what we can tell, it's not too pretty. It seems to be bald and incredibly pale, similar to the description of the Floofs (see Self-Plagiarism). However, it could have been a kid in a mask.
• Nothing Is Scarier: Even more prominently than the Midnight entity, the Hider is so indistinct and unknowable that it may not even exist, but such an impediment makes it no less terrifying.
• Primal Fear: Represents the basic human fear of being watched by the unknown. Not just human, as it applies to every species, including Time Lords.
• Riddle for the Ages: Does it actually exist? The episode itself implies that it most likely doesn't. The Doctor's obsession with proving its existence is merely his way of coping with the fact that even he is still afraid of the dark, just like the rest of us. However, the veiled figure in Danny's room and the things outside Orson Pink's bunker may make you think twice...
• Self-Plagiarism: The concept of creatures that have evolved to be so adept at hiding that they're undetectable was previously used by Steven Moffat in his short story Corner of the Eye. The creatures in that story were identified as Floofs, but the key difference is that the Floofs actually reveal themselves, which is more than can be said for the figure in "Listen".
• Sole Survivor: Alongside the Doctor himself, Ashildr, the Toclafane, Orson Pink and possibly a few other Eldritch Abominations on this very page, the Hiders (if they even existed in the first place) could be among the universe's last surviving beings before the inevitable heat death collapse, and they decide to finally come out of obscurity Just Before the End, trillions of years in the future. Either way, something was banging on the door of Orson's bunker.
  • According to The Diary Of River Song, the knocking was River and Captain Jack playing a prank on the Doctor.

The Boneless

The Boneless (Twelfth Doctor)

Twelfth Doctor: I tried to reach out, I tried to understand you, but I think that you understand us perfectly. And I think that you just don't care!

"Whatever they are, they are experimenting. They're testing. They are, they are dissecting. Trying to understand us. Trying to understand... three dimensions."

— Twelfth Doctor

Creatures from another plane that only understand two dimensions, and have entered our world through Bristol and have started taking people and turning them flat.

---

• Ambiguously Evil: It's really unclear why they decided to enter our dimension, whether they want to communicate with us, study us or eliminate us one by one. The Doctor ponders this question for a while, but eventually lands on them as aware of their actions, but too callous to care, and banishes the Boneless to their home dimension to keep them from causing any more damage.
• First-Contact Math: The Starfish Language of 2-Dimensional beings proves too alien for even the TARDIS's Universal Translator to handle. The Doctor had hoped the creatures are a Non-Malicious Monster who are simply so alien and confused by a 3-D world they don't realise they're harming sentient beings. He establishes rudimentary communication with them by using the digits of pi. They respond with the number on the jacket of the man they killed, and then the number of the one they're about to.
• Flat World: Their universe is two-dimensional, so they're from a very literal version of this trope.
• For the Evulz: As enigmatic as they are, it is made clear that they are gleefully aware of the harm they're causing.
• Hidden Agenda Villain: Their motives are left deliberately unclear and many hypotheses are brought up during the episode; perhaps they're here to contact us, kill us all, dissect or study us and don't even know that we require 3 dimensions to survive.
• Humanoid Abomination: Eventually they take the form of those they've killed when they finally understand 3 dimensions.
• Only Known by Their Nickname: Their real name is unknown due to being unable to communicate. The Doctor dubs them "The Boneless" since he found "Killer Graffiti" rubbish.
• Paper People: Comes with being 2-D lifeforms.
• Starfish Aliens: Beings from a 2-D dimension that are attacking Earth.
• Starfish Language: The TARDIS is unable to translate their language because aliens who don't understand the concept of a third dimension are even too bizarre for her standards.
• Stealth Pun: They're two-dimensional in more ways than one.
• They Would Cut You Up: Rare alien-on-human example. They turn humans into 2-D and dissect them to understand their bodies so they can become 3D.
• Uncertain Doom: The Doctor states that some will survive being sent back to their home dimension, though there is no way of knowing if any of the Boneless die on their way back home.
• Zombie Gait: When they take the appearance of those they've killed, the creatures run after everyone this way. Having a rudimentary understanding of 3D and human anatomy, their walking style is crude and zombie-like.

Ashildr / "Me"

Ashildr/The Knightmare/Lady Me/Mayor Me/Me (Twelfth Doctor)

Played by: Maisie Williams (2015)

"I call myself 'Me'. All the other names I chose died with whoever knew me. 'Me' is who I am now. No one's mother, daughter, wife. My own companion — singular, unattached, alone."

A central character in the Series 9 Story Arc, Ashildr was a brave young Viking girl whose village was attacked by the Mire (aliens) in the 9th century. The Doctor saved her village at the accidental cost of her life. In his grief, he rashly defied the fates by using Mire medical technology to resurrect her — which turned out to make her "functionally immortal" (basically really hard to kill). Realizing the danger of this, he takes a "professional interest" in her, following her progress as centuries on The Slow Path pass. Unfortunately, while the Mire tech repairs her body, her mind is the same as any other human, leading to an infinite lifespan with a finite memory. Thus her personality evolves significantly over the Doctor's actual encounters with her: In the 17th century she's "Lady Me", a noblewoman moonlighting as a highwayman called "The Knightmare" and resenting the Doctor for trapping her in life and just moving on. But thanks in part to his compassion and concern, Lady Me subsequently decides to seek out others who have encountered the Doctor and help them after he's moved on. By 2015, she's become "Mayor Me", the woman in charge of a "trap street" — a hidden street in London inhabited by aliens in disguise. When she makes a deal with the Time Lords to capture him in exchange for protection of the street, the plot goes horrifically awry, resulting in Clara Oswald's death. Now the man who saved her and believed in her inherent goodness may hold a grudge against her for the rest of eternity due to the death of the woman he loved.

---

• The Ace: Self-described as such in "The Woman Who Lived".
  "Ten thousand hours is all it takes to master any skill. One hundred thousand hours and you're the best there's ever been. I don't have to be invincible. I'm superb."
• Action Girl: She was pretty badass as a normal Viking girl, willing to declare war. Eight centuries later, she's a gun-toting highwaywoman who fought at Agincourt. A few more centuries, and she effectively runs the trap street inhabited by aliens in "Face the Raven".
• The Ageless: Although she can still be killed by violent action, she doesn't age and her immune system adapts quickly. This woman caught the Black Plague and got better!
• Anti-Villain: Uses rather unscrupulous methods to lure the Doctor into the trap street, but she's doing it solely to protect the residents and doesn't mean for anyone to get hurt, much less killed. Her remorse at what happens to Clara is undisguised.
• Artistic License – History: Ashildr was unlikely, if ever, to have been a Viking name. Aeschild in Old English was an actual Anglo-Saxon name, and Asheldham in Essex was named for an actual Ashildr, whose identity remains unknown.
• Been There, Shaped History: She says she helped end the Hundred Years War.
• Break the Haughty: Her immortality has given her a very smug and confident personality until Clara dies because of a Batman Gambit gone horribly wrong and the Doctor warns her that he better not see her again. Ever. And for the first time since she's became immortal, she's properly scared out of her mind.
• Broken Bird: Oh yes. With over 1,000 years of trauma, she's broken more than any human should ever be. When she breaks the Doctor in "Face the Raven" over what happens to Clara, she risks living the rest of eternity in fear of the wrath of the man who saved her life and believed in her the most.
• Burn the Witch!: She saved a village from scarlet fever, so the locals thought she was a witch and tried to drown her, a more common type of execution for suspected witches.
• Came Back Wrong: It doesn't happen immediately, but she loses her original personality as the centuries pass due to her limited memory and all the trials she goes through. She was virtuous as Ashildr, but becomes morally dubious as Me.
• The Chains of Commanding: She's a very harsh leader of the "Trap Street", but she has to be. Otherwise all of the different alien species would be at each other's throats.
• Classy Cat-Burglar: In the 1600s she's known as "Lady Me", respected noblewoman, and as "The Knightmare", the most feared highwayman in England. Her reason for robbing and stealing? The adventure.
• Contrasting Sequel Antagonist: This is a complicated one. She's one of the closest Series 9 has to a specific recurring Arc Villain, there's no big dramatic confrontation between her and The Doctor, they simply talk things through at the end of the Universe and part ways seemingly for good. Like most end of season enemies she was a lot in common with The Doctor but instead of being a full on Evil Counterpart she's more of a darker take at what being like The Doctor could do to someone's psyche. Also while The Doctor generally defeats the latest threat and moves on to the next adventure Me actually get's exactly what she wanted.
• Create Your Own Villain: By the time of "The Woman Who Lived", she's become bitter towards the Doctor for making her immortal and then just moving on and refusing to make her a companion. They reconcile by the end... and then she invokes this trope by inadvertently having a hand in the death of Clara and turning him against her. For bonus points, where he was still willing to help her and did his best to understand her situation once he realized the pain she was in, she doesn't do anything to try and make up for what she did to him.
• Deadpan Snarker: Gives the Doctor this treatment in "Hell Bent" when he tries to play the Just Friends card with regards to Clara — despite his actions screaming otherwise.
• Do Not Call Me "Paul": She grows to disregard her birth name and embraces the name of "Me".
• Earn Your Happy Ending: Has to wait literally until the end of the universe for it to happen, but finally gets her wish to travel time and space in the Series 9 finale. Oddly, this overlaps with Karma Houdini (see below).
• Easily Forgiven: By Clara at least, as when last seen they have become travelling companions. Forgiveness was a theme in Series 9, after all. While the Doctor never forgives her onscreen, he doesn't keep her from following him into the second stolen TARDIS in "Hell Bent" when he could easily have left her behind to the fate of Dying Alone at the end of the universe.
• Evil Wears Black: In "Face the Raven" she wears only black, including black tattoos from a contract with her supernatural executioner. While she is not evil in this episode, she is definitely an antagonist and uses a sinister power.
• Faking the Dead: She did this on at least two occasions, one to escape her execution by drowning at the hands of villagers who thought she was a witch, and once to end her stint as a medieval queen, as she thought it was boring.
• The Fog of Ages: An infinite life but a normal human memory. She deals with it by recording her memories in journals. She still can't remember her home village, presumably because she started her record keeping after she had already forgotten them. Turns out that she even learned to Exploit it; if she ever has something she for some reason or another doesn't want to remember, she either neglects to write it down or rips out the page from her journal and then waits for the memory to slip.
• Foil: Not only to the Doctor, as noted below, but also to many of his companions, especially those created by Steven Moffat:
  • Her similarity to Jack Harkness is noted by the Doctor by the end of "The Woman Who Lived".
  • She has a dark side to her that means she and the Doctor would be a terrible influence on each other. This is the same reason that the Doctor and River Song don't travel together regularly.
    River: One psychopath per TARDIS.
  • Like Amy, she spent her entire life (her long, long life) hoping the Doctor would come back for her. Unlike Amy, he refuses to take her with him.
  • Like Rory, she lives through a lot of human history. While Rory is kept sane by his love for Amy and remembers what happened to him, keeping it locked away in his mind, Ashildr ends up losing everyone she loves and forgetting them. She becomes cold and distant due to this.
  • She suffered a great loss and briefly became cruel and reckless in response, just like Clara did after Danny's death in "Dark Water". Of course, immortality means "briefly" has a very different scale in Ashildr's case.
  • She briefly has one in the form of Sam Swift, a rival highwayman who is decidedly less impressive but much more charismatic than the Knightmare. The fact that Sam is one of the "mayflies", however, allows him to truly see the beauty in life and never waste a single second of it. It's unclear if he became immortal like Ashildr after the Mire repair kit was used to save his life and whether his happy-go-lucky attitude changed as a result of this.
• The Heavy: For Series 9. She's the closest it has to a recurring villain and her luring the Doctor to the Trap Street in order to send him to her employer is what leads to the events of the finale taking place.
• Heel–Face Revolving Door: She starts as a brave innocent in "The Girl Who Died". By the time of "The Woman Who Lived" she is callous, robbing people for kicks and willing to kill to escape the planet. She is brought back to empathy by the Doctor, and decides she'll take The Slow Path to look after those he leaves behind. Alas, while she has noble intentions as Mayor Me, she's willing to go to extreme measures to protect the trap street — executing anyone who steps out of line no matter how noble their intentions and betraying the Doctor to the Time Lords (resulting in horrific torture for him), which also inadvertently paves the way for Clara's death. In the end, however, she is Easily Forgiven by the semi-resurrected Clara and becomes her companion.
• Heel Realization: During the climax of "The Woman Who Lived", seeing the terrified villagers running for their lives from the attacking starships helps Ashildr realize how callous and detached she'd become.
  Ashildr: I care. My God, I actually care.
• Heroic Sacrifice: She died saving her village. Then the Doctor brought her back. The rest is, quite literally, history.
• Immortal Procreation Clause: She can have children but swore not to have any more after they die from the Plague.
• It Gets Easier: By the time the Doctor reunites with her in the mid-17th century she's killed so many people it no longer bothers her. It can also be said to refer to her general attitude towards immortality.
• Karma Houdini: She is forgiven by Clara over causing Clara's own death, and receives no punishment of any sort because Clara forbids the Doctor from punishing her. And in the end, Clara allows her to become a companion for a trip back to Gallifrey the long way 'round. Still, she did live in fear of meeting a raging Doctor for trillions of years.
• Last of Her Kind: By the time the end of the universe comes around she's the last of the immortals. Also the last human, depending on where Orson Pink was at that moment. Before that, it's probably fair to call her the last Viking by the time The Present Day rolls around.
• Living Forever Is Awesome: Though she has many bad things to say about immortality, she never considers dying. In fact, after living up to trillions of years, up until the end of the universe, she's ready for untold years of more adventures. Probably helps that she's subject to The Fog of Ages. She never has to live with the burdens of multiple lifetimes, and if she ever wants to forget anything entirely, she just doesn't write it down.
• Mirror Character: From the Doctor — both are immortal Renaissance Man types, doomed to lose everyone they love, and prone to suffering detachment from beauty and kindness without the aid of mortals — with the last point the reason why he refuses to take her with him in the TARDIS. The events of "Face the Raven" bring the "sliver of ice in his heart" forward when it comes to self-interest. Also, both of them are storytellers in different ways — she an imaginative weaver of heroic adventures (this fades to The Fog of Ages), he "a bloke in a box, telling stories" who created the identity of the Doctor for himself — which is one reason he became so fond of her to the point of saving her life via extreme measures. Both also give up their original names at some point, and felt/were out of place in their original societies. In "Hell Bent", each argues that the other could qualify as the Hybrid of the Gallifreyan prophecy, though it was later confirmed to be the Doctor and Clara. In the end, she gets to be a companion to Clara.
• Natural End of Time: Manages to live all the way to right before the end of the universe, waiting for the inevitable on the ruins of future Gallifrey
• Never Be Hurt Again: She lost her children to the Black Plague, so she refused to have any more.
• Never My Fault: Claims that she is not responsible for what happened to Clara in "Hell Bent" — granted, she uses that statement to also absolve the Doctor of his guilt over that, and Clara has no problem forgiving her in any case.
• Noodle Incident:
  • Something caused her so much pain that she ripped out the journal pages about it. Note that she kept the ones about her children's deaths. Given which pages are missing, it was likely everything else about their birth and lives.
  • We never learn how she came to be mayor of the trap street, meet the quantum shade, or what incident occurred that resulted in her agreeing to the scheme to trap the Doctor in order to protect her residents.
• No Sympathy: It's a downplayed case. When they meet one more time in "Hell Bent", she not only fails to apologize to the Doctor for betraying him and all the misery that came after, but like Ohila and the Time Lords does not understand why he doesn't just get over Clara's death. Like them, her immortality and detachment means she cannot fully comprehend how deeply he cares for her, although she has a better understanding of it than they. Unlike them, she tries to absolve the Doctor of any guilt over Clara's death by reassuring him that it wasn't his fault, even saying that Clara died for "who she loved", which of course directly referred to the Doctor.
• Older Than They Look: In her first appearance, she looks her age. In subsequent appearances, she's hundreds, thousands, and even billions of years older.
• Really 700 Years Old: She was born in the 9th century and is approximately 800 years old by 1651. By 2015, she's passed the millennium mark. She eventually lives up to the end of the universe and beyond.
• Renaissance Woman: A good enough soldier to help fight the Hundred Years War, enough medical knowledge to cure scarlet fever, and numerous other skills besides. It's justified, as Ashildr has had a lot of time to master many skills.
• Royals Who Actually Do Something: Played With. She was a queen in medieval times, but apparently it was mostly "paperwork and backgammon". Eventually she got so bored she faked her own death!
• Sadistic Choice: In The Triple Knife short story, she has to decide which of her three children to save from the Plague using a spare Mire Repair Kit. She lets all three die because she couldn't impose immortality on another person.
• The Slow Path: She survives from the ninth century A.D. up into the 21st century A.D. this way. She even lived until the end of the universe this way.
• The Sociopath: For a long time she was desensitized to the world, seeing no value in human life and even claiming that she had forgotten what sorrow feels like. The Doctor helps her realize that she does still care about human life in "The Woman Who Lived".
• The Storyteller: Was this in the beginning, and the Doctor (who felt an affinity with her, being "a bloke in a box, telling stories" himself) used her imaginative gifts to help him defeat the Mire by hooking her up in one of their helmets and creating illusions to scare and embarrass them.
• Time Abyss: She eventually becomes billions (100 Trillion if the timeline of Utopia holds up) of years old and witnessing the end of the universe, having outlived all the other immortals.
• Trapped in Villainy: In "Face the Raven", she's forced to deliver the Doctor to the Time Lords in order to keep her alien community safe from harm.
• Ultimate Authority Mayor: In the alien refugee community in the Trap Street; she calls herself "mayor" but there's no indication that she was elected. Like "doctor", it's a name she tries to live up to.
• We Used to Be Friends: "Friends" is stretching it, but she and the Doctor were relatively friendly until she pulls a Batman Gambit that results in Clara's death. Naturally the Doctor is furious with her after this and tells her in no uncertain terms to make sure they never meet again. They do, but while he doesn't take Revenge upon her he is apparently unwilling to reconcile over her past actions, which is telling because Twelve is one of the more forgiving Doctors when it comes to those who wrong others.
• What the Hell, Hero?:
  • Chews the Doctor out twice — first for "trapping" her in immortality in "The Woman Who Lived", and second for becoming The Unfettered and risking the universe just to save Clara in "Hell Bent". While he is shaken and heartsbroken by the first speech, the second has no effect on him because she has No Sympathy for the suffering he's gone through — which she was partially, albeit indirectly, responsible for, after all.
  • The Doctor gives her this treatment during her Knightmare days, even threatening to become her enemy if she follows through with killing a man. Needless to say, in "Face the Raven" he's not happy with her behaviour as the trap street's mayor and hanging judge, and then she betrays him to an unknown party, and then she isn't able to save Clara from an unjust execution...
• Wild Card: She's an unpredictable immortal with very loose morals. The Doctor takes a "professional interest" in her partially because he was responsible for said immortality and thus feels responsible for what she becomes.
• Who Wants to Live Forever?: She hates her immortal state because it has led to boredom and loneliness, but she gets used to it over time.

Thirteenth Doctor era debut

The Solitract

The Solitract (Thirteenth Doctor)

Voiced by: Sharon D Clarke

An impossibly old form of consciousness, born alongside the universe itself. But its sheer alien nature was a threat, so it was banished to its own plane of existence.

---

• Animalistic Abomination: Adopts the form of a frog.
• Cosmic Flaw: Was born alongside the universe but is mutually incompatible to it, thus both had to be isolated from each other to fully form. Particularly the portal connecting it to the universe spontaneously forms a pocket dimension as a buffer because any kind of direct "contact" between them would destroy them both.
• Eldritch Location: So eldritch that any kind of interaction with normal space-time, including beings from it, is mutually destructive.
• A Form You Are Comfortable With: Part of how it lures people into it, but eventually it finds a form it's comfortable with. A talking frog. Because that was Grace's favourite animal and the Solitract liked it.
• Genius Loci: The best way to describe it is that it's an intelligent universe.
• Knight of Cerebus: The Solitract was the first universe-level threat the Thirteenth Doctor faced. Although it takes the form of a talking frog, in typical Doctor Who fashion, it is taken completely seriously and even given some pathos as it manages to bond with the Doctor over their shared loneliness.
• Lotus-Eater Machine: It creates illusions of people's dead loved ones in order to entice them into not leaving.
• Tragic Monster: It ultimately doesn't mean any harm to the people it abducts, it's simply UNFATHOMABLY lonely. It even is willing to let the Doctor, its last remaining companion, go free for both their sakes.

Kasaavin

The Kasaavin (Thirteenth Doctor)

A race of extra-dimensional aliens working with the Master and Daniel Barton on a mysterious plot.

---

• Bio-Augmentation: They have the means to modify human DNA for incredibly high capacity data storage. This unfortunately leaves the poor subject permanently comatose, not that they care.
• Eldritch Abomination: One Kasaavin that the Doctor is briefly able to capture claims to come from "far beyond... [her] understanding".
• A Form You Are Comfortable With: They claim to have taken humanoid forms to mock humanity.
• Intangibility: Are capable of passing through walls. Even the TARDIS walls.
• Light Is Not Good: They take the form of glowing humanoids.
• Stealth Expert: Appropriate for a story riffing on Spy Fiction tropes, they are a race of extra-dimensional intelligence gatherers. They remained completely hidden while surveying the main universe throughout its entire history, waiting for the perfect time to strike.

Zellin and Rakaya

Zellin and Rakaya (Thirteenth Doctor)

Played by: Ian Gelder (Zellin), Claire-Hope Ashitey (Rakaya)

A pair of cruel alien gods who played bloody games with the inhabitants of a pair of planets. When the people finally got wise to what was going on, they sealed Rakaya inside a prison that neither of them could break. Zellin eventually came up with a plan to free her by targeting the Doctor and her companions...

---

• All There in the Manual: According to The Guide to the Dark Times, they are both Eternals.
• All There in the Script: Rakaya's name is only given in the credits of their episode.
• Bald of Evil: Zellin.
• Call-Back: They mention the Toymaker and the Guardians on-screen for the first time in how many years?
• Detachment Combat: Zellin can detach and regrow his fingers to attack people with and feed on their nightmares.
• Emotion Eater: Both of them feed on fear.
• God Guise: They each took on the role of deity to the population of one of a pair of neighboring planets and then turned the two worlds against each other, just to see who would win. Fortunately, their worshippers figured it out and turned on them.
• It Amused Me: They make wagers on the destruction of planets, foster wars between species and civilisations, and feed on the nightmares of humans, all as ways to keep themselves entertained.
• Jerkass Gods: A pair of alien gods from another dimension who like to play horrific "games" with mortals for their own amusement.
• Laser-Guided Karma: They end up trapped in Rakaya's prison, hopefully for good this time, alongside one of the nightmares Zellin had brought to life.
• Nightmare Weaver: They can harvest nightmares and trap people inside them.
• Obviously Evil: Zellin has a very sinister appearance. Rakaya's appearance, in contrast, is more angelic, which helps Zellin's Batman Gambit to trick the heroes into freeing her by pretending he's the one who imprisoned her.
• Sealed Evil in a Can: Rakaya. Zellin managed to evade imprisonment.
• Shrouded in Myth: The Doctor knew Zellin as "a mythical name, way beyond this universe".
• White Hair, Black Heart: Rakaya has white hair and turns out to be evil and, apparently, even more powerful than Zellin.

Swarm

Swarm (Thirteenth Doctor)

Played by: Sam Spruell, Matthew Needham ("Old Swarm")

A seemingly ageless alien with a mysterious grudge against the Doctor.

---

• Arch-Enemy: He claims to be the Doctor's original nemesis, having apparently waged many epic battles against her across time and space. Considering that the Doctor has no recollection of who he is, it is heavily implied that his existence was erased from her memories by the Division. While somewhat disappointed that she doesn't remember him, he considers it advantageous.
• Big Bad Ensemble: With the Sontarans in Series 13. He and Azure kill Tecteun to take control of the Flux and destroy the universe in the hopes of freeing their "savior," Time itself. Meanwhile, the Sontarans take advantage of the chaos to conquer Earth.
• Calacas: He has a bright sparkly Skull for a Head.
• Cold Ham: He has yet to raise his voice above an ominous murmur, yet he is highly intimidating and theatrically villainous in his manner. He only gets hammier as time goes on.
• Deadpan Snarker: He has a very snide sense of humour, which only serves to make him creepier.
• Faux Affably Evil: Always polite and charming, but clearly this is a facade, as he views everyone he meets as a lesser being.
• No Body Left Behind: He can completely atomize a person with a single touch. As a dose of Karmic Death, this is the exact fate he and his sister suffer at Time's hands.
• The Nth Doctor: He's introduced in an older-looking form, who escapes confinement by absorbing the lifeforce of a poor Gallifreyan guard and regenerating into his current form, played by a different actor. "Old Swarm" reappears in the flashbacks to the Siege of Atropos.
• Remember the New Guy?: While he claims to have an intimate history with the Doctor, she does not remember him at all.
• Shrouded in Myth: All that we know is he's an ancient evil with a grudge against the Doctor.
• Skull for a Head: His rejuvenated form has a face resembling a human skull.
• Terrible Trio: With Azure and Passenger.
• Time Abyss: He's apparently been imprisoned on an alien planet since the dawn of the universe. Or very close to it.
• Translation Convention: His name, as well as Azure's and Passenger's, are merely English translations for their true names.
• Your Soul Is Mine!: He absorbs the energy of one of the Division agents charged with inspecting his prison cell, rejuvenating himself into a sleeker, mauve-skinned form with a skull-like facade.

Azure

Azure (Thirteenth Doctor)

Played by: Rochenda Sandall

The sister of Swarm.

---

• Becoming the Mask: She was living life on Earth as a human with a husband and was apparently happy with it until Swarm kills her husband and restores her true personality.
• Calacas: Like her brother, has a sparkly decorated skull.
• Distaff Counterpart: She's basically a female version of her brother, Swarm.
• The Dragon: To Swarm, somewhat. The two appear to be equal partners, but Swarm is more prominent and seems to come up with the duo's plans.
• Refusal of the Call: She's been living life as a human until the events of the show. When she receives a message from outside their neat little home (it's unclear if it's from her brother, or if it's a warning to her human identity and her husband that trouble is coming), she smashes it and ignores it. So Swarm comes for her personally.
• Terrible Trio: With Swarm and Passenger.

Passenger

Passenger (Thirteenth Doctor)

Played by: Jonny Mathers

A being that follows Swarm and Azure. It turns out to be an artificial entity designed for holding a great many people captive in a very small space.

---

• Bigger on the Inside: He can store practically infinite numbers of people and things inside himself.
• The Big Guy: He's a lot larger than his companions.
• Chekhov's Gunman: Upon discovering that Passenger's ability to absorb souls into his body has almost no limits, the Doctor picks him up in the TARDIS and hurls him at the Flux wave itself, which he swallows whole.
• Flat Character: While Swarm and Azure get backstories and build-up, Passenger just suddenly appears in the temple alongside them. Justified, as it turns out "he's" not technically a character at all.
• Sealed Inside a Person-Shaped Can: His true nature; he's less a proper creature and more a sentient prison in which countless people's consciousnesses can be imprisoned simultaneously, and which is also capable of a limited degree of autonomous action.
• Silent Antagonist: He has no lines as he is just a humanoid living prison.
• Terrible Trio: With Swarm and Azure.

Time

Time (Thirteenth Doctor)

Played by: Sam Spruell, Jodie Whittaker

The Anthropomorphic Personification of Time itself that has been imprisoned by the Mouri in the Temple of Atropos since the Dark Times. Swarm and Azure’s ultimate goal is to release it back into the universe.

---

• Anthropomorphic Personification: Of time, of course. As a destructive entity, it seems to embody entropy as well.
• Canon Immigrant: The concept of Time taking a physical form to interact with the Doctor has been used in outside media before, notably in the Doctor Who New Adventures novels from the 1990s (though there it was an Eternal who'd adopted the name, rather than Time itself incarnate).
• A Form You Are Comfortable With: Time takes the physical form of whoever it is facing. At first, it appears as Swarm, before transforming into a dark mirror of the Thirteenth Doctor, wearing her costume with inverted colours.
• Greater-Scope Paragon: If Time had a consciousness from the beginning of the Doctor's travels, then it has acted like a warden of reality. It has also allowed the TARDIS passage through its vortex. It is aware of past, present, and future events, and in some cases drawn the TARDIS to certain events, good and bad, or repelled it, explaining why the TARDIS seems to decide where to go on its own and disobey the Doctor. Time enigmatically leads the Doctor to intervene in specific conflicts, while also refusing to bend to serve other Time Lords with darker intentions. One can only wonder what it did during the Time War, because Rassilon's final action in the war was trying to make it disappear.
• Sealed Evil in a Can: The statue-like Mouri guard the Time Force in the Temple of Atropos. Swarm and Azure seek to unleash its power back into the universe at large.
• Vagueness Is Coming: Reminiscent of the Tenth Doctor’s "he will knock four times" omen, Time issues a typically vague premonition of the Thirteenth Doctor’s coming demise-qua-regeneration. Time does, at least, explicitly mention that the Master will play a role.
• Villainy-Free Villain: Despite being built up as an ultimate force of destruction, Time’s worst crime is eradicating Swarm and Azure, the main antagonists of Flux. It then lets the Doctor go after mimicking her form, though it delivers a vague warning of another threat that is to come before she leaves.
• You Have Outlived Your Usefulness: Swarm and Azure are rewarded for their efforts to free Time by a slice of Karmic Death at its hand. However, the way events play out, it seems they welcome this because they will Ascend to a Higher Plane of Existence, becoming one with the essence of time, which they worship.

Fourteenth Doctor era debut

Not-Things

Not-things (Fourteenth Doctor)

Not-Doctor: The notion of shape is strange.
Not-Donna: It limits. It is limiting.

Played by: David Tennant (Not-Doctor), Catherine Tate (Not-Donna)

"We drifted here, in the lack-of-light, passing no-time. But we would feel it from so far away... your noisy, boiling universe. We want to travel there to play your vicious games and win."

— Not-Doctor

Mysterious and terrifying creatures who existed outside the known universe, and are the antagonists of the 60th anniversary special "Wild Blue Yonder". They can take the forms of people they encounter, but aren't that good at it... yet.

---

• Become a Real Boy: Their plan is to learn how to properly imitate inhabitants of the universe and wreak havoc.
• Body Horror: Not-Doctor and Not-Donna reveal themselves as such when they mess up the arms to make them freakishly large. While chasing the Doctor and Donna through the hallway, their faces become distorted to uncanny effect.
• Copied the Morals, Too: Villainous example. The Not-Things are hostile because the darkest impulses of humanity somehow made its way to them at the end of the universe, influencing them to imitate that.
• Deadpan Snarker: Given who Not-Donna is imitating, sarcasm is no surprise:
  Not-Donna: Love letters don't travel very far.
• Evil Knockoff: Invoked. The Doctor and Donna are the first to visit the spaceship after three years, thus they take forms based on them and start copying the duo.
• Humans Are Bastards: Or rather All Sentient Species Are Bastards. They're so violent because somehow humanity's and the rest of the known universe's darkness managed to transmit itself to them. When Donna says humans are more than that, Not-Donna quips "Love letters don't travel very far."
• No Object Permanence: Played for Horror, as object permanence is one part of physics they figure out on the fly. Donna realizes the Not-Doctor isn't the real Doctor when she looks down and sees that the tie he dropped earlier has suddenly disappeared.
  Not-Doctor: Oh, I see! When something is gone, it keeps existing...
• Involuntary Shapeshifting: The Not-Things ability to retain shape is lacking at-first, leading to instances of Body Horror as their "limbs" act up. It doesn't last.
• Transforming Conforming: At the start, they have trouble maintaining a convincing shape, such as taking longer to get the arms the right length, or losing track of how many knees per leg. The longer they stay transformed, the more "locked in" they become, losing their more Body Horror related transformations in favor of a better disguise. Notably, they lost everything they had learned from the Captain after she killed herself before they could finish copying her, sending them back to square one.

---