Arch-Enemies of Doctor Who

This is part of my Doctor Who Guide.

The Doctor has made many enemies across time and space during his centuries of travel. The Sea Devils and Silurians. The Nestenes and Autons. Werewolves, witches, so-called "demons" and even vampires (who are considered the "Ancient Enemies" of the Time Lords).

Here then are some basic introductions to the Doctor's most dangerous foes.

VAMPIRES

In the legends of the Time Lords, vampires are referred to as the "Ancient Enemy" (which is also what they call the Time Lords). We learned of the existence of vampires during the career of the Fourth Doctor, who explained that the original vampire race had once warred with the people of Gallifrey, before they became Time Lords. The most powerful ones, the "Great Vampires", were giants.

During the war, the people of Gallifrey used "bow-ships" which fired steel bolts through the hearts of the vampires. These bow-ships may have been the creation of Rassilon, who led the charge against the Great Vampires and, in later years, founded the society of Time Lords.

Apparently, a few survivors escaped during the war, seeding different planets and creating sub-species. This is why there are legends of vampires in so many different cultures and worlds.

According to the Doctor, the war with the vampires spanned across the universe and was "so bloody" that afterward the Gallifreyans became "sickened of violence forever." A sub-species of vampire known as the hemovores was fought by the Seventh Doctor in the classic television series. The Tenth Doctor encountered a "plasmavore" in one of his TV adventures, but whether or not this creature was related to the ancient vampires is unknown.

In the Big Finish audio plays, the Sixth Doctor claimed that the vampire race originally existed in another dimension. Apparently, early Gallifreyan scientists accidentally allowed them access into our universe during experiments in dimensional portals. During an Eighth Doctor audio play, a vampire named Lord Tepesh claimed that the original race of vampires had only fed on livestock that was specially grown for nourishment at first. He claimed it was only after Rassilon declared war on them that they were forced to begin hunting sentient life, as their food supply ran low and they became desperate. Whether this is true or not is not known.

CYBERMEN

Cybermen were once a race of beings nearly identical to humans. They lived on the planet Mondas, a twin version of Earth which shared its orbit on the opposite side of the sun. Centuries ago, Mondas shifted its orbit and the planet became a harsh environment. The people made their planet into a giant, mobile world and they were forced to regularly replace organs with plastic and metal substitutes to survive in the new environment.

Eventually, the Mondasians became a race of cyborgs with barely any organic components left, their forms sheathed in plastic and metal suits, their brains wired with computers so that they became part of a collective intelligence. To prevent themselves from suffering any pain and to ease the presence of a hive-mind, their brains were surgically altered to remove emotions.

Cybermen are drones for the most part. Groups are led by Cyber-Leaders (identified by black rods on their face plate), who in turn report to a Cyber-Controller (identified by a translucent skull plate), who maintains some sense and understanding of emotion to help him deal with new situations and threats.

Whether its from their mobile planet Mondas, their later home Telos, or any of their hidden safe houses, the Cybermen are always seeking to dominate other races for two reasons. They are driven to do this for two reasons: 1, they are constantly looking to add new technology to their own, as this will help them near a state of perfection; and 2, they expand their race by capturing other organic beings and forcibly "converting" them (if they are compatible) into new Cybermen.

Cybermen believe that they are the most advanced race in the universe, existing in a state that is beyond disease, decay or emotional weaknesses brought on by being an individual who can suffer from fear, prejudice and doubt. They believe that in making others into new Cybermen, they are helping those others become superior to the rest of the universe.

The Cybermen live by a simple motto: "There is nothing to fear. You belong to us. You will be like us. Resistance is useless."

DAVROS AND THE DALEK EMPIRE

The Daleks were once a humanoid race known as the Kaleds and were native to the planet Skaro. The Kaleds started a war with the Thals, another society of people who lived on the same planet. The war lasted for roughly a thousand years and involved both nuclear and germ warfare. During the latter half of the war, mutations began to occur in the Kaled people and it seemed that extinction loomed in the future.

A scientist named Davros decided to create a new superior race out of the ashes of his people. After long experimentation, he genetically engineered several mutating Kaleds into a new race of small tentacled creatures he called Daleks, creatures who had a greater tolerance for radiation and disease.

Furthermore, Davros increased the brain power of the Daleks while removing specific emotional "weaknesses" such as sympathy and pity. He also increased the survival instinct to the point that Daleks would have an ingrained need to eliminate all possible threats.

Davros equipped each Dalek with a mobile war machine based on his own life-support unit. These mobile war machines were like personal tanks, protecting each Dalek with a combination of force-fields and "polycarbide" armor, involving (among other things) a metal loosely referred to as "Dalekanium." Anti-grav pods in the unit allow for easy travel and limited flight. Each Dalek has a manipulator arm which can use small, localized force-fields to work machinery, guide a prisoner, or crush a grown man's skull to pulp within seconds. A Dalek gun can temporarily paralyze, fire bolts of electricity and energy beams that kill almost instantly by melting the internal organs. It can also be substituted with other tools, such as a cutting torch. To help them operate the war machine and its weapons, Daleks have their brains wired into the control circuits.

The Daleks destroyed their Kaled predecessors, seeing them as "impure" and weak. Though confined to Skaro for centuries, they eventually spread out into the stars and began their empire.

People often mistake the Daleks for robots and some even find their appearance comical. But inside each war machine is a tentacled creature that believes all creatures who are not part of the "pure Dalek race" must be destroyed or enslaved. If you are different, then you are impure and you cannot convince them otherwise. They are known for screaming "Exterminate!" as they kill others and are basically the sci-fi equivalent of Nazis. Like the Time Lords, Daleks also possess time travel technology, but to a much less-advanced degree, often relying on "time tunnels" to act as a bridge between one point in space-time and another.

The Daleks do have some weaknesses. Though very intelligent, they have an inherent lack of imagination, making them at times predictable and causing them to take much longer to make advances in their technology. They also have trouble understanding when sentient beings do something irrational or act out of self-sacrifice. And at times, they simply cannot help from savoring a kill and taking the time to gloat, due to their intense hatred of all other life forms and their delight in proving their superiority.

Most Daleks are simple soldiers, but there are levels of rank. Black and red Daleks seem to be captains of larger groups. Above them sit the Supreme Daleks, who make up the Supreme Council. All of these higher ranked Daleks are notably more cunning and intuitive than the average Dalek. And above them is the Dalek Emperor. There have been different Dalek Emperors apparently, each enormous in size and with a great capacity for emotional understanding. There have also been certain Daleks made for special missions, such as the Special Weapons Dalek who had a customized cannon built into his mobil war unit.

Aside from genetic impurity, the Daleks seem to only fear the Doctor and have referred to him as "the oncoming storm" or as the Ka Faraq Gatri, which in their language means "The Destroyer of Worlds" or "The Bringer of Death." This is in reference to the fact that, during his seventh incarnation, the Doctor actually blew up their home planet Skaro (in the TV adventure "Remembrance of the Daleks").

The Doctor first met Davros when he journeyed into Skaro's past to the first days of the Dalek race (in the TV story "Genesis of the Daleks"). The Doctor warned Davros that his new race would be a force of evil and would decimate other races, but Davros refused to end his experiments, claiming that it was only by eliminating or enslaving all other races that the Daleks could ensure peace throughout the universe. He also displayed a definite joy in having others under his power and causing them pain. He joyfully admitted that if he possessed a virus that would destroy all sentient life on his world, he would use it because its use would prove his own genius and power, making him like a god.

Though the Daleks later attempted to kill Davros, seeing their creator as weak and belonging to the past, the evil scientist had prepared for such an attack and had pre-programmed his life-support chair to save him through a combination of nannites and stimulant agents. Over the centuries, Davros was kept alive, facing the Doctor in several incarnations, always determined to create the perfect race. He even went so far as to create a new breed of Daleks who would be loyal to him, forcing the Dalek Empire into a civil war for some time.

The Doctor deeply hates the Daleks and Davros. Interestingly, Davros feels a small kinship with the Doctor, due to their shared experiences and to the fact that the Doctor is one of the only people he's met who can match him intellectually.

THE MASTER

When he was a boy, the Doctor dreamed of freedom, of leaving behind the confines and stifling rules of the society of Time Lords. He was not alone. Another boy, a friend of his at the Academy on Gallifrey, felt the same way.

Like the Doctor, this other boy grew up to be a Time Lord and eventually denounced his society, journeying into the cosmos in his TARDIS. But whereas the Doctor seeks knowledge for its own sake, this renegade Time Lord sees knowledge as a means to an end. This renegade seeks to dominate all life in the universe. Like the Doctor, his true name is unknown. He has used different aliases but, more often than not, simply calls himself the Master.

Just as the Doctor enjoys meeting people and adventuring for its own sake, the Master takes an obvious pleasure in exerting his will over others and in proving how inferior or insignificant other beings are compared to him. He will gladly sacrifice a thousand sentient beings if he thinks he can learn something from the experience. He has literally destroyed planets in his quest for power.

Time Lords are mildly telepathic and the Master has highly developed these skills. Not only is he able to hypnotize people with complex instructions, forcing them to do things they normally wouldn't, but he has, at times, seemed to peek into the Doctor's basic thoughts. Concerning the Master being able to predict his actions, the Doctor once commented "In many ways, we have the same mind."

Due to his dangerous lifestyle, the Master went through his lives fairly quickly. The novel "Dark Half" claimed that he lost the majority of his lives when the Second Doctor caused him to pilot into a black hole. When he reached his final incarnation, he was little more than an animated corpse barely clinging to life through sheer will alone. Knowing he had little time left, he became obsessed with gaining immortality or a new set of regenerations. His quest caused him to almost destroy Gallifrey itself and later he attempted to steal the Doctor's body and all his remaining regenerations.

The Master finally succeeded in projecting his consciousness into the mind of a scientist from Traken, giving himself a new body while killing the mind of his host in the process. Thus, the Master was able to break the 13th life limitation of Time Lords. However, he was still vulnerable, since this non-Time Lord body lacked the ability to regenerate.

Years later, the Master was seemingly killed by the Daleks. However, he had taken precautions and was able to keep his consciousness alive, housed inside the form of a slug-like parasite. He then took over the body of an unsuspecting human, giving him a 15th life. Hours later, a battle with the Doctor ended with the Master hurled into the time-space vortex. In the 8th Doctor comic strips in Doctor Who Magazine, it was shown that the Master escaped from the vortex and transmitted his mind into yet another human being, giving him a 16th life. He amassed great power as he once again tried to achieve universal domination, but was defeated, his body and mind seemingly ripped apart and scattered throughout space and time. But can a man who's cheated death so often before ever truly be gone?

Interestingly, although he obviously hates the Doctor for his interference in his schemes, he also has an obvious respect for the heroic Time Lord and has often wished they could work together instead of acting as enemies. During the TV adventure "The Five Doctors", the Master learned of a plot to erase his rival from existence and was shocked, whispering, "A universe without the Doctor scarcely bares thinking about!" And in "The Mind of Evil", it was revealed that one of the Master's greatest fears would one day find him simply amusing and laugh at his efforts, finding him ridiculous and not at all intimidating.

OTHER SIGNIFICANT FOES

The Eternals - A race who lives in the space-time vortex itself, they are truly immortal and can control matter and energy to a large degree. They can summon forth whatever they wish, but the fact is that they have no imagination. Thus, they are dependent on mortal beings (whom they call "ephemerals") to give their lives meaning and to give them ideas of what to do with their lives.

In the novels, it was said that the ancient people of Gallifrey were visited by some Eternals, whom they mistook for gods. One of these Eternals, who named herself Death, fought the Seventh Doctor in a few novels and in an audio play. Another of these ancient Eternals was called Time and it is interesting to note that the Seventh Doctor called himself "Time's Champion" on occasion.

During the Last Great Time War, which ended just before the new modern-day TV series began, the Eternals grew fearful of the destruction that was being wrought and they all left our universe entirely. They are still mentioned occasionally in the new TV series.

The Sontaran Empire - A race of warrior clones, the Sontarans have been at war with the Rutons for many, many centuries. The Sontarans are one of the only races to have invaded the planet Gallifrey. They possess very limited time travel technology but are usually more interested in direct warfare.

Sontarans are very strong and single-minded in their purpose of conquest. Because they are clones bred from birth for warfare, they all tend to think alike. One significant weakness is that they do not understand the complex emotions of other beings who prize individuality, and so they can be surprised by seemingly irrational actions. They also have a vent at the back of their suits that, if struck or blocked, can cause their muscles to painfully sieze up for several moments.

Do any of these folks show up in the new, modern-day series? Go watch the DVDs and find out!