Wayward Melody

There are a lot of great villains in the Doctor Who verse so it would be great to discuss them here.

I also found a poll from the BBC Website that selected the top ten villains from the show:


1. The Daleks
2. The Empty Child Zombies
3. The Beast
4. The Cybermen
5. The Clockwork Droids
6. The Ood
7. The Empress of Racnoss
8. The Werewolf
9. The Autons/Nestenes
10. Chloe’s Dad

I'm actually suprised that Omega was omitted by fans. He's one of the most interesting villians in the fandom because he was once the Time Lords' "greatest hero". Even more suprising than that was that The Master wasn't included. *shakes head* Dunno, silly fans.


Mandy

Raonaild

This looks like a list compiled just after the last Christmas special, and includes only villains from the new series. It doesn't include S3 villains like the Weeping Angels or the Master which I'm sure would beat several on this list.

Omega is a bit of a mixture of villain and hero - he does bad things, but you can sort of sympathize with his motivation. The Time Lords in general are sometimes the bad guys as far as the Doctor is concerned, despite how sentimental he gets about them in the new series.

The interesting thing I find about the villians of Doctor Who is that although there are a few classics like the Daleks, Cybermen and the Master that appear over and over again, most other villains only appear in once over the entire run of the original series. Other than big three, the only villains I can think of who featured in multiple stories in the classic series are:

- Omega
- Sontarans
- Autons/Nestene
- Silurians/Sea Devils
- Ice Warriors
- The White/Black Guardians
- The Rani

Wayward Melody

I forgot about the Ice Warriors. I like them they mastered the art of flip flop too, what with flipping on the Galactic Federation. I think I like many villians, of villians collective rather than a singular villian, I'm weird like that.

Whose your favorite villian, or group, Raonaild?


Mandy

Raonaild

I can't think of a particular favourite at the moment. Of the big three, I like the Master the best, because he's the Doctor's equal, his evil twin as it were, so the Doctor cannot get away with outwitting him as easily as he can other adversaries. I also like the Daleks - including Davros, I find the Daleks more menacing when he's around - because they're just so ruthless and usually appear with such overwelming numbers, and because the Doctor has such a history with them they affect him in a way that other villains don't. I've never been a big fan of the Cybermen though, I don't find them particularly scary.

stoptheqtip

The Master is my favourite. I've never seen the old series, though, so I can't attest to his previous incarnations, but John Simm + The Master =

I don't like the Dalkes. I think the stories with them are pretty weak. I loved Bad Wolf/POTW and Army of Ghosts/Doomsday, but the Daleks had nothing to do with my enjoyment. Usually (particularly s3's story) I usually just roll my eyes, and think "now the obligitary Dalek story is done and dusted, can we please get on with the show, now?" Pretty much the same sort of feel with the Cybermen. I really hope we get a break from both next season.

But I wouldn't mind if John Simm's Master turned up every season, no matter how crap the story was to revive him.



Yeah, somehow I doubt that "Chloe's dad" beat The Master or the Zygons, for example I mean, that just looks like a list of the villians in s1/2. I mean there haven't been many more than ten.

Raonaild

Dalek, Bad Wolf/POTW and Doomsday worked pretty well, but Daleks in Manhattan/Evolution of the Daleks for me was pretty much the worst story of the new series. I wouldn't blame the Daleks for that though, the problem was the story itself - I think RTD got a bit lazy with that one, thinking the Daleks and the Dalek/Human hybrid would get the viewers so excited that we wouldn't notice how poor the story was. Some of the best stories of the old series involved the Daleks though - Genesis of the Daleks and Remembrance of the Daleks are two of my personal favourites.

I think the New Who writers have painted themselves into a corner with the Daleks. Daleks are scariest when they appear in overwelming numbers, like in Bad Wolf/POTW. But in the new series they've been wiped out like the Time Lords with only a few survivors, and in order to get around that the writers have to come up with complicated explanations to justify a) how they survived the Time War, and b) how they also survived Bad Wolf!Rose.

Another problem with New Who is that they've been overdoing it with the Daleks - with the classic series, the 5th, 6th and 7th Doctors only encountered the Daleks one time each over 2-3 years apiece, and in the 7 seasons of the 4th Doctor, he only ran into them twice. In the New Series they've had at least one Dalek episode per season. That hasn't happened since WIlliam Hartnell's time, when they first created the Daleks.

stoptheqtip

I've never found the Daleks scary, because all I've seen is the new series. So when my mother says they used to terrify her as a kid, I'm baffled. Especially when in the same breath she says they were made of tinfoil. DiM/EotD were pretty dire, but not as bad as Fear Her or Love and Monsters IMO.

You're completely right. The writers have backed themselves into a corner- a bit of a Catch 22, really. Because they either have them in ineffective, small numbers or they have to write a contrived story in which they're restored to their former glory.

This is my major problem with it. One season = good. Two seasons = a bit of overkill. Three seasons=

Raonaild

Hey, tinfoil was pretty terrifying back then That and bubblewrap.

Seriously, I don't know that the Daleks were ever made of tinfoil, they're more the monster that was build from a DIY hardware store. It's the Cybermen that were made out of tinfoil. But I can get beyond that if the stories are good - I see the production back as more like a stage play than a feature film, which is what the series these days is like. Like a stage play, the costume/effects are only suggestions, you have to use your imagination to fill in the gaps. The effects with the new series can be taken more literally.

I thought Fear Her was okay, average but not as bad as it's made out to be. Love and Monsters I also strongly disliked, but I think it was a decent concept poorly executed. DiM/EotD was a bad idea from start to finish, and again, I blame RTD for that - I gather the Empire State Building setting, the Pig Men and the Human/Dalek hybrid were all his ideas, and then he left the script to a newbie writer who clearly needed more help.

SiriuslyPotter

I like Love & Monsters, but maybe because I have a crush on Marc Warren for some reason, and I just thought it was very clever and sweet, I can't say I liked the Abzorba - whatever it's called, nor do I like Peter Kay in general.

Helen Raynor who wrote DiM/EoTD wrote one of my favourite Torchwood episodes Ghost Machine so I don't think it's her, I think it's RTD and his to saddle the writers with lists of bizzare concepts.

I'd say my favourite villians are the Weeping Angels and The Family of Blood, the weeping angels because of the simple yet effectiuvely scary concept, and The Family of Blood because they were very creepy.

stoptheqtip

I don't think she meant they were literally made of tinfoil- just that the production values were so low back then, that they might as well have been. See, I just can't get past the dodgy sets/effects/costumes for anything- not the best story in the world, not the greatest actor. Every time I see an episode of classic DW, I think "ooh, this is interesting... wait why is the background MOVING? Why is that monster wearing what looks like the contents of my garage?" I suppose I'm shallow, but I always get distracted by the bad things, rather than the good. I suppose, though, thirty years down the line, people will be mocking and laughing at the dodgy effects of our Doctor Who- and we'll be defending it, saying "hey, CGI was cutting edge back in the Noughties" . So, it's just aged badly.

Yeah, Fear Her was average- I was just bored throughout, except for the occasional scene. L&M was definitely a good idea poorly-executed- I mean, I can remember "Blink" being referred to as the "Love & Monsters" (i.e. lack of the Doctor/Companion and an outsider's POV) of s3- and Blink was absolutely fantastic. Blink had Sally Sparrow, a very captivating female lead (who I was almost hoping would be next companion, but I prefer Donna ) it was incredibly intelligent, its monsters were original and CREEPY and very funny- and was written by- who else?- Steven Moffat. L&M had Andrew Wells Elton Pope (Sally would so kick his ass), a crappy, unoriginal monster and just wasn't funny (although it tried desperately to me) Even the Doctor lacked his normal captivity (and this is DAVID TENNANT- the man breathes it) so the writing had to be pretty awful to make the Doctor seem boring and was written by- guess who?- RTD.

See, the thing is DiM/EotD was complete crap, I was interested- that's the difference, for me. It's a bit like watching a serious documentary- you watch it, and dislike it because it's boring, but you know it's decent, it was just boring. Then you watch something, say, like, American Pie and you know it's all a bit naff, but you enjoy it, because it doesn't take any thought. The perfect balance is something like Blink or Father's Day which is both entertaining and thought-provoking.

The Abzorbaloff. It's so sad I know that. I adore Peter Kay, and I didn't like this episode. I wanted it to be good, too.


I agree. Plus, The Empty Child Zombies, completely freaked me out.

Lost in Translation

They made me sad.

stoptheqtip

Oh, they freaked me out majorly. *shudders* Especially the little boy- until his gas mask came off and he was the most gorgeous little boy ever.

indigo sunrise

they REALLY freaked me out as well. Those and the Weeping Angels are the only Who monsters so far that I found genuinely scary.

Wayward Melody

I like the Daleks, and to me, what makes them sacry and also the Cybermen to some extent is the absence of feeling mostly. To only be able to function in a realm where only things like fear and rage dominate your life would be a pretty lonely and painful existence.

The Empty Child Zombies freak me majorly out, and the way the boy keeps asking “are you my mummy?” Eegads.

RTD's DW is very streamlined. Alot of what made the classic series special was because there were so many things to encounter, so many things we haven't seen or as Raonaild said, a gap between being bomabred with the same things. There are so many villians from the DW universe they could easily be infused into the new series, but it's almost like there is a resistance to do so.


Mandy

stoptheqtip

Hmm, I don't mind it being "streamlined"- to be honest, I'm not interested in the villains (except the Master, doy!) as much as I am about the Doctor. He could be fighting a bin bag (a cost-cutting throwback to the old series, more than likely ) every week and as long as they wrote him well, I'd keep watching. Actually, they could write him terribly, and as long as DT still played the role, I'd keep watching.