Ada Gillyflower, daughter of Mrs. Winifred Gillyflower, is the main character of "the Crimson Horror." She is also one of...three blind characters on Doctor Who that I can think of (at time of writing)? I'm thinking of Elizabeth in "Battlefield" who runs the inn and has the Second Sight (and whose blindness is eventually cured by Morgaine by way ( Read more... )

Last week I talked about the Moroks of Xeros, so today let's talk about the Morlocks of Karfel. They are nothing alike. They are also nothing like their namesakes from the Time Machine, despite being directly based thereon (or, possibly, the inspiration therefor). I blame Herbert; you know how Victorians are - everything's gotta be an allegory ( Read more... )

I have written about "the Space Museum" before in this space, but I can't say I really did it justice. Who could? It's one of my very favorite episodes in the entire show. So let's talk about its villains: the Moroks ( Read more... )

Ohila is the High Priestess of the Sisterhood of Karn, keepers of the Flame of Utter Boredom Eternal Life: everyone's favorite immortality cult whom none of us ever expected to see again. That's the wonderful thing about Doctor Who. It's got a lot of continuity and all of it is fair game. Ohila was not obviously present last time around, but her ( Read more... )

The Sontaran Scout Robot from "the Sontaran Experiment" is probably the worst robot in all of Doctor Who. Hard to say - there are a lot of Killer Robots in Doctor Who, and they're all extremely different from one another. I sometimes think that one of the greatest challenges (and triumphs) of 60s Who was coming up with such a quantity of wholly ( Read more... )

Anne Travers, the third excellent Anne I have covered in this project, is the daughter of Professor Travers, the Earth's foremost expert on Killer Robot Yeti from Outer Space (and also the other type, but they're not nearly so exciting). As such, she is the scientific presence in charge of trying to manage the unexpected influx of web-slinging ( Read more... )

...also known as 'Those Two Random Americans' in "Delta and the Bannermen." I somehow managed to miss them when doing my Fourth of July Spectacular last year, which is a shame because I have mad love for "Delta and the Bannermen" generally and these two idiots in particular. So a year later it's time to rectify this oversight ( Read more... )

In the words of the (fourth) Doctor: "Never trust gimmicky gadgets!" The psychic paper used by the Doctor (and others) is a gimmicky gadget par excellence whose purpose is to answer the age-old question of "Who are you and how did you get into my house" - and should, of course, never ever be trusted ( Read more... )

"The Massacre of Saint Bartholomew's Eve," often abbreviated to "the Massacre," is an exceptionally dark story, set around an exceptionally dark period of human history. It's also an exceptionally odd story, and is perhaps the one that would benefit most from being found. That is to say, things like "Marco Polo" you can tell are excellent even ( Read more... )

I've been showing Doctor Who to a good friend of mine for the first time. We have just finished the Third Doctor's run and she has officially declared the famous Blue Planet of Metebelis III to be the "worst planet ever." Now, I believe Kembel is canonically the worst planet ever, and Androzani Minor is observably the worst planet ever, but ( Read more... )