Man Who Makes the Greatest Monsters of Doctor Who
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Daleks
First Appearance: "The Daleks," Season 1, 1963
Why They're Important: Well, for one thing, they're the most long-lived of the Doctor Who monsters -- and also the most popular, appearing in every season of the revived show since 2005. They're also an integral part of the larger Who mythology, having been named as the enemies of the Time Lords during the Great Time War which eventually led to the eradication of the Doctor's race. Not bad for a pun of shrill-voiced pepper pots.
Autons
First Appearance: "Spearhead from Space," Season 7, 1970
Why They're Important: The Autons -- life-size plastic dummies animated by an alien presence called the Nestene Consciousness -- occupy a couple of particular places in Who history, being the first monsters to appear in a color episode of the series (Yes, the first six years of the show were in black and white), and also the first monsters to appear in the revived version of the show in 2005. As such, they were also the first monsters to encounter the Third and Ninth Doctors, respectively.
Slitheen
First Appearance: "Aliens of London," Revived series Season 1, 2005
Why They're Important: The Doctor Who Monster equivalent of Mean Girls' "Fetch," the Slitheen were monsters that creator and then-current Who showrunner Russell T. Davies just couldn't let go. They were far more comedic than threatening -- as if they didn't look ridiculous enough, they also had problems with intestinal gas -- and, after a couple of unsuccessful appearances as villains on Who, quickly became recast as comic relief or unscary threats on kid-centric spin-off The Sarah Jane Adventures. In other words, consider them to Doctor Who what the Ferengi were to Star Trek.
Ood
First Appearance: "The Impossible Planet," Revived series Season 2 (2006)
Why They're Important: The Ood are a truly strange case of science-fiction metaphor meeting Hollywood cliche. When we initially meet them, they're an enslaved race who, we're told, have to be kept in servitude for their own good. Of course, this doesn't turn out to be the case, and eventually freed, they evolve into a race of wise, knowing beings who offer guidance and spirituality to others. Whether or not swapping the stereotype of the black slave with the stereotype of the Magical Negro was intentional remains unclear.
Cybermen
First Appearance: "The Tenth Planet," Season 4 (1966)
Why They're Important: Arguably the second-best known of the Doctor Who monsters, the Cybermen represent a particular brand of body (and mental) horror -- what happens to humanity when it gets a little too obsessed with upgrading itself with the use of technology. Part Frankenstein myth, part commentary on group-think and the herd mentality, the Cybermen could be the most chilling of all of the Who monsters -- if only you could ignore their radiator heads.
Weeping Angels
First Appearance: "Blink," Revived series Season 3 (2007)
Why They're Important: Who has a history of making monsters out of everyday objects, as the Autons demonstrate. The Weeping Angels may be the zenith of that particular trend, however -- alien statues that can move only when you're not looking at them, and who are slowly coming to kill you (or, perhaps, transform you into one of them, or maybe throw you back in time to eat your misery. It gets less clear the more often they appear). Their first episode, "Blink," is one of Who's finest moments in the entire 50-year run.
Sontarans
First Appearance: "The Time Warrior," Season 11 (1973)
Why They're Important: Doctor Who is, in many ways, an essentially pacifist show, and one of the places where that may be most obvious is with the Sontarans -- a militaristic race of cloned soldiers who want only war and, more importantly, conquest of others. Despite that, the Sontarans are ridiculous, especially in the revived series' take on them, where their machismo is played for laughs and reinforced with a lack of critical thinking -- or even much intelligence at all, outside of strategic planning. Only Doctor Who would have such glee in satirizing militarized cultures.
Silurians
First Appearance: "Doctor Who and the Silurians," Season 7 (1970)
Why They're Important: The original "owners" of Earth, the Silurians -- also known as the Sea Devils for reasons too oblique to explain here -- are that most welcome of things: Villains who might, actually, have the moral superiority in their conflict with humanity. Since their reappearance in the show's revived incarnation, they've managed to both be partially responsible for the (temporary) death of one of the Doctor's companions and also offered up the fabulous Madame Vastra, Victorian detective and the show's quasi-inspiration for Sherlock Holmes.
Ice Warriors
First Appearance: "The Ice Warriors," Season 5 (1967)
Why They're Important: There's something wonderfully classic about the Ice Warriors' core concept: They're Martians who are invading Earth because they've managed to destroy their own planet and would like a replacement. Although the Warriors have suffered in comparison to other Who monsters -- in many ways, they're like a combination of the Daleks and the Cybermen in terms of motivation -- they reappeared in the most recent season of the revised show, suggesting their particular cold war might be about to heat up again in future episodes.
Zygons
First Appearance: "Terror of the Zygons," Season 13 (1975)
Why They're Important: An invading race of alien shapeshifters, it could be argued that the Zygons aren't incredibly important, as yet. Certainly, they've only appeared in the series once, and despite their distinctive visual, have apparently become part of the long line of threats the Doctor had managed to vanquish and then forget about. But... they are appearing in this Saturday's anniversary episode, with a pre-release promotional video created to remind old fans (and educate new ones) about just how dangerous they can be. So maybe there's more than meets the eye to them after all... as would befit a shapeshifter, when it comes down to it.
The Time Lord, also known as “The Doctor,” has run into a lot of different aliens, monsters and miscellaneous beasties during his five-decade run on the BBC’s Doctor Who. With the show’s 50th anniversary upon us this weekend, WIRED talked to Neill Gorton — director of Millennium FX, which has created prosthetics and makeup for Doctor Who for the last nine years — about what it’s like to make the show’s most memorable monsters (above) appear on-screen.
Although Gorton works with other television series, movies and live events, he said Doctor Who in particular is more than just another job. “There’s no other project we’ve had such a close association with for so long,” he told WIRED. “It can’t help but become part of your life.”
It helps, too, that Gorton was a Who fan long before he started working on the show. “I grew up in Liverpool in the ’70s so I was a long way away from the London-centric film and TV world,” he recalled. “Nearby Blackpool, the Las Vegas of the North, had a permanent Doctor Who exhibition, and on our yearly family day trips to Blackpool I would insist on visiting. I think this was the first time I really started to understand that these things, these creatures and robots and monsters, had to be made by someone. On TV it was magical and far away but here I could see the joins and the seams and paint flaking off. Seeing that they where tangible made them something in my grasp.”
That early love for the show paid off when one of his childhood favorite characters reappeared on the series. “Davros [the cyborg creator of the show's signature monsters, the Daleks] haunted me as a child,” Gorton said. “I remember seeing him on TV and thinking, ‘Where did they find that creepy old man?’ For years, I thought they found a bald old bloke and painted him brown. I pestered Russell T. [Davies, former Doctor Who showrunner] constantly about when I would get to do Davros.”
When the character did reappear in 2008′s “The Stolen Earth,” Gorton said that his work with actor Julian Bleach was “really personal to me… I sculpted [the prosthetics], molded it, painted and applied the makeup on the shoot every day. It’s the only revival of a classic Doctor Who monster that I’ve not heard a single fan moan about. Everyone just loved it.”
After nine years of working on the show, Gorton said that his team and the show’s producers have “a pretty good understanding” of how to deal with the prosthetic effect demands for the show. “It’s like that scene in Apollo 13 when they dump a box of bits on the table and the Nasa guys have to figure out how to make a CO2 scrubber out of odd objects and trash that happens to be aboard,” he joked. “The team is so clever at at getting the maximum effect out of the minimum resources, we’d be able to rustle up an engine modification that’d get us a round trip to Mars on top of fixing up that life support… The reality is the scripted vision always outstrips the budget by a huge margin.”
Although the showrunner usually plots out the season’s stories before Gorton’s team becomes involved — meaning there’s little chance to impact storyline decisions — that’s not always the case. “Last [season], I mentioned to producer Marcus Wilson that I had a couple of cool nine-foot robot suits that could add value to an episode. And several months later Chris Chibnall delivers ‘Dinosaurs on a Spaceship’ with two nine-foot robots taking featured roles!” he said. “Since then I’ve been turfing all kinds of oddities out of my store rooms and excitedly saying ‘How about this?’”
Despite approaching ten years with the show, Gorton believes that the best may be yet to come when it comes to his work on Who. Not only did his team re-create the classic Zygon monsters for this weekend’s 50th anniversary special — “I had campaigned for years to build Zygons, as I just loved their pug faces, barrel chests and complete weirdness” — but he said that this year’s Christmas episode contains something “something very special that I personally created in its entirety, but I can’t tell you what.”
Doctor Who‘s 50th anniversary episode, “The Day of the Doctor,” airs on BBC America at 2:50pm Eastern and 11:50am Pacific on November 23, with 3D cinema screenings in select theaters the following Monday.
