Take Me To Your Leader: Top 5

Guest contributor Connor Hamilton counts down his top evil leaders.

Anthony Head recently commented about reprising his role as Krillitane leader ‘Mr Finch,’ whose evil plans were foiled by the Doctor in ‘School Reunion.’ This comment came after he was voted the best guest star the show has had since its 2005 return. In light of this statement, it got me thinking about some other cunningly evil and incredible leaders that have graced our screens for the past 10 years. So now I wish to discuss my top 5 truly memorable villainous leaders and what makes them such incredible characters worthy of a return.

5. Max Capricorn

Leader of the Heavenly Host

While Max is one who is fairly hard to make or explain any sort of return, I still really liked him. His pretentious ego and villainous ways made his undeniably cheesy catchline quite haunting. While Mr Capricorn is believably dead after being forklifted into the flaming engines of the Titanic, his reappearance on the show is not impossible, though it’d take a better writer than me to think of a way round that one. His time on the show was brief, hence why I’ve placed him at 5th, however he is still very memorable and quite frankly, leader to one of my favourite villains ever on the show… the deadly Heavenly Host. His attempt to destroy the Titanic and Earth failed, however if succeeded he would merely have hidden away on Penhaxico II where he could live out his days in retirement. That’s quite an evil scheme in my books…

And I should know, because… My name is Max!

4. Miss Foster

Leader of the Adipose

Miss Foster is another deceased villain, yet despite her current state, she was a very good opponent. A lady dressed all in black, armed with a sonic pen, and an evil scheme to take a fattened country and kill them through a dieting plan? You can’t deny that’s one heck of a woman. Portrayed by the incredible Sarah Lancashire, Miss Foster is originally known as Matron Cofelia. However, if you’re Donna Noble, then ‘an outer space Super Nanny’ is the more appropriate terminology. The Doctor foiled this incredible opponent’s schemes, as she planned to use a dieting pill created by ‘Adipose Industries’, to get the fat of Britain transformed into little creatures made up of fat. Matron Cofelia committed a crime by seeding on a Level 5 Planet and was murdered after her accomplices, the First Family, refused to let her onboard the ship when she was mid-teleport, high up in the air. It’s needless to say that Miss Foster is definitely gone, with her falling from such a height, she’s another one I’d struggle to bring back logically. However sometimes, a worthy opponent doesn’t always need to come back, sorry all you Matron Cofelia superfans, time to put your sonic pens back into your drawer.

3. Madame Kovarian

Leader of the Kovarian Chapter

Moving onto people whose return is entirely possible, we analyse the wonderfully cruel and cold-hearted Madame Kovarian, leader of a rebellion army of the Silence. Tired of the ever-growing conflict that the Siege of Trenzalore brought about, Kovarian travelled back in time with some Silents from the Papal Mainframe and engineered River Song, a psychopath to kill the Doctor. It’s needless to say her plans didn’t work and the Doctor is still very much alive. However, Kovarian lives on. While we saw Amy kill her, we later went on to find out that the murder did not count as it took place in an alternate timeline. So Kovarian wherever she may be now, lives on. My reasoning for such a horrific villainess to return is the simplicity of her rancorous emotions for the Doctor. This being a woman who felt so afraid and acrimonious towards the Doctor that she kidnapped a baby from its mother, raised it into a killing machine and barely even batted an eyelid. Kovarian is pure evil, to do such things and not even be used for a return to take another shot at him, that’s a mistake the writers will have to live with.

2. The Beast

Leader of the Ood

The Beast could easily come back. He’s basically the Devil, and I’m certain it’d take more than a renegade Time Lord in a spacesuit to destroy Lucifer himself. Possessing the Ood as his own little army, the Beast was a leader you do not want to mess with. His possessed army killed several passengers onboard the ill-fated Walker Expedition. His army being a race of kind-serving aliens, he managed to take such kindness and turn them into murderers. While Rose did manage to spiritually destroy the Beast, by sending unfortunately possessed Toby flying straight into the black hole, I have reason to believe that the Devil himself, the mighty Beast who lived beneath the core of the Planet Krop Tor, is still alive, and one day we may see him return.

Now in first place, I present who I feel was the BEST leader of the show since its return, having controlled an army of Victorian faceless men, hacked 21st century wifi and people’s minds using electronically hypnotised servants to do the dirty work, and uniting an army of Snowmen to capture the Doctor on a Victorian Christmas Eve… I present to you, my personal favourite villainous leader of the show…

1. The Great Intelligence

Leader of the Whispermen, Snowmen and Mentally Hacked People

There’s no denying it for me, the Great Intelligence, a villain orientated from the classic series of the show, who made a shocking return to the show in the Christmas special ‘The Snowmen’ is 100% the most incredible evil leader there is/was. Possessing a young boy named ‘Walter Simeon’, the Great Intelligence instrumented Simeon right up until old age, until eventually he possessed him. After a few encounters which included hacking people using Wifi, building an army of snowmen and luring the Doctor to Trenzalore using his army of Whispermen, the big old GI showed himself to be an entity not to be messed with.

Eventually the body of Simeon in which the Great Intelligence took form in, was destroyed, after he threw himself into the Doctor’s timeline, making all the Doctor’s victories into failures. Clara threw herself in, wiping Simeon out of the timeline and seemingly taking the Great Intelligence with him. However being an entity, I’d love to see the Great Intelligence make a return once more, in perhaps a newer body, with an even bigger hatred for the Doctor. That’s something I’d love to see happen one day. However with Matt Smith fairly recently facing the GI, I’d give it half a decade before I feel a return would be ultimately necessary.

(Dis) Honourable Mentions

My top 5 sadly misses out some incredible leaders, one being the man who inspired this article, Mr Finch. Others were missed such as the Jagrafess, John Lumic, the Master and the mighty ‘man’ himself… Davros. I majorly enjoyed Davros as a leader, and I feel he is definitely a threat I’d like to see return, however his leadership skills are not something I’d like to see anymore. I’d much rather see […possible spoilers…] the unconfirmed origin story of Davros that the Mirror teased about in Series 9.

Hopefully these mighty villainous leaders, alongside the incredible Anthony Head, make a return if possible some day, however for now, I guess I’ll just have to wait…