The Valeyard

The Valeyard, as he appeared in The Mysterious Planet

**The Valeyard** was the alias most commonly used by a sinister renegade. He was in some sense an emanation or incarnation of the Doctor, although his exact nature relative to the Sixth Doctor was shrouded in mystery, with the Valeyard himself creating multiple fanciful accounts of his own origins. Whatever he was, the Valeyard did not have, or had run out of, regenerations, and was primarily motivated by his desire to steal the Doctor's own regenerations for himself.

## Biography

### Origins

#### Creation of the High Council

In one account, the Tremas Master explained that the Valeyard was an "amalgamation of the darker sides of [the Doctor's] nature, [taken] somewhere between [his] twelfth and final incarnation". (TV: *The Ultimate Foe*)

#### Future Doctor

According to another account, however, what the Tremas Master actually said was that the Valeyard was the Doctor's "penultimate reincarnation… somewhere between [their] twelfth and thirteenth regenerations". (PROSE: *The Ultimate Foe*)

### First meeting with the Doctor

On behalf of the corrupt High Council, seeking to cover up the Ravolox affair that the Sixth Doctor had accidentally uncovered, the Valeyard acted as the prosecutor in the Doctor's trial in exchange for his seven remaining regenerations. (TV: *The Ultimate Foe*) Keeping his end of the bargain, the Valeyard presented extracts from the Matrix depicting recent events in the Doctor's life as evidence of the Doctor violating the Time Lords' non-interference policy. (TV: *The Mysterious Planet*, *Mindwarp*)

Unbeknownst to the Time Lord jury present at the trial, the Valeyard had tampered with the Matrix extracts to show the Doctor in the worst possible light and steer the trial to a guilty verdict. He created the impression of the Doctor abandoning his companion, Peri Brown, to save himself, (TV: *Mindwarp*) and also added the charge of the genocide of the Vervoids, despite their artificial nature and the act being from the Doctor's future. (TV: *Terror of the Vervoids*)

The Master eventually stepped in after taking delight in seeing the Doctor's plight, sending Sabalom Glitz and Melanie Bush to act as witnesses for the Doctor's version of events, and revealed the Valeyard's origin and motives. The Valeyard escaped into the Matrix via the Seventh Door, which he opened with a copy of the Key of Rassilon. He was pursued and finally defeated by the Sixth Doctor when he tried to use a particle disseminator to destroy the court at the Doctor's trial. The Doctor programmed the disseminator to feed back into the Matrix and escaped before the resulting blast apparently destroyed the Valeyard. The Inquisitor dismissed the trial. However, as the Sixth Doctor and Mel departed, the Valeyard was secretly still present – having somehow escaped under the guise of the Keeper of the Matrix. (TV: *The Ultimate Foe*)

### Return

The Valeyard later tangled with the Doctor in his ninth incarnation, revealing his mastery of the Dark Matrix, a counterpart of the original. He assumed the identity of Jack the Ripper and used the Ripper murders to "feed" the Matrix. He tried to use its power to give himself a true body, unconcerned with the dangers his actions posed to history. While he committed the Ripper murders, he used the Dark Matrix to reach into his past to corrupt the Doctor's other selves to do his work, such as driving the Doctor to destroy other Time Lords as he left Gallifrey in his first incarnation, his fourth incarnation into destroying the Daleks at their beginning and his fifth incarnation into drinking the bat's milk himself while Peri died in his place. These corrupted incarnations became wraiths in the Valeyard's TARDIS, resembling cloaked, twisted versions of themselves, which he could subsequently use as his agents.

After the Ninth Doctor was attacked by one of the Valeyard's wraiths, he attempted to leave Lena Haigh in Victorian London for safety, only to nearly fall under the Valeyard's influence before he sealed his conscious mind in the TARDIS' telepathic circuits. After wandering London as an amnesic cardsharp by the name "Johnny", the Doctor was reunited with the circuits in time to save Lena from being the Ripper's sixth victim.

Tracking the Valeyard to the church where he had established his base, the Doctor confronted his enemy - who stated that he now called himself "the Ripper" as he found the name more evocative - while the Ripper summoned the wraiths of the other twelve Doctors to confront the Ninth. Fleeing deeper into the tomb that was the Valeyard's TARDIS, the Doctor provoked the Matrix into rebellion against the Valeyard's control, informing it that it was still as trapped now as it had been on Gallifrey, resulting in it lashing out from its prison in the Valeyard's TARDIS. He fought the Ripper on the top the church, but the destruction of the Valeyard's TARDIS and the subsequent release of energy caused by the 'rebellion' of the Dark Matrix seemingly killed the Valeyard and restored history to normal. (TV: *Matrix*)

## Personality

The Valeyard was similar to several of the Doctor's incarnations, cunning and verbal, with a knack for manipulation. He had a bit of a temper, and was prone to outbursts, but generally calm and collected, also traits of several incarnations of the Doctor. However, his actions were constantly defined by his egotism. The Valeyard would risk or sacrifice anything to ensure his own existence, even break the Laws of Time and kill his own past self and try to control the Dark Matrix despite the dangers its presence would pose to established history. (TV: *The Mysterious Planet*, *The Ultimate Foe*, *Matrix*)

## Appearance

The Valeyard appeared as a middle-aged man, with light grey eyes and short black hair. In full courtly dress, the Valeyard wore long black robes with a stiff black collar edged in white and a black skullcap. After the trial of the Doctor, the Valeyard at least temporarily became the Keeper of the Matrix; this time he wore an orange version of his previous outfit with a stiff collar. (TV: *Mindwarp*, *The Ultimate Foe*)

Inside the Matrix, he disguised himself as Mr Popplewick, a slightly overweight man with curly blond hair. In this capacity, he wore human clothes typical of the 19th/early 20th century which included a white shirt and a vest under a large blue jacket. He also wore a bow tie and a pair of glasses. (TV: *The Ultimate Foe*)

While acting as the Ripper in London in 1888, he was typically shown wearing a long dark robe that concealed most of his features. He had grown noticeably older by this point, with noticeable wrinkles on his face and greying hair. (TV: *Matrix*)

## Behind the Scenes

### Possible origins

* Some of the background for the Valeyard was lost due to creative differences between John Nathan-Turner, *Doctor Who*'s producer, and script editor Eric Saward. An earlier draft of *The Ultimate Foe* made it clear that the Doctor would definitely, at some stage, turn into the Valeyard, desperate to extend his life after his remaining regenerations had run out — a situation not dissimilar to the one earlier faced by the Decayed Master. Nathan-Turner did not favour the dark nature of these and other developments in the script and felt this plot point would allow cancellation of the series for bookending the Doctor's future destiny. This fear was justified by the then-recent hiatus placed on the show by BBC One controller Michael Grade. Pip and Jane Baker ended up patching up the continuity — without reference to the scripts, for legal reasons.
* In the novelisation of *The Ultimate Foe,* the Master states, "The Valeyard, Doctor, is your penultimate reincarnation... Somewhere between your twelfth and thirteenth regeneration."

### Other matters

* Contrary to the in-universe definition, "Valeyard" is not a genuine legal title meaning "learned court prosecutor". The word was entirely made-up by writer Robert Holmes. The title does bear some similarity to the French word "vieillard", meaning "old man".
* The Valeyard appeared in the unauthorised fan novel charity publication *Time's Champion* begun by Craig Hinton and completed by Chris McKeon.

## Appearances

### Season 23

* *The Mysterious Planet*
* *Mindwarp*
* *Terror of the Vervoids*
* *The Ultimate Foe*