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DOCTOR WHO
The Tragedy of the Master
The story arc of the Doctor’s dearest nemesis — Part One
I’ve been a life long fan of Doctor Who. Going all the way back to the beginning, I haven’t missed an iteration of the Doctor. And yes, they are “the Doctor” — the character has never been “Doctor Who.” That is the name of the show.
The Master is the Doctor’s dearest nemesis. They were children together and friends growing up on the Time Lord home planet of Gallifrey. And, they were rivals at the Time Academy. Viewers first met the Master, then portrayed by Roger Delgado, in “The Terror of the Autons” with the third Doctor, portrayed by Jon Pertwee.
Since that first appearance, the Master and the Doctor have faced off frequently. Over the decades, the nuance of the character has been eked out in dribbles, largely through offhand or filler dialogue in the original run of the TV series (1963–89), in the Fox Entertainment/BBC collaboration movie (1996), and in the long running peripheral series of radio/audio series (Big Finish), plus a prolific series of published books.
The Master was always the villain in the OG series, again with only dribbles of their larger story arc. However, in the rebooted series, their broader story arc is revealed to be basically a calculated creation of the Time…