Valeyard
Encyclopedia
The Valeyard is a fictional character
from the long-running British
science fiction television
series, Doctor Who
. He is described as an aspect of the Doctor
from between his twelfth and final incarnations as depicted in the TV show or regenerations in the novelization of the story. In the serial The Trial of a Time Lord
, comprising the whole of Season 23 of the series, the Time Lord
s appoint the Valeyard as prosecutor at the Sixth Doctor
's trial, hoping to have him executed - thereby removing the sole witness to their near-destruction of life on Earth.
, Mindwarp
, Terror of the Vervoids
and The Ultimate Foe
. In episode 4 of The Mysterious Planet it is stated that "valeyard" means "learned court prosecutor" in their language, although the term is obsolete and highly obscure.
During the course of the trial, the Doctor
was accused of "conduct unbecoming a Time Lord" and transgressing the First Law of Time. As prosecutor, the Valeyard presented the events of The Mysterious Planet
and Mindwarp
as extracts from the Matrix
, the computer network that serves as the repository of all Time Lord knowledge. The Valeyard used these extracts as evidence of the Doctor's meddling in time and space. Throughout the presentation of the evidence the Doctor barked at the Valeyard, calling him names such as "the Boneyard," "the Scrapyard," and "the Knacker
's Yard," and only the interventions of the Inquisitor, another Time Lord, kept the trial going.
What was not discovered until later was that the Matrix extracts had been tampered with to show the Doctor in the worst possible light, the Doctor unable to directly contradict some of the actions shown as his own memory of the events depicted was hazy due to his extraction from time having disorientated his memory. In The Mysterious Planet this involved the editing of particular scenes. Scenes of the mercenary Sabalom Glitz
attempting to buy "secrets" from the robot Drathro were censored completely. In Mindwarp substantial portions of the extract were falsified entirely by the Valeyard. The most significant alteration was when the Time Lords intervened in the brain transplant experiments of Lord Kiv and his scientist Crozier. In the Matrix extract, it appeared that Yrcanos was manoeuvred into killing the Mentors after Kiv's mind had been transplanted into the body of the Doctor's companion
Peri
– the Doctor having apparently betrayed Peri to save himself after exposure to one of the machines in the lab temporarily altered his personality – effectively killing her.
When the Doctor presented in his defence the future events of Terror of the Vervoids
, he began to suspect that the Valeyard was tampering with the evidence – having reviewed the evidence before presenting it and noting some differences between what he had witnessed then and what was now being displayed – but lacked proof. The Doctor was shown being forced to destroy the human-plant hybrids known as the Vervoids when they ran rampant on a space liner. If they had been allowed to reach Earth they would have eliminated all animal life. The Valeyard argued that this meant the Doctor had committed genocide
.
In The Ultimate Foe
, the Master
appeared in the Matrix, revealing that it was possible to infiltrate it. Sabalom Glitz and the Doctor's future companion Melanie Bush
were presented to the Court to rebut the Valeyard's accusations. It was then revealed that the Valeyard was, in fact, the Doctor himself — or rather, a distillation of the Doctor's evil side, a potential dark version who might exist around his twelfth and final incarnation. This concept is similar to the ethereal "Watcher" that manifested itself to bridge the gap between his fourth
and fifth
incarnations (Logopolis
). However, in the novelisation of the story the Master states "The Valeyard, Doctor, is your penultimate reincarnation... Somewhere between your twelfth and thirteenth regeneration".
The Valeyard was also revealed to be acting at the behest of the High Council of Time Lords to cover its corruption in the Ravalox affair
. The "secrets" that Glitz had been seeking were information from the Matrix. Ravalox was Earth, but the Time Lords moved it through space, killing virtually every human being living on it. To prevent the Doctor discovering the secret and revealing it, they used the Valeyard to try to have the Doctor executed under the pretence of a trial. The reward for the Valeyard's actions would have been to give him all of the Doctor's remaining regenerations and make his existence concrete. However, the Valeyard would then have slain every member of the Court as well, using a particle disseminator located within the Matrix.
The Doctor entered the Matrix and fought and defeated the Valeyard in a fictional world of his creation. The Inquisitor revealed that Peri had indeed survived and was married to Yrcanos. The Master and the Valeyard appeared to be trapped in the Matrix, with the Valeyard apparently being destroyed by the feedback from the particle disseminator, but at the end of the serial, the Valeyard was seen disguised as the Keeper of the Matrix. The subsequent whereabouts of the Valeyard have never been disclosed in the television series.
media. In these stories, the Doctor is aware that he has the potential to become the Valeyard and tries to step away from any path that might lead him to that future. In the Virgin Publishing Missing Adventure Millennial Rites
by Craig Hinton, the Sixth Doctor succumbed to his darker side and became the Valeyard very briefly due to reality being destabilised by three competing laws of physics being concentrated in one place, but snapped back to normal after he nearly killed an innocent child, allowing his true conscience to assert itself.
Throughout the New Adventures, the Seventh Doctor
is tormented by the knowledge that he might become the Valeyard, with it being implied that his potential presence in the Doctor's mind drove the Sixth Doctor to commit 'suicide' by allowing the TARDIS to be caught in the Rani
's tractor beam. With this revelation, the memory of the Sixth Doctor becomes increasingly associated with the Valeyard in the Seventh Doctor's mind, causing the past five Doctors to 'lock' the Sixth Doctor's memory away for fear of what he might become. However, in The Room With No Doors
, the Doctor learns to forgive himself for his past sins, removing the guilt that would have led to the Valeyard's creation and freeing the Sixth Doctor from the room.
In the BBC Books
novel The Eight Doctors
, by Terrance Dicks
, the Eighth Doctor
returns to the trial of the Sixth Doctor and rescues him from an alternate timeline in which the Sixth Doctor is about to be executed by the Valeyard, the Eighth Doctor denouncing the charge of genocide as ludicrous due to the Vervoids having been artificially created rather than a naturally-evolving species. The Master reinforces the statement made in The Ultimate Foe
novelization to the Eighth Doctor--that the Valeyard is "an amalgam of the Doctor's darker side, somewhere between his twelfth and thirteenth regenerations." This combined with the information from The Twin Dilemma
reinforces the idea that the Valeyard is indeed the Doctor's thirteenth and last "normal" incarnation.
In the Past Doctor Adventures
novel Mission: Impractical
by David A. McIntee
, the villanous Mr Zimmerman, a renegade Time Lord who had hired two assassins to kill the Doctor, refers to the Sixth Doctor as "I" before correcting himself. McIntee has confirmed that this is a subtle hint that Zimmerman was actually the Valeyard.
In Matrix
by Robert Perry and Mike Tucker
, the Valeyard again appears, and encounters the Seventh Doctor
. After possessing the body of the Keeper, he acquires control over the Dark Matrix, the repository of all of the Time Lords' most evil impulses, and tries to use it to take revenge on the Doctor. To this end, he travels to London in 1888, taking on the identity of Jack the Ripper
, and using the Ripper murders as sacrifices to power the Dark Matrix, believing that he can use and control the Matrix to grant himself a true existence independent of the Doctor. Once it has enough power, the Dark Matrix will be unleashed on the world, creating a dystopia
n nightmare and corrupting history forever. As an added bonus, the Valeyard has tracked down all thirteen incarnations of the Doctor, reverting them to their basic, evil natures, using their corrupted spirits to animate golem
s to do his work. However, the Seventh Doctor escapes the Valeyard's attack by sealing his conscious mind away from the assault in the TARDIS telepathic circuits, although this briefly leaves him as nothing more than an amnesic cardsharp who calls himself 'Johnny'. Having regained his memory, the Doctor confronts the Valeyard (now calling himself "the Ripper" on the grounds that the name is more evocative), causing his foe to lose control of the Dark Matrix. The Valeyard is eventually killed by a lightning bolt being generated by his damaged TARDIS
as it collapses, and history is restored to normal.
A novel from the late Doctor Who author Craig Hinton
, Time's Champion
, was to have featured the Valeyard once again alongside the sixth incarnation of the Doctor. Connecting plot lines from the Virgin novels' New and Missing Adventures range, the narrative centered upon the circumstances involving the sixth Doctor's regeneration and also the purpose and origins of the Valeyard. A synopsis of the novel was rejected by BBC Books (who published another novel dealing with the Sixth Doctor's regeneration, Spiral Scratch
, around the same time). According to Hinton's friend and co-writer Chris McKeon, this compelled McKeon to begin working on an unofficial publication of the book, based in part on the six chapter synopsis (and including the three pages of text) Hinton had completed. McKeon would go on to complete the novel upon Hinton's death. The novel was edited and published by David J. Howe
as a benefit for the British Heart Foundation
.
The Doctor Who Reprint Society
are currently campaigning to have a collected edition of the Valeyard's further mentoins collected in a single volume.
The Big Finish Productions
' Doctor Who Unbound audio drama He Jests at Scars...
documents an alternative timeline in which the Valeyard, once again voiced by Michael Jayston, has defeated the Doctor (in the aftermath of the trial) and gone on to ransack time and space. He has forged an empire by carefully eliminating time sensitives and altering his own (i.e. the Doctor's) past to his advantage, monopolising time travel and claiming the various doomsday weapons the Doctor left buried and concealed for his own use. The Doctor's companion Mel, hardened by many years of dark experience, eventually tracks him down with a view to assassinating the Valeyard after confirming that there is nothing of the Doctor left in him, but finds that he has become the victim of his own time meddling, having unintentionally twisted his own past so much- such as accidentally killing the Fourth Doctor
, or planning to kill the First Doctor
's companion Dodo Chaplet
to stop the Doctor visiting a planet for a holiday at the same time as the Valeyard destroyed it- due to his lack of the Doctor's compassion and knowledge of when not to take certain actions, that he has trapped himself in the TARDIS, terrified even to move in case he makes things worse, the TARDIS having diverted all its power to keeping the Valeyard and Mel in stasis, only able to move enough to talk. Mel and a seemingly repentant, broken Valeyard suffer the penalty for breaking the Time Lords' first law, and become trapped in the TARDIS, perhaps forever enmeshed in the centre of the web of time.
The IDW Doctor Who comic series "The Forgotten" featured another individual calling himself "The Valeyard", but this was revealed to be a disguise taken by a cranial parasite while it and the Tenth Doctor
were trapped in the TARDIS' matrix.
Fictional character
A character is the representation of a person in a narrative work of art . Derived from the ancient Greek word kharaktêr , the earliest use in English, in this sense, dates from the Restoration, although it became widely used after its appearance in Tom Jones in 1749. From this, the sense of...
from the long-running British
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
science fiction television
Science fiction on television
Science fiction first appeared on a television program during the Golden Age of Science Fiction. Special effects and other production techniques allow creators to present a living visual image of an imaginary world not limited by the constraints of reality; this makes television an excellent medium...
series, Doctor Who
Doctor Who
Doctor Who is a British science fiction television programme produced by the BBC. The programme depicts the adventures of a time-travelling humanoid alien known as the Doctor who explores the universe in a sentient time machine called the TARDIS that flies through time and space, whose exterior...
. He is described as an aspect of the Doctor
Doctor (Doctor Who)
The Doctor is the central character in the long-running BBC television science-fiction series Doctor Who, and has also featured in two cinema feature films, a vast range of spin-off novels, audio dramas and comic strips connected to the series....
from between his twelfth and final incarnations as depicted in the TV show or regenerations in the novelization of the story. In the serial The Trial of a Time Lord
The Trial of a Time Lord
The Trial of a Time Lord is a fourteen-part British science fiction serial of the long running BBC series Doctor Who. The serial, produced as the twenty-third season of the Doctor Who television series, aired in weekly episodes from 6 September to 6 December 1986...
, comprising the whole of Season 23 of the series, the Time Lord
Time Lord
The Time Lords are an ancient extraterrestrial race and civilization of humanoids in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, of which the series' eponymous protagonist, the Doctor, is a member...
s appoint the Valeyard as prosecutor at the Sixth Doctor
Sixth Doctor
The Sixth Doctor is the sixth incarnation of the protagonist of the long-running BBC television science-fiction series Doctor Who. He was portrayed by Colin Baker...
's trial, hoping to have him executed - thereby removing the sole witness to their near-destruction of life on Earth.
In The Trial of a Time Lord
The Valeyard appears in all four segments of Trial — The Mysterious PlanetThe Mysterious Planet
-Preproduction:In February 1985, the BBC announced that the planned twenty-third season of Doctor Who had been cancelled. After vocal protests by the press and Doctor Who fans , the BBC announced that the programme was merely on "hiatus", and would return in September 1986...
, Mindwarp
Mindwarp
Mindwarp is a serial in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast in four weekly parts from 4 October to 25 October 1986. It is part of the larger narrative known as The Trial of a Time Lord, encompassing the whole of the 23rd season...
, Terror of the Vervoids
Terror of the Vervoids
Terror of the Vervoids is the title commonly used for a serial in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast in four weekly parts from 1 November to 22 November 1986. It is part of the larger narrative known as The Trial of a Time Lord, emcompassing the...
and The Ultimate Foe
The Ultimate Foe
The Ultimate Foe is the generally accepted title for a serial in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast in two weekly parts from 29 November to 6 December 1986. It is part of the larger narrative known as The Trial of a Time Lord, encompassing the whole...
. In episode 4 of The Mysterious Planet it is stated that "valeyard" means "learned court prosecutor" in their language, although the term is obsolete and highly obscure.
During the course of the trial, the Doctor
Doctor (Doctor Who)
The Doctor is the central character in the long-running BBC television science-fiction series Doctor Who, and has also featured in two cinema feature films, a vast range of spin-off novels, audio dramas and comic strips connected to the series....
was accused of "conduct unbecoming a Time Lord" and transgressing the First Law of Time. As prosecutor, the Valeyard presented the events of The Mysterious Planet
The Mysterious Planet
-Preproduction:In February 1985, the BBC announced that the planned twenty-third season of Doctor Who had been cancelled. After vocal protests by the press and Doctor Who fans , the BBC announced that the programme was merely on "hiatus", and would return in September 1986...
and Mindwarp
Mindwarp
Mindwarp is a serial in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast in four weekly parts from 4 October to 25 October 1986. It is part of the larger narrative known as The Trial of a Time Lord, encompassing the whole of the 23rd season...
as extracts from the Matrix
Matrix (Doctor Who)
The Matrix, in the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who, is a massive computer system on the planet Gallifrey that acts as the repository of the combined knowledge of the Time Lords....
, the computer network that serves as the repository of all Time Lord knowledge. The Valeyard used these extracts as evidence of the Doctor's meddling in time and space. Throughout the presentation of the evidence the Doctor barked at the Valeyard, calling him names such as "the Boneyard," "the Scrapyard," and "the Knacker
Knacker
A knacker is a person in the trade of rendering animals that are unfit for human consumption, such as horses that can no longer work. This leads to the slang expression "knackered" meaning very tired, or "ready for the knacker’s yard", where old horses are slaughtered and made into dog food and glue...
's Yard," and only the interventions of the Inquisitor, another Time Lord, kept the trial going.
What was not discovered until later was that the Matrix extracts had been tampered with to show the Doctor in the worst possible light, the Doctor unable to directly contradict some of the actions shown as his own memory of the events depicted was hazy due to his extraction from time having disorientated his memory. In The Mysterious Planet this involved the editing of particular scenes. Scenes of the mercenary Sabalom Glitz
Sabalom Glitz
Sabalom Glitz is a fictional character from the long-running British science fiction television series, Doctor Who. Glitz is a rogue from the planet Salostophus in the Andromeda Constellation. Glitz's first love is money, and he is often engaged in mercenary acts and profiteering...
attempting to buy "secrets" from the robot Drathro were censored completely. In Mindwarp substantial portions of the extract were falsified entirely by the Valeyard. The most significant alteration was when the Time Lords intervened in the brain transplant experiments of Lord Kiv and his scientist Crozier. In the Matrix extract, it appeared that Yrcanos was manoeuvred into killing the Mentors after Kiv's mind had been transplanted into the body of the Doctor's companion
Companion (Doctor Who)
In the long-running BBC television science fiction programme Doctor Who and related works, the term "companion" refers to a character who travels with, and shares the adventures of the Doctor. In most Doctor Who stories, the primary companion acts as both deuteragonist and audience surrogate...
Peri
Peri Brown
Peri Brown, full name Perpugilliam Brown, is a fictional character played by Nicola Bryant in the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who....
– the Doctor having apparently betrayed Peri to save himself after exposure to one of the machines in the lab temporarily altered his personality – effectively killing her.
When the Doctor presented in his defence the future events of Terror of the Vervoids
Terror of the Vervoids
Terror of the Vervoids is the title commonly used for a serial in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast in four weekly parts from 1 November to 22 November 1986. It is part of the larger narrative known as The Trial of a Time Lord, emcompassing the...
, he began to suspect that the Valeyard was tampering with the evidence – having reviewed the evidence before presenting it and noting some differences between what he had witnessed then and what was now being displayed – but lacked proof. The Doctor was shown being forced to destroy the human-plant hybrids known as the Vervoids when they ran rampant on a space liner. If they had been allowed to reach Earth they would have eliminated all animal life. The Valeyard argued that this meant the Doctor had committed genocide
Genocide
Genocide is defined as "the deliberate and systematic destruction, in whole or in part, of an ethnic, racial, religious, or national group", though what constitutes enough of a "part" to qualify as genocide has been subject to much debate by legal scholars...
.
In The Ultimate Foe
The Ultimate Foe
The Ultimate Foe is the generally accepted title for a serial in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast in two weekly parts from 29 November to 6 December 1986. It is part of the larger narrative known as The Trial of a Time Lord, encompassing the whole...
, the Master
Master (Doctor Who)
The Master is a recurring character in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who. He is a renegade Time Lord and the archenemy of the Doctor....
appeared in the Matrix, revealing that it was possible to infiltrate it. Sabalom Glitz and the Doctor's future companion Melanie Bush
Melanie Bush
Mel, also sometimes referred to as Melanie, is a fictional character in the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who. A computer programmer from the 20th Century who is a companion of the Sixth and Seventh Doctors, she was a regular in the programme from 1986 to 1987...
were presented to the Court to rebut the Valeyard's accusations. It was then revealed that the Valeyard was, in fact, the Doctor himself — or rather, a distillation of the Doctor's evil side, a potential dark version who might exist around his twelfth and final incarnation. This concept is similar to the ethereal "Watcher" that manifested itself to bridge the gap between his fourth
Fourth Doctor
The Fourth Doctor is the fourth incarnation of the protagonist of the long-running BBC British television science-fiction series Doctor Who....
and fifth
Fifth Doctor
The Fifth Doctor is the fifth incarnation of the protagonist of the long-running BBC television science-fiction series Doctor Who. He is portrayed by Peter Davison....
incarnations (Logopolis
Logopolis
Logopolis is a serial in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast in four weekly parts from 28 February to 21 March 1981. It was Tom Baker's last story as the Doctor and marks the first appearance of Peter Davison in the role...
). However, in the novelisation of the story the Master states "The Valeyard, Doctor, is your penultimate reincarnation... Somewhere between your twelfth and thirteenth regeneration".
The Valeyard was also revealed to be acting at the behest of the High Council of Time Lords to cover its corruption in the Ravalox affair
The Mysterious Planet
-Preproduction:In February 1985, the BBC announced that the planned twenty-third season of Doctor Who had been cancelled. After vocal protests by the press and Doctor Who fans , the BBC announced that the programme was merely on "hiatus", and would return in September 1986...
. The "secrets" that Glitz had been seeking were information from the Matrix. Ravalox was Earth, but the Time Lords moved it through space, killing virtually every human being living on it. To prevent the Doctor discovering the secret and revealing it, they used the Valeyard to try to have the Doctor executed under the pretence of a trial. The reward for the Valeyard's actions would have been to give him all of the Doctor's remaining regenerations and make his existence concrete. However, the Valeyard would then have slain every member of the Court as well, using a particle disseminator located within the Matrix.
The Doctor entered the Matrix and fought and defeated the Valeyard in a fictional world of his creation. The Inquisitor revealed that Peri had indeed survived and was married to Yrcanos. The Master and the Valeyard appeared to be trapped in the Matrix, with the Valeyard apparently being destroyed by the feedback from the particle disseminator, but at the end of the serial, the Valeyard was seen disguised as the Keeper of the Matrix. The subsequent whereabouts of the Valeyard have never been disclosed in the television series.
Other appearances
The Valeyard has appeared in some of the spin-offDoctor Who spin-offs
Doctor Who spin-offs refers to material created outside of, but related to, the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who....
media. In these stories, the Doctor is aware that he has the potential to become the Valeyard and tries to step away from any path that might lead him to that future. In the Virgin Publishing Missing Adventure Millennial Rites
Millennial Rites
Millennial Rites is an original novel written by Craig Hinton and based on the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who...
by Craig Hinton, the Sixth Doctor succumbed to his darker side and became the Valeyard very briefly due to reality being destabilised by three competing laws of physics being concentrated in one place, but snapped back to normal after he nearly killed an innocent child, allowing his true conscience to assert itself.
Throughout the New Adventures, the Seventh Doctor
Seventh Doctor
The Seventh Doctor is the seventh incarnation of the protagonist of the long-running BBC television science-fiction series Doctor Who. He was portrayed by the actor Sylvester McCoy....
is tormented by the knowledge that he might become the Valeyard, with it being implied that his potential presence in the Doctor's mind drove the Sixth Doctor to commit 'suicide' by allowing the TARDIS to be caught in the Rani
Rani (Doctor Who)
The Rani is a fictional character in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who. She was played by Kate O'Mara. The word "Rani" means "queen" in the Urdu and Hindi languages and "The Rani" follows the naming convention for other renegade timelords, "The Doctor," "The Monk," "The War...
's tractor beam. With this revelation, the memory of the Sixth Doctor becomes increasingly associated with the Valeyard in the Seventh Doctor's mind, causing the past five Doctors to 'lock' the Sixth Doctor's memory away for fear of what he might become. However, in The Room With No Doors
The Room With No Doors
The Room With No Doors is an original novel written by Kate Orman and based on the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who. It features the Seventh Doctor and Chris....
, the Doctor learns to forgive himself for his past sins, removing the guilt that would have led to the Valeyard's creation and freeing the Sixth Doctor from the room.
In the BBC Books
BBC Books
BBC Books is an imprint majority owned and managed by Random House. The minority shareholder is BBC Worldwide, the commercial subsidiary of the British Broadcasting Corporation...
novel The Eight Doctors
The Eight Doctors
The Eight Doctors is a BBC Books original novel written by Terrance Dicks and based on the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who. It was the first of the Eighth Doctor Adventures range and features the Eighth Doctor and introduces his new companion, Sam Jones.The novel...
, by Terrance Dicks
Terrance Dicks
Terrance Dicks is an English writer, best known for his work in television and for writing a large number of popular children's books during the 1970s and 80s.- Early career :...
, the Eighth Doctor
Eighth Doctor
The Eighth Doctor is the eighth incarnation of the protagonist of the long-running BBC television science-fiction series Doctor Who. He was portrayed by Paul McGann...
returns to the trial of the Sixth Doctor and rescues him from an alternate timeline in which the Sixth Doctor is about to be executed by the Valeyard, the Eighth Doctor denouncing the charge of genocide as ludicrous due to the Vervoids having been artificially created rather than a naturally-evolving species. The Master reinforces the statement made in The Ultimate Foe
The Ultimate Foe
The Ultimate Foe is the generally accepted title for a serial in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast in two weekly parts from 29 November to 6 December 1986. It is part of the larger narrative known as The Trial of a Time Lord, encompassing the whole...
novelization to the Eighth Doctor--that the Valeyard is "an amalgam of the Doctor's darker side, somewhere between his twelfth and thirteenth regenerations." This combined with the information from The Twin Dilemma
The Twin Dilemma
The Twin Dilemma is a serial in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast in four twice-weekly parts from 22 March to 30 March 1984, the first to star Colin Baker in the title role.-Synopsis:...
reinforces the idea that the Valeyard is indeed the Doctor's thirteenth and last "normal" incarnation.
In the Past Doctor Adventures
Past Doctor Adventures
The Past Doctor Adventures were a series of spin-off novels based on the long running BBC science fiction television series Doctor Who and published under the BBC Books imprint. For most of their existence, they were published side-by-side with the Eighth Doctor Adventures...
novel Mission: Impractical
Mission: Impractical
Mission: Impractical is a BBC Books original novel written by David A. McIntee and based on the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who...
by David A. McIntee
David A. McIntee
-Biography:McIntee has written many spin-off novels based on the BBC science fiction television series Doctor Who, as well as one each based on Final Destination and Space: 1999. He has also written a non-fiction book on Star Trek: Voyager and one jointly on the Alien and Predator movie franchises...
, the villanous Mr Zimmerman, a renegade Time Lord who had hired two assassins to kill the Doctor, refers to the Sixth Doctor as "I" before correcting himself. McIntee has confirmed that this is a subtle hint that Zimmerman was actually the Valeyard.
In Matrix
Matrix (Doctor Who novel)
Matrix is a BBC Books original novel written by Mike Tucker and Robert Perry and based on the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who.-Summary:...
by Robert Perry and Mike Tucker
Mike Tucker
Mike Tucker is a special effects expert who worked for many years at the BBC Television Visual Effects Department, and now works as an Effects Supervisor for his own company, The Model Unit. He is also the author of a variety of spin-offs relating to the television series Doctor Who and...
, the Valeyard again appears, and encounters the Seventh Doctor
Seventh Doctor
The Seventh Doctor is the seventh incarnation of the protagonist of the long-running BBC television science-fiction series Doctor Who. He was portrayed by the actor Sylvester McCoy....
. After possessing the body of the Keeper, he acquires control over the Dark Matrix, the repository of all of the Time Lords' most evil impulses, and tries to use it to take revenge on the Doctor. To this end, he travels to London in 1888, taking on the identity of Jack the Ripper
Jack the Ripper
"Jack the Ripper" is the best-known name given to an unidentified serial killer who was active in the largely impoverished areas in and around the Whitechapel district of London in 1888. The name originated in a letter, written by someone claiming to be the murderer, that was disseminated in the...
, and using the Ripper murders as sacrifices to power the Dark Matrix, believing that he can use and control the Matrix to grant himself a true existence independent of the Doctor. Once it has enough power, the Dark Matrix will be unleashed on the world, creating a dystopia
Dystopia
A dystopia is the idea of a society in a repressive and controlled state, often under the guise of being utopian, as characterized in books like Brave New World and Nineteen Eighty-Four...
n nightmare and corrupting history forever. As an added bonus, the Valeyard has tracked down all thirteen incarnations of the Doctor, reverting them to their basic, evil natures, using their corrupted spirits to animate golem
Golem
In Jewish folklore, a golem is an animated anthropomorphic being, created entirely from inanimate matter. The word was used to mean an amorphous, unformed material in Psalms and medieval writing....
s to do his work. However, the Seventh Doctor escapes the Valeyard's attack by sealing his conscious mind away from the assault in the TARDIS telepathic circuits, although this briefly leaves him as nothing more than an amnesic cardsharp who calls himself 'Johnny'. Having regained his memory, the Doctor confronts the Valeyard (now calling himself "the Ripper" on the grounds that the name is more evocative), causing his foe to lose control of the Dark Matrix. The Valeyard is eventually killed by a lightning bolt being generated by his damaged TARDIS
TARDIS
The TARDISGenerally, TARDIS is written in all upper case letters—this convention was popularised by the Target novelisations of the 1970s...
as it collapses, and history is restored to normal.
A novel from the late Doctor Who author Craig Hinton
Craig Hinton
Craig Paul Alexander Hinton was a British writer best known for his work on various spin-offs from the BBC Television series Doctor Who....
, Time's Champion
Time's Champion
Time's Champion is a work of Doctor Who fan fiction, written by Chris McKeon on the basis of an original novel outline by the late Craig Hinton, and incorporating fragments of text by Hinton...
, was to have featured the Valeyard once again alongside the sixth incarnation of the Doctor. Connecting plot lines from the Virgin novels' New and Missing Adventures range, the narrative centered upon the circumstances involving the sixth Doctor's regeneration and also the purpose and origins of the Valeyard. A synopsis of the novel was rejected by BBC Books (who published another novel dealing with the Sixth Doctor's regeneration, Spiral Scratch
Spiral Scratch (Doctor Who)
Spiral Scratch is a BBC Books original novel written by Gary Russell and based on the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who. It features the Sixth Doctor and Mel...
, around the same time). According to Hinton's friend and co-writer Chris McKeon, this compelled McKeon to begin working on an unofficial publication of the book, based in part on the six chapter synopsis (and including the three pages of text) Hinton had completed. McKeon would go on to complete the novel upon Hinton's death. The novel was edited and published by David J. Howe
David J. Howe
David J. Howe is a British writer, journalist, publisher, and media historian.-Biography:David Howe was born in 1961 and established himself as an authoritative media historian through writing articles for fanzines and other publications...
as a benefit for the British Heart Foundation
British Heart Foundation
The British Heart Foundation is a charity organisation in Britain that funds research, education, care and awareness campaigns aimed to prevent heart diseases in humans.-Foundation:...
.
The Doctor Who Reprint Society
are currently campaigning to have a collected edition of the Valeyard's further mentoins collected in a single volume.
The Big Finish Productions
Big Finish Productions
Big Finish Productions is a British company that produces books and audio plays based, primarily, on cult British science fiction properties...
' Doctor Who Unbound audio drama He Jests at Scars...
He Jests at Scars...
He Jests at Scars... is a Big Finish Productions audio drama based on the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who. The Doctor Who Unbound dramas pose a series of "What if...?" questions.-Plot:What if.....
documents an alternative timeline in which the Valeyard, once again voiced by Michael Jayston, has defeated the Doctor (in the aftermath of the trial) and gone on to ransack time and space. He has forged an empire by carefully eliminating time sensitives and altering his own (i.e. the Doctor's) past to his advantage, monopolising time travel and claiming the various doomsday weapons the Doctor left buried and concealed for his own use. The Doctor's companion Mel, hardened by many years of dark experience, eventually tracks him down with a view to assassinating the Valeyard after confirming that there is nothing of the Doctor left in him, but finds that he has become the victim of his own time meddling, having unintentionally twisted his own past so much- such as accidentally killing the Fourth Doctor
Fourth Doctor
The Fourth Doctor is the fourth incarnation of the protagonist of the long-running BBC British television science-fiction series Doctor Who....
, or planning to kill the First Doctor
First Doctor
The First Doctor is the initial incarnation of the protagonist of the long-running BBC television science-fiction series Doctor Who. He was portrayed by the actor William Hartnell from 1963 to 1966. Hartnell reprised the role in the tenth anniversary story The Three Doctors in 1973 - albeit in a...
's companion Dodo Chaplet
Dodo Chaplet
Dorothea "Dodo" Chaplet is a fictional character played by Jackie Lane in the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who. An Earth teenager from the year 1966, she was a companion of the First Doctor and a regular in the programme in its third season, from February to July,...
to stop the Doctor visiting a planet for a holiday at the same time as the Valeyard destroyed it- due to his lack of the Doctor's compassion and knowledge of when not to take certain actions, that he has trapped himself in the TARDIS, terrified even to move in case he makes things worse, the TARDIS having diverted all its power to keeping the Valeyard and Mel in stasis, only able to move enough to talk. Mel and a seemingly repentant, broken Valeyard suffer the penalty for breaking the Time Lords' first law, and become trapped in the TARDIS, perhaps forever enmeshed in the centre of the web of time.
The IDW Doctor Who comic series "The Forgotten" featured another individual calling himself "The Valeyard", but this was revealed to be a disguise taken by a cranial parasite while it and the Tenth Doctor
Tenth Doctor
The Tenth Doctor is the tenth incarnation of the protagonist of the long-running BBC television science-fiction series Doctor Who. He is played by David Tennant, who appears in three series, as well as eight specials...
were trapped in the TARDIS' matrix.