In ancient Time Lord history, there stands no greater figure than Omega. Omega was a stellar engineer who first experimented with time travel, gifting the Time Lords with their ability to travel through time. Omega created a remote stellar manipulator called the Hand of Omega (Remembrance of the Daleks). Omega was caught in a stellar explosion that trapped him in a universe of anti-matter (The Three Doctors). Bitter and hell bent on revenge, Omega sought to defeat the Time Lords and also wished to return to our universe by any means necessary (Arc of Infinity). The Doctor felt sorry for Omega during his encounters with him in Doctor Who, pitying him for his dire situation. Omega was also known as the Mad God, the Titan and the Original Sin. He wanted to become the God of Time and feast on other Time Lords, including the Rani and the Doctor… (Wish World/The Reality War).

The Three Doctors

★★★★★

TX: 30/12/1972 – 20/01/1973

Written by Bob Baker & Dave Martin    Directed by Lennie Mayne

A mysterious force is draining all the energy from Gallifrey via a black hole. The Time Lords send the first three incarnations of the Doctor over the event horizon to investigate. The Doctors, Jo and U.N.I.T discover that an ancient Time Lord called Omega lives in anti-matter universe on the other side of the black hole. Omega wants revenge on the Time Lords for abandoning him to die following a stellar explosion. Sadly, I never had the pleasure of meeting Stephen Thorne who originally played Omega. Omega tries to persuade the Second and Third Doctors to take over the burden of his duties in the anti-matter realm. However, when the Doctors lift Omega’s mask they make the shocking discovery that Omega has long since eroded and only his will lives on. The Doctors realise that the Second Doctor’s recorder is still made of matter and that it can be used to defeat Omega and to get back home in the TARDIS. After sending home all of the Doctors’ friends, Omega is tricked by the Doctors into taking the recorder which causes an explosion – a result of matter interacting with anti-matter. The Doctors escape back to our universe in the TARDIS. The Time Lords send a new dematerialisation circuit to the Third Doctor and his exile to Earth is lifted as a reward. My dad was born in 1956 and he grew up watching William Hartnell and Patrick Troughton as the Doctor. My mum was born in 1966 and she grew up watching Jon Pertwee as the Doctor. I was born in 1994 and my brother Jonny was born in 1996 and we grew up watching Christopher Eccleston and David Tennant as the Doctor and we watched the show as a family. Doctor Who is a family show!

Arc of Infinity

★★☆☆☆

TX: 03/01/1983 – 12/01/1983

Written by Johnny Byrne    Directed by Ron Jones

A traitor on the High Council of the Time Lords is helping Omega to return to our universe. Omega intends to bond with the Doctor in order to regain a corporeal form in our universe. The Doctor is intercepted inside his TARDIS with Nyssa. The Doctor returns to Gallifrey to discover more when he is arrested, tried and apparently executed. Nyssa manages to help the Doctor to unmask the traitor in the High Council. The Doctor enters the Time Lord Matrix where he finds Omega and a link to his companion Tegan Jovanka, who is currently in Amsterdam. Tegan’s travelling cousin Colin encountered Omega’s anti-matter servant, the Ergon. The Doctor discovers that Omega intends to return to our universe through the Matrix on Gallifrey. The Time Lord Councillor Hedin is revealed as the traitor who transmitted the bio-data. Hedin is in awe of his master, the legendary Time Lord Omega. Hedin wishes to release Omega from his exile in a universe of anti-matter, not realising that the great Time Lord has been driven insane by his years of solitary confinement. The Castellan kills Councillor Hedin, but this does not prevent Omega using the Arc of Infinity to seize total control of the Matrix and come to Earth. When he peels his decayed mask away, he reveals the features of the Doctor, whom he now perfectly resembles.The Doctor, Nyssa and Tegan arrive in Amsterdam where they arrive too late to stop Omega bonding with the Doctor as he has now taken on an identical form to him. Within a short time, the Doctor’s prediction of an unstable transfer begins to come true: Omega’s flesh decays and it is clear his new body is not permanent. When the Doctor and Nyssa catch up with him, it is a painful task for the Doctor to use the Ergon’s anti-matter converter on Omega, expelling him back to his own universe of antimatter. The Time Lord High Council on Gallifrey detects the end of the threat. Once Tegan has checked on her cousin’s progress in hospital, she decides to rejoin the TARDIS crew.

Wish World/The Reality War

★★★★★

TX: 24-31/05/2025

Written by Russell T Davies   Directed by Alex Sanjiv Pillai

On a fantasy world, a young man called John Smith lives an ordinary life with his wife Belinda Chandra and their young daughter (Human Nature/The Family of Blood). The couple are so wrapped up in their idyllic lives that they barely notice mugs falling through their kitchen table. John Smith works in finance at the old U.N.I.T base. However, a mysterious young woman called Ruby turns up on John and Belinda’s doorstep, saying that she knows him but can’t remember why. No explanation can be given either by their neighbour Melanie Bush. The group live in an Orwellian world where doubts about society are illegal (Last of the Time Lords, Day of the Moon, The Lie of the Land) and gigantic skeletal creatures roam the landscape. This is all a diabolical experiment by the two Ranis, who have teamed up with Conrad from Lucky Day to create a Wish World of their own. The Rani has also kidnapped the seventh son of a seventh son in 19th Century Bavaria (and he has a familiar cackle – The Giggle). To do this, the Rani turned a whole family into violets, ducks and an owl, which is similar to how she turned innocent people into trees in The Mark of the Rani. Conrad reads stories of Doctor Who on daily broadcasts (Sherlock: The Reichenbach Fall). Ruby reunites with Shirley from U.N.I.T, who now lives in an outcast society of other homeless disabled people (The Sound of Drums, The Sarah Jane Adventures: The Curse of Clyde Langer). John Smith aka the Doctor expresses doubts about their society after he sees his old lover Rogue on the TV who points out to him that mugs fall through the table, which is physically impossible. Belinda reports John Smith aka the Doctor to the police, but Mrs Flood arrives to take them both back to the Rani’s lair. The Rani reveals herself to the Doctor, whose memories have now been restored. The Fifteenth Doctor’s amnesia echoes the Seventh Doctor’s loss of memory in Time and the Rani. The Rani is about to conduct her greatest experiment yet! By creating a world based on doubt (including the doubts of a Time Lord like the Doctor), the Rani has shattered the surface of this dimension on 24th May 2025. This will allow the Rani to release the legendary Time Lord Omega from underneath. As London and the rest of the world collapses around them, it looks like it could all be over for the Doctor and his friends!

The Doctor is falling to his death when at the last moment, a portal to the Time Hotel opens and Anita rescues him. Anita has been working at the Time Hotel since the Doctor last saw her (Joy to the World) and she has been watching the Doctor’s adventures through the doors (The Wedding of River Song, Day of the Daleks, Rogue). The world keeps ending on 24th May 2025, which is affecting the future at the Time Hotel. The Doctor and Anita return to the present day via the Time Hotel rooms and they arrive at U.N.I.T HQ. Their arrival starts to break the wish and Kate Stewart and the other members of U.N.I.T begin to realise what is happening. Ruby and Belinda show up, having woken up in their respective homes and having been summoned to U.N.I.T via a tracking device implant. The Doctor assembles the U.N.I.T team together and tells them that they are facing an evil Time Lord called the Rani, whom Mel remembers from Time and the Rani. The Rani appears and reveals that she survived the Time War thanks to a Time Ring (Genesis of the Daleks, Revenge of the Cybermen). Mrs Flood also appears and she reveals to Ruby and Belinda that she is also the Rani and that she spied on them as part of her plan to trap the Doctor. The Rani offers the Doctor to share the universe with her or stay down on Earth with The BeastsBelow. The Rani declares battle on U.N.I.T and she sends the bone beasts to attack the U.N.I.T tower, although U.N.I.T return fire with their cannons (The Giggle). Ruby uses Project Indigo to teleport to the Rani’s lair and confront Conrad. Project Indigo is a Sontaran-based experimental teleportation system (The Sontaran Stratagem/The Poison Sky) that was previously used by U.N.I.T member Martha Jones in The Stolen Earth/Journey’s End. Belinda and her daughter Poppy are sealed inside an artificial Zero Room by Susan Triad for their protection (Castrovalva). Meanwhile, the Doctor uses the Rani’s hoverbike to navigate past the bone beasts and crash into the Rani’s lair. The two Ranis tempt him as a fellow Time Lord to help them find Omega. The Rani opens a portal to the underworld and Omega emerges. However, Omega has now devolved into a husk and is a simple beast (Gridlock) that wants to feed on other Time Lords (The Three Doctors, Arc of Infinity). Omega eats the Rani, but Mrs Flood escapes using the Time Ring. The Doctor manages to defeat Omega by using the Vindicator. Ruby rescues the baby and wishes Conrad to be happy and he vanishes. The Rani’s lair begins to collapse, but the Doctor makes it back to the safety of the TARDIS, where he reunites with Ruby. The pair return to U.N.I.T HQ where they are reunited with Belinda and Poppy. Later inside the TARDIS, the Doctor and Belinda are planning to go travelling together again. However, Ruby notices that Poppy vanishes and only she can remember her. After returning to U.N.I.T, the Doctor, Belinda and Ruby discover that a few things changed after the Wish World ended. Ruby says that she remembers the Doctor and Belinda’s daughter Poppy and eventually the Doctor believes her. The Doctor flies off in the TARDIS to try and find her. The Doctor starts regenerating, but before that he is visited by the Thirteenth Doctor, who gives him some words of encouragement. The Fifteenth Doctor begins his regeneration. But he wakes up in Belinda’s garden and discovers that she had a daughter called Poppy all along and she had a normal life back on Earth with her mother. Content that he finally got Belinda home, the Doctor returns to the TARDIS. The Fifteenth Doctor opens the TARDIS doors in space as he looks out to the star called Joy (Joy to the World). The Fifteenth Doctor regenerates into the face of his former companion Rose Tyler. It is unclear as to whether Billie Piper is playing the Sixteenth Doctor or if she is playing an unnumbered “caretaker” Doctor who will only be in a few specials. Despite the rumours, I think that Doctor Who does have a future, but not with Disney. The BBC and Bad Wolf should just accept that the Disney deal is dead (rather than waiting for Disney to make a move, which they won’t) and they should either a). do a deal with a different streamer i.e. Netflix or b). produce Doctor Who in-house at Bad Wolf on a smaller budget.