Doctor Who: 10 One Off Monsters Who Should Return (And The Stories They Need)

By James Story / May 8, 2013

Doctor Who has survived for so long based on a number of its strengths. Being able to host a story in any time period or corner of space is certainly one of them but out of this it also has shown a great ability to bring back and rework characters from its own past in interesting ways. When the show returned, its leading episode€™s story rested on the familiar but instantly understandable aliens, the Autons. They€™re simple, living plastic dummies that the new fan can see and €˜get€™ straight away while older fans recognise them from the Jon Pertwee days. From there we€™ve seen many of the classic aliens return. Of course the Daleks, the Cybermen and the Master weren€™t going to be left out of the modern revival but each year we see the show go deeper into its roots to dust off a classic series foe and give them new life.

In the Matt Smith era alone we have seen the Silurians and the Ice Warriors return, with the Zygons primed to make an appearance in the 50th anniversary special. What is remarkable about this is that the Zygons only ever appeared in one story (Tom Baker€™s Terror of the Zygons) and yet the show has the confidence to put them into what show runner Steven Moffat promises to be a massive, game-changer of an event. This begs the question, what other one-off villains, from either the old or new series, should come back? Not every great villain can come back, depending on the type of story it is created for. Everyone loved the David Tennant episode Midnight, and the entity involved, but seeing it used again would be awkward and difficult to write for without appearing be a rehash of the previous episode.

Now I know the site has had quite a few Doctor Who articles up lately as part of the build up for the 50th anniversary. It€™s been a big, sweeping and entertaining look back, forward, side to side and any other direction in the show€™s history which is why this list comes with a little extra detail. Rather than just seeing which one-off monsters should come back to the screen, I€™m also going to give you a great story that each of the villains should feature in. Let€™s get started with...

10. The Clockwork Robots

Before Steven Moffat took the reins of Doctor Who and started exploding and resetting all of time and space, he was writing tales of empty children and making sure we never look at statues the same way again. Each Moffat story from the Russel T Davies era was a hit, Blink in particular spawning the hit aliens, The Weeping Angels. It was in The Girl In The Fireplace where we saw the Clockwork Robots trying to repair their ship by capturing Madame de Pompadour once she had reached thirty seven years old. We can all agree simply the look of them, when the Doctor peels back the disguise and shows the cogs and wheels ticking away inside, is superb and they should definitely come back again, but not necessarily as the villains. Ask yourself this. Why, on a spaceship, nevertheless one fitted with a quantum drive that can open windows in time and space, would a crew use clockwork robots?

Imagine not just a clockwork robot, but a clockwork planet. Everything from the people who walk on its surface to the core of the planet itself is ticking away. Their entire civilisation is literally built on time and that time is running out. The planet is about to grind to a halt when the Doctor brings his companion along to check out the amazing sites. Suddenly the robots have a hope, their ultimate saviour has come, a Time Lord. But the Doctor brings not only the chance to keep the planet going, but the seemingly impossible concept of travelling through time and seeing how the planet began, something the elder clockwork robots cannot let slip away.