10 Times Doctor Who Wasted Great Villains

The Wire was an energy-based being that took the essences and souls of people in Great Britain in 1953 during the time of Queen Elizabeth’s II coronation. The Doctor was never able to know what The Wire’s true form was, as its physical body had been destroyed before he arrived.

But what did The Wire actually do? It sucked off people’s faces, causing them to become faceless and mindless, with their real faces appearing on TV screens yelling out for help. The Wire was hoping to use the energy it sucked from people to manifest itself into a physical form once more. We learn at one point in the episode that The Wire was sentenced to death but survived its execution, escaping to Earth and preserving itself through television.

With its catchphrase “I’m hungry”, The Wire doesn’t do much throughout the episode apart from suck people's faces off and traumatise a poor man who was forced to help in order for him to survive. There seems to be a theme throughout Doctor Who that very complex villains have a very simple way of being defeated. The Doctor ends up trapping The Wire on a Betamax and taping over it so it would remain trapped for all eternity.