Series 7 provided another frustratingly bad villain in the episode Nightmare in Silver. No, not the Cybermen equipped with farcical super-speed (what was that about?!), but rather the Cyber Planner occupying nearly half of the Doctor's brain, otherwise known as Mr Clever. Leaving aside the unfortunate fact that Matt Smith tried to create easily distinguishable performances for the Doctor and Mr Clever by making them both quick-talking and emotionally intense, there's the issue of whether a Cyber Planner should even be so volatile. Previously, Cyber Planners were depicted as entirely emotionless, just like the Cybermen themselves (The Invasion, The Wheel in Space, etc). In this story, however, viewers were introduced to a Planner that was more in thrall to its feelings than the typical human. The Planner even put an entire Cyber army on hold seconds before the completion of a planetary takeover, just so it could win a chess game that it was only playing to keep the Doctor occupied whilst its army got into position. Making the Cyber Planner so foolishly emotional fundamentally changes a key element of the Planner, of course. What's next? Bringing back the scheming, manipulative Macra as mindless beasts? Oh, wait...
Mike has lived in the UK, Japan and the USA. Currently, he is based in Iowa with his wife and 2 young children. After working for many years as a writer and editor for a large corporation, he is now a freelancer. He has been fortunate enough to contribute to many books on Doctor Who over the last 20 years and is now concentrating on original sci-fi & fantasy short stories, with recent sales including Flame Tree, Uffda, and The Martian Wave. Also, look for his contribution on Blake's 7 to "You and Who Else", a charity anthology to be released later this year.
You can find him on Tumblr at https://www.tumblr.com/blog/culttvmike
