Doctor Who: Every Master Ranked Worst To Best

Doctor Who made its return, it was a hit, and everybody immediately wondered when The Doctor's dastardly counterpart would make his big comeback.

After some slick build up, John Simm's Master was born, and everything about him was basically perfect. He matched David Tennant's charisma nuance for nuance, and exuded fun-loving, narcissistic and unfathomably clever wickedness for every moment he occupied the scene. His relationship and dialogue with The Doctor was gold dust, and the ensuing drama during each of his episodes made for a hearty blend of laughter, tears, and grit.

John Simm seemed to have a natural intuition for playing this character. The humanity, the cruelty, and the desperation all came out during his tenure, and it meant that the bar for Doctor Who's most interesting baddie would be forever sky-high. More recent successors have had to come up with something very special to match it.

After a nifty resurgence at the tail-end of Peter Capaldi's run, we even got to see how this one died, which is a rarity. Plus he'd grown the iconic Master goatee. Journey complete.