Victoria Waterfield
Victoria Waterfield | |
---|---|
Doctor Who character | |
First appearance | The Evil of the Daleks |
Last appearance |
Fury from the Deep (regular) "Dimensions in Time" (charity special) |
Portrayed by | Deborah Watling |
Information | |
Affiliated | Second Doctor |
Species | Human |
Home planet | Earth |
Home era | 1866 |
Victoria Waterfield is a fictional character played by Deborah Watling in the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who. A native of Victorian England, she was a companion of the Second Doctor and a regular in the programme from 1967 to 1968. Only two complete serials to feature her exist in the BBC archives (The Tomb of the Cybermen and The Enemy of the World). DVDs of her adventures The Ice Warriors and The Web of Fear were also released, where official BBC reconstructions complete the missing episodes of those serials.[1]
Character history
Victoria first appears in the 1967 serial The Evil of the Daleks. She is the daughter of scientist Edward Waterfield (played by John Bailey), who in 1866 is experimenting with time travel and has attracted the attention of the Daleks. In order to assure Waterfield's collaboration with their capture of the Doctor and their experiments with the Human and Dalek Factors, the Daleks with the help of Theodore Maxtable took Victoria as a prisoner. To measure his emotional responses, they then manipulated Jamie McCrimmon into rescuing her, although they ultimately re-captured her and took her to Skaro. At the conclusion of the adventure, Waterfield is killed saving the Doctor's life, and asks him to take care of Victoria. The Doctor and Jamie take her in as part of the TARDIS crew.
On the outside, Victoria is a typically fragile lady of her era, frequently screaming when faced with the creatures the Doctor and his companions encounter in their travels, such as the Cybermen and the Yeti. However, this exterior hides an inner strength that crops up when needed. Victoria may be young, but she has an instinct for when she is being lied to, and her sensibility is a contrast to the recklessness of Jamie and the curiosity of the Doctor. Jamie, in particular, is very protective towards and fond of Victoria, and is heartbroken when she chooses to leave.
Despite being a good match to her two companions, Victoria eventually finds herself unsuited to extended travel with the Doctor. At the conclusion of the serial Fury from the Deep, she decides to leave the TARDIS, settling with a family named Harris in the 20th century. Her subsequent life is not shown in the television series. She is mentioned, but not seen to be travelling with the Second Doctor in the 1985 serial The Two Doctors.
Other appearances
Victoria's life after leaving the TARDIS is not explored in the series. The video release Downtime (1995) and its 1996 novelisation by Marc Platt as part of the Virgin Missing Adventures range, reveals that she struggles to adapt to twentieth century life and eventually returns to the Detsen monastery in Tibet, where she again falls under the influence of the Great Intelligence, now trapped on Earth after the end of The Web of Fear. The Intelligence manipulates Victoria into founding New World University, with the money left to her by her father (via a new will he drew up whilst working for the Daleks in 1866), where Victoria serves as Vice Chancellor and the possessed Professor Travers as Chancellor. Using the university's computers, the Intelligence seizes control of the internet and creates new Yetis. Realising she has been misled, Victoria helps Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart and Sarah Jane Smith defeat it. She is then approached by both the Fourth and Third Doctors, but chooses not to travel with them.
List of appearances
Television serials
- Season 4
- Season 5
- The Tomb of the Cybermen
- The Abominable Snowmen
- The Ice Warriors
- The Enemy of the World
- The Web of Fear
- Fury from the Deep
- 30th anniversary charity special
Video
- Downtime (also novelised by scriptwriter Marc Platt as part of the Virgin Missing Adventures line)
Audio
- The Great Space Elevator
- The Emperor of Eternity
- Power Play (with the Sixth Doctor)
- The Black Hole
Short Trips audios
- The Way Forward
Novels
- Dreams of Empire by Justin Richards
- Heart of TARDIS by Dave Stone
- Combat Rock by Mick Lewis
Short stories
- "Face-Painter" by Tara Samms (Short Trips: A Universe of Terrors)
- "The Astronomer's Apprentice" by Simon A. Forward (Short Trips: The Muses)
- "The Farmer's Story" by Todd Green (Short Trips: Repercussions)
- "The Age of Ambition" by Andrew Campbell (Short Trips: Life Science)
- "Screamager" by Jacqueline Rayner (Short Trips: Monsters)
- "The Last Emperor" by Jacqueline Rayner (Short Trips: 2040)
- "The Cutty Wren" by Ann Kelly (Short Trips: The Ghosts of Christmas)
- "On a Pedestal" by Kathleen O. David (Short Trips: The Quality of Leadership)
Comics
- "Freedom by Fire" by David Brian (Doctor Who Annual 1969)
- "Atoms Infinite" by David Brian (Doctor Who Annual 1969)
- "Bringer of Darkness" by Warwick Gray and Martin Geraghty (Doctor Who Magazine Summer Special 1993)
References
External links
- Victoria Waterfield on TARDIS Data Core, an external wiki
- Victoria Waterfield on the BBC's Doctor Who website