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From cosmic scavengers to cunning masterminds, the villains of Doctor Who have hatched some truly brilliant schemes. We're counting down the 10 smartest villain plans that would have succeeded if it wasn't for that meddling Time Lord.
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00:00When you stand back and look at Doctor Who, the majority of the villains weren't all-powerful
00:04beings. They're scavengers, taking advantage of whatever's to hand to make the most of a bad
00:09situation. Maybe that makes them smart, maybe that makes them lazy, but whichever way you look
00:13at it, you'd be hard-pressed to find a scheme that wouldn't have succeeded if it wasn't for
00:18the Doctor's intervention. Pretty much every villain the Doctor has fought would have got
00:22away with it if it wasn't for the Doctor or their companion saving the day. And some of them had
00:27some pretty smarty-pants plans that we're genuinely impressed by. And so, with that in mind,
00:33I'm Ellie with Who Culture, here with the 10 smartest villain plans in Doctor Who.
00:38Number 10. Miss Foster in Partners in Crime. One surefire way to invade without resistance
00:45is to trick the population into thinking you're offering them something they want.
00:48That's the tactic Matron Cophilia under the alias Miss Foster took when she was tasked with
00:53finding a new breeding world for the adipose. She capitalised on 21st century Britain's obsession
00:59with weight loss by distributing a too-good-to-be-true diet pill, which, when activated,
01:04turned excess human fat into adipose babies. It's the one plan on this list that, in fairness,
01:10might have actually benefited humanity under more agreeable conditions. Even the Doctor eventually
01:15admits that as a diet plan, it sort of works. It's just the same that using a level 5 planet
01:20for
01:20breeding is against galactic law. Besides, Miss Foster had her eyes on much more than just weight
01:25loss. Ultimately, she planned to conduct emergency pathogenesis, a process by which human hair,
01:31bones, and organs can also be converted, leaving nothing left. The Doctor was able to put a stop
01:36to the scheme by hacking the adipose computer, but there was nothing he could do about the adipose
01:41that had already been bred, other than let them live, which means that, to quote the Doctor himself,
01:45Miss Foster's plan sort of worked. 9. The Master in Frontier in Space
01:51The first Master, brought to life so brilliantly by Roger Delgado, had his fair share of evil schemes,
01:58from the bonkers to the brilliant. Frontier in Space most definitely falls into the latter category.
02:03In the 26th century, humans and draconians are able to exist alongside each other, but allegations of
02:09attacks on each other's territory are rife, heightening tensions between the two species.
02:14The real culprit? The Commissioner of Sirius IV, otherwise known as The Master, who is using a
02:20hypnosound machine to disguise ogrons as humans and draconians, with the intention of provoking a
02:26full-scale war. As revealed at the serial's end, this is part of a larger plan to pave the way
02:31for
02:32a Dalek invasion. Unfortunately, we never got to see the end result of this invasion, nor how The
02:37Master's alliance with the Daleks ended. In fact, Frontier in Space marks Roger Delgado's final
02:43appearance in the show, as he would tragically pass away shortly after the story first broadcast.
02:49Had he been around to feature in the following season, we might have seen an even more audacious
02:53scheme from this Master. But as things stand, this is definitely his most ambitious.
02:598. The Ravagers in Flux
03:01The Ravagers, otherwise known as Swarm and Azure, were the overarching antagonists of Series 13,
03:07and for a while, we were constantly in the dark about their true motives. But if you stand back
03:12and look at it, their plan, though technically complex, is actually pretty simple. Swarm and
03:17Azure are the ultimate scavengers. Their initial aim is revenge against the Doctor and Division for
03:22imprisoning them all those years ago, and how do they go about doing this? By using Division's most
03:27powerful weapons against it. After building a psychotemporal bridge capable of reaching Division's
03:33space, the pair are able to complete the first part of their plan, doing away with head honcho
03:38Tectaeun. But their ultimate goal is to do away with all physical things in the universe.
03:43And how? By hijacking the Flux to create endless destruction, and then using time to replay that
03:49destruction in an endless loop. If the Doctor hadn't managed to, in turn, hijack the Flux against
03:54them, the Ravagers would have succeeded, with devastating results for the entire universe.
04:007. Scaroth in City of Death
04:03Scaroth, last of the Jaggeroth, is a textbook example of making the most of a bad situation.
04:09When his ship exploded in prehistoric Earth, he was flung into the Time Vortex and split into 12
04:14splinters of himself, scattered across Earth's history. Scaroth's 12th incarnation found himself
04:20in Paris 1979, a period where, obviously, time travel had not yet developed. However, there was
04:26nothing to stop him developing it prematurely by conducting his own experiments. There was just
04:31one problem. Time travel experiments aren't cheap. Fortunately, one of Scaroth's splinters,
04:36Captain Tancredi, was a contemporary of Leonardo da Vinci, who he persuaded to paint a further six
04:42copies of the Mona Lisa. These could then be sold in 1979 to make a quick buck. In the end,
04:48Scaroth's ultimate plan, to go back in time and prevent his ship from exploding, was sabotaged.
04:52But his plan was very smart, and he was successful in one regard. When most copies of the Mona Lisa
04:58are destroyed in a fire, including the original, the only copy left is one of Scaroth's fakes.
05:04So, in a sense, we've got him to thank for the fact that the painting still exists today.
05:086. Missy in Dark Water and Death in Heaven
05:12The Master's regeneration into a woman was the single biggest change to the character in their
05:18then 43-year history, as reflected by their temporary name change to Missy. But one thing
05:24that hadn't changed was the Master's knack for a good old evil plan. They'd always enjoyed playing
05:29the long game, but Missy took it to the extreme, establishing herself as a god-like figure and
05:34picking up the Doctor's departed friends in a series of cameos across Series 8, apparently set
05:39in heaven. Of course, the truth was a lot darker. In reality, this mystery location was the
05:45Nether Sphere, a cloud-based depository to which mines were uploaded and then downloaded into new
05:51Cyberman bodies. Missy's ultimate aim? To gift this new army of Cybermen to the Doctor as a birthday
05:58present. But there's more. How did the Doctor become embroiled in Missy's plan? Through his
06:03companion Clara, whose partner Danny was killed in a hit-and-run. Might Missy have been the one
06:08driving the car to ensure the whole chain of events was set in motion? Well, it's not the most
06:12unlikely headcanon. Number 5, Davros in Revelation of the Daleks. Missy wasn't the only one to take
06:19advantage of dead bodies. In fact, the Doctor's other nemesis, Davros, got there first, fashioning
06:24a new race of Daleks from the dead. And having established himself as the head of funeral parlor
06:29Tranquil Repose, he was perfectly placed to do so. This wasn't the only string to Davros's bow,
06:35however. Ever resourceful, he used the remains of these, well, remains, to create a revolutionary new
06:41food source for a famine-ridden galaxy. This, in turn, bolstered his reputation as the philanthropic
06:47Great Healer, which enabled him to continue his experiments unnoticed. Like Missy, Davros used one
06:53of the Doctor's friends to lure him to his lair, the late Arthur Stengoss. Unlike Missy, however,
06:59his aims were more traditional, to conquer the universe. What he hadn't counted on was two of
07:04Tranquil Repose's staff allying themselves with the rival renegade faction of Daleks who were intent on
07:10recapturing Davros and putting him on trial, a goal they managed to achieve. In the commotion,
07:15he lost his surviving hand, hence why the Davros of the Revival series has a metal gauntlet.
07:21Number 4. Rasmussen in Sleep No More
07:24Like Miss Foster, Professor Gagin Rasmussen came up with a solution to one of humanity's biggest bugbears.
07:31Sleep. The average person spends one-third of their life sleeping. Rasmussen sought to do something
07:35about this, and he succeeded. His Morpheus pods, named after the God of Dreams, were capable of
07:41concentrating a month of sleep into five minutes, enabling its user to spend more time awake. They
07:47were loved by some and hated by others, but you can't deny that, at least in principle, it's not
07:52a bad idea. But there was a catch. When we sleep, dust builds up in the corner of our eyes.
07:57The more time
07:58we spend asleep, the more this dust builds up, and the electronic signal transmitted by the Morpheus pods
08:03had the unfortunate catch of giving this dust sentience, creating carnivorous sandmen. Which
08:08is kind of gross when you think about it. I mean, the sleepy dust in your eyes making creatures?
08:13Grim. The Doctor managed to destroy the Morpheus pods which hadn't yet been distributed,
08:17and sought to destroy all those that had. But Rasmussen, being a genius, had one more trick up his
08:22sleeve. A video recording into which the Morpheus signal was encoded, infecting anyone who watched it.
08:28And not just any video recording, but the very episode of Doctor Who we'd all just witnessed.
08:33Does anyone else feel like they need to rub their eyes now?
08:36Number 3. Rassilon in the Five Doctors
08:39As one of the founders of Time Lord Society, it was important that Rassilon maintained his position.
08:45So he designed a test, the game of Rassilon, for anyone who sought to usurp him. And in fairness,
08:51it worked. The challenge? To reach Rassilon's tomb in the Death Zone on Gallifrey. The reward?
08:57The Ring of Rassilon, which bestows immortality upon its wearer. At least this is what fellow Time Lord
09:02Berusa understood the game of Rassilon to be. But there was a catch. A riddle hidden in plain sight,
09:08inscribed on an obelisk in the tomb. To lose is to win, and he who wins shall lose.
09:14Though that clearly sounds like a warning, Berusa doesn't care one bit. As he discovers,
09:19the Ring of Rassilon does indeed grant its wearer immortality, albeit not in the form of perpetual
09:24regeneration, but perpetual imprisonment. As a mummified face on the side of Rassilon's sarcophagus.
09:30It is quite different to the other plans on this list, since the Doctor was quite happy to stand
09:35back and let it reach fruition. But no less ingenious.
09:39Number 2. The Slitheen in Aliens of London and World War 3
09:43Let's face it, the Slitheen are remembered for one thing and one thing only. But forget about the
09:47flatulence, and you're left with a surprisingly canny, watertight plan. This was 21st Century Who's
09:54first fully-fledged alien invasion. And showrunner Russell T. Davis certainly pulled out all the stops,
09:59coming up with something truly special. It all begins with that iconic shot of a spaceship
10:04scuffing the side of Big Ben before landing in the Thames. Its pilot? A spacesuit-clad pig,
10:10designed to distract from the real aliens while they establish themselves at the heart of the
10:14British government. Their goal? To incite enough panic to initiate a third world war, reducing the
10:20Earth to smithereens which can then be sold on the black market. Meanwhile, they can escape in their
10:25spaceship conveniently parked at the bottom of the Thames. Staging a fake alien invasion in order
10:30to further your own is a frankly genius move, and quite unlike anything we'd seen in the show up to
10:36this point. It's never going to be the thing the Slitheen are best remembered for, but that doesn't
10:40stop it from being a genuinely brilliant plan. Number 1. The Monks in The Monk Trilogy
10:46The Monks are, without a doubt, the most duplicitous race to ever stage an invasion of Earth. For one
10:52thing, they had a lot of practice, using a highly sophisticated simulation of the planet to determine
10:57the optimum time and place to strike. For another, they rule not through force, but through a contract
11:03of consent. Once they've secured that consent by, for example, posing as saviors in the face of a
11:08genuine natural catastrophe and framing their dominion as the least worst option, there's no
11:13going back. The monks had used this strategy to conquer a multitude of planets, and Earth was no
11:18exception, the catastrophe in question being the accidental creation of a deadly bacteria.
11:23Fast forward six months, and they've subjugated the planet's population. For a time, it seems even
11:28the Doctor has fallen under their spell. Ultimately, though, Bill is able to corrupt the Monks' propaganda
11:33with memories of her mother, but if it wasn't for that, their reign might never have ended.
11:38What's more, unlike most villains on this list, the Monks escaped with their lives, and arguably in a
11:43stronger position than they were in before. It's surely only a matter of time before they just strike again.
11:48And that concludes our list. If you think we missed any, then do let us know in the comments below,
11:53and while you're there, don't forget to like and subscribe, and tap that notification bell so you
11:57never miss a Who Culture video again. Also, head over to Twitter and follow us there, and Instagram
12:01as well. I've been Ellie with Who Culture, and in the words of Riversong herself, goodbye, sweeties.
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