Silurian (Doctor Who)

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
For other uses, see Silurian (disambiguation).

Silurian
Doctor Who race
The 2010 redesign of the Silurians
First appearanceDoctor Who and the Silurians (1970)
Created byMalcolm Hulke
In-universe information
Home worldEarth
Type
Sub-races
Sea Devils
Affiliation
  • The Alliance

The Silurians are a race of

science fiction television series Doctor Who, who first appeared in Doctor Who in the 1970 serial Doctor Who and the Silurians, and were created by Malcolm Hulke. The first Silurians introduced are depicted as prehistoric and scientifically advanced sentient humanoids who predate the dawn of man; in their backstory, the Silurians went into self-induced hibernation to survive what they predicted to be a large atmospheric upheaval caused by the Earth capturing the Moon
.

The Silurians introduced in the 1970 story are broad, three-eyed land-dwellers. The 1972 serial

Sea Devils made an appearance in 1984's Warriors of the Deep, and did not appear in the show again before its cancellation in 1989. Following the show's revival in 2005, heavily redesigned Silurans were reintroduced to the series in 2010, and have recurred frequently since then, while the Sea Devils first reappeared in 2022, with their designs mostly unchanged. In 2018 the real-life scientists Adam Frank and Gavin Schmidt named their Silurian hypothesis
for the fictional species.

Commonly called Silurians, after their supposed origins in the Silurian period,[note 1] the creatures have also been referred to by other names. In The Sea Devils, the Third Doctor (Jon Pertwee) claims that "properly speaking", the Silurians should have been called "Eocenes".[3] The name Homo reptilia is first used to describe the creatures in the novelisation Doctor Who and the Cave-Monsters (1974),[9] and is first used in the series proper in the episode "The Hungry Earth" (2010).[4] In The Sea Devils, an amphibious Silurian is dubbed a "Sea Devil" by the human workman Clark (Declan Mulholland),[3] while in Warriors of the Deep, the land-dwelling Silurians use the term "Sea Devil" to refer to their aquatic counterparts.[8]

Creation

An original-style Silurian, in Doctor Who and the Silurians.

Drawing on the ideas of the

sixth season's serial The Invasion. Producer Barry Letts and script editor Terrance Dicks, inheriting this new vision for the series, also wanted their stories for the seventh season to have a serious, deeper subtext. They approached Malcolm Hulke, co-writer of the Patrick Troughton serials The Faceless Ones (1967) and The War Games (1969), to write a serial for this new season.[10]

Hulke saw limitations with this earthbound format – he believed there would be two types of stories, one featuring mad scientists and the other alien invasions. Terrance Dicks claims credit for thinking of the idea of creatures that had been there all along;[10] however, other sources[citation needed] give Hulke credit for deliberately thinking his way outside his earlier preconceptions.

While planning stories for Doctor Who's

ninth season, Dicks and Letts decided to revive the Silurian concept, this time with the twist of these new Silurians originating in the sea. Originally dubbed "Sea Silurians", they were rechristened "Sea Devils" for dramatic effect as Hulke's storyline was edited.[11]

Johnny Byrne, writer of the Peter Davison serial Warriors of the Deep (1984), notes that the Myrka creature was created to absolve the Silurians from the guilt of genocide, using the creature as a weapon of last resort.

Appearances

Television

In their first appearance in Doctor Who and the Silurians (1970), a group of Silurians are awakened from hibernation by the energy from a nearby nuclear power research center in Derbyshire.[12] The Third Doctor (Jon Pertwee) initially manages to negotiate an honourable compromise with the colony's leader. Unfortunately, the colony's leader is murdered by a younger Silurian who becomes the new leader, intent on a far more aggressive policy. To that end, the Silurians then attempt to reclaim the planet from humanity by releasing a deadly virus and attempting to disperse the Van Allen radiation belt. Both plans were thwarted by the Doctor. Despite the Doctor's best efforts to broker a peaceful solution, the Silurians are still determined to exterminate humanity, only to have their base destroyed by UNIT on the orders of Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart (Nicholas Courtney) to preempt this open threat.[13]

The Sea Devils, shown at a 50th Anniversary event

In

cold war" between factions of humanity, the serial describes the Sea Devils as being elite warriors; they sport bulletproof samurai-style armour. The Fifth Doctor (Peter Davison) tries in vain to prevent any bloodshed against either species; he tells companions Tegan Jovanka (Janet Fielding) and Vislor Turlough (Mark Strickson
) to give the Silurians oxygen to keep them safe from the hexachromite gas he released into the base's atmosphere. The last surviving Silurian in the episode, however, is killed by Turlough, leaving the Doctor despondent.

Silurians are reintroduced to the series, following its cancellation and revival, in the 2010 two-part story, "The Hungry Earth" and "Cold Blood", in which Silurians are awoken in 2020 by an underground drilling operation. These Silurians lack the third eye of their 1970–1984 counterparts, and wear masks. Having misinterpreted the drilling as a deliberate attack, the Silurians take hostages. After a protracted conflict, the Eleventh Doctor (Matt Smith) leaves behind Tony Mack (Robert Pugh) and Nasreen Chaudhry (Meera Syal) in the Silurian city to act as ambassadors to the human race when they re-awaken in a thousand years, despite the race being active again 64 years later in "Warriors of the Deep".[4][5]

In "The Pandorica Opens" (2010), some Silurians appear in A.D. 102 alongside various alien enemies of the Doctor (including alien Daleks, Cybermen, Sontarans, Judoon and other species) to imprison the Doctor in the mythical "Pandorica" in order, as they see it, to save the universe from him.[15]

Recurring character

Strax (Dan Starkey) as her butler. The "Paternoster Gang", as the three are known, sometimes including the Doctor,[16][17] appear again in "The Snowmen" (2012) and its three short prequels in 2012–2013, "The Crimson Horror", "The Name of the Doctor" (both 2013), and "Deep Breath
" (2014). In "The Crimson Horror", Vastra claims to be from 65 million years ago.

Silurians are mentioned in the 2011 Torchwood: Miracle Day episode "The Blood Line" (2011); Captain Jack Harkness (John Barrowman) briefly muses that the Blessing (an ancient phenomenon beneath the Earth's surface) could be out of "Silurian mythology".

A Silurian doctor named Malohkeh (Richard Hope) is seen attending to Winston Churchill (Ian McNeice) in "The Wedding of River Song" (2011) in an aborted timeline. Hope plays another Silurian in "Dinosaurs on a Spaceship" (2012), seen briefly on a computer screen. The titular spaceship is a Silurian Ark searching for a new planet with a cargo of dinosaurs, the Silurian colony on board having been ejected from the ship by Solomon (David Bradley) prior to the episode. The ship is shown to have reached a planet named Siluria with its dinosaurs at the episode's conclusion.

In "The Time of the Doctor" (2013), many Silurian Arks are seen among the ships gathered round Trenzalore.

Sea Devils made their first modern appearance in the 2022 special "Legend of the Sea Devils" (2022), a Thirteenth Doctor (Jodie Whittaker) story. Unlike the Silurians, their appearance and design are mostly unchanged from the original series.

Literature

All of the Silurian stories on television prior to 2010 were

alternate reality have conquered Earth after the Third Doctor was killed in their initial appearance, with the Seventh Doctor eventually forcing the humans and Silurians of this world into a truce.[20] Contradicting the Warriors of the Deep novelisation, the novel The Scales of Injustice (1996) mentions that Icthar's shelter awoke forty years before the events of Doctor Who and the Silurians, and that the shelter is located on the other side of the world to the British Isles.[21] In The Scales of Injustice, the power-hungry Silurian Auggi plans to eradicate humanity, beginning with an invasion fleet of Silurian hybrids on the Kent coast. UNIT successfully fights off this fleet.[22] The Third Doctor also learns about the Silurians' battle cruisers and Myrka weapon in this book, both of which appear in Warriors of the Deep.[23]

Silurians have also made many minor appearances in the Virgin New Adventures series of novels.[

Madame Vastra also co-stars in the novella Devil in the Smoke (2012)[27][28] and the novel Silhouette (2014).[29]

Silurians, with their masks on, on display at an exhibition

Comics

The Silurians also make a number of appearance in comic books. Comic book story "Twilight of the Silurians" (1980) is set during the species' last days pre-hibernation, where Silurians observe captive "ape-men" in their zoological research station, millions of years ago.

Madame Vastra co-stars in the Doctor Who Magazine comic strip "The Crystal Throne" (2014).[31]

Audio drama

Silurians also feature in the

Bloodtide (2001), in which the Sixth Doctor intervenes when Charles Darwin and the HMS Beagle expedition encounter a rogue Silurian group in the Galápagos Islands. The audio drama reveals that the leader of this group had been responsible for creating humanity's prehistoric ancestors via a forbidden breeding program, sabotaging the Silurian stasis chambers to escape punishment for his actions. In the audio drama The Poison Seas (2003), from the Bernice Summerfield series of adventures, Summerfield travels to the planet Chosan sometime in the future to assist a colony of Earth Reptiles (Sea Devils) under threat there. In UNIT: The Coup (2004), the Silurians attempt to finally make peace with the humans, though the general public believes it to be a stunt involving men in rubber suits. In UNIT: The Wasting (2005), Silurians aid UNIT in finding a cure for a deadly plague. In 2017, the Silurians appear in the Seventh Doctor audio The Silurian Candidate, where the Silurian Triad of 2088 attempt to infiltrate a crucial peace conference by brainwashing one of the participants so that he will kill himself and the other major leader in a manner that would trigger a nuclear war, but the Doctor is able to avert this plan, and instead proposes a new plan where the Silurian colonies will come out of suspended animation millennia in the future after Earth recovers from being ravaged by solar flares (as referenced in The Ark in Space
), colonies gradually 'waking up' so that humanity and Silurians will essentially rebuild Earth without either side possessing numerical superiority.

Outside Doctor Who

Silurians also appear outside Doctor Who-related media. A cave drawing of a Silurian and a Sea Devil appear in a cave on

League of Extraordinary Gentlemen where they were connected to the creature from the Black Lagoon
; League of Extraordinary Gentlemen is set in a fictional universe which reconciles the exploits of different fictional characters in one continuity.

A 2018 journal article published in the International Journal of Astrobiology, in which the authors discuss the hypothetical possibility of detecting evidence of ancient industrial civilizations in Earth's geologic record, makes reference to the "Silurian hypothesis" in its title.[32]

Summary of appearances

This list does not include Madame Vastra who has her own list.

Doctor Who

Cameos

Notes

  1. ^ In episode 3 of Doctor Who and the Silurians, the Third Doctor (Jon Pertwee) discovers notes containing calculations of the age of the Earth inside the office of Dr Quinn (Fulton Mackay), a human scientist who desires the Silurians' scientific knowledge in the serial. The Doctor says that the calculations have "particular reference to the Silurian era".[1] In the following episode, the Doctor addresses one of the creatures on screen for the first time as a "Silurian".[2] In The Sea Devils, the Third Doctor claims that "Silurian" is a "complete misnomer", mentioning "The chap who discovered them must have got the period wrong."[3] In "The Hungry Earth" (2010), the Eleventh Doctor (Matt Smith) appears to describe "Silurian" as a former name, when he says that Homo reptilia were "once known as the Silurian race",[4] although the name "Silurian" is subsequently used again on screen by various characters in "Cold Blood" (2010),[5] "A Good Man Goes to War" (2011)[6] and "Dinosaurs on a Spaceship" (2012).[7] By the time of Warriors of the Deep, set in 2084, the Silurians have begun to refer to themselves by the term "Silurian".[8]

References

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  4. ^ a b c Chibnall, Chris (writer); Way, Ashley (director) (22 May 2010). "The Hungry Earth". Doctor Who. Series 5. Episode 8. BBC. BBC One.
  5. ^ a b Chibnall, Chris (writer); Way, Ashley (director) (29 May 2010). "Cold Blood". Doctor Who. Series 5. Episode 9. BBC. BBC One.
  6. ^ Moffat, Steven (writer); Hoar, Peter (director) (4 June 2011). "A Good Man Goes to War". Doctor Who. Series 6. Episode 7. BBC. BBC One.
  7. ^ Chibnall, Chris (writer); Metzstein, Saul (director) (8 September 2012). "Dinosaurs on a Spaceship". Doctor Who. Series 7. Episode 2. BBC. BBC One.
  8. ^
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  9. ISBN 978-1-849-90194-9
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  10. ^ a b Courtney, Nicholas; Dicks, Terrance; John, Caroline; Letts, Barry; Levene, John; Sherwin, Derrick; Ware, Derek (2006). The U.N.I.T Family part one (DVD). BBC Worldwide. BBCDVD3671.
  11. ^ Cann, David; Briant, Michael; Sumpter, Donald; Scholes, Steve; Manning, Katy; Fell, Stuart; Dicks, Terrance; Letts, Barry; de Vere, David; King, Dave; Coventry, Digby (2008). Hello Sailor! – Making The Sea Devils. BBC Worldwide. BBCDVD2438(B).
  12. ^ Braxton, Mark (21 September 2009). "Doctor Who and the Silurians *****". Radio Times. Retrieved 21 January 2017.
  13. BBC1
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  14. BBC1
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  15. ^ Moffat, Steven (writer); Haynes, Toby (director) (19 June 2010). "The Pandorica Opens". Doctor Who. Series 5. Episode 12. BBC. BBC One.
  16. ^ a b "Madame Vastra". BBC One – Doctor Who, Series 8. Retrieved 17 May 2016.
  17. ^ "Doctor Who Mini Episode". BBC One – Doctor Who, Series 7 Part 1. 20 November 2012. Retrieved 17 May 2016.
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  19. ISBN 0-426-19561-2
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  20. ISBN 978-0-426-20399-5
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  21. ISBN 978-1-849-90780-4
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  24. ISBN 978-0-426-20497-8
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  25. ISBN 978-1-84435-045-2
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  27. ASIN B00APKG5LI
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  28. ISBN 978-1849907231
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  29. ISBN 978-1-84990-772-9
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  30. ^ Moore, Steve (w), Lloyd, David (a). "Twilight of the Silurians" Doctor Who Weekly, no. 21–22 (5–12 March 1980). London: Marvel UK.
  31. ^ Gray, Scott (w), Collins, Mike, David A Roach (a). "The Crystal Throne" Doctor Who Magazine, no. 475–476 (August – September 2014). Tunbridge Wells: Panini UK Ltd.
  32. S2CID 55018003
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