The Leader was the dictatorial President of the Republic of Great Britain and supreme head of the British Empire on the Inferno Earth. (TV: Inferno)
One account suggested that he was the version of the Doctor native to this reality; specifically, instead of rejecting all the faces suggested to him at the Doctor's trial following (PROSE: Timewyrm: Revelation, TV: The War Games) the War Chief incident, (PROSE: CIA File Extracts) this reality's Second Doctor had accepted the "thin" face, thus becoming the Leader instead of another reality's more heroic Third Doctor. (PROSE: Timewyrm: Revelation, TV: The War Games)
Another account was far more vague about his background; leaving it ambiguous whether he was human or an extra-terrestrial. Commenting on his health he refers to his "hearts" in the plural. Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart recalled meeting a Party "zealot" who believed the Leader used to have the ability to extend his life through a "miraculous procedure" that had since been taken away from him. The Leader also showed a streak of paranoia when Lethbridge-Stewart suggested aliens may have infiltrated the Cabinet. Whatever the case, by 1968 the Leader was increasingly frail, despite his official portrait still depicting him as a healthy middle-aged man. (PROSE: I, Alastair)
Biography
Origins
According to one account, the Leader came into being because Inferno universe's version of the Second Doctor selected one of the bodies offered to him by the Time Lords after his trial, before being exiled to Earth. (PROSE: Timewyrm: Revelation) Indeed, one of the faces rejected by the Second Doctor in the conventional version of event was a thin man (TV: The War Games) with a certain resemblance to the Leader. (TV: Inferno)
Another account gave no overt clarification of the Leader's species, leaving it possible he was merely a human politician. (PROSE: I, Alastair)
Rise to power
The Leader first gained prominence in 1930s England when he became an associate of Oswald Mosley. The two were regulars at the Revolutionary Arms pub in Westminster, and a photo from the era showed the future Leader drawing a beer for one of his colleagues — in public, he projected a kind avuncular personality, covering a cold and ruthless core.
He soon became the new leader of the revolutionary movement, following Mosley's assassination while giving a speech at the Free Trade Hall in Manchester in 1936. The Leader crafted Mosley's legacy as a martyr of the British people and successfully broadened the Party's appeal, turning it into a mass movement capable of threatening the establishment. (PROSE: I, Alastair)
In 1943, the revolution finally arrived, the old democratic regime collapsed and numerous executions were carried out on the Leader's orders, ostensibly those who had conspired to assassinate Mosley, including, among others, the British Royal Family. (PROSE: I, Alastair, TV: Inferno)
Years in power
By 1968, the Leader had become irritable and paranoid, sacking members of his Cabinet for perceived slights and failings, demoting Arthur Fless, Director of Information, to a remote colonial posting in West Africa for failing to locate an illegal radio transmitter interrupting BBC broadcasts with anti-Party propaganda in the London area. His health had severely declined and he was visibly elderly as his age caught up with him; he spent two months at his seaside retreat in Bognor Regis to convalesce from a condition afflicting his hearts but suffered a stroke soon after, confining him to a wheelchair. The Cabinet had started jockeying for power on assumption the Leader would not survive much longer, but he still retained his intelligence and cunning. (PROSE: I, Alastair)
Death
The Leader was killed in 1968 when Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart opportunistically used his wheelchair as a battering ram during an alien attack on Downing Street. After his death, the Leader's popularity with the public remained high and years later portraits and posters of him remained omnipresent to cement the legitimacy of President Lethbridge-Stewart's regime. (PROSE: Night of the Intelligence, I, Alastair)
President Lethbridge-Stewart perished during a volcanic catastrophe in the 1970s, when a secret British science project conducted at Eastchester, which involved drilling beneath Earth's crust to gain access to pockets of a potential new energy source, went terribly wrong — not only releasing an unidentifiable green, viscous substance that transformed humans into savage werewolf-like creatures on contact, but also enough energy to devastate the planet beyond recovery. (PROSE: The Face of the Enemy)
Legacy
During a conversation with the Seventh Doctor, the Third Doctor recalled the face on the poster in the hut at the Inferno Project, and described its similarity to the one offered to him by the Time Lords, concluding the Leader was an alternative incarnation of his. (PROSE: Timewyrm: Revelation, TV: The War Games)
Behind the scenes
- A black-and-white photograph of the BBC special effects designer Jack Kine were used to depict the Leader on the UNITY IS STRENGTH poster in the Technical Store, the Doctor's hut on the regular Earth timeline; and the framed picture on the wall of Brigade Leader Lethbridge-Stewart's office in Inferno. However, the Leader never appears on-screen in person and there is no on-screen evidence to suggest that the Doctor and the Leader had any connection; this connection was made only in the novels.
- In I, Alastair it is implied the Leader may not be entirely human. (He could not be explicitly confirmed to be a version of the Doctor for legal reasons). At the very least it is hinted he may be a Time Lord. When speaking of his heart condition the Leader says that his "hearts are not what they once were"; there is a rumour that he could once extend his life; when Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart starts referring to alien infiltration, the Leader initially seems about to have him dragged away (which Gordon takes as meaning he's not convincing him).
- Robert Mammone, interviewed in 2021, noted that the Leader's paranoia and tendency to play cabinet members off against each other are based on Joseph Stalin. He also admitted that when writing it, he had forgotten about Paul Cornell's implication that the Inferno Earth ruler was a version of the Doctor; "in my head, the Leader was just another in a long line of very human tyrants".[1] In the press release for I, Alastair Mammone mentioned that Andy Frankham-Allen had helped him with continuity references he may have missed, saying that; "I had a lot of fun throwing in bits and pieces that call back to events in the Doctor Who universe. Andy [Frankham-Allen] is as always a font of information about the setting, and was a great sounding board when I found myself lost in the weeds. His work editing [I, Alastair] has made it an even better book".[2]
Footnotes
- ↑ Interview in Doctor Who - The Mind-Blowing Secret Of This 1970 Photo.
- ↑ I, Alastair Press Release