Wilfred Mott
Wilfred Mott was the husband of Eileen Mott, the father of Sylvia Noble, the maternal grandfather of Donna Noble and great-grandfather of Rose Noble.
He was also a one-time travelling companion of the Tenth Doctor, and the final companion with whom the Doctor travelled in that incarnation. Unlike many of the people of Earth, Wilfred was willing to believe aliens would come in peace one day, and that humanity would eventually travel out to the stars and mingle with them.
A witness to several alien invasions of Earth, he was instrumental in stopping the Time Lords' return from within the time-lock which had sealed them in the Last Great Time War. In that effort, he trapped himself in a chamber about to be flooded with lethal radiation. His rescue was the proximate cause of the Tenth Doctor's regeneration into his eleventh incarnation.
Biography
Early life
Wilf was born circa 1928-29. (TV: The Star Beast [+]Loading...{"timestamp":"00:24:00","1":"The Star Beast (TV story)"})
Donna Noble stated that he had enlisted to fight in World War II while underage. (AUDIO: The Nemonite Invasion) By 1948, Wilf was a private in the 6th Airborne Division of the British Army, stationed in the British Mandate of Palestine at its end. According to a mysterious Time Lady, Wilf had served in the military without once taking a life, a fact Wilf defended, feeling proud not to have killed anyone. (TV: The End of Time)
Family life
At some point, Wilf met Eileen and had a daughter named Sylvia with her. He said that his time with his wife was the most wonderful years he had and that the time with her flew by. (PROSE: In the Blood) He never shouted at Sylvia during her childhood. (PROSE: In the Blood)
In the 2006 elections, after the death of the British Prime Minister at the hands of the Slitheen family, (TV: Aliens of London [+]Loading...["Aliens of London (TV story)"]) Wilfred claimed to have voted for Harriet Jones, though Sylvia disputed this. (TV: The Stolen Earth) On Christmas Eve 2007, Wilfred was laid up with Spanish flu, unable to attend his granddaughter's wedding. (TV: The Sontaran Stratagem) Sometime later, Eileen died. (PROSE: Beautiful Chaos)
Meeting the Doctor
During Christmas Eve 2008, while most of London had fled to the countryside to avoid a potential third alien invasion after the previous Christmastime attacks from the Sycorax and the Racnoss, Wilf remained to man his newspaper stand. During the night, he was approached by the Tenth Doctor and Astrid Peth, and told them he was the only person in London apart from Queen Elizabeth II in Buckingham Palace. After he explained to them why London was empty, they were teleported away after the Doctor told him not to worry. The next day, Wilf saw the Titanic hurtled over London, yelling for the aliens not to ruin Christmas. (TV: Voyage of the Damned)
An amateur astronomer and keen stargazer, Wilf pitched a tent behind his daughter's house in Chiswick and spent most of his nights on top a hill with a telescope looking for aliens among the stars. Donna waved to him from the Doctor's TARDIS while flying away. Seeing the Doctor again through his telescope, Wilf felt happy for his granddaughter for being able to travel the universe, yelling and cheering as the TARDIS took off. (TV: Partners in Crime)
Supporting Donna's travels
Donna visited her mother and him after she had returned to Earth. She told Wilf, but not her mother about the Doctor, for fear she would react badly. She told him about ATMOS and what they were doing. When the Doctor turned up with a UNIT soldier, Wilfred realised the Doctor was the same man he had met at Christmas. He opened the family car to investigate an ATMOS device and was trapped inside when it was triggered. He began to suffocate (TV: The Sontaran Stratagem) but was freed by his daughter Sylvia Noble. The next day he told Donna he would keep her secret and not tell her mother. (TV: The Poison Sky)
Wilfred featured on the home improvement, reality TV series Haunted Makeovers alongside Sylvia, the Doctor and Donna. The Doctor and Donna were investigating the haunting of Morley mansion. (AUDIO: No Place)
At some point, Wilfred discovered a new star, which was named after him. (PROSE: Beautiful Chaos)
The Dalek invasion
When the Earth was moved into the Medusa Cascade, he and Sylvia tried to fight the Daleks. Wilf fired a paintball at a Dalek's eyestalk, hoping to blind it, but it dissolved the paint. As it was about to exterminate him, Rose Tyler teleported to the scene and killed the Dalek. Sylvia and Wilf took her to their home. A message came from a Sub-Wave Network. They couldn't respond, as Sylvia thought webcams were "naughty" and didn't let her father have one. He watched as Martha Jones and her mother, Torchwood Three and Sarah Jane Smith spoke with Harriet Jones. (TV: The Stolen Earth) After the Earth was returned to its proper place, they celebrated. When the Doctor brought Donna back to them without any memory of her adventures with him, Wilf was distraught at the thought of her returning to her previous life. He promised to look up at the sky every night and remember the Doctor on Donna's behalf. (TV: Journey's End)
Helping the Doctor
As Christmas approached, Wilf, along with everyone else on Earth, began having nightmares involving the laughing face of the Saxon Master. Seeking refuge in a church, he was approached by a mysterious woman, who told him the church had been a convent in the 1300s, had been attacked by a demon from the sky and saved by a "sainted physician"; then she vanished. The next day, Wilf organised a "Silver Cloak" of old age pensioners. He quickly found the Doctor and in a café learned of his prophesied death. On Christmas morning, Wilf was watching the Queen's speech when it was interrupted by the mysterious woman, whom only he could see. She told Wilf he would have to take up arms, that the Doctor could still be saved and that Wilf must not tell the Doctor anything of what she had said. Wilf took his old service revolver, met the Doctor outside the Noble house and joined him in tracking down the Master.
They arrived too late to stop the Master turning every human on Earth into a duplicate of himself, but Wilf was protected from the effect behind a radiation shield. He escaped with the Doctor to a spaceship. During this time, Wilf and the Doctor felt they would both be proud to have been related to each other. After another encounter with the woman, he gave the Doctor his gun and urged him to kill the Master. The Doctor initially refused, but on learning the Time Lords were behind everything, he took the gun.
In the fight that followed, Earth shot missiles at the ship. Wilf manned one of the guns and had the aliens land so he could join the Doctor. He freed someone trapped in the radiation booth, but as a result was himself trapped. After he witnessed the Doctor and the Master defeat Rassilon and the Time Lords, Wilf then knocked on the booth door four times to be let out, unknowingly fulfilling the prophecy of "He will knock four times."
Due to the nuclear bolt still being active, the radiation would flood the booth and kill him, but not harm anyone else. To save him, the Doctor would have to sacrifice himself. Wilf was willing to die instead because he had "had his time", but the Doctor saved him and absorbed a fatal dose of radiation, which caused him to start to regenerate. He took Wilf home and promised to see him one more time before he changed.
At Donna's second wedding, Wilf met the Doctor again, just like he had promised. The Doctor gave Wilf and Sylvia a winning lottery ticket he had purchased with money borrowed from Geoff Noble before leaving. Wilf and Sylvia gave Donna the ticket and Wilf tearfully saluted the Doctor as he took off. (TV: The End of Time)
Later life
Wilf was met by River Song to talk about his history with the Tenth Doctor, alongside Jackie Tyler, Sylvia Noble and Francine Jones. (PROSE: Judge, Jury and Executioner)
At some point, Wilf was taken to the Black Archive by UNIT to have his record as a companion of the Doctor taken. His memories of the visit were subsequently erased and he was sent on his way. (TV: The Day of the Doctor)
Wilf became a great-grandfather when Donna and Shaun had a daughter named Rose. (PROSE: We Are Family [+]Loading...{"page":"35","1":"We Are Family (short story)"})
By 2023, Wilf was living in sheltered accommodation paid for by UNIT, as their leader, Kate Stewart, said she would take care of him due to his days as a soldier, as he was unable to use the stairs in the Noble's new home paid for with Donna's lottery winnings.
After Donna regained her memories during the attempted Destruction of London, she decided to go on one last trip with the Fourteenth Doctor to see Wilf, excited at the chance to show him that her memories were back and to let Wilf meet his old friend once again. However, after Donna accidentally spilled coffee on the console, the TARDIS took off, completely out of control. (TV: The Star Beast [+]Loading...["The Star Beast (TV story)"])
When the Doctor and Donna returned a few days later, they were greeted by a now wheelchair-bound Wilf. Wilf was ecstatic to see Donna and shocked but pleased to see the Doctor again who hugged Wilf, commenting that he felt better now and that nothing was wrong in the whole world. Wilf admitted that he never thought that he'd see the Doctor again after all of these years and that he'd never lost faith that Donna would get her memory back without dying or that the Doctor would come back and save them all again. Much to the Doctor and Donna's alarm, Wilf revealed that he'd sent the rest of the family away to bunker down and save themselves while he kept watch. Chaos began erupting around them with people attacking each other. Wilf told the Doctor and Donna that everyone and everything was going mad and the whole world was coming to an end. Wilf pleaded with the Doctor to do something and, as a jet crashed nearby, the three took cover behind the TARDIS. (TV: Wild Blue Yonder)
Other realities
Donna's World
- Main article: Wilfred Mott (Donna's World)
Wilfred Mott had his life changed for the worse on 25 June 2007, when Donna created a parallel world by turning right instead of left. He and his family were forced to relocate to Leeds following the destruction of London. Watching the night sky through his telescope, Wilf was first to inform Donna that the stars were going out, convincing her to go with Rose Tyler, who would help her negate the timeline. (TV: Turn Left)
The continuity bomb
In an alternative timeline created by a continuity bomb, the Doctor allowed Wilfred to die in the radiation chamber instead of saving him from death, viewing himself as the more useful of the two to the universe. This led to the Doctor becoming a tyrant that ruled the cosmos with an iron fist until his death. (COMIC: Four Doctors)
Personality
Wilfred had a positive attitude. Even in a crisis, he turned to good war-time spirit. He was a strong patriot, loyal to Queen Elizabeth and his beloved England. He also had a good relationship with his granddaughter Donna Noble and encouraged her companionship with the Doctor, even keeping it a secret from his daughter, Sylvia, for a time. (TV: The Sontaran Stratagem)
According to Sylvia, he always spilt either soup or tea down his cardigan. (AUDIO: Prequel to Donna Noble: Kidnapped)
Wilfred also proved a loyal companion to the Doctor, from searching him out when prompted to by the mysterious woman, to giving the Doctor his gun and prompting him to kill the Master, as well as serving as a gunner when the ship they were on was under attack. He convinced the Vinvocci to take him back to help the Doctor. He also showed a willingness for self-sacrifice by saving someone trapped in a radiation booth and being willing to die there so the Doctor could live, saying he was an old man who had had his time. (TV: The End of Time)
When the Doctor brought Donna back with her memories erased, Wilfred was devastated as he felt she had grown into a better person after her travels with the Doctor and even tried to get him to talk to her, remarking that he needed her when the Doctor admitted he had done wrong whilst travelling alone. However, he didn't share his daughter's hard feelings against him for wiping her memories, and promised to look up at the sky every night on Donna's behalf. (TV: Journey's End, The End of Time)
He developed a paternal relationship with the Doctor, trying to comfort him when he began to cry during their conversation and wanted him to be happy and to have someone to make him laugh. He was also willing to give up his life to let the Doctor live. This relationship was picked up by others, with the Saxon Master sarcastically referring to Wilfred as the Doctor's father. (TV: The End of Time) The Fourteenth Doctor expressed a desire to see Wilf again after Donna safely regained her memories, with Donna noting that it would have been hard for Wilf to keep the Doctor a secret from her for so many years and that he would love to see him one last time.
According to Sylvie, she had no higher compliment than Wilfred being impressed by something. (TV: The Star Beast)
Skills
A trained soldier, Wilfred survived World War II without killing anyone. Being proud of his service, he wore a Parachute Regiment pin on his signature red hat. He still kept his service revolver as a memento, which he later gave to the Doctor to use against the Saxon Master. He also proved to be a proficient gunner when he shot down some of the missiles that the Master had fired at the Vinvocci's spaceship. (TV: The End of Time) He momentarily blinded a Dalek with a well-placed paintball shot to its small eye stalk, although the Dalek recovered its vision almost instantly. (TV: The Stolen Earth)
Unlike so many others who had spent years searching, Wilfred and the small gang of pensioners whom he commanded found the Doctor within only a few hours of his arrival, much to the Doctor's bewilderment. (TV: The End of Time)
Behind the scenes
- When Voyage of the Damned was filmed, Wilfred was intended neither as a recurring character nor as Donna's grandfather. He was meant solely to be a newsstand worker named Stan. The character was made Sylvia Noble's father after the death of Howard Attfield, who was originally to have reprised his Runaway Bride role. Several scenes with Geoffrey Noble had already been filmed before Attfield's death, and these were rewritten and reshot to incorporate Wilfred as Donna's grandfather. Russell T Davies changed the character's name from Stan to Wilfred as he didn't feel Stan was a suitable name for a recurring character.[source needed]
- Wilfred Mott and Donna Noble were the first companions introduced to be related to each other. Wilfred was introduced in Voyage of the Damned, while Donna was introduced in Doomsday, predating the introduction of River Song in Silence in the Library and River's parents Amy Pond and Rory Williams in The Eleventh Hour.
- David Tennant would later name his child (born in May 2013) Wilfred.[source needed]
- In Postman Pat: The Movie, Tennant voiced a character named Wilf.
- Before playing Wilfred, Bernard Cribbins played companion Tom Campbell in the movie Daleks' Invasion Earth 2150 A.D..
- In 2020, Robert Shearman stated that he had always believed Wilfred to be the Doctor's Whifferdill companion Frobisher, partly because he considered Cribbins a good fit for the character, and partly because he thought that having a shapeshifting penguin grandfather made a great deal of sense for Donna Noble as a character.[1]
- The setting of the present day of Donna Noble's family in series four of Doctor Who is inconsistent, and their later appearance in the Christmas Special and New Year Special The End of Time is not dated at all. In the television episode The Fires of Pompeii, Donna mentions the Doctor saving her in 2008. In the novel Beautiful Chaos, set between the television episodes The Poison Sky and The Stolen Earth, a newspaper at a newsagent gives the date as Friday 15 May 2009. During an in-universe episode of The Blue Box Files in the audio drama SOS, Abby McPhail describes the events of the television story Partners in Crime as taking place in 2008.
External links
Footnotes
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