The Master (The Destination Wars): Difference between revisions

|name         = The Master

|main alias   = The Inventor

|image       = Master 1DA1.jpg

|species     = Time Lord

|origin       = [[Gallifrey]]

|first       = The Destination Wars (audio story)

|appearances = {{Il|[[AUDIO]]: ''[[The Home Guard (audio story)|The Home Guard]]''|[[AUDIO]]: ''[[The Psychic Circus (audio story)|The Psychic Circus]]''|[[AUDIO]]: ''[[Blood of the Time Lords (audio story)|Blood of the Time Lords]]''}}

|voice actor = James Dreyfus

Sometime after leaving [[Gallifrey]], '''[[the Master]]''' found himself being confronted by various incarnations of [[the Doctor]] on [[Destination]] (where he spent some time under the alias of '''the Inventor'''), on [[Segonax]], and on a human colony planet.

The Master began calling himself "the Master" when he was "beginning to hone [his] talents", during an unspecified incarnation. At this point, he still knew the First Doctor.

Later, he departed his home world "in much the same circumstances" as the Doctor, except that the ship he took from the repair bays was "not quite so operational", because the [[Quadrigger|Quadriggers]] had not yet had the chance to "overhaul" it. He managed to travel for an unknown period, and had an encounter with [[Harry Houdini]], but eventually the ship "simply fell apart around [his] ears". He crash-landed on Destination, a planet in "the farthest arm of the galaxy, in the earliest [[Segment of Time|Segments of Time]]". The Master would later attribute this to "an experiment gone wrong", and say that it left him with "the bare minimum of components." ([[AUDIO]]: ''[[The Destination Wars (audio story)|The Destination Wars]]'')

On arrival on a planet where human colonists had settled in a fictional recreation of an [[English]] [[village]] during the [[Second World War]] to live in peace away from Earth, the Master took control of the environment, organised a [[home guard]] and armed the original population of the planet to entice a conflict and demonstrate that an outgunned and outnumbered group of people could resist against a much greater enemy when properly motivated. When the [[Second Doctor]] arrived with [[Ben Jackson]], [[Polly Wright]] and [[Jamie McCrimmon]], the Master hypnotised them into joining his experiment. The Doctor, however, immersed himself too deep in his role of commander of the home guard and made contact with the aliens to reach a peaceful solution, resulting in the aliens attacking earlier than the Master had anticipated. In the ensuing battle, the Master escaped in his TARDIS, with the intent of returning to look on the results of the conflict. However, when he returned, the Doctor had already set a trap for him after persuading the fighters into a peace. The Master was captured and put on trial for illegal use of [[mind control]], while his TARDIS was confiscated. ([[AUDIO]]: ''[[The Home Guard (audio story)|The Home Guard]]'')

On [[Segonax]], the Master allied himself with the [[Gods of Ragnarok]], and used a [[pendant]] they gave him to contact a street artist on [[Zamyatin]] named [[Kingpin]] and use Kingpin's free spirited energy to cause a [[psychic storm]], which caused a revolution on Zamyatin. The Master then persuaded Kingpin to organise a collective of various artists and bring them to Segonax to become the [[Psychic Circus]]. The Master then persuaded the [[Chief clown]] to organise a talent contest so that new energy could be acquired. When Kingpin managed to contact the [[Seventh Doctor]], the Master used his abilities to stop him from reaching the Circus, first creating an illusion of him landing on Zamyatin, and then one of him returning to [[Paradise Towers]]. When the Doctor eventually came to the Circus, he and the Master confronted each other on a [[psychic plane]], where the Doctor exploited the Gods' curiosity to buy time to steal the pendant from the Master and pass it to Kingpin. Kingpin then used the pendant to free the Circus from the Master and the Gods' influence, and the Master was left at the mercy of the Gods of Ragnarok. ([[AUDIO]]: ''[[The Psychic Circus (audio story)|The Psychic Circus]]'')

This incarnation of the Master was very self-centred, willing to influence a whole planet's development to refuel his craft, and equally willing to abandon his plans just to steal the Doctor's ship. He found amusement in shaping a culture to his benefit. He looked down on others as his inferiors, claiming to have "longed for a mind equal to [his] own" when confronting the Doctor on [[Destination]]. He particularly disregarded humans as "ape-descended primitives".

The [[Fourth Doctor]] highlighted this Master's youthful insecurity as his key trait: "In this incarnation, the Master is the most unscrupulous he's ever been. He's not simply an arch-pragmatist willing to quash anything in his way - he's a fractious creature, quick to take offence, to let the whole universe burn, like a child holding a magnifying glass to a butterfly." ([[AUDIO]]: ''[[Blood of the Time Lords (audio story)|Blood of the Time Lords]]'')

* This incarnation of the Master was first created for ''[[Blood of the Time Lords (audio story)|Blood of the Time Lords]]'' where an uncertain [[Fourth Doctor]] asks him whether he was in his second or third "regeneration". The Master, angered by the Doctor's forgetfulness, refuses either to confirm or deny his guesses. It was [[David Richardson]] who proposed during the production of ''[[The Destination Wars (audio story)|The Destination Wars]]'' they "introduce the First Master".<ref>https://www.bigfinish.com/vortex/v/106</ref> And while James Dreyfus was initially promoted by [[Big Finish Productions]] as portraying the "first [[incarnation]]" of the Master, or "the first Master" <ref>https://www.bigfinish.com/news/v/david-bradley-returns-to-the-tardis-in-doctor-who-the-first-doctor-adventures</ref><ref>https://www.bigfinish.com/news/v/the-big-finish-roundup1</ref> writer [[John Dorney]] has stated that none of that made it in any of the scripts, and that if anything it was contradicted.<ref>https://notthebigfinishforum.freeforums.net/thread/5101/names-masters-incarnations?page=2</ref> Dorney also noted that the name "First Master" could be interpreted multiple ways, as meaning either "first incarnation, first to call himself Master or first the Doctor meets in continuity."<ref>https://notthebigfinishforum.freeforums.net/post/226435</ref> When asked whether Dreyfus portrayed the Master as he originally was before he ever regenerated, [[Nicholas Briggs]] replied that that's intentionally left unanswered and open for interpretation.<ref>https://www.bigfinish.com/vortex/v/112</ref>