The Stranger (series)
- You may wish to consult
The Stranger (disambiguation)for other, similarly-named pages.
The Stranger was a series of six direct-to-video movies and four audio dramas produced by BBV. Although having no license to any DWU concepts, they were advertised as being set in it and had a number of cast and crew connections. Because of their lack of license, they are not covered by this wiki.
History[[edit] | [edit source]]
The first three videos in the series featured Nicola Bryant as the Stranger's companion, "Miss Brown", obvious analogues to the Sixth Doctor and Peri. Interestingly, it technically was partially made with BBC funding, as Bill Baggs was part of a BBC film club. The second video, More Than a Messiah, was a remake of the Audio Visuals Doctor Who story of the same name.
Later on, the Stranger was given his own backstory and the identity of Solomon, the character of Miss Brown was dropped, and the series diverged from the Doctor Who universe.
Besides the presence of Baker and Bryant, the series also featured appearances by a number of other Doctor Who alumni, including Sophie Aldred, Michael Wisher, Louise Jameson and David Troughton. Nicholas Briggs wrote several of them, and co-starred in the third entry, In Memory Alone. Nigel Fairs contributed scripts for several of the stories, and also performed an acting role in More Than a Messiah.
In late 2023, a novel set some time after the events of the final Stranger film (Eye of the Beholder) was released by Starry Eyed Press.
Videos[[edit] | [edit source]]
- Summoned by Shadows
- More Than a Messiah
- In Memory Alone
- The Terror Game
- Breach of the Peace
- Eye of the Beholder
Audios[[edit] | [edit source]]
- The Last Mission
- Eye of the Storm
Prose[[edit] | [edit source]]
- In A Strange Land
Connection to the DWU[[edit] | [edit source]]
When originally published, the first three films in the Stranger series were directly intended to secretly feature the Sixth Doctor and Peri Brown, with the gimmick being that no one would ever ask them for their names. "The Stranger" was only used as a credit for the titular character. At one point in Summoned by Shadows, when Miss Brown is asked if her "friend" is a Doctor, she laughs as if there is some hidden truth to the statement.
Important parts of the narrative were excluded to make the films cohesive to the Doctor Who universe. For instance, while the Stranger and Miss Brown travel through time and space, how they do this is not initially shown. The intention for the first two films was evidently that the Doctor's TARDIS was being used off-screen. The third film introduced the plot point of amnesia to justify why the characters continued to fail to say their names or any details of their lives.
Eventually, Nicola Bryant quit the series due to never being paid, and her character was written out in the fourth film. This same production retconned that the Stranger was not the Doctor, and was a once-terrorist fighting against his people, the Custodians. As the film series went on, it had increasingly less to do with the Doctor Who Universe.
Due to More Than A Messiah and In Memory Alone being adapted from Audio Visuals stories, elements which appeared in those films (Majus Seventeen for the former and Drudgers for the latter) were referenced in some licensed DWU stories by former Audio Visuals writers.
A direct reference to the Stranger series was not made in licensed fiction until 2022, when a Big Finish storyline introduced an alternate timeline where the Time War had happened sooner due to the Fourth Doctor choosing to prevent the creation of the Daleks. In AUDIO: Dust Devil, Miss Brown appears as a citizen of the alternate timeline. The character speaks with a British accent, like in the films, and says her name isn't Peri. She is killed during the plot of the story.
The P.R.O.B.E. Case Files instalment Stranger would later officially crossover P.R.O.B.E. and The Stranger, with Giles doing a case file on the titular character. A later crossover was Portents of Doom [+]Loading...["Portents of Doom (home video)"], which saw Giles and Solomon team up to fight a common enemy.
Gallery[[edit] | [edit source]]
DVD covers[[edit] | [edit source]]
Summoned by Shadows
More Than a Messiah
In Memory Alone
The Terror Game
Breach of the Peace
Eye of the Beholder
Audio covers[[edit] | [edit source]]
The Last Mission
Eye of the Storm
Force of Nature
Other matters[[edit] | [edit source]]
- The reference work Howe's Transcendental Toybox suggests the BBV film The Airzone Solution, which also stars Colin Baker and Nicola Bryant (the latter once again playing a character named Brown), is part of the series. Officially, however, The Airzone Solution is considered a standalone work with no connection to The Stranger or Doctor Who beyond the presence of common actors.
