Tuesday 30 April 2019

G is for... Great Intelligence


A malevolent, disembodied being which drifted through space until it came across the Earth. In the form of ice crystals, it arrived on the planet in the winter of 1842. It created for itself the form of a snowman, which could communicate telepathically with a lonely young boy named Walter Simeon. It manipulated his life so that by the year 1892 he had become a rich and powerful scientist, head of the Great Intelligence Institute. The Intelligence required a body for itself on Earth. A children's governess had drowned in a pond full of Intelligence ice crystals, and it was able to study her form before the body was removed. A crystal version of her form began to grow in the pond. Simeon's activities were being investigated by the Paternoster Gang - the Silurian Madam Vastra, her maid Jenny Flint and their Sontaran butler Strax. The Doctor was in London at this time, but had retired following the loss of companions Amy and Rory. He became involved through the intervention of Clara Oswin Oswald, who was the children's new governess. Clara appeared to be the same person whom the Doctor had met in the far future when he visited the Dalek Asylum.


The Intelligence was contained in a huge globe of ice crystals in Simeon's Institute. He employed vicious snowmen to dispose of his enemies. Once the Ice Governess was fully formed, the Intelligence would use it as a template to create more bodies for itself, and take over the planet as it plunged the Earth into a permanent winter. Clara's death prompted salt-laced rain to destroy the snowmen, whilst the Ice Governess was smashed to pieces in a fall. The Doctor took the remains to Simeon in a tin decorated with a map of the London Underground. The Intelligence had now taken over his body fully. However, the tin really contained a Memory Worm which bit Simeon - causing him to forget. The psychic link to the Intelligence was broken, and it was ejected back into space.


The Intelligence had earlier managed to forge a link with the master of Det-Sen, a Tibetan monastery - Padmasambhava. he had encountered the Doctor in the 17th Century, when the Time Lord had saved the monks from bandit raids. The Great Intelligence gave the master prolonged life. He was compelled to construct robot versions of the Yeti creatures which lived in the mountains above Det-Sen. These would be used to keep people away from the area whilst the Intelligence prepared its invasion plans. Its essence was contained in a pyramid of silver spheres, hidden in a cave in the mountains and guarded by a Yeti.


Its plan reached fruition in 1935, but coincided with the return of the Doctor to Det-Sen. The Intelligence used the Yeti to attack the monastery and force the monks to retreat, whilst the pyramid of spheres in the mountain cave burst open and began to disgorge vast quantities of glowing material - the host for the entity which would expand to cover the planet. The Doctor fought a mental duel with the possessed Padmasambhava, which distracted him whilst Jamie and a young warrior monk destroyed a similar pyramid of spheres hidden in the inner sanctum. The Intelligence was once again ejected back into space, and the ancient master of Det-Sen was finally able to die.


30 or so years later, the Intelligence was ready to attempt another conquest of the planet. To prevent the Doctor from interfering, it ensnared the TARDIS in a web-like substance - its new host form - and tried to force it to land in its lair, which was in part of the London Underground system. It had remembered the map on the tin and realised that this could be a strategic weakness. Professor Travers, who had earlier assisted the Doctor in Tibet, had managed to reactivate a Yeti control sphere, which made its way to a host body in a small private museum. The creature had come back to life, and soon afterwards the web substance had begun to appear in the Underground, whilst central London was smothered in a dense fog. More Yeti patrolled this, killing people with suffocating web-guns. The Doctor joined forces with Travers and his daughter, and was to encounter someone who would become a life-long friend - Colonel Lethbridge-Stewart. At one point Travers was taken over by the Intelligence, but its main puppet was an army Staff Sergeant named Arnold. The Intelligence intended to capture the Doctor and absorb his mind. The Doctor sabotaged the equipment so that it would absorb the Intelligence instead - but his friends smashed the device to rescue him - sending the Intelligence back out into space once again.


However, around this time it took over the body of a young girl named Kizlet. It manipulated her in the same way it had Walter Simeon, so that by 2013 it could take over control of the Wi-Fi network to absorb the consciousness of people who operated a particular link on their computers. One of its targets was Clara Oswald, who was to become the Doctor's new travelling companion. She looked exactly like the Clara whom he had met when he last encountered the Intelligence, as well as that spaceship crew member on the Dalek asylum planet - something which intrigued him. The Intelligence remained hidden within the internet, but used the appearance of Simeon to interact with Miss Kizlet. This time the Intelligence employed robotic "Spoonheads" - mobile computer interfaces - as its tools. The Doctor reprogrammed one of these to mimic himself and used it to attack Kizlet's base in London's Shard Tower. He forced her to release those more recently trapped, such as Clara, and the Intelligence elected to retreat - resetting those whom it had taken over. Miss Kizlet reverted to having the mind of the child she had been when first possessed.


The Intelligence then decided to attack the Doctor directly. Assuming Simeon's likeness once again, it laid a trap for him, using its latest weapons -the faceless Whisper Men - to send a message to the Paternoster Gang via a criminal whom Vastra had helped capture. Vastra contacted Clara and River Song to warn the Doctor that the Intelligence had discovered the whereabouts of the Doctor's final resting place. This was on the planet Trenzalore, where the Doctor would in future die after a great battle, and be buried in his TARDIS. The Doctor, Clara and the Paternoster Gang travelled to the planet, where they found the Intelligence and its Whisper Men waiting for them. River joined them, though she only existed as a psychic link. The Doctor discovered that his past lives were beginning to unravel, as the Intelligence planned to enter his time stream and undo all the good he had ever down throughout his existence. This would destroy the entity, but it was prepared to kill itself to wipe out the Doctor's work. It was ultimately unsuccessful, as Clara followed it into the Doctor's time stream - causing facets of her to appear throughout the Doctor's life who were there to help him.

Played by: Wolfe Morris (Padmasambhava), Jack Woolgar (Staff Sgt. Arnold), Richard E Grant (Walter Simeon) and Sir Ian McKellen (voice of the Intelligence). Appearances: The Abominable Snowmen (1967), The Web of Fear (1968), The Snowmen (2012), The Bells of Saint John (2013), The Name of the Doctor (2013).
  • The Great Intelligence also appears in the unofficial spin-off production Downtime, where it once again possesses Professor Travers (Jack Watling). Directed in 1995 by Christopher Barry, it features Lis Sladen as Sarah Jane Smith, Deborah Watling as Victoria Waterfield, and Nicholas Courtney as the Brigadier, and it is the first production to feature a daughter for the Brigadier named Kate. Prefiguring The Bells of Saint John, it has the Intelligence using the internet as a weapon.

No comments:

Post a Comment